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Biomedical subjects

Ashish Goel

Publications and source records attributed to Ashish Goel.

9 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed2006

Prevalence and risk factors of obstructive sleep apnea syndrome in a population of Delhi, India.

OBJECTIVE: Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) has been recognized in the Western world as a public health burden, but there has been no community-based study performed to assess the prevalence of the condition in India. The study was performed to assess the prevalence and risk factors of OSA in a semi-urban Indian population. DESIGN: A two-stage, cross-sectional, community-based prevalence study. SETTING: A semi-urban community in Delhi. DURATION: Two years (2003 to 2005). PATIENTS AND PARTICIPANTS: All citizens residing in the community who were 30 to 60 years of age. Exclusion criteria included those patients with recent myocardial infarction, upper airway surgery, class III/IV congestive heart failure, pregnancy, hypothyroidism on treatment, acromegaly, chronic renal failure, systemic steroid treatment, and hormone replacement therapy. INTERVENTION: An OSA assessment was performed in 2,400 subjects who were screened in stage 1 of the study by means of a sleep questionnaire. Subjects were then divided into habitual and nonhabitual snorers. Eighty-three randomly selected habitual snorers and 80 nonhabitual snorers were invited to participate in stage 2 of the study, which consisted of in-hospital polysomnography studies. OBSERVATIONS AND RESULTS: A total of 2,150 subjects returned questionnaires (response rate, 90%). Of 550 habitual snorers and 1,596 nonhabitual snorers, 77 habitual snorers and 73 nonhabitual snorers underwent polysomnography. A total of 36 habitual snorers (46.75%) and 2 nonhabitual snorers (2.73%) were found to have OSA, giving prevalence rates of 13.74% and 3.57%, respectively, for OSA and OSA syndrome (OSAS) on extrapolation. Multivariate analysis revealed that male gender, age, obesity (defined by a high body mass index), and waist/hip ratio as significant risk factors for OSAS. CONCLUSIONS: This study demonstrated that the risk factors and prevalence for OSA in India are similar to those in the West, which is contrary to the findings of some previous reports, which had a strong inclusion bias.

Adult↗
PubMed2003

Glucose metabolism in cancer. Evidence that demethylation events play a role in activating type II hexokinase gene expression.

One of the "signature" phenotypes of highly malignant, poorly differentiated tumors, including hepatomas, is their remarkable propensity to utilize glucose at a much higher rate than normal cells, a property frequently dependent on the marked overexpression of type II hexokinase (HKII). As the expression of the gene for this enzyme is nearly silent in liver tissue, we tested the possibility that DNA methylation/demethylation events may be involved in its regulation. Initial studies employing methylation restriction endonuclease analysis provided evidence for differential methylation patterns for the HKII gene in normal hepatocytes and hepatoma cells, the latter represented by a highly glycolytic model cell line (AS-30D). Subsequently, sequencing following sodium bisulfite treatment revealed 18 methylated CpG sites within a CpG island (-350 to +781 bp) in the hepatocyte gene but none in that of the hepatoma. In addition, treatment of a hepatocyte cell line with the DNA methyltransferase inhibitors, 5'-azacytidine and 5'-aza-2'-deoxycytidine, activated basal expression levels of HKII mRNA and protein. Finally, stably transfecting the hepatocyte cell line with DNA demethylase also resulted in activating the basal expression levels of HKII mRNA and protein. These novel observations indicate that one of the initial events in activating the HKII gene during either transformation or tumor progression may reside at the epigenetic level.

Animals↗
PubMedDate not supplied

When is enough enough?

How do medical students learn to make impossible decisions every day? They can share their problems with their colleagues and seniors, and learn decision-making skills which will carry over into their practice once they graduate. At the MGIMS, a group of residents and interns has started informal discussions of case study scenarios. The idea is to encourage students to discuss their dilemmas, identify the reasons for their decisions and thus clarify the decision-making process. The first case study was based on a real life scenario at the MGIMS.

Decision Making↗