This is the first report comparing combined laparoendoscopic RV versus ERCP for potential pancreatic damage and showing that RV reduces the number of patients with an iatrogenic pathologic increase of amylase when compared to ERCP, and also significantly reduces the duration of endoscopic procedure.

In this large consecutive cohort study of LSG, proximal staple line reinforcement (buttress material or suture) reduced the risk of a leak. The risk of a proximal leak was much higher in the surgeons first 100 cases, which has implications for training and supervision during this "learning curve" period.

Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) is still an untreatable lethal X-linked disorder, which affects 1 in 3500 male births. It is caused by the absence of muscle dystrophin due to mutations in the dystrophin gene. The potential regenerative capacity as well as immune privileged properties of mesenchymal Stem Cells (MSC) has been under investigation for many years in an attempt to treat DMD. One of the questions to be addressed is whether stem cells from distinct sources have comparable clinical effects when injected in murine or canine muscular dystrophy animal models. Many studies comparing different stem cells from various sources were reported but these cells were obtained from different donors and thus with different genetic backgrounds. Here we investigated whether human pericytes obtained from 4 different tissues (muscle, adipose tissue, fallopian tube and endometrium) from the same donor have a similar clinical impact when injected in double mutant Utrn (tm1Ked) Dmd (mdx) /J mice, a clinically relevant model for DMD. After a weekly regimen of intraperitoneal injections of 10(6) cells per 8 weeks we evaluated the motor ability as well as the life span of the treated mice as compared to controls. Our experiment showed that only adipose tissue derived pericytes are able to increase significantly (39 days on average) the life span of affected mice. Microarray analysis showed an inhibition of the interferon pathway by adipose derived pericytes. Our results suggest that the clinical benefit associated with intraperitoneal injections of these adult stem cells is related to immune modulation rather than tissue regeneration.

Gastrointestinal tuberculosis (TB) is quite rare, representing only 3% of all extra-pulmonary cases. Blind gut and ileum are the most common gastrointestinal localizations, while appendix involvement is infrequent. Appendix involvement is usually related to symptoms of acute appendicitis since the caseous necrosis may lead to adhesions and surgical complications such as perforation. For this reason patients with suspected appendicular TB usually undergo surgery even without a secure diagnosis. In these cases, due to the absence of specific symptoms and signs, the diagnosis is delayed after surgery, thus resulting in a high percentage of important, and sometimes lethal, complications. Histopathological examination is often the only way to reach a diagnosis and to establish specific antibiotic therapy, while an early diagnosis could avoid surgical treatment. We report a case of appendicular TB not only for its rarity but also to discuss the difficulty in its diagnosis.