Gene/Protein Disease Symptom Drug Enzyme Compound
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Query: UMLS:C0032285 (pneumonia)
 54,520 document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)

Topotecan is a topoisomerase I inhibitor with significant activity in patients with myelodysplastic syndrome and chronic myelomonocytic leukemia. Pre-clinical data suggest a synergistic activity with DNA damaging agents such as cyclophosphamide, where topotecan might prevent the repair of cyclophosphamide-induced DNA damage. We thus designed a combination including cyclophosphamide 500 mg/m2 every 12 hours given on days 1 to 3; topotecan 1.25 mg/m2/day by continuous infusion on days 2 to 6, and cytosine arabinoside (ara-C) 2 g/m2 over 4 hours daily for 5 days on days 2 to 6 (CAT). Sixty six (63 evaluable) patients were treated. Fifty two patients had refractory (n=12) or relapsed (n=40) acute myelogenous leukemia (AML), and eleven had acute lymphocytic leukemia (ALL) (refractory n=3, relapsed n=8); their median age was 57 years (range, 18 to 79 years). Eleven patients (17%) achieved a complete remission (CR), and two patients (3%) had a hematologic improvement (HI; met all criteria for CR except for platelets < 100x10(9)/L), for an overall response rate of 20%. Responses occurred in 12 of 52 AML patients (23%), including 10 CR (19%) and 2 HI (4%), and in 1 of 11 patients with ALL (9%). Myelosuppression was universal; there were 23 episodes of pneumonia or sepsis and 18 episodes of fever of unknown origin complicating 74 courses of CAT. Non-hematologic toxicity was mostly gastrointestinal, including nausea, vomiting, diarrhea and mucositis, but was severe in only 8%. In summary, the CAT regimen is well tolerated and has significant anti-leukemia activity which warrants further investigation.
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PMID:Cyclophosphamide, ara-C and topotecan (CAT) for patients with refractory or relapsed acute leukemia. 1078 92

Pneumonitis followed by lung fibrosis is a frequent complication of radiation therapy of chest tumors. A hallmark of these fibrotic lesions is the excessive production and accumulation of extracellular matrix proteins such as type I collagen. In addition to TGF-beta1, IL-4 has been recognized as a potent inducer of collagen gene synthesis in fibroblasts. In this study, we analyzed the regulation of the alpha1(I) procollagen (COL1A1) promoter and the alpha2(I) procollagen (COL1A2) promoter by IL-4 in normal human lung fibroblasts. We provide evidence that the IL-4-induced transcriptional activator STAT6 binds to various sequences within the COL1A1 and COL1A2 promoter. The regulatory function of these regions was tested by reporter gene analysis using 5' deletions of the COL1A1 and COL1A2 promoter fused to the luciferase gene. Interleukin-4 treatment of human fibroblasts transiently transfected with COL1A1 promoter deletion constructs resulted in luciferase activity exceeding that of untreated fibroblasts by 25%, while luciferase activity driven by the COL1A2 promoter was enhanced by about 70% upon IL-4 treatment. A combined action of SP1, NFkappaB, and STAT6 essentially contributes to the IL-4 mediated COL1A2 gene activation. An AP2 site adjacent to the reverse orientated STAT6 consensus motif TTC N(3/4) GCT is located within 205 bases from the transcription start site and seems to support the moderate IL-4-induced COL1A1 gene activation. Interferon-gamma downregulation of transcription is mainly seen with the COL1A1 promoter.
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PMID:Transcriptional activation of the type I collagen genes COL1A1 and COL1A2 in fibroblasts by interleukin-4: analysis of the functional collagen promoter sequences. 1460 27

Streptococcus pneumoniae is one of the most frequent causative agents of community acquired pneumoniae, meningitis, sinusitis, bronchitis and otitis media both in children and adults. Conventional laboratory methods may sometimes fail to identify S. pneumoniae. The aims of this study were i) to compare the conventional methods and molecular methods which detected pneumococcal surface antigen A (psaA) and autolysin (lytA) genes; ii) to determine the serotype distribution of S. pneumoniae isolated from the respiratory samples. Randomly chosen 62 S. pneumoniae strains isolated from respiratory samples of patients with clinically proven pneumococcal pneumonia (age range: 1-79 years) between years 2000-2006, were included in the study. Classical microbiological analysis for the isolates included Gram staining, optochin sensitivity test performed in 5% CO2 and ambient air and bile solubility test. Capsular serotyping was performed by using latex particles sensitized with mono-specific typing sera (Statens Serum Institut, Denmark). Quellung reaction (Statens Serum Institut, Denmark) was used for serotyping the isolates that gave equivocal results using latex agglutination. Pneumococcal surface antigen A and autolysin genes were detected by in-house polymerase chain reaction (PCR) using psaA1 (5'-CTT TCT GCA ATC ATT CTT G), psaA2 (5'-GCC TTC TTT ACC TTG TTC TGC), lytAF (5'-ACG CAA TCT AGC AGA TGA AGC) and lytAR (5'-TGT TTG GTT GGT TAT TCG TGC) primers. Twenty six different serotypes were detected in 62 S. pneumoniae isolates. The most prevalent capsule serotype was 14 (n= 6), followed by 19A (n= 5). Four isolates could not be typed by the available antisera. All the isolates were optochin sensitive with or without carbondioxide incubation and were bile soluble. All the isolates included in the study have harboured (100%) psaA and lytA genes. No difference was found between the classical and molecular methods for the identification of S. pneumoniae isolates. In conclusion, detection of psaA and/or lytA genes by molecular methods is of value especially in "nonserotypeable strains" when they are performed with conventional methods in clinically proven S. pneumoniae isolates.
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PMID:[Value of demonstration of pneumococcal surface antigen A and autolysin genes for the identification of Streptococcus pneumoniae clinical isolates]. 1933 75