NEET MDS Lessons
General Pathology
Aplasticanaemia and pancytopenia.
Aplastic anaemia is a reduction in all the formed elements of blood due to marrow hypoplasia.
Causes
- Primary or Idiopathic.
- Secondary to :
1 Drugs :
Antimetabolites and antimitotic agents.
Antiepileptics.
Phenylbutazone.
Chloramphenicol.
2 Industrial chemicals.
Benzene.
DDT and other insecticides.
TNT (used in explosives).
3 Ionising radiation
- Familial aplasia
Pancytopenia (or reduction in the formed elements of blood) can be caused by other conditions also like:
-Subleukaemic acute leukaemia.
-Megaloblastic anaemia
-S.L.E.
-hypersplenism.
-Marrow infiltration by lymphomas metastatic deposits, tuberculosis, myeloma etc
Features:
- Anaemia.
- Leucopenia upper respiratory infections.
- Thrombocytopenis :- petechiae and bruising.
Blood picture:
- Normocytic normochromic anaemia with minimal anisopoikilocytosis in aplastic anaemia. Other causes of pancytopenia may show varying degrees of anisopoikilocytosis
- Neutropenia with hypergranulation and high alkaline phosphatase.
- Low platelet counts
Bone marrow:
- Hypoplastic (may have patches of norm cellular or hyper cellular marrow) which may -> dry tap. .
- Increase in fat cells , fibroblasts , reticulum cells, lymphocytes and plasma cells
- Decrease in precursors of all three-Series.
- Underlying cause if any, of pancytopenia may be seen
Summary
Hepatitis A → ssRNA → Picornavirus → Oral–anal
Hepatitis B → dsDNA → Hepadnavirus → Sexual contact , Blood (needles), Perinatal
Hepatitis C → ssRNA → Flavivirus → Sexual contact , Blood (needles)
Hepatitis D → ssRNA → Deltavirus → Sexual contact, Blood (needles)
Hepatitis E → ssRNA → Calicivirus → Oral–anal
Strep viridans
Mixed species, all causing α-hemolysis. All are protective normal flora which block adherence of other pathogens. Low virulence, but can cause some diseases:
Sub-acute endocarditis can damage heart valves.
Abscesses can form which are necrotizing. This is the primary cause of liver abscesses.
Dental caries are caused by Str. mutans. High virulence due to lactic acid production from glucose fermentation. This is why eating sugar rots teeth. Also have surface enzymes which deposit plaque.
Abnormalities in chromosome number
Trisomy 21 (Down syndrome)
(1) The most common chromosomal disorder.
(2) A disorder affecting autosomes. It is generally caused by meiotic nondisjunction in the mother, which results in an extra copy of chromosome 21 or trisomy 21.
(3) Risk increases with maternal age.
(4) Clinical findings include mental retardation and congenital heart defects. There is also an increased risk of developing acute leukemia
and an increased susceptibility to severe infections.
(5) Oral findings include macroglossia, delayed eruption of teeth, and hypodontia.
Trisomies 18 and 13
(1) Trisomy 18 (Edwards syndrome):
characterized by an extra copy of chromosome 18. Oral findings include micrognathia.
(2) Trisomy 13 (Patau’s syndrome): characterized by an extra copy of chromosome 13. Oral findings include cleft lip and palate.
(3) Meiotic nondisjunction is usually the cause of an extra chromosome in both of these trisomies.
(4) Clinical findings for both of these trisomies are usually more severe than trisomy 21. Most children with these diseases die within months after being born due to manifestations such as congenital heart disease.
Klinefelter’s syndrome
(1) One of the most common causes of male hypogonadism.
(2) Characterized by two or more X chromosomes and one or more Y chromosomes. Typically, there are 47 chromosomes with the karyotype of XXY.
(3) The cause is usually from meiotic nondisjunction.
(4) Clinical findings include atrophic and underdeveloped testes, gynecomastia, tall stature, and a lower IQ.
Turner’s syndrome
(1) One of the most important causes of amenorrhea.
(2) Characterized by having only one X chromosome, with a total of 45 chromosomes and a karyotype of XO.
(3) Clinical findings include underdeveloped female genitalia, short stature, webbed neck, and amenorrhea. Affected females are usually
sterile. Unlike other chromosomal disorders, this one is usually not complicated by mental retardation.
Treacher Collins syndrome (mandibulofacial dysostosis)
(1) Genetic transmission: autosomal dominant.
(2) A relatively rare disease that results from abnormal development of derivatives from the first and second branchial arches.
(3) Clinical findings include underdeveloped zygomas and mandible and deformed ears. Oral findings include cleft palate and small or absent parotid glands.
