Time series analysis of human brucellosis in mainland China by using Elman and Jordan recurrent neural networks.

BACKGROUND: Establishing epidemiological models and conducting predictions seems to be useful for the prevention and control of human brucellosis. Autoregressive integrated moving average (ARIMA) models can capture the long-term trends and the periodic variations in time series. However, these models cannot handle the nonlinear trends correctly. Recurrent neural networks can address problems that involve nonlinear time series data. In this study, we intended to build prediction models for human brucellosis in mainland China with Elman and Jordan neural networks. The fitting and forecasting accuracy of the neural networks were compared with a traditional seasonal ARIMA model. METHODS: The reported human brucellosis cases were obtained from the website of the National Health and Family Planning Commission of China. The human brucellosis cases from January 2004 to December 2017 were assembled as monthly counts. The training set observed from January 2004 to December 2016 was used to build the seasonal ARIMA model, Elman and Jordan neural networks. The test set from January 2017 to December 2017 was used to test the forecast results. The root mean squared error (RMSE), mean absolute error (MAE) and mean absolute percentage error (MAPE) were used to assess the fitting and forecasting accuracy of the three models. RESULTS: There were 52,868 cases of human brucellosis in Mainland China from January 2004 to December 2017. We observed a long-term upward trend and seasonal variance in the original time series. In the training set, the RMSE and MAE of Elman and Jordan neural networks were lower than those in the ARIMA model, whereas the MAPE of Elman and Jordan neural networks was slightly higher than that in the ARIMA model. In the test set, the RMSE, MAE and MAPE of Elman and Jordan neural networks were far lower than those in the ARIMA model. CONCLUSIONS: The Elman and Jordan recurrent neural networks achieved much higher forecasting accuracy. These models are more suitable for forecasting nonlinear time series data, such as human brucellosis than the traditional ARIMA model.

A review of documents prepared by international organizations about influenza pandemics, including the 2009 pandemic: a bibliometric analysis.

BACKGROUND: World Health Organization (WHO), the World Bank, UN System Influenza Coordination (UNSIC) and other international organizations released a series of documents to fight against the influenza pandemic. Those documents have great significance on guiding influenza pandemic preparedness and responses and providing a multilevel, multi-directional influenza pandemic prevention and control network for their member countries. This study focuses on the above-mentioned influenza pandemic preparedness guidelines with the aim of exploring the roles of the society, defining the relationship of different interventions and evaluating the planning on influenza pandemic preparedness. METHODS: Documents about pandemic influenza preparedness were retrieved from the official websites of the following three international organizations, World Health Organization (WHO), the World Bank, UN System Influenza Coordination (UNSIC) with the key words 'pandemic', 'influenza' and the Boolean combinations of these words as the retrieval strategy. Guidelines, research study and meeting reports were included in the study. The categories of the ministries/departments involved and their roles/responsibilities in pandemic influenza preparedness were summarized. Word frequency of selected vocabularies about pandemic influenza preventive measures were collected from the documents and the correlations between the word frequency of these measures were analyzed. Ochiai coefficient was employed to show the correlation between the word vocabularies. RESULTS: A total of 38 records on the topic of pandemic influenza preparedness were included. The responsibilities of the whole-of-society mentioned in the international organizations' documents varied across the 2009 influenza pandemic period. Meanwhile, it had been emphasized that a comprehensive influenza prevention and control plan in every sector should be developed and evaluated. Because various measures were emphasized in the guidelines after 2009 pandemic influenza, the correlations between the word frequencies of the various influenza preventive measures became stronger after the pandemic influenza. CONCLUSIONS: Responsibilities of ministries of education, ministries of energy, ministries of agriculture and animal health, ministries of communication and the business sector in the pandemic influenza preparedness were described more comprehensively in the international organizations' documents in 2017. Better understanding the variations of the guidelines delivered by international organizations would be useful for the member countries to strengthen their influenza control network.

The Risk Factors of Acquiring Severe Hand, Foot, and Mouth Disease: A Meta-Analysis.

