ObjectiveTo evaluate the clinical efficacy and safety of the traditional Chinese medicine （TCM） compound Chaiqin Xiaoyong Decoction （柴芩消痈饮， CXD） combined with Jinhuang Ointment （金黄膏， JO） in treating the nodular stage of acne mastitis of liver meridian heat accumulation type. MethodsA randomized， double-blind， placebo-controlled clinical trial was conducted. A total of 108 patients with liver meridian heat accumulation type acne mastitis in the nodular stage were randomly assigned to a treatment group and a control group， with 54 patients in each group. Both groups received topical application of JO once daily at a thickness of 3~5 mm for 8 hours， along with standard nursing care. On this basis， the treatment group received oral CXD granules， while the control group received placebo granules， administered twice daily， 3 sachets per dose， for 14 consecutive days. Clinical efficacy， TCM symptom scores， nodule size， visual analogue scale （VAS） pain scores， white blood cell （WBC） count， C-reactive protein （CRP） level， and systemic immune-inflammation index （SII） were compared. At the end of treatment， efficacy and safety indicators were evaluated. A 6-month follow-up was conducted to compare the proportion of patients undergoing surgical treatment. ResultsThe total clinical efficacy rate in the treatment group was 90.38% （47/52）， significantly higher than 32.00% （16/50） in the control group （P＜0.01）. The treatment group also showed significantly lower TCM symptom scores， VAS scores， nodule size， WBC count， CRP level， and SII （P＜0.05 or P＜0.01）. During follow-up， the surgical intervention rate in the treatment group was 5.77% （3/52）， lower than 14.00% （7/50） in the control group， with a statistically significant difference （P＜0.01）. No significant abnormalities were observed in safety indicators before and after treatment in either group. ConclusionCXD effectively reduces nodule size and alleviates symptoms such as redness and pain in patients with acne mastitis of liver meridian heat accumulation type， improves TCM symptom scores， enhances overall clinical efficacy， and demonstrates good safety.

BackgroundMigraine is a common chronic neurological disease， and patent foramen ovale （PFO） has been closely associated with migraine. Current research primarily focuses on the pathological mechanism and the therapeutic effects of interventional closure， with limited attention paid to the impact of PFO on sleep quality in migraine patients. ObjectiveTo compare the difference in sleep quality between PFO-positive and PFO-negative migraine patients， and to analyzes influencing factors of sleep quality in PFO-positive migraine patients， so as to provide references for clinical interventions to improve sleep quality in PFO-positive migraine patients. MethodsA total of 673 migraine patients who met the diagnostic criteria of migraine in the International Classification of Headache Disorders， third edition （ICHD-3）， and all patients underwent contrast-enhanced transcranial Doppler （c-TCD） and transthoracic echocardiographic right heart contrast echocardiography （cTTE） in the Third Hospital of Mianyang from January 2020 to October 2024. Basic demographic data were collected using a self-designed questionnaire， headache severity was assessed with the Visual Analogue Scale （VAS）， and sleep quality was invaluated using the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index （PSQI）. PFO patients was diagnosed through c-TCD combined with c-TTE. Binary logistic regression analysis was employed to examine the influencing factors of sleep quality in PFO-positive migraine patients. ResultsA total of 673 （100.00%） migraine patients were enrolled， including 223 PFO-positive cases （33.14%） and 450 PFO-negative cases（66.86%）. The PFO-positive group showed significantly more severe headache severity （χ²=15.799， P<0.01） and poorer sleep quality （χ²=14.377， P<0.01） compared with PFO-negative group. PFO-positive patients demonstrated significantly higher barrier factor scores of sleep quality， sleep latency， sleep efficiency， sleep disturbance， hypnotic medication use， and daytime dysfunction compared with PFO-negative counterparts （t=3.634， 3.269， 2.785， 3.428， 2.907， 3.637， Bonferroni adjust P<0.05/7=0.007）.By contrast， no significant difference was noted in sleep duration scores between the two groups（t=2.349， Bonferroni adjust P>0.05/7=0.007）.The Binary Logistic regression analysis revealed that age （OR=1.021， 95% CI： 1.001~1.041）， headache severity （OR=6.030， 95% CI： 4.085~8.901）， and PFO grade （OR=1.893，95% CI： 1.288~2.784）were significant influencing factors for sleep quality in migraine patients with PFO. ConclusionMigraine patients with PFO-positive exhibited poorer sleep quality compared wtih PFO-negative patients. Older age， higher headache servity， and more severe PFO grade are identified as risk factors for impaired sleep quality in PFO-positive migraine patients.

