Hot answers tagged pathology
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It is possible for viruses to live in mutualistic relationships with their hosts, these associations are often overlooked due to the devastating effect that many viruses can have.
To give an example in humans, when HIV-1-infected patients are also infected with hepatitis G virus, progression to AIDS is slowed significantly (Heringlake et al., 1998; Tillmann ...
15
This is because rabies is a viral infection of nervous tissue that propagates through peripheral nerves into the brain and causes brain tissue inflammation (encephalitis).
As long as the virus is in the brain there is no way to get rid of it. The main trade-off here is that everything that would kill the virus will be as (or even more) aggressive against ...
9
Alzheimer's disease is a very complex field, and I am going to restrict my answer to two particular areas: the neuritic plaques and the neurofibrillary tangles. This area is also of interest to me, hence the protracted answer.
The two pathological hallmarks of Alzheimer's disease, first described by Alois Alzheimer in about 1906, are the extracellular ...
8
There is the term “corset liver”. It describes changes (“grooves”) on the liver’s surface following external compression and subsequent local atrophy, e.g. from wearing a corset for a long time. (see Dancygier: Clinical Hepatology)
A paper from the 1980s describes some abnormality in the histological findings of liver tissue of dogs after chronic abdominal ...
7
There have been some studies regarding the use of intensive UV light installations in surgical wards or other settings as a anti-microbial tool. Generally speaking, these are part of a general interest in non-cleaning based anti-microbials in hospitals, such as UV light, O3-based machines, and copper/silver coated surfaces.
The answer to your question will ...
7
This article has some good information. It's certainly more than I want to know about warts.
Isolated warts may remain unaltered for
months or years, or a large number of new lesions
may develop rapidly in a short period of time. The
development of warts is not predictable.
Approximately 65% of warts disappear spontaneously
within two years. ...
6
It may actually be curable, as shown by success stories involving the Milwaukee protocol in which the brain is effectively shut down to allow for the immune system to eradicate the virus. In most cases, however, it is fatal once symptomatic. Note that the Milwaukee protocol boasts an imporessive (sarcastic) survival rate of under 15%
6
In general antibiotics don't help with viruses. However, sometimes a bacterial infection may follow a cold virus, so there might be some scenarios in which antibiotics would be needed. However in many cases it could be due to people demanding antibiotics from their doctor.
You can read more here (CDC site): http://www.cdc.gov/Features/getsmart/
6
Yes, plants of all sizes can have cancerous growths.
Agrobacterium tumifaciens, the causative agent of crown gall disease, produces what is called a tumor. See this link for detailed information on these growths. Alternatively, use a plant physiology textbook to look up the above terms. (Here, is where a textbook is better than a single abstract in PubMed.)
...
5
it does not, really. unless we're talking about things like frostbite or severe hypothermia.
it's a myth that it does.
the virus is more stable in colder air, however.
see more here:
Study Shows Why the Flu Likes Winter
Influenza Virus Transmission Is Dependent on Relative Humidity and Temperature
Innate responses proved to be comparable between ...
5
As mentioned in this question , Adeno-associated virus is often used for gene therapy. This is due largely to its predictability when injecting genes (1), however it is also used as it is not implicated in any human pathology. As it is a replication deficient/helper dependent virus, natural infection is much less likely.
The human immune system does ...
5
Alright, having read the citation linked, and doing a little poking of my own, here's my approach at an answer:
Some human herpes virus infections may compete with HIV infection. Essentially, some strains (not the ones you normally think of) infect CD4 cells - the same cells targeted by HIV. These strains down regulate transcription in CD4 cells, which in ...
5
The main factors of urban air pollution are nitric oxides, carbon monoxide, and what is called in german "Feinstaub" (very small carbon-rich particles from diesel exhaust). However, do not forget heavy metals: street dust is especially metal-rich and is swept into the soil near the streets where children and farmed plants can take it up. Lead is a heavy ...
5
The function of bile produced by the liver and concentrated in the gall bladder is to aid in fat digestion. Bile acts as an emulsifier to allow the fat to be packaged into small droplets, micelles. The breakdown of fats into small micelles greatly increases the surface area for lipases produced by the pancreas have to act on. These are then absorbed ...
4
It really depends on what you consume, how much of it you consume, and the state of your immune system. Let me give you some examples. Yogourt is full of bacteria, and yet we can eat it without issue. The bacteria likely don't survive digestion, but if they do, they will quite happily live in our intestines contributing to the already existing population of ...
