Journal of Isfahan Medical School
Year:2014 | Volume:32 | Issue:291|Papers Count:6

Background: Iran is one of the areas with higher incidence of esophageal cancer in the world.The survival benefit of surgery followed by adjuvant therapy has been demonstrated and widely accepted as a standard therapy in other gastrointestinal malignancies. Definitive chemo radiotherapy (DCRT) is used for locally advanced esophageal cancer and for inoperable tumors thus is an alternative to surgical treatment. The purpose of the current study is to evaluate the effects of Definitive therapy and adjuvant therapy on survival of Patients with esophageal cancer.Methods: This retrospective study was conducted in North-West of Iran 2006 - 2011, included of 331 consecutive patients with esophageal cancer that referred to Radiation Oncology Therapy of Imam Reza (AS) Hospital in Tabriz. Health status of patients followed by Telephone contact. Survival rate and the impact of demographic characteristics, treatment modulatory and chemoradiotheraptic factors in survival rate was analyzed with Kaplan- Meier, Life Table and Cox regression in SPSS software (16).Findings: Median survival was 14.2 (CI95%: 16.6 - 12.33) months. The 1-, 3-, and 5-year overall survival rates of all patients were 60 , 21 and 16 %, respectively. The factors influencing survival rate were, age at diagnosis (p<0.001), stage of disease (p<0.001), Tumor differentiation (0.02=P), treatment modulatory (p<0.001), radiation dose (p=0. 01) and type of drugs used in chemotherapy (P=0.01). Among those six significant variables verified by univariate analysis, independent prognostic factor for survival determined by multivariate analysis was the radiation dose.Conclusion: The results of this study indicate that survival rates of esophageal cancer in our patients are poor. Early detection and improved treatment methods with clinical trial will help to extend the life of patients in the future.

Background: Colon cancer is one major cause for cancer-related deaths. UBD and its alike proteins are signal transduction pathways with several cellular functions including and DNA repair control. There is relation between increase in UBD and increase in p53 expression in a way that in many cases this growth has accelerated the cancer progress. The aims of this study are to detect UBD as a marker for the early detection of colorectal cancer and disease progress in patients.Methods: 30 samples of paraffin tissue blocks of colorectal cancer patients and 10 normal tissue samples, the selected slices were collected. RT-PCR testing to detect UBD gene and b-actin gene as an internal control were obtained.Findings: The size of RT-PCR product of UBD gene was 395 base pair and the size of amplified bactin was 350bp. The RT-PCR of b-actin was positive in all samples. The RT-PCR products of 18 samples (95%) of male patients and 11 samples (100%) of female patients were positive. Only one sample had negative product.Conclusion: Considering the results we can conclude that UBD as a useful marker that is independent of tumor stage plays an important role in the detection of colorectal cancer and it’s study is really important in identification and detection of early stages of disease. Results showed that the expression of the UBD in patients is 97% and it reduces to 5% in healthy people.

Background: Hydro alcoholic extract from aerial part of Pycnocycla spinosa have shown to possess antispasmodic and anti diarrhoeal activities. Anti diarrhoeal effect of the extract both quantitatively and in quality are very close to lope ramide. The aim of this research was identification of active fraction separated from extract of P. spinosa by applying bioassay method on contraction of rat ileum.Methods: From aerial part of P. spinosa methanolic extract was prepared and then medium polar fractions were separated. The antispasmodic activities of separated fractions were assessed on rat isolated ileum contraction induced by KCl and compared with total extract. After that the most active fraction was identified for further comparison with control groups. Contraction were measured as maximum recorded amplitude and express as % of initial contraction. Full concentration response curve were plotted for each group of experiment and the IC50 value (inhibitory concentration of extract causing 50% of maximum response) was calculated.Findings: From nine fractions isolated from P. spinosa extract, the third fraction identified as the most active fraction which contains the active substance (s). Five fractions had a medium activity and two fractions were ineffective.Conclusion: This research demonstrated that P. spinosa possessed a number of active substances with different potencies. The most potent substance was in the third fraction and therefore, purification and identification of this substance is recommended.

Background: Colorectal cancer is the most common cause of death in the world. More studies were done on using the probiotics and selenium for cancer prevention. In this research liver enzymes changes (such as Alanine Aminotransferase, Asparate Aminotransferase and Alkaline Phosphatase) were assayed following dietary administration of Saccharomyces cerevisiae (simple and Selenium enriched forms) in the rat with colorectal cancer induced by Dimethyl hydrazine.Methods: Forty female rats (200-250 g initial body weight) divided into five groups as healthy control, cancer control, simple form of yeast, selenium and selenium enriched yeast. All animals received carcinogenic agent (40 mg/kg body weight) twice weekly for five weeks, but except healthy control only received normal saline. Selenium group received 4 mg/ml of Selenium nitrate in water, Saccharomyces cerevisiae was administered at 5×108 CFU/ml concentration with Dimethyl hydrazine in yeast group and finally, the last group received selenium enriched yeast at the same concentration. At the end of forty weeks after Dimethyl hydrazine injection all animals were euthanized and blood samples were taken for enzymes assay.Findings: Although the mean of enzymes activity were higher at cancer control, but other groups significantly (P<0.05) showed lower enzymes activity. The most decrease of enzyme activity was seen at animals that received se-enriched yeast.Conclusion: The level of liver enzymes activity increase in colorectal cancer induced by Dimethyl hydrazine in rat. Selenium enriched yeast administration in rat could decrease the enzymes level and it prevent tissue damage after carcinogenic agent injection.

Background: Lipid abnormalities, is one of the major causes of cardiovascular disease in dialysis patients. This study aimed to assess the relationship of serum magnesium and blood lipid profile in patients with peritoneal dialysis and hemodialysis.Methods: This cross- sectional study was performed on 110 dialysis patients in Zahedan .Serum lipids and magnesium levels were measured. Data were analyzed using T-test and Pearson correlation.Findings: The mean patients' age was 46.1±14.7 years. In peritoneal dialysis patients, who were not under treatment of antilipid agents, the association of serum magnesium with triglyceride and VLDL was significant (p<0.05), whereas the association of serum magnesium with cholistrol and LDL-C was significant, only in subgroup who were under treatment of antilipid agents (p<0.05).In hemodialysis group, the association of serum magnesium with cholesterol, triglyceride and VLDL was significant (p<0.05).Conclusion: This study showed that serum magnesium had correlation with serum lipids and could contribute to atherosclerosis and cardiovascular disease in these patients.