BACKGROUND: It is thought in traditional Chinese medicine that "the head is the residence of intelligence", "the head is the leader of body, and the focus of the spirit". Therefore, scalp electro-acupuncture can induce resuscitation, relieve mental confusion, dredge the meridian and eliminate the depression in treatment of post-stroke depression.OBJECTIVE: To observe the curative effect of head acupuncture on poststroke depression.DESIGN: Randomized controlled and single blind evaluationSETTING: Department of Acupuncture and Moxibustion, Nanfang Hospital of Southern Medical University; College of Acupuncture and Massage,Guangzhou University of Traditional Chinese Medicine.PARTICIPANTS: Totally 90 patients with post-stroke depression were from Affiliated Nanfang Hospital and,Zhujiang Hospital of Southern Medical University, First Affiliated Hospital of Guangzhou University of Traditional Chinese Medicine were recruited. The Score of all the patients in Hamilton Rating Scale for Depression (HRSD) were ＞ 20. Ninety patients were randomly divided as scalp acupuncture group (n=46) and routine acupuncture group (n=44).METHODS: The patients in the routine acupuncture group were treated mainly at points of three-yang meridians of foot and hand at the hemiplegia side. The points include jianyu (LI-15) , binao (LI-14) , quchi (LI-11),shousanli (LI-10), waiguan (SJ-5), hegu (LI-4), biguan (St-31), liangqiu (St-34), zusanli (St-36), yanglingquan (GB-34), kunlun (UB-60), jiexi (St41). The above points were divided into 2 groups, 1 group each day, alternately. Even reinforcing-reducing method was used, with 30-minute needle retention, 6 successive days treatment with 1 day rest, for 6 weeks totally.The patients in the scalp acupuncture were treated with, besides the above method, scalp acupuncture. Mid-parietal line, mid-frontal line, laterofrontal lineI (both sides)were chosen. After arrival of qi, G6805 type electro-acupuncture apparatus (interrupted wave, 50 Hz,4 V) was connected, with 30-minute needle retention, 6 suocessive days treatment with 1 day rest, 6 for 6 weeks totally. HRSD was used to evaluate the status of depression before and after treatment. Stroke score was used to evaluate the curative effect of stroke.MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: HRSD scores and curative effect of apoplexy before and after treatment of the patients in two groups.RESULTS: According to the intention treatment, all 90 patients entered the result analysis. ① HRSD score after treatment was lower than that be fore treatment in the scalp acupuncture group,and that after treatment group in the routine acupuncture group (8.55±1.73,30.61±4.02,15.04±2.33,P ＜ 0.01 ). ②There was no significant difference of the total effective rate in the two groups , but some tendency indicated the effective rate in the scalp acupuncture group was better than that in the routine acupuncture group ( 100% ,98% ,x2=1.9167 ,P ＞ 0.05).CONCLUSION: Scalp electro-acupuncture has obvious curative effect on post-stroke depression. The amelioration of melancholia has a certain promoting effect on rehabilitation of apoplexy.

BACKGROUND: Recent studies indicate that after indirect co-culture of neonate rat myocardial cells and bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells, bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells can differentiate into myocardial cells successfully. OBJECTIVE: To induce human bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells (hBMSCs) to differentiate into endothelial cells using human umbilical vein endothelial cells by indirect co-culture. DESIGN, TIME AND SETTING: In vitro study of cell engineering was done at the Medical Research Center of Guangdong Provincial People’s Hospital between January and July 2007. MATERIALS: Small quantities of bone marrow were obtained from 11 children with congenital heart disease but without hematologic diseases through manubrium of sternum puncture in the congenital heart defect corrective surgery after the permission of family member. Umbilical cord of full-term normal delivery healthy newborn was provided by the Department of Obstetrics, the First Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University. Fresh cattle jugular vein was provided by Guangdong Dali Meat Cattle Butchery. METHODS: The hBMSCs were isolated and purified using density gradient centrifugation method and were cultured in vitro. Human umbilical vein endothelial cells were obtained from newborn umbilical cord by enzyme digestion. Cell culture insert with semipermeable membrane combined with 6-well plate was used to do indirect co-culture induction. Human umbilical vein endothelial cells were expanded in the cell culture insert, passage 3 bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells were expanded in the 6-well plate outside the culture insert at the density of 1?105 cells/well, the initial ratio of the two kinds of cells was 1:5, then low-glucose DMEM culture solution containing 10% fetal bovine serum was added, cells were cultured for 14 days. Co-culture of bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells and bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells was used as control. Introduced endothelioid cells were cultured and then seeded on the cell-free cattle jugular vein intravascular stent. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Morphology changes of induced cells; introduced endothelioid cell surface antigen detected through immunocytochemical staining; the growth and adhesion condition of endothelioid cells on the intravascular stent observed under scanning electronic microsope. RESULTS: The morphologies of introduced endothelial cells were uniform, introduced endothelial cells presented a cobblestone-like appearance, they amplified fast and expressed endothelial cell-specific surface marker CD31 and vWF and the positive rate was over 99%. They also could form a continuous unicellular layer on the cell-free cattle jugular vein intravascular stent. CONCLUSION: Human umbilical vein endothelial cells can induce hBMSCs to differentiate into endothelial cells successfully and to adhere and grew on the cell-free cattle jugular vein intravascular stent through indirect co-culture method.

