Objective To assess the value of four different techniques of detecting the Mycobacterium tuberculosis (MTB) in bronchoalveolar lavage fluid (BALF) in the diagnosis of tracheobronchial tuberculosis. Methods A total of 98 patients diagnosed as tracheobronchial tuberculosis were selected from May 1,2013 to June 30,2016. The clinical data was analyzed retrospectively,and the positive rates of MTB of the 960 cultrue, the direct smears , the modified Ziehl?Neelsen stain method and Xpert MTB/RIF assay were compared. Results The positive rates of the 960 cultrue,the direct smears,the modified Ziehl?Neelsen stain method and Xpert MTB/RIF assay were 20.4%(20/98),15.3%(15/98),70.4%(69/98) and 74.5%(73/98),respectively. Among the four techniques ,the positive rates of the modified Ziehl?Neelsen stain method and Xpert MTB/RIF assay were significantly higher than those of the 960 cultrue and the direct smears(P<0.05,respectively). However,no significant difference was found between the modified Ziehl?Neelsen stain method and the Xpert MTB/RIF assay (P > 0.05). Conclusions The modified Ziehl?Neelsen stain method and Xpert MTB/RIF assay for detecting the MTB in BALF have high clinical value in the diagnosis of tracheobronchial tuberculosis.

Objective To evaluate the efficacy and safety in treatment of patients with mild to moderate Alzheimer’s disease (AD). Methods A total of 233 patients with mild to moderate potential AD were enrolled in a 16-week multi-center double blind clinical trial. All patients were randomized into two groups. 110 patients in galantamine group and 108 patients in donepezil group were enrolled in efficacy analysis. The scales of Alzheimer’s Disease Assessment Scale-Cognitive Subscale (ADAS-cog), Alzheimer’s Disease Cooperative Study Activities of Daily Living Scale (ADCS-ADL) and The Neuropsychiatric Inventory (NPI) were used to assess the effect at both baseline and the end of 16 weeks. Safety issues, including vital signs, lab assays and ECG examinations were measured. Results Patients in both groups were obviously improved in the total score of ADAS-cog (-5.4?6.4) in the galantamine group and (-4.0?7.3) in the donepezil group, P=0.098). 76% patients of the galantamine group had a score of ADAS-cog less than 20 at the end of 16 weeks treatment, which was higher than that of the donepezil group (58%, P=0.015). The sub-score of speech ability in ADAS-cog were improved in the galantamine group (baseline 2.8?2.9,16 weeks 1.8?2.5) compared with the donepezil group (baseline 2.8?3.0, 16 weeks 2.3?2.9, P=0.035). No significant difference of ADSC-ADL and NPI scale was found between the two groups (P=0.447 and 0.936 respectively). The sleep/night behavior was improved in the donepezil group (baseline 14%, 16 weeks 10%) compared with the galantamine group (baseline 23%, 16 weeks 22%, P=0.012). Two drug-related severe adverse events occurred during the trial, which were platelet reduction in the galantamine group and acute drug-induced hepatic injury in the donepezil group. The incidence of adverse events was 44% in the galantamine group and 47% in the donepezil group respectively. Galantamine had little influence on vital signs and lab assays. Conclusion Safe and well tolerated, galantamine improves the cognition, activities of daily living and neuropsychiatric symptoms of patients with mild to moderate AD.

Holmes-Adie syndrome (HAS) is a clinical syndrome mainly characterized by tonic pupil and disappearance of tendon reflex. It is mostly idiopathic and can also be seen in cerebral diseases, such as trauma, infection and tumors. However, it is rarely reported to be accompanied with myasthenia gravis (MG). We report a case of MG and HAS, whose clinical manifestations were fluctuation of limb weakness, breathing difficulties, right ptosis. Her pupils were unequal: the left pupil was 3 mm, the right pupil was 2 mm, direct and indirect light reflex was slow in left pupil, and right pupil was sensitive to light reflex. The left eye pupil shrank to 2 mm after dripped pilocarpine diluent for 10 minutes, while the right pupil was still 2 mm. Chest CT examination revealed thymoma. After treatment with thymectomy, glucocorticoid, immunoglobulins and tacrolimus, her symptoms of MG were improved, but the left pupil diameter and light reflex were not changed. Combined with the patient's symptoms, physical signs and examinations, this patient was diagnosed as MG accompanied with HAS.

Per- and poly-fluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) are a new type of persistent organic pollutants that have received extensive attention in recent years. This article reviewed the population characteristics of environmental exposure to PFAS, as well as the potential health effects. Previous studies have verified that people are exposed to PFAS mainly through ingestion, and food and water are the dominant contributors. In terms of exposure characteristics, geographical, gender, age, and occupational differences have an impact on the level of PFAS exposure in the corresponding populations by influencing their behavioral characteristics and metabolic levels, with occupational exposure receiving more attention, especially in the exploration of novel PFAS. PFAS associate with a variety of adverse health effects caused by hepatorenal toxicity, immunotoxicity, reproductive toxicity, neurotoxicity, and carcinogenicity. However, some of the conclusions are not completely consistent, and the published epidemiological studies have focused on children and young people, lacking relevant data of the elderly. Future research can pay more attention to the elderly population and carry out validation exploration on controversial conclusions.

Aiming at the problems of missing important features, inconspicuous details and unclear textures in the fusion of multimodal medical images, this paper proposes a method of computed tomography (CT) image and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) image fusion using generative adversarial network (GAN) and convolutional neural network (CNN) under image enhancement. The generator aimed at high-frequency feature images and used double discriminators to target the fusion images after inverse transform; Then high-frequency feature images were fused by trained GAN model, and low-frequency feature images were fused by CNN pre-training model based on transfer learning. Experimental results showed that, compared with the current advanced fusion algorithm, the proposed method had more abundant texture details and clearer contour edge information in subjective representation. In the evaluation of objective indicators, Q ^AB/F, information entropy (IE), spatial frequency (SF), structural similarity (SSIM), mutual information (MI) and visual information fidelity for fusion (VIFF) were 2.0%, 6.3%, 7.0%, 5.5%, 9.0% and 3.3% higher than the best test results, respectively. The fused image can be effectively applied to medical diagnosis to further improve the diagnostic efficiency.
Image Processing, Computer-Assisted/methods* ; Neural Networks, Computer ; Tomography, X-Ray Computed ; Magnetic Resonance Imaging/methods* ; Algorithms