AIM: To evaluate the efficacy and safety of 3% diquafosol sodium eye drops in children wearing orthokeratology lenses and with dry eye disease(DED)or at risk of DED.METHODS: Randomized controlled trials. Children with DED or at risk of DED were randomly assigned in a 1:1 ratio to receive either 3% diquafosol sodium eye drops 6 times daily or a blank control at Chongqing Aier Children's Eye Hospital from November 2023 to November 2024. The primary endpoint was the change in the Dry Eye Questionnaire-5(DEQ-5)score from baseline at 12 wk. Secondary assessments included non-invasive breakup time(NIBUT), tear meniscus height, Schirmer's test, corneal fluorescein staining score, and axial length.RESULTS: A total of 80 participants(80 eyes)were enrolled(40 in each group), the average age of the participants was 11.11±1.88 years, with 43 females(54%)and 37 males(46%), and all completed the trial. After 12 wk, the DEQ-5 scores for the diquafosol sodium group and the blank control group were 1.88±2.02 and 2.88±2.79, respectively(P=0.079). The diquafosol sodium group demonstrated a significant improvement in DEQ-5 dryness symptom scores(-0.33±0.66 vs. 0.05±0.81, P=0.023)and NIBUT(6.18±3.73 vs. -1.09±4.40 s, P<0.001)at 12 wk. Additionally, the diquafosol sodium group showed no axial length elongation, in contrast to the blank control group, which exhibited elongation(0.00±0.08 vs. 0.05±0.10 mm, P=0.013). No other significant differences were found in the secondary endpoints. No adverse events occurred during the trial.CONCLUSION: Although no statistically significant improvements were noted in the overall DEQ-5 scores, the 3% diquafosol sodium eye drops significantly improved dryness symptoms and NIBUT when compared to the blank control group.

As activated hepatic stellate cells (aHSCs) play a central role in fibrogenesis, they have become key target cells for anti-fibrotic treatment. Nevertheless, the therapeutic efficiency is constrained by the exosomes they secrete, which are linked to energy metabolism and continuously stimulate the activation of neighboring quiescent hepatic stellate cells (qHSCs). Herein, an intercellular communication interference strategy is designed utilizing paeoniflorin (PF) loaded and hyaluronic acid (HA) coated copper-doped ZIF-8 (PF@HA-Cu/ZIF-8, PF@HCZ) to reduce energy-related exosome secretion from aHSCs, thus preserving neighboring qHSCs in a quiescent state. Simultaneously, the released copper and zinc ions disrupt key enzymes involved in glycolysis to reduce bioenergy synthesis in aHSCs, thereby promoting the reversion of aHSCs to a quiescent state and further decreasing exosome secretion. Therefore, PF@HCZ can effectively sustain both aHSCs and qHSCs in a metabolically dormant state to ultimately alleviate liver fibrosis. The study provides an enlightening strategy for interrupting exosome-mediated intercellular communication and remodeling the energy metabolic status of HSCs with boosted antifibrogenic activity.

Objective:To investigate the mediating effect of social interaction on the relationship between internet use and the health status of the elderly.The findings of this research can potentially contribute new insights into improving the health status of the elderly population.Methods:Based on the data from the Chinese General Social Survey(CGSS)in 2021, a total of 2 675 elderly individuals aged 60 and above were included in the study.The researchers analyzed the linear regression relationship between Internet use, social interaction, and the health status of the elderly using a hierarchical regression model.Additionally, a mediation effect test was conducted using the Bootstrap test.Furthermore, heterogeneity analysis of the mediation effect was performed considering factors such as gender, place of residence, working conditions, and physical exercise among the elderly participants.Results:The total effect value was 0.170.The direct effect of Internet use on the health status of older adults was 0.160(95% CI: 0.078-0.240), accounting for 93.66% of the effect value.The indirect effect of social interaction was 0.011(95% CI: 0.003-0.021), accounting for 6.34% of the effect value.The mediating effect of social interaction on the health status of older adults varied among different groups.Among female elderly, rural elderly, elderly who are currently unemployed, and those who are physically active, the mediating effects were 5.16%, 7.86%, 10.18%, and 9.91%, respectively. Conclusions:The impact of internet use and social interaction on the health status of the elderly is notably positive.Additionally, social interaction partially mediates the relationship between internet use and the health status of the elderly.