Tumor metastasis is the leading cause of high mortality in most cancers, and numerous studies have demonstrated that the malignant crosstalk of multiple components in the tumor microenvironment (TME) together promotes tumor metastasis. Cancer-associated fibroblasts (CAFs) are the major stromal cells and crosstalk centers in the TME of various kinds of tumors, such as breast cancer, pancreatic cancer, and prostate cancer. Recently, the CAF-induced pro-tumor metastatic TME has gained wide attention, being considered as one of the effective targets for tumor therapy. With in-depth research, CAFs have been found to promote tumor metastasis through multiple mechanisms, such as inducing epithelial-mesenchymal transition in tumor cells, remodeling the extracellular matrix, protecting circulating tumor cells, and facilitating the formation of a pre-metastatic niche. To enhance the anti-tumor metastasis effect, therapeutic strategies designed by combining nano-drug delivery systems with CAF modulation are undoubtedly a desirable choice, as evidenced by the research over the past decades. Herein, we introduce the physiological properties of CAFs, detail the possible mechanisms whereby CAFs promote tumor metastasis, categorize CAFs-based nano-drug delivery strategies according to their anti-metastasis functions and discuss the current challenges, possible solutions, as well as the future directions in order to provide a theoretical basis and reference for the utilization of CAFs-based nano-drug delivery strategies to promote tumor metastasis therapy.

Functional dyspepsia (FD), characterized by persistent or recurrent dyspeptic symptoms without identifiable organic, systemic or metabolic causes, is an increasingly recognized global health issue. The objective of this guideline is to equip clinicians and nursing professionals with evidence-based strategies for the management and treatment of adult patients with FD using traditional Chinese medicine (TCM). The Guideline Development Group consulted existing TCM consensus documents on FD and convened a panel of 35 clinicians to generate initial clinical queries. To address these queries, a systematic literature search was conducted across PubMed, EMBASE, the Cochrane Library, China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI), VIP Database, China Biology Medicine (SinoMed) Database, Wanfang Database, Traditional Medicine Research Data Expanded (TMRDE), and the Traditional Chinese Medical Literature Analysis and Retrieval System (TCMLARS). The evidence from the literature was critically appraised using the Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development, and Evaluation (GRADE) approach. The strength of the recommendations was ascertained through a consensus-building process involving TCM and allopathic medicine experts, methodologists, pharmacologists, nursing specialists, and health economists, leveraging their collective expertise and empirical knowledge. The guideline comprises a total of 43 evidence-informed recommendations that span a range of clinical aspects, including the pathogenesis according to TCM, diagnostic approaches, therapeutic interventions, efficacy assessments, and prognostic considerations. Please cite this article as: Zhang SS, Zhao LQ, Hou XH, Bian ZX, Zheng JH, Tian HH, Yang GH, Hong WS, He YY, Liu L, Shen H, Li YP, Xie S, Shu J, Zeng BF, Li JX, Liu Z, Xiao ZH, Xiao JD, Zheng PY, Huang SG, Chen SL, Fei GJ. International clinical practice guideline on the use of traditional Chinese medicine for functional dyspepsia (2025). J Integr Med. 2025; 23(5):502-518.
Dyspepsia/drug therapy* ; Humans ; Medicine, Chinese Traditional/methods* ; Practice Guidelines as Topic ; Drugs, Chinese Herbal/therapeutic use*

