Objective To investigate the clinical value of serum lipoprotein ( a ) concentration in evaluation of plaques characteristics for patients with coronary atherosclerotic heart diseases ( CAHD ) . Methods Using case-control method, Patients with suspicious CAHD, received coronary computed tomography angiography in the Shanghai East Hospital during October 2013 to June 2015 were enrolled.According to the results of coronary artery CTA, the patients were divided into two groups : the CAHD group (352 cases) and control group(438 cases) , the particle concentrations and mass concentration of lipoprotein(a), triglyceride, total cholesterol, HDL-C, LDL-C, glucose, HBA1c and hs-CRP and other tests were measured, the patients of CAHD group were divided into three subgroups by characteristics of coronary artery plaques including soft plaque (176 cases), calcified plaque (90 cases) and mixed plaque (86 cases), analysis were made with all these data.Using T test or variance analysis to compare the means between or among groups, the risk for CAHD was analyzed by logistic regression, the relationship between LP (a) -P and LP( a) -M were explored by linearly egression analysis, Conformance test were analyzed using kappa test.Results Compared with control group, the mean results of the CAHD group are significantly higher than that of control group, including LP (a) -P 18.5(8.3 -43.0))nmol/L vs.13.6 (7.6-32.4)nmol/L( t =-2.110), LP(a)-M 183(71 -361)mg/L vs.126(67 -293)mg/L(t =-2.063), age (62 ±9)years vs.(52 ±9)years(t=-7.691), hs-CRP 0.86(0.44-1.97) )mg/L vs.0.70(0.38-1.64)mg/L(t=-2.236), glucose (6.1 ±2.29 )mmol/L vs.(5.36 ±1.32 )mmol/L(t=-4.914), BA1c (6.13 ±0.98) % vs.(5.81 ±0.58) %(t=-4.842), APO(B) (1.09 ±0.33) g/L vs.(1.03 ±0.29) g/L( t=-2.407), all of the P values <0.05;The relative risk(RR)of age, glucose, LP( a)-P and LP ( a)-M are 1.067, 2.377, 1.384 and 1.342 respectively; Among the three types of plaques groups,the mean differences of age, TC, HDL-C, LDL-C and LP ( a)-P are statistically significant ( F=6.276,3.060,3.127,4.723,2.878;all of the P<0.05);The median of LP ( a)-P in the soft plaque group 20.3(8.3-48.2)nmol/L is higher than that of the mixed plaque group 15.7(7.3-26.0)nmol/L(P<0.05 ) and calcified plaque group 15.6 ( 8.1 -23.1 ) nmol/L ( P <0.05 ).The linearly regression equation of LP ( a) -M and LP( a)-P is Y=6.646X, r=0.939; Consistency test indicate the two methods are not consistent when used for grouping ( Kappa value is 0.557 ).Conclusions Serum concentration of lipoprotein(a) is an independent risk factor of CAHD, and the particle concentration of LP(a) is closely related to the characteristics of the plaques, especially to the soft plaque.

"Target trial emulation" (TTE), as a new framework in real-world research, has been formally established in recent years. It can be used to guide the evaluation of the effectiveness and safety of medical interventions based on real-world data for observational causal inference. The core idea of this framework is to follow the principles of randomized controlled trial (RCT), emulate a corresponding RCT using real-world data, and then draw conclusions about the causal relationship between interventions and outcomes. The main implementation tips of TTE can be summarized as "3-7-2": 3 implementation steps including formulating the causal question, designing the emulation plan, and emulating the target study; 7 design elements including eligibility criteria, treatment strategies, intervention allocation, follow-up period, outcome, causal contrast of interest, and analysis plan; and control of 2 critical biases including immortal time bias and prevalent user bias. In this article, we present an overview of the development, current status, implementation steps, classic examples, advantages and limitations of TTE, and its application prospects in traditional Chinese medicine (TCM). It is hoped that this article can assist researchers in TCM to utilize this method for real-world research and contribute to the construction of a clinical evaluation system with distinctive features of TCM.

To analyze the methodological and reporting quality of systematic reviews of prediction models published in Chinese journals, with the aim of providing reference for enhancing the overall quality of Chinese systematic reviews of prediction models.

Objective    Zero-events studies frequently occur in systematic reviews of adverse events, which consist of an important source of evidence. We aimed to examine how evidence of zero-events studies was utilized in the meta-analyses of systematic reviews of adverse events. Methods    We conducted a survey of systematic reviews published in two periods: January 1, 2015 to January 1, 2020 and January 1, 2008, to April 25, 2011. Databases were searched for systematic reviews that conducted at least one meta-analysis of any healthcare intervention and used adverse events as the exclusive outcome. An adverse event was defined as any untoward medical occurrence in a patient or subject in healthcare practice. We summarized the frequency of occurrence of zero-events studies in eligible systematic reviews and how these studies were dealt with in the meta-analyses of these systematic reviews. Results    We included 640 eligible systematic reviews. There were 406 (63.45%) systematic reviews involving zero-events studies in their meta-analyses, among which 389 (95.11%) involved single-arm-zero-events studies and 223 (54.93%) involved double-arm-zero-events studies. The majority (98.71%) of these systematic reviews incorporated single-arm-zero-events studies into the meta-analyses. On the other hand, the majority (76.23%) of them excluded double-arm-zero-events studies from the meta-analyses, of which the majority (87.06%) did not discuss the potential impact of excluding such studies. Systematic reviews published at present (2015-2020) tended to incorporate zero-events studies in meta-analyses than those published in the past (2008-2011), but the difference was not significant [proportion difference=–0.09, 95%CI (–0.21, 0.03), P=0.12]. Conclusion    Systematic review authors routinely treated studies with zero-events in both arms as "non-informative" carriers and excluded them from their reviews. Whether studies with no events are "informative" or not, largely depends on the methods and assumptions applied, thus sensitivity analyses using different methods should be considered in future meta-analyses.