Comparison of the Efficacy of Indwelling Gastric Tubes in Preoperative and Postoperative Patients With Oral and Maxillofacial Malignancies.

PURPOSE: To explore the optimal plan for the timing of indwelling gastric tube placement in oral and maxillofacial malignant tumor patients. DESIGN: A prospective randomized controlled trial. METHODS: 80 patients with oral and maxillofacial tumor were selected, and 40 patients were Pre-operative group. The remaining 40 patients were the control group, called Postoperative group. The body weight and hospital stay of the two groups were observed before and after surgery. Blood samples were taken before surgery and 1, 3 and 7 days after surgery to detect hemoglobin and plasma albumin. FINDINGS: The number of postoperative hospitalization days in the pre-operative group was significantly lower than that in the post-operative group; postoperative hemoglobin and plasma albumins were lower in both groups compared with the preoperative level. CONCLUSIONS: Preoperative nasogastric tube ensured early postoperative administration of gastrointestinal nutrition, promoted postoperative plasma albumin recovery, and shortened the days of hospitalization.

Construction and optimization of a polygenic risk model for venous thromboembolism in the Chinese population.

BACKGROUND: Venous thromboembolism (VTE) has both environmental and genetic risk factors. It is regulated by polygenes and multisites. The polygenic risk score (PRS) has been widely used because any single genetic biomarker failed to accurately predict the genetic risk of VTE. However, no polygenic risk model has been proposed for VTE in the Chinese population. Thus, we aimed to construct a PRS model for the first episode of VTE in the Chinese population. METHODS: First, single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) associated with VTE in genome-wide association studies, meta-analyses, and candidate gene studies were screened as variables for the PRS. The logarithm of the odds ratio was used to weight the variables. Second, a training set with simulated data from 1000 cases of VTE and 1000 controls was created with different genotypes and frequencies. Finally, we calculated the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC) to evaluate the discriminatory ability of the PRS model. RESULTS: We screened 53 SNPs potentially associated with the first episode of VTE in the Chinese population. The AUC of the PRS-53 model (containing 53 SNPs) was 0.748 (95% confidence interval, 0.727-0.770) in the training set. From the largest weight to the smallest weight, SNPs were incrementally added to the model to calculate the AUC for model optimization. The AUC of the PRS-10 model (containing 10 SNPs) was 0.718 (95% confidence interval, 0.696-0.740), with no statistically significant difference from the AUC for the PRS-53 model. CONCLUSIONS: The PRS-10 and PRS-53 models showed similar predictive abilities and satisfactory discriminatory power and can be used to predict the genetic risk of the first episode of VTE in the Chinese population. The simplified PRS-10 model is more efficient in clinical practice.

Oxidative Stress Amelioration of Novel Peptides Extracted from Enzymatic Hydrolysates of Chinese Pecan Cake.

Pecan (Carya cathayensis) is an important economic crop, and its hydrolyzed peptides have been evidenced to reduce the effect of oxidative stress due to their antioxidant capacity. Hence, the protocols of ultrafiltration and gel filtration chromatography were established to obtain bioactive peptides from by-products of C. cathayensis (pecan cake). As measured by DPPH/ABTS radical scavenging, the peptides with less molecular weight (MW) possess higher antioxidant capacity. PCPH-III (MW < 3 kDa) presented higher radical scavenging capacity than PCPH-II (3 kDa < MW < 10 kDa) and PCPH-I (MW > 10 kDa) measured by DPPH (IC50: 111.0 µg/ mL) and measured by ABTs (IC50: 402.9 µg/mL). The secondary structure and amino acid composition varied by their MW, in which PCPH-II contained more α-helices (26.71%) and ß-sheets (36.96%), PCPH-III contained higher ratios of ß-turns (36.87%), while the composition of different secondary of PCPH-I was even 25 ± 5.76%. The variation trend of α-helix and random experienced slightly varied from PCPH-I to PCPH-II, while significantly decreased from PCPH-II to PCPH-III. The increasing antioxidant capacity is followed by the content of proline, and PCPH-III had the highest composition (8.03%). With regard to the six peptides identified by LC-MS/MS, two of them (VYGYADK and VLFSNY) showed stronger antioxidant capacity than others. In silico molecular docking demonstrated their combining abilities with a transcription factor Kelch-like ECH-associated protein 1 (Keap1) and speculated that they inhibit oxidative stress through activating the Keap1-Nrf2-ARE pathway. Meanwhile, increased activity of SOD and CAT­antioxidant markers­were found in H2O2-induced cells. The residue of tyrosine was demonstrated to contribute the most antioxidant capacity of VYGYADK and its position affected less. This study provided a novel peptide screening and by-product utilization process that can be applied in natural product developments.

