Displaying publications 1 - 20 of 49 in total

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  1. Nur Azurah, A.G., Ani Amelia, Z., Sagap, I.
    MyJurnal
    We report the case of a 34-year-old Malay, admitted for constipation and abdominal pain at 35 weeks of gestation. Initially, she was diagnosed to have paralytic ileus and was managed conservatively. As her condition did not improve, emergency laparotomy was performed for suspected intestinal obstruction. She delivered a baby boy weighing 2.84kg with good Apgar score through a caesarean section. Intra-operatively, she was noted to have sigmoid volvulus and sigmoidopexy was performed. Post-partum, colonoscopy and bowel decompression was performed. She recovered well and was discharged on day 5. This case illustrates the need to diagnose or suspect volvulus in pregnant woman presenting with severe constipation as early surgical intervention can reduce morbidity to both mother and fetus.
  2. Yaakup H, Sagap I, Fadilah SA
    Singapore Med J, 2008 Oct;49(10):e289-92.
    PMID: 18946602
    Primary oesophageal lymphoma is a very rare entity, with fewer than 30 reported cases worldwide. It represents an important cause of dysphagia. Most of the oesophageal lymphomas are diffuse large B-cell type, with only one reported case of anaplastic large cell lymphoma (ALCL) of T-cell phenotype. Primary oesophageal lymphomas that are not associated with an immunocompromised state tend to affect elderly patients. We describe the first case of primary oesophageal Ki (CD30)-positive ALK+ALCL of T-cell phenotype in a 34-year-old immunocompetent woman, who presented with a two-year history of dysphagia. She was treated with chemotherapy and endoscopic oesophageal dilations and stenting, resulting in complete remission of the lymphoma and resolution of the dysphagia. She then underwent autologous peripheral blood haematopoietic stem cell transplantation and remained disease-free two years after the diagnosis.
  3. Badrasawi MM, Shahar S, Sagap I
    J Multidiscip Healthc, 2014;7:365-70.
    PMID: 25187726 DOI: 10.2147/JMDH.S58752
    Enterocutaneous fistula is a challenging clinical condition with serious complications and considerable morbidity and mortality. Early nutritional support has been found to decrease these complications and to improve the clinical outcome. Location of the fistula and physiological status affect the nutrition management plan in terms of feeding route, calories, and protein requirements. This study investigated the nutritional management procedures at the Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia Medical Center, and attempted to determine factors that affect the clinical outcome. Nutritional management was evaluated retrospectively in 22 patients with enterocutaneous fistula seen over a 5-year period. Medical records were reviewed to obtain data on nutritional status, biochemical indices, and route and tolerance of feeding. Calories and protein requirements are reported and categorized. The results show that surgery was the predominant etiology and low output fistula was the major physiological category; anatomically, the majority were ileocutaneous. The spontaneous healing rate was 14%, the total healing rate was 45%, and the mortality rate was 22%, with 14% due to fistula-associated complications. There was a significant relationship between body mass index/serum albumin levels and fistula healing; these parameters also had a significant relationship with mortality. Glutamine was used in 50% of cases; however, there was no significant relationship with fistula healing or mortality rate. The nutritional status of the patient has an important impact on the clinical outcome. Conservative management that includes nutrition support is very important in order to improve nutritional status before surgical repair of the fistula.
  4. Praveen S, Ho CC, Fadilah S, Sagap I
    Med J Malaysia, 2010 Jun;65(2):98-100.
    PMID: 23756789
    Primary gastrointestinal (GIT) lymphoma constitutes only 5 - 10% of all gastrointestinal tumours. The optimal therapy for these lymphomas is poorly defined and still controversial. We present our experience in the treatment and outcome of primary GIT lymphomas in UKM Medical Center, Malaysia. A retrospective review of all patients with primary GIT lymphoma from the year 2002 until 2007 was done. Our series has shown that primary GIT lymphoma is a rare disease as it comprises only 6.5% of all lymphomas treated in this institution. We had a female predominance of this disease with a large majority at an advanced stage of the disease. There was equal distribution involving stomach, small and large intestines. The incidence of primary GIT lymphomas was 6.5% with a female predominance. The majority had advanced diseases (stage III and IV) with equal distribution involving the stomach, small and large intestines. The most common histological variant was diffuse large B cell lymphoma (66%). Most (83%) patients with intestinal lymphoma had surgical resection and adjuvant chemotherapy. All patients with gastric lymphomas had chemotherapy alone. The mortality rate was 22% predominantly in younger patients with aggressive histology subtypes and advanced disease.