OBJECTIVES: The incidence of severe hand, foot, and mouth disease (HFMD) is not low, especially in mainland China in almost every year recently. In this study, we conducted a meta-analysis to generate large-scale evidence on the risk factors of severe HFMD to provide suggestions on prevention and controlling. METHODS: PubMed, Web of Science, Embase, Cochrane Library, China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI), and Wanfang (Chinese) were searched to identify relevant articles. All analyses were performed using Stata 14.0. RESULTS: We conducted a meta-analysis of 11 separate studies. Fever (odds ratio (OR) 7.396, 95% confidence interval (CI) 3.565-15.342), fever for more than 3 days (OR 5.773, 95% CI 4.199-7.939), vomiting (OR 6.023, 95% CI 2.598-13.963), limb trembling (OR 42.348, 95% CI 11.765-152.437), dyspnea (OR 12.869, 95% CI 1.948-85.017), contact with HFMD children (OR 5.326, 95% CI 1.263-22.466), rashes on the hips (OR 1.650, 95% CI 1.303-2.090), pathologic reflexes (OR 3057.064, 95% CI 494.409-19000), Lethargy (OR 31.791, 95% CI 3.369-300.020), convulsions (OR 23.652, 95% CI 1.973-283.592), and EV71 infection (OR 9.056, 95% CI 4.102-19.996) were significantly related to the risk of severe HFMD. We did not find an association between female sex (OR 0.918, 95% CI 0.738-1.142), scatter-lived children (OR 1.347, 95% CI 0.245-7.397), floating population (OR 0.847, 95% CI 0.202-3.549), rash on the hands (OR 0.740, 95% CI 0.292-1.874), rash on the foot (OR 0.905, 95% CI 0.645-1.272), the level of the clinic visited first (below the country level) (OR 5.276, 95% CI 0.781-35.630), breast feeding (OR 0.523, 95% CI 0.167-1.643), and the risk of severe HFMD. CONCLUSIONS: Fever, fever for more than 3 days, vomiting, limb trembling, dyspnea, contact with HFMD children, rashes on the hips, pathologic reflexes, lethargy, convulsions, and EV71 infection are risk factors for severe HFMD.

Polymorphisms of cancer stem cell marker gene CD133 are associated with susceptibility and prognosis of gastric cancer.

AIM: This study was aimed to investigate the associations between single nucleotide polymorphisms of cancer stem cell marker genes, CD44 and CD133, and susceptibility and prognosis of gastric cancer. PATIENTS & METHODS: Five single nucleotide polymorphisms in CD44 and CD133 genes were genotyped in 898 gastric cancer cases and 992 controls. RESULTS: The A/C or C/C genotypes of CD133 rs2240688 were associated with decreased risk of gastric cancer comparing with the A/A genotype (odds ratio: 0.81; 95% CI: 0.67-0.97; p = 0.023). The T allele of CD133 rs3130 predicted a worse survival for gastric cancer patients receiving tumorectomy (hazard ratio: 1.28; 95% CI: 1.04-1.58; p = 0.020), independent from tumor node metastasis stage, vessel invasion and postoperational chemotherapy. CONCLUSION:  CD133 polymorphisms are promising biomarkers for genetic susceptibility and prognosis prediction of gastric cancer.

Interaction between Helicobacter pylori and host genetic variants in gastric carcinogenesis.

Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori) is the definite carcinogen of gastric cancer. H. pylori infection induces chronic inflammation, causes DNA damage and aberrant methylation of genes and these pathways are involved in H. pylori-related gastric carcinogenesis. Polymorphisms of the genes involved in these pathways could alter susceptibility to gastric cancer. In this mini review, we focused on the role of polymorphisms in these genes on the susceptibility to gastric cancer, with a particular emphasis on their possible interactions with H. pylori infection. We found that many studies on this theme did not simultaneously report H. pylori infection and the interactions remained inconclusive.

Dual Specificity Phosphatase 6 (DUSP6) Polymorphism Predicts Prognosis of Inoperable Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer after Chemoradiotherapy.

