Objective To observe the effects of early rehabilitation training on endothelial progenitor cells (EPCs),stromal cell-derived factor alpha 1 (SDF-lα) and motor function recovery in hemiplegic patients with acute cerebral infarction.Methods Fifty hemiplegic patients after a first acute cerebral infarction were randomly divided into a control group (n =25) and an experimental group (n =25).Both groups of patients were given routine drug therapy,while the experimental group also received early rehabilitation (within 48 hours of onset).EPCs and SDF-1α levels in peripheral blood were measured before and after one week of treatment,and Fugl-Meyer assessments and modified Barthel index scoring were conducted at admission and after three months of treatment.Results There was no difference between the 2 groups before the treatment.After a week of treatment,however,the EPC and SDF-1α values of both groups had increased,with those of the experimental group increasing significantly more than in the control group.Spearman rank correlation analysis showed that the increase in EPCs was positively correlated with the SDF-1α increment in the first week.After 3 months of treatment,the average FMA and MBI results of the experimental group were significantly better than those of the control group.Conclusion Early rehabilitation training can help to further improve the recovery of motor function for hemiplegic patients after acute cerebral infarction.This may be related to its effect in upregulating the expression of SDF-1α,thus contributing to the mobilization of EPCs in the bone marrow.

Objective To supply evidence for quality control of Herba Ephedra by determining content limit in different batches of medicinal material of Herba Ephedra.Methods A RP-HPLC method was used for the determination of ephedrine and pseudo-ephedrine. The chromatographic conditions were: Kromasil RP-C18(250?4.6 mm,5 ?m) column, a mixture of 0.3 %phosphoric acid-methanol (10∶90) as mobile phase and 213nm as detected wavelengths.Results The contents of the above two alkaloids showed great difference among the 14 patches of tested samples. The content of ephedrine ranged 0.361 %～1.538 %and that of pseudo-ephedrine 0.332～2.087 %. The suggested content limitation of ephedrine should be 1.082 %, and that of psedoephedrine be 1.008 %in the crude Herba Ephedra.Conclusion The established method has been proven to be simple, stable and repeatable, and can be applied for quality control of the crude crude Herba Ephedra and compound prescriptions containing crude Herba Ephedra.

Objective To evaluate the clinical application of implantation of totally implantable venous access port (TIVAP) via the internal jugular vein (IJV) guided by ultrasonography in infants.Methods The clinical data of 446 sick infants,who received TIVAP at the Affiliated Shanghai Children's Medical Center,School of Medicine,Shanghai Jiaotong University,China (single center) during the period from January 2009 to July 2016,were retrospectively analyzed.The time spent on surgery,the success rate of first puncturing of IJV and the incidence of puncture-related complications were recorded,and the results were compared between traditional IJV blind puncture group and ultrasound-guided IJV puncture group.Results Of the 446 sick infants,traditional IJV blind puncture was employed in 265 and ultrasound-guided IJV puncture was adopted in 181.In traditional IJV blind puncture group,the mean time spent on surgery was 7.6 min,the success rate of first puncturing of IJV was 75.85％ (201/265),and the incidence of puncturerelated complications was 5.66％ (15/265).In ultrasound-guided IJV puncture group,the mean time spent on surgery was 4.2 min,the success rate of first puncturing of IJV was 97.24％(176/181),and the incidence of puncture-related complications was 1.70％ (3/181).Conclusion For the performance of TIVAP implantation in sick infants,the use of ultrasound-guided IJV puncture technique can shorten the operation time,improve the success rate of first puncturing,and reduce the incidence of puncture-related complications.Therefore,ultrasound-guided IJV puncture is a safe,effective,simple and feasible technique.This technique is worthy of clinical promotion.

Objective To establish a method for the content determination of naringin and hesperidin in Fructus Aurantii Immaturus.Methods HPLC was performed on the Merck-Lichrospher RP-C18 column(4.6?250 mm,5 ?m);CH3CN-H2O(23 ∶77) served as mobile phase and the detection wavelength was at 283 nm,the column temperature at 30 ℃and the flow rate being 1.0 mL/min.Results The content of naringin ranged from 4.65 to 12.50 mg/g and that of hesperidin from 1.60 to 6.75 mg/g.Conclusion This method is simple,sensitive,specific and can be used for the quality control of Fructus Aurantii Immaturus.