Objective To observe the therapeutic effect of neuromuscular electrical stimulation (NMES) combined with Flexi-bar exercise training on postpartum diastasis recti abdominis (DRA). Methods A total of 120 postpartum DRA patients were selected and randomly divided into observation group (60 cases) and control group (60 cases). Patients in the control group received NMES treatment, while those in the observation group received NMES treatment combined with Flexi-bar exercise therapy. The therapeutic effects between the two groups were compared after 6 weeks of continuously treatment. Results Before treatment, there was no significant difference in the distance between the rectus abdominis muscles at 4 cm above and below the umbilicus, or at the level of the umbilicus between two groups (P>0.05); after treatment, those distances were significantly reduced, and the distance between the rectus abdominis muscles at 4 cm above and below the umbilicus in the observation group were smaller than control group (P < 0.05). There were no significant differences between the two groups in terms of upper abdominal circumference, middle abdominal circumference, lower abdominal circumference, rectus abdominis root mean square (RMS), maximum muscle strength of classⅠmuscle fibers of pelvic floor, average muscle strength of class Ⅱ muscle fibers of pelvic floor, and 36-item Shot-form Health Status Survey(SF-36) scores before treatment (P>0.05); after treatment, the upper abdominal circumference, middle abdominal circumference and lower abdominal circumference of the two groups were decreased than those before treatment, and were lower in the observation group compared to the control group (P < 0.05). The rectus abdominis RMS, maximum muscle strength of class Ⅰ muscle fibers of pelvic floor, average muscle strength of class Ⅱ muscle fibers of pelvic floor, and SF-36 scores of the two groups were increased than those before treatment, and were higher in the observation group compared to the control group (P < 0.05). Conclusion NMES combined with Flexi-bar exercise training on postpartum DRA has significant therapeutic effect, which is helpful to enhance the abdominal muscle strength and improve the quality of life of patients.

Objective　To analyze the sensitivity of carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriaceae (CRE) producing different carbapenemases to antibacterial drugs, compare various detection methods of carbapenemases, and provide a technical basis for the clinical anti-infective treatment of CRE. Methods A total of 88 CRE strains isolated from clinical samples in a hospital in Nanchang, Jiangxi Province, from January 2021 to August 2022 were collected. MALDI-TOF MS was used for strain identification and Vitek 2-compact was used to detect their susceptibility to commonly used antibacterial drugs. The susceptibility of ceftazidime/avibactam and polymyxin B to CRE was detected by the broth microdilution method. The carbapenemase inhibitor enhancement test (EDTA-APB) was employed to screen for carbapenemase phenotypes, while polymerase chain reaction (PCR) method was used to detect five carbapenemase resistance genes: Klebsiella pneumoniae carbapenemases (blaKPC), New Delhi metallo-beta-lactamase-1 (blaNDM), Imipenem hydrolyzing β-lactamase (blaIMP), Metal β-lactamase of Verona integron (blaVIM), and Oxacillin-hydrolyzing carbapenemase (blaOXA-48-like). The consistency between carbapenemase phenotypes and gene results was compared. Results CRE infection was predominantly found in males (58 cases), with an average age of (63.4±14.2) years, mainly distributed in neurosurgery (26.1%, 23/88), the intensive care unit (17.0%, 15/88), and the rehabilitation department (15.9%, 14/88). The main sources of positive specimens were respiratory secretions (60.2%, 53/88), urine (21.6%, 19/88), and blood (5.7%, 5/88). The results of the drug susceptibility test showed that CRE had the highest resistance rate to cephalosporins and piperacillin/tazobactam, exceeding 95%, and the lowest resistance rate to tigecycline and polymyxin B, at 4.5% (4/88) and 1.1% (1/88), respectively. The results of the carbapenemase phenotype detection showed that the strains producing class A serine enzymes, class B metalloenzymes, and both class A and B carbapenemases accounted for 69.4% (61/88), 28.4% (25/88), and 1.1% (1/88), respectively. The results of PCR amplification of carbapenemase genes showed that the strains carrying class A resistance gene blaKPC, class B resistance gene blaNDM or blaIMP, and both blaKPC+NDM accounted for 70.5% (62/88), 28.4% (25/88), and 1.1% (1/88), respectively, with high consistency with enzyme phenotype results. The susceptibility rate of the strains carrying only blaKPC to ceftazidime/avibactam was 91.9% (57/62), while those carrying blaNDM or blaIMP were all highly resistant to ceftazidime/avibactam, accounting for 83.3% (25/30) of ceftazidime/avibactam-resistant strains. Conclusions The resistance mechanism of CRE strains to ceftazidime/avibactam is primarily due to the production of NDM-type metalloenzymes, while strains producing only KPC-type show higher sensitivity. Some ceftazidime/avibactam-resistant strains producing only KPC enzymes are caused by blaKPC-2 mutations. In addition, enzyme phenotype inhibition enhancement test and in vitro drug susceptibility test of ceftazidime/avibactam are recommended clinically to provide a basis for the rational selection of antibacterial drugs.

