Risk assessment and analysis of Traditional Chinese Medicine intervention in coronavirus disease.

OBJECTIVE: To explore the advantages of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) in "prevention" and "control" of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. METHODS: In this paper, we wish to estimate the effect on the virus transmission of scenarios assuming TCM were used to build the first defense line at the very early stage of the spread in Wuhan. We therefore first developed a classic susceptible infected removed (susceptible infected removed, SIR) transmission model based on the national data in China and then updated it to a TCM-SIR model to assess the potential impact of such assumptions, i.e. the underlying risk of lives lost and social economy loss. RESULTS: (a) With the nationwide community lockdown, the risk value was from 90 000 to 250 000 without TCM intervention and the risk value was from 70 000 to 220 000 with TCM intervention; (b) Based the risk assessment method, we forecasted that the infections peak would be 58016 without TCM intervention, which happened on February 17 2020. However, the infections peak would be 45713 with TCM intervention, which happened on 16 February 2020. CONCLUSIONS: The adoption of nationwide community lockdown is conducive to timely control the epidemic and protect people's lives and safety. At the same time, we can get lower infections if TCM intervention can be considered. We can also get the benefits from TCM prevention of COVID-19 pandemic by the basic number of infections.

Cluster analysis for syndromes of real-world coronary heart disease with angina pectoris / 医学前沿

Syndromes of coronary heart disease with angina pectoris were analyzed to provide guidance for clinical practice and to improve accuracy of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) diagnoses and efficacy of TCM treatment. A total of 860 cases with coronary heart disease with angina pectoris were selected from TCM Clinical Research Information Sharing System for TCM clinics and research. Syndromes were automatically extracted with the cluster method and were analyzed to provide objective evidence for clinical studies. Final syndrome classifications were recognized and confirmed by clinical experts. Popular syndromes included Qi and blood deficiency, blood stasis and obstruction collaterals, liver depression and spleen deficiency, and Qi stagnation and blood stasis. Syndromes Qi and blood deficiency and blood stasis and obstruction collaterals accounted for 28.61% of total syndromes, whereas liver depression and spleen deficiency and Qi stagnation and blood stasis accounted for 26.44%. The main syndrome elements comprised Qi deficiency, blood deficiency, blood stasis, and Qi stagnation.

Effects of iron and calcium carbonate on the variation and cycling of carbon source in integrated wastewater treatments.

Iron and calcium carbonate were added in wastewater treatments as the adjusting agents to improve the contaminant removal performance and regulate the variation of carbon source in integrated treatments. At different temperatures, the addition of the adjusting agents obviously improved the nitrogen and phosphorous removals. TN and TP removals were respectively increased by 29.41% and 23.83% in AC-100 treatment under 1-day HRT. Carbon source from dead algae was supplied as green microbial carbon source and Fe2+ was supplied as carbon source surrogate. COD concentration was increased to 30mg/L and above, so the problem of the shortage of carbon source was solved. Dead algae and Fe2+ as carbon source supplement or surrogate played significant role, which was proved by microbial community analysis. According to the denitrification performance in the treatments, dead algae as green microbial carbon source combined with iron and calcium carbonate was the optimal supplement carbon source in wastewater treatment.

Key Technologies of International Patient Registry Study for Acupuncture-moxibustion Based on Real World / 世界科学技术-中医药现代化

Acupuncture-moxibustion has been used in more than 180 countries,but high quality evidences for its efficacy and safety are still insufficient,which is a key issue limiting the development of acupuncture-moxibustion.Combined with characteristics of acupuncture-moxibustion discipline,this study was aimed to use international patient registry to collect real world clinical data and design meaningful clinical outcome in order to exploit the efficacy and safety of acupuncture-moxibustion and to provide important basis and supplement for confirmatory research.This paper summarized key technologies of international patient registry study for acupuncture-moxibustion based on real world to guide the design,implementation and evaluation.

Influences of seasons, N/P ratios and chemical compounds on phosphorus removal performance in algal pond combined with constructed wetlands.

Nitrogen (N) and phosphorous (P) are main contaminants and P removal was restrained by several factors: season, N/P, and chemical compounds (CCs) in water ecosystems. In this paper, two algal ponds combined with constructed wetlands were built to increase the removal performance. Different hydraulic retention time (HRT), different N/P and chemical compounds were chosen to investigate the influences of the above factors on the contaminant removal performance. The optimum phosphorus removal rate was 69.74% under the nitrogen removal of 92.85% in influent containing PO43- after 3-day HRT in algal pond combined with constructed wetlands. The investigation results indicated that these factors improved the nutrient removal efficiencies. Seasonal influence on the removal performance can be avoided by choosing the optimal HRT length of 3days. The higher N/P at 60 can improve the phosphorus removal and the lower N/P at 15 showed the stronger synergistic effect between phosphorus and nitrogen removals. Compared with PO3- and P2O74- in influent, PO43- affected phosphorus removal more significantly. The better linear fitting between organic phosphorus removal and nitrogen removal in influent contained P2O74- was found. Algae can absorb nutrients for growth, and oxygen release, microbial activity intensification and microbial carbon replenishment induced by algae will improve the performance. The study suggested that the control of HRTs, N/Ps, CCs, and algae might be an effective way to improve wastewater treatment performance.

Effects of Acupuncture Combination with Medicated Thread Moxibustion ofZhuangNationality Medicine on Neurotransmitters in Rats with Sleep Deprivation / 世界科学技术-中医药现代化

This study was aimed to observe the effects of acupuncture combination with medicated thread moxibustion ofZhuang nationality medicine on neurotransmitters in rats with sleep deprivation. A total of 80 SPF grade healthy Wistar rats were randomly divided into the control group, model group, treatment group and diazepam group with 20 rats in each group. The establishment of insomnia model was through sleep deprivation in the model group, treatment group and diazepam group. Based on the treatment of the model group, the treatment group was treated by acupuncture combination with medicated thread moxibustion ofZhuang nationality medicine, once a day for continuous 14 days. Intragastric administration of diazepam according to 3 mg·kg-1 body weight was given in the diazepam group. While intragastric administration of the same volume normal saline was given to the control group once a day for continuous 14 days. And then, the levels of orexin, NE, 5-HT, CRH and ACTH were detected. The expressions of orexin mRNA and c-Fos were observed. The results showed that compared with the control group, the levels of orexin, ACTH, 5-HT, NE and CRH increased or obviously increased in the model group with significant difference (P < 0.05, orP< 0.01). The expressions of orexin mRNA and c-Fos in the model group were increased or obviously increased with significant difference (P < 0.05, orP< 0.01). Compared with the model group, the levels of orexin, ACTH, 5-HT, NE and CRH reduced or obviously reduced with significant difference in the treatment group (P < 0.05, orP < 0.01). The expressions of orexin mRNA and c-Fos were reduced or obviously reduced with significant difference in the treatment group (P <0.05, orP < 0.01). It was concluded that acupuncture combination with medicated thread moxibustion ofZhuang nationality medicine took an effect on the treatment of insomnia by mediating neurotransmitters associated with hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis (HPA axis) through orexin, which was probably related with its therapeutic mechanism.