BACKGROUND: Dual-specificity phosphatase 6 (DUSP6) inactivates different target kinases to regulate cell proliferation and differentiation. Altered DUSP6 expressions or gene polymorphisms are associated with human cancer development including non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). DNA topoisomerase II alpha (TOP2A) regulates chromosome condensation and chromatid separation, and altered TOP2A expressions are associated with drug resistance development. This study assessed DUSP6 and TOP2A single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) associated with NSCLC patient survival. METHODS: This study included 152 surgically resected NSCLC patients and 277 chemoradiotherapy treated inoperable cases. DNA samples from each patient were genotyped for DUSP6 and TOP2A SNPs. Kaplan-Meier survival analysis, log-rank test, and Cox proportional hazard model were used to evaluate the association between these variants and NSCLC overall survival. RESULTS: DUSP6 rs2279574 A/A genotype was associated with significantly poor inoperable NSCLC patient overall survival (A/A vs. C/C, adjusted HR = 1.549, 95% CI = 1.019-2.355). Stratification analysis against clinical stage, histology, weight loss, and ECOG performance status revealed that the DUSP6 rs2279574 A/A variant homozygous genotype is associated with a decrease in survival of stage IV NSCLC patients compared to those with the C/C genotype (log-rank, p = 0.003). No association was found among histology, weight loss, and ECOG performance status. Moreover, there was no association of TOP2A SNPs between clinicopathological and survival data. CONCLUSIONS: Data obtained from the current study demonstrated that functional DUSP6 rs2279574 polymorphism was able to predict inoperable NSCLC patient survival after chemoradiotherapy.

SULT1A1 Arg213His polymorphism and susceptibility of environment-related cancers: a meta analysis of 5,915 cases and 7,900 controls.

The common genetic polymorphism for SULT1A1 is Arg213His polymorphism, which may affect the sulfation process of various environmental carcinogens and thus is suggested to be related to susceptibility of several cancers. However, studies on the association between SULT1A1 Arg213His polymorphism and cancer susceptibility are inconsistent. To assess the relationship between Arg213His polymorphism and environmental-related cancers systematically, we performed a meta analysis from 20 case-control studies including 5,915 cases and 7,900 controls. The odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were used to estimate the strength of risk, we found a significant association between SULT1A1 Arg213His polymorphism and environment-related cancers (for dominant model: OR 1.22, 95% CI 1.07-1.39, P = 0.003). When stratified by ethnicity, a significant risk was observed in Asian cases, compared with controls (for dominant model: OR 1.69, 95% CI 1.17-2.43, P = 0.005). When we chose only smokers in our analysis, we also found a significantly increased risk between Arg213His polymorphism and susceptibility of environment-related cancers for participants exposed to a smoking environment. In conclusion, SULT1A1 Arg213His polymorphism, ethnicity, smoking may modulate environment-related cancer risk. Studies on gene-gene interactions in the sequential or concurrent metabolic pathway and gene-environment interactions need to be further conducted to explore the susceptibility of cancer occurrence.

Association between ATM polymorphisms and cancer risk: a meta-analysis.

To date, epidemiological studies have assessed the association between Ataxia-telangiectasia mutated (ATM) gene polymorphisms and cancer risk, including lung cancer, breast cancer, glioma and pancreatic cancer. However, the results of these studies remain controversial. We aimed to examine the associations between two SNPs (rs664143 and rs664677) and cancer risk by conducting a meta-analysis of case-control studies. A total of 12 publications were included in this meta-analysis, 8 for rs664143 and 7 for rs664677. Overall, rs664143 heterozygote carriers turned out to be associated with cancer risk (OR = 1.18, 95% CI 1.02-1.36). In the subgroup analysis by cancer type, we observed that the ATM rs664143 polymorphism was significantly associated with lung cancer risk (GA vs. GG: OR = 1.48, 95% CI 1.18-1.85, AA vs. GG: OR = 1.51, 95% CI 1.18-1.93) and rs664677 polymorphism was associated with decreased lung cancr risk and increased breast cancer risk (for lung cancer: TC vs. TT: OR = 0.76, 95% CI 0.62-0.92, CC vs. TT: OR = 0.80, 95% CI 0.64-0.99 and for breast cancer: TC vs. TT: OR = 1.42, 95% CI 1.17-1.73, CC vs. TT: OR = 1.51, 95% CI 1.21-1.87). In the subgroup analysis by region, we also observed that individuals with ATM rs664143 GA or AA genotype had an obvious increased cancer risk among Asian people (GA vs. GG: OR = 1.40, 95% CI 1.20-1.63, AA vs. GG: OR = 1.37, 95% CI 1.16-1.62). In conclusion, ATM rs664143 polymorphism was associated with cancer susceptibility. ATM rs664143 polymorphism was significantly associated with lung cancer risk. ATM rs664677 polymorphism was associated with decreased lung cancer risk as well as increased breast cancer risk.