Objective To explore the effect of electroacupuncture on CD 34 +VEGFR2 +endothelial progenitor cell (EPC)-derived vessels and stromal cell-derived factor-1α(SDF-1α)/CXCR4, and study its mechanism of promoting an-giogenesis in hippocampus after focal cerebral ischemia /reperfusion .Methods A total of 180 healthy male adult Sprague Dawley (SD) rats were randomly divided into sham operation (sham) group, model (I/R) group, electroacupuncture (I/RE) group, I/RE plus AMD3100 (A specific antagonist of CXCR4) group (I/REA) and AMD3100 (I/RA) group. The rats received filament occlusion of the right middle cerebral artery for 2 hours followed by reperfusion .Electroacupunc-ture was applied to “Baihui” (GV20)/“Siguan” (Hegu LI 4/Taichong LR 3) acupoints for 30 min, once a day.The mR-NA expression of SDF-1αand CXCR4 were detected by reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction ( RT-PCR) .Double immunofluorescence was used to stain CD 34 +VEGFR2 +EPC-derived vessels.Results Compared with the sham group, the mRNA expressions of SDF-1αand CXCR4 were significantly upregulated in I/R and I/RE group ( P<0.05 ) , but that in I/RE group was more significantly increased than I/R group(P<0.05).In addition, the mRNA expression of SDF-1αand CXCR4 were highly increased on day 1 in the I/REA group than that of I/RE group, but decreased than that of I/RE group on day 7 after reperfusion (P<0.01).CD34 +VEGFR2 +EPCs-derived vessels were obviously increased on 3d and 7d in the I/RE group compared with that of the I/R group, and significantly decreased on 7d in the I/REA group compared with that of the I/RE group ( P<0.01) .Conclusions Electroacupuncture can effectively promote an-giogenesis through upregulating the expression of SDF-1αand CXCR4 in rat ischemic hippocampus after focal cerebral is-chemia/reperfusion.

Objective To evaluate the diabetes self-management program based on Chinese local patients in Nanjing community. Methods From April 2014 to June 2014, diabetes patients were recruited through health records system screening in the community health service centers, letter invitation, poster announcements at communities, and telephone notification. A total of 53 self-management groups were established. Nanjing diabetes self-management program included six 1-1.5 hours sessions scheduled on consecutive weeks, based on the blueprint of Shanghai Chronic Disease Self-Management Program (CDSMP) developed at Stanford University. Baseline and three-month later interviews were conducted respectively. Results A total of 636 patients were recruited and agreed to enter CDSMP; 603 completed the 6-session activities, with the response rate being 94.8%. Compared to baseline, nine of the patients' the awareness rate of diabetes-related knowledge, six of self-management behaviors, the scores of quality of life in physical component summary [(47.51 ± 9.47) vs. (49.10 ± 8.27) points, t=6.170, P=0.000] and mental component summary [(47.09±11.95) vs. (49.13±10.74) points, t=5.157, P=0.000] were all higher after three months (all P values<0.05). Three months after implementation, the level of systolic blood pressure, diastolic blood pressure, fasting plasma glucose and total cholesterol decreased respectively by (1.42±0.52) mmHg (1 mmHg=0.133 kPa), (0.98 ± 0.34) mmHg, (0.66 ± 0.16) mmol/L, (0.15 ± 0.56) mmol/L,the differences were statistically significant (tpaired values were 3.935, 2.030, 4.889, 4.899, all P values<0.05). Conclusion The diabetes self-management program based on Chinese local patients for Nanjing may improve patients' awareness rate of diabetes-related knowledge, self-management behavior, the quality of life, and health status. CDSMP could be applied effectively in Nanjing.

AIM:To establish an effective and rapid method to develop transplanted subcutaneous pancreatic carcinoma by inducing PANC-1 cells into nude mice, and then use this mouse model to evaluate the tumor-homing and gene-silencing effects of siRNA-loading nanoparticles in vivo.METHODS:Different numbers of PANC-1 cells in 100 μL or 300 μL PBS were inoculated subcutaneously into the right flank of BALB /c (nu/nu) mice.When the tumor volume reached 100 mm 3 , siRNACY 5.5 nanoparticles were injected through the mouse tail vein to perform in vivo imaging assay.Be-sides, the mice were randomly divided into 3 treatment groups treated with PBS, scrambled control RNA nanoparticles and siKras nanoparticles, respectively.The protein expression of Kras was detected by Western blotting and immunohistochemi-cal staining.RESULTS:After inoculated with 1 ×10 7 PANC-1 cells in 300 μL PBS, all mice developed tumors within 2 weeks.The in vivo results showed that siRNA-loading nanoparticles accumulated in the tumor tissues and exerted gene si-lencing effect.CONCLUSION:In the present study, an effective and rapid method was established for PANC-1 cells to induce transplanted subcutaneous pancreatic carcinoma in nude mice within 2 weeks, which is suitable for in vivo imaging and treatment evaluations as a reproducible and reliable way for the further experiments .

