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Prevalence of birefringent crystals in cardiac and prostatic tissues, an observational study
- Source :
- BMJ Open
- Publication Year :
- 2014
- Publisher :
- BMJ Publishing Group, 2014.
-
Abstract
- Introduction The prevalence of urate crystals in residual tissue samples from coronary arteries, aortic valves and prostate glands was assessed. Methods Alcohol-fixed coronary arteries from 55 explanted hearts, alcohol-fixed aortic valves collected from 75 valve replacement surgeries and 40 frozen, unfixed prostate specimens resected during cancer surgery were examined for birefringent crystals with polarising microscopy. Results In the 55 explanted hearts, 6 (10.9%) contained a coronary artery with birefringent crystals. One of the 75 aortic valves (1.4%) contained negatively and positively birefringent crystals. Nineteen of the 40 (47.5%) prostates contained birefringent crystals. Conclusions We found that a remarkable percentage of coronary arteries and prostate specimens contained birefringent crystals. Crystal presence is an obvious prerequisite for possible crystal induced-inflammation in these tissues, just as similar crystals elicit a gouty inflammatory cascade in synovial joints. Further studies are necessary to determine whether urate crystals may play this role in these tissues and, if so, to establish whether urate-lowering therapy may be beneficial in prostatitis and coronary disease.
- Subjects :
- Adult
Male
medicine.medical_specialty
Pathology
medicine.medical_treatment
Prostatitis
Coronary Disease
Young Adult
Valve replacement
Rheumatology
Prostate
Internal medicine
medicine
Humans
Aorta
Aged
Birefringence
business.industry
Research
Myocardium
General Medicine
Aortic Valve Stenosis
Middle Aged
medicine.disease
Uric Acid
Coronary arteries
medicine.anatomical_structure
Inflammatory cascade
Female
business
Crystallization
Artery
Subjects
Details
- Language :
- English
- ISSN :
- 20446055
- Volume :
- 4
- Issue :
- 7
- Database :
- OpenAIRE
- Journal :
- BMJ Open
- Accession number :
- edsair.doi.dedup.....c9a27749ca1880e79a1313b219183a8e