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Laparoscopic surgery is a safe procedure for patients with benign insulinomas. The complication rates are comparable with those for laparotomy procedures. Relative to open operations, laparoscopic pancreas operations are associated with a more rapid postoperative recovery.

Laparoscopic pancreatic resection is a feasible and safe procedure for patients with insulinomas. Further studies are required to evaluate the potential application of the hand-assisted approach for tumors located at anatomically unfavorable positions.

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Postcontrast 3D MR imaging may be useful in the measurement of carotid artery plaque burden.

Despite advancements in management of acute myocardial infarction, this disease remains one of the leading causes of death. Timely reestablishment of epicardial coronary blood flow is the cornerstone of therapy; however, substantial amount of damage can occur as a consequence of cardiac ischaemia/reperfusion (I/R) injury. It has been previously proposed that the pathway leading to major cell death, apoptosis, is responsible for cardiac I/R injury. Nevertheless, there is compelling evidence to suggest that necroptosis, a programmed necrosis, contributes remarkably to both myocardial injury and microcirculatory dysfunction following cardiac I/R injury. Receptor‐interacting protein kinase 1 (RIPK1), RIPK3, and mixed‐lineage kinase domain‐like pseudokinase (MLKL) are shown as the major mediators of necroptosis. In addition to the traditional perception that RIPK1/RIPK3/MLKL‐dependent plasma membrane rupture is fundamental to this process, several RIPK3‐related pathways such as endoplasmic reticulum stress and mitochondrial fragmentation have also been implicated in cardiac I/R injury. In this review, reports from both in vitro and in vivo studies regarding the roles of necroptosis and RIPK3‐regulated necrosis in cardiac I/R injury have been collectively summarized and discussed. Furthermore, reports on potential interventions targeting these processes to attenuate cardiac I/R insults to the heart have been presented in this review. Future investigations adding to the knowledge obtained from these previous studies are needed in the pursuit of discovering the most effective pharmacological agent to improve cardiac I/R outcomes.

High-resolution MRI provides unique information about morphology of atherosclerotic carotid plaque. In this study, the accuracy and precision of measurements of carotid plaque burden and lumen narrowing were determined for in vivo black blood MRI assessment with respect to ex vivo MRI in a group of 37 atherosclerosis patients who underwent carotid endarterectomy (CEA). Three different plaque measures were compared between paired in vivo and ex vivo MR images: maximum wall area (MWA), minimum lumen area (mLA), and wall volume (WV Carotid atherosclerosis is one of the main causes of stroke (1). Traditionally, the degree of lumen stenosis has been used as a marker for high-risk plaques that may cause thromboembolic events. Clinically, X-ray (conventional angiography), CT, MR angiography, and ultrasound are used to determine lumen stenosis. Although these techniques have been shown to accurately assess the severity of lumen narrowing, they do not provide as much information as MRI regarding the internal composition of the plaque (2). Furthermore, MRI provides high contrast between the vessel wall and surrounding tissues, enabling measurement of plaque burden. Because both plaque composition and burden are believed to be closely associated with plaque vulnerability (3), MRI is emerging as a valuable tool for evaluating atherosclerosis.The significance of measuring plaque burden in addition to lumen stenosis arises because a vessel may go through compensatory remodeling where the buildup of plaque leads to outward expansion of the vessel (4). This outward expansion may proceed independently from lumen narrowing, making plaque burden a complementary measurement to lumen stenosis. In order to use plaque burden as an additional risk factor, a method for accurately measuring burden must be established. For this purpose, flow suppressed (black blood) MRI is a strong candidate because it can visualize the artery lumen and provide detailed information about the artery wall (2). In a recent study, Yuan et al. (5) showed that, based on a group of 14 patients, the in vivo measurement of maximum wall area strongly correlates to the same measurement on excised plaque specimens, where ex vivo images were used as a gold standard. However, this study did not address the relationship of maximum wall area and lumen narrowing. The accuracy of vessel wall area measurement was not established either.The goals of this study were to 1) determine the accuracy and precision of quantitative measurements of vessel wall size using a high-resolution black blood MRI technique on the human carotid artery with respect to ex vivo data, and 2) study the association between these measurements and lumen stenosis. Analyses comparing three key vessel wall size measurements between in vivo and ex vivo MRI scans were carried out. These parameters were vessel wall volume (WV), maximum wall area (MWA), and minimum lumen area (mLA). Measurements obtained from plaque specimens removed intact during surgery were used as the gold standard for the in vivo measure...

TACE pre-LT for HCC patients increased the chances of pulmonary or distant metastasis of the primary tumor, thus reducing the long-term survival rate.