Biomedical subjects

Anca Trifan

Publications and source records attributed to Anca Trifan.

4 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMedDate not supplied

[Chronic hepatitis B virus infection].

Chronic hepatitis B virus infection affects approximately 350 million people worldwide and 1.1 million in Romania. Despite the tremendous progress in the management of virus B infection, the treatment of chronic hepatitis B remain difficult and often disappointing. The aim of treatment is sustained suppression of HBV replication and remission of liver disease. Treatment is not indicated in immune tolerance phase or in the inactive carrier state, but it is necessary in immune clearance phase, after 3-6 months of surveillance. Two antiviral drugs are accepted: alpha-interferon and lamivudine. The results of both treatments are far of being perfect; new, more potent antiviral drugs are required.

Antiviral Agents↗

PubMedDate not supplied

Helicobacter pylori infection in patients with diabetes mellitus.

Data concerning the prevalence of Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori) in diabetic patients are scanty and controversial. The aim of this study was to evaluate the prevalence of H. pylori infection in patients with diabetes mellitus (DM), and to assess whether the presence of bacterium was associated with severity of dyspeptic symptoms and endoscopic findings in such patients. The study involved 42 patients (19 men, 23 women; mean age 55 years, range 34-75 years) with DM and dyspeptic symptoms. Sixteen patients (38%) were classified as having type 1 diabetes and 26 (62%) patients as having type 2 diabetes. All patients had chronic dyspepsia, and each patient has completed a self-report questionnaire to obtain information concerning the presence and severity of upper gastrointestinal tract symptoms. H. pylori status was confirmed by 13C-urea breath test (13C-UBT), and diabetic patients underwent upper gastrointestinal endoscopy. Twenty-six (61.9%) of patients with DM were positive for 13C-UBT. There were no statistically significant differences in the infection rate between patients with type 1 and type 2 diabetes, and the prevalence of H. pylori infection was not associated with the known duration of diabetes. There was no significant difference in the symptoms score between H. pylori-positive and H. pylori-negative diabetic patients, and endoscopic findings in patients with DM were in the same range with those found in dyspeptic subjects from the same region. In conclusion, H. pylori infection is not associated with DM, duration of diabetes, or severity of dyspeptic symptoms in patients with DM.

Adult↗

PubMedDate not supplied

Therapy of chronic hepatitis B: today and tomorrow.

Hepatitis B virus infection represents an important health problem all around the world, with almost 350 million people chronically infected and 1 million death per year. Despite an efficient vaccination program and despite therapeutic progresses, chronic hepatitis B is still a disease with severe evolution and an increased prevalence in many countries, including Romania. Today, we have two groups of drug that are used for chronic hepatitis B treatment: interferon and lamivudine. Unfortunately, long term results for interferon or lamivudine treatment are far from satisfactory, fact that explains the interest for new antiviral agents, which are under evaluation procedures in many clinical trials. A combination of two or more new antiviral action agents it is believed to be the optimum therapy of chronic hepatitis B in the future.

Antiviral Agents↗

PubMedDate not supplied

Capsule endoscopy--a new frontier.

Capsule endoscopy (CE)--about the size of a vitamin pill--has enormous potential for the noninvasive investigation of diseases of the small bowel--"the last frontier" of endoscopy. Its use is spreading rapidly-over 150,000 capsules have been ingested worldwide since CE was introduced in 2001--reflecting the enormous impact of CE on the field of gastroenterology. CE has a higher diagnostic yield in recognizing Crohn's disease than any other method available. CE is able to establish a diagnosis in a high proportion of patients with obscure gastrointestinal bleeding, detecting small bowel lesions. New indications and applications of CE are emerging: CE has proven useful in the diagnosis of celiac disease, NSAID enteropathy and small bowel malignancies, its use in pediatric gastroenterology, the new Pill Cam ESO specifically-designed to visualize the esophageal mucosa etc. The objectives of this article are to present an overview of the CE: its history and development, indications, contraindications, and CE role in the diagnosis of small bowel diseases. Finally, it is presented the experience with CE at our institutions.

Contraindications↗