Clinical diagnostic value and analysis of MRI combined with ultrasound in prenatal pernicious placenta previa with placenta accreta.

BACKGROUND: Placenta previa is one dangerous disease which threatens the health of pregnant women and their fetuses. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the clinical value of ultrasound combined with magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in screening for placenta previa complicated by placenta accreta. METHODS: Seventy patients with abnormal fetal position admitted to our hospital from January 2019 to January 2020 were selected for the study. Patients were diagnosed by ultrasound alone, MRI alone, and ultrasound combined with MRI. Diagnostic accuracy, sensitivity, specificity and false positive and negative diagnosis rates were evaluated against the postoperative pathological examinations of the patients. RESULTS: The diagnostic accuracy, sensitivity and false negative rate for ultrasound combined with MRI were 86.27%, 97.78% and 72.00%, respectively. These results were significantly superior to those of MRI or ultrasound alone (P<0.05). The specificity and false positive rate for ultrasound combined with MRI were 13.73% and 5.26%, respectively, which were not significantly different from those for MRI or ultrasound alone (P>0.05). CONCLUSIONS: Compared with ultrasound or MRI alone, ultrasound combined with MRI has higher accuracy and sensitivity in the diagnosis of placenta previa with placenta accreta, along with lower false positive diagnosis rates. These findings are clinically important for improving the diagnostic efficiency.

Prognostic significance of serum soluble DR5 levels in small-cell lung cancer.

The death receptor 5 (DR5) is a member of the tumor necrosis factor receptor superfamily that can transduce the apoptosis signal in cells. This study assessed serum levels of soluble death receptor 5 (sDR5) in small-cell lung cancer (SCLC) patients compared with those in healthy controls. Clinicopathological features of patients, treatment responses, and overall survival of patients were also recorded and analyzed. The sDR5 levels were analyzed using ELISA in 50 healthy controls and 82 SCLC patients before and after first-line chemotherapy. The statistical data showed that pre-treatment levels of serum sDR5 in SCLC patients were higher than those of healthy controls (P<0.001). Pre-treatment levels of serum sDR5 were significantly associated with smoking history of patients, Veterans Administration Lung Study Group (VALSG) stage, tumor size, and lymph node (N) metastasis (P=0.028, 0.001, 0.028, and 0.01, respectively). After treatment with the first-line chemotherapy, the post-treatment levels of serum sDR5 were obviously decreased (P<0.001), and correlated with treatment responses (P<0.001), although there was no significant difference in their pretreatment sDR5 levels (P=0.62). Cox proportional hazard analysis demonstrated that the post-treatment levels of serum sDR5, VALSG stage, and PS status were all independent predictors for overall survival of patients. The results from the current study indicate that serum level of sDR5 could be further confirmed as a biomarker to predict treatment responses and survival of SCLC patients.