Objective:Taking the main international collaborative innovation network management modes for clinical research as a reference, to promote the construction of a collaborative innovation network for clinical research in China.Methods:Using literature research, case study, comparative analysis, and interview methods, this study systematically studied the collaborative innovation network management modes of clinical research in the United States, the United Kingdom, Japan, South Korea, and China from the perspective of integrating and sharing clinical research resources.Results:Based on the comparative results and drawing on foreign experience, suggestions were proposed to optimize the management mode of the clinical research collaborative innovation network in China and promote the construction of clinical research collaborative innovation network.Conclusions:It is recommended to establish national medical research institutions, increase investment in clinical research funds, build a platform for integrating volunteer resources based on clinical research collaborative innovation networks, and establish a clinical sample resource service platform to further supplement and improve the structure and layout of China’s clinical research collaborative innovation network.

Objective:Analyze the ethical issues encountered or potential in the use of ChatGPT and explore its ethical norms and requirements.Methods:Based on the ethical perspective of medical scientific research, this paper analyzed the disputes existing in ChatGPT from the perspectives of morality, fairness, responsibility and supervision, and explored the reasons for the disputes from both subjective and objective aspects.Results:ChatGPT has ethical issues, fairness issues, accountability issues, and regulatory issues.Conclusions:Ethical issues in ChatGPT should be regulated from the perspectives of people-oriented, limiting monopoly, strengthening responsibility and insisting on development, to reduce potential risks and negative effects.

Objective:To identify multimorbidity patterns in a nationally representative sample of elderly patients with chronic diseases and to explore the relationship between these multimorbidity patterns and health care utilization.Methods:Based on data from the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study(CHARLS)in 2018, 10 764 elderly people aged 60 years and older were included, and latent class analysis(LCA)was used to identify multimorbidity patterns in the elderly, and the Logistic model was used to analyze the relationship between multimorbidity patterns and healthcare utilization in 8 041 elderly people with complete information on the variables.Results:The primary LCA identified five categories, with 4 164(52.1%)participants belonging to the relatively healthy category.The other four categories represented different patterns of multimorbidity, with 473(5.7%)belonging to the respiratory disease category, 1994(25.3%)to the vascular disease category, 948(11.7%)to the stomach-arthritis/rheumatism disease category and 426(5.2%)to the multisystemic disease category.In terms of outpatient service utilization, compared with the relatively healthy category, the multisystemic disease category was the most likely one to seek outpatient services( aOR=2.920, 95% CI: 2.305-3.699), followed by the respiratory disease category( aOR=1.827, 95% CI: 1.429-2.336), the stomach-arthritis/rheumatism disease category( aOR=1.680, 95% CI: 1.392-2.027), and the vascular disease category( aOR=1.482, 95% CI: 1.267-1.734).In terms of inpatient service utilization, compared to the relatively healthy category, the multisystemic disease category was the most likely one to seek inpatient services( aOR=2.718, 95% CI: 2.158-3.425), followed by the respiratory disease category( aOR=2.627, 95% CI: 2.105-3.280), the stomach-arthritic/rheumatism disease category( aOR=1.940, 95% CI: 1.624-2.318), and the vascular disease group( aOR=1.887, 95% CI: 1.632-2.183). Conclusions:There is a significant correlation between multimorbidity patterns and outpatient and inpatient service utilization in the elderly.Compared to relatively healthy people, those with one of the other four multimorbidity patterns have a significantly increased risk needing outpatient and inpatient services.

The situation of population aging is grim.And scientific and technological innovation is an important strategic support means to solve the problem of population aging.President Xi Jinping has put forward the guiding ideology of "Four Facing" of scientific and technological innovation, pointing out the direction of using science and technology to support the high-quality development of the aging cause and to realize healthy aging.The scientific and technological innovation of population aging has always been highly integrated with exploring international science frontiers, serving main economic sectors, meeting major national needs and safeguarding people's life and health.This paper elaborates on the deep integration between the aging population and the "four facing" of scientific and technological innovation, in order to better construct a new development pattern, and for science to help actively cope with the smooth implementation of the national strategy of population aging.

