Analysis of efficacy and safety of vismodegib therapy in patients with advanced basal cell carcinoma - real world multicenter cohort study.

BACKGROUND: Basal cell carcinoma (BCC) is the most frequent non-melanoma skin cancer. The basis of treatment is surgical resection. The treatment of locally advanced and metastatic disease is currently based on sonidegb or vismodegib, small molecule inhibitors of the hedgehog signalling pathway. OBJECTIVES: The study aimed to retrospectively analyse the efficacy and safety of treatment with vismodegib in 108 patients with locally advanced or metastatic disease treated from August 1st, 2017 to December 31st, 2020. The primary objective was to evaluate the objective response rate (ORR), overall survival (OS) and progression-free survival rates. The secondary aims of the study were the disease control rate, the incidence of adverse events (AEs) and the estimation of the factors that potentially impact the treatment outcome and patient survival. METHODS: Patients treated in national drug programme were enrolled into this retrospective cohort study. Evaluation of the treatment efficacy was performed according to CT/MRI scans and by the response evaluation criteria in solid tumours (RECIST) 1.1. The safety evaluation was performed according to the Common Terminology Criteria for Adverse Events v. 5.0 (CTCAE) classification and severity assessment. RESULTS: The median duration of treatment was 14 months (range 1-94 months). The median progression-free survival reached 30.5 months (95% CI; 24.8-36.3), and the progression-free survival rate after 6, 12 and 24-months were 92%, 78% and 61%, respectively. The median overall survival was 41.5 months (95% CI; 31.6-51.3), and the overall survival rate after 1, 2 and 3 years accordingly 86%, 73% and 60%. The univariant and multivariant analysis indicated that the female gender is an independent positive prognostic factor of progression-free survival. CONCLUSIONS: The response to treatment is the prognostic factor for response maintenance and better overall survival. The therapy was well tolerated with the safety profile consistent in general with known from previous studies.

Phenotypic Correlations of Testes Size with Semen Traits and the Productive Traits of Young Boars.

The aim of this study was to investigate whether there is a relationship of young boar testes size with semen traits and with productive traits. The dimensions (length, width and volume) of each testis and semen traits (semen volume, percentage of sperm with progressive motility, sperm concentration, total number of sperm in semen, percentage of sperm with normal acrosome, percentage of sperm with major and minor morphological defects, osmotic resistance test value and activity of aspartate aminotransferase in seminal plasma) were determined on 120 young boars aged 6 months. At 180 day of age, the boars backfat thickness and leanness (by ultrasonic apparatus) and body weight were also measured. The average daily gain was determined in the period from 70 to 180 days of age of the boars. The results showed that the sperm concentration, total number of sperm in semen and percentage of progressive motile sperm were a significantly positively correlated with width and volume of the left (p ≤ 0.01) and right testis (p ≤ 0.05) and with total volume of both testes (p ≤ 0.01). But the highest values of correlation coefficients were found between the width of the left testis and sperm concentration, total number of sperm in semen and percentage of progressive motile sperm. A correlations of dimensions (length and width) and volume of testes with other semen traits were very low and statistically non-significant. The volume of testes (left and right testis and total testes) was significantly positively correlated with body weight at 180 days of age and daily gain (p ≤ 0.01), but lower correlation coefficient was between left testis and daily gain (p ≤ 0.05), whereas correlations were low and non-significant with leanness and backfat thickness.

ATR-IR study of skin components: Lipids, proteins and water. Part I: Temperature effect.

In this work we report the studies of the effect of temperature on skin components, such as lipids, proteins and water. Modifications of lipids structure induced by increasing temperature (from 20 to 90°C) have been studied using ATR-IR (Attenuated Total Reflectance Infrared) spectroscopy, which is a powerful tool for characterization of the molecular structure and properties of tissues, such as skin. Due to the small depth of penetration (0.6-5.6µm), ATR-IR spectroscopy probes only the outermost layer of the skin, i.e. the stratum corneum (SC). The assignment of main spectral features of skin components allows for the determination of phase transitions from the temperature dependencies of band intensities [e.g. νas(CH2) and νs(CH2)]. The phase transitions were determined by using two methods: the first one was based on the first derivative of the Boltzmann function and the second one employed tangent lines of sigmoidal, aforementioned dependencies. The phase transitions in lipids were correlated with modifications of the structure of water and proteins.

Association od the DdeI growth hormone gene polymorphism with some performance traits in Polish Large White and Czech Large White x Polish Large White pigs.

The genotypes of growth hormone gene polymorphisms (GH-DdeI, GH-MspI, GH-HaeII, GH-ApaI, GH-CfoI) were determined in 78 pigs [Czech Large White sires (CLWsire line) x Polish Large White (PLW) sows, Polish Large White sires x Polish Large White sows], by the PCR-RFLP method. Preliminary studies found only GH DdeI polymorphism to be associated with performance traits. The associations of this polymorphism with growth and carcass traits were investigated. The linear model included the effects of candidate genes, genetic groups, sex and linear covariables of age at slaughter and body weight at weaning. The DdeI polymorphism of the GH gene showed associations with carcass length (P