Staphylococcal Infection
Staphylococci, including pathogenic strains, are normal inhabitants of the nose and skin of most healthy people
Virulence factors include coagulase (which clots blood), hemolysin, and protein A (which ties up Fc portions of antibodies). Although we have antibodies against staphylococci, they are of limited usefulness.
Staphylococci (and certain other microbes) also produce catalase, which breaks down H2O2, rendering phagocytes relatively helpless against them.
The coagulase-positive staphylococcus (Staphylococcus pyogenes var. aureus) is a potent pathogen. It tends to produce localized infection
It is the chief cause of bacterial skin abscesses. Infection spreads from a single infected hair (folliculitis) or splinter to involve the surrounding skin and subcutaneous tissues
Furuncles are single pimples
carbuncles are pimple clusters linked by tracks of tissue necrosis which involve the fascia.
Impetigo is a pediatric infection limited to the stratum corneum of the skin -- look for honey-colored crusts
Staphylococcal infections of the nail-bed (paronychia) and palmar fingertips (felons) are especially painful and destructive
These staph are common causes of wound infections (including surgical wounds) and of a severe, necrotizing pneumonia. Both are serious infections in the hospitalized patient.
Staph is the most common cause of synthetic vascular graft infections. Certain sticky strains grow as a biofilm on the grafts
Staph aureus is pathogenic, β-hemolytic, and makes coagulase.
Staph epidermidis are non-pathogenic strains that don’t make coagulase. Often Antibiotics resistant, and can become opportunistic infections in hospitals.
Staph aureus is normal flora in the nose and on skin, but can also colonize moist areas such as perineum. Causes the minor infections after cuts. Major infections occur with lacerations or immune compromise, where large number of cocci are introduced.
While Staph aureus can invade the gut directly (invasive staphylococcal enterocolitis), it is much more common to encounter food poisoning due to strains which have produced enterotoxin B, a pre-formed toxin in un-refrigerated meat or milk products
Staph epidermidis (Coagulase-negative staphylococci)
Universal normal flora but few virulence factors. Often antibiotic resistant.
Major cause of foreign body infections such as prosthetic valve endocarditis and IV line sepsis.
Staph saprophyticus
Common cause of UTI in women.
Pathogenicity
Dominant features of S. aureus infections are pus, necrosis, scarring. The infections are patchy. Serious disease is rare because we are generally immune. However, foreign bodies or necrotic tissue can start an infection. Staph infections include wound infections, foreign body sepsis, pneumonia, meningitis.
Occassionally, S. aureus can persist within cells.
Major disease presentations include:
--Endocarditis
--Abscesses (due to coagulase activity)
--Toxic Shock
--Wound infections
--Nosocomial pneumonia
Prevention of Staph aureus infections
S. aureus only lives on people, so touching is the main mode of transmission. Infected patients should be isolated, but containment is easy with intense hand washing.
Eczematous Dermatitis
Eczematous dermatitis includes a large category of skin lesions characterized by severe pruritus and distinctive gross and microscopic features.
- type I hypersensitivity is involved with atopic dermatitis in patients who have an allergic history.
- type IV hypersensitivity is involved in contact dermatitis (poison ivy).
- acute eczematous dermatitis is characterized by a weeping, pruritic rash, while a chronic eczematous dermatitis presents with dry, scaly, plaque-like thickening of the skin, a process called lichenification.
CHRONIC INFLAMMATlON
When the inflammatory reaction instead of subsiding after the acute phase (or without entering an acute phase), persists as a smouldering lesion, it is called chronic inflammation. .
Characteristics
- Predominantly mononuclear response.
- Inflamation.and..repair going on simultaneously.
- Usually results in more prominent-scarring.
Causes:
Chronicity may be due to :
- Defective defence mechanisms.
- Persistence of injurious agent.
(a) Certain organisms resist phagocytosis and destruction e.g tubercle bacillus, fungi
(b) insoluble particulate matter e.g., crystals. fibres suture materials.
(c) Constants supply of causative agent as in autoimmune disease where body reacts against its own tissues.
- Defective healing.
Granulomatous inflammation
It is a type of chronic inflammation characterised by localised collections of histiocytes.
These cells are usually accompanied by lymphocytes, fibroblasts and giant cells also.
Granulomas are characteristically seen in diseases like tuberculosis. syphilis, leprosy, sarcoidosis, fungal infections etc. In some of these, the lesion is morphologically distinct enough to point to the type of underlying disease. These are sometimes called' specific' granulomas. Granulomas can also be elicited by particulate, insoluble foreign material e.g. granuloma, suture granuloma, cholesterol granuloma (organising haemorrhages).