4
This is apparently a debate since decades in the UK. As to the pathology:
Eurasian badgers (Meles meles) are an important wildlife reservoir of
tuberculosis (Mycobacterium bovis) infection in Ireland and the United
Kingdom. As part of national programmes to control tuberculosis in
livestock, considerable effort has been devoted to studying the
...
4
Alzheimer is also considered a tauopathy due to abnormal aggregation of the tau protein. There has been succesful research in that direction, recently, which was a bit neglected, presumably because of vested interests in the amyloid hypothesis.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tauopathy
However, another alternative to amyloid (and tau) is the hypothesis that ...
4
The molecular basis of copper-transport diseases in Trends in Molecular Medicine, Volume 7, Issue 2, 1 February 2001, Pages 64–69, has a link to a 1973 paper by JM Gillespie entitled "Keratin Structure and Changes with Copper Deficiency," stating
Menkes patients are often diagnosed from their unusual hair structure – termed pili torti – also known as ...
4
Coeliac disease is an immune disorder resulting from a reaction to ingested gluten (a protein found in wheat, barley and rye). It is associated with inflammation of the small intestine resulting in a generalised reduction in the capacity for digestion and absorption. According to this paper:
Celiac disease is associated with pancreatico-biliary disease. ...
3
In short, 'No.'
Yogurt, in and of itself, is the product of milk with specific strains of bacteria that are not particularly unique. Yogurt is just as hospitable to harmful bacteria as beneficial bacteria.
The two mechanisms which spring to my mind that would prevent infection by harmful bacteria in yogurt would be the following:
*The already dominant ...
3
Everything depends upon the infection and on the general immune status of the patient.
Generally, the prerequisite for DNA to freely circulate in the blood is the presence of bacteria themselves in the blood (bacteraemia). This means that the infection left its original site (where it is usually kept isolated from the blood flow by the immune system). ...
3
This article covers some of the key issues of cancer in layman's terms.
Essential, cancer is caused by multiple mutations in key regulatory genes which function in maintaining the cell cycle. This provokes uncontrollably rapid cell division, with only furthers the problem with genetic mutation. Here are some quotes from the article to strengthen your ...
3
Conner's response contained just the type of source material I was looking for. Thanks Conner -- let us all +1 him. Allow me to summarize the specifics of the article in relation to my question:
Transmission
PVs are transmitted through direct or indirect contact with an
individual who has the lesion. Dysfunctions in the epithelial barrier
by ...
3
This is just about where the pathogens can be found that are dangerous to people.
Vomit is highly acidic and less accommodating to microbe growth. Similarly saliva has many immune components in it as well as digestive enzymes that keep most microorganisms down.
Urine and CSF are actually quite sterile as they come from environments that are highly ...
3
I have never heard about this phenomenon from my patients or professors at the Medical School, but this is a possible mechanism that comes to my mind.
One of the classification for antibiotics takes consideration the effect on bacteria. Two possible effects are either stopping the proliferation (and letting the immune system to kill those that are currently ...
3
E. coli is mostly harmless; only a few strains are harmful.
I don't believe the route by which gut biota is established has been entirely established for any species but, for example, koala feed their faeces to their offspring to help them establish biota capable of digesting eucalyptus. It seems that a small proportion of ingested bacteria somehow survive ...
3
Metastasis is the spreading of cancerous cells to a new site within the body where they form a secondary tumour. There is nothing special about how these metastases cause death, they do so in the same ways as the primary cancer eventually might:
Replacing functional cells with non-functional cancerous cells
Eroding into other tissues and disrupting normal ...
2
It's usually important to rule out other medical conditions when considering many psychiatric diagnoses due to similarities in symptoms between them. There are many examples but I'm not sure if it's appropriate to note them here as a lot of symptoms have to be considered in a clinical context and might be mistaken as medical advice. It's also important to ...
2
As far as I remember the pathology course from medical school, chronic long-lasting inflammation often leads to proliferation of connective tussie and ultimately to fibrosis.
The actual mechanism here is the lack of oxygen which is used-up by different immune system cells to produce peroxydes and superoxydes.
2
TB is an extremely poor example, because as has been mentioned, it usually requires prolonged contact.
But lets go with something with a low required infectious dose, that's friendly to surface contamination, and persists in the environment: Norovirus.
Can norovirus serve as a medium for pathogens? Absolutely. To be blunt, almost anything will serve as a ...
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