Circulating Tfh cell and subsets distribution are associated with low-responsiveness to hepatitis B vaccination.

BACKGROUND: An estimated 5-10 % of healthy vaccinees lack adequate antibody response following receipt of a standard three-dose hepatitis B vaccination regimen. The cellular mechanisms responsible for poor immunological responses to hepatitis B vaccine have not been fully elucidated to date. METHODS: There were 61 low responders and 56 hyper responders involved in our study. Peripheral blood samples were mainly collected at D7, D14 and D28 after revaccinated with a further dose of 20 µg of recombinant hepatitis B vaccine. RESULTS: We found low responders to the hepatitis B vaccine presented lower frequencies of circulating follicular helper T (cTfh) cells, plasmablasts and a profound skewing away from cTfh2 and cTfh17 cells both toward cTfh1 cells. Importantly, the skewing of Tfh cell subsets correlated with IL-21 and protective antibody titers. Based on the key role of microRNAs involved in Tfh cell differentiation, we revealed miR-19b-1 and miR-92a-1 correlated with the cTfh cell subsets distribution and antibody production. CONCLUSIONS: Our findings highlighted a decrease in cTfh cells and specific subset skewing contribute to reduced antibody responses in low responders.

Association of rs10811656 on 9P21.3 with the risk of coronary artery disease in a Chinese population.

BACKGROUND: Genome-wide association studies have reported that the 9p21.3 locus confers risk for coronary artery disease (CAD). However, it is not known whether rs10811656 is linked with CAD in a Chinese population. Thus, the purpose of this study was to investigate the potential association between rs10811656 and the risk of CAD in a Chinese population. METHODS: We conducted a hospital-based, case-control study with 251 CAD patients and 304 controls to examine the potential association of rs10811656 with CAD. RESULTS: The frequencies of the TT genotypes in CAD cases were significantly different from those in controls (adjusted OR: 1.96, 95 % CI: 1.09-3.505, P = 0.024). Compared to controls, rs10811656 was significantly associated with the stable angina pectoris (adjusted OR: 1.42, 95 % CI: 1.06-1.90, P = 0.017), but not with acute coronary syndrome. There was also a highly significant association of rs10811656 with double-vessel and triple-vessel disease when patients were divided into subgroups based on the number of diseased vessels (adjusted OR: 1.68 and 1.60, 95 % CI: 1.14-2.44 and 1.10-2.33, P = 0.009 and 0.02, respectively). CONCLUSION: Our results suggest that the rs10811656 locus might be associated with CAD in a Chinese Han population.

Validation of the Chinese version of the diabetes health profile to predict the impact of mobile health education on quality of life in type 2 diabetes patients.

Purpose: The Diabetes Health Profile (DHP18), initially created in the United Kingdom, currently lacks a Chinese version. This study endeavors to authenticate the Chinese adaptation of the DHP18 and assess the influence of mobile health (mHealth) education intervention on the quality of life of individuals living with diabetes. Patients and methods: The study included 470 Type 2 diabetes Mellitus (T2DM) patients (204 men, 266 women), spanning an age range of 19-79 years, with an average age of 54 ± 12.40 years. Data analysis employed Jamovie and Mplus software. Moreover, test-retest reliability was evaluated in 52 hospitalized T2DM patients through two repeated measurements taken 4 weeks apart. Results: The Chinese version DHP18 scale exhibited high reliability, evidenced by a Cronbach's alpha of 0.88, and coefficient of test-retest reliability of 0.84. Individual subscales also demonstrated strong reliability, ranging from 0.76 to 0.84, with test-retest reliability spanning from 0.71 to 0.74. Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) employing a three-factor structure (χ2 = 294.69, GFI = 0.92, TLI = 0.91, RMSEA = 0.05, SRMR = 0.06) validated the scale's construct validity. Notably, there was a statistically significant difference (p < 0.05) in the quality of life between Type 2 diabetes patients using mHealth education intervention and those without mHealth education intervention. Mediation analysis revealed that Appraisal of Diabetes (ADS) and Self-Management Efficacy (SED) mediated the effects of Psychological Distress (PD) and Behavior Adherence (BA) on quality of life, both significant direct and indirect effects (p < 0.001). In addition, Dietary Abstinence (DE) displayed significant overall impact (ß = -0.13, p < 0.001) and indirect influence (ß = -0.10, p < 0.01) on diabetic patients' quality of life, though lacking a significant direct effect (ß = -0.03, p = 0.38). Conclusion: The Chinese version of the Diabetes Health Profile Scale meets stringent psychometric standards and stands as an appropriate measurement tool for Chinese T2DM patients, maintaining comparable results to the original scale's structure. The mHealth education intervention yielded a notably positive impact on the quality of life among T2DM patients. Mediation analysis revealed that the three dimensions of the DHP were mediated by Appraisal of Diabetes and Diabetes Self-Management Efficacy, partially mediated by Psychological Distress and Behavior Adherence, and fully mediated by Dietary Abstinence, providing insight into the positive effects of the mHealth model on the quality of life of diabetic patients.