  5. Ramzisham ARM, Sagap I, Ismail AM
    Med J Malaysia, 2003 Mar;58(1):125-7.
    PMID: 14556338
    Bleeding into the rectus sheath is an uncommon but a well-recognised condition that mimics several other diagnoses of acute abdomen. A wide range of etiology has been proposed in association with this condition. It is often self-limiting, but can lead to unnecessary laparotomy if the diagnosis is not recognised.
  6. Badrasawi M, Shahar S, Sagap I
    Malays J Med Sci, 2015 12 31;22(4):6-16.
    PMID: 26715903 MyJurnal
    The management of Enterocutaneous fistula (ECF) is challenging. It remains associated with morbidity and mortality, despite advancements in medical and surgical therapies. Early nutritional support using parenteral, enteral or fystuloclysis routs is essential to reverse catabolism and replace nutrients, fluid and electrolyte losses. This study aims to review the current literature on the management of ECF. Fistulae classifications have an impact on the calories and protein requirements. Early nutritional support with parenteral, enteral nutrition or fistuloclysis played a significant role in the management outcome. Published literature on the nutritional management of ECF is mostly retrospective and lacks experimental design. Prospective studies do not investigate nutritional assessment or management experimentally. Individualising the nutritional management protocol was recommended due to the absence of management guidelines for ECF patients.
  7. Sagap I, Elnaim AL, Hamid I, Rose IM
    Indian J Surg, 2011 Jun;73(3):194-8.
    PMID: 22654330 DOI: 10.1007/s12262-010-0197-y
    The survival of Colorectal Cancer patients is very much dependent on complete tumor resection and multimodality adjuvant treatment. However, the main determinants for management plan of these patients rely heavily on accurate staging through histopathological examination (HPE). A reliable standard HPE protocol will be a significant impact in determining best surgical outcome. We evaluate surgeons' intra-operative judgment and the quality of resected specimens in the treatment of colorectal cancers. To quantify the quality of surgery by applying standard HPE protocol in colorectal cancer specimens and to assess the use of new format for pathological reporting in Colorectal Cancer using a formulated standard proforma. We perform a prospective observation of all colorectal cancer patients who underwent surgical resection over 8 month duration. Surgeons are required to make self-assessment about completion of tumor excision and possible lymph nodes or adjacent organ involvement while all pathologists followed standard reporting protocol for examination of the specimens. We evaluate the accuracy of surgeons judgment against HPE. The study involved 44 colorectal cancers comprising of 23 male and 21 female patients. The majority of these patients were Malay (50%) followed by Chinese (43%) and Indian (7%). The main presenting symptoms were bleeding (32%), intestinal obstruction (29%) and perforation (7%). Sixteen (36%) patients underwent emergency surgery.Rectal tumor was the commonest (53%) followed by sigmoid colon (22.7%). Neoadjuvant Chemoradiation were given to 8 patients and complete pathological response was observed in 1 (12.5%) of these. The final TNM classification for staging were; stage I (22.7%), stage IIa (18.2%), stage IIb (11.4%), stage IIIa (2.3%), stage IIIb (25%), stage IIIc (13.6%) and stage IV (6.8%).The commonest surgery performed was anterior resection with mesorectal excision (43.2%). Ten patients (22.7%) had laparoscopic surgery with 3 (30%) patients converted to open surgery. The surgeons claimed to have performed a curative resection with complete excision and clear margin in 40 (90%) patients. Of these, only 1 (2.5%) patient had a positive resection margin. Meanwhile, the surgeons reported involvement of resection margins in 4 cases but this was disputed by the HPE in all 4 cases. Lymph nodes involvement was detected intra-operatively in 13 (29.5%) of the cases and all were proven positive for metastases through HPE. On the other hand, of the remaining 31 patients who were reported as no obvious lymphadenopathy by the surgeons, lymph nodes positvity was found in 7 (22.5%) cases. Using standard HPE reporting protocol brings suitable evaluation of surgery in colorectal cancer treatment. Although surgeons' judgment is fairly accurate in predicting margin clearance and complete specimen excision, complete mesocolic and mesorectal excision is of utmost importance since lymph nodes metastatic involvement may not be obvious at surgery.
