Background
Most often, the patients with pancreatic diseases are presented with a mass in pancreatic head region and existing methods of diagnosis fail to confirm whether the head mass is malignant or benign. As subsequent management of the disease hugely depends on the correct diagnosis, we wanted to explore possible biomarkers which could distinguish benign and malignant pancreatic head masses.
Methods
In order to address that gap, we performed a case–control study to identify genome-wide differentially expressed coding and noncoding genes between pancreatic tissues collected from benign and malignant head masses. These genes were next shortlisted using stringent criteria followed by selection of top malignancy specific genes. They subsequently got validated by quantitative RT-PCR and also in other patient cohorts. Survival analysis and ROC analysis were also performed.
Results
We identified 55 coding and 13 noncoding genes specific for malignant pancreatic head masses. Further shortlisting and validation, however, resulted in 5 coding genes as part of malignancy specific multi-gene signature, which was validated in three independent patient cohorts of 145 normal and 153 PDAC patients. We also found that overexpression of these genes resulted in survival disadvantage in the patients and ROC analysis identified that combination of 5 coding genes had the AUROC of 0.94, making them potential biomarker.
Conclusions
Our study identified a multi-gene signature comprising of 5 coding genes (CDCA7, DLGAP5, FOXM1, TPX2 and OSBPL3) to distinguish malignant head masses from benign ones.
Penetrating trauma to neck resulting in arteriovenous (AV) fistula and aneurysms involving the carotid system are uncommon injuries with life-threatening consequences. We report here a case of a young factory worker who developed a traumatic AV fistula with false aneurysm, with however, no other complications. He was successfully operated when he presented to us two months after the injury and is doing well in follow-up.
ER has a strong prognostic importance in early breast cancer and can play a major role in optimizing treatment modalities in node negative early breast cancer.
Splenic torsion with rupture of spleen is an extremely rare phenomenon. The clinical picture mimics several common conditions which are causes of acute abdomen and so it is seldom detected pre-operatively. An 18 year old female patient was admitted with an acute abdomen and shock. The provisional diagnosis was of a ruptured ectopic pregnancy. Peri-operatively we found a spontaneous rupture of the spleen following torsion along with early intrauterine pregnancy. Splenectomy was carried out and patient recovered well. Our report confirms that this rare entity can present as an acute abdomen which is very difficult to diagnose preoperatively and can masquerade as ruptured ectopic pregnancy in women of childbearing age group.
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