Background: and Purpose Guillain–Barré syndrome (GBS) is an autoimmune-mediated disorder characterized by demyelinating or axonal injury of the peripheral nerve. Our aim is to determine whether serum amyloid A (SAA) is a biomarker of demyelinating injury and disease severity in patients with GBS. Methods: This study retrospectively enrolled 40 patients with either the demyelinating or axonal GBS and sex- and age-matched controls with other neurological diseases as well as healthy subjects. The demographic and clinical features at entry were collected. The serum levels of the SAA isoforms SAA1, SAA2, and SAA4 were determined in the patients with GBS and the controls using the enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay and analyzed for the associations between levels of different SAA isoforms and the clinical features of the patients. Results: The levels of SAA2 and SAA4 were significantly higher in patients with GBS than in both the other neurological disease controls and the healthy subjects (p<0.05 for all). The level of SAA1 did not differ between patients with GBS and the controls. The level of SAA2 was considerably higher in GBS patients with antecedent infection than in those without infection (p=0.020). The levels of different SAA isoforms were not associated with the disease severity or other clinical features of patients with GBS (p>0.05 for all). Conclusions Increased levels of SAA2 and SAA4 may only represent the acute inflammatory status and so cannot be utilized as biomarkers of the disease severity or demyelinating injury in patients with GBS.

Background: and Purpose Guillain–Barré syndrome (GBS) is an autoimmune-mediated disorder characterized by demyelinating or axonal injury of the peripheral nerve. Our aim is to determine whether serum amyloid A (SAA) is a biomarker of demyelinating injury and disease severity in patients with GBS. Methods: This study retrospectively enrolled 40 patients with either the demyelinating or axonal GBS and sex- and age-matched controls with other neurological diseases as well as healthy subjects. The demographic and clinical features at entry were collected. The serum levels of the SAA isoforms SAA1, SAA2, and SAA4 were determined in the patients with GBS and the controls using the enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay and analyzed for the associations between levels of different SAA isoforms and the clinical features of the patients. Results: The levels of SAA2 and SAA4 were significantly higher in patients with GBS than in both the other neurological disease controls and the healthy subjects (p<0.05 for all). The level of SAA1 did not differ between patients with GBS and the controls. The level of SAA2 was considerably higher in GBS patients with antecedent infection than in those without infection (p=0.020). The levels of different SAA isoforms were not associated with the disease severity or other clinical features of patients with GBS (p>0.05 for all). Conclusions Increased levels of SAA2 and SAA4 may only represent the acute inflammatory status and so cannot be utilized as biomarkers of the disease severity or demyelinating injury in patients with GBS.

Background: and Purpose Guillain–Barré syndrome (GBS) is an autoimmune-mediated disorder characterized by demyelinating or axonal injury of the peripheral nerve. Our aim is to determine whether serum amyloid A (SAA) is a biomarker of demyelinating injury and disease severity in patients with GBS. Methods: This study retrospectively enrolled 40 patients with either the demyelinating or axonal GBS and sex- and age-matched controls with other neurological diseases as well as healthy subjects. The demographic and clinical features at entry were collected. The serum levels of the SAA isoforms SAA1, SAA2, and SAA4 were determined in the patients with GBS and the controls using the enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay and analyzed for the associations between levels of different SAA isoforms and the clinical features of the patients. Results: The levels of SAA2 and SAA4 were significantly higher in patients with GBS than in both the other neurological disease controls and the healthy subjects (p<0.05 for all). The level of SAA1 did not differ between patients with GBS and the controls. The level of SAA2 was considerably higher in GBS patients with antecedent infection than in those without infection (p=0.020). The levels of different SAA isoforms were not associated with the disease severity or other clinical features of patients with GBS (p>0.05 for all). Conclusions Increased levels of SAA2 and SAA4 may only represent the acute inflammatory status and so cannot be utilized as biomarkers of the disease severity or demyelinating injury in patients with GBS.

Objective:To investigate the epidemiological and clinical characteristics of patients with nontuberculous mycobacterial infections in Hunan Province using metagenomics next generation sequencing (mNGS) .Methods:Pathological data form 320 patients diagnosed with mycobacterial infections at the Department of Pathology of Hunan People′s Hospital from June 2019 to December 2023 were collected, including HE staining, acid-fast staring, and fungal fluorescence staining. mNGS was utilized for the classification of mycobacterial pathogens.Results:Among 320 patients with mycobacterial infections, 249 cases were positive for Mycobacterium tuberculosis and 71 cases were positive for nontuberculous mycobacteria. Thirteen genera of nontuberculous mycobacteria were identified from the mycobacterial samples, including Mycobacterium chelonae, Mycobacterium avium complex, Mycobacterium abscessus, Mycobacterium gordonae, Mycobacterium intracellulare, Mycobacterium xenopi, Mycobacterium kansasii, Mycobacterium paragordonae, Mycobacterium obuense, Mycobacterium marinum, Mycobacterium fortuitum, Mycobacterium smegmatis and Mycobacterium mageritense. Conclusions:Infections caused by nontuberculous mycobacteria are gradually increasing, transitioning from single-strain infections to multi-strain complex infections. The histopathological features of nontuberculous mycobacterial infections are difficult to distinguish form those of tuberculosis, posing significant challenges for clinical diagnosis and treatment.

