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1.
Does presbygeusia really exist? An updated narrative review.
Ponzo, V, Bo, M, Favaro, E, Merlo, F, Isaia, G, Presta, R, Collo, A, Riso, S, Bo, S
Aging clinical and experimental research. 2024;(1):84
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Abstract
This review critically assessed the existence of presbygeusia, i.e., the impairment in taste perception occurring in the elderly, as a natural part of the aging process and its potential clinical implications. Several factors might contribute to age-related taste alterations (TAs), including structural changes in taste buds, alterations in saliva composition, central nervous system changes, and oral microbiota dysbiosis. A comprehensive literature review was conducted to disentangle the effects of age from those of the several age-related diseases or conditions promoting TAs. Most of the included studies reported TAs in healthy elderly people, suggesting that presbygeusia is a relatively frequent condition associated with age-related changes in the absence of pathological conditions. However, the impact of TAs on dietary preferences and food choices among the elderly seems to be less relevant when compared to other factors, such as cultural, psychological, and social influences. In conclusion, presbygeusia exists even in the absence of comorbidities or drug side effects, but its impact on dietary choices in the elderly is likely modest.
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The effects of a fibre-enriched bakery product on glucose, insulin values and appetite. A pilot randomised cross-over trial.
Ponzo, V, Ojeda-Mercado, D, Finocchiaro, C, Goitre, I, Favaro, E, Lamberti, L, Bo, S
International journal of food sciences and nutrition. 2024;:1-9
Abstract
Brewers spent grain (BSG) is a valuable source of arabinoxylans with potential beneficial effects on glucose values. This pilot randomised crossover double-blind trial compared the effects of panettone, a sweet baked-product, enriched with BSG-fibre (p-rich) to unenriched panettone (p-standard) on glucose and insulin blood values and appetite scores. Ten healthy volunteers consumed each food in a random order. Blood variables and appetite scores were assessed at fasting and at different intervals after each food consumption. Glucose values were significantly higher after p-standard intake at 90-min (89.9 ± 16.1 vs 74.6 ± 19.4 mg/dL) and 120-min (81.1 ± 9.85 vs 72.1 ± 14.0 mg/dL). The areas-under-the-curve (AUCs) were lower for both glucose (p = .043) and insulin values (p = .036) with p-rich. At 240-min, satiety was higher (p = .006), and desire-to-eat lower (p = .008) with p-rich; desire-to-eat AUC was lower with p-rich too (p = .029). The integration of a small amount of BSG-derived fibre into a sweet food led to improved glycaemic control and appetite regulation.
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Effects of Treatment with Liraglutide Early after Surgical Intervention on Clinical Outcomes in Patients with Short Bowel Syndrome: A Pilot Observational "Real-Life" Study.
Merlo, FD, Aimasso, U, Ossola, M, Ippolito, M, Cravero, L, Ponzo, V, Bo, S
Nutrients. 2023;(12)
Abstract
Liraglutide, a glucagon-like peptide-1 agonist, has been shown to have beneficial effects on fecal output in short bowel syndrome (SBS) by small human studies. Its potential effects early after gut resection are not known. In this pilot observational study, we described the 1- and 6-month liraglutide effects in 19 adult patients with a new SBS diagnosis within 1 month after surgical resection. Stomal/fecal and urinary outcomes, serum/urinary electrolytes, and body composition were assessed. Both within-group differences and between-group comparisons with 20 SBS patients refusing liraglutide treatment were evaluated. The main liraglutide-related side effect was mild nausea, except in one patient, who experienced severe nausea/vomiting. The median ostomy/fecal output was significantly reduced by -550 mL/day after 6 months of treatment (vs. -200 mL/day in untreated, p = 0.04). The number of patients reaching a ≥20% output reduction was 10/19 (52.6%) treated vs. 3/20 (15.0%) untreated patients (p = 0.013) at 1 month and 12/19 (63.2%) vs. 6/20 (30.0%) (p = 0.038) at 6 months, respectively. Participants with a clinically relevant output reduction at 6 months had a significantly lower baseline weight and BMI. Energy parenteral supply significantly decreased, while infused volumes, oral energy, and fluid intakes slightly decreased, though not significantly. This pilot study supports liraglutide benefits in ostomy/fecal output early after surgical gut resection in SBS patients, particularly in those with lower baseline weight values.
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Naturally occurring prenylated stilbenoids: food sources, biosynthesis, applications and health benefits.
Bo, S, Chang, SK, Zhu, H, Jiang, Y, Yang, B
Critical reviews in food science and nutrition. 2023;(26):8083-8106
Abstract
Prenylated stilbenoids are a unique class of natural phenolic compounds consisting of C6-C2-C6 skeleton with prenyl substitution. They are potential nutraceuticals and dietary supplements presented in some edible plants. Prenylated stilbenoids demonstrate promising health benefits, including antioxidant, anti-cancer, anti-inflammatory, anti-microbial activities. This review reports the structure, bioactivity and potential application of prenylated stilbeniods in food industry. Edible sources of these compounds are compiled and summarized. Structure-activity relationship of prenylated stilbenoids are also highlighted. The biosynthesis strategies of prenylated stilbenoids are reviewed. The findings of these compounds as food preservative, nutraceuticals and food additive are discussed. This paper combines the up-to-date information and gives a full image of prenylated stilbenoids.
