PRESS-NEWS.org - Press Release Distribution
PRESS RELEASES DISTRIBUTION

Less invasive techniques help manage complications of severe pancreatic disease

2011-01-07
(Press-News.org) The use of combined treatments for severe acute pancreatitis is safe and effective in managing the disease, resulting in shorter hospitalizations and fewer radiological procedures than standard therapy, according to a study in Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology, the official journal of the American Gastroenterological Association (AGA) Institute. In a related study, doctors found that patients with infected pancreatic necrosis were able to avoid surgery through primary conservative treatment, which is in-patient medical treatment.

Pancreatitis refers to the inflammation of the pancreas that usually begins as a sudden attack and is often caused by gallstones or alcohol abuse. Severe acute pancreatitis is the initial stage of pancreatitis, characterized by gradual or sudden severe pain in the center part of the abdomen that moves around to the back, signaling a damaged or severely irritated pancreas. Some people have more than one attack and recover completely after each episode, yet 20 percent of patients with acute pancreatitis have a severe, life-threatening illness with multiple complications, including walled-off pancreatic necrosis (WOPN). WOPN can become infected, obstruct or create passages to adjacent organs, erode into or compress blood vessels, and significantly delay a patient's functional improvement. When WOPN becomes infected or obstructs nearby organs, drainage and surgery generally has been advocated. However, less invasive techniques have evolved over the past 15 years that show equivalent effectiveness and fewer complications than surgery.

Doctors at Virginia Mason Medical Center compared the established treatment for WOPN (standard percutaneous drainage, which uses a thin needle to drain the infected fluid) with combined modality therapy (endoscopic transenteric [through the intestine] stents added to a regimen of percutaneous [under the skin] drains). Symptomatic patients with WOPN between January 2006 and August 2009 were treated with standard percutaneous drainage or combined modality therapy and compared by disease severity, length of hospitalization, duration of drainage, complications, and number of radiological and endoscopic procedures.

Patients undergoing combined modality therapy had significantly decreased length of hospitalization, duration of external drainage and number of computed tomography scans. Patients in the standard percutaneous drainage group had more complications.

"Patients with walled-off pancreatic necrosis require long hospitalization, utilize substantial amounts of health-care resources and are exposed to large quantities of ionizing radiation," said Michael Gluck, MD, of the Digestive Disease Institute, Virginia Mason Medical Center, and lead author of the study. "Until a large, multi-center, randomized trial is conducted, this current study adds another seemingly effective and safe management technique for symptomatic walled-off pancreatic necrosis with the added benefit of reducing length of hospitalization and use of radiological resources."

A life-threatening complication of acute pancreatitis is infected pancreatic necrosis (dead pancreatic tissue), which accounts for the majority of deaths in patients with acute pancreatitis. According to various practice guidelines, the standard of care for necrotizing pancreatitis is surgery. In a second study, doctors compared the outcomes of surgical treatment versus primary conservative treatment, in which patients are kept in intensive care and treated with antibiotics, organ support, intensive nutritional support and, if required, percutaneous drainage.

"Until now, there has not been a trial comparing conservative and surgical therapy in patients with infected pancreatitis necrosis because conservative management was never considered a viable treatment option," said Pramod Kumar Garg, MD, DM, of the All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi, and lead author of this study. "We were able to demonstrate that throughout the course of 10 years, those who received primary conservative treatment had significantly higher survival rates than those who underwent surgery."

A group of 28 patients with infected pancreatitis necrosis were treated with surgery, while 52 patients in a second group were given primary conservative treatment. A primary conservative strategy resulted in mortality that was comparable with that following surgery. In addition, 76 percent of the patients were able to avoid surgery, and 54.5 percent were successfully managed with the primary conservative strategy.

INFORMATION:

For more information on pancreatitis, please read the AGA brochure "Understanding Pancreatitis" at http://www.gastro.org/patient-center/digestive-conditions/pancreatitis.

About the AGA Institute

The American Gastroenterological Association is the trusted voice of the GI community. Founded in 1897, the AGA has grown to include 17,000 members from around the globe who are involved in all aspects of the science, practice and advancement of gastroenterology. The AGA Institute administers the practice, research and educational programs of the organization. www.gastro.org.

About Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology

The mission of Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology is to provide readers with a broad spectrum of themes in clinical gastroenterology and hepatology. This monthly peer-reviewed journal includes original articles as well as scholarly reviews, with the goal that all articles published will be immediately relevant to the practice of gastroenterology and hepatology. For more information, visit www.cghjournal.org.

Become an AGA fan on Facebook.
Join our LinkedIn group.
Follow us on Twitter @AmerGastroAssn.
Check out our videos on YouTube.

END



ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

Loss of gene promotes brain-tumor development, reduces survival, study finds

2011-01-07
COLUMBUS, Ohio – New research shows that loss of a gene called NFKBIA promotes the growth of glioblastoma multiforme, the most common and deadly form of brain cancer, and suggests that therapies that stabilize this gene may improve survival for certain glioblastoma patients. The study was published recently in the New England Journal of Medicine. "We show that NFKBIA status may be an independent predictor of survival in certain patients with glioblastoma," says senior coauthor Dr. Arnab Chakravarti, chair and professor of Radiation Oncology and co-director of the Brain ...

Secondhand television exposure linked to eating disorders

2011-01-07
Boston, MA (January 5, 2010) — For parents wanting to reduce the negative influence of TV on their children, the first step is normally to switch off the television set. But a new study suggests that might not be enough. It turns out indirect media exposure, i.e., having friends who watch a lot of TV, might be even more damaging to a teenager's body image. Researchers from Harvard Medical School's Department of Global Health and Social Medicine examined the link between media consumption and eating disorders among adolescent girls in Fiji. What they found was surprising. ...

Routine blood test may identify people with pre-diabetes, cutting later treatment costs

Routine blood test may identify people with pre-diabetes, cutting later treatment costs
2011-01-07
INDIANAPOLIS – A simpler form of testing individuals with risk factors for diabetes could improve diabetes prevention efforts by substantially increasing the number of individuals who complete testing and learn whether or not they are likely to develop diabetes. Approximately 60 million Americans, one-third of the adult population, are pre-diabetic. Thirty percent of these individuals will develop Type 2 diabetes in less than a decade, yet most don't know they are at high risk for the disease. A study published in the January 2011 issue of the American Journal of Preventive ...

Study of 'sarcoid-like' granulomatous pulmonary disease finds elevated rates in WTC responders

2011-01-07
Mount Sinai researchers coordinating the largest clinical study to date of "Sarcoid Like" Granulomatous Pulmonary Disease in World Trade Center (WTC) responders have found that the rate of the condition was increased in this group as compared to the records of pre-9/11 FDNY personnel. The study is published online in the American Journal of Industrial Medicine. The Mount Sinai researchers studied almost 20,000 responders who had an initial exam in the Mount Sinai World Trade Center Medical Monitoring and Treatment Program between July 2002 and September 2007. Overall ...

Border collie comprehends over 1,000 object names

2011-01-07
Spartanburg, S.C., USA, 6 January, 2010 – Researchers at Wofford College discovered that a Border Collie comprehends the names of over 1000 objects, differentiating between names of objects and orders to fetch them. This research deepens the findings of researchers in Germany, who had discovered a dog that knew the names of a couple of hundred objects. Important questions were left open as to how far a dog could go, and whether the dog really understood that the object names were nouns and not commands to retrieve the object. John Pilley and Alliston Reid answered two ...

The hunt for the lunar core

The hunt for the lunar core
2011-01-07
The Moon, Earth's closest neighbor, has long been studied to help us better understand our own planet. Of particular interest is the lunar interior, which could hold clues to its ancient origins. In an attempt to extract information on the very deep interior of the Moon, a team of NASA-led researchers applied new technology to old data. Apollo seismic data was reanalyzed using modern methodologies and detected what many scientists have predicted: the Moon has a core. According to the team's findings, published Jan. 6 in the online edition of Science, the Moon possesses ...