Objective:To investigate the epidemiological and clinical characteristics of patients with nontuberculous mycobacterial infections in Hunan Province using metagenomics next generation sequencing (mNGS) .Methods:Pathological data form 320 patients diagnosed with mycobacterial infections at the Department of Pathology of Hunan People′s Hospital from June 2019 to December 2023 were collected, including HE staining, acid-fast staring, and fungal fluorescence staining. mNGS was utilized for the classification of mycobacterial pathogens.Results:Among 320 patients with mycobacterial infections, 249 cases were positive for Mycobacterium tuberculosis and 71 cases were positive for nontuberculous mycobacteria. Thirteen genera of nontuberculous mycobacteria were identified from the mycobacterial samples, including Mycobacterium chelonae, Mycobacterium avium complex, Mycobacterium abscessus, Mycobacterium gordonae, Mycobacterium intracellulare, Mycobacterium xenopi, Mycobacterium kansasii, Mycobacterium paragordonae, Mycobacterium obuense, Mycobacterium marinum, Mycobacterium fortuitum, Mycobacterium smegmatis and Mycobacterium mageritense. Conclusions:Infections caused by nontuberculous mycobacteria are gradually increasing, transitioning from single-strain infections to multi-strain complex infections. The histopathological features of nontuberculous mycobacterial infections are difficult to distinguish form those of tuberculosis, posing significant challenges for clinical diagnosis and treatment.

BACKGROUND: Understanding the association between floods and bacillary dysentery (BD) incidence is necessary for us to assess the health risk of extreme weather events. This study aims at exploring the association between floods and daily bacillary dysentery cases in main urban areas of Chongqing between 2005 and 2016 as well as evaluating the attributable risk from floods. METHODS: The association between floods and daily bacillary dysentery cases was evaluated by using distributed lag non-linear model, controlling for meteorological factors, long-term trend, seasonality, and day of week. The fraction and number of bacillary dysentery cases attributable to floods was calculated. Subgroup analyses were conducted to explore the association across age, gender, and occupation. RESULTS: After controlling the impact of temperature, precipitation, relative humidity, long-term trend, and seasonality, a significant lag effect of floods on bacillary dysentery cases was found at 0-day, 3-day, and 4-day lag, and the cumulative relative risk (CRR) over a 7-lag day period was 1.393 (95%CI 1.216-1.596). Male had higher risk than female. People under 5 years old and people aged 15-64 years old had significantly higher risk. Students, workers, and children had significantly higher risk. During the study period, based on 7-lag days, the attributable fraction of bacillary dysentery cases due to floods was 1.10% and the attributable number was 497 persons. CONCLUSIONS This study confirms that floods can increase the risk of bacillary dysentery incidence in main urban areas of Chongqing within an accurate time scale, the risk of bacillary dysentery caused by floods is still serious. The key population includes male, people under 5 years old, students, workers, and children. Considering the lag effect of floods on bacillary dysentery, the government and public health emergency departments should advance to the emergency health response in order to minimize the potential risk of floods on public.
Adolescent ; Adult ; Aged ; Aged, 80 and over ; Child ; Child, Preschool ; China/epidemiology* ; Cities ; Dysentery, Bacillary/epidemiology* ; Female ; Floods ; Humans ; Incidence ; Infant ; Infant, Newborn ; Male ; Middle Aged ; Retrospective Studies ; Young Adult

Objective:To preliminarily compile the words list of personality in southern China, and structurally analyse the words with natural personality traits.Methods:A semi-structured questionnaire was used to obtain 603 valid questionnaires in six provinces in southern China, and the lexical collation, consolidation, deletion, lexicographic analysis and structural analysis were conducted.Results:(1)After three rounds of collation and merging of 8 022 natural words describing personality traits, a personality trait word list containing 136 words was obtained.(2)Econometric analysis of words according to positivity, neutrality and negativity, showed that all negative words involving moral evaluations (ruthless, vicious, evil, cunning, narrow-minded and so on) were used to describe others, while negative words describing oneself were mainly non-virtuous words (capricious, stubborn, impatient, impetuous, pessimistic and so on). (3) The proportion of desirability and virtue dimensions in the words list was highest(23.20%, 16.80%); and the proportion of desirability and extroversion in total words frequency was highest(24.39%, 19.96%).Conclusion:A personality word list containing 136 personality traits in southern China is compiled from primary sources; and a 7-factor personality structure was latent in the word list.Subjects are richer in describing the content of the vocabulary of agreeable, virtuous, pioneering, and persevering personality traits, while agreeable and extroverted personality traits are most easily perceived in interpersonal interactions.

