Objective To investigate the characteristics of peripheral lymphocytic subsets and cytokines in patients with primary biliary cirrhosis( PBC) and their changes after therapy. Methods Eighty two patients with untreated PBC were divided randomly into three groups. Group U (28 patients) were treated with ursodeoxycholic acid ( UDCA) , group UP (27 patients) were treated with UDCA and prednisonlone, while group UA (27 patients) were treated with UDCA and azatharaprine. Levels of peripheral lymphocytic subsets and cytokines were monitored at 0, 3, 6 months after therapy. Twenty healthy people were included as healthy control ( HC). Results Compared with HC, the percentage of CD/ T cell (P = 0. 044) increased in PBC; the levels of IFNγ(P = 0. 001), IL-2 (P =0. 000) , IL-4 (P =0. 010) , IL-6 (P = 0. 029) , tumor necrosis factora ( TNFα ) ( P = 0. 000) , IL-1β ( P = 0. 008 ) and transforming growth factorβ(TGFβ) (P =0. 069) increased in PBC. The level of TNFa in peripheral was correlated with those of ALT (P=0.005), AST (P=0.002), total bilirubin(Tbil) (P=0.001), direct bilirubin( Dbil) (P=0. 002) , and mayo risk score(MRS) (P=0. 020). The percentage of CD_4~+T cell decreased in group U. In group U, the levels of IFNγ,IL-4,IL-6 all decreased after therapy at the third month, but rebounded thereafter. In group of UP and UA, the levels of IFN-γ, IL-4, IL-6 were suppressed below the levels of baseline after therapy.Levels of TNFa and IL-2 decreased in all three groups after therapy. Conclusions Levels of both Thl and Th2 related cytokines are abnormal in the peripheral blood of patients with PBC. The abnormal levels of Thl related cytokine indicated that PBC is a cell immunity based autoimmune disease. IFNγ,TNFα are directly related to the disease. The three treatments have different effects on the adjustment of the immune system.

Antineoplastic Combined Chemotherapy Protocols ; therapeutic use ; Child ; Child, Preschool ; Combined Modality Therapy ; Cord Blood Stem Cell Transplantation ; adverse effects ; Female ; Graft vs Host Disease ; therapy ; Humans ; Leukemia, Myelogenous, Chronic, BCR-ABL Positive ; therapy ; Male ; Precursor Cell Lymphoblastic Leukemia-Lymphoma ; therapy ; Transplantation, Homologous

A biomedical entity association evolution network was constructed by mining the implicit associations in PubMed-covered literature, which can help scientific researchers to form new scientific hypotheses, to analyze the topological features of associated network, to study the scientific literature-enriched knowledge structure, associa-tions, development rules, to introduce new visual angles and methods for literature-based knowledge discovery, and to improve the knowledge discovery efficiency.

Adolescent ; Female ; Humans ; Lung Neoplasms ; congenital ; Lymphoma, Large-Cell, Anaplastic ; physiopathology

Objective: To explore the factors affecting the prevalence of HIV-associated neurocognitive disorders (HAND) among HIV/AIDS patients, so as to provide insights into developing HAND prevention measures. Methods: HIV/AIDS patients aged 18 years and above in the Infection Department of Nanjing Second Hospital were selected.Demographic data, treatment regimen and blood biochemical indicators were collected. Depression was evaluated using Patient Health Questionnaire Depression Scale, frailty was evaluated using Chinese version of Tilburg Frailty Indicator, and HAND was evaluated by Montreal Cognitive Assessment Scale. Factors affecting HAND were analyzed using a multivariable logistic regression model. Results: Totally 440 questionnaires were allocated and 426 valid questionnaires were recovered, with an effective rate of 96.82%. The median age of patients investigated was 33.00 (interquartile range, 10.00) year. There were 407 males, accounting for 95.54%; 232 patients with bachelor degree or above, accounting for 54.46%; 171 patients with HAND, accounting for 40.14%. Multivariable logistic regression analysis showed that educational level (bachelor degree or above, OR=0.291, 95%CI: 0.157-0.541), depression (OR=2.499, 95%CI: 1.530-4.083), frailty (OR=2.121, 95%CI: 1.307-3.441) and treatment regimen including efavirenz (OR=2.223, 95%CI: 1.367-3.615) were the influencing factors for HAND among HIV/AIDS patients. Conclusion Educational level, depression, frailty and use of efavirenz may be associated with HAND risk.

The effect of paper publication time on knowledge discovery in biomedical literature was studied by analyzing the role of time factor in indirect link mining and tested using the PubMed-covered data set,which showed that recently published papers played a better role than early published papers in knowledge discovery,indicating that the time factor plays a certain role in knowledge discovery in biomedical literature and can thus improve the efficiency of knowledge discovery in biomedical literature.

