Bronchial Cryo-Denervation for Severe Asthma: A Pilot Study.

INTRODUCTION: Targeting the parasympathetic nervous system innervating the airway with pharmacologic products has been proved to improve the clinical outcomes of severe asthma. Bronchial cryo-denervation (BCD) is a novel non-pharmacologic treatment for severe asthma using an endobronchial cryo-balloon administered via bronchoscopy to denervate parasympathetic pulmonary nerves. Preclinical studies have demonstrated that BCD significantly disrupted vagal innervation in the lung. METHODS: A total of 15 patients with severe asthma were enrolled in this prospective, single-center pilot study. Patients underwent bifurcated BCD treatment at a 30-day interval after baseline assessment. Follow-up through 12 months included assessment of adverse events, technical feasibility, and changes in pulmonary function; asthma control questionnaire-7 (ACQ-7); and asthma control test (ACT). RESULTS: BCD was performed on all 15 severe asthma patients, with technical feasibility of 96.7%. There were no device-related and 2 procedure-related serious adverse events through 12 months, which resolved without sequelae. The most frequent nonserious procedure-related adverse event was increased cough in 60% (9 of 15) patients. Pulmonary function remained unchanged, and significant improvements from baseline ACQ-7 (mean, -1.19, p = 0.0032) and ACT (mean, 3.18, p = 0.0011) scores were observed since the first month's follow-up after a single lung airway treatment, with similar trends till the end of the 12-month follow-up. CONCLUSION: This study provides the first clinical evidence of the safety, feasibility, and initial efficacy of BCD in patients with severe asthma.

[Epidemiological data and medical care situation of patients with chronic inflammatory diseases in Germany : Real-world evidence on prevalence, disease combinations, care]. / Epidemiologische Daten und medizinische Versorgungssituation von Patienten mit chronischen Entzündungserkrankungen in Deutschland : Real-World-Evidenz zu Prävalenz, Erkrankungskombinationen, Versorgung.

BACKGROUND: Chronic inflammatory diseases (immune-mediated inflammatory diseases, IMID) can overlap or occur simultaneously due to clinical similarities. The resulting utilization of heathcare structures has not yet been investigated across disciplines but is of potential importance for optimizing the treatment of patients with IMID. AIM OF THE WORK: Analysis of epidemiological data including utilization of care services in patients with selected IMIDs: psoriasis, psoriatic arthritis (PsA), rheumatoid arthritis (RA), ankylosing spondylitis, ulcerative colitis, Crohn's disease and connective tissue disease. MATERIAL AND METHODS: In a retrospective cross-sectional analysis based on health insurances accounting data with a sample of approximately 4 million insured persons, the prevalence of the abovementioned IMID and the frequency of IMID combinations were analyzed based on documented diagnoses (ICD-10 GM). The frequency of hospitalizations and utilization of outpatient physician contacts was recorded in predefined specialist disciplines (general medicine, dermatology, gastroenterology, rheumatology) and compared with an age-adjusted and gender-adjusted reference population. RESULTS: A total of 188,440 patients had at least 1 of the IMID diagnoses analyzed (4.7%), with an age peak of 61-70 years. The highest prevalence was observed for psoriasis (1.85%), followed by rheumatoid arthritis (1.38%). Combinations with at least one other IMID were relatively common (29%), with this being most common in patients with psoriatic arthritis (82.9%, of which 68.2% had psoriasis), followed by ankylosing spondylitis (27.5%) and Crohn's disease (21.6%). Compared to the reference population, patients with IMID were hospitalized more often and more frequently utilized the outpatient disciplines. DISCUSSION: The study results describe that IMIDs occur in combination and that the patients make comparatively more use of care structures of different disciplines. A multidisciplinary approach could increase the efficiency of care; an evaluation is still pending.

Fluorous-Tagged Peptide Nanoparticles Ameliorate Acute Lung Injury via Lysosomal Stabilization and Inflammation Inhibition in Pulmonary Macrophages.

