Objective To investigate whether 3D-guided cone-shaped segmentectomy can achieve comparable long-term outcomes with lobectomy for deep early-stage lung cancer with diameter≤2 cm. Methods We retrospectively screened patients with deep early-stage non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) with diameter≤2 cm who underwent lobectomy or segmentectomy in the First Affiliated Hospital of Nanjing Medical University from 2012 to 2018. All pulmonary segmentectomy was performed using 3D-guided cone-shaped segmentectomy with segment or subsegment as the resection unit. Univariate and multivariate regression analyses were performed by Cox proportional hazard regression model. The patients who underwent segmentectomy and lobectomy were matched 1∶1 by propensity-score matching analysis. The oncological outcomes of two groups were compared. Results Our cohort was divided into a segmentectomy group (n=222) and a lobectomy group (n=127). The age, total nodule size, solid component size and proportion of pure solid nodule in the lobectomy group were significantly higher than those in the segmentectomy group. The median follow-up time was 49 months. Surgical margins were negative in all patients. The local recurrence rate of segmentectomy was 0.45%. The disease-free survival (DFS) rate and overall survival (OS) rate of patients in the segmentectomy group were significantly better than those in the lobectomy group (5-year DFS rate: 98.64% vs. 89.77%, P<0.001; 5-year OS rate: 99.55% vs. 92.10%, P<0.001). Multivariate regression analysis showed that the differences between two groups were not significant [DFS rate: HR=0.52. 95%CI (0.11, 2.59), P=0.427; OS rate: HR=0.08. 95%CI (0.00, 3.24), P=0.179] after adjusting for other factors. After propensity score matching, 77 patients were preserved in both segmentectomy group and lobectomy group, with the mean nodule size of 1.44 cm and 1.49 cm and the mean consolidation tumor ratio (CTR) of 0.46 and 0.52, respectively. There was no statistical difference in DFS rate (P=0.640) or OS rate (P=0.310) between the two groups. Conclusion 3D-guided cone-shaped segmentectomy can be an acceptable treatment for low-grade malignant NSCLC deep in lung parenchyma with diameter≤2 cm, and its oncology effect is not inferior to lobectomy.

Objective To discuss the effect of multidisciplinary family empowerment mode in home care for patients after receiving percutaneous endoscopic gastrostomy(PEG).Methods A total of 86 patients,who received initial PEG at the Jilin Provincial Cancer Hospital of China from January 2021 to July 2023,were selected for this study.The patients were randomly divided into observation group.The patients of the control group received routine nursing guidance for gastrostomy,while the patients of the observation group received multidisciplinary family empowerment nursing mode.The self-care ability[using self-care ability scale of the elderly(SASE)score],health behavior ability[using self-rating scale of health behavior ability(SRAHP)score],incidence of complications,and healing time of complications were compared between the two groups.Results In the observation group the SASE[(129.48±5.48)points vs.(73.05±12.04)points]and the SRAHP[(80.14±1.00)points vs.(70.25±7.92)points]were significantly higher than those in the control group(all P＜0.05),the incidence of complications was lower than that in the control group,and the healing time of complications was shorter than that in the control group.Conclusion The implementation of multidisciplinary family empowerment nursing mode can improve the self-care ability and health behavior ability of patients after receiving PEG,reduce postoperative complications,as well as shorten the healing time of complications,therefore,this nursing mode is suitable for home patients after receiving PEG.

Background::Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has potential risks for both clinically worsening pulmonary hypertension (PH) and increasing mortality. However, the data regarding the protective role of vaccination in this population are still lacking. This study aimed to assess the safety of approved vaccination for patients with PH.Methods::In this national prospective cohort study, patients diagnosed with PH (World Health Organization [WHO] groups 1 and 4) were enrolled from October 2021 to April 2022. The primary outcome was the composite of PH-related major adverse events. We used an inverse probability weighting (IPW) approach to control for possible confounding factors in the baseline characteristics of patients.Results::In total, 706 patients with PH participated in this study (mean age, 40.3 years; mean duration after diagnosis of PH, 8.2 years). All patients received standardized treatment for PH in accordance with guidelines for the diagnosis and treatment of PH in China. Among them, 278 patients did not receive vaccination, whereas 428 patients completed the vaccination series. None of the participants were infected with COVID-19 during our study period. Overall, 398 patients received inactivated severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) vaccine, whereas 30 received recombinant protein subunit vaccine. After adjusting for baseline covariates using the IPW approach, the odds of any adverse events due to PH in the vaccinated group did not statistically significantly increase (27/428 [6.3%] vs. 24/278 [8.6%], odds ratio = 0.72, P = 0.302). Approximately half of the vaccinated patients reported at least one post-vaccination side effects, most of which were mild, including pain at the injection site (159/428, 37.1%), fever (11/428, 2.6%), and fatigue (26/428, 6.1%). Conclusions::COVID-19 vaccination did not significantly augment the PH-related major adverse events for patients with WHO groups 1 and 4 PH, although there were some tolerable side effects. A large-scale randomized controlled trial is warranted to confirm this finding. The final approval of the COVID-19 vaccination for patients with PH as a public health strategy is promising.