Standing tall is key for success in 2011

2011-01-07
Show enthusiasm, ask questions and bring copies of a resume. These are just a handful of the most common interview tips for job seekers, but a person's posture may also be a deciding factor for whether they land a coveted position – even when the person on the other side of the desk is in a more powerful role. According to new research from the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University, posture plays an important role in determining whether people act as though they are really in charge. The research finds that "posture expansiveness," or positioning oneself ...

The 'mad' Egyptian scholar who proved Aristotle wrong

2011-01-07
Ibn al-Haytham's 11th-century Book of Optics, which was published exactly 1000 years ago, is often cited alongside Newton's Principia as one of the most influential books in physics. Yet very little is known about the writer, considered by many to be the father of modern optics. January's Physics World features a fanciful re-imagining of the 10-year period in the life of the medieval Muslim polymath, written by Los Angeles-based science writer Jennifer Ouellette. The feature covers the time when al-Haytham -- banished from society and deprived of books -- came up with ...

Young people say sex, paychecks come in second to self-esteem

2011-01-07
COLUMBUS, Ohio – Young people may crave boosts to their self-esteem a little too much, new research suggests. Researchers found that college students valued boosts to their self-esteem more than any other pleasant activity they were asked about, including sex, favorite foods, drinking alcohol, seeing a best friend or receiving a paycheck. "It is somewhat surprising how this desire to feel worthy and valuable trumps almost any other pleasant activity you can imagine," said Brad Bushman, lead author of the research and professor of communication and psychology at The ...

Iowa State, Ames Lab researcher developing bio-based polymers that heal cracks

Iowa State, Ames Lab researcher developing bio-based polymers that heal cracks
2011-01-07
AMES, Iowa – Michael Kessler has worked with polymers that repair themselves when they crack. And he's worked with polymers made from vegetable oils. Now he's working to combine the two technologies. Kessler, an Iowa State University associate professor of materials science and engineering and an associate of the U.S. Department of Energy's Ames Laboratory, is researching and developing biorenewable polymers capable of healing themselves as they degrade and crack. "If successful, the results of this research will provide biorenewable alternatives to petroleum-based ...

LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES:

Top five rising star Texas researchers named in 2025 Edith and Peter O’Donnell Awards by TAMEST

Fast, rewritable computing with DNA origami registers

Uncovering the pigments and techniques used to paint the Berlin Wall

MD Anderson’s Lauren Averett Byers receives TAMEST O’Donnell Award for seminal contributions to lung cancer research

Chung-Ang University researchers unveil the biogenesis and role of transfer RNA fragments in cancer progression

Secret of the female orgasm uncovered by psychologists

Breakthrough in zinc-based rechargeable batteries: A safer, sustainable alternative

"Superman" bacteria offer a sustainable boost to chemical production

FunMap reveals a functional network of genes and proteins in human cancer

First full characterization of kidney microbiome unlocks potential to prevent kidney stones

IMDEA Software researchers present MixBuy, a protocol for secure and privacy-preserving digital purchases

Having a good breakfast reduces cardiovascular risk

New study reveals provincial and territorial inequities and inadequacies in access to medications and treatment for cardiovascular conditions in Canada

Pre-seed funding to recolor the world greener

New research unlocks jaw-dropping evolution of lizards and snakes

Cardiorespiratory fitness linked to preservation of cognitive abilities in older age

Around 1 in 5 of the world’s under 50s living with genital herpes (HSV)

Cutting early life exposure to parental smoking may lower MS risk in genetically prone

High-flow nasal oxygen vs noninvasive ventilation in patients with acute respiratory failure

Flexible hibernation could help hedgehogs adapt to environmental changes

What is a unit of nature? New framework shows the challenges involved with establishing a biodiversity credit market

NYCEDC and NYU Tandon launch applications for new digital game design incubator

Soda taxes don’t just affect sales. They help change people’s minds.

Early restrictive vs liberal oxygen for trauma patients

Enabling AI to explain its predictions in plain language

A greener, cleaner way to extract cobalt from ‘junk’ materials

Better environmental performance boosts profits and cuts costs

Making self-driving cars safer, less accident prone

Rethinking the quantum chip

When does waiting stop being worth it?

[Press-News.org] Less invasive techniques help manage complications of severe pancreatic disease