Acute lung injury (ALI)/acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) is a common respiratory critical syndrome that currently has no effective therapeutic interventions. Pulmonary macrophages play a principal role in the initiation and progression of the overwhelming inflammation in ALI/ARDS. Here, a type of fluorous-tagged bioactive peptide nanoparticle termed CFF13F is developed, which can be efficiently internalized by macrophages and suppress the excessive expression of cytokines and the overproduction of reactive oxygen species (ROS) triggered by lipopolysaccharide (LPS). The cytoprotective effect of CFF13F may be attributed to the lysosomal-stabilization property and regulation of the antioxidative system. Moreover, intratracheal pretreatment with CFF13F can effectively reduce local and systematic inflammation, and ameliorate pulmonary damage in an LPS-induced ALI murine model. The therapeutic efficacy of CFF13F is affected by the administration routes, and the local intratracheal injection is found to be the optimal choice for ALI treatment, with preferred biodistribution profiles. The present study provides solid evidence of the potent immunomodulatory bioactivity of the fluorous-tagged peptide nanoparticles CFF13F in vitro and in vivo, and sheds light on the development of novel efficient nanodrugs for ALI/ARDS.

Detection and staging of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease using a computed tomography-based weakly supervised deep learning approach.

OBJECTIVES: Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is underdiagnosed globally. The present study aimed to develop weakly supervised deep learning (DL) models that utilize computed tomography (CT) image data for the automated detection and staging of spirometry-defined COPD. METHODS: A large, highly heterogeneous dataset was established, consisting of 1393 participants retrospectively recruited from outpatient, inpatient, and physical examination center settings of four large public hospitals in China. All participants underwent both inspiratory chest CT scans and pulmonary function tests. CT images, spirometry data, demographic information, and clinical information of each participant were collected. An attention-based multi-instance learning (MIL) model for COPD detection was trained using CT scans from 837 participants. External validation of the COPD detection was performed with 620 low-dose CT (LDCT) scans acquired from the National Lung Screening Trial (NLST) cohort. A multi-channel 3D residual network was further developed to categorize GOLD stages among confirmed COPD patients. RESULTS: The attention-based MIL model used for COPD detection achieved an area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC) of 0.934 (95% CI: 0.903, 0.961) on the internal test set and 0.866 (95% CI: 0.805, 0.928) on the LDCT subset acquired from the NLST. The multi-channel 3D residual network was able to correctly grade 76.4% of COPD patients in the test set (423/553) using the GOLD scale. CONCLUSIONS: The proposed chest CT-DL approach can automatically identify spirometry-defined COPD and categorize patients according to the GOLD scale. As such, this approach may be an effective case-finding tool for COPD diagnosis and staging. KEY POINTS: • Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease is underdiagnosed globally, particularly in developing countries. • The proposed chest computed tomography (CT)-based deep learning (DL) approaches could accurately identify spirometry-defined COPD and categorize patients according to the GOLD scale. • The chest CT-DL approach may be an alternative case-finding tool for COPD identification and evaluation.

Carotid Intima-Media Thickness Progression as Surrogate Marker for Cardiovascular Risk: Meta-Analysis of 119 Clinical Trials Involving 100 667 Patients.

BACKGROUND: To quantify the association between effects of interventions on carotid intima-media thickness (cIMT) progression and their effects on cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk. METHODS: We systematically collated data from randomized, controlled trials. cIMT was assessed as the mean value at the common-carotid-artery; if unavailable, the maximum value at the common-carotid-artery or other cIMT measures were used. The primary outcome was a combined CVD end point defined as myocardial infarction, stroke, revascularization procedures, or fatal CVD. We estimated intervention effects on cIMT progression and incident CVD for each trial, before relating the 2 using a Bayesian meta-regression approach. RESULTS: We analyzed data of 119 randomized, controlled trials involving 100 667 patients (mean age 62 years, 42% female). Over an average follow-up of 3.7 years, 12 038 patients developed the combined CVD end point. Across all interventions, each 10 µm/y reduction of cIMT progression resulted in a relative risk for CVD of 0.91 (95% Credible Interval, 0.87-0.94), with an additional relative risk for CVD of 0.92 (0.87-0.97) being achieved independent of cIMT progression. Taken together, we estimated that interventions reducing cIMT progression by 10, 20, 30, or 40 µm/y would yield relative risks of 0.84 (0.75-0.93), 0.76 (0.67-0.85), 0.69 (0.59-0.79), or 0.63 (0.52-0.74), respectively. Results were similar when grouping trials by type of intervention, time of conduct, time to ultrasound follow-up, availability of individual-participant data, primary versus secondary prevention trials, type of cIMT measurement, and proportion of female patients. CONCLUSIONS: The extent of intervention effects on cIMT progression predicted the degree of CVD risk reduction. This provides a missing link supporting the usefulness of cIMT progression as a surrogate marker for CVD risk in clinical trials.