Background::The potential impact of pre-existing coronary artery stenosis (CAS) on acute pulmonary embolism (PE) episodes remains underexplored. This study aimed to investigate the association between pre-existing CAS and the elevation of high-sensitivity cardiac troponin I (hs-cTnI) levels in patients with PE.Methods::In this multicenter, prospective case-control study, 88 cases and 163 controls matched for age, sex, and study center were enrolled. Cases were patients with PE with elevated hs-cTnI. Controls were patients with PE with normal hs-cTnI. Coronary artery assessment utilized coronary computed tomographic angiography or invasive coronary angiography. CAS was defined as ≥50% stenosis of the lumen diameter in any coronary vessel >2.0 mm in diameter. Conditional logistic regression was used to evaluate the association between CAS and hs-cTnI elevation.Results::The percentage of CAS was higher in the case group compared to the control group (44.3% [39/88] vs. 30.1% [49/163]; P = 0.024). In multivariable conditional logistic regression model 1, CAS (adjusted odds ratio [OR], 2.680; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.243–5.779), heart rate >75 beats/min (OR, 2.306; 95% CI, 1.056–5.036) and N-terminal pro-B type natriuretic peptide (NT-proBNP) >420 pg/mL (OR, 12.169; 95% CI, 4.792–30.900) were independently associated with elevated hs-cTnI. In model 2, right CAS (OR, 3.615; 95% CI, 1.467–8.909) and NT-proBNP >420 pg/mL (OR, 13.890; 95% CI, 5.288–36.484) were independently associated with elevated hs-cTnI. Conclusions::CAS was independently associated with myocardial injury in patients with PE. Vigilance towards CAS is warranted in patients with PE with elevated cardiac troponin levels.

Background and objective Current studies suggest that for early-stage lung cancers with a component of ground-glass opacity measuring ≤2 cm,sublobar resection is suitable if it ensures adequate margins.However,lobectomy may be necessary for some cases to achieve this.The aim of this study was to explore the impact of size and depth on surgical techniques for wedge resection,segmentectomy,and lobectomy in early-stage lung cancer ≤2 cm,and to determine methods for ensuring a safe resection margin during sublobar resections.Methods Clinical data from 385 patients with early-stage lung can-cer ≤2 cm,who underwent lung resection in 2022,were subject to a retrospective analysis,covering three types of procedures:wedge resection,segmentectomy and lobectomy.The depth indicator as the OA value,which is the shortest distance from the inner edge of a pulmonary nodule to the opening of the corresponding bronchus,and the AB value,which is the distance from the inner edge of the nodule to the pleura,were measured.For cases undergoing lobectomy and segmentectomy,three-dimensional computed tomography bronchography and angiography(3D-CTBA)was performed to statistically determine the number of subsegments required for segmentectomy.The cutting margin width for wedge resection and segmentectomy was recorded,as well as the specific subsegments and their quantities removed during lung segmentectomy were documented.Results In wedge resection,segmentectomy,and lobectomy,the sizes of pulmonary nodules were(1.08±0.29)cm,(1.31±0.34)cm and(1.50±0.35)cm,respectively,while the depth of the nodules(OA values)was 6.05(5.26,6.85)cm,4.43(3.27,5.43)cm and 3.04(1.80,4.18)cm for each procedure,showing a progressive increasing trend(P＜0.001).The median resec-tion margin width obtained from segmentectomy was 2.50(1.50,3.00)cm,significantly greater than the 1.50(1.15,2.00)cm from wedge resection(P＜0.001).In wedge resections,cases where AB value＞2 cm demonstrated a higher proportion of cases with resection margins less than 2 cm compared to those with margins greater than 2 cm(29.03％vs 12.90％,P=0.019).When utilizing the size of the nodule as the criterion for resection margin,the instances with AB value＞2 cm continued to show a higher proportion in the ratio of margin distance to tumor size less than 1(37.50％vs 17.39％,P=0.009).The median number of subsegments for segmentectomy was three,whereas lobectomy cases requiring segmentectomy involved five subsegments(P＜0.001).Conclusion The selection of the surgical approach for lung resection is influenced by both the size and depth of pulmonary nodules.This study first confirms that larger portions of lung tissue must be removed for nodules that are deeper and larger to achieve a safe margin.A distance of ≤2 cm from the inner edge of the pulmonary nodule to the nearest pleura may be the ideal indication for performing wedge resection.

