Objective:To evaluate serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D 3 [25(OH)D 3] as a potential biomarker for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) severity and to identify risk factors influencing ALS prognosis. Methods:This study included 217 ALS patients hospitalized at the Department of Neurology, First Medical Center, Chinese PLA General Hospital, between October 2018 and October 2021, who met the revised El Escorial diagnostic criteria. A cross-sectional analysis assessed differences in clinical indicators-including the ALS Functional Rating Scale-Revised (ALSFRS-R) and forced vital capacity percentage (FVC%)-across different serum 25(OH)D 3 levels. The correlation between 25(OH)D 3 levels and individual ALSFRS-R components was also examined. Conduct a prospective cohort study to identify independent risk factors affecting the survival time of ALS patients. Results:Among three groups categorized by serum 25(OH)D 3 levels, there were significant differences in the proportion of males ( χ2=10.51, P<0.05). Serum 25(OH)D 3 levels correlated positively with lower limb function scores in the ALSFRS-R ( r=0.05, P<0.05), but they were not identified as an independent risk factor for survival ( HR=0.98, 95% CI 0.93-1.04, P>0.05). In contrast, delayed diagnosis( HR=0.94, 95% CI 0.89-0.99, P<0.05) and reduced FVC%( HR=0.94, 95% CI 0.97-0.99, P<0.05) were independent predictors of shorter survival. Conclusion:Serum 25(OH)D 3 levels differ by gender distribution and may be linked to better lower limb function in ALS patients. However, their role in prolonging survival remains uncertain.

Objective:To evaluate serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D 3 [25(OH)D 3] as a potential biomarker for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) severity and to identify risk factors influencing ALS prognosis. Methods:This study included 217 ALS patients hospitalized at the Department of Neurology, First Medical Center, Chinese PLA General Hospital, between October 2018 and October 2021, who met the revised El Escorial diagnostic criteria. A cross-sectional analysis assessed differences in clinical indicators-including the ALS Functional Rating Scale-Revised (ALSFRS-R) and forced vital capacity percentage (FVC%)-across different serum 25(OH)D 3 levels. The correlation between 25(OH)D 3 levels and individual ALSFRS-R components was also examined. Conduct a prospective cohort study to identify independent risk factors affecting the survival time of ALS patients. Results:Among three groups categorized by serum 25(OH)D 3 levels, there were significant differences in the proportion of males ( χ2=10.51, P<0.05). Serum 25(OH)D 3 levels correlated positively with lower limb function scores in the ALSFRS-R ( r=0.05, P<0.05), but they were not identified as an independent risk factor for survival ( HR=0.98, 95% CI 0.93-1.04, P>0.05). In contrast, delayed diagnosis( HR=0.94, 95% CI 0.89-0.99, P<0.05) and reduced FVC%( HR=0.94, 95% CI 0.97-0.99, P<0.05) were independent predictors of shorter survival. Conclusion:Serum 25(OH)D 3 levels differ by gender distribution and may be linked to better lower limb function in ALS patients. However, their role in prolonging survival remains uncertain.

Objective To evaluate the short-term outcome of robot-assisted thoracoscopic surgery (RATS) for the treatment of posterior mediastinal neurogenic tumour. Methods The clinical data of consecutive patients with mediastinal neurogenic tumors who received RATS treatment completed by the same operator in the Department of Thoracic Surgery, Gansu Provincial People's Hospital from June 2016 to June 2022 were retrospectively analyzed. The tumors were preoperatively localized and evaluated using magnetic resonance imaging or enhanced CT. Results A total of 35 patients were enrolled, including 19 males and 16 females with a mean age of 34.9±7.1 years. All patients successfully completed the resection of posterior mediastinal neurogenic tumors under RATS, and no conversion to thoracotomy occurred during the operation. The average operative time was 62.3±18.0 min, docking time was 10.3±2.6 min, intraoperative bleeding was 33.9±21.6 mL, postoperative 24-hour chest drainage was 69.0±28.9 mL, postoperative chest drainage time was 2.0 (1.0, 3.0) d and the postoperative hospital stay was 3.0 (2.0, 4.0) d. Postoperative complications occurred in 3 patients, including 2 patients with transient Honor syndrome and 1 patient with transient anhidrosis of the affected upper limb. Conclusion RATS for posterior mediastinal neurogenic tumours is safe, effective and feasible, and allows the full benefit of the robotic surgical system to be exploited.