  8. Teoh CM, Gunasegaram T, Chan KY, Sukumar N, Sagap I
    Med J Malaysia, 2005 Aug;60(3):275-80.
    PMID: 16379179 MyJurnal
    This is a retrospective study evaluating the risk factors for clinical anastomotic leakage after anterior resection in 64 patients with rectal cancer operated from November 2001 till August 2003. The percentage of anastomosis leakage was higher in those patients with diabetic, low albumin level, neoadjuvant radiotherapy, higher staging, and poorly differentiated tumour. However, these differences were statistically not significant. There was a significant difference (p=0.03) of anastomosis leakage in those patients with very distal tumour of < 4cm from anal verge (42%), when compare to those patients with proximal tumor of > 15cm from anal verge (4.3%). The mortality associated with this complication was 30%. Hence, a surgeon may consider a covering stoma or be more vigilant in operating patients with multiple risk factors.
  9. Cheong KL, Roohi S, Jarmin R, Sagap I, Tong SHY, Qureshi A
    Med J Malaysia, 2000 Dec;55(4):464-6.
    PMID: 11221158
    Colonoscopy is an integral part of the clinician armamentarium in the diagnosis of colorectal cancer and its precursor, the adenoma. Polypoid lesions when identified can be excised at colonoscopy and in turn reduce the risk of colorectal cancer. We prospectively evaluated the yield of colorectal cancer and adenomatous polyps by indication for colonoscopy over a one-year period. A total of 375 colonoscopies were carried out. The more common indications of colonoscopy were rectal bleeding, abdominal pain, surveillance of colorectal cancer and altered bowel habit. The highest yield for cancer was for rectal bleeding with 12.5% while surveillance of patients with a history of polyps yielded the highest percentage of new polyps. We conclude that rectal bleeding as an indication for colonoscopy yielded the highest number of cancers.
  10. Raja Ram NK, Chan KK, Md Nor SF, Sagap I
    Colorectal Dis, 2020 12;22(12):2199-2203.
    PMID: 32780561 DOI: 10.1111/codi.15305
    AIM: Fistula-in-ano (FIA) is an anomalous passage between perianal skin and the anal canal or the rectum that presents many management difficulties. Ligation of intersphincteric fistula tract (LIFT) was introduced as a cost-effective sphincter-saving procedure with a reported success rate of 94.4%. Unfortunately, this procedure is technically challenging, and recently submucosal ligation of fistula tract (SLOFT), a simplification of LIFT, was proposed. Our aim was to assess the SLOFT technique over a longer follow-up period to determine its effectiveness.

    METHOD: A prospective observational study was performed in 47 patients with FIA treated by SLOFT from September 2017 to February 2019.

    RESULTS: There were 47 patients, of whom 33(70.2%) were men. The median age was 39 years (range 30-50 years). All the patients had primary FIA of cryptoglandular origin. The patients were followed up for 1 year and were postoperatively assessed at 2, 4, 12 and 24 weeks and 1 year. The median body mass index was 27.3 kg/m2 (range 24.3-29.4 kg/m2 ) and the median duration of surgery was 15 min (range 13-20 min). Most (83.0%) of the fistulas were trans-sphincteric. The success rates at the end of 24 weeks and 1 year were 87.2% and 80.9%, respectively. No postoperative incontinence was recorded.

