Recent Publications

Acute suppurative parotitis (ASP) is an acute infection of the parotid gland that necessitates hospitalization in some patients. The aim of this study was to evaluate clinical laboratory values including hydration, nutritional status, inflammatory markers and age, and to compare them with duration of hospitalization of patients with ASP. 

Antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) are a class of peptides found across a wide array of organisms that play key roles in host defense. AMPs induce selective death in target cells and orchestrate specific or nonspecific immune responses. Many AMPs exhibit native anticancer activity in addition to antibacterial activity, and others have been engineered as antineoplastic agents. We discuss the use of AMPs in detection and treatment of cancer as well as mechanisms of AMPinduced cell death.

Adjuvant chemotherapy induces weight gain, glucose intolerance, and hypertension in about a third of women. The mechanisms underlying these events have not been defined. This study assessed the association between the microbiome and weight gain in patients treated with adjuvant chemotherapy for breast and gynecological cancers.

These studies reinforce the importance of lipidomics investigation by detailing how KO of SREBF1 affects both BMD and lipid-signaling mediators, thus confirming the importance of SREBF1 for musculoskeletal homeostasis.

Risk stratification in patients post-transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR) is limited to and is based on clinical judgment and surgical scoring systems. Serum natriuretic peptides are used for general risk stratification in patients with aortic stenosis, reflecting the increase in their afterload and thereby stressing the need for valve intervention. The objective of this study was to determine the predictive value of pre- and post-procedural serum brain natriuretic peptide (BNP) on 1-year all-cause mortality in patients who underwent TAVR. (Gabby Elbaz-Greener, Diab Ghanim, Fabio Kusniec, Asaf Rabin, Doron Sudarsky, Shemy Carasso, Tal Czeiger, Mirit Shoan-Dayan, Ali Sakhnini, Liza Grosman-Rimon, Offer Amir)

The Arab population in Israel is a minority ethnic group with its own distinct cultural subgroups. Minority populations are known to underutilize genetic tests and counseling services, thereby undermining the effectiveness of these services among such populations. However, the general and culture-specific reasons for this underutilization are not well defined. Moreover, Arab populations and their key cultural-religious subsets (Muslims, Christians, and Druze) do not reside exclusively in Israel, but are rather found as a minority group in many European and North American countries. Therefore, focusing on the Arab population in Israel allows for the examination of attitudes regarding genetic testing and counseling among this globally important ethnic minority population. (BMC Med Ethics)

Patients with relapsed/refractory AL amyloidosis (RRAL) have poor prognosis, but emerging data shows promising results with the use daratumumab. We evaluated daratumumab treatment in RRAL in real-world setting.

We aimed to assess the association of pre-operatively evaluated ultrasonographic endometrial thickness with outcomes of patients with endometrial cancer.

Women with only one elevated 100 g OGTT value are not considered as having gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) and therefore there are no recommendations to address this population as a risk group for type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). We aimed to elucidate whether one elevated OGTT value increases the risk for T2DM.

This article will review the current knowledge about peptides and their role in the circulatory system, focusing on the physiological roles of natriuretic peptides in the cardiovascular system and their implications in CVDs

During aging, there is a physiological decline, an increase of morbidity and mortality, and a natural change in the gut microbiome. In this study, we investigated the influence of the gut microbiome on different metabolic parameters in adult and aged mice.

We assessed intrauterine bacterial growth for elective and non-elective caesarean sections (CSs).

Tissue growth in the adult is an orchestrated process that often requires biological clocks to time stem cell and progenitor activity. Here, we employed the hair follicle, which cycles between growth and regression in a timely-restricted mode, to show that some components of the hair cycle clock reside within the mesenchymal niche of the hair follicle, the dermal papilla (DP), and both Fgf and Wnt signaling pathways interact within the DP to regulate the expression of these components that include Wnt agonists (Rspondins) and antagonists (Dkk2 and Notum).

Advanced age is considered an adverse factor in endometrial cancers, but may be a surrogate for other conditions that impact outcomes. The study objective was to assess the association of age with endometrial cancer features, treatment and prognosis.