OBJECTIVE: To analyze Chinese medicine (CM) prescriptions for gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD), we model topics on GERD-related classical CM literature, providing insights into the potential treatment. METHODS: Clinical guidelines were used to identify symptom terms for GERD, and CM literature from the database "Imedbooks" was retrieved for related prescriptions and their corresponding sources, indications, and other information. BERTopic was applied to identify the main topics and visualize the data. RESULTS: A total of 36,207 entries are queried and 1,938 valid entries were acquired after manually filtering. Eight topics were identified by BERTopic, including digestion function abate, stomach flu, respiratory-related symptoms, gastric dysfunction, regurgitation and gastrointestinal dysfunction in pediatric patients, vomiting, stroke and alcohol accumulation are associated with the risk of GERD, vomiting and its causes, regurgitation, epigastric pain, and symptoms of heartburn. CONCLUSIONS Topic modeling provides an unbiased analysis of classical CM literature on GERD in a time-efficient and scale-efficient manner. Based on this analysis, we present a range of treatment options for relieving symptoms, including herbal remedies and non-pharmacological interventions such as acupuncture and dietary therapy.
Humans ; Gastroesophageal Reflux/drug therapy* ; Medicine, Chinese Traditional/methods* ; Drugs, Chinese Herbal/therapeutic use* ; Models, Theoretical

Central venous lesion is a difficult problem in the vascular access complications of hemodialysis, which can cause serious clinical symptoms and affect the quality of hemodialysis and life of patients. We established arteriovenous fistula of the contralateral graft blood vessel with the used vein on the diseased side of the central vein of the patient. The arteriovenous fistula of the graft blood vessel was successfully punctured and hemodialysis was performed 2 weeks later. In this way, we not only solved the problem of venous hypertension and subsequent vascular access in the patient, but also reserved more vascular resources.
Humans ; Arteriovenous Shunt, Surgical/adverse effects* ; Blood Vessel Prosthesis Implantation ; Treatment Outcome ; Renal Dialysis ; Arteriovenous Fistula

