OBJECTIVETo assess the temperature variation of the root surface using Nd: YAG laser irradiation in the root canal with different power and to evaluate the safety of laser application on the periodontal region.

METHODSThirty extracted human teeth with single-roots were collected. The teeth were cross-sectioned in the cervical portion, standardizing the roots at a 12-mm length. The roots were used as specimen. The roots were radiographed in the buccal-lingual direction to measure the thickness of the proximal walls, by means of a digital radiographic system. The specimens were divided into three groups according to the laser potency (1.5, 3.0, and 4.5 W). Each group was subdivided into two subgroups according to laser frequency (15 and 30 Hz). With the Nd: YAG laser irradiation for 20 s, the temperature variation of the root surface was monitored by thermocouples located at different parts of the root external wall and recorded by digital thermometers.

RESULTSThe groups irradiated with 4.5 W presented the greatest temperature variation (above 10°C), followed by 3.0 and 1.5 W. The temperatures were statistically different (P < 0.01). The groups irradiated in the same potency, regardless of whether 15 Hz or 30 Hz was used, presented with no statistical difference (P > 0.05). The apical half of the root presented statistically higher temperature rises than the cervical half of the root (P < 0.01).

CONCLUSIONThe temperature variation of the root surface was associated with laser power, irradiation time, and the thickness of dentin. Application of Nd: YAG laser in the root at 1.5 W for 20 s can safely be used in endodontic treatment.

Cross-Sectional Studies ; Fatigue ; epidemiology ; Female ; Humans ; Linear Models ; Male ; Medical Staff, Hospital ; statistics & numerical data ; Sampling Studies

Objective To understand the schistosomiasis prevention knowledge of middle school students from areas with dif-ferent endemic levels in Hubei Province. Methods The schistosomiasis endemic regions were divided into transmission con-trolled areas and endemic controlled areas in Hubei Province,middle school students from different types of areas were selected through stratified randomized cluster sampling and were investigated by questionnaire. Results A total of 3 204 students were se-lected and investigated. The awareness rate of schistosomiasis prevention and control knowledge among the students ranged from 65.1%-90.3%. Overall,the students from endemic controlled areas had higher knowledge rates of all the items than those from transmission controlled areas(all P<0.05). The middle school students acquired schistosomiasis prevention knowledge mainly from the teachers,parents,doctors and schistosomiasis staff. Conclusion Health education to students should adopt different ways targeting at different endemic levels in the future.

Ribonucleic acid (RNA) medicines have strong therapeutic potential for numerous rare genetic illnesses and malignancies because of its exact programmability based on Watson-Crick base pairing principle and unique ability to regulate gene expression. However, RNA medicines still have limitations in many areas, including stability, half-life time, immunogenicity, organ selectivity, cellular uptake and endosomal escape efficiency despite their great therapeutic potentials. This review briefly introduced numerous RNA medications [mostly messenger RNA (mRNA), small interfering RNA (siRNA), microRNA (miRNA) and antisense oligonucleotide (ASO)] that have intrigued of researchers in recent years, as well as their action mechanism in vivo. A number of delivery techniques, such as chemical modification, ligands coupling and nanocarriers have been proposed. The manufacture and applications of lipid nanoparticle, polymer nanoparticle and exosomes were discussed in depth. The goal of this work is to give a theoretical foundation and design concepts for the development of effective and safe RNA delivery technology, as well as to facilitate RNA therapeutic clinical translation.