The correlation between temperature and the incidence of COVID-19 in four first-tier cities of China: a time series study.

The COVID-19 outbreak emerged in Wuhan, China, and was declared a global pandemic in March 2020. This study aimed to explore the association of daily mean temperature with the daily counts of COVID-19 cases in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Shenzhen, China. Data on daily confirmed cases of COVID-19 and daily mean temperatures were retrieved from the 4 first-tier cities in China. Distributed lag nonlinear models (DLNMs) were used to assess the association between daily mean temperature and the daily cases of COVID-19 during the study period. After controlling for the imported risk index and long-term trends, the distributed lag nonlinear model showed that there were nonlinear and lag relationships. The daily cumulative relative risk decreased for every 1.0 °C change in temperature in Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Shenzhen. However, the cumulative relative risk increased with a daily mean temperature below - 3 °C in Beijing and then decreased. Moreover, the delayed effects of lower temperatures mostly occurred within 6-7 days of exposure. There was a negative correlation between the cumulative relative risk of COVID-19 incidence and temperature, especially when the temperature was higher than - 3 °C. The conclusions from this paper will help government and health regulators in these cities take prevention and protection measures to address the COVID-19 crisis and the possible collapse of the health system in the future.

Health economic assessment for screening of gastric cancer in a high risk population in northeastern china.

OBJECTIVE: To assess economic cost-effects for the screening programs of gastric cancer in a high risk population in northeastern China. METHODS: The data were collected from November 2001 to December 2003. The multi-stage sampling to define the screening group and the control group was applied in this study. Two stage screening programs were used in the study. An epidemiological survey and serum PG test were carried out in the first stage. The endoscopy and pathological examination were performed in the second stage screening. Effectiveness was assessed by the increased quality adjusted life-year (QALY) because of reduced gastric cancer deaths in screening. RESULTS: A total of 27,970 participants (n=7,128 screening group, n=20,842 control group) were enrolled in the survey. Twenty nine gastric cancer cases were detected in the screening group with 20 cases in the early stage and 9 cases in the advanced stage, respectively. Eighty six gastric cancer cases were detected in the control group, all of whom were in the advanced stage and had died before the study finished. The screening and treatment of 29 cases cost $152,227 and $5,249 per each case, respectively. The costs were $459 to gain per QALY. CONCLUSION: The screening program of gastric cancer used in our study is an economic and society-beneficial measure to detect gastric cancer in high risk area. The methods fit China's present economic development level.

Improving the precision of modeling the incidence of hemorrhagic fever with renal syndrome in mainland China with an ensemble machine learning approach.

OBJECTIVE: Hemorrhagic fever with renal syndrome (HFRS), one of the main public health concerns in mainland China, is a group of clinically similar diseases caused by hantaviruses. Statistical approaches have always been leveraged to forecast the future incidence rates of certain infectious diseases to effectively control their prevalence and outbreak potential. Compared to the use of one base model, model stacking can often produce better forecasting results. In this study, we fitted the monthly reported cases of HFRS in mainland China with a model stacking approach and compared its forecasting performance with those of five base models. METHOD: We fitted the monthly reported cases of HFRS ranging from January 2004 to June 2019 in mainland China with an autoregressive integrated moving average (ARIMA) model; the Holt-Winter (HW) method, seasonal decomposition of the time series by LOESS (STL); a neural network autoregressive (NNAR) model; and an exponential smoothing state space model with a Box-Cox transformation; ARMA errors; and trend and seasonal components (TBATS), and we combined the forecasting results with the inverse rank approach. The forecasting performance was estimated based on several accuracy criteria for model prediction, including the mean absolute percentage error (MAPE), root-mean-squared error (RMSE) and mean absolute error (MAE). RESULT: There was a slight downward trend and obvious seasonal periodicity inherent in the time series data for HFRS in mainland China. The model stacking method was selected as the best approach with the best performance in terms of both fitting (RMSE 128.19, MAE 85.63, MAPE 8.18) and prediction (RMSE 151.86, MAE 118.28, MAPE 13.16). CONCLUSION: The results showed that model stacking by using the optimal mean forecasting weight of the five abovementioned models achieved the best performance in terms of predicting HFRS one year into the future. This study has corroborated the conclusion that model stacking is an easy way to enhance prediction accuracy when modeling HFRS.

