[Efficacy of leech powder on hyperlipidaemia-associated erectile dysfunction in male rats].

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the therapeutic effect of the Chinese medicine leech powder (LP) on hyperlipidaemia-associated ED (HLED) in male rats. METHODS: We randomly divided 50 eight-week-old male SD rats into five groups, blank control, HLED model control, tadalafil and low- and high-dose leech powder. After establishment of the HLED model by high-fat diet, we treated the rats in the latter three groups by intragastric administration of tadalafil at 5 mg/kg/d, LP at 0.3 g/kg/d and LP at 1.8 g/kg/d, respectively, all for 4 weeks. We examined the erectile function of the rats by mating experiment, apomorphine assay, and measurement of intracavernosal pressure (ICP) and mean arterial pressure (MAP), obtained the levels of blood glucose, lipid, serum total superoxide dismutase (SOD), malondialdehyde (MDA) and oxidized low-density lipoprotein (ox-LDL), observed the pathological changes in the rat liver and penile tissue by HE staining, and determined the expressions of NF-κB, MCP-1 and PDE5A in penile tissue by Western blot. RESULTS: Compared with the HLED model controls, all the rats in the tadalafil and LP intervention groups showed significantly improved erectile function (P < 0.05), increased erection frequency, ICPmax and ICPmax/MAP ratio, even more significantly in the LP groups; the levels of LDL, TC and TG were remarkably decreased in the three treatment groups (P < 0.05), most significantly in the low-dose LP group; the content of SOD was markedly increased while those of MDA and ox-LDL decreased after intervention (P < 0.05). The results of Western blot revealed that the expressions of NF-κB and MCP-1 in the testis tissue was down-regulated in the tadalafil and high-dose LP groups while that of PDE5A up-regulated in the tadalafil and low-dose LP groups. CONCLUSION: Leech powder can improve erectile function in male rats with hyperlipidaemia-associated ED by reducing blood lipid levels and oxidative stress, which may related to the NF-κB signaling pathway.

[Efficacy of Jujing Decoction combined with lipoic acid in the treatment of asthenospermia and teratospermia].

OBJECTIVE: To observe the clinical efficacy of Jujing Decoction combined with lipoic acid in the treatment of asthenospermia and teratospermia. METHODS: Fifty patients with asthenospermia and teratospermia meeting the inclusion criteria were randomly divided into a blank control (n = 10) and a medication group (n = 40), the former provided with fertility guidance and the latter treated with Jujing Decoction combined with lipoic acid. After 12 weeks of treatment, the clinical therapeutic effects were evaluated by comparing the semen volume, sperm concentration, percentages of progressively motile sperm (PMS) and morphologically abnormal sperm (MAS), rate of acrosome integrity, sperm DNA fragment index (DFI) and pregnancy rate between the two groups. RESULTS: Compared with the control group, the medication group achieved a significantly higher overall effectiveness rate (10% ï¼»1/10ï¼½ vs 88.89% ï¼»32/36ï¼½, P < 0.05) and pregnancy rate (0% ï¼»0/10ï¼½ vs 8.33% ï¼»3/36ï¼½, P < 0.05) after treatment. The medication group also showed remarkably increased PMS from (21.04 ± 6.49)% to (32.66 ± 7.05)%, decreased MAS from (98.31 ± 1.28)% to (96.52 ± 1.11)%, elevated acrosome integrity from (42.18 ± 16.67)% to (60.42 ± 11.61)%, and reduced sperm DFI from (21.92 ± 6.96)% to (12.37 ± 3.79)%, all with statistically significant differences compared with the blank control group. CONCLUSION: Jujing Decoction combined with lipoic acid can significantly improve sperm motility, reduce MAS and DFI and increase the pregnancy rate through antioxidant stress, and has a high clinical safety.

[Action mechanism of Professor Xu Fusong's Shuilu Erxian Dan in the treatment of premature ejaculation: An exploration based on network pharmacology and molecular docking technology].