Antitumor effect of neoantigen-reactive T cells combined with PD1 inhibitor therapy in mouse lung cancer.

PURPOSE: Neoantigens produced from mutations in tumors are important targets of T-cell-based immunotherapy and immune checkpoint blockade has been approved for treating multiple solid tumors. We investigated the potential benefit of adoptive neoantigen-reactive T (NRT) cells in combination with programmed cell death protein 1 inhibitor (anti-PD1) for treating lung cancer in a mouse model. METHODS: NRT cells were prepared by co-culturing T cells and neoantigen-RNA vaccine-induced dendritic cells. Then, adoptive NRT cells in combination with anti-PD1 were administered to tumor-bearing mice. Pre- and post-therapy cytokine secretion, antitumor efficacy, and tumor microenvironment (TME) changes were determined both in vitro and in vivo. RESULTS: We successfully generated NRT cells based on the 5 neoantigen epitopes identified in this study. NRT cells exhibited an enhanced cytotoxic phenotype in vitro and the combination therapy led to attenuated tumor growth. In addition, this combination strategy downregulated the expression of the inhibitory marker PD-1 on tumor-infiltrating T cells and promoted the trafficking of tumor-specific T cells to the tumor sites. CONCLUSION: The adoptive transfer of NRT cells in association with anti-PD1 therapy can exert an antitumor effect on lung cancer, and is a feasible, effective, and novel immunotherapy regimen for treating solid tumors.

An underlying mechanism behind interventional pulmonology techniques for refractory asthma treatment: Neuro-immunity crosstalk.

Asthma is a common disease that seriously threatens public health. With significant developments in bronchoscopy, different interventional pulmonology techniques for refractory asthma treatment have been developed. These technologies achieve therapeutic purposes by targeting diverse aspects of asthma pathophysiology. However, even though these newer techniques have shown appreciable clinical effects, their differences in mechanisms and mutual commonalities still deserve to be carefully explored. Therefore, in this review, we summarized the potential mechanisms of bronchial thermoplasty, targeted lung denervation, and cryoablation, and analyzed the relationship between these different methods. Based on available evidence, we speculated that the main pathway of chronic airway inflammation and other pathophysiologic processes in asthma is sensory nerve-related neurotransmitter release that forms a "neuro-immunity crosstalk" and amplifies airway neurogenic inflammation. The mechanism of completely blocking neuro-immunity crosstalk through dual-ablation of both efferent and afferent fibers may have a leading role in the clinical efficacy of interventional pulmonology in the treatment of asthma and deserves further investigation.

Biguanide MC001, a Dual Inhibitor of OXPHOS and Glycolysis, Shows Enhanced Antitumor Activity Without Increasing Lactate Production.

Metformin and other biguanides represent a new class of inhibitors of mitochondrial complex I that show promising antitumor effects. However, stronger inhibition of mitochondrial complex I is generally associated with upregulation of glycolysis and higher risk of lactic acidosis. Herein we report a novel biguanide derivative, N-cystaminylbiguanide (MC001), which was found to inhibit mitochondrial complex I with higher potency while inducing lactate production to a similar degree as metformin.Furthermore, MC001 was found to efficiently inhibit a panel of colorectal cancer (CRC) cells in vitro and to suppress tumor growth in a HCT116 xenograft nude mouse model, while not enhancing lactate production relative to metformin, exhibiting a superior safety profile to other potent biguanides such as phenformin. Mechanistically, MC001 efficiently inhibits mitochondrial complex I, activates AMPK, and represses mTOR, leading to cell-cycle arrest and apoptosis. Notably, MC001 inhibits both oxidative phosphorylation (OXPHOS) and glycolysis. We therefore propose that MC001 warrants further investigation in cancer treatment.

