Drug-eluting bead transarterial chemoembolization (TACE) vs conventional TACE in treating hepatocellular carcinoma patients with multiple conventional TACE treatments history: A comparison of efficacy and safety.

This study aimed to compare the efficacy and safety of drug-eluting bead transarterial chemoembolization (DEB-TACE) vs conventional TACE (cTACE) in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) patients with multiple cTACE treatments history.Eighty-one HCC patients with multiple cTACE treatments history who underwent DEB-TACE (N = 42) and cTACE treatment (N = 39) were included in this retrospective cohort study and allocated to DEB-TACE and cTACE groups accordingly. Multiple cTACE treatments history was defined as history of three or more cycles cTACE treatments. Then treatment responses were assessed according to the criteria of modified Response Evaluation Criteria in Solid Tumors (mRECIST), and progression free survival (PFS), as well as overall survival (OS), was calculated. In addition, adverse events and liver function related indexes were recorded.Complete response (P = .167) was of no difference while objective response rate (ORR) (P = .003) was increased in DEB-TACE group compared with cTACE group. Patients in DEB-TACE group presented with more favorable PFS (P = .028) and OS (P = .037) compared with cTACE group. Further analysis revealed that DEB-TACE (vs cTACE) was an independent predictive factor for better ORR (P = .001), PFS (P = .006) and OS (P = .001). The albumin (ALB) level at first month after treatment was elevated (P = .015) while the other liver function indexes levels did not vary (all P > .05) in DEB-TACE group compared with cTACE group. The incidences of pain (P = .327), fever (P = .171) and nausea/vomiting (P = .400) during hospitalization were similar between the 2 groups.DEB-TACE is more efficient and equally tolerant compared with cTACE in HCC patients with multiple cTACE treatments history.

Systematic Review of Herbal Tea (a Traditional Chinese Treatment Method) in the Therapy of Chronic Simple Pharyngitis and Preliminary Exploration about Its Medication Rules.

BACKGROUND: Chronic simple pharyngitis (CSP) is a common clinical chronic respiratory inflammation with persistent and intransigent symptoms. We analyzed the clinical data to find the evidence that herbal tea, a traditional Chinese medicine treatment in China, could improve the symptoms of CSP patients in a simple way. METHODS: We systematically reviewed the clinical data of randomized controlled treatments from April 2019 and evaluated the results using the improved Jadad scale and the Cochrane bias risk assessment tool. RevMan 5.3 software was used for chart analysis. In addition, we used Excel to conduct frequency statistics on Chinese herbs from included articles and analyze its medication rules. RESULTS: Among the collection of 161 articles, 6 RCTs published in Chinese journals were included in this review. The methodological quality of the treatments was low, and most of them only provide diagnostic criteria. Inclusion and exclusion criteria were not specified, and none of the 6 RCTs used the blind method on the result evaluator. Furthermore, only one RCT evaluated the baseline level variance. For these reasons, we did not make a network meta-analysis. CONCLUSIONS: The traditional Chinese herbs involved in herbal tea did have ingredients to alleviate CSP symptoms. However, our research showed that the current research could not draw any credible conclusions on the curative effect of herbal tea, which indicated that the overall level of TCM clinical research needs to be improved to evaluate the efficacy of herbal tea.