    CONCLUSION: In our series the success rate of SLOFT was 80.9%. There were no sphincter-related complications. Repeat SLOFT was feasible for cases of recurrence. Therefore, SLOFT should be considered an alternative sphincter-saving procedure to LIFT for the management of FIA.

  11. Raja Ram NK, Chan KK, Fareeda S, Sagap I
    Colorectal Dis, 2020 12;22(12):2334-2335.
    PMID: 32946673 DOI: 10.1111/codi.15370
  12. Johdi NA, Ait-Tahar K, Sagap I, Jamal R
    Front Immunol, 2017;8:620.
    PMID: 28611777 DOI: 10.3389/fimmu.2017.00620
    Regulatory T cells (Tregs), a subset of CD4(+) or CD8(+) T cells, play a pivotal role in regulating immune homeostasis. An increase in Tregs was reported in many tumors to be associated with immune suppression and evasion in cancer patients. Despite the importance of Tregs, the molecular signatures that contributed to their pathophysiological relevance remain poorly understood and controversial. In this study, we explored the gene expression profiles in Tregs derived from patients with colorectal cancer [colorectal carcinoma (CRC), n = 15], colorectal polyps (P, n = 15), and in healthy volunteers (N, n = 15). Tregs were analyzed using CD4(+)CD25(+)CD127(low)FoxP3(+) antibody markers. Gene expression profiling analysis leads to the identification of 61 and 66 immune-related genes in Tregs derived from CRC and P patients, respectively, but not in N-derived Treg samples. Of these, 30 genes were differentially expressed both in CRC- and P-derived Tregs when compared to N-derived Tregs. Most of the identified genes were involved in cytokine/chemokine mediators of inflammation, chemokine receptor, lymphocyte activation, and T cell receptor (TCR) signaling pathways. This study highlights some of the molecular signatures that may affect Tregs' expansion and possible suppression of function in cancer development. Our findings may provide a better understanding of the immunomodulatory nature of Tregs and could, therefore, open up new avenues in immunotherapy.
  13. Johdi NA, Mazlan L, Sagap I, Jamal R
    Cytokine, 2017 11;99:35-42.
    PMID: 28689023 DOI: 10.1016/j.cyto.2017.06.015
    Soluble proteins including cytokines, chemokines and growth factors are small proteins that mediate and regulate immunity. They involved in the pathogenesis of many diseases including cancers. The concentration of these proteins in biological fluids (serum or plasma) and tissues in diseases may suggest pathway activation that leads to inflammatory response or disease progression. Therefore, these soluble proteins may be useful as a tool for screening, diagnosis classification between stages of disease or surveillance for therapy. Enzyme-linked immunosorbent assays (ELISA) and bioassay have been used as a gold standard in cytokine level measurements in clinical practice. However, these methods allow only single cytokine detection at a time and ineffective for screening purposes. Hence, the innovation of multiplexing technology allows measurement of many these soluble proteins simultaneously, thus allowing rapid, cost effective and better efficiency by using a minute amount of sample. In this study, we explored the profiles of key inflammatory cytokines, chemokines and other soluble proteins from the serum derived from colorectal carcinoma (CRC, n=20), colorectal polyps (P, n=20) and healthy volunteers (N, n=20) using multiplexed bead-based immunoassays. We aimed to evaluate if the levels of these soluble proteins can classify these groups of populations and explore the possible application of the soluble proteins as biomarkers in early stage screening and/or surveillance. We observed significant high IL-4, MIP-1β, FasL and TGF-β1 levels but lower levels for RANTES in P-derived serum as compared to N-derived serum. Significant high IL-8, VEGF, MIP-1β, Eotaxin and G-CSF observed in CRC-derived serum when compared to N-derived serum. Between CRC- and P-derived serum, significantly higher levels of IL-8, Eotaxin and G-CSF but lower levels for TGF-β1 were detected in CRC-derived serum. These preliminary results were obtained from small sample size and could be further validated with larger sample size cohort to produce a panel of biomarkers for CRC and P patients. Our findings might be useful in developing a disease-specific panel for biomarker screening assay. This could be used for early diagnosis and/or treatment surveillance.