Background The clinical efficacy and safety of mouse nerve growth factor(NGF) for injection have been evaluated by Ⅰ,Ⅱ,Ⅲ stage of clinical trials.But as a clinical drug,its adverse effects for special population should been further studied.Objective This clinical trial was to observe and assess the safety and tolerability of mouse NGF for injection during the application in juvenile and elder patients with optic nerve damage.Methods A multicenter non-randomized controlled trial for the safety evaluation of mouse NGF injection solution was performed in 100 eye centers in China.This study protocol was approved by the Ethic Committee of each drug research center,and written informed consent was obtained from the subject,legal mandatary and guardian prior to this study.Total 2046 patients who met the included criteria of optical nerve damage were enrolled.The patients were divided into the juvenile group(90 cases,＜ 18 years),youth-middle-age group (1868 cases,1 8-75 years) and older group(88 cases,＞75 years).Mouse NGF(30 μg)was intranuscularly injected once per day for 21 days in all the patients.Systolic and diastolic blood pressure,heart rate,intraocular pressure (lOP),laboratory examinations of blood and urine,blood biochemical indexes were recorded before and after injection.All adverse events were evaluated after administration of drug.Results There were 189 (189/2046,9.23％)dropped out cases,including 184 lost cases after 3 weeks of treatment and 5 withdrew cases from adverse responses of drug,with a shedding rate ＜10％ in each group.Total 1857 individuals finished this trial.No significant differences were found in the IOP,heart rate and blood pressure between before and after admninistration of grug in the juvenile group,youth-middle-age group and older group (P＞0.05).The incidence rate of the adverse response in the juvenile group,youth-middle-age group and older group was 57.78％,68.18％,60.01％ respectively,and the primary local adverse events were pain(48.89％),redness and swelling(59.09％),duration(54.49％),without significant difference in the rate of local adverse events among the three groups(X2 =2.302,P =0.324).The abnormal rates of laboratory results of blood and urine were not significantly different among the three groups(all at P＞0.05).The percentage of impaired fasting glucose was 7.46％,23.73％and 7.79％ in the juvenile group,youth-middle-age group and older group,respectively,and the percentage in the older group was higher than that in the juvenile group and the youth-middle-age group (x2 =8.685,P =0.005 ;x2 =27.720,P =0.000).Conclusions Injection of mouse NGF is well tolerated in juvenile and elder patients over the age of 75 years.

ObjectiveTo explore the clinical diagnostic value of ambulatory EEG (AEEG) in epilepsy and atypical epilepsy.MethodsThe monitoring of 24-hour AEEG were performed in 67 epileptic and 53 atypical epileptic.Results65.7% of epileptic cases presented abnormality, and 34.0% of atypical epilepsy. The 85.5% of epileptic form discharges were found in the stage of sleep, especially in the Ⅰor Ⅱstage of NREM. The main epileptic form discharges was sharp waves.ConclusionThe monitoring of 24-hour AEEG may play important role in the diagnosis of epilepsy or atypical epilepsy, but can do little in the classification and detecting the focus of epilepsy.

