MTC designation leads to an increased case volume with considerable implications for operating theatre capacity and bed occupancy. Although no mortality benefit was demonstrated within 6 months of establishing this trauma network, early detectable advantages included improved functional outcome at discharge.

Majority of patients were treated with combination therapy of pegylated interferon a2a and ribavarin whilst a small proportion (28) have received (triple therapy) protease inhibitors. The total number of patients who achieved sustained virologic response (SVR) at the end of treatment were 264 (60.41%). 196 (74.42%) of those were genotype 3a, 57 (21.60%) were genotype 1a/1b and 11 (4.17%) were genotype 2b/2a. 43 (9.84%) were considered non-responders. 49 (11.21%) patients were unable to complete treatment due to critical physical or mental illness with 12 of those (24.50%) have achieved SVR. Patients' feedback for this nurse-led service has been very positive. Conclusion Specialist nurse-led and clinicians supported hepatitis C service has delivered a high quality of care. Our dedicated specialist nurses working closely with clinicians have achieved high successful treatment rates in such a large cohort of patients.

Stimulation of mammalian cells frequently initiates phospholipase D-catalysedhydrolysis of phosphatidylcholine in the plasma membrane to yield phosphatidic acid (PA) a novel lipid messenger. PA plays a regulatory role in important cellular processes such as secretion, cellular shape change and movement. A number of studies have highlighted that PLD-based signalling also plays a pro-mitogenic and pro-survival role in cells and therefore anti-apoptotic. We show that human PLD1b and PLD2a contain functional caspase-3 cleavage sites and identify the critical aspartate residues within PLD1b that affect its activation by phorbol esters and attenuate phosphatidylcholine hydrolysis during apoptosis.

No abstract