Locally organised and activated Fth1hi neutrophils aggravate inflammation of acute lung injury in an IL-10-dependent manner.

Acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) is a common respiratory critical syndrome with no effective therapeutic intervention. Neutrophils function in the overwhelming inflammatory process of acute lung injury (ALI) caused by ARDS; however, the phenotypic heterogeneity of pulmonary neutrophils in ALI/ARDS remains largely unknown. Here, using single-cell RNA sequencing, we identify two transcriptionally and functionally heterogeneous neutrophil populations (Fth1hi Neu and Prok2hi Neu) with distinct locations in LPS-induced ALI mouse lungs. Exposure to LPS promotes the Fth1hi Neu subtype, with more inflammatory factors, stronger antioxidant, and decreased apoptosis under the regulation of interleukin-10. Furthermore, prolonged retention of Fth1hi Neu within lung tissue aggravates inflammatory injury throughout the development of ALI/ARDS. Notably, ARDS patients have high ratios of Fth1 to Prok2 expression in pulmonary neutrophils, suggesting that the Fth1hi Neu population may promote the pathological development and provide a marker of poor outcome.

Pharmacologic therapies of ARDS: From natural herb to nanomedicine.

Acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) is a common critical illness in respiratory care units with a huge public health burden. Despite tremendous advances in the prevention and treatment of ARDS, it remains the main cause of intensive care unit (ICU) management, and the mortality rate of ARDS remains unacceptably high. The poor performance of ARDS is closely related to its heterogeneous clinical syndrome caused by complicated pathophysiology. Based on the different pathophysiology phases, drugs, protective mechanical ventilation, conservative fluid therapy, and other treatment have been developed to serve as the ARDS therapeutic methods. In recent years, there has been a rapid development in nanomedicine, in which nanoparticles as drug delivery vehicles have been extensively studied in the treatment of ARDS. This study provides an overview of pharmacologic therapies for ARDS, including conventional drugs, natural medicine therapy, and nanomedicine. Particularly, we discuss the unique mechanism and strength of nanomedicine which may provide great promises in treating ARDS in the future.

Carnitine Palmitoyltransferase System: A New Target for Anti-Inflammatory and Anticancer Therapy?

Lipid metabolism involves multiple biological processes. As one of the most important lipid metabolic pathways, fatty acid oxidation (FAO) and its key rate-limiting enzyme, the carnitine palmitoyltransferase (CPT) system, regulate host immune responses and thus are of great clinical significance. The effect of the CPT system on different tissues or organs is complex: the deficiency or over-activation of CPT disrupts the immune homeostasis by causing energy metabolism disorder and inflammatory oxidative damage and therefore contributes to the development of various acute and chronic inflammatory disorders and cancer. Accordingly, agonists or antagonists targeting the CPT system may become novel approaches for the treatment of diseases. In this review, we first briefly describe the structure, distribution, and physiological action of the CPT system. We then summarize the pathophysiological role of the CPT system in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, bronchial asthma, acute lung injury, chronic granulomatous disease, nonalcoholic fatty liver disease, hepatic ischemia-reperfusion injury, kidney fibrosis, acute kidney injury, cardiovascular disorders, and cancer. We are also concerned with the current knowledge in either preclinical or clinical studies of various CPT activators/inhibitors for the management of diseases. These compounds range from traditional Chinese medicines to novel nanodevices. Although great efforts have been made in studying the different kinds of CPT agonists/antagonists, only a few pharmaceuticals have been applied for clinical uses. Nevertheless, research on CPT activation or inhibition highlights the pharmacological modulation of CPT-dependent FAO, especially on different CPT isoforms, as a promising anti-inflammatory/antitumor therapeutic strategy for numerous disorders.

Anti-tumour effect of neo-antigen-reactive T cells induced by RNA mutanome vaccine in mouse lung cancer.