Objective     To systematically evaluate the accuracy of endoscopy-based artificial intelligence (AI)-assisted diagnostic systems in the diagnosis of early-stage esophageal cancer and provide a scientific basis for its diagnostic value. Methods    PubMed, EMbase, The Cochrane Library, Web of Science, Wanfang database, VIP database and CNKI database were searched by computer to search for the relevant literature about endoscopy-based AI-assisted diagnostic systems for the diagnosis of early esophageal cancer from inception to March 2022. The QUADAS-2 was used for quality evaluation of included studies. Meta-analysis of the literature was carried out using Stata 16, Meta-Disc 1.4 and RevMan 5.4 softwares. A bivariate mixed effects regression model was utilized to calculate the combined diagnostic efficacy of the AI-assisted system and meta-regression analysis was conducted to explore the sources of heterogeneity. Results    A total of 17 articles were included, which consisted of 13 retrospective cohort studies and 4 prospective cohort studies. The results of the quality evaluation using QUADAS-2 showed that all included literature was of high quality. The obtained meta-analysis results revealed that the AI-assisted system in the diagnosis of esophageal cancer presented a combined sensitivity of 0.94 (95%CI 0.91 to 0.96), a specificity of 0.85 (95%CI 0.74 to 0.92), a positive likelihood ratio of 6.28 (95%CI 3.48 to 11.33), a negative likelihood ratio of 0.07 (95%CI 0.05 to 0.11), a diagnostic odds ratio of 89 (95%CI 38 to 208) and an area under the curve of 0.96 (95%CI 0.94 to 0.98). Conclusion    The AI-assisted diagnostic system has a high diagnostic value for early stage esophageal cancer. However, most of the included studies were retrospective. Therefore, further high-quality prospective studies are needed for validation.

Objective    To evaluate the efficacy and safety of robot-assisted thymectomy (RATS) versus video-assisted thoracoscopic thymectomy (VATS). Methods    Web of Science, PubMed, EMbase, The Cochrane Library, Wanfang, VIP and CNKI databases were searched by computer from inception to February 2022. Relevant literatures that compared the efficacy and safety of RATS with those of VATS were screened. The Newcastle-Ottawa Scale (NOS) was used to evaluate the quality of included cohort studies, and Review Manager 5.4 software was utilized to perform a meta-analysis. Results    A total of 16 retrospective cohort studies were included, covering a total of 1 793 patients (874 patients in the RATS group and 919 patients in the VATS group). The NOS scores of the included studies were≥7 points. Meta-analysis results revealed that RATS had less intraoperative bleeding (MD=−22.45, 95%CI −34.16 to −10.73, P<0.001), less postoperative chest drainage (MD=−80.29, 95%CI −144.86 to −15.72, P=0.010), shorter postoperative drainage time (MD=−0.69, 95%CI −1.08 to −0.30, P<0.001), shorter postoperative hospital stay (MD=−1.14, 95%CI −1.55 to −0.72, P<0.001) and fewer conversion to thoractomy (OR=0.40, 95%CI 0.23 to 0.69, P=0.001) than VATS; whereas, the operative time (MD=8.37, 95%CI −1.21 to 17.96, P=0.090), incidence of postoperative myasthenia gravis (OR=0.85, 95%CI 0.52 to 1.40, P=0.530), overall postoperative complications rate (OR=0.80, 95%CI 0.42 to 1.50, P=0.480) and tumour size (MD=−0.18, 95%CI −0.38 to 0.03, P=0.090) were not statistically different between the two groups. Conclusion    In the aspects of intraoperative bleeding, postoperative chest drainage, postoperative drainage time, postoperative hospital stay and conversion to thoracotomy, RATS has unique advantages over the VATS.