OBJECTIVE: To analyze the potential action mechanism of Shuilu Erxian Dan in the treatment of premature ejaculation based on network pharmacology. METHODS: The TCMSP database was searched for the main chemical constituents of Euryale and golden cherry, the core components of Shuilu Erxian Dan. Oral bioavailability and medicinal properties were set as the parameters for screening active components, premature ejaculation-related disease targets retrieved from the DisGeNET, GeneCards, OMIM and TTD databases, the common targets of drug pairs and diseases identified with the Wayne diagram, and a drug-active ingredient-target-disease network map constructed with the software Cytoscape. A PPI network map designed through the STRING platform, the website Metascape used for GO and KEGG analyses of the common targets, and the protein receptors and small molecular ligands of the core genes employed for molecular docking and PyMOL visualization. RESULTS: A total of 7 chemical constituents and 171 predictive targets, 1 918 premature ejaculation targets and 113 common targets were identified. GO analysis showed significant enrichment of BP in response to toxic substances and inorganic substances, CC in membrane raft and plasma membrane protein complex, and MF in transcription factor binding and kinase binding. KEGG analysis manifested markedly enriched TNF signaling pathway, JAK-STAT signaling pathway and Cocaine addiction. The results of molecular docking exhibited a good binding energy between the core gene and the component. CONCLUSION: Network pharmacology has revealed the potential action mechanism of Shuilu Erxian Dan in the treatment of premature ejaculation, which has paved the theoretical ground for verification of the effectiveness of Shuilu Erxian Dan in the treatment of premature ejaculation via animals and cells.

[Prostate cancer stem cells: Current understanding].

Prostate cancer is the most common malignancy in men and seriously harms their health. The current theories on prostate cancer cannot fully explain the heterogeneity, metastatic growth, drug resistance and tumor recurrence of the disease. Prostate stem cells are small heterogeneous subpopulations in the prostate that are characterized by self-renewal and proliferation, and can produce all the lineages of prostate epithelia. According to the cancer stem cell hypothesis, prostate cancer may be a stem cell disease. Prostate cancer stem cells have a markedly increased clonogenicity and therapeutic resistance, and play a decisive role in the occurrence and development of prostatic malignancies. Therapeutic strategies for selectively targeting these stem cells have attracted widespread attention. This article focuses on the origin, identification, molecular markers and clinical application of prostate cancer stem cells, their physiological function and possible involvement in the pathogenesis of prostate cancer, paving a theoretical ground for the development of efficient and sophisticated therapeutic strategies.

[Treatment of impotence based on the theory of spleen and stomach].

The treatment of impotence is mainly centered on the liver and kidney, but it is also closely related to the spleen and stomach. Spleen and stomach are the "acquired foundation", "the source of qi and blood biochemistry" and "the hub of qi rise and fall", which are of great significance to ensure the normal erectile function. The spleen and stomach is closely related to the liver and kidney, and the rise and fall of the spleen and stomach function can affect the erectile function indirectly through the two organs. At present, in clinical and scientific research, remarkable progress has been made in the treatment of impotence from the spleen and stomach. This paper intends to summarize the progress in the treatment of impotence based on the theory of spleen and stomach through the collation of literature.

Feasibility and strategy of common hepatic artery lymph node dissection in thoracolaparoscopic esophagectomy for thoracic esophageal squamous cell cancer.