BACKGROUND: The clinical features of patients with common single-mutation of epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) in non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) has been well characterized. There is a high adenocarcinoma incidence rate among female patients with none or shorter smoking history. Those patients have higher objective response rate (ORR) and progression free survival (PFS) treated with EGFR tyrosine kinase inhibitors (EGFR-TKIs). However, it is still unclear that the clinical features of patients with EGFR double mutation and the sensitivity towards EGFR-TKIs treatment. METHODS: We performed a retrospective cohort study of 1,238 primary NSCLC patients who had EGFR gene testing in Affiliated Hospital of Qingdao University from January 1, 2015 to December 31, 2016 and identified 603 patients with single mutation and 59 patients with double mutation. All genes were uniformly detected by using ARMS-PCR technology. We analyze the gene of 32 double-mutant patients with specific genotyping, and randomly selected 60 patients with single mutation and compared the clinical features with 59 patients with double mutation. Furthermore, we examined the efficacy of EGFR-TKIs treatment in lung cancer patients with double mutation and single mutation in EGFR. RESULTS: The rare single mutation gene is the most common in patients with double mutation of EGFR. There is no significant statistical difference in gender, smoking history, age, pathological type or tumor-node-metastasis (TNM) staging among patients with single and double EGFR mutantion. In the double mutation patients treated with EGFR-TKIs, the objective response rate was 36.80%, the disease control rate was 68.40%. The objective response rate was 60.00% and the disease control rate was 90.00% in the patients with single mutation. However, overall PFS was significantly higher in EGFR single mutation patients (P=0.003), with median PFS of 12.0 months compared with 6.0 months in EGFR double mutation patients. CONCLUSIONS There was no significant difference between the clinical features of patients with EGFR double mutation and single mutation. Patients with EGFR double mutation is associated with poor survival underwent the first generation of EGFR-TKIs treatment compared with patients with a single mutation.
Carcinoma, Non-Small-Cell Lung ; drug therapy ; genetics ; ErbB Receptors ; antagonists & inhibitors ; genetics ; Exons ; genetics ; Female ; Humans ; Lung Neoplasms ; drug therapy ; genetics ; Male ; Middle Aged ; Mutation ; Protein Kinase Inhibitors ; pharmacology ; therapeutic use ; Retrospective Studies ; Treatment Outcome