  14. Sukor NF, Yahaya A, Sagap I, Jamal R, Johdi NA
    Turk J Biol, 2022;46(5):361-374.
    PMID: 37529004 DOI: 10.55730/1300-0152.2623
    Colorectal cancer (CRC) is a malignant tumor arising from a human inner colon lining that may spread to other organs such as the liver and lungs. Per ARNT Sim domain containing 1 (PASD1) is a cancer-testis antigen expressed in cancers including CRC but not in normal tissues except for normal testes. This study aims to study PASD1 protein as a potential target for CRC immunotherapy. A total of 90 CRC and polyps tissue samples were investigated for PASD1 RNA and protein expression using a real-time polymerase chain reaction and immunohistochemical staining, respectively. Matched patients' peripheral blood mononuclear cells were pulsed with PASD1 peptides and measured for immunogenicity, cell cytotoxicity, and cytokine assays. The clinical data were collected and analyzed accordingly. Our results show that PASD1_v2 mRNA expression was highly expressed in CRC (46.0%) and polyps samples (33.3%). Both PASD1-1 and PASD1-2 proteins were expressed in 31.7% of CRC and 29.4% of polyps samples. Protein expression was weak to moderate positive in the cytoplasm and/or nucleus of the tissues. Immune responses towards CD4-specific PASD1 peptides were detected in 21.7% of CRC and 23.5% of polyps patients. The most immunogenic peptide was PASD1 (1) in CRC while PASD1 (3) in polyps. Cytotoxicity effects were detected up to 57.20% observed in CRC samples while IL-17A and IL-6 cytokines were highly expressed. The demographic data suggest that Chinese female patients more than 60 years old, diagnosed with late-stage rectosigmoid tumors may benefit from the PASD1 peptide immunotherapy approach. This is the first report describing CD4-positive T-helper response to the PASD1 positive CRC patients and its cytotoxicity.
  15. Elnaim ALK, Musa S, Wong MP, Sagap I
    Malays J Med Sci, 2021 Oct;28(5):102-107.
    PMID: 35115892 DOI: 10.21315/mjms2021.28.5.10
    Objective: This study was designed as a prospective and interventional study that evaluated LigaSure™ haemorrhoidectomies with regional anaesthesia as a daycare procedure.

    Methods: Patients with third- and fourth-degree haemorrhoids were recruited from the clinic from January 2018 to December 2019. The procedure was performed as a day case under regional anaesthesia. Using a LigaSureTM device, excisional haemorrhoidectomies (Milligan-Morgan haemorrhoidectomy) were performed without sutures or an anal sponge. We evaluated wound bleeding, pain and urinary retention per daycare protocols.

    Results: A total of 264 patients were enrolled. There were 153 males (57.9%) with a median age of 30 years old (range 16 years old-80 years old). A total of 142 patients (54%) had third-degree haemorrhoids, while the rest had fourth-degree haemorrhoids. The median operating time was 8 min (range 4 min-17 min) and minimal blood loss was observed. During follow-up, the complications were one case (0.3%) had anal stenosis, one case (0.3%) had minimal bleeding and one case (0.3%) had urine retention. Upon discharge, four patients (1.5%) required additional analgesia and another four (1.5%) developed post-spinal headaches. No incontinence was encountered.

    Conclusion: LigaSure™ excisional haemorrhoidectomy is a safe and effective daycare procedure with acceptable re-admission and complication rates.

  16. Wong YP, Shah SA, Shaari N, Mohamad Esa MS, Sagap I, Isa NM
    Asian Pac J Cancer Prev, 2014;15(4):1725-30.