PURPOSE: Mutation-specific T-cell response to epithelial cancers and T-cell-based immunotherapy has been successfully used to treat several human solid cancers. We aimed to investigate the anti-tumour effect of neo-antigen-reactive T(NRT) cells induced by RNA mutanome vaccine, which may serve as a feasible and effective therapeutic approach for lung cancer. METHODS: We predicted candidate neo-antigens according to the mutant gene analysis by sequencing the mouse Lewis cells and C57BL/6 mouse tail tissue. RNA vaccine was prepared with the neo-antigens as the template. We assessed antitumor efficacy, cytokine secretion and pathological changes after adoptive transfer of NRT cells in vitro and vivo experiments. RESULTS: We identified 10 non-synonymous somatic mutations and successfully generated NRT cells. The percentage of T-cell activation proportion was increased from 0.072% in conventional T cells to 9.96% in NRT cells. Interferon-γ secretion augmented from 17.8 to 24.2% as well. As an in vivo model, adoptive NRT cell infusion could promote active T-cell infiltration into the tumour tissue and could delay tumour progression. CONCLUSION: NRT cells induced by RNA mutanome vaccine exert a significant anti-tumour effect in mouse lung cancer, and adoptive NRT cell therapy might be considered a feasible, effective therapeutic approach for lung cancer.

Normative values for carotid intima media thickness and its progression: Are they transferrable outside of their cohort of origin?

BACKGROUND: The clinical use of carotid intima media thickness (cIMT) requires normal values, which may be subject to variation of geographical factors, ethnicity or measurement details. The influence of these factors has rarely been studied. The aim of this study was to determine whether normative cIMT values and their association with event risk are generalizable across populations. DESIGN: Meta-analysis of individual participant data. METHOD: From 22 general population cohorts from Europe, North America and Asia we selected subjects free of cardiovascular disease. Percentiles of cIMT and cIMT progression were assessed separately for every cohort. Cox proportional hazards models for vascular events were used to estimate hazard ratios for cIMT in each cohort. The estimates were pooled across Europe, North America and Asia, with random effects meta-analysis. The influence of geography, ethnicity and ultrasound protocols on cIMT values and on the hazard ratios was examined by meta-regression. RESULTS: Geographical factors, ethnicity and the ultrasound protocol had influence neither on the percentiles of cIMT and its progression, nor on the hazard ratios of cIMT for vascular events. Heterogeneity for percentiles of cIMT and cIMT progression was too large to create meaningful normative values. CONCLUSIONS: The distribution of cIMT values is too heterogeneous to define universal or regional population reference values. CIMT values vary widely between different studies regardless of ethnicity, geographic location and ultrasound protocol. Prediction of vascular events with cIMT values was more consistent across all cohorts, ethnicities and regions.

Citation analysis of meta-analysis articles on posttraumatic stress disorder.

BACKGROUND: In the past two decades enormously scientific researches on posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) have been undertaken and many related meta-analyses have been published. Citation analysis was used to get comprehensive perspectives of meta-analysis articles (MA articles) on PTSD for the purpose of facilitating the researchers, physicians and policy-makers to understand the PTSD. METHODS: MA articles on PTSD in any languages from January 1980 to March 2009 were included if they presented meta-analytical methods and received at least one citation recorded in the Web of Science (WoS). Whereas studies, in which any effect sizes of PTSD were not distinguished from other psychological disorders, were excluded. Citations to and by identified MA articles were documented basing on records in WoS. Citation analysis was used to examine distribution patterns of characteristics and citation impact of MA articles on PTSD. Canonical analysis was used to explore the relationship between the characteristics of MA articles and citation impact. RESULTS: Thirty-four MA articles published during 1998 and 2008 were identified and revealed multiple study topics on PTSD: 10 (29.4%) were about epidemiology, 13 (38.2%) about treatment or intervention, 6 (17.6%) about pathophysiology or neurophysiology or neuroendocrine, 3 (8.8%) about childhood and 2 (5.9%) about psychosocial adversity. Two articles cited most frequently with 456 and 145 counts were published in Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology by Brewin (2000) and Psychological Bulletin by Ozer (2003), respectively. Mean cited count was 7.48 ± 10.56 and mean age (year 2009 minus article publication year) was (4.24 ± 2.91) years. They had been cited approximately by 67 disciplines and by authors from 42 countries or territories. Characteristics of meta-analysis highly correlated with citation impact and reflected by canonical correlation of 0.899 (P < 0.000 01). CONCLUSIONS: The age of MA articles predicted their citation impact. Citation analysis would serve to capture the global perspectives and topics of MA articles on PTSD.