This study aims at trying to establish a novel method of sterility test for injections based on biothermodynamics, in order to overcome the deficiencies of routine sterility tests such as long detecting cycle, low sensitivity and prone to misjudgments. A biothermodynamics method was adopted to rapidly detect the microorganism contamination of injections by monitoring the heat metabolism during the growth of microbe. The growth rate equal to or greater than zero and the heat power difference of P(i) and P(0) with three folds higher than the noise of baseline were chosen as indexes to study the heat change rule of microbe. In this way, the effectiveness of the new method to detect strains required by conventional sterility test or in injection samples was also investigated. Results showed that the Gram-positive bacteria, Gram-negative bacteria and fungi demanded by sterility testing methodology could be detected by biothermodynamics method within 10 hours, with the sensitivity lower than 100 CFU x mL(-1). Meanwhile, this method was successfully applied to the sterility test of Compound Yinchen injection (FFYC), Shuanghuanglian powder injection (SHL) and Compound Triamcinolone injection (TAND) which were sterilized with different degrees. Therefore, the biothermodynamics method, with advantages of fast detection and high sensitivity, could be a complementary solution for conventional sterility tests.
Anti-Inflammatory Agents ; administration & dosage ; chemistry ; Drug Contamination ; Drugs, Chinese Herbal ; administration & dosage ; chemistry ; Fungi ; isolation & purification ; Gram-Negative Bacteria ; isolation & purification ; Gram-Positive Bacteria ; isolation & purification ; Hot Temperature ; Injections ; Microbiological Techniques ; methods ; Sensitivity and Specificity ; Sterilization ; Triamcinolone ; administration & dosage ; chemistry

The study is to report the establishment of a method of screening the antitumor compounds based on the dynamic bio-response profile of cells to make up for the shortages of conventional end-point tests such as tedious operation and low sensitivity. Based on the principle of electric impedance of cells, the real-time cell electronic sensing (RT-CES) system was used to monitor the effect of epirubicin (EPI), cisplatinum (DDP) and carboplatin (CBP) on the growth of HepG2 cells, with the cell index (CI), half maximal inhibitory concentration (IC50) and detachment curve as evaluation indexes. Meanwhile, cell counting kit-8 (CCK-8) and microscopy were applied for verification. The results showed that CI curve could sensitively real-time profile the inhibitory effect of model drugs on HepG2 cells. The IC50 of EPI, DDP and CBP were 0.53 +/- 0.04, 9.79 +/- 0.26 and 597.00 +/- 3.79 microg x mL(-1), respectively. What's more, the significant differences of detachment curves of the three drugs indicated that their functional mechanisms might be different, this is consistent with the literature. The RT-CES system with non-invasive, label-free and real-time characteristics could be used to monitor the bio-response profile of the three drugs to HepG2 cells, allowing to qualitatively and quantitatively distinguish the antitumor activities of the three drugs, and could be a complementary method for the present screening of antitumor compounds.

This study aims at trying to establish a novel method of sterility test for injections based on biothermodynamics, in order to overcome the deficiencies of routine sterility tests such as long detecting cycle, low sensitivity and prone to misjudgments. A biothermodynamics method was adopted to rapidly detect the microorganism contamination of injections by monitoring the heat metabolism during the growth of microbe. The growth rate equal to or greater than zero and the heat power difference of P(i) and P(0) with three folds higher than the noise of baseline were chosen as indexes to study the heat change rule of microbe. In this way, the effectiveness of the new method to detect strains required by conventional sterility test or in injection samples was also investigated. Results showed that the Gram-positive bacteria, Gram-negative bacteria and fungi demanded by sterility testing methodology could be detected by biothermodynamics method within 10 hours, with the sensitivity lower than 100 CFU x mL(-1). Meanwhile, this method was successfully applied to the sterility test of Compound Yinchen injection (FFYC), Shuanghuanglian powder injection (SHL) and Compound Triamcinolone injection (TAND) which were sterilized with different degrees. Therefore, the biothermodynamics method, with advantages of fast detection and high sensitivity, could be a complementary solution for conventional sterility tests.