Chemo-radiotherapy for advanced non-small cell lung cancer: concurrent or sequential? It's no longer the question: a systematic review.

There has been conflicting evidence concerning the best sequence of radiotherapy (RT) and chemotherapy (CT) for advanced non-small-cell-lung-cancer (NSCLC). To investigate whether current clinical trials can clarify this schedule and offer further bases for clinical decision making, we performed a systematic review of 11 trials (2,043 patients; concurrent-1,019, sequential-1,024) that compared concurrent RT-CT with sequential arm in advanced NSCLC patients. Primary end point was overall survival (OS). Pooled median ratios (MRs) and progression-free-survival ratios (FRs) for median survival and progression-free survival (PFS) were calculated using the weighted sum of the log ratio of MR and FR of individual study. Pooled odds ratios (ORs) for the objective response rate, relapse control rate, and toxic events were calculated using the Mantel-Haenszel estimate. Results confirmed that concurrent RT-CT determined a statistically significant increase in median survival time (16.3 vs. 13.9 months; MR = 1.17,95%CI:1.09-1.26), response rate (64.0% vs. 56.3%; OR = 1.38,95%CI:1.10-1.72), and tumor-relapse control (OR = 0.82,95%CI:0.69-0.97), though at the expense of increased hematological toxicity (neutropenia and thrombocytopenia) and non-hematological toxicity (nausea/vomiting, stomatitis, and esophagitis). Similar results were obtained from the sensitivity analysis of all Phase-III/trials designed to evaluate the primary end point of OS. Subgroup analysis revealed that concurrent strategy was mainly associated with improved loco-regional control (OR = 0.68,95%CI:0.52-0.87). However, no difference in PFS is shown. While careful interpretation of our conclusions is required because of potential bias, the present study, to some extent, exhibits the superiority of the concurrent arm over the sequential in the treatment of advanced NSCLC. Further improvements will be obtained by optimizing the conditions for a concurrent regimen.

Comparison of ARIMA model and XGBoost model for prediction of human brucellosis in mainland China: a time-series study.

OBJECTIVES: Human brucellosis is a public health problem endangering health and property in China. Predicting the trend and the seasonality of human brucellosis is of great significance for its prevention. In this study, a comparison between the autoregressive integrated moving average (ARIMA) model and the eXtreme Gradient Boosting (XGBoost) model was conducted to determine which was more suitable for predicting the occurrence of brucellosis in mainland China. DESIGN: Time-series study. SETTING: Mainland China. METHODS: Data on human brucellosis in mainland China were provided by the National Health and Family Planning Commission of China. The data were divided into a training set and a test set. The training set was composed of the monthly incidence of human brucellosis in mainland China from January 2008 to June 2018, and the test set was composed of the monthly incidence from July 2018 to June 2019. The mean absolute error (MAE), root mean square error (RMSE) and mean absolute percentage error (MAPE) were used to evaluate the effects of model fitting and prediction. RESULTS: The number of human brucellosis patients in mainland China increased from 30 002 in 2008 to 40 328 in 2018. There was an increasing trend and obvious seasonal distribution in the original time series. For the training set, the MAE, RSME and MAPE of the ARIMA(0,1,1)×(0,1,1)12 model were 338.867, 450.223 and 10.323, respectively, and the MAE, RSME and MAPE of the XGBoost model were 189.332, 262.458 and 4.475, respectively. For the test set, the MAE, RSME and MAPE of the ARIMA(0,1,1)×(0,1,1)12 model were 529.406, 586.059 and 17.676, respectively, and the MAE, RSME and MAPE of the XGBoost model were 249.307, 280.645 and 7.643, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: The performance of the XGBoost model was better than that of the ARIMA model. The XGBoost model is more suitable for prediction cases of human brucellosis in mainland China.

