Background Unhealthy lifestyle behaviors may be associated with an increased risk of cardiometabolic risk factor aggregation (CMRF≥ 2), and few studies have focused on the correlation between the two in occupational populations. Objective To investigate the current status of CMRF≥2 and the compliance of healthy lifestyle in male occupational personnel, explore the effect of lifestyle on cardiometabolic risk, and provide reference for formulating healthy behavior promotion strategies and reducing cardiometabolic risk in occupational populations. Methods The study subjects were selected from male workers who completed occupational health examinations at an occupational disease prevention and control hospital in Shanxi Province from May to December 2023, and 15125 study subjects aged 18−60 years were finally included according to pre-determined inclusion and exclusion criteria. All subjects received a series of assessments including questionnaires (basic information, lifestyle habits, and occupational factors), physical examination, laboratory tests, and six cardiometabolic risk factors (central obesity, hypertension, type 2 diabetes, hypertriglyceridemia, low-density lipoprotein cholesterolemia, and hyperuricemia). A healthy lifestyle score was calculated based on six behavioral factors (smoking, drinking, physical activity, diet, sleep, sedentary behavior) and 1 point for one positive healthy behavior. The enrolled workers were then divided into three groups according to their total scores: 0−1 points (poor group), 2−3 points (moderate group), and 4−6 points (good group). Logistic regression models were used to analyze the statistical associations between lifestyle and CMRF≥2. Results The median age of the 15125 male study participants was 40 years, and the positive rate of CMRF≥2 was 53.5%. Adherence to moderate alcohol consumption was the most compliant healthy behavior (79.4%), followed by current non-smoking (41.7%), while adherence to adequate sedentary behavior (23.6%) and healthy eating (21.1%) were relatively low, and only 17.4% were able to adhere to four or more healthy lifestyle behaviors. After adjusting for confounders, when compared with the poor group high lifestyle score was found to be a protective factor for CMRF≥2 (moderate group: OR=0.70, 95%CI: 0.63, 0.77; good group: OR=0.66, 95%CI: 0.58, 0.75). In stratified analyses across different job types (coal miners, auxiliary workers, ground workers, and others), occupational stress (with or without), shift patterns (day shift, night shift, or rotating shift), dust exposure (with or without), and noise exposure (with or without), individuals with higher lifestyle scores exhibited a consistently lower risk of CMRF≥2. There was an interaction between shift pattern and lifestyle on CMRF≥2 (P_interaction<0.05). Conclusion This occupational group has a high positive rate of CMRF≥2 and a high prevalence of poor lifestyles with low adherence to some healthy behaviors. High healthy lifestyle scores are associated with a lower risk of aggregation of cardiometabolic risk factors, which may be reduced through lifestyle interventions.

Background Volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in exhaled breath are closely associated with respiratory diseases and are linked to various metabolic reactions in the human body. A quantitative analytical method can provide technical support for studying VOCs related to various diseases. Objective To establish a thermal desorption-gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (TD-GC-MS) method for the determination of 27 VOCs in exhaled breath. Methods VOCs in exhaled breath were collected using a Bio-VOC sampler and enriched with Tenax TA thermal desorption tubes before TD-GC-MS analysis. Standards were collected using thermal desorption tubes and optimized for thermal desorption conditions as well as chromatographic and mass spectrometric conditions: The separation of the 27 VOCs was achieved by an optimized temperature program, the improvement of sensitivity by optimizing quantitative ions, and the increase of VOCs desorption efficiency by optimizing thermal desorption time and temperature. Limit of detection, limit of quantification, accuracy, precision, and stability of the proposed method were investigated by spiking with a blank gas bag, and exhaled breath samples from 20 healthy individuals were collected for an application study of the proposed method. Results The thermal desorption temperature was 280 ℃, and desorption time was 6 min. A VF-624ms chromatographic column was selected for the separation of target substances. The initial temperature of heating program was 35 ℃, maintained for 1 min, and then increased to 100 ℃ at a heating rate of 3 ℃·min⁻¹ for 1 min, followed by increasing to 210 ℃ at a heating rate of 28 ℃·min⁻¹ for 5 min. A quantitative analysis was conducted with a single ion monitoring (SIM) mode. Under these conditions, the 27 VOCs showed good linear relationships in their respective concentration ranges and the correlation coefficients were higher than 0.9990. The limits of detection of the method were in the range of 0.01-0.13 nmol·mol⁻¹, the limits of quantification were in the range of 0.02-0.44 nmol·mol⁻¹, and the spiked recoveries were in the range of 80.1%-120.5%, with intra-batch and inter-batch precision ≤ 18.8% and 17.9% respectively. All substances can be stored at room temperature (23-28 °C) for 7 d and at 4 °C for 14 d. The proposed method was applied to exhaled breath samples from 20 subjects with detection rates≥ 80% (except for trans-2-pentene and decane) and a concentration range of 0.00-465.50 nmol·mol⁻¹. Conclusion The established TD-GC-MS method for quantification of VOCs in exhaled breath is characterized by high sensitivity and good accuracy, and is suitable for quantitative determination of VOCs in exhaled breath, which can provide technical support for the study of exhaled breath VOCs.

