Uncovering a novel function and molecular mechanism for cyclin G1 in HCC will shed new light on the understanding of tumor progression and metastasis. We thank Dong-Ping Hu, Shan-Na Huang, Dan-Dan Huang, Shan-Hua Tang, Lin-Na Guo, and Dan Cao for technical assistance. We also thank Mu-Sheng Zeng (Sun Yat-sen University School of Medicine, Guangzhou, China) for providing E-box-luciferase reporter plasmid. Additional Supporting Information may be found in the online version of this article. “
“There have been only a few trials demonstrating additional effects of human serum albumin
(HSA) on diuretic therapy in patients with cirrhotic ascites. We aimed to evaluate the safety and efficacy of recombinant FK506 mouse HSA, KD-294, treatment in patients with cirrhotic ascites.
The inclusion criteria were patients 20–75 years of age, with cirrhotic ascites and a serum albumin concentration of less than 3.0 g/dL. Eighty-five patients were registered and 71 patients underwent randomization. Enrolled patients received oral spironolactone at 50 mg/day and i.v. furosemide at 20 mg/day in addition find more to low-sodium diet. They were divided randomly into a KD-294 treatment group (n = 35) or non-treatment control group (n = 36). Patients in the KD-294 group received KD-294 at 25 g/day for up to 5 days and those in the control group continued the diuretic therapy.
They were followed up for 5 weeks. KD-294 was well tolerated. A correlation between the increases in serum albumin and decreases in bodyweight was not shown. However, changes of plasma renin concentration (PRC) showed a significant decrease in Chloroambucil the KD-294 group compared with the control group. As a result of this exploratory analysis, patients with high PRC showed a significant correlation between increases in serum albumin and decreases in bodyweight. The present data do not show efficacy in all patients with cirrhotic ascites, however, they suggest that additional effects of HSA on diuretic therapy are expected in high PRC patients. “
“Aim: Early disappearance of serum hepatitis C virus (HCV) RNA is the prerequisite for achieving sustained virological response (SVR) in peg-interferon (PEG-IFN) plus ribavirin (RBV) therapy for chronic hepatitis C. This study aimed to develop a decision tree model for the pre-treatment prediction of response. Methods: Genotype 1b chronic hepatitis C treated with PEG-IFN alpha-2b and RBV were studied. Predictive factors of rapid or complete early virological response (RVR/cEVR) were explored in 400 consecutive patients using a recursive partitioning analysis, referred to as classification and regression tree (CART) and validated.