Medicine and Health

Una de les aplicacions dels ultrasons és l'exploració del pàncrees

Progress

Personality as a Predictor of Depression Symptoms in Burn Patients

The results of a pioneering study conducted at the Vall d’Hebron University Hospital with adult patients admitted to the Burn Unit suggest that some personality characteristics might be used to identify the most vulnerable patients who may develop more severe depressive symptoms at different points in their recovery, interfering with the process of rehabilitation.

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Progress

Learning Treatment to Suppress Rumination

Rumination is characterised by an effortless recurrent regurgitation of recently ingested food into the mouth, with consequent spitting and/or re-chewing and re-swallowing. A study with 28 patients detected the manoeuvre that causes regurgitation by measuring the electrical activity of the abdomen and chest muscles. Later, patients were able to suppress rumination.

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Progress

Development of a Harmless Artificial Virus for Gene Therapy

Researchers of the Nanobiology Unit from the UAB Institute of Biotechnology and Biomedicine have produced an alternative to the use of viruses in gene therapy.The researchers synthesised nanoparticles which act as artificial viruses, capable of surrounding DNA fragments and releasing them as therapeutic agents, with no biological risk, into the interior of cells.

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Progress

Air quality in Barcelona Schools

Epidemiological and toxicological studies consistently have associated exposure to air pollutants with diverse negative health outcomes. To determine if air pollution (especially road traffic-related pollution) has any detrimental effect on the neurodevelopment of schoolchildren, the BREATHE project was born.

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11/2007 -

Pancreas: ultrasounds for a better diagnosis

Non invasive techniques are essential for diagnosis in medicine. One of these techniques is the ultrasonography, an exploration technique that registers the echoes of acoustic waves inside the body. One of the applications of the ultrasounds is the exploration of the pancreas.

References

"Ultrasonography of the pancreas. 1. Conventional imaging". Martínez-Noguera A, D'Onofrio M. Abdom Imaging. 2007 Mar-Apr;32(2):136-49.

The ultrasounds (US)image of the pancreas has meant a big advance in the last years and plays an important role in the detection, characterization and the staging of the pancreatic illnesses. Conventional ultrasonography (US) is a non-invasive imaging modality, which continues to be the first diagnostic step in the evaluation of the pancreas.

The pancreas is usually divided into head, neck, body, and tail regions. In accordance with the literature, the pancreas can be visualized by US in a big percentage of patients (93 %). To obtain a complete visualization of all portions of the gland is convenient to perform different scanning techniques, such as filling the stomach with water, examining the patient with suspended inspiration or expiration and changing the patient’s position.

In the pathological processes the aptitude to reflect the ultrasounds of the pancreas (its echogenicity) is altered. Among these processes we find acute pancreatitis and its complications, chronic pancreatitis or the pancreatic adenocarcinomas. Using ultrasonography all of these complications can be visualized, acute fluid collections, pseudocyst, pancreatic abscess, infected necrosis and haemorrhage, pseudoaneurysms and venous thrombosis

The clinical diagnosis of chronic pancreatitis is best confirmed together US, CT, magnetic resonance MRcolagiopancreatography (MRCP) and endoscopic retrograde colangiopancreatography (ERCP). Recent technological developments in the field of US, as harmonics and US pulse inversion, color-power Doppler and new contrasts agents allow pancreatic US imaging compete with CT and MR.

Antonio Martínez Noguera 
Mirko D’Onofrio2 

Department of Medicine

Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona

2 Università di Verona

antonio.martinezN@uab.cat

2024 Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona

B.11870-2012 ISSN: 2014-6388