Anterior diastema is a common esthetic defect in China.The general treatment for a patient with diastema-ta,including orthodontics and direct and indirect restorations,is a multidisciplinary clinical procedure covering the ortho-dontics,operative dentistry,general dentistry,and prosthodontics department.Given the diversity of departments and the complex etiology of this defect,decision-making regarding the closing methods and time selection is undefined and unin-tegrated,which makes the long-term stability of closure unpredictable.This article proposed an etiology-based decision tree with actual measurement of diastemata width for diastemata closure.The decisional steps include classifying the eti-ological factors based on patients'medical history and clinical manifestation to evaluate the stability of diastemata.After maintaining the stability of diastemata,contemporary and multidisciplinary treatment plans were selected in accordance with the measured width of diastemata and patients'cosmetic psychology,economics,and available time.These decision trees focus on the challenges of collaboration among dental departments,propose an objective and efficient ways for con-nections,and promote efficient and effective diastemata closure.

Objective To analyze the prevalence of chronic diseases and its influencing factors of dust-exposed male workers in a coal mine. Methods A total of 9 782 dust-exposed male workers from a coal mine in Shanxi Province were selected as the study subjects using the purposive sampling method. Their occupational health examination results were collected to analyze the prevalence of chronic diseases and its influencing factors. Results The prevalence of dyslipidemia, hyperuricemia, hypertension and diabetes were 40.3%, 30.7%, 23.5% and 5.6%, respectively. The prevalence of chronic diseases was 64.8%. Among them, the prevalence of having one, two, three or more chronic diseases were 36.5%, 21.6% and 6.7%, respectively. The prevalence of comorbid chronic diseases was 28.3%, with the highest prevalence of concurrent dyslipidemia and hyperuricemia of 11.0%. The results of binary logistic regression analysis showed that the risk of chronic disease was higher in workers <40 years old, smoking, overweight, obesity and total working years >20 years (all P<0.05). The results of multinomial logistic regression analysis showed that workers <40 years old, overweight, obesity and total working years >20 years were risk factors for having one chronic disease (all P<0.05). The workers <40 years old, smoking, overweight, obesity and total working years >20 years were risk factors for having two chronic diseases (all P<0.05). The workers <40 years old, smoking, alcohol consumption, overweight, obesity, other types of work, and working years >20 years were risk factors for having three or more chronic diseases (all P<0.05). Conclusion The prevalence of chronic diseases is high and the comorbidity of chronic diseases is common among dust-exposed male workers. The main influencing factors were age, smoking, alcohol consumption, overweight, obesity, type of work, and working year. Workers with more contributing factors have higher risk of chronic comorbidities.

Telephone follow-up is one of the important ways to follow up patients. High-quality follow-up can benefit both doctors and patients. However, clinical research-related follow-up is often faced with problems such as time-consuming, laborious and poor patient compliance. The authors belong to a team that has been committed to the study of patient-reported outcomes for a long time. The team has carried out long-term follow-up of symptoms, daily function and postoperative complications of more than 1 000 patients after lung cancer surgery, and accumulated certain experience. In this paper, the experience of telephone follow-up was summarized and discussed with relevant literatures from the aspects of clarifying the purpose of clinical research follow-up, understanding the needs of patients in follow-up, and using follow-up skills.