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Dysgeusia in Patients with Breast Cancer Treated with Chemotherapy-A Narrative Review.
Pellegrini, M, Merlo, FD, Agnello, E, Monge, T, Devecchi, A, Casalone, V, Montemurro, F, Ghigo, E, Sapino, A, Bo, S
Nutrients. 2023;(1)
Abstract
Breast cancer (BC) is the most common cancer worldwide. Chemotherapy (CT) is essential for the treatment of BC, but is often accompanied by several side effects, including taste alterations, due to different mechanisms. Although dysgeusia is usually underestimated by clinicians, it is considered very worrying and disturbing by cancer patients undergoing CT, because it induces changes in dietary choices and social habits, affecting their physical and psychological health, with a profound impact on their quality of life. Several strategies and therapies have been proposed to prevent or alleviate CT-induced dysgeusia. This review aimed to evaluate the available evidence on prevalence, pathophysiological mechanisms, clinical consequences, and strategies for managing dysgeusia in BC patients receiving CT. We queried the National Library of Medicine, the Cochrane Library, Excerpta Medica dataBASE, and the Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature database, performing a search strategy using database-specific keywords. We found that the literature on this topic is scarce, methodologically limited, and highly heterogeneous in terms of study design and criteria for patient inclusion, making it difficult to obtain definitive results and make recommendations for clinical practice.
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Efficacy of Teduglutide for Parenteral Support Reduction in Patients with Short Bowel Syndrome: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.
Bioletto, F, D'Eusebio, C, Merlo, FD, Aimasso, U, Ossola, M, Pellegrini, M, Ponzo, V, Chiarotto, A, De Francesco, A, Ghigo, E, et al
Nutrients. 2022;(4)
Abstract
Teduglutide has been described as an effective treatment for parenteral support (PS) reduction in patients with short bowel syndrome (SBS). However, a quantitative summary of the available evidence is still lacking. PubMed/Medline, EMBASE, Cochrane library, OVID, and CINAHL databases were systematically searched up to July 2021 for studies reporting the rate of response (defined as a ≥20% reduction in PS) to teduglutide among PS-dependent adult patients. The rate of weaning (defined as the achievement of PS independence) was also evaluated as a secondary end-point. Ten studies were finally considered in the meta-analysis. Pooled data show a response rate of 64% at 6 months, 77% at 1 year and, 82% at ≥2 years; on the other hand, the weaning rate could be estimated as 11% at 6 months, 17% at 1 year, and 21% at ≥2 years. The presence of colon in continuity reduced the response rate (-17%, 95%CI: (-31%, -3%)), but was associated with a higher weaning rate (+16%, 95%CI: (+6%, +25%)). SBS etiology, on the contrary, was not found to be a significant predictor of these outcomes, although a nonsignificant trend towards both higher response rates (+9%, 95%CI: (-8%, +27%)) and higher weaning rates (+7%, 95%CI: (-14%, +28%)) could be observed in patients with Crohn's disease. This was the first meta-analysis that specifically assessed the efficacy of teduglutide in adult patients with SBS. Our results provide pooled estimates of response and weaning rates over time and identify intestinal anatomy as a significant predictor of these outcomes.
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Lifestyle-Related Risk Factors of Orthorexia Can Differ among the Students of Distinct University Courses.
Guglielmetti, M, Ferraro, OE, Gorrasi, ISR, Carraro, E, Bo, S, Abbate-Daga, G, Tagliabue, A, Ferraris, C
Nutrients. 2022;(5)
Abstract
Orthorexia nervosa (ON) is defined as the excessive attention on healthy eating, and studies especially focused on food quality ON prevalence in university students can be extremely variable. The objective of this study is to investigate whether there was a difference in ON risk between health-scientific, economic-humanistic, sport sciences and dietetics and nutrition students, and to evaluate if lifestyle-related ON risk factors (dieting, physical activity, drugs and supplements use) could have an impact in different ways in determining ON risk among students attending these four programs. Participants were recruited at the University of Pavia and received a two-section questionnaire including demographic and lifestyle information and the ORTO-15 questionnaire. A total of 671 students (54% F e 46% M) completed the questionnaire (median age 21.00 (IQR 20.00−23.00), median BMI 21.77 kg/m2 (IQR 20.06−23.66 kg/m2)). The 31.2% had ORTO-15 test scores < 35, and were considered at risk of having ON. No differences were found in ON risk among the students attending the four university courses. Dieting was confirmed as the major ON risk factor for health-scientific, economic-humanistic and sport sciences students. The type of sport practiced was an important determinant of ON risk only for the economic-humanistic course, while supplements use was statistically different between sport sciences students with or without ON. Our findings may suggest that lifestyle-related risk factors of orthorexia can differ among the students of distinct university courses, but these results need to be supported by further longitudinal and prospective studies.
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8.