This study aimed to examine whether ophiopogonin D (OP-D) is capable of protecting cardiomyocytes against DOX-induced injury and the mechanisms involved. H9c2 cells were cultured. MTT assay was used to evaluate cell viability and toxicity. Mito-tracker as fluorescence probe was used to measure ROS content raised from mitochondria. The mRNA and protein expression of ATF6alpha, GRP78 and CHOP were analyzed using real-time PCR and Western blotting, respectively. The results showed that a significant endoplasmic reticulum stress (ERS) was induced upon exposure of H9c2 cells to DOX as indicated by the increase in the expression of ERS related proteins, which was paralleled with the accumulation of reactive oxygen species (ROS) and decrease in the viability of H9c2 cells. Whereas, DOX-induced ROS accumulation and up-regulation of ERS related proteins were partially abolished by pretreatment with OP-D. Consequently, a DOX-induced ERS was mitigated by application of OP-D. Similarly, DOX-induced decrease in cell viability was partially attenuated by either inhibiting CHOP or pretreatment with N-acetylcysteine (NAC), an antioxidant. Moreover, cardiac ultrastructural abnormalities seen in mouse receiving DOX injections were obviously ameliorated by pretreatment of OP-D. Taken together, the present study proved that OP-D protects cardiomyocytes against DOX-induced injury, at least in part, through reducing ROS accumulation and alleviating ERS.

Background and purpose:Invasion and metastasis lead to poor prognosis in gastric cancer. In this study, we investigated the potential function of miR-26a in gastric cancer.Methods:Real-time lfuorescent quantitative polymerase chain reaction (RTFQ-PCR) was used to detect the expression of miR-26a in gastric cancer cells.In vitro CCK-8 assay, cloning formation assay and Matrigel-Transwell assay were used to evaluate the proliferation, migration and invasion of gastric cancer cells. A luciferase reporter assay was also conducted to confirm that matrix metallo-proteinase-16 (MMP16) is a direct target of miR-26a.Results:miR-26a was down-regulated in gastric cancer tissues compared with that in non-cancerous tissues. Functional studies showed that miR-26a inhibited cell proliferation, col-ony formation, cell motility and invasion. However, miR-26a had no effect on cell proliferation. We also characterized MMP16 as a direct target of miR-26a. We showed that knocking down MMP16 in gastric cancer cells signiifcantly de-creased MMP16 expression and inhibited cell invasion, whereas ectopic MMP16 expression signiifcantly abrogated the suppressed cell invasion induced by miR-26a.Conclusion:miR-26a suppresses gastric cancer cell invasion by targeting MMP16. miR-26a could represent a potential therapeutic target for gastric cancer.

Objective To compare the quality of prepared slices of Herba Ephedrae from different producing areas and to establish reference quality criterion of Herba Ephedrae.Methods Determined the content of Ephedrine and Pseudoephedrine in Herba Ephedra Prepared Herbal by HPLC.According to Chinese Pharmacopeia of 2000-year edition,extract,ash,water,impurity and foreign substance were detected; accelerated stability test was performed according to experience.Results The content of Ephedrine in Herba Ephedra is 0.995 %～1.589 %,honey-fried HerbaEphedra is 0.855 %～1.557 %;the content of Pseudoephedrine in Herba Ephedra is 0.560 %～2.087 %,honey-fried Herba Ephedra is 0.508 %～1.902 %; water-soluble extract was 8.83 %～18.30 %and 14.81%～27.45 %, alcohol-soluble extract was 7.74 %～18.83 %and 14.15 %～27.34 %, the total ash content was 6.49 %～10.29 %and 6.34 %～10.24 %and acid-insoluble ash was 0.19 %～0.42 %and 0.18 %～0.42 %in Herba Ephedrae and honey-prepared Herba Ephedrae respectively.The average water content was 8.10 %(s=0.3961)and 4.02 %(s=0.4674)and average content of impurity and foreign substance was 2.02 %(s=0.1954)and 2.01 %(s=0.2209)in Herba Ephedrae and honey-prepared Herba Ephedrae respectively.Conclusion This research will provide a reference criterion for the quality control of prepared slices of Herba Ephedrae.