Biomedical subjects

Antonio De Franco

Publications and source records attributed to Antonio De Franco.

2 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMedDate not supplied

Malabsorption syndromes.

Malabsorption syndromes are divided according to the underlying cause: maldigestion; bacterial contamination; mucosal abnormalities. One of the main causes of maldigestion are surgical resections. Malabsorption from bacterial contamination is due to a lower effectiveness of one or more of the factors that normally inhibit the growth of pathogens. The most common malabsorption syndrome from mucosal abnormalities is celiac disease for which, with small bowel enteroclysis a specific radiographic pattern has been identified. The gold standard in the diagnosis of diseases associated to malabsorption is represented by mucosal biopsy and histology though some patterns are similar and create difficulties in the differential diagnosis. Among radiologic examinations, small bowel enteroclysis is highly predictive; hopefully, novel diagnostic methods will support radiology.

Bacterial Infections↗

PubMedDate not supplied

Imaging of small bowel tumors.

Small bowel tumors represent less than 25% of all gastrointestinal tumors and 1-2% of malignant tumors in general. However for their nonspecific clinical presentation, diagnosis is often late, because of the patient delay to contact the doctor and especially the doctor difficulty to advance the clinical suspicion and request the suitable clinicoinstrumental diagnostic tests. The radiologist plays a major role in early diagnosis, treatment and prognosis. In the last decade diagnostic imaging (US, CT, MRI) has supported conventional barium studies: the diagnostic accuracy has been enhanced in terms of identification, characterization and evaluation of the degree of severity of these diseases. The choice of the most suitable technique should be based on the diagnostic skills acquired in the field and on the awareness of the limits and indications of each method. In this article, the contribution of imaging to the diagnosis of small bowel tumors, is analyzed.

Humans↗