The 100 top-cited articles in menopausal syndrome: a bibliometric analysis.

BACKGROUND: Significant scientific research has been conducted concerning menopausal syndrome(MPS), yet few bibliometric analyses have been performed. Our aim was to recognise the 100 most highly cited published articles on MPS and to analytically evaluate their key features. METHODS: To identify the 100 most frequently cited articles, a search was conducted on Web of Science using the term 'menopausal syndrome'. Articles that matched the predetermined criteria were scrutinised to obtain the following data: citation ranking, year of publication, publishing journal, journal impact factor, country of origin, academic institution, authors, study type, and keywords. RESULTS: The publication period is from January 1, 2000, to August 31, 2022. The maximum number of citations was 406 and in 2012. The median citations per year was 39.70. Most of the articles focused on treatment and complications. These articles were published in 36 different journals, with the Journal of MENOPAUSE having published the greatest number (14%). Forty-eight articles (48%) were from the United States, with the University of Pittsburgh being the leading institute (9%). Joann E. Manson was the most frequent first author (n = 6). Observational studies were the most frequently conducted research type (n = 53), followed by experimental studies (n = 33). Keyword analysis identified classic research topics, including genitourinary syndrome of menopause, bone mineral density (BMD), and anti-mullerian hormone (AMH) loci. CONCLUSION: Using bibliometrics, we conducted an analysis to identify the inadequacies, traditional focal points, and potential prospects in the study of MPS across current scientific areas. Treatment and complications are at the core of MPS research, whereas prediction and biomarkers have less literature of high quality. There is a necessity for innovative analytical metrics to measure the real effect of these papers with a high level of citation on clinical application.

Mechanism of traditional Chinese medicine in elderly diabetes mellitus and a systematic review of its clinical application.

Objective: Affected by aging, the elderly diabetes patients have many pathological characteristics different from the young people, including more complications, vascular aging, cognitive impairment, osteoporosis, and sarcopenia. This article will explore their pathogenesis and the mechanism of Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) intervention, and use the method of systematic review to evaluate the clinical application of TCM in elderly diabetes. Method: Searching for randomized controlled trials (RCTs) published from January 2000 to November 2023 in the following databases: Web of Science, Pubmed, Embase, Cochrane Library, Sinomed, China National Knowledge Internet, Wanfang and VIP. They were evaluated by three subgroups of Traditional Chinese Prescription, Traditional Chinese patent medicines and Traditional Chinese medicine extracts for their common prescriptions, drugs, adverse reactions and the quality of them. Results and Conclusion: TCM has the advantages of multi-target and synergistic treatment in the treatment of elderly diabetes. However, current clinical researches have shortcomings including the inclusion of age criteria and diagnosis of subjects are unclear, imprecise research design, non-standard intervention measures, and its safety needs further exploration. In the future, the diagnosis of elderly people with diabetes needs to be further clarified. Traditional Chinese patent medicines included in the pharmacopoeia can be used to conduct more rigorous RCTs, and then gradually standardize the traditional Chinese medicine prescriptions and traditional Chinese medicine extracts, providing higher level evidence for the treatment of elderly diabetes with traditional Chinese medicine.

Crosstalk among podocytes, glomerular endothelial cells and mesangial cells in diabetic kidney disease: an updated review.

Diabetic kidney disease (DKD) is a long-term and serious complication of diabetes that affects millions of people worldwide. It is characterized by proteinuria, glomerular damage, and renal fibrosis, leading to end-stage renal disease, and the pathogenesis is complex and involves multiple cellular and molecular mechanisms. Among three kinds of intraglomerular cells including podocytes, glomerular endothelial cells (GECs) and mesangial cells (MCs), the alterations in one cell type can produce changes in the others. The cell-to-cell crosstalk plays a crucial role in maintaining the glomerular filtration barrier (GFB) and homeostasis. In this review, we summarized the recent advances in understanding the pathological changes and interactions of these three types of cells in DKD and then focused on the signaling pathways and factors that mediate the crosstalk, such as angiopoietins, vascular endothelial growth factors, transforming growth factor-ß, Krüppel-like factors, retinoic acid receptor response protein 1 and exosomes, etc. Furthermore, we also simply introduce the application of the latest technologies in studying cell interactions within glomerular cells and new promising mediators for cell crosstalk in DKD. In conclusion, this review provides a comprehensive and updated overview of the glomerular crosstalk in DKD and highlights its importance for the development of novel intervention approaches.

Moxibustion's protective role against atherosclerosis: Inhibition of Ca2+ overload-triggered oxidative stress and inflammatory response via P2Y12/PI3K/AKT pathway.

OBJECTIVE: This study aims to investigate the protective mechanism of moxibustion in combating atherosclerosis (AS). METHODS: Apolipoprotein E (ApoE)-deficient mice, aged 8 weeks, were randomly assigned into four groups: the model group (n = 6), SC79 group (n = 6), moxibustion group (n = 6), and moxibustion+SC79 group (n = 6). All mice were fed with a high-fat diet (HFD). Concurrently, 8-week-old C57BL/6 mice of the same genetic background were utilized as the control group (n = 6) and were given a regular diet. Macrophages were isolated via flow cytometry. The intracellular Ca2+ expression in macrophages was evaluated, and aortic plaques were quantitatively assessed through en face oil red O and Masson staining. The presence of macrophages and smooth muscle cells in AS plaques was determined by MAC-3 and α-smooth muscle actin (α-SMA) immunohistochemistry. The relative fluorescence intensity of nuclear factor-κB (NF-κB) in macrophages was identified by immunofluorescence staining. The expressions of proteins related to the P2Y12/phosphatidylinositol 3-hydroxy kinase (PI3K)/protein kinase B (AKT) signaling pathway were examined by Western blotting. RESULTS: Moxibustion reduced free Ca2+ expression in macrophage cytoplasm, inhibiting Ca2+ influx and oxidative stress. Significant reductions in atherosclerotic plaque formation and inflammation markers, including TNF-α and IL-1ß, were noted in the moxibustion group. Moxibustion modulated the P2Y12/PI3K/AKT pathway, impacting various inflammatory and oxidative stress-related proteins. Introduction of the AKT activator SC79 counteracted moxibustion's benefits, highlighting the P2Y12/PI3K/AKT pathway's central role. CONCLUSION: Moxibustion, through the P2Y12/PI3K/AKT signaling pathway, can inhibit Ca2+ overload-induced oxidative stress and inflammatory response, decrease macrophage infiltration, and increase the content of smooth muscle cells and collagen, thereby exerting a protective effect against AS.

Gut microbial beta-glucuronidase: a vital regulator in female estrogen metabolism.

A growing amount of evidence has supported that gut microbiota plays a vital role in the reproductive endocrine system throughout a woman's whole life, and gut microbial ß-glucuronidase (gmGUS) is a key factor in regulating host estrogen metabