Iodized Salt May Not Be Sufficient to Guarantee an Adequate Iodine Intake in Pregnant Women.

Adequate iodine intake is of crucial importance in pregnancy to meet the thyroid hormone needs of both mother and fetus. In the present study, undertaken as a part of the surveillance actions following the introduction in Italy of a national salt iodination program in 2005, the iodine intake was investigated in 123 pregnant women and 49 control women living in the same area of central Italy. All the participants were screened for urinary iodine concentration (UIC), serum level of thyrotropin, free-thyroxine, free-triiodothyronine, and thyroid volume. Moreover, they were provided with a questionnaire on the use of iodine-containing salt or supplements. Control women had a median UIC of 102 µg/L, consistent with an iodine sufficiency, while in pregnant women the median UIC value was 108 µg/L, lower than the endorsed UIC of 150 µg/L. In addition, pregnant women showed a significantly increased median thyroid volume compared to controls. Interestingly, the median UIC did not differ between pregnant women not using iodine-containing salt or supplements and those regularly consuming iodized salt alone, while pregnant women with a daily intake of iodine-containing supplements had an adequate median UIC (168 µg/L). In conclusion, the data reported here showed that pregnant women and their fetuses are still exposed to the detrimental effects of iodine deficiency and that the consumption of iodine-containing supplements should be recommended in pregnancy.

Analysis of tissue and salivary nicotinamide N-methyltransferase in oral squamous cell carcinoma: basis for the development of a noninvasive diagnostic test for early-stage disease.

Oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) is the most common form of head and neck cancer worldwide. In recent decades, the 5-year mortality rate is approximately 50% around the world. As reliable biomarkers of oral cancer are still lacking, it is necessary to identify new target molecules for early diagnosis, effective therapy, and monitoring of the disease. In the present work, we focused on the expression of the enzyme nicotinamide N-methyltransferase (NNMT). We analyzed enzyme activity in 37 paired tumor and non-tumor tissues and found that activity levels are significantly higher in tumor compared with adjacent normal oral mucosa. Interestingly, oral epithelium surrounding tumor of unfavorable cases (N+) seems to display higher activity levels compared with that of favorable ones (N0). Western blot analyses were performed to evaluate protein levels in saliva samples from patients with OSCC and healthy subjects. Preliminary results indicated an up-regulation of salivary NNMT in tumor. This study shows a marked increase in enzyme activity in oral cancer and suggests that adjacent normal tissue of unfavorable cases seems to change toward cancer. Moreover, it is conceivable to hypothesize that NNMT could represent a potential biomarker for early and non-invasive diagnosis of oral cancer.

Gene expression profile of cytokines in patients with chronic graft-versus-host disease after allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation with reduced conditioning.

There are no reliable markers useful to predict the onset or the evolution of chronic graft-versus-host disease (cGVHD) after allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT), although several candidate biomarkers have been identified from limited hypothesis-driven studies. In this study we evaluated 14 patients who received a reduced intensity conditioning HSCT. Seven patients had cGVHD, whereas 7 never developed cGVHD during the period of observation. The expression of 114 cytokines in immunoselected cell populations was explored by microarray analysis and 11 cytokines were selected for further evaluation by real-time PCR. Differential gene expression measurements showed a significant up-regulation for INFγ (interferon, gamma) in CD8+ and for TNFSF3 (tumor necrosis factor superfamily, member 3) and for TNFSF10 (tumor necrosis factor superfamily, member 10) in CD14+ cell population when comparing cGVHD with control samples. The expression levels were significantly decreased for TNFSF10 in CD8+ cell population and for TNFSF12 (tumor necrosis factor superfamily, member 12) and for PDGFß (platelet-derived growth factor, beta) in CD4+. Our data seem to suggest that different immune populations can play a role in cGVHD pathogenesis and the early detection of gene expression profile in these patients could be useful in the monitoring of GVHD. We hypothesized that PDGFß down-regulation could represent a negative feedback to compensate for enhanced expression of its receptor recently reported.