Medical Technology SA - Volume 18, Issue 2, December 2004

Extracted from text ... MEDICAL TECHNOLOGY SA 2 DECEMBER 2004 VOL. 18 NO. 2 Editorial CHOLESTEROL: "IN THE DOG BOX" In the nineteen sixties a flood of cardiovascular diseases hit the Western world. Epidemiological examinations were performed to identify the causative factors. Total Cholesterol seemed to be one of the most important, and an intensive campaign of preventative medicine followed to reduce the average cholesterol levels of the population with the aid of dietary and pharmacological means. During the late nineties statistically significant results of more than 20 years of controlled studies were made available. The medical fraternity geared themselves to put pen ..

The use of the neutralisation assay in the serotyping of unknown enterovirus isolates has been successfully applied for years since its description by Lim and Benyesh-Melnick. However, the procedure is labour-intensive and time consuming. In addition, the continuous depletion of the Benyesh-Melnick sera makes it prohibitive for most diagnostic laboratories to continue using the assay. Owing to these factors, a majority of laboratories only type for the polioviruses and report any other enterovirus isolate as "a nonpolio enterovirus". With this approach, however, important findings such as the isolation of a new enterovirus or association of a known enterovirus with a new clinical syndrome will remain unidentified. <br>In this study, a multiple-serum-pools approach similar to that described by Lim and Benyesh-Melnick (LBM) for the neutralisation test, was applied in an immunofluorescence (IMF) test for the rapid serotyping of enteroviruses. This test was able to type any unknown enterovirus isolate belonging to the different enterovirus serotypes tested in this study, in about three hours as compared to the eight days currently taken by the LBM neutralisation test.

The primary aim of the study was to assess the effect of a nutritional supplement on the clinical conditions of HIV-positive / AIDS patients using standard procedures. This clinical trial comprising 35 patients consisted of a baseline visit and three months of nutrient supplementation from April to September 2003. At baseline, pre-study examinations of the patients were done and patients who satisfied the inclusion criteria were included in the study. At baseline, the physical and clinical conditions of the patients were noted and reported by a physician. This was followed by nutrient supplementation for three months under adequate supervision. The physical and clinical examinations were repeated monthly and at the end of the study. It is believed that the supplement probably played a contributory role in improving the clinical conditions, improvement on the physical appearance and quality of life. However, the positive effects of the supplement on the clinical conditions of the patients cannot be confirmed in this study. This is because the patients were also treated for different clinical conditions during the course of supplementation. Further studies are needed to confirm the effect of the supplement. The study was limited by small sample size, short duration of study and the late stage of HIV infection of the patients.

Low Level Laser Therapy (LLLT) is a form of phototherapy used to promote wound healing in different clinical conditions. Many different cytokines have been shown to be present in wound fluid although their detection does not necessarily correlate with biologic activity. This study aimed to establish the effect of LLLT on the release of interleukin-6 (IL-6) from normal and wounded&lt;sup&gt;2&lt;/sup&gt; human skin fibroblasts (HSF) following irradiation and the effect of IL-6 on cell migration and cell proliferation. <br>Morphologically, wounded fibroblasts responded to single exposure of 5J/cm&lt;sup&gt;2&lt;/sup&gt; with the highest rate of haptotaxis and chemotaxis indicating a stimulatory effect while 16J/cm&lt;sup&gt;2&lt;/sup&gt; showed the lowest rate indicating an inhibitory effect. Responses were evaluated by changes in cell morphology together with changes in cell proliferation using alkaline phosphatase (ALP) enzyme activity and cytokine expression using IL-6. Cell proliferation changes indicated a decrease at higher doses of 10.0J/cm&lt;sup&gt;2&lt;/sup&gt; and 16J/cm&lt;sup&gt;2&lt;/sup&gt; while a dose of 5.0J/cm&lt;sup&gt;2&lt;/sup&gt; appeared to stimulate mitochondrial activity, which leads to normalization of cell function. A dose of 5J/cm&lt;sup&gt;2&lt;/sup&gt; showed the highest rate of cell proliferation supporting morphological evidence that 5J/cm&lt;sup&gt;2&lt;/sup&gt; has a stimulatory effect on wounded fibroblasts. Interleukin-6 studies indicated that 5J/cm&lt;sup&gt;2&lt;/sup&gt; stimulates migration, proliferation, and metabolism of wounded fibroblasts to accelerate wound closure. The results indicate a direct correlation between the dose and the stimulation of cell migration, cell proliferation and the increase in the release of ALP and IL-6.

Extracted from text ... MEDICAL TECHNOLOGY SA VOL. 18 NO. 2 DECEMBER 2004 17 1. The nutritional supplement used on HIV/Aids patients contains the following: (a) vitamin C, (b) sitosterol & sitosterolin, (c) biocydin, (d) all of the above. 2. It cannot be categorically stated whether the observed decrease in the prevalence of diarrhoea at the end of the study was due to effect of the supplement or the treatment. a) True b) False. 3. The decrease in CD4+T-cell count reflects the: (a) adverse effect of the supplement (b) effect of biocydin (c) effect of vitamin C (d) severity of the immune system 4. ..