Circulating cell-free nucleic acids are defined as extracellular DNAs or RNAs in blood with physiological or pathological origins. Previous studies showed that the concentration of cell-free nucleic acids in the blood of cancer patients is significantly higher than in healthy people. Further studies showed that the genetic and epigenetic alterations of circulating cell-free nucleic acids are relevant to cancer development and progression, including mutation, hypermethylation, loss of heterozygosity, change of integrity, and abnormal expression of microRNAs. Detection of circulating cell-free nucleic acids shows promising potential in cancer screening, diagnosis, personalized treatment, and prognosis.

Objective To investigate the aetiology of acute exacerbations of COPD (AECOPD),and the effects of moxifloxacin in the treatment of AECOPD.Methods Patients with stable COPD based on GOLD criteria were included in the study.Sputum collected at first exacerbation was analyzed for bacteria count and culture.IL-6,IL-8 and TNF-?were measured by enzyme- linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA).Eligible patients were randomized to receive moxifloxacin (400 mg qd for 5 days) or ce- faclor (250 mg q8h for 7 days).Efficacy parameters were evaluated at 7 and 14 days after treatment initiation and 1 year later. Results Of the 46 patients with moderate or severe COPD (male 38,moderate 24),21 (45.65%) were microbiologically evalu- able at baseline.The main pathogen was Haemophilus influenzae (10/21).Clinical efficacy rate was 87.0% in moxifloxacin group and 82.6% in cefaclor group.Bacterial eradication rate was 80.0% and 72.7% respectively.The difference between groups was not statistically significant in terms of clinical or microbiological efficacy.In moxifloxacin arm,the frequency of ex- acerbation was 2.6?1.0,significantly lower than control arm (3.5?1.4,P

OBJECTIVETo observe the efficacy differences between acupoint catgut embedding at cervical Jiaji (EX-B 2) points combined with electroacupuncture (EA) at acupoints near ear and simple EA for the treatment of nervous tinnitus.

METHODSSixty-three patients were randomly divided into an observation group (31 cases) and a control group (32 cases). The observation group was treated with acupoint catgut embedding at C4-C7 Jiaji (EXB 2) points on the affected side combined with EA at acupoints near ears, including Ermen (TE 21). Tinggong (SI 19), Tinghui (GB 2), etc.; the control group was treated with EA at regular acupoints near ears alone. The EA treatment was given five times per week, and the acupoint catgut embedding was given once every two weeks. All the treatment was given for 6 weeks. The Tinnitus severity score (TSS)was applied to assess the severity of tinnitus before the treatment, 2 weeks, 4 weeks and 6 weeks into treatment and one month after treat ment. Also the efficacy of two groups was compared.

RESULTSAfter the treatment, the severity of tinnitus was both improved in two groups at each time point (all P<0.05). which was more significant in the observation group (P<0.05, P<0.01). The cured and markedly effective rate was 77.4% (24/31) in the observation group, which was superior to 50.0% (16/32) in the control group (P<0.05).

CONCLUSIONThe short-term and long-term efficacy of acupoint catgut embedding at cervical Jiaji (EX-B 2) points combined with electroacupuncture are both superior to those of simple electroacupuncture for treatment of nervous tinnitus.

Acupuncture Points ; Acupuncture, Ear ; Adult ; Catgut ; Electroacupuncture ; Female ; Humans ; Male ; Middle Aged ; Tinnitus ; therapy

Teacher student relationship is the most important part in educational activities.It’s quality and quantity have a significant impact on educational and teaching effectiveness.This article aims to analyze the exiting status of the relationship between the tutors and the postgraduates in Peking Union Medical College Hospital, focusing on the some main factors which affect the said relationship, including education environment factor, tutor factor, postgrad-uate factor and etc., and combining the characteristics of Medical Colleges’studying.On the basis of the concerned survey, this article initially discusses the key issues during the establishment of the harmony relationship between tutors and postgraduates.

Objective:To explore the breakthrough points of pharmaceutical care in the anti-infection treatment by clinical phar-macists. Methods:Using the pharmaceutical care carried out by clinical pharmacists in the treatment of infected patients as the exam-ple, the breakthrough points of pharmaceutical care in the anti-infection treatment by clinical pharmacists were discussed. Results:Clinical pharmacists should be in accordance with the specific clinical conditions to find out such breakthrough points of pharmaceutical care as judging the indications of antibacterial drugs use, assisting in the development of drug therapeutic regimens ( including the choice of species, dosage and solvent, the optimization of PK/PD parameters and the infusion speed) , paying close attention to bacteri-al culture, concerning on drug interactions, monitoring adverse drug reactions and efficacy, providing patient medication education and so on. Conclusion:Clinical pharmacists can participate in anti-infection treatment and carry out individual pharmaceutical care to en-sure the safety and efficacy of drugs.

Objective To investigate the research quality of present medical graduates and propose suggestions for improvement.Method A self-designed questionnaire entitled Investigating Questionnaire for Research Quality Analysis of Medical Graduates in Peking Union Medical College Hospital was distributed to the clinical and academic medical graduates in the hospital from July to August 2015.Among 276 collected questionnaires,270 were validated as effective.SPSS 18.0 software was used to statistically describe the result and to perform t test on different subgroups.Results The research quality average of the surveyed hospital was 10.28.Results revealed that in regard of the three aspects of research quality,research consciousness ranked first,followed by the research ability,while scientific spirit was the weakest.Academic medical graduates showed significantly higher scores than clinical graduates in terms of total research quality and every single aspect (P values less than 0.05).Conclusions To better cultivate the academic leaders in medical research,it is necessary to strengthen the research training for the graduates,practice their scientific thinking especially the clinical graduates,reinforce tutors' guidance,and promote communication and collaboration.