    PMID: 24641399
    Management of patients with stage II colorectal carcinomas remains challenging as 20 - 30% of them will develop recurrence. It is postulated that these patients may harbour nodal micrometastases which are imperceptible by routine histopathological evaluation. The aims of our study were to evaluate (1) the feasibility of multilevel sectioning method utilizing haematoxylin and eosin stain and immunohistochemistry technique with cytokeratin AE1/AE3, in detecting micrometastases in histologically-negative lymph nodes, and (2) correlation between nodal micrometastases with clinicopathological parameters. Sixty two stage I and II cases with a total of 635 lymph nodes were reviewed. Five-level haematoxylin and eosin staining and one-level cytokeratin AE1/AE3 immunostaining were performed on all lymph nodes retrieved. The findings were correlated with clinicopathological parameters. Two (3.2%) lymph nodes in two patients (one in each) were found to harbour micrometastases detected by both methods. With cytokeratin AE1/AE3, we successfully identified four (6.5%) patients with isolated tumour cells, but none through the multilevel sectioning method. Nodal micrometastases detected by both multilevel sectioning and immunohistochemistry methods were not associated with larger tumour size, higher depth of invasion, poorer tumour grade, disease recurrence or distant metastasis. We conclude that there is no difference between the two methods in detecting nodal micrometastases. Therefore it is opined that multilevel sectioning is a feasible and yet inexpensive method that may be incorporated into routine practice to detect nodal micrometastases in centres with limited resources.
  17. Ali Hassan NZ, Mokhtar NM, Kok Sin T, Mohamed Rose I, Sagap I, Harun R, et al.
    PLoS One, 2014;9(4):e92553.
    PMID: 24694993 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0092553
    Integrative analyses of multiple genomic datasets for selected samples can provide better insight into the overall data and can enhance our knowledge of cancer. The objective of this study was to elucidate the association between copy number variation (CNV) and gene expression in colorectal cancer (CRC) samples and their corresponding non-cancerous tissues. Sixty-four paired CRC samples from the same patients were subjected to CNV profiling using the Illumina HumanOmni1-Quad assay, and validation was performed using multiplex ligation probe amplification method. Genome-wide expression profiling was performed on 15 paired samples from the same group of patients using the Affymetrix Human Gene 1.0 ST array. Significant genes obtained from both array results were then overlapped. To identify molecular pathways, the data were mapped to the KEGG database. Whole genome CNV analysis that compared primary tumor and non-cancerous epithelium revealed gains in 1638 genes and losses in 36 genes. Significant gains were mostly found in chromosome 20 at position 20q12 with a frequency of 45.31% in tumor samples. Examples of genes that were associated at this cytoband were PTPRT, EMILIN3 and CHD6. The highest number of losses was detected at chromosome 8, position 8p23.2 with 17.19% occurrence in all tumor samples. Among the genes found at this cytoband were CSMD1 and DLC1. Genome-wide expression profiling showed 709 genes to be up-regulated and 699 genes to be down-regulated in CRC compared to non-cancerous samples. Integration of these two datasets identified 56 overlapping genes, which were located in chromosomes 8, 20 and 22. MLPA confirmed that the CRC samples had the highest gains in chromosome 20 compared to the reference samples. Interpretation of the CNV data in the context of the transcriptome via integrative analyses may provide more in-depth knowledge of the genomic landscape of CRC.
  18. Abdul Karim R, Zakaria NF, Zulkifley MA, Mustafa MM, Sagap I, Md Latar NH
    Biomed Eng Online, 2013;12:21.
    PMID: 23496940 DOI: 10.1186/1475-925X-12-21
    Telepointer is a powerful tool in the telemedicine system that enhances the effectiveness of long-distance communication. Telepointer has been tested in telemedicine, and has potential to a big influence in improving quality of health care, especially in the rural area. A telepointer system works by sending additional information in the form of gesture that can convey more accurate instruction or information. It leads to more effective communication, precise diagnosis, and better decision by means of discussion and consultation between the expert and the junior clinicians. However, there is no review paper yet on the state of the art of the telepointer in telemedicine. This paper is intended to give the readers an overview of recent advancement of telepointer technology as a support tool in telemedicine. There are four most popular modes of telepointer system, namely cursor, hand, laser and sketching pointer. The result shows that telepointer technology has a huge potential for wider acceptance in real life applications, there are needs for more improvement in the real time positioning accuracy. More results from actual test (real patient) need to be reported. We believe that by addressing these two issues, telepointer technology will be embraced widely by researchers and practitioners.
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