Objective To investigate the difference of the protein expression in serum of rats with acute edematous pancreatitis (AEP) and acute necrotizing pancreatitis (ANP),and to investigate serum marker for acute pancreatitis severity.Methods The model of AEP and ANP was induced by retrograde injection of 4％ or 5％ sodium taurocholate into the biliopancreatic duct.Weak cation exchange (WCX2) and surface enhanced laser desorption/ionization time of flight mass spectrometry ( SELDI TOF MS) was used to investigate the difference of the protein expression in serum of rats with AEP and ANP.Results Thirty-eight spectral peak clusters which had significantly different signal intensities between AEP and ANP sera at mass charge ratio between 1000-50 000(P ＜0.05) were detected.The peak clusters at 9500 and 9700 in the sera of AEP were higher than that in ANP rata.Conclusions Serum analysis with SELDI-TOF MS can detect the difference of the protein expression in rats with AEP and ANP.The decreased expression of the protein of molecular weight of 9500 and 9700 may be a signal of AEP transition into ANP.

Objective To study 18F-deoxyglueose positron emission tomography computed tomo graphy(18 FDG PET-CT) in the diagnosis of cervical lymph node(LN) metastasis from rabbit nasopharyngeal VX2 carcinoma.Methods Nasopharyngeal VX2 carcinoma model using 30 rabbits was established. 18 FDG PET-CT,MRI and pathological diagnosis were performed and compared.ResultsFifty-three cervi cal LNs were picked up from resected specimens of 30 rabbits with nasopharyngeal VX2 carcinoma.There were 42 pathologically confirmed positive LNs.Positivity rate was significantly correlated with the volume and the shortest diameter of the LNs (r = 9.18,P =0.007 ; r = 2.77,P = 0.008).The diagnostic sensitivity of PET-CT was 96% (24/25) and 29% (5/17) for LNs with volume >0.5 cm3 and ≤0.5 cm3 ,83% (25/30) and 33% (4/12) for LNs with the shortest diameter ≥0.5 cm and < 0.5 cm,respectively.The diagnostic sensitivity,specificity and accuracy of PET-CT was 69% (29/42) ,100% (11/11) and 95% (40/42) ,com paring with 60% (25/42) ,91% (10/11) and 83% (35/42) of MRl,respectively.The volume measured by PET-CT images was not significantly different from the pathologically measured volume (t =-1.23,P = 0.233) ,while the volume measured by MRI was significantly different from the pathologically measured vol ume (t =-3.99,P = 0.001).Conclusions The sensitivity,specificity and accuracy of PET-CT are better than those of MRl,especially for the cervical lymph nodes with volume >0.5 cm3 or the shortest diameter ≤ 0.5 cm.PET-CT also can be used to detect the smaller metastatic lymph nodes,though the false negative rate is higher.

AIM:To observe the effects of the combination of berberin and epirubicin on the cell cycle of T24 bladder cancer cells and the underlying mechanisms.METHODS:The cancer cells were exposed to epirubicin in the presence or absence of different concentrations of berberin.The viability of the cancer cells was determined by MTT assay.The cell cycle distribution was detected by flow cytometry, and the protein levels of cyclin D1, CDK2, CDK4, P21 and P27 were detected by Western blot.RESULTS:Berberine markedly enhanced the inhibitory effect of epirubicin on the viability of T24 cells and promoted epirubicin-induced cell cycle arrest at G0/G1 phase as compared with the negative control cells.Epirubicin increased the protein expression of P27 and P21, both of which were enhanced by treatment with berberin.In contrast, berberin exposure further decreased the protein expression of cyclin D1, CDK2 and CDK4 in epirubicin-treated T24 cells.CONCLUSION:Berberine significantly promotes epirubicin-induced G0 /G1 phase arrest in human bladder cancer cells by up-regulating P27 and P21 expression and inhibiting the expression of cyclin D1, CDK2 and CDK4.