Facts and fiction of the relationship between preexisting tuberculosis and lung cancer risk: a systematic review.

There has been conflicting evidence concerning the possible association between tuberculosis (TB) and subsequent risk of lung cancer. To investigate whether currently published epidemiological studies can clarify this association, we performed a systematic review of 37 case-control and 4 cohort studies (published between January 1966 and January 2009) and a meta-analysis of risk estimates, with particular attention to the role of smoking, passive smoking and the timing of diagnosis of TB on this relationship. Data for the review show a significantly increased lung cancer risk associated with preexisting TB. Importantly, the association was not due to confounding by the effects of tobacco use (RR=1.8, 95% confidence interval (CI)=1.4-2.2, among never smoking individuals), lifetime environmental tobacco smoke exposure (RR=2.9, 95%CI=1.6-5.3, after controlling) or the timing of diagnosis of TB (the increased lung cancer risk remained 2-fold elevated for more than 20 years after TB diagnosis). Interestingly, the association was significant with adenocarcinoma (RR=1.6, 95%CI=1.2-2.1), but no significant associations with squamous and small cell type of lung cancer were observed. Although no causal mechanism has been demonstrated for such an association, present study supports a direct relation between TB and lung cancer, especially adenocarcinomas.

Dynamic changes in T-cell subsets and C-reactive protein after radiation therapy in lung cancer patients and correlation with symptomatic radiation pneumonitis treated with steroid therapy.

OBJECTIVES: To investigate relationships among serum T-cell subsets, CRP, levels and radiation pneumonitis (RP) in lung cancer patients receiving radiotherapy. METHODS: A case-control study with frequency matching was carried out. The case group comprised 36 lung cancer patients who had developed grade ≥2 RP after thoracic radiotherapy. The control group was 36 patients with lung cancer without RP. Patients in the case group received steroid therapy for 1 month after diagnosis of RP and were followed up for 3 months. T-cell subsets, CRP, and pulmonary function were detected at three time points (onset of RP and 1 and 3 months after diagnosis). Data for the control group were collected 3 months after radiotherapy. Treatment effectiveness was evaluated at 1 and 3 months after diagnosis of RP. RESULTS: Of the 36 patients in the case group, three with grade5 RP died from respiratory failure. The other 33 cases had all improved with steroid therapy at 3 months after RP diagnosis. In these 33, CD3+T-cell quantity, CD4+T-cell quantity, and of CD4+:CD8+ ratio in T-cell subsets decreased significantly and CRP increased (P<0.05) at the onset of RP compared with the control group. After steroid therapy, CD4+T-cell quantity increased significantly compared to before treatment. The same change was seen in CD4+:CD8+ ratio, whereas CRP levels decreased obviously, with treatment effectiveness improved. In addition, with the damage level of RP increased, CD4+ T -cell quantity decreased obviously and CRP levels increased accordingly at the onset of RP (P<0.05). CONCLUSION: T-cell subsets and CRP may become effective immunological biomarkers for predicting damage from RP and evaluating treatment effectivesness of steroid therapy.

Dual-specificity phosphatase 6 genetic variants associated with risk of lung squamous cell carcinoma in Han Chinese.

