Zahedan Journal of Research in Medical Sciences
Volume:18 Issue: 1, Jan 2016

Febrile seizures (FS) are the most common form of convulsion in children with the aged between 6 months to 5 years. Different studies have shown that reduction of zinc leads to the incidence of FS in children.
This study was conducted with the goal of examination of the zinc level in the patients with FS.
Patients and This case-control study was conducted on 90 children in three equal groups of children with febrile seizures, febrile children without febrile seizures (FS) and healthy children. In order to examine the zinc level blood samples were taken of all subjects and the zinc level of these patients was determined. The data was analyzed using the SPSS-16 statistical software and by descriptive statistical tests and ANOVA.
Forty three male (47.2%) and 47 female children (52.8%) with the average age of 2.43 ± 1.23 years were examined. The three groups had no significant difference in terms of age and sex. The average of zinc level in the patients with FS was 56.8 ± 52.7 µg/dL and it was 96.1 ± 53.4 µg/dL in the febrile children without FS and 108 ± 28 µg/dL in the healthy control group. According to ANOVA test, there was a significant difference between the three groups in terms of the zinc level (P = 0.01).
The low serum zinc level in the group of patients with FS compared with two other groups can indicate the existence of a relationship between the serum zinc level and development of FS in children aged between 6 months and 5 years.

Colorectal cancer is the most common gastrointestinal cancer and the second leading cause of cancer deaths worldwide.
The purpose of this study is to investigate the prevalence of cytomegalovirus in patients with colorectal carcinomas and polyps in comparison with healthy people.
Patients and In this analytical case-control study, 15 patients with colorectal cancer, 20 patients with colorectal polyps and also 35 patients without malignancy as controls were studied. Biopsy specimens were frozen under sterile conditions at -20ºC. After DNA extraction, analysis of polymerase chain reaction (PCR) to detect CMV DNA in tissue samples was performed. Statistical analysis was performed with χ2 test.
CMV DNA were found in 8 (53.3%) of tumor samples, in 10 (50%) of polyp samples and 13 (37.1%) of the non-malignant control group. Statistical analysis showed no significant association between the prevalence of CMV and incidence colorectal cancer and polyps in comparison with the control group.
The results of the present study has shown the presence of CMV sequences in differentiated cancer tissue, polyp and non-malignant by PCR method reflects the ability of the virus to infect of the different colon cells.

Congenital heart diseases (CHD) are the most common of all birth defects, affecting nearly 0.9% of all live births. Nkx2-5 mutations were reported to cause CHD but data in Kurdish populations of Iran are limited.
In this experimental study, we performed high resolution melt (HRM) mutation scanning of Nkx2-5 exons of non-syndrome patients.
Patients and Thirty nine patients with atrial septal defect and 57 patients with ventricular septal defect, 4 patients possessing both defects as case groups and 50 healthy controls. Then we grouped samples according to HRM graph and sequenced several samples from each group.
HRM analysis showed 2 deviated curves for exon 1 and one group for exon 2A and exon 2B. Then, 2 samples of exon 1 that showed different HRM curves, 3 samples of another group from this exon and 5 samples of exon 2A, 2B and healthy controls were randomly sequenced. The results of sequencing confirmed the HRM analysis, and one polymorphism (A65G) was identified in 2 atrial septal defects with deviated curves.
The environmental and effective factors on the heart development within embryonic evolution as well as the possibility of the existence of the mutation in coding genes of the other cardiac transcription factors such as GATA4 and TBX5 can be the reasons for the lack of the pathogenic mutation in this study. It is suggested in further related studies to investigate normal and abnormal cardiac tissue samples of these studied patients and coding genes of the other cardiac transcription factors.