Objective To evaluate the value of the differential diagnosis of peripheral pulmonary cancer using contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS).MethodsTotally 59 patients selected with peripheral pulmonary lesions(27 primary lung cancer and 32 non-lung cancer cases including 12 pulmonary abscess,19 tuberculosis and 1 hemangioma subjects)were examined by traditional gray-scale sonography and color Doppler flow imaging (CDFI),the lesions shape,borders,echo characteristic and blood flow were recorded first,and then the contrast enhancedsonographicstudies were performed.The process of contrast enhancement and regression was observed and the parameters were quantitative analyzed by acoustic quantification analysis software (ACQ).Finally,surgery or biopsy were conducted.Results CEUS had higher detection rates of blood flow signals than CDFI( P ＜0.001 ).There were significant differences (P ＜ 0.01) between the primary lung cancer group and the non-lung cancer group regarding parameters peak intensity ( PI ) and enhanced intensity ( EI ).By drawing the ROC curve and obtaining the area under the curve:a cut-off value＞15.7 dB of PI in assessing lung cancer had higher sensitivity and specificity (66.7 ％,81.2％).A cut-off value＞ 10.77 dB of EI in assessing lung cancer had higher sensitivity and specificity (81.5％,68.8％).Conclusions CEUS is helpful to identify necrotic tissue in biopsy and improving the biopsy positive rate.The parameters of PI and EI can help to identify the primary lung cancer with the Nonlung cancer.

Objective To screen the genes related with signal transducers and activators of transcription 3 (STAT3) regulating pancreatic cancer invasion and metastasis by gene chips.Methods Human pancreatic cancer cell line SW1990 stably expressing low level of Stat3 was established by lentivirus transfection,while cells transfected with mock plasmid and cells without transfection served as control groups.The differences of invasion and metastasis related genes expression among the three groups were screened by gene chips.STAT3 mRNA and protein expression was measured by real-time PCR and Western blot.Three differentially expressed genes (MMP-7,IL-1β and IgTα7) were verified.ResultsThe expression level of STAT3 mRNA was 0.391 ± 0.037 after pancreatic cancer SW1990 cell trarsfected with STAT3 targeted lentivirus,which was significantly lower than those in mock plasmid group (1.002 ± 0.015) and nontransfected group ( 1.206 ± 0.042,P ＜ 0.05 ) ; the expression level of STAT3 protein was 182.38 ± 65.32,which was significantly lower than those in mock plasmid group (223.40 ±58.40) and non-transfected group (212.33 ±53.69).Eight invasion and metastasis related genes of SW1990 lowly expressing Stat3 were upregulated,while 3 genes were down-regulated.By verification,the mRNA level of MMP-7 and IL-1β were lower than in control group transfected with mook plassmid(0.287 ± 0.115 vs 1.010 ± 0.124,t =19.45,P =0.000;0.490 ± 0.10 vs 1.002 ± 0.002,t =13.83,P =0.000),but the mRNA level of IgTα7 was not decreased (1.173 ±0.280 vs 0.998 ±0.003,t =4.236,P =0.094).Meanwhile,the protein level of MMP-7 was significantly down-regulated when Stat3 was knocked down.ConclusionsStat3 causes changes of expressions of many invasion and metastasis-related genes of SW1990,and MMP-7 may be the main target gene regulated by Stat3.

Aim To study the transport of geniposide and geniposide in Zhizi Bopi Decoction in MDCK cell membrane model. Methods The safety concentration of geniposide and Zhizi Bopi Decoction in MDCK cells were determined by MTT assay. Then the MDCK cell membrane model was used to investigate the transport of drugs. Firstly, the effects of time, drug concentra-tion, P-gp inhibitor and EDTA on the absorption and transport of geniposide were studied systematically. Secondly, the differences were compared between the transport of the same concentration of geniposide as single compound and that in Zhizi Bopi Decoction in MDCK cell model. The drug concentration was deter-mined by high performance liquid chromatography ( HPLC) to calculate the apparent permeability coeffi-cient (Papp). Results Geniposide transport in MDCK cell monolayer was time and concentration dependent. P-gp inhibitors had no significant effect on its transport and the transport of geniposide was enhanced by ED-TA. The absorption Papp of different concentrations of geniposide in Zhizi Bopi Decoction were ( 8. 96 ± 0. 35 ) × 10 -7 cm · s-1 , ( 8. 95 ± 0. 38 ) × 10 -7 cm · s-1 and (9. 16 ± 0. 30) × 10 -7 cm·s-1, significantly higher than the absorption Papp of geniposide as single compound(5. 85 ± 0. 44) × 10 -7 cm·s-1, (6. 88 ± 0. 38) × 10 -7 cm·s-1 and (6. 31 ± 0. 19) × 10 -7 cm ·s-1 ( P<0. 05 ) . Conclusion The transport of ge-niposide in MDCK cell membrane model is passive transport and is not affected by P-gp. Geniposide may transport via the paracellular route. The Zhizi Bopi De-coction can increase the absorption of geniposide.