Objective To investigate the effects of different doses of T-2 toxin on the expression of cytokines cytokines and pathological changes in parental mice and their offspring. Methods One hundred female mice and 25 male mice (CD-1, SPF) were adapted for one week. After regular random mating, observation of vaginal suppository within the first 24 hours was as the 0th day of pregnancy. The pregnant rats were divided into high dose, medium dose, low dose and control groups according to body weight by a random number table(Feed: the doses of T-2 toxin were 1 200, 600, 300, and 0 μg/kg, respectively), with 16 - 18 rats in each group. The high, middle and low dose groups began to consume the poisoned feed on the 0th day of pregnancy, while the control group consumed the standard feed. After natural delivery, their offspring were continually treated the same way as their mother until the offspring reached adulthood. Serum levels of interleukin-1β (IL-1β) and interleukin-6 (IL-6), tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-α), organ coefficient and pathological changes of articular cartilage were determined. Results The levels of IL-1β,IL-6 and TNF-α in the control, low, middle and high T-2 toxin groups during the pro-pregnancy of the middle-aged mice were [(219.56 ± 19.32), (136.89 ± 20.41), (210.49 ± 21.23), (207.41 ± 21.23); (192.73 ± 22.43), (136.25 ± 29.55), (187.43 ± 39.32), (232.48 ± 39.32); (1 303.02 ± 142.10), (1 072.60 ± 78.30), (1 065.03 ± 37.44), and (1 169.72 ± 104.18) ng/L], respectively. The differences between control and T-2 toxin treated groups were statistically significant (F = 17.124, 6.237, 7.670, P < 0.05). For further pairwise comparison,IL-1β and IL-6 in low dose group were significantly lower than those in control, middle and high dose groups (P < 0.05); TNF-α content in control group was significantly higher than those in low,middle and high dose groups(P<0.05).There were significant differences in the levels of IL-1β,IL-6 and TNF-α between the control group and the low,middle and high dose groups of offspring weanling mice[(142.36 ± 13.36),(113.01 ± 8.65), (102.13 ± 8.31), (123.42 ± 10.41); (109.92 ± 9.76), (100.26 ± 15.60), (85.25 ± 9.97), (100.21 ± 16.46);(1 308.45 ± 204.90), (1 248.60 ± 96.85), (1 081.09 ± 105.51), (1 204.87 ± 153.96) ng/L, F = 49.823, 10.530, 7.490, P < 0.05]. The levels of IL-1β and IL-6 in the control group were significantly higher than those in the low, middle and high dose groups(P < 0.05).The levels of TNF-α in the control group were significantly higher than those in the medium and high dose groups(P < 0.05).The levels of the three cytokines IL-1β, IL-6 and TNF-α in adult filial mice were significantly different [(69.71 ± 9.61), (61.31 ± 10.07), (63.07 ± 10.39), (58.56 ± 9.69); (172.55 ± 24.55),(146.91 ± 13.47),(151.02 ± 24.93), (157.21 ± 17.86); (1 136.87 ± 137.39), (1 002.22 ± 86.52), (987.12 ± 130.80),(1 047.21 ± 171.64)ng/L, F=4.670,5.636, 4.775, P < 0.05], the contents of the three cytokines in the poisoning groups were significantly lower than that of the control group (P < 0.05). The organ coefficients of thymus, spleen and liver in the second trimester were significantly different [(0.14 ± 0.03), (0.20 ± 0.06), (0.15 ± 0.02), (0.12 ± 0.03); (0.71 ± 0.16), (0.78 ± 0.14), (0.77 ± 0.15), (0.38 ± 0.10); (6.19 ± 0.43), (5.57 ± 0.57), (6.04 ± 0.32), (5.11 ± 0.29), F = 4.056, 11.064, 8.312, P < 0.05], and the thymus index was significantly increased in low dose group (P<0.05),spleen coefficient decreased significantly in high dose group (P < 0.05), and liver coefficients in low and high dose group were significantly decreased (P < 0.05). In the offspring, the midbrain coefficient of viscera showed significant changes [(3.45 ± 0.73), (3.11 ± 0.31), (2.98 ± 0.45), (3.04 ± 0.22), F = 7.529, P < 0.05], which was significantly decreased in the exposed rats(P<0.05).Both the mid-pregnant mice and filial mice showed varying degrees of changes in epiphyseal cartilage injury. The degree of epiphyseal cartilage injury became higher with increasing dosages of T-2 toxin in mid-pregnancy and post-weaning parental mice, and the injury was more serious in post-weaning mice. Conclusions Exposure to T-2 toxin can cause decrease of cytokines IL-1β, IL-6 and TNF-α in the blood of CD-1 pregnant and filial mice, and also cause the cartilage damage in mice, which are aggravated following increased doses of T-2 toxin and extension of exposure time.

Objective To investigate the expression of DNA methyltransferase 3b (DNMT3B) in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) and its effect and mechanism on the proliferation,invasion and migration of HCC cells.Methods The expression of DNMT3B gene was detected by qRT-PCR in 46 cases of HCC tissues and corresponding adjacent tissues;the results and clinical pathological parameters were analyzed.SiRNA targeting DNMT3B was transfected into MHCC97-H cells by RNA interference (RNAi) technique.The mRNA and protein expression levels of related genes were detected by qRT-PCR and Western blot.The cell proliferation was measured by MTT assay,and the invasion and migration abilities were measured by Transwell assay.Results In 46 HCC patients,the expression of DNMT3B (73.91％) was significantly higher in HCC than in adjacent normal tissue.The high expression of DNMT3B gene was associated with histological type and tumor size of HCC (all P＜0.05).Inhibition of DNMT3B gene expression decreased proliferation,invasion and migration of MHCC97-H cells.Interference with DNMT3B gene increased the expressions of tumor suppressor genes RASSFA1,APC and MTSS1 at mRNA and protein levels.Conclusion DNMT3B is associated with the progression of HCC.It may inhibit the proliferation,invasion and migration of HCC cells by regulating the methylation of downstream tumor suppressor gene.