Objective To understand the prevalence and influential factors of allergic diseases among infants aged 6-24 months in Enshi prefecture to provide the basis for the prevention of the allergic disease in infants and young children .Methods 1 724 in-fants were extracted by using multi-stage stratified cluster sampling and the data including the demographic characteristics ,family condition ,caregiver condition and behavior ,and allergic disease information were collected by the questionnaire survey .The multiva-riate Logistic regression analysis was performed to analyze the influential factors of allergic diseases .Results Among the investiga-ted infants and young children ,the prevalence of allergic diseases was 11 .83% ,which was dominated by eczema with the prevalence of 7 .54% ,followed by allergic asthma (1 .97% ) .The univariate Logistic regression analysis showed that allergic diseases were as-sociated with the nationality (χ2 =17 .865 ,P=0 .000) ,month age(χ2 =9 .420 ,P=0 .009) ,feeding patterns(χ2 =6 .304 ,P=0 .043) and ,time for adding solid food(χ2 =12 .695 ,P=0 .002) and family income(χ2 =9 .259 ,P =0 .010) .The multivariate Logistic re-gression analysis showed that the ethnic minority [OR95% CI:1 .86(1 .27~2 .73) ,P=0 .001]and artificial feeding [OR95% CI:1 .17 (1 .01~2 .82) ,P=0 .045]had the higher risk for suffering from allergic diseases ,the month age between 18 to 24 months[OR95%CI:0 .57(0 .39~0 .84) ,P=0 .005]and the family income>30 000 yuan each year [OR95% CI:0 .64(0 .43~0 .96) ,P=0 .030]were negatively correlated with the allergic diseases in infants and young children .Conclusion The prevalence of allergic diseases among infants and young children aged 6-24 months in Enshi prefecture is relatively higher and the infants of ethnic minority ,low month age ,artificial feeding and lower family income have the higher risk of allergic diseases .

Examination reform was explored in Introduction to clinical medicine, and a new evaluation system was constructed which included the combination of formative assessment and sum-mative assessment as well as content system, operation system and monitoring system. The feedback mechanism of formative assessment was put into a full use to improve the teaching effect in this new evaluation system. At the same time, the method of summative assessment was substituted from the traditional closed-book exam to literature translation and presentation carried out by groups. The com-bination of summative assessment and formative assessment could evaluate the teaching efficiency of introduction to clinical medicine more comprehensively and objectively. In addition, it played an ac-tive role in improving students' comprehensive ability and their learning enthusiasm.

[ABSTRACT]OBJECTIVETo investigate the therapeutic effect of early combination treatment with intratympanic glucocorticoid injection for sudden sensorineural hearing loss(SSNHL).METHODSTotal of 178 patients with diagnosis of SSNHL, including 44 with hearing loss at middle-low frequencies,50 at high frequencies,44 at all frequencies and 40 at total deafness, were randomly divided into combination treatment group (CT group) and systemic oral prednisone group (OP group).CT group (82 patients) received intratympanic administration of methylprednisolone and oral prednisone in tapering doses. Pure-tone threshold audiometry (PTA) was performed at week 8 after beginning of therapy. RESULTSIn middle-low frequencies, the final PTA and PTA improvement were 26.14±24.82 dB and 42.23±1.61 dB in CT group respectively, and were 37.91±13.98 dB and 30.00±13.30 dB in OP group respectively (both P<0.05). In high frequencies, all frequencies and total deafness SSNHL group, the differences of the final PTA and PTA improvement were not statistically significant in both groups. The PTA improvement in CT group for total deafness (26.52±14.03) dB was more than that of OP group (22.06±11.17)dB (t=2.361,P<0.05). In middle-low frequencies, the recovery rate was 72.73%(16 cases) in CT group, and 40.91% (9 cases) in OP group, the difference was significant (χ2=4.539,P<0.05), but not in apparent effective rate, effective rate and total effective rate. In high frequencies, all frequencies and total deafness, there were no significant differences in therapeutic effect. The recovery rate of total CT group (40.24%) was significantly increased compared with that of OP group (26.04%)(χ2=4.061,P<0.05), the differences of apparent effective rate, effective rate and total effective rate were not statistically significant in both groups.CONCLUSIONFor low-middle frequencies SSNHL, the early combination treatment with intratympanic glucocorticoid injection leads to higher hearing recovery and therapeutic effect compared with traditional oral prednisone. Systemic application should be applied for high frequencies, all frequencies and total deafness of SSNHL.