Efficacy of acupuncture for a cough-related symptom cluster in patients with lung cancer: A randomized controlled trial.

PURPOSE: This study was designed to evaluate the effect of acupuncture on cough, expectoration, and shortness of breath in lung cancer patients. METHODS: Between December 2021 and June 2022, a total of 130 lung cancer patients were recruited, and they were split into control and intervention groups at random. Routine nursing was provided to the control group, whereas routine nursing with acupuncture using LU7 (Lie Que), LU9 (Tai Yuan), BL13 (Fei Shu), and BL20 (Pi Shu) was administered to the intervention group for 7 days. The severity of cough, expectoration, and shortness of breath was assessed 1 day before and after the interventions using the lung cancer-specific module of the MDASI. A two-way ANOVA was performed for group comparisons. RESULTS: Compared with the control group, the symptoms of cough in the intervention group were significantly improved (F = 5.095, MD = -0.32, 95% CI, -0.59 to 0.04, P = 0.025), while expectoration (F = 0.626, MD = -0.11, 95% CI, -0.38 to 0.16, P = 0.430) and shortness of breath (F = 0.165, MD = -0.05, 95% CI, -0.27 to 0.18, P = 0.685) had no significant change. Cough also identified an obvious interaction effect (P = 0.014), and the post-intervention simple main effect test demonstrated a tangible difference between the two groups (MD = -0.66, 95% CI, -0.99 to 0.33, P < 0.001) post-intervention. CONCLUSIONS: Acupuncture using LU7, LU9, BL13, and BL20 can relieve the cough of lung cancer patients, but not relieve expectoration and shortness of breath.

Identifying Genetic Differences Between Dongxiang Blue-Shelled and White Leghorn Chickens Using Sequencing Data.

The Dongxiang Blue-shelled chicken is one of the most valuable Chinese indigenous poultry breeds. However, compared to the Italian native White Leghorn, although this Chinese breed possesses numerous favorable characteristics, it also exhibits lower growth performance and fertility. Here, we utilized genotyping sequencing data obtained via genome reduction on a sequencing platform to detect 100,114 single nucleotide polymorphisms and perform further biological analysis and functional annotation. We employed cross-population extended haplotype homozygosity, eigenvector decomposition combined with genome-wide association studies (EigenGWAS), and efficient mixed-model association expedited methods to detect areas of the genome that are potential selected regions (PSR) in both chicken breeds, and performed gene ontology (GO) enrichment and quantitative trait loci (QTL) analyses annotating using the Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes. The results of this study revealed a total of 2424 outlier loci (p-value <0.01), of which 2144 occur in the White Leghorn breed and 280 occur in the Dongxiang Blue-shelled chicken. These correspond to 327 and 94 PSRs containing 297 and 54 genes, respectively. The most significantly selected genes in Blue-shelled chicken are TMEM141 and CLIC3, while the SLCO1B3 gene, related to eggshell color, was identified via EigenGWAS. We show that the White Leghorn genes JARID2, RBMS3, GPC3, TRIB2, ROBO1, SAMSN1, OSBP2, and IGFALS are involved in immunity, reproduction, and growth, and thus might represent footprints of the selection process. In contrast, we identified six significantly enriched pathways in the Dongxiang Blue-shelled chicken that are related to amino acid and lipid metabolism as well as signal transduction. Our results also reveal the presence of a GO term associated with cell metabolism that occurs mainly in the White Leghorn breed, while the most significant QTL regions mapped to the Chicken QTL Database (GG_4.0) for the Dongxiang Blue-shelled breed are predominantly related to lesions, bone mineral content, and other related traits compared to tibia length and body weight (i.e., at 14, 28, 42, and 70 d) in the White Leghorn. The results of this study highlight differences in growth, immunity, and egg quality traits between the two breeds, and provide a foundation for the exploration of their genetic mechanisms.