OBJECTIVE: To observe the immediate analgesic effect of electroacupuncture (EA) combined with diclofenac sodium on acute gouty arthritis (AGA). METHODS: A total of 90 patients with AGA were randomly divided into a low-dose medication (LM) group (30 cases, 1 case was eliminated, 1 case dropped off), a conventional medication (CM) group (30 cases, 1 case dropped off) and a combination of acupuncture and medication (AM) group (30 cases ). The LM group was given oral administration of 50 mg diclofenac sodium sustained-release capsule; the CM group was given oral administration of 100 mg diclofenac sodium sustained-release capsule; on the basis of the treatment of LM group, the AM group was treated with electroacupuncture at ashi points, Dadu (SP 2), Taichong (LR 3), Taibai (SP 3), Neiting (ST 44), Sanyinjiao (SP 6), Zusanli (ST 36) and Yinlingquan (SP 9) on the affected side, and Taichong (LR 3) and Zusanli (ST 36), Sanyinjiao (SP 6) and Yinlingquan (SP 9) were connected to electroacupuncture respectively, continuous wave, 2 Hz in frequency. The visual analogue scale (VAS) scores of pain before treatment and after 10 min, 2 h, 4 h and 6 h of treatment completion, joint tenderness and swelling scores before treatment and after 10 min and 6 h of treatment completion were compared, and the rate of diclofenac sodium addition within 24 h after treatment completion was recorded among the three groups. RESULTS: After 10 min of treatment completion, the scores of VAS, joint tenderness and joint swelling in the AM group were lower than those before treatment (P<0.05), and the VAS score in the AM group was lower than that in the other two groups (P<0.05). After 2, 4 and 6 h of treatment completion, the VAS scores of the three groups were lower than those before treatment (P<0.05), and the scores in the AM group were lower than those in the LM group (P<0.05). After 6 h of treatment completion, the joint tenderness scores of the three groups and the joint swelling scores of the AM group and the CM group were lower than those before treatment (P<0.05), and the joint tenderness and swelling scores of the AM group were lower than those of the LM group (P<0.05). The rate of diclofenac sodium addition was 3.3 % (1/30) and 3.4 % (1/29) in the AM group and the CM group, respectively, which were lower than 17.9% (5/28) in the LM group (P<0.05). CONCLUSION Electroacupuncture combined with diclofenac sodium have a good immediate analgesic effect in the treatment of AGA, and have the advantages of small dosage of analgesic drugs and less adverse reactions.
Humans ; Diclofenac ; Electroacupuncture ; Arthritis, Gouty/drug therapy* ; Delayed-Action Preparations ; Acupuncture Therapy ; Arthralgia

ObjectiveTo collect and screen records concerning the spleen and stomach diseases and syndromes in ancient books of traditional Chinese medicine （TCM） using an automated framework and to systematically explore the concept evolution of spleen and stomach diseases and syndromes using the visualization method. MethodA total of 1 224 kinds of ancient book data in the Ancient Books of Traditional Chinese Medicine Database （V2.1） were analyzed using the automated testing tool Selenium WebDriver with the Python 3.8 programming language and the etree library of Lxml for automatic collection and statistics of the "book title" "author" "classification" "dynasty" "completion time"， and "informative abstract". After being checked and collated， the collected data were visually analyzed with Tableau （V2020.1.3） for figuring out the concept evolution of spleen and stomach diseases and syndromes in the past dynasties from the perspectives of symptoms and signs， etiology and pathogenesis， principle-method-recipe-medicinal， and prognosis. ResultA total of 7 203 clauses were automatically collected from 989 ancient books. It was found that in the pre-Qin period， there were few ancient books related to the spleen and stomach diseases and syndromes， and the understandings were confined to the superficial symptoms or signs and the basic etiology and pathogenesis. From the Han to Sui and Tang dynasties， the related concepts gradually increased and the descriptions about the manifestations are more detailed than those in previous dynasties. The etiology， diagnosis， and treatment system of the spleen and stomach diseases and syndromes were further perfected. In the Song， Jin， and Yuan dynasties， such concepts as independent signs，symptoms， as well as nature and location of spleen and stomach diseases and syndromes were enriched. In the Ming and Qing dynasties， a TCM syndrome differentiation and treatment system for spleen and stomach diseases and syndromes was formed， and the related concepts were gradually simplified and unified. ConclusionThe concepts of spleen and stomach diseases and syndromes have undergone an evolution from simplicity to complexity and then back to simplicity. There are numerous ancient books discussing the concepts of spleen and stomach diseases and syndromes， exhibiting a fluctuating yet rising trend with time. The automated framework enables the construction of a lightweight database of spleen and stomach diseases and syndromes. Based on data visualization， the concept evolution of the spleen and stomach diseases and syndromes from ancient times to the present has been efficiently uncovered， which is conducive to tracing the origin and development of spleen and stomach diseases and syndromes in TCM. This has provided reference for related research of spleen and stomach diseases in modern Chinese medicine.