BACKGROUND: Nonsmall cell lung cancer (NSCLC) mainly contains adenocarcinoma (AC) and squamous cell carcinoma (SqCC). This study investigated single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) of topoisomerase II alpha (TOP2A) and dual-specificity phosphatase 6 (DUSP6) in a hospital-based case and control cohort of individuals for association with risk of different histological subtypes of NSCLC. MATERIALS AND METHODS: A total of 454 (237 SqCC and 217 AC) NSCLC patients, and 454 healthy controls were recruited for analysis of TOP2A rs471692 and DUSP6 rs2279574 genotypes using the TaqMan polymerase chain reaction technique. RESULTS: TOP2A rs471692 and DUSP6 rs2279574 SNPs were in complete linkage disequilibrium; however, frequency of DUSP6 rs2279574 genotype was significantly different between the case and control, that is, DUSP6 rs2279574a/A and A/C genotypes might contribute to an increased risk of lung squamous carcinoma compared with the C/C genotype. Moreover, DUSP6 rs2279574 AA genotype was also significantly associated with advanced stages of lung cancer. In contrast, frequency of the TOP2A rs471692 genotype had no association between cases and controls (P = 0.906). Genotype frequency of DUSP6 rs2279574 was 11.9% for C/C, 43.6% for C/A, and 44.5% for A/A in the case versus 16.7% C/C, 43.4% C/A, and 39.9% A/A in the control population (χ2 = 3.136, P= 0.077 by Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium test [HWE]). The genotype frequency of TOP2A rs471692 was 50.0% for C/C, 41.6% for C/T, and 8.4% for T/T in the case versus 50.2% C/C, 43.0% C/T, and 6.8% T/T in the control populations (χ2 = 0.023, P= 0.879 by HWE test). CONCLUSION: Individuals are carrying DUSP6 rs2279574 AA and AC genotypes associated with an increased risk in developing lung squamous carcinoma in Han Chinese and with advanced NSCLC stages.

[Determining the risk factors of uterine myomas by using back propagation neural network].

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the value of a back propagation (BP) network in determining the risk factors of uterine myomas. METHODS: Using stratified randomized sampling method, 1260 women were surveyed by questionnaire. 1:2 matched case-control study was conducted in 113 cases of uterine myomas. Neural network tools box of Software MATLAB 6.5 was used to train and simulate BP artificial network. The mean impact value (MIV) for each input variables was analyzed, and was compared with multiple logistic regression analysis and log-linear model for interaction between factors. RESULTS: BP artificial neural analysis showed that the leading risk factors for uterine myomas were delayed menstruation, family history of uterine myomas, cervicitis, menstrual disorder, induced abortion, pelvic inflammatory, oral contraceptive medication, and elytritis, with mean impact value -0.0405, 0.0361, 0.0162, 0.0143, 0.0135, 0.0117, 0.0094, 0.0087, respectively. Both BP artificial neural and logistic regression analysis showed that the sequence of leading risk factors were similar in the whole, but there were some differences observed, induced abortion was proved to be an important cooperation variable through logline model analysis respectively. CONCLUSION: Compared to the conventional statistics method, BP artificial neural network could deal with the interaction between covariables preferably, thus provided a powerful method to risk factor analysis.

[Meta-analysis on relationship between FasL and gastric cancer].

OBJECTIVE: To analyze the relationship between Fas ligand (FasL) and gastric cancer extensively. METHODS: The computerized CNKI database, Wangfang database, Weipu database, Springerlink full-text periodical database and ProQuest full-text periodical database were searched. And, the literatures detecting FasL in gastric cancer with immunohistochemical method which have been published during 1990 to 2006 were also reviewed. The research hypothesis and research method of each literature were the same; the diagnosis of case and control were definite; the size of sample was also definite; the primitive data must offer the number of object whose FasL were expressed positively or offered the positive rate. Each study and its quality were also evaluated. A software Review Manager 4.2.10, was used to analyze the data. and to estimate the overall OR and its 95% CI. RESULTS: A total of 49 literatures have been reviewed. According to the selection and washing out criteria, 13 literatures were used in this Meta-analysis. In the research of gastric cancer group and normal gastric mucosa group, 10 literatures were used. Between the two groups the expression of FasL has statistical significance (OR(overall) = 14.88, 95% CI 5.34 - 41.48; P < 0.00001); In the research of different differentiation level, 8 literatures were used. Between the two groups the expression of FasL had no statistical significance (OR(overall) = 1.90, 95% CI 0.68 - 5.28; P = 0.22); In the research of different TNM staging, 5 literatures were used. Between the two groups the expression of FasL had statistical significance (OR(overall) = 2.58, 95% CI 1.05 - 6.32; P = 0.04); In the research of different Lymph node metastasis, 8 literatures were used. Between the two groups the expression of FasL has no statistical significance (OR(overall) = 1.00, 95% CI 0.45 - 2.21; P = 1.00). CONCLUSION: The high expression of FasL is the high risk of gastric cancer, and TNM staging has some associations with gastric cancer.