Objective To understand the status of sexually transmitted infection and seeking medical treatment behavior, and influencing factors of Vietnamese cross-border female sex workers (FSWs) in Hekou County, Yunnan, and to provide a basis for promoting reproductive health and preventing and controlling the spread of sexually transmitted diseases (STD) in Vietnamese cross-border FSWs. Methods The snowball sampling method was used to recruit research subjects in entertainment venues in Hekou County, Yunnan, to conduct a questionnaire survey and collect blood, vaginal secretions and cervical swab specimens for HIV/STD testing. Results A total of 262 Vietnamese cross-border FSWs were investigated. The total infection rate of sexually transmitted diseases and HIV was 35.8% (94/262). The positive rate of genital herpes simplex, fungal vaginitis, trichomoniasis, wet warts and chlamydia were 23.5%, 8.0%, 2.7%, 1.5% and 1.5%, respectively. The positive rate of HIV was 1.5%. In the past year, 116 Vietnamese cross-border FSWs had symptoms related to sexually transmitted diseases. Among them, 34.5% chose to go to the hospital or private outpatient clinic, 44.8% bought medicines by themselves, and 20.7% did not receive any treatment. The FSWs who reported having sexually transmitted diseases testing in the past year (OR=3.54, P<0.05), came from medium and high-end places (OR=3.94, P<0.05), had more than two symptoms (OR=3.88, P<0.05), and self-perceived high risk of sexually transmitted infection were more likely to seek medical treatment. Conclusion The Vietnamese cross-border FSW population in Hekou County of Yunnan Province had a high rate of sexually transmitted infections. The proportion of seeking medical treatment among FSWs having symptoms related to sexually transmitted diseases was low. It is necessary to guide the Vietnamese cross-border FSWs to seek formal medical treatment.

Objective To determine the expression profile of serum microRNAs(miRNAs) in early-onset familial Alzheimer's disease (EO-FAD) patients. methods miRNA microarrays were performed to detect the expression profile of serum miRNAs in 2 cases of EO-FAD patients,2 cases of EO-FAD carriers and 2 cases of normal controls.Preliminary bioinformatic analysis was conducted. Result sIt was found that 21 miRNAs were up-regulated and 22 miRNAs were down-regulated in serum of EO-FAD patients,the differences were statistically significant(P<0.05).miR-5704(P=0.0002),miR-4639-3p(P=0.0195),miR-107(P=0.0204) were markedly up-regulated,miR-5572(P=0.0008),miR-204-3p(P=0.0014),miR-542-5p(P=0.0106) and miR-155-5p(P=0.0240) were markedly down-regulated.Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) pathway analysis suggested that the dysregulated miRNAs may be involved in the mechanism of EO-FAD by affecting neurotrophin signaling pathway.Conclusion miR-5704,miR-4639-3p,miR-107,miR-5572,miR-204-3p,miR-542-5p and miR-155-5p may be used as potential biomarkers of EO-FAD,and involved in the mechanism of EO-FAD by affecting neurotrophin signaling pathway.

Objective To isolate bacteriophages against extensively-drug resistant Acinetobacter baumannii from hospital sewage and analyze their biological characteristics.Methods Extensively-drug resistant Acinetobacter baumannii isolated from several hospitals in Shanghai during December, 2013 to July, 2014 were used as host bacteria, adopting double-layer agar method to isolate bacteriophages from raw sewage of these hospitals.The phage with broad host range was selected for further study, including observation of electron microscopic morphology, examination of thermal stability, pH stability and the optimal MOI, drawing of the adsorption, one-step-growth and infection curves, as well as sequencing of the phage genome DNA. Results An extensively-drug resistant Acinetobacter baumannii bacteriophage vB_AbaP_PD-AB9 ( PD-AB9 for short) with broad host range was isolated, and electron microscopy revealed it belonged to Podoviridae family.The optimal MOI of PD-AB9 was 0.001.PD-AB9 remained stable among 4 ℃to 50 ℃and pH 4 to 11.In the adsorption experiment, the adsorption rate of PD-AB9 reached above 95%within 5 min.PD-AB9 had a latent period of 4 min and a burst size of 213.PD-AB9 could obviously restrain the host growth, with faster effect at the higher MOIs (MOI=1, 0.1, 0.01) than at the lower ones (MOI=0.001, 0.000 1).Furthermore, genome of PD-AB9 proved to be a double-stranded linear DNA with size of 40 938 bp and GC content of 39.34%.Conclusions PD-AB9 exhibits good thermal stability, wide pH tolerance range, very fast adsorption, a short latent period, a large burst size and it could quickly cause effective host lysis after infection.Therefore, PD-AB9 is promised to act as a new antimicrobial agent to control drug-resistant Acinetobacter baumannii infections and its bio information remains to be further studied.