Objective To compare the perioperative efficacy and safety of da Vinci robot-assisted thoracoscopic surgery (RATS) for treatment of anterior mediastinal tumors through subxiphoid versus lateral thoracic approaches under the laryngeal mask anesthesia. Methods We retrospectively analyzed the clinical data of 102 patients with anterior-mediastinal tumors treated by RATS under laryngeal mask anesthesia completed by the same operator. Forty-five patients underwent the subxiphoid approach (subxiphoid group), and 57 patients were treated with the lateral thoracic approach (lateral thoracic group). The operating time, intraoperative bleeding, and total postoperative drainage volume in the two groups were compared and analyzed. Results All patients successfully completed resection of the anterior mediastinal tumor without the occurrence of perioperative death. In terms of total postoperative drainage volume, postoperative drainage time, postoperative hospital stay, and VAS pain on postoperative days 2 and 3, the subxiphoid group was more advantages (P < 0.05). No statistically significant difference was found between the two groups in terms of operative time, docking time, total operative time, intraoperative bleeding volume, postoperative day 1 VAS pain score, or postoperative complications (P > 0.05). Conclusion The subxiphoid approach of RATS is safe and feasible for resection of anterior mediastinal tumors. Compared with the lateral thoracic approach, the subxiphoid approach has advantages in terms of rapid postoperative recovery and postoperative pain.

Objective:To investigate the association between split foot and electrophysiology in patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS).Methods:The clinically definite or clinically probable ALS patients hospitalized in the Department of Neurology, the First Medical Center of Chinese People′s Liberation Army General Hospital from April 2021 to December 2022 were prospectively collected. From April 2021 to December 2022, patients who visited the Chinese People′s Liberation Army General Hospital for other reasons without abnormal electrophysiological examination were collected as the control group. The incidence of split leg [the limb whose modified Medical Research Council Muscle Strength Scale (mMRC) score of ankle dorsiflexors was lower than that of ankle plantarflexors] in ALS patients was calculated, and the incidence of split foot (the limb whose mMRC score of hallux dorsiflexors was lower than that of hallux plantarflexors) in ALS patients was calculated. The amplitude of compound muscle action potential (CMAP) of common peroneal nerve and tibial nerve was detected to observe the involvement of motor neurons innervating ankle dorsiflexors and ankle plantarflexors. The characteristics of split leg and split foot in ALS patients were analyzed from the perspective of muscle strength, and the characteristics of split foot in ALS patients were analyzed from the perspective of electrophysiology. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve was used to analyze the sensitivity and specificity of peroneal nerve/tibial nerve CMAP amplitude ratio in distinguishing ALS patients from controls.Results:A total of 101 ALS patients with lower limb involvement and 110 controls with normal lower limb muscle strength were collected. Among the 101 ALS patients with lower limb involvement, strength of ankle plantarflexors was greater than that of ankle dorsiflexors in 35.64% (36/101) patients, strength of ankle dorsiflexors was greater than that of ankle plantarflexors in 5.94% (6/101) patients, and strength of ankle plantarflexors and ankle dorsiflexors was equal in 58.42% (59/101) patients. Strength of hallux dorsiflexors was lower than that of hallux plantarflexors in 53.47% (54/101) patients, strength of hallux dorsiflexors was greater than that of hallux plantarflexors in 1.98% (2/101) patients, and the strength of hallux dorsiflexors and hallux plantarflexors was equal in 44.55% (45/101) patients. The incidence of split leg was negatively correlated with age ( OR=0.25, 95% CI 0.16-0.40, P<0.05), course of disease ( OR=0.52, 95% CI 0.38-0.80 P<0.05) and ALS functional revised scores ( OR=0.29, 95% CI 0.12-0.67, P<0.05). The incidence of split foot was negatively correlated with the onset time of lower limb symptoms ( OR=0.96, 95% CI 0.93-0.99, P<0.05). Compared with the control group, the differences of the decrease of CMAP amplitude in the common peroneal nerve and tibial nerve [the common peroneal nerve (6.45±2.56) mV vs (3.63±1.83) mV, tibial nerve (12.87±4.72) mV vs (9.18±6.22) mV] were statistically significant ( t=-4.65, t=-3.44, both P<0.001) and the differences of the peroneal nerve/tibial nerve CMAP amplitude ratio (0.54±0.24 vs 0.36±0.18) decrease was statistically significant ( t=-4.31, P<0.001) in patients with split foot. ROC curve analysis showed that the area under the ROC curve of CMAP amplitude ratio of common peroneal nerve/tibial nerve in ALS patients with split foot was 0.70, indicating that the accuracy of CMAP amplitude of common peroneal nerve/tibial nerve in distinguishing ALS patients from controls was low. Conclusions:In ALS patients with lower limb involvement, strength of ankle dorsiflexors is weaker than that of ankle plantarflexors, and strength of hallux dorsiflexors is weaker than that of hallux plantarflexors. At the diagnostic level, the CMAP amplitude ratio of common peroneal nerve/tibial nerve in ALS patients with split foot has a lower accuracy in the diagnosis of ALS.