Objective To explore the clinical manifestations and recovery from neuroimaging abnormalities of acute disseminated encephalomyelitis (ADEM),in order to improve the understanding of ADEM.Methods A total of 47 children with ADEM in Department of Neurology,Children′s Hospital of Soochow University were followed up for 1 year.The clinical manifestations,auxiliary examination (especially neuroimaging),treatment and prognosis were analyzed.The recovery conditions from clinical and neuroimaging abnormalities were summarized.Results Among 47 cases,37 cases (78.72%) had prodromic infection history,and 5 cases (10.64%) had the history of vaccination.The clinical manifestations were varied,including 36 cases (76.60%) with somatic discomfort,30 cases (63.83%) with fever,30 cases (63.83%) with disturbance of consciousness,28 cases (59.57%) with epileptic seizure,24 cases (51.06%) with headache and dizziness,22 cases (46.81%) with nausea and vomiting,15 cases (31.91%) with dyskinesia,15 cases (31.91%) with cranial nerve injury,9 cases (19.14%) with incoordination,and 8 cases (17.02%) with mental and behavior disorders.Abnormal lesions presented multiple,asymmetric patchy and large patchy signal image showed by brain magnetic resonance imaging (MRI),and 7 cases (14.89%) involved the spinal cord.All patients received the treatment of Methylprednisolone [15-20 mg/(kg·d)] combined with intravenous gamma globulin (total 2 g/kg,3 to 5 days).The dose of Methylprednisolone gradually decreased after it had been used for 3 days.In the end,it was replaced by an oral administration of Prednisone [1.0-2.0 mg/(kg·d)],and the total treatment period was for 2-3 months.The follow-ups of 47 children with ADEM showed that the MRI lesions of all the children were reduced and the MRI lesions in 4 (8.51%) of them disappeared completely after 0.5 month of follow-up;the lesions disappeared completely in 13 cases (27.66%) after 1 month of follow-up;the lesions disappeared completely in 23 cases (48.94%) after 3 months of follow-up;the lesions disappeared completely in 32 cases (68.09%) after 6 months of follow-up;the lesions disappeared completely in 43 cases (91.49%) after 1 year of follow-up;and finally there were 4 cases (8.51%) with residual lesions.Conclusion The clinical manifestations of children with ADEM are varied.Most children with ADEM have a favorable prognosis.Imaging lesions of 68.09% of the cases completely disappeared after the onset of 6 months.Imaging lesions in 91.49% of the cases completely disa-ppeared at the onset of 1 year.Only a small fraction of patients present permanent lesions.

Antimetabolites, Antineoplastic ; adverse effects ; therapeutic use ; C-Reactive Protein ; analysis ; Child ; Child, Preschool ; Cytarabine ; adverse effects ; therapeutic use ; Diagnosis, Differential ; Female ; Fever ; blood ; chemically induced ; diagnosis ; Humans ; Infant ; Male ; Precursor Cell Lymphoblastic Leukemia-Lymphoma ; blood ; drug therapy ; Teniposide ; therapeutic use

Child ; Child, Preschool ; Female ; Flow Cytometry ; methods ; Humans ; Infant ; Male ; Thrombasthenia ; classification ; diagnosis

Objective To compare the plasma hepatitis C virus(HCV)RNA levels detected by the fully automated viral load detection system(COBAS TaqMan)and the national real-time quantitative polymerase chain reaction(PCR)kit,and to investigate the clinical application value of these two methods in clinical practice.Methods A total of 168 serial plasma samples collected from 26 patients with chronic hepatitis C(CHC)before and at week 2,4,12,24,36 and 48 of antiviral treatment were detected by both COBAS Taqman 48 analyzing system and the national real-time quantitative PCR kit.The results of two methods were compared by chi square test and t test.Resnlts Both COBAS and national kit showed great positive detecting results when HCV RNA≥1×104IU/mL(at week O),and the virus load value detected by national kit was significantly higher than that detected by COBAS(t=2.05,P<0.05).However,when HCV RNA<1×104(at week 2-48),the positive rate of HCV detected by COBAS was significantly higher than that detected by national kit (t=3.66,P<0.01).At week 4 of treatment,the rapid virological response(RVR)rate was 46.2 % (12/26)detected by COBAS,while that was 88.5%(23/26)detected by national kit,and the difference was significant(x2=10.575,P<0.01).At week 12 of treatment,the complete early virological response(cEVR)was 95.7%(22/23)detected by COBAS,while that was 100%(17/17)detected by national kit,and the difference was not significant(x2=0.726,P>0.05).Conclusions The national TaqMan real-time quantitative PCR kits could be used to screen the suspected cases of HCV infecrion and to diagnose CHC cases with high HCV virus load.COBAS detection is more sensitive in cases with low HCV virus load and in on-treatment monitor during anti-HCV therapy.