Controversy about the adequate extent of lymph node (LN) dissection persists in surgery for thoracic esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC). The present study estimates the feasibility and strategy of common hepatic artery LN dissection during ESCC surgery.The clinical data of 482 patients with ESCC, who underwent thoracolaparoscopic esophagectomy at Fujian Medical University Union Hospital, were retrospectively selected. Among the 482 ESCC patients, 224 patients underwent thoracolaparoscopic esophagectomy with routine common hepatic artery LN dissection (cohort 1), while 258 patients underwent the same procedure without common hepatic artery LN dissection (cohort 2). The proposed operation method was introduced to safely dissect the common hepatic artery LN. Both univariate and multivariate analyses were performed to analyze the clinicopathological factors correlated to the common hepatic artery LN metastasis.The main postoperative complications were pneumonia, anastomotic leakage, vocal cord palsy and cardiovascular disease. There was no significant difference in the incidence of major postoperative complications between the 2 cohorts (P >.05), and the incidence was similar in a number of reports. The metastatic rate of common hepatic artery LNs was 4.91%, which was relatively lower. Based on the logistic regression analysis of 5 factors, tumor location and T classification were risk factors for common hepatic artery LN metastasis (P <.05).Routine common hepatic artery LN dissection is safe and feasible during a thoracolaparoscopic esophagectomy for ESCC. Although the metastatic rate is lower, common hepatic artery LN dissection should be performed for lower thoracic ESCCs, especially for tumors that invade the outer membrane.

Optimizing a machine learning based glioma grading system using multi-parametric MRI histogram and texture features.

Current machine learning techniques provide the opportunity to develop noninvasive and automated glioma grading tools, by utilizing quantitative parameters derived from multi-modal magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) data. However, the efficacies of different machine learning methods in glioma grading have not been investigated.A comprehensive comparison of varied machine learning methods in differentiating low-grade gliomas (LGGs) and high-grade gliomas (HGGs) as well as WHO grade II, III and IV gliomas based on multi-parametric MRI images was proposed in the current study. The parametric histogram and image texture attributes of 120 glioma patients were extracted from the perfusion, diffusion and permeability parametric maps of preoperative MRI. Then, 25 commonly used machine learning classifiers combined with 8 independent attribute selection methods were applied and evaluated using leave-one-out cross validation (LOOCV) strategy. Besides, the influences of parameter selection on the classifying performances were investigated. We found that support vector machine (SVM) exhibited superior performance to other classifiers. By combining all tumor attributes with synthetic minority over-sampling technique (SMOTE), the highest classifying accuracy of 0.945 or 0.961 for LGG and HGG or grade II, III and IV gliomas was achieved. Application of Recursive Feature Elimination (RFE) attribute selection strategy further improved the classifying accuracies. Besides, the performances of LibSVM, SMO, IBk classifiers were influenced by some key parameters such as kernel type, c, gama, K, etc. SVM is a promising tool in developing automated preoperative glioma grading system, especially when being combined with RFE strategy. Model parameters should be considered in glioma grading model optimization.

Esophageal suspension method in scavenging peripheral lymph nodes of the left recurrent laryngeal nerve in thoracic esophageal carcinoma through semi-prone-position thoracoscopy.

OBJECTIVE: Many Chinese doctors have performed microinvasive esophageal cancer resection in the semi-prone position. However, few reports have focused on high-quality methods of scavenging the peripheral lymph nodes (PLNs) of the left recurrent laryngeal nerve (RLN). MATERIALS AND METHODS: Retrospective analysis was performed on 145 cases of microinvasive esophageal cancer resection in the semi-prone position. Among which, 75 cases underwent complete freeing of the thoracic esophagus and subsequent scavenging of the PLNs of the left RLN from April 2011 to April 2012 (Group A). In the other 70 cases, the incompletely freed upper thoracic esophagus was suspended, and the PLNs of the left RLN were scavenged from May 2012 to April 2013 (Group B). RESULTS: The average number of scavenged PLNs of the left RLN in Groups A and B was 4.6±2.9 and 5.2±3.0 pieces, respectively (P=0.799). The total scavenged PLNs of the left RLN in Groups A and B were 344 and 357 pieces, respectively. Among which, the broken lymph nodes were 109 and 66 pieces, respectively (P<0.0001). The postoperative hoarseness rate in Groups A and B was respectively 12.0% and 2.8% (P=0.038). CONCLUSIONS: Dissection of the left RLN can be easily performed after esophageal suspension, thus ensuring the quality of PLN scavenging.