Prediction of Short-Term Breast Cancer Risk with Fusion of CC- and MLO-Based Risk Models in Four-View Mammograms.

This study performed and assessed a novel program to improve the accuracy of short-term breast cancer risk prediction by using information from craniocaudal (CC) and mediolateral-oblique (MLO) views of two breasts. An age-matched dataset of 556 patients with at least two sequential full-field digital mammography examinations was applied. In the second examination, 278 cases were diagnosed and pathologically verified as cancer, and 278 were negative, while all cases in the first examination were negative (not recalled). Two generalized linear-model-based risk prediction models were established with global- and local-based bilateral asymmetry features for CC and MLO views first. Then, a new fusion risk model was developed by fusing prediction results of the CC- and MLO-based risk models with an adaptive alpha-integration-based fusion method. The AUC of the fusion risk model was 0.72 ± 0.02, which was significantly higher than the AUC of CC- or MLO-based risk model (P < 0.05). The maximum odds ratio for CC- and MLO-based risk models were 8.09 and 5.25, respectively, and increased to 11.99 for the fusion risk model. For subgroups of patients aged 37-49 years, 50-65 years, and 66-87 years, the AUCs of 0.73, 0.71, and 0.75 for the fusion risk model were higher than AUC for CC- and MLO-based risk models. For the BIRADS 2 and 3 subgroups, the AUC values were 0.72 and 0.71 respectively for the fusion risk model which were higher than the AUC for the CC- and MLO-based risk models. This study demonstrated that the fusion risk model we established could effectively derive and integrate supplementary and useful information extracted from both CC and MLO view images and adaptively fuse them to increase the predictive power of the short-term breast cancer risk assessment model.

To Analyze the Application Value of Perioperative Nursing Care in Patients with Resected Brain Tumor Accompanied with Epileptic Symptoms under Cortical Electrocorticography Monitoring.

OBJECTIVE: To explore the application value of perioperative nursing for patients with brain tumors with epilepsy symptoms under the cortical electrocorticography (EEG) monitoring. METHODS: A total of 86 patients with brain tumor complicated with epilepsy admitted to the department of brain surgery of our hospital from January 2018 to December 2019 were selected as the research objects, and all underwent resection under cortical EEG monitoring. According to different nursing methods, they were divided into the control group and observation group, each with 43 cases. The control group was given perioperative basic nursing, and the observation group was given perioperative comprehensive nursing. The EEG image of the patient during the operation was observed by a portable EEG monitor. Anxiety and depression were assessed by self-rating anxiety scale (SAS) and self-rating depression scale (SDS) scores. The self-made satisfaction questionnaire was used to investigate the nursing satisfaction. A visual analogue (VAS) score is used to assess pain degree. A multiparameter monitor was used to detect the patient's heart rate (HR), systolic blood pressure (SBP), and diastolic blood pressure (DBP). The quality of life was assessed by the European Organization for Research and Treatment of Cancer Quality of Life Questionnaire-Core 30 (EORTC QLQ-30). The complication rate and recurrence rate were also counted. RESULTS: Eighty-six patients with epileptic brain tumor developed spikes in 35 cases, including 7 meningiomas, 22 gliomas, and 6 cholesteatomas; 27 cases of sharp waves, including 14 meningiomas, 12 gliomas, and 1 case of cholesteatomas; and 24 cases of complex wave, including 9 cases of meningioma, 13 cases of glioma, and 2 cases of cholesteatoma. There was no significant difference in the scores of SAS, SDS, VAS, HR, SBP, DBP, and quality of life between the two groups at T0. The VAS score increased at T1 and T2, and the increase in the control group was greater than that in the observation group. At T3 and T4, the SAS, SDS, and VAS scores of the two groups decreased, and the observation group decreased more than the control group. HR, SBP, and DBP of the two groups showed an upward trend at T1 and T2, and the increase in the control group was more significant than that in the observation group. At T3, the three indicators of the two groups decreased, and the observation group decreased more significantly than the control group. At T4, the scores of all indicators of the quality of life of the two groups increased, and the observation group increased more significantly than the control group. The nursing satisfaction of the observation group was higher than that of the control group. The complication rate and recurrence rate in the observation group were decreased compared with the control group. CONCLUSION: Perioperative comprehensive nursing intervention for patients with epileptic brain tumor undergoing resection under cortical EEG monitoring can reduce or even eliminate the recurrence rate of epilepsy, reduce the patient's pain and stress response, and improve the patient's quality of life. It can also reduce the occurrence of complications, improve nursing satisfaction, thereby improving patient compliance, and has a high clinical application value.