Leptin is a multifunctional hormone plays an important role in regulating lipid, energy, homeostasis, angiogenesis, inflammation, hematopoiesis and cell cycle. This polypeptide is effective in growth and differentiation of leukemic cells through an Ob-R receptor expressed by them.
The purpose of this study was to evaluate serum leptin levels in patients with acute leukemia and compare it in lymphoid and myeloid groups.
Patients and This analytical case-control study, conducted on 60 children in age ranged from 6 months to 16 years in two case and control groups in Ali ibn Abi Talib hospital, Zahedan. They matched based on age and gender and examined after their parent’s satisfaction according to the parental consent forms. None of patients had heart disease, digestive, glandular and metabolic problems, iron deficiency anemia and chronic kidney disease. After collecting the samples, leptin levels of both groups were measured with ELISA kit. Then, the gathered data were analyzed in SPSS-20 software, using independent t-test in considering of 95% confidence interval.
Leptin serum levels in patients with acute leukemia and controls showed significant difference (P The findings of this study showed that in patients with acute leukemia, leptin serum levels increase independently of age and gender. In addition, leptin serum levels in acute lymphoid leukemia were higher than acute myeloid leukemia in this study.

In acute myeloid leukemia (AML), a large number of tumor suppressor genes are silenced through DNA methylation such as CDKN2B and p73. Wnt inhibitory factor 1 (WIF1) and Dickkopf-1 (DKK-1) are negative regulator of the Wnt signaling pathway.
In the present study, we studied the methylation status of WIF1 and DKK-1 genes in AML patients.
Patients and In this case-control study, blood samples from 120 AML patients and 25 healthy control subjects collected, isolated DNA was treated with sodium bisulphite and examined by methylation specific PCR (MS-PCR) with primers specific for methylated and unmethylated sequences of the WIF1 and DKK-1 genes.
The frequency of aberrant hypermethylation of WIF1 and DKK-1 genes in AML patients determined 35% (42/120) and 28.3% (34/120), respectively. In addition, for all subjects in control group, methylation of WIF1 and DKK-1 genes were negative. Patients with M0 subtype of French-American-British (FAB)-AML had the highest incidence of hypermethylation of WIF1 (P = 0.003) and DKK-1 (P = 0.005) genes.
The present study showed that, like many solid tumors, WIF1 and DKK-1 genes methylation also occurs in AML. The study of other antagonists of Wnt signaling pathway are recommended.

Some of the most commercially used compounds in fragrances have been associated with various adverse effects in various experimental in vivo and in vitro models and are still being used promiscuously in perfumes and as additives in other household products.
This study sought to determine the effects of exposing wistar rats to two locally made Nigerian perfumes on some cardiac performance enzyme and genes.
In this experimental study, 18 animals were allocated into three groups (A, B and C) of six each. Groups B and C animals were exposed (by inhalation) to the first and second perfumes (designated F1 and F2) respectively for 77 days, while animals in group A were unexposed control. The rats were sacrificed at the end of the exposure period after which heart tissue was excised for creatine kinase enzyme assay and formalin fixed, paraffin embedded heart tissues were processed for RNA extraction and analyzed by quantitative real time polymerase chain reaction for the mRNA expression of creatine kinase genes Ckm and Ckmt2.
The results showed that animals in both exposure groups demonstrated significantly (P These results suggest that exposure to these two locally made fragrances contributes to cardiomyocyte stress.

Thymoma commonly associated with various paraneoplastic syndromes. Here is a 62-year-old non-smoker man with history of ulcerative colitis tree years ago. Recurrent attacks of respiratory symptoms make repeated visit of the patient by physician afterward. Chest radiographic findings were compatible with thymoma. The condition was followed by hypoimmunoglubolinemia and pure red cell aplasia. Anemia was refractory to thymectomy. Cyclosporine and prednisolone was started but led to pneumococcal pneumonia and sepsis in patients who had already suffered from hypoimmunoglubolinemia.

Misidentification syndrome is a condition in which the person thinks that familiar persons have been replaced with other one. Coexistence of some types of this syndrome has been reported with other psychiatric syndromes. In this report, we present a 47-year-old married man with coexistence of reverse Capgras and subjective double syndromes with Cotard syndrome. There is no previous report of coexistence of these three forms of delusions in a single case.