AIM: To observe the effects of rapamycin pregnancy intervention on cognitive function of autism model in rat offspring. METHODS: Fourteen pregnant rats were randomly divided into normal group (n = 3), model group (n = 4), rapamycin (RAPA) control group (n =3) and intervention group (n = 4). The model group and intervention group were i.p. injected with sodium valproate 600 mg/kg at embryonic day (E) 12.5 to establish autism model in rat offspring. RAPA control group and intervention group were i.g. given RAPA 4 mg/kg every day from the 13th day of gestation until the offspring rats were weaned at 23 days. After the birth of the above four groups of pregnant rats, 15, 27, 21 and 26 offspring male rats were selected to conduct behavioral tests to identify the model. Then, paw withdrawal mechanical threshold (PWMT), tail flick latency (TFL) evoked under different light intensity and learning and memory function of offspring rats were further detected. RESULTS: Rat offspring in the model group had lower growth and development indexes and exploratory behavior ability, but stronger repetitive stereotyped behavior compared with the normal group (P < 0.05), while the indexes between the intervention group and model group were reversed (P < 0.05). The model group had higher PWMT than normal group (P < 0.01) and the PWMT of intervention group was lower than that of model group (P < 0.01). The TFLs of rats in 4 groups showed a timed dose-response relationship (TDRR, P < 0.01), that is, TFLs were shortened with the increase of light intensity. The TDRR curve of model group shifted to right compared with normal group (P < 0.01) and intervention group shifted to left compared with model group (P < 0.01). At the light intensity of Focus 34, 51 and 76, the TFLs of model group were longer than those of normal group (P < 0.01) and intervention group had shorter TFLs compared with model group (P<0.01). In spatial probing trial of Morris water maze test, the platform crossover number in model group was less than that in normal group (P<0.01) and that in intervention group was more than model group (P < 0.05). CONCLUSION: RAPA intervention during pregnancy may alleviate behavior disorder, pain tolerance and memory function of autism model in rat offspring to some extent.

Rare diseases have been a major challenge for clinical medicine and public health challenge in China. One of the effective measures is to conduct proactive research on rare diseases to deal with the disease burden of the diseases. However, low prevalence, disperse distribution of patients, lack of knowledge about the disease course, and phenotype heterogeneity hamper the development of research for rare diseases. Recently, it has been found that patients registry is effective in understanding the course of the disease and accu- mulating the cases and data of clinical research or clinical trial design. At present, most of developed countries or regions in the world have promoted clinical research and clinical trials of new medications on rare diseases by using the registration of rare disease. In 2016, Peking Union Medical College Hospital established China's first registry system at the national level-National Rare Disease Registry System of China(NRDRS). NRDRS has accumulated 68 137 cases data registered by the researchers from China's 101 collaborating hospitals in 29 provinces/municipalities/autonomous regions, covering 171 different, and forming 188 cohorts. To date, NRDRS complete the initial stage of resources buildup.Nex stage will be focused on clinical research and clinical trials related to rare diseases based on NRDRS. This article is on the process of building NRDRS, the potential support for conducting clinical research and clinical trials related to rare diseases, and the challenges will be faced.

BACKGROUND: Lobectomy is the main treatment strategy for early lung cancer. However, there are many anatomical variations in the lungs, especially some pulmonary veins will deviate from the normal position, and even cross the border of lob to enter the adjacent lobes, which increases the difficulty and risk of lobectomy. This study aims to analyze the variation types and frequency of pulmonary translobar veins, and further investigate its clinical significance in lobectomy. METHODS: This study retrospectively included 916 patients who underwent lung resection in our center from December 2018 to November 2019, and selected 310 patients who underwent enhanced chest computed tomography (CT) examination before surgery. Enhanced chest CT and three-dimensional computed tomography bronchography and angiography (3D-CTBA) of these patients were applied to analyze the types and frequency of translobar veins. Further, 48 cases of lobectomy whose operation areas involved translobar veins were further screened out of 916 surgical cases (Among them, the translobar veins of 36 subjects were cut off and the other 12 patients were reserved). The effect of two different treatments on remaining lung was observed by surgical video. RESULTS: A total of 26 translobar veins patterns were identified with an overall incidence of 82.26%, much greater in the right than in the left lung (80.65% vs 11.94%). The major types (frequency >5%) in the right lung include: the VX2 (5.48%) that flows into the inferior pulmonary vein behind the intermediate bronchus, the V3b (58.39%) that converges the venous branches of the upper and middle lobe, the VX4 that flows into the V2 (13.23%) or V3 (12.58%) in the horizontal fissure, the VX4 (8.71%) or VX5 (7.42%) that flows into the left atrium beneath the middle lobe bronchus, and the VX6 that flows into V2 in the Oblique fissure. The major types in the left lung include the common trunk (9.36%) of the superior and inferior pulmonary vein, of which 4.84% are greater than 1 cm in length. Compared to the preserved group, circulatory function of the remaining lung was impaired in the severed group, with the impaired area failing to collapse long after ventilation is stopped, the incidence of postoperative hemoptysis (13.89% vs 0.00%) and pulmonary air leakage (19.44% vs 8.33%) increased, the postoperative hospital stay [(4.72±1.86) d vs (3.92±1.62) d] was longer, and the total drainage during 3 days after operation [(705.42±265.02) mL vs (604.92±229.64) mL] was more, but the difference is not statistically significant. CONCLUSIONS There are a variety of types of translobar pulmonary veins and some of them have a high incidence; However, most of the translobar veins were neglected in surgery, which could adversely affect the safety of surgery and the recovery of patients after surgery.