This article reports the prenatal diagnosis of 22q11.2 deletion syndrome (22q11.2 DS) in two consecutive pregnancies of a woman. Echocardiography on the first fetus at 24 +4 gestational weeks identified the right aortic arch, and right-sided ductus arteriosus with aberrant left subclavian artery. Subsequently, an amniocentesis was performed, and chromosomal microarray analysis (CMA) of amniotic fluid revealed a 2.181 Mb heterozygous microdeletion of 22q11.21, which indicated the presence of 22q11.2 DS in the fetus. After genetic counseling, the pregnant woman decided to terminate the pregnancy and declined genetic testing. During her second pregnancy, ultrasound at 21 +5 weeks detected interrupted aortic arch type B with aberrant left subclavian artery, ventricular septal defect, and enlarged posterior fossa in the fetus and further CMA of amniotic fluid indicated fetal 22q11.2 DS. CMA was performed on peripheral blood of the woman, which found the same deletion on 22q11.21. The woman had nasal sounds and velopharyngeal insufficiency with normal phenotype. Following the genetic counseling regarding the risk of recurrence, the pregnant woman opted to terminate the pregnancy and was suggested to undergo preimplantation genetic diagnosis in future pregnancies. One year after the second pregnancy termination, the woman's father developed heart failure at the age of 53 and was also found to have nasal sounds. Low-depth whole genome copy number variation sequencing in venous blood confirmed 22q11.2 DS in her father. For those with a prenatal diagnosis of 22q11.2 DS, genetic testing of the fetal parents is recommended to help assess the risk of recurrence and facilitate genetic counseling.

Exosomes are phospholipid bilayer vesicles secreted by living cells that can carry a variety of signaling molecules, such as RNA, DNA, protein, and lipids. Exosomes play a role in the transmission of signaling molecules between cells, thus regulating many physiological and pathological processes. The methods of extracting exosomes include differential centrifugation, density gradient centrifugation, exclusion chromatography, ultrafiltration, coprecipitation, polymer immune affinity, microfluidic separation technology, etc. Each of these extraction technologies has advantages and disadvantages; however, there is no unified international standard. In addition, the expression of specific proteins and genetic material of exosomes from different cell sources are different; thus, their expression characteristics and functions are also distinctive. Based on this situation, research on exosomes is limited to preclinical studies, and difficulties and challenges still exist in clinical application. This paper summarizes the progress of research in the field of exosomes, to understand the characteristics, modification and application of exosomes from different cell sources, and to summarize their advantages and disadvantages as well as challenges, which can help researchers better understand and master the performance of exosomes. Furthermore, improvement of standard procedures in the extraction and manufacturing of exosomes is important, as it will provide a reference for researchers to carry out exosome-related translational clinical research.

Objective To explore hemodynamic performance of the aortic dissection after lesions, so as to provide a more scientific basis for patient treatment. Methods Based on computed tomography angiography (CTA) image data from a patient with complex Stanford B-type aortic dissection, the personalized aortic dissection models with different rupture shapes (H-type, O-type, and V-type) at proximal end of the aortic dissection were established. Combined with computational fluid dynamics (CFD) and morphological analysis method, distributions of the velocity at rupture section, the blood flow, the wall pressure and the wall shear stress (WSS) were analyzed. Results The flow velocity, the highest pressure difference and the WSS proportion at entrance of the H-shaped rupture showed larger hemodynamic parameters than those of the other two types. The risk of dissection rupture for type H was the largest, while type V was in the middle, and type O was the smallest. Conclusions This study provides an effective reference for further numerical analysis the cases and formulation of treatment plans.

Objective To study the influence of different support heights, support numbers and cross-sectional dimensions on support performance of NiTi thoracic aortic stents. Methods Twenty-seven scaffold models with different parameters were established by using AutoCAD 2016 and SoildWorks 2014 software. HyperMesh 14.0 was used for tetrahedral mesh division, and ABAQUS 2017 was used for support performance simulation analysis. Results With the decrease of support height, the support stiffness would increase; a larger cross-section size would lead to a larger support stiffness; with the increase of support numbers, the support stiffness would increase. Among the influencing factors of support performance, the order of influence degree was support height＞section size＞support numbers. Conclusions The research findings have certain guiding significance for the development and research of thoracic aortic stents, and provide theoretical basis for the selection and optimization of clinical stents.

Since the appearance of urethral stent, it has become an alternative treatment for urethral stricture except for urethral reconstructive surgery, and can be used safely in some patients with poor efficacy of urethral reconstructive surgery or unable to receive reconstructive surgery. This article summarizes the urethral stent in the application of bladder neck, prostatic urethra, ball, membrane urethra, penile urethra stricture, and postoperative hypospadias. Most study revealed that urethral stent could significantly relieve symptoms, improve the maximum urinary flow rate, reduce the residual urine volume, improve patients' quality of life, but the long-term effect need more follow-up and research evidence.