Objective To explore the consistency among different indices of abdominal ultrasonography for the diagnosis of schistosomiasis japonica-related morbidity and the best combination of the indices. Methods Six indices of abdominal ultrasonography were selected to investigate schistosomiasis-related morbidity in residents in a village of Hunan Province, and the Kappa coefficients of diagnostic consistency among different indices and Cronbach's alpha coefficients of different combinations of indices were computed. Results The Kappa coefficients of 'liver parenchyma≥gradeⅡ' with 'right midclavicular subcostal' and with 'portal vein diameter' were 0^4131 and 0^4655 respectively, higher than normal level. The degree of their consistency was fair, and others showed poor or almost no consistency. Among the combinations made up of different indices, the Cronbach's alpha coefficient of the combination made up of 'liver parenchyma≥gradeⅡ', 'right midclavicular subcostal' and 'portal vein diameter' was 0^6566 which was the highest, showing the strongest internal consistency. Conclusion The six indices can not be replaced with each other in assessing schistosomiasis-related morbidity. Before abdominal ultrasonography is used extensively to assess the morbidity, it is necessary to study the diagnostic consistency of these indices and the best combination of the indices.

Objective To study the effect of low frequency on drug release from improved PLGA microcapsules, and investigate the possibility of utilizing PLGA microcapsules as the carrier of ultrasound targeted drug delivery system to deliver drug into brain. Methods Doxorubicin loaded poly (D,L lactic-co-glycolic acid) (PLGA) microcapsules were prepared via double emulsion solvent evaporate method and coated with either chitosan or gelatin. In vitro drug release profile and the drug release rate under the exposure of low frequency pulsed ultrasound (25 kHz) and continuous wave ultrasound (35.1 kHz) were assayed. Results The coating with chitosan or gelatin can depress the burst of drug release. The drug release rate from uncoated and chitosan-coated microcapsules did not changed with the exposure of ultrasound, and the rate of gelatin-coated microcapsules did increased. The effect of pulsed ultrasound was stronger than that of continuous ultrasound. Conclusion The drug release from gelatin-coated PLGA microcapsules can be controlled and triggered by 25 kHz pulsed ultrasound, which may be a potent carrier of targeting drugs into brain.

This paper summarizes the factors affecting schistosomiasis transmission in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River before and after the completion of the Three Gorges Dam and analyzes schistosomiasis prevalence trends to provide a basis for the application of the Three Gorges project methodologies in other areas.The Three Gorges Dam has demonstrated a positive effect on schistosomiasis control.Hubei,Hunan,Jiangxi,Anhui,and Jiangsu in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River are currently regions with a high prevalence of schistosomiasis.These five provinces contained 97.62％ of known snail areas and 93.66％ of calculated schistosomiasis cases with 90.07％ of counties (cities,districts) not yet meeting the criteria for schistosomiasis transmission interruption by the end of 2016.After the Three Gorges Dam was built,the prevalence of schistosomiasis in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River decreased.By the end of 2016,the estimated number of cases decreased by 92.75％ and the snail habitat areas decreased by 6.56％ compared to 2004.No acute schistosomiasis cases have occurred for two consecutive years since 2015.

Hypertension is the primary disease that endangers human health. A convenient and accurate blood pressure measurement method can help to prevent the hypertension. This paper proposed a continuous blood pressure measurement method based on facial video signal. Firstly, color distortion filtering and independent component analysis were used to extract the video pulse wave of the region of interest in the facial video signal, and the multi-dimensional feature extraction of the pulse wave was preformed based on the time-frequency domain and physiological principles; Secondly, an integrated feature selection method was designed to extract the universal optimal feature subset; After that, we compared the single person blood pressure measurement models established by Elman neural network based on particle swarm optimization, support vector machine (SVM) and deep belief network; Finally, we used SVM algorithm to build a general blood pressure prediction model, which was compared and evaluated with the real blood pressure value. The experimental results showed that the blood pressure measurement results based on facial video were in good agreement with the standard blood pressure values. Comparing the estimated blood pressure from the video with standard blood pressure value, the mean absolute error (MAE) of systolic blood pressure was 4.9 mm Hg with a standard deviation (STD) of 5.9 mm Hg, and the MAE of diastolic blood pressure was 4.6 mm Hg with a STD of 5.0 mm Hg, which met the AAMI standards. The non-contact blood pressure measurement method based on video stream proposed in this paper can be used for blood pressure measurement.
Humans ; Blood Pressure/physiology* ; Blood Pressure Determination/methods* ; Algorithms ; Hypertension/diagnosis* ; Sexually Transmitted Diseases