CD24 genetic variants contribute to overall survival in patients with gastric cancer.

AIM: To investigate the role of single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in CD24 gene in susceptibility and overall survival of gastric cancer (GC). METHODS: We genotyped 3 tagging SNPs of CD24-P-534 in the promoter region, P170 in the coding region of exon 2 and P1527 in the 3' untranslated region - using polymerase chain reaction-restriction fragment length polymorphism in specimens from 679 histologically-confirmed GC cases, 111 gastric atrophy (GA) cases and 976 tumor-free controls. Serum immunoglobulin G antibodies to Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori) of all subjects were detected by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. CD24 expression was evaluated by immunohistochemistry in 131 GC specimens. Correlations between SNPs and risk of GC or GA were shown by P values and odd ratios (ORs) with 95% confidence intervals (95%CI) compared with the most common genotype of each SNP using the unconditional logistic regression model after adjusting for age, sex and H. pylori infection. Survival within each SNP group was plotted by Kaplan-Meier method and compared by log-rank test (recessive model). Hazard ratios with 95%CIs were computed by Cox regression model after adjusting for age, sex, histological type, tumor differentiation, clinical stage and post-operational chemotherapy. RESULTS: All of the three loci were in Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium in the control group. Median follow-up time for the 600 GC patients included in the survival analysis was 36.2 mo (range, 2.1-66.7 mo; 95%CI: 34.3-36.5 mo). Patients with the P-534 A/A genotype had significantly shorter survival (HR = 1.38, 95%CI: 1.01-1.88, P = 0.042) than did the C/C or C/A genotype carriers after adjusting for age, sex, histological type, tumor differentiation, clinical stage and post-operational chemotherapy. This trend was more evident in patients who lived longer than 2.5 years (HR = 7.55, 95%CI: 2.16-26.32, P = 0.001). The P170 T/T genotype was associated with a shorter lifespan than the non-T/T genotypes, but not significantly so. None of the three genetic variants was found to be associated with risk of GC (including tumor stage, grade and distant metastasis) or with risk of gastric atrophy. Furthermore, no difference of CD24 expression was found among the genotypes. CONCLUSION: The P-534 site in CD24 gene affects the overall survival of gastric cancer and may serve as a prognostic marker for gastric cancer.

[Association of genetic polymorphism in the DNA repair gene XRCC1 with susceptibility to lung cancer in non-smoking women].

OBJECTIVE: To assess the relationship between the XRCC1 polymorphism and susceptibility to lung cancer in non-smoking female on the basis of a hospital-based case-control study. METHODS: Genotypes were determined by PCR-restriction fragment length polymorphism in 50 patients with lung cancer and 50 controls. The adjusted odds ratios (OR) and 95% confidence intervals (CI) were calculated using logistic regression model to study the relationship between different genotypes and risk of lung cancer in non-smoking women. Furthermore, a multiplicative interaction between exposure to cooking oil smoke and the variant XRCC1 399Gln allele on risk of lung adenocarcinoma was evaluated. RESULTS: Individuals carrying Gln/Gln genotype were at an increased risk to suffer from lung adenocarcinoma as compared with those with the Arg/Arg genotype (OR: 14.12; 95% CI: 2.14 approximately 92.95, adjusted for age and cooking oil smoke). The OR of lung adenocarcinoma for the variant XRCC1 399Gln allele with exposure to cooking oil smoke was 6.29 (95% CI 1.99 approximately 19.85). CONCLUSION: The above described findings indicate that Arg 399Gln polymorphism in the XRCC1 is associated with risk of lung adenocarcinoma but not with risk of squamous-cell carcinoma of the lung in non-smoking women.