Distribution of HPV 16 E6 gene variants in screening women and its associations with cervical lesions progression.

The aim of this study is to investigate distribution of human papillomavirus (HPV) 16 variants in screening healthy women and the potential association between HPV 16 variants and progression of cervical lesions. For this study a total of 2000 healthy women in Tianjin urban area and 212 patients who were HPV 16 positive and underwent colposcopy were analyzed for HPV 16 variants by pyrosequencing. The results show that the HPV 16 was the most prevalent genotype in Tianjin healthy women and five HPV 16 variant types were detected. The HPV 16 variants were determined by sequencing parital E6 region and the detected variants were European prototype E-T350 (E-p), E-G350, E-C109 G, Asian (As) and Asian-American (AA), among which the E-p variant was the most prevalent (82.76%) followed by As variant. Interestingly, in patients with suspected cervical lesions the most prevalent variant was As variant (54.9%) by increasing significance with severity of cervical diseases (OR 4.337; 95% CI 1.248-15.067; P = 0.021), and followed by HPV 16 E-p variant while E-G350 variant only appeared in HSIL and cervical cancer. Our results show that HPV 16 E-p variant was more prevalent than As in Tianjin healthy screening women while As variant was the most frequently type in HSIL and cervical cancer. It is suggested that the mutation of HPV 16 Asian variants, comparing with HPV 16 E-p variants, might contribute to the transformation from HPV 16 persistent infection to cervical cancer.

Assessment of global and local region-based bilateral mammographic feature asymmetry to predict short-term breast cancer risk.

This study aims to develop and test a new imaging marker-based short-term breast cancer risk prediction model. An age-matched dataset of 566 screening mammography cases was used. All 'prior' images acquired in the two screening series were negative, while in the 'current' screening images, 283 cases were positive for cancer and 283 cases remained negative. For each case, two bilateral cranio-caudal view mammograms acquired from the 'prior' negative screenings were selected and processed by a computer-aided image processing scheme, which segmented the entire breast area into nine strip-based local regions, extracted the element regions using difference of Gaussian filters, and computed both global- and local-based bilateral asymmetrical image features. An initial feature pool included 190 features related to the spatial distribution and structural similarity of grayscale values, as well as of the magnitude and phase responses of multidirectional Gabor filters. Next, a short-term breast cancer risk prediction model based on a generalized linear model was built using an embedded stepwise regression analysis method to select features and a leave-one-case-out cross-validation method to predict the likelihood of each woman having image-detectable cancer in the next sequential mammography screening. The area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC) values significantly increased from 0.5863 ± 0.0237 to 0.6870 ± 0.0220 when the model trained by the image features extracted from the global regions and by the features extracted from both the global and the matched local regions (p = 0.0001). The odds ratio values monotonically increased from 1.00-8.11 with a significantly increasing trend in slope (p = 0.0028) as the model-generated risk score increased. In addition, the AUC values were 0.6555 ± 0.0437, 0.6958 ± 0.0290, and 0.7054 ± 0.0529 for the three age groups of 37-49, 50-65, and 66-87 years old, respectively. AUC values of 0.6529 ± 0.1100, 0.6820 ± 0.0353, 0.6836 ± 0.0302 and 0.8043 ± 0.1067 were yielded for the four mammography density sub-groups (BIRADS from 1-4), respectively. This study demonstrated that bilateral asymmetry features extracted from local regions combined with the global region in bilateral negative mammograms could be used as a new imaging marker to assist in the prediction of short-term breast cancer risk.