Objective: To develop a machine learning (ML) pipeline based on radiomics to predict Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) severity and the future deterioration to critical illness using CT and clinical variables. Materials and Methods: Clinical data were collected from 981 patients from a multi-institutional international cohort with real-time polymerase chain reaction-confirmed COVID-19. Radiomics features were extracted from chest CT of the patients. The data of the cohort were randomly divided into training, validation, and test sets using a 7:1:2 ratio. A ML pipeline consisting of a model to predict severity and time-to-event model to predict progression to critical illness were trained on radiomics features and clinical variables. The receiver operating characteristic area under the curve (ROC-AUC), concordance index (C-index), and time-dependent ROC-AUC were calculated to determine model performance, which was compared with consensus CT severity scores obtained by visual interpretation by radiologists. Results: Among 981 patients with confirmed COVID-19, 274 patients developed critical illness. Radiomics features and clinical variables resulted in the best performance for the prediction of disease severity with a highest test ROC-AUC of 0.76 compared with 0.70 (0.76 vs. 0.70, p = 0.023) for visual CT severity score and clinical variables. The progression prediction model achieved a test C-index of 0.868 when it was based on the combination of CT radiomics and clinical variables compared with 0.767 when based on CT radiomics features alone (p < 0.001), 0.847 when based on clinical variables alone (p = 0.110), and 0.860 when based on the combination of visual CT severity scores and clinical variables (p = 0.549). Furthermore, the model based on the combination of CT radiomics and clinical variables achieved time-dependent ROC-AUCs of 0.897, 0.933, and 0.927 for the prediction of progression risks at 3, 5 and 7 days, respectively. Conclusion CT radiomics features combined with clinical variables were predictive of COVID-19 severity and progression to critical illness with fairly high accuracy.

Objective: To develop a machine learning (ML) pipeline based on radiomics to predict Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) severity and the future deterioration to critical illness using CT and clinical variables. Materials and Methods: Clinical data were collected from 981 patients from a multi-institutional international cohort with real-time polymerase chain reaction-confirmed COVID-19. Radiomics features were extracted from chest CT of the patients. The data of the cohort were randomly divided into training, validation, and test sets using a 7:1:2 ratio. A ML pipeline consisting of a model to predict severity and time-to-event model to predict progression to critical illness were trained on radiomics features and clinical variables. The receiver operating characteristic area under the curve (ROC-AUC), concordance index (C-index), and time-dependent ROC-AUC were calculated to determine model performance, which was compared with consensus CT severity scores obtained by visual interpretation by radiologists. Results: Among 981 patients with confirmed COVID-19, 274 patients developed critical illness. Radiomics features and clinical variables resulted in the best performance for the prediction of disease severity with a highest test ROC-AUC of 0.76 compared with 0.70 (0.76 vs. 0.70, p = 0.023) for visual CT severity score and clinical variables. The progression prediction model achieved a test C-index of 0.868 when it was based on the combination of CT radiomics and clinical variables compared with 0.767 when based on CT radiomics features alone (p < 0.001), 0.847 when based on clinical variables alone (p = 0.110), and 0.860 when based on the combination of visual CT severity scores and clinical variables (p = 0.549). Furthermore, the model based on the combination of CT radiomics and clinical variables achieved time-dependent ROC-AUCs of 0.897, 0.933, and 0.927 for the prediction of progression risks at 3, 5 and 7 days, respectively. Conclusion CT radiomics features combined with clinical variables were predictive of COVID-19 severity and progression to critical illness with fairly high accuracy.