Integration of RNA molecules data with prior-knowledge driven Joint Deep Semi-Negative Matrix Factorization for heart failure study.

Heart failure (HF) is the main manifestation of cardiovascular disease. Recent studies have shown that various RNA molecules and their complex connections play an essential role in HF's pathogenesis and pathological progression. This paper aims to mine key RNA molecules associated with HF. We proposed a Prior-knowledge Driven Joint Deep Semi-Negative Matrix Factorization (PD-JDSNMF) model that uses a hierarchical nonlinear feature extraction method that integrates three types of data: mRNA, lncRNA, and miRNA. The PPI information is added to the model as prior knowledge, and the Laplacian constraint is used to help the model resist the noise in the genetic data. We used the PD-JDSNMF algorithm to identify significant co-expression modules. The elements in the module are then subjected to bioinformatics analysis and algorithm performance analysis. The results show that the PD-JDSNMF algorithm can robustly select biomarkers associated with HF. Finally, we built a heart failure diagnostic model based on multiple classifiers and using the Top 13 genes in the significant module, the AUC of the internal test set was up to 0.8714, and the AUC of the external validation set was up to 0.8329, which further confirmed the effectiveness of the PD-JDSNMF algorithm.

Traditional Chinese Medicine Constitution Is Associated with the Frailty Status of Older Adults: A Cross-Sectional Study in the Community.

Objective: This study explored the relationship between traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) constitution and frailty status in older adults. Methods: A total of 3,586 participants, 65 years of age and older, with complete data were evaluated. All received a complete frailty assessment and completed a TCM geriatric constitution questionnaire. Baseline characteristics and demographic information were collected. The relationship between the TCM constitution and frailty was evaluated by binary regression analysis. The consistency of the result was tested by multivariate linear regression. Results: The average prevalence of frailty among older adult participants was 12.5%. The three most prevalent biased constitutions in the frail older adult participants were phlegm dampness 140 (31.3%), Yin deficiency 77 (17.2%), and Yang deficiency 47 (10.5%). Univariate analysis showed that TCM constitution significantly correlated with frailty. After adjusting for potential confounders, binary logistic regression found a significant correlation between biased constitutions and frailty, including Qi stagnation (odds ratio (OR) = 3.51, 95% confidence interval (CI): 1.94-6.36)), Qi deficiency ((OR = 3.23, (95% CI: 1.76-5.94)), Yang deficiency ((OR = 2.37, (95% CI: 1.50-3.74)), phlegm dampness ((OR = 1.75, (95% CI: 1.24-2.48)), and Yin deficiency ((OR = 1.70, (95% CI: 1.15-2.50)). Results of multiple linear regression were consistent. Conclusions: TCM constitution was significantly associated with frailty status in older adults, and the distribution was different. Compared with a neutral constitution, older adults with Qi stagnation, Qi deficiency, Yang deficiency, phlegm dampness, and Yin deficiency were more likely to experience frailty.

How to make more people adopt healthy behaviors? Assessing health literacy, health promoting lifestyle and their association of community residents in Shenzhen, China.

Introduction: Health literacy (HL) has been concerned a key factor for determining the use of health information and promoting health. The study aimed to explore the relationship between different health literacy types and health promoting lifestyle (HPL) in different health literacy population. Methods: The survey analyzed a sample of 16,921 community residents in Shenzhen. The Chinese Citizen Health Literacy Questionnaire and health-promoting lifestyle profile II (HPLP- II) were used to assess health literacy and health promoting lifestyle. Results: Participants were divided into different populations based on the correlation between HL and HPL. The low-HL and medium-HL populations were judged to lack health literacy, and demographic characteristics were significantly different between different HPL levels in low-HL and medium-HL populations. There were 6 types of HL, and health information literacy (ß = 0.08, P < 0.001) and chronic disease literacy (ß = 0.08, P < 0.001) positively predicted HPL in the low-HL population. In the medium-HL population, the results of reward and punishment analysis showed that health information was a basic factor, chronic disease was performance factor, medical care was a motivating factor for HPL; there were 6 dimensions of HPL, and health responsibility (HR), stress management (SM) and physical activity (PA) were not significantly different in medium-HL population. The results of regression analysis showed that HR and PA had a great impact on HPL (HR: ß = 0.193, PA: ß =0.179, ß for other dimensions was 0.186, 0.176, 0.171, 0.164), but the HR and PA standardized scores were lowest in the HPL dimensions (HR: 69.42, PA: 68.5, lower than other dimensions), so it may be HR and PA that cause HPL unchanged between groups in the medium-HL population. Conclusions: Different HL levels have different relationships with HPL, and different HL types have different effects on HPL. Shenzhen community residents need to improve their HL, and they have great potentials for further progress to improve the population health. Public health policy makers need to consider formulating different policies for people with different HL levels.

