The association between phenomena on the Sun, geomagnetic activity, meteorological variables, and cardiovascular characteristic of patients with myocardial infarction

It has been found that solar and geomagnetic activity affects the cardiovascular system. Some evidence has been reported on the increase in the rate of myocardial infarction, stroke and myocardial infarction related deaths during geomagnetic storms. We investigated the association between cardiovascular characteristics of patients, admitted for myocardial infarction with ST elevation (STEMI), and geomagnetic activity (GMA), solar proton events (SPE), solar flares, and meteorological variables during admission. The data of 1,979 patients hospitalized at the Hospital of Lithuanian University of Health Sciences (Kaunas) were analyzed. We evaluated the association between environmental variables and patient’s characteristics by multivariate logistic regression, controlling patient’s gender and age. Two days after geomagnetic storms the risk of STEMI was over 1.5 times increased in patients who had a medical history of myocardial infarction, stable angina, renal or pulmonary diseases. The dose–response association between GMA level and STEMI risk for patients with renal diseases in history was observed. Two days after SPE the risk of STEMI in patients with stable angina in anamnesis was increased over 1.5 times, adjusting by GMA level. The SPE were associated with an increase of risk for patients with renal diseases in history. This study confirms the strongest effect of phenomena in the Sun in high risk patients.     

Pathogen Inactivating Properties and Increased Sensitivity in Molecular Diagnostics by PAXgene,a Novel Non-Crosslinking Tissue Fixative

Background

Requirements on tissue fixatives are getting more demanding as molecular analysis becomes increasingly relevant for routine diagnostics. Buffered formaldehyde in pathology laboratories for tissue fixation is known to cause chemical modifications of biomolecules which affect molecular testing. A novel non-crosslinking tissue preservation technology, PAXgene Tissue (PAXgene), was developed to preserve the integrity of nucleic acids in a comparable way to cryopreservation and also to preserve morphological features comparable to those of formalin fixed samples.

Methods

Because of the excellent preservation of biomolecules by PAXgene we investigated its pathogen inactivation ability and biosafety in comparison to formalin by in-vitro testing of bacteria, human relevant fungi and human cytomegalovirus (CMV). Guidelines for testing disinfectants served as reference for inactivation assays. Furthermore, we tested the properties of PAXgene for detection of pathogens by PCR based assays.

Results

All microorganisms tested were similarly inactivated by PAXgene and formalin except Clostridium sporogenes, which remained viable in seven out of ten assays after PAXgene treatment and in three out of ten assays after formalin fixation. The findings suggest that similar biosafety measures can be applied for PAXgene and formalin fixed samples. Detection of pathogens in PCR-based diagnostics using two CMV assays resulted in a reduction of four to ten quantification cycles of PAXgene treated samples which is a remarkable increase of sensitivity.

Conclusion

PAXgene fixation might be superior to formalin fixation when molecular diagnostics and highly sensitive detection of pathogens is required in parallel to morphology assessment.