Identification of Disease-Related 2-Oxoglutarate/Fe (II)-Dependent Oxygenase Based on Reduced Amino Acid Cluster Strategy.
Zhou, J, Bo, S, Wang, H, Zheng, L, Liang, P, Zuo, Y
Frontiers in cell and developmental biology. 2021;:707938
Abstract
The 2-oxoglutarate/Fe (II)-dependent (2OG) oxygenase superfamily is mainly responsible for protein modification, nucleic acid repair and/or modification, and fatty acid metabolism and plays important roles in cancer, cardiovascular disease, and other diseases. They are likely to become new targets for the treatment of cancer and other diseases, so the accurate identification of 2OG oxygenases is of great significance. Many computational methods have been proposed to predict functional proteins to compensate for the time-consuming and expensive experimental identification. However, machine learning has not been applied to the study of 2OG oxygenases. In this study, we developed OGFE_RAAC, a prediction model to identify whether a protein is a 2OG oxygenase. To improve the performance of OGFE_RAAC, 673 amino acid reduction alphabets were used to determine the optimal feature representation scheme by recoding the protein sequence. The 10-fold cross-validation test showed that the accuracy of the model in identifying 2OG oxygenases is 91.04%. Besides, the independent dataset results also proved that the model has excellent generalization and robustness. It is expected to become an effective tool for the identification of 2OG oxygenases. With further research, we have also found that the function of 2OG oxygenases may be related to their polarity and hydrophobicity, which will help the follow-up study on the catalytic mechanism of 2OG oxygenases and the way they interact with the substrate. Based on the model we built, a user-friendly web server was established and can be friendly accessed at http://bioinfor.imu.edu.cn/ogferaac.
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Development and validation of a scoring system for pre-surgical and early post-surgical prediction of bariatric surgery unsuccess at 2 years.
Bioletto, F, Pellegrini, M, D'Eusebio, C, Boschetti, S, Rahimi, F, De Francesco, A, Arolfo, S, Toppino, M, Morino, M, Ghigo, E, et al
Scientific reports. 2021;(1):21067
Abstract
Bariatric surgery (BS) is an effective treatment for morbid obesity. However, a simple and easy-to-use tool for the prediction of BS unsuccess is still lacking. Baseline and follow-up data from 300 consecutive patients who underwent BS were retrospectively collected. Supervised regression and machine-learning techniques were used for model development, in which BS unsuccess at 2 years was defined as a percentage of excess-weight-loss (%EWL) < 50%. Model performances were also assessed considering the percentage of total-weight-loss (%TWL) as the reference parameter. Two scoring systems (NAG-score and ENAG-score) were developed. NAG-score, comprising only pre-surgical data, was structured on a 4.5-point-scale (2 points for neck circumference ≥ 44 cm, 1.5 for age ≥ 50 years, and 1 for fasting glucose ≥ 118 mg/dL). ENAG-score, including also early post-operative data, was structured on a 7-point-scale (3 points for %EWL at 6 months ≤ 45%, 1.5 for neck circumference ≥ 44 cm, 1 for age ≥ 50 years, and 1.5 for fasting glucose ≥ 118 mg/dL). A 3-class-clustering was proposed for clinical application. In conclusion, our study proposed two scoring systems for pre-surgical and early post-surgical prediction of 2-year BS weight-loss, which may be useful to guide the pre-operative assessment, the appropriate balance of patients' expectations, and the post-operative care.
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Mediterranean Diet and SARS-COV-2 Infection: Is There Any Association? A Proof-of-Concept Study.
Ponzo, V, Pellegrini, M, D'Eusebio, C, Bioletto, F, Goitre, I, Buscemi, S, Frea, S, Ghigo, E, Bo, S
Nutrients. 2021;(5)
Abstract
The aim of this observational study was investigating the possible correlation between adherence to the Mediterranean diet (MeD) and SARS-COV-2 infection rates and severity among healthcare professionals (HCPs). An online self-administrated questionnaire (evaluating both MeD adherence and dietary habits) was filled out by HCPs working in Piedmont (Northern Italy) from 15 January to 28 February 2021. Out of the 1206 questionnaires collected, 900 were considered reliable and analyzed. Individuals who reported the SARS-COV-2 infection (n = 148) showed a significantly lower MeD score, with a lower adherence in fruit, vegetables, cereals, and olive oil consumption. In a logistic regression model, the risk of infection was inversely associated with the MeD score (OR = 0.88; 95% CI 0.81-0.97) and the consumption of cereals (OR = 0.64; 0.45-0.90). Asymptomatic individuals with SARS-COV-2 infection reported a lower intake of saturated fats than symptomatic; individuals requiring hospitalization were significantly older and reported worse dietary habits than both asymptomatic and symptomatic individuals. After combining all symptomatic individuals together, age (OR = 1.05; 1.01-1.09) and saturated fats intake (OR = 1.09; 1.01-1.17) were associated with the infection severity. HCPs who reported a SARS-COV-2 infection showed a significantly lower MeD score and cereal consumption. The infection severity was directly associated with higher age and saturated fat intake.