Associations Among Multimorbid Conditions in Hospitalized Middle-aged and Older Adults in China: Statistical Analysis of Medical Records.

BACKGROUND: Multimorbidity has become a new challenge for medical systems and public health policy. Understanding the patterns of and associations among multimorbid conditions should be given priority. It may assist with the early detection of multimorbidity and thus improve quality of life in older adults. OBJECTIVE: This study aims to comprehensively analyze and compare associations among multimorbid conditions by age and sex in a large number of middle-aged and older Chinese adults. METHODS: Data from the home pages of inpatient medical records in the Shenzhen National Health Information Platform were evaluated. From January 1, 2017, to December 31, 2018, inpatients aged 50 years and older who had been diagnosed with at least one of 40 conditions were included in this study. Their demographic characteristics (age and sex) and inpatient diagnoses were extracted. Association rule mining, Chi-square tests, and decision tree analyses were combined to identify associations between multiple chronic conditions. RESULTS: In total, 306,264 hospitalized cases with available information on related chronic conditions were included in this study. The prevalence of multimorbidity in the overall population was 76.46%. The combined results of the 3 analyses showed that, in patients aged 50 years to 64 years, lipoprotein metabolism disorder tended to be comorbid with multiple chronic conditions. Gout and lipoprotein metabolism disorder had the strongest association. Among patients aged 65 years or older, there were strong associations between cerebrovascular disease, heart disease, lipoprotein metabolism disorder, and peripheral vascular disease. The strongest associations were observed between senile cataract and glaucoma in men and women. In particular, the association between osteoporosis and malignant tumor was only observed in middle-aged and older men, while the association between anemia and chronic kidney disease was only observed in older women. CONCLUSIONS: Multimorbidity was prevalent among middle-aged and older Chinese individuals. The results of this comprehensive analysis of 4 age-sex subgroups suggested that associations between particular conditions within the sex and age groups occurred more frequently than expected by random chance. This provides evidence for further research on disease clusters and for health care providers to develop different strategies based on age and sex to improve the early identification and treatment of multimorbidity.

Circulating follicular helper T cells and subsets are associated with immune response to hepatitis B vaccination.

Around 5-10% of healthy vaccinees lack or produce an inadequate antibody response following receipt of a standard hepatitis B vaccination regimen. Studying immune response to hepatitis B vaccination could promote researches of immunological events contributing to this poor response. To address this, we investigated follicular helper T (Tfh) cells and firstly demonstrated similar kinetics between circulating Tfh (cTfh) cells and Tfh cells derived from mice spleen after hepatitis B vaccination. And cTfh cells were positively associated with anti-HBs at one week after vaccination (D7). Furthermore, we found PBMCs stimulated by HBsAg showed preferential activation of CXCR3- Tfh cells subsets in vitro. The expression of transcription factor BCL6 in CD4+ T cell significantly differed between D7 and four weeks after vaccination (D28). However, dynamic curve of CD19+ B cells tended to rise then fall but no significant trends were observed. Our findings revealed a decrease in cTfh cells and subset skewing contribute to reduced antibody responses in immune response to hepatitis B vaccination, which indicated the importance of Tfh cell in facilitating the optimization of vaccine efficacy.

Development of frailty subtypes and their associated risk factors among the community-dwelling elderly population.

In order to explore frailty subtypes and find their associated risk factors, we conducted cross-sectional surveys of 5,341 seniors aged 60 and over in China using the Frailty Index (FI) scale. We identified four frailty subtypes, namely multi-frail, cognitive and functionally frail, psychologically frail and physiologically frail. Old age and low education level were the common risk factors among the four subtypes. Being widowed, divorced or unmarried was a risk factor for multi-frail, cognitive and functionally frail and psychologically frail, and male sex was a protective factor against cognitive and functionally frail and psychologically frail subtypes. Having a harmonious relationship with family was a protective factor against multi-frail, and fewer visits to the elderly by their children was a risk factor for psychologically frail. Dissatisfaction with their housing was a risk factor for cognitive and functionally frail, psychologically frail and physiologically frail, and a pension being the main source of income was a risk factor for cognitive and functionally frail and psychologically frail. Exercising every day was a protective factor against multi-frail and cognitive and functionally frail, and a lower level of physical activity was a risk factor for all four frailty subtypes. Our findings confirm the heterogeneity of frailty and suggest that different frail elderly individuals need more targeted care interventions.