OBJECTIVETo study the CT findings of cystic nephroma (CN) and multilocular cystic renal cell carcinoma (MCRCC) and to improve the accuracy of preoperative diagnosis of these two diseases.

METHODSThe CT findings of nine CN cases and 19 MCRCC cases confirmed by pathology were blindly reviewed and compared with their pathological results. Fisher's exact test and independent-samples T test were applied to statistically analyze some of the CT features of the CN and MCRCC lesions.

RESULTSThe thickness of cystic walls and partitions in the nine CN cases ranged from 0.5 to 5 mm. Cystic walls and partitions were slightly thicker in some parts without visible mural nodules. Varying amounts of solid tissue could be found in all the 19 MCRCC tumors, and the cystic walls and partitions were found partially thickened ranging from 3 mm to 13 mm. Eight cases were with mural nodules (nodule diameter: 4.5-16 mm). Nine cases of CN tumors were lobulated and 7 protruded into the renal sinus. Three out of the 19 MCRCC presented shallow lobulation, and 7 tumors protruded into the renal sinus. The CT contrast-enhancement scanning displayed moderate delayed enhancement in the cystic walls and partitions in 8 cases. The enhanced scanning revealed that all the nine cases showed enhancement of the cystic walls and partitions, while 8 cases of them had mild to moderate delayed enhancement. The cystic walls, partitions and nodules were enhanced in 19 MRCC cases, among them 17 cases displayed obvious enhancement in the cortical phase. Among the differences of CT findings between MC and MRCC, the shallow lobulation, protruding into the renal sinus, mural nodules, cystic wall and partition thickness, and net growth in the cortical and nephrographic phase were statistically significantly different (P<0.05 for all).

CONCLUSIONSCT scan can provide significant evidence for CN and MCRCC diagnosis. CN cases usually present relatively thin and even cystic walls and partitions without mural nodules and with shallow lobulation and protruding into the renal sinus. The enhancement is mild to moderate, dynamic and delayed, while the opposite CT findings may indicate a higher possibility of MCRCC.

Adenocarcinoma, Clear Cell ; diagnostic imaging ; Carcinoma, Renal Cell ; diagnostic imaging ; Diagnosis, Differential ; Humans ; Kidney ; diagnostic imaging ; Kidney Diseases, Cystic ; diagnostic imaging ; Kidney Neoplasms ; diagnostic imaging ; Tomography, X-Ray Computed

OBJECTIVESTo investigate the regression pattern of mid and low rectal cancer treated with neoadjuvant chemoradiotherapy and then to provide the pathological proofs for reasonable resectional margin in rectal cancer surgery.

