Primary Cilium in the Human Thyrocyte: Changes in Frequency and Length in Relation to the Functional Pathology of the Thyroid Gland.

BACKGROUND: Primary cilia (PC) are conserved structures in the adult thyroid gland of different mammals. It was recently described that in humans, PC are usually present as a single copy per follicular cell emerging from the follicular cell apex into the follicular lumen. METHODS: To understand the role developed by PC in thyroid hormonogenesis better, their changes in different human functional thyroid diseases (diffuse toxic hyperplasia/Graves' disease [GD] and nodular hyperplasia [NH]/nodular goiter), in comparison to normal thyroid tissue, were investigated using immunofluorescence, morphometry, and electron microscopy analyses. RESULTS: Significantly decreased ciliary frequencies were found in both NH (51.16 ± 11.69%) and GD (44.43 ± 23.70%) compared to normal thyroid tissue (76.09 ± 7.31%). Similarly, PC lengths were also significantly decreased in both NH (2.02 ± 0.35 µm) and GD (2.4 ± 0.48 µm) compared to normal glands (3.93 ± 0.90 µm). Moreover, in GD patients, hyperactive-follicle foci always showed diminished ciliary frequency and length compared to any other thyroid follicle pattern, independent of their thyroid status. Finally, in GD, the percentage of thyrocytes exhibiting PC in the "normal-appearance areas" was significantly lower in correspondence with the subsistence of signs of thyroid biosynthetic hyperactivity after long-term antithyroid drug treatment. CONCLUSIONS: The results suggest a direct relationship between ciliogenesis and both follicle activity and tissue heterogeneity in the functional pathology of the thyroid gland.

Tumor microenvironment and immune effects of antineoplastic therapy in lymphoproliferative syndromes.

Lymphomas represent a wide group of heterogenic diseases with different biological and clinical behavior. The underlying microenvironment-specific composition seems to play an essential role in this scenario, harboring the ability to develop successful immune responses or, on the contrary, leading to immune evasion and even promotion of tumor growth. Depending on surrounding lymphoid infiltrates, lymphomas may have different prognosis. Moreover, recent evidences have emerged that confer a significant impact of main lymphoma's treatment over microenvironment, with clinical consequences. In this review, we summarize these concepts from a pathological and clinical perspective. Also, the state of the art of lymphoma's anti-idiotype vaccine development is revised, highlighting the situations where this strategy has proven to be successful and eventual clues to obtain better results in the future.

Biliary tract disease: a rare manifestation of eosinophilic gastroenteritis.

Eosinophilic gastroenteritis (EGE) is a rare inflammatory disease characterized by diffuse or scattered eosinophilic infiltration of the digestive tract and usually by peripheral blood eosinophilia. The most common presenting symptoms of EGE are abdominal pain, vomiting and diarrhea, but clinical features depend on which layers or location of gastrointestinal tract are involved. Treatment with corticosteroids results in clinical and histological remission in most patients and surgery can be avoided if a correct diagnosis is made. Previous history of allergy is a key to diagnosing EGE, but peripheral eosinophilia may be absent in some patients under concomitant treatment with corticosteroids. Radiological and endoscopic findings are also nonspecific and diagnosis must always be histologically confirmed. The gastrointestinal involvement is patchy in distribution, so more than one panendoscopic examination is often necessary to establish the diagnosis, and surgical or CT-guided full-thickness biopsy is needed in patients with muscular or serosal involvement. It emphasises the importance of a high index of clinical suspicion, which mainly depends on knowledge of natural history of the disease. We report here a case of EGE associated with transmural eosinophilic cholecystocholangitis, in a patient who presented with dyspeptic symptoms and recurrent cholestasis responsive to corticoesteroids. To our knowledge, this patient represents the second case, in the English literature, in which corticoid-responsive cholangitis was associated to histologically proven eosinophilic cholecystitis and gastrointestinal involvement, suggesting that EGE must always be considered in the differential diagnosis of biliary tract disease in patients with eosinophilia and/or atopic diseases.