A couple-based unmet supportive care needs intervention for colorectal cancer couples: A preliminary feasibility study.

PURPOSE: To support colorectal cancer couples cope with cancer, we developed a couple-based unmet supportive care needs intervention program guided by the Supportive Care Needs Framework and examined the feasibility, acceptability, and initial effects of the unmet supportive care needs program. METHODS: The design of a pre-and post-intervention study was conducted among Chinese colorectal cancer couples. The intervention was delivered in five sessions through in-person and telephone interventions combined. To measure program feasibility through recruitment and retention rates, and to test program acceptability through quantitative and qualitative post-intervention program assessments. The complete data (N = 20 pairs) were used to calculate effect sizes to assess the initial intervention effect. RESULTS: There was evidence of the feasibility of the intervention program in terms of recruitment (66.7%) and retention (83.3%) rates. Participants' satisfaction with the program also attested to its acceptability. The intervention (Cohen's = 0.15-0.56) had a small-moderate effect size in improving unmet supportive care needs and most cancer-adapted outcomes for colorectal cancer couples, validating the initial effect of the program. CONCLUSIONS: The unmet supportive care needs program is feasible, acceptable, and preliminarily effective in supporting Chinese colorectal cancer couples to improve unmet supportive care needs and cancer adaptability, as provided by this study.

Continuous Room-Temperature Spin-Injection Modulation Achieved by Spin-Filtering Competition in Molecular Spin Valves.

Abundant spin-related phenomena that originate from interfaces between ferromagnetic electrodes and molecular semiconductors have greatly enriched research in spintronics, and they are considered promising for realizing novel spintronic functionalities in the future. However, despite great effort, the interfacial effect cannot be precisely controlled to achieve steady and predictable functions, especially at room temperature, and this has gradually become a significant bottleneck in the development of molecular spintronics. In this study, an innovative spin-filtering-competition mechanism is proposed to continuously modulate the interfacial effect in molecular spin valves at room temperature. To form this novel mechanism, the original spin-filtering effect from pure cobalt competes with the newly generated one, which is induced by the bonding effect between cobalt and lithium fluoride. Subsequently, by precisely controlling competition through lithium fluoride coverage on the cobalt surface, continuous modulation of the spin-injection process can be successfully achieved at room temperature. Spin polarization of the injected current and magnetoresistance effect can be actively controlled or their sign can be completely reversed through this novel mechanism. This study provides an innovative approach and theory for precisely controlling spin-related interfacial effects, which may further promote the scientific and technological development of spintronics.

Validating World Health Organization cardiovascular disease risk charts and optimizing risk assessment in China.

BACKGROUND: World Health Organization (WHO) released region-specific cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk prediction charts recently, but the extent to which the charts can apply to Chinese population is unknown. We aimed to validate the WHO CVD risk charts for East Asia, and evaluate their practicability combining with China-PAR (Prediction for Atherosclerotic Cardiovascular Disease Risk in China) equations among Chinese adults. METHODS: The China-PAR cohort with 93,234 participants aged 40-80 years was followed up during 1992-2015, including 29,337 participants from three sub-cohorts with follow-up period of over 10 years. We validated the WHO CVD risk charts using the China-PAR cohort by assessment of the predicted number of events, C index, calibration χ², and calibration plots, further elaborated the concordance between the China-PAR equations and the WHO risk charts. FINDINGS: During an average follow-up of 13•64 years, 1849 incident CVD cases were identified from 29,337 participants. Both the laboratory-based and non-laboratory-based charts overestimated CVD events by 59% and 58% in men, and by 72% and 85% in women, respectively. However, 92% of participants identified as high risk by the China-PAR equations could be successfully detected by the laboratory-based charts at the cut-off point of 10%. We also observed that the non-laboratory-based charts demonstrated the poor performance for diabetic population, with high proportion of high-risk individuals (17% for men, 31% for women) would be missed. INTERPRETATION: Although the WHO CVD risk charts for East Asia apparently overestimated CVD risk among Chinese population, they could be pragmatic pre-selection tools, as potential supplement to the China-PAR equations. The widespread use of the WHO risk charts along with the China-PAR equations might facilitate the implementation of the risk-based CVD prevention in China. FUNDING: Full funding sources are listed at the end of the paper (see Acknowledgments).

Hypertension burden and control in mainland China: Analysis of nationwide data 2003-2012.

BACKGROUND: No nationwide survey on hypertension was conducted in China since 2002. We assessed the prevalence, awareness, treatment, and control of hypertension in mainland China and in various regions using nationwide data from 2003 to 2012. METHODS AND RESULTS: We identified studies that reported age- and gender-specific prevalence and/or age-specific awareness, treatment and control of hypertension in representative population samples from 31 provinces, using China National Knowledge Infrastructure, Wanfang and PubMed, supplemented by a manual search of references of retrieved articles. All data were extracted independently by two investigators using a standardized data-collection form. Overall, 265 million adults (145 million men and 120 million women) had hypertension for a prevalence of 26.7% (28.9% among men and 24.5% among women) in 2010. Among hypertensive patients, only 44.6% were aware of their condition, 35.2% were taking antihypertensive medication, and 11.2% achieved adequate blood pressure control. There were substantial geographic variations in the prevalence and control of hypertension. Hypertension prevalence was the highest in east region (32.6%) followed by northeast region (31.8%). Worse still, the control rate among hypertensive people was very poor in southwest (4.8%) and northeast (5.9%) regions. CONCLUSIONS: Hypertension is highly prevalent in mainland China, with inadequate awareness, treatment, and control of hypertension. Effective strategies are urgently needed in China, especially in the regions with high prevalence and low control.