METHODSForty cases of mid and low rectal cancer patients received concurrent chemoradiotherapy and then underwent radical operation. The whole-mount serial sections of resected rectal cancer specimen were stained with cytokeratin antibody using immunohistochemical techniques to show the residual cancer cells under the mucosa. The microscopic measurement was performed to determine the reverse infiltration of cancer cells in the rectal wall and to describe the cancer cells scatter ways in the cancer mass. The Ki-67 immunohistochemical stain was also performed to show the proliferation activity of residual cancer cells after neoadjuvant chemoradiotherapy.

RESULTSThe length of specimen was shrinking continuously during the pathologic section production and the shrink rate was 18%. There were remanent cancer cells which showed positive Ki-67 expression and the chemoradiotherapy decreased the Ki-67 expression significantly. The lower edge of remaining ulcers or scars could be used as the reference point from which the cancer infiltration could be measured. According to our measurement, the average reverse infiltration of cancer cells in the whole-mount section was (6.1±4.7) mm, the deepest one was 11.0 mm in the section which could be converted into fresh bowel length of 12.98 mm. The pathology showed that the residual cancer cells scattered in the fibrous tissue of ulcers, scars and manifested a regression of spatial distribution.

CONCLUSIONSThe rectal cancers show regression in different degrees after neoadjuvant chemoradiotherapy. The residual cancer cells in the fiber tissues manifest proliferation activity. The distal end of resection should be at least 2 cm away from the lower edge of ulcers or scars of primary tumor in the rectal wall in patients after neoadjuvant chemoradiotherapy. The circumferential resection margin should include all the fibrous scar of the tumor area to ensure the remove of tumor cells completely.

Aged ; Chemoradiotherapy ; Female ; Humans ; Male ; Middle Aged ; Neoadjuvant Therapy ; Rectal Neoplasms ; pathology ; surgery ; therapy

Objectives To investigate the regression pattern of mid and low rectal cancer treated with neoadjuvant chemoradiotherapy and then to provide the pathological proofs for reasonable resectional margin in rectal cancer surgery. Methods Forty cases of mid and low rectal cancer patients received concurrent chemoradiotherapy and then underwent radical operation. The whole-mount serial sections of resected rectal cancer specimen were stained with cytokeratin antibody using immunohistochemical techniques to show the reridual cancer cells under the mucosa. The microscopic measurement was performed to determine the reverse infiltration of cancer cells in the rectal wall and to describe the cancer cells scatter ways in the cancer mass. The Ki-67 immunohistochemical stain was also performed to show the proliferation activity of residual cancer cells after neoadjuvant chemoradiotherapy. Results The length of specimen was shrinking continuously during the pathologic section production and the shrink rate was 18%. There were remanent cancer cells which showed positive Ki-67 expression and the chemoradiotherapy decreased the Ki-67 expression significantly. The lower edge of remaining ulcers or scars could be used as the reference point from which the cancer infiltration could be measured. According to our measurement, the average reverse infiltration of cancer cells in the whole-mount section was (6.1±4.7) mm, the deepest one was 11.0 mm in the section which could be converted into fresh bowel length of 12.98 mm. The pathology showed that the residul cancer cells scattered in the fibrous tissue of ulcers, scars and manifested a regression of spatial distribution. Conclusions The rectal cancers show regression in different degrees after neoadjuvant chemoradiotherapy. The residual cancer cells in the fiber tissues manifest proliferation activity. The distal end of resection should be at least 2 cm away from the lower edge of ulcers or scars of primary tumor in the rectal wall in patients after neoadjuvant chemoradiotherapy. The circumferential resection margin should include all the fibrous scar of the tumor area to ensure the remove of tumor cells completely.