Progress of Traditional Chinese Medicine in the prevention and treatment of arterial thrombosis / 国际中医中药杂志

Atherosclerosis (AS) is a chronic and progressive arterial disease. It is an important cause of the occurrence and development of cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases. With the development of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), TCM has many advantages in the therapy of AS, with less adverse reactions. Studies have shown that TCM can resist AS, and the mechanism mainly belongs to regulating lipid metabolism, anti-lipid peroxidation, anti-inflammation, anticoagulation, and protecting the structure and function of vascular endothelial cells. The mechanism of TCM for AS is warranted to be studied systematically, and the chemical components need to be further clarified.

Efficacy of pudendal nerve block for alleviation of catheter-related bladder discomfort in male patients undergoing lower urinary tract surgeries: A randomized, controlled, double-blind trial.

BACKGROUND: Catheter-related bladder discomfort (CRBD) to an indwelling urinary catheter is defined as a painful urethral discomfort, resistant to conventional opioid therapy, decreasing the quality of postoperative recovery. According to anatomy, the branches of sacral somatic nerves form the afferent nerves of the urethra and bladder triangle, which deriving from the ventral rami of the second to fourth sacral spinal nerves, innervating the urethral muscles and sphincter of the perineum and pelvic floor; as well as providing sensation to the penis and clitoris in males and females, which including the urethra and bladder triangle. Based on this theoretical knowledge, we formed a hypothesis that CRBD could be prevented by pudendal nerve block. OBJECTIVE: To evaluate if bilateral nerve stimulator-guided pudendal nerve block could relieve CRBD through urethra discomfort alleviation. DESIGN AND SETTING: Single-center randomized parallel controlled, double blind trial conducted at West China Hospital, Sichuan University, China. PARTICIPANTS: One hundred and eighty 2 male adult patients under general anesthesia undergoing elective trans-urethral resection of prostate (TURP) or trans-urethral resection of bladder tumor (TURBT). Around 4 out of 182 were excluded, 178 patients were randomly allocated into pudendal and control groups, using computer-generated randomized numbers in a sealed envelope method. A total of 175 patients completed the study. INTERVENTION: Pudendal group received general anesthesia along with nerve-stimulator-guided bilateral pudendal nerve block and control group received general anesthesia only. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Incidence and severity of CRBD; and postoperative VAS score of pain. RESULTS: CRBD incidences were significantly lower in pudendal group at 30 minutes (63% vs 82%, P = .004), 2 hours (64% vs 90%, P < .000), 8 hours (58% vs 79%, P = .003) and 12 hours (52% vs 69%, P = .028) also significantly lower incidence of moderate to severe CRBD in pudendal group at 30 minutes (29% vs 57%, P < .001), 2 hours (22% vs 55%, P < .000), 8 hours (8% vs 27%, P = .001) and 12 hours (6% vs 16%, P = .035) postoperatively. The postoperative pain score in pudendal group was lower at 30 minutes (P = .003), 2 hours (P < .001), 8 hours (P < .001), and 12 hours (P < .001), with lower heart rate and mean blood pressure. One patient complained about weakness in levator ani muscle. CONCLUSION: General anesthesia along with bilateral pudendal nerve block decreased the incidence and severity of CRBD for the first 12 hours postoperatively.

Automatic classification of lip color based on SVM in traditional Chinese medicine inspection / 生物医学工程学杂志

The lip color of a person is closely related to his or her health in the visual diagnosis of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM). The traditional method to judge the color of lips is through observing by a TCM doctor. The diagnosis result is affected not only by the doctor's knowledge and diagnosis experience, but also by the light, temperature and other environmental impacts. For these reasons, sometimes different doctors may make different judgement for the same lips. So it is urgently needed that an objective evaluation as reference for doctors can be obtained. A method based on support vector machine (SVM) that classifies lip color by computer automatically is presented in the present paper. Firstly, nine features of lip color in Hue, Saturation and Intensity (HSI) color space were extracted. Then, according to different combinations of these features five different experiments were conducted. By comparing the results of these experiments, it was discovered that the mean value is one of the most important features for the lip color. The overall effect of classification is better when the mean value and variance of HSI were chosen than other characteristics. In addition, experiments results demonstrated that the accuracy rate of classification is not improved when more features were adopted. The objective of the present paper is to select the appropriate characteristics and to combine them effectively to classify lip colors.

An inveatigation on adsorptive effect of attapulgite with Tanshinone Ⅰand Tanshinone Ⅱ_A in traditional Chinese medicine decoction / 中国生化药物杂志

Purpose To investigate the adsorptive effect of attapulgite on Tanshinone Ⅰ and TanshinoneⅡ_A in decoction of Radix et Rhizoma Salviae Mihiorrhizae and Composite Dansen Pill.Methods Using the amount of solid component and the content of Tanshinone Ⅰ and Tanshinone Ⅱ_A as index,the adsorptive effect of common attapulgite and acidified attapulgite on decoction of Radix et Rhizoma Salviae Miltiorrhizae and Composite Dansen Pill was investigated respectively and the content of Tanshinone Ⅰ and Tanshinone Ⅱ_A was determined by HPLC.Results Common attapulgite could not markedly decreased the amount of solid component and had a litfle effect on the content of Tanshinone Ⅰ and TanshinoneⅡ_A in decoction of Radix et Rhizoma Salviae Miltiorrhizae and Composite Dansen Pill.The acidified attapulgite could obviously decrease the amount of solid component and had a little effect on the content of Tanshinone Ⅰ and TanshinoneⅡ_A in decoction of Radix et Rhizoma Salviae Miltiorrhizae and Composite Dansen Pill.Conclusion Acidified attapulgite could be used as adsorptive clarifier in decoction of Radix et Rhizoma Salviae Miltiorrhizae and Composite Dansen Pill.