The deep analysis has been done on the cases of adverse events and common injury of cupping therapy encountered in recent years in terms of manipulation and patient's constitution. The adverse events of cupping therapy are commonly caused by improper manipulation of medical practitioners, ignoring contraindication and patient's constitution. Clinical practitioners should use cupping therapy cautiously, follow strictly the rules of standard manipulation and medical core system, pay attention to the contraindication and take strict precautions against the occurrence of adverse events.
Hospitals ; statistics & numerical data ; Humans ; Medicine, Chinese Traditional ; adverse effects ; instrumentation ; methods

Objective This paper reports a modified method for the isolation of rat thoracic aortic vascular smooth muscle cells based on combined enzyme double digestion.Methods An enzyme mixture containing collagenase II, soybean trypsin inhibitor and elastase was prepared and used to remove the aortic tunica intima and tunica adventitia, and then the tunica media was subjected to second digestion using the same enzyme mixture and to isolate vascular smooth muscle cells.Results The isolated VSMCs were cultured in vitro and the growing cells had an elongated spindle-shape, reached confluence within a week, and displaying a typical hill-and-valley pattern.After 1 week, the cells were passaged.Contractile smooth muscle markers(α-SMA, myosin-II and β-tubulin) were highly expressed in the isolated cells.More than 90% of the cells significantly expressed alpha smooth muscle actin and myosin-II.Conclusions Themethod established in this study has advantages of simple and easy to operate, and good reproducibility, with a high activity and purity of the separated cells.It can ensure to obtain a large amount of contraction-type vascular smooth muscle cells within a short time.

italic>Anoectochilus roxburghii (Wall.) Lindl. is a medicinal species belonging to the Orchidaceae, whose whole plant can be used as a medicinal herb, known as "JinXianLian". It has antidiabetic, liver-protecting, anti-inflammatory, etc. A. roxburghii has long been used as food and medicine in Guangdong and Fujian provinces. With the wide recognition of the concept of "medicine and food homology" and the surge of market demand, wild A. roxburghii has been far from meeting the supply. It is important to establish an artificial propagation system. Resource characteristics are the key basis for optimizing germplasm and propagation systems. Therefore, this paper summarizes the germplasm resource characteristics and propagation technologies of A. roxburghii in China to provide a reference for sustainable development and subsequent mechanistic research.

Background and purpose:In 2013, the ofifcial journal of European Society of Radiotherapy &Oncology (ESTRO) -Radiotherapy & Oncology published the updated version of Consensus Guidelines of Delineation of the neck node levels for head and neck tumors, which contributed to the standardization of description of neck nodal metastasis, as well as reduction of treatment variations from various institutions. This study applied this updated guidelines to analyze the patterns of lymph node metastasis of nasopharyngeal carcinoma and explore the prognostic value of the radiologic characteristics of nodes, in order to provide evidence for future revision of N staging system. Methods:A total of 656 patients from Jan. 2009 to Dec. 2010 were retrospectively recruited to analysis. All were pathologically diagnosed as non-metastatic nasopharyngeal carcinoma, treated with intensity-modulated radiotherapy. All patients received a pretreatment MRI scan. We retrospectively reviewed the MRI imaging of 656 patients and mapped the lymph node metastasis using the 2013 International Consensus Guidelines.Results:Median follow-up was 46.9 months. Four-year local recurrence-free survival, nodal recurrence-free survival, distant metastasis-free survival, disease-free survival and overall survival was 91.3%, 95.1%, 87.7%, 78.5% and 92.8%, respectively. The most common metastatic node levels were levelⅡ (76.2%) and levelⅦa (65.1%), followed by levelⅢ (50.4%),Ⅴa(17.5%) andⅣa (11.7%). There was a very low incidence of node skipping (1.0%). Cervical nodal necrosis was observed in 46.4%of patients with positive nodes and extracapsular spread was noted in 74.4% of them. Univariate analysis showed that bilateral nodal involvement, greatest dimension of positive nodes (≥6 cm), central nodal necrosis, T stage and N stage were prognostic factors for disease-free survival and distant metastasis-free survival (P<0.05). Extracapsular spread showed a trend to correlate with poor distant metastasis-free survival (P=0.060). The involvement of lower neck levels (below the caudal border of cricoid cartilage) did not have a signiifcant impact on disease-free survival and distant metastasis-free survival. In multivariate analysis, T stage and greatest dimension of nodes (≥6 cm) were independent prognostic factors for distant metastasis-free survival (P<0.05). T stage, greatest dimension of nodes (≥6 cm) and central nodal necrosis were independent prognostic factors of disease-free survival (P<0.05).Conclusion:This study demonstrates the patterns of lymph node metastasis of nasopharyngeal carcinoma based on 2013 International Consensus Guidelines. Bilateral nodal involvement, greatest dimension of positive nodes and central nodal necrosis had prognostic values on disease-free survival and distant metastasis-free survival. In our study, the involvement of lower neck levels was not proved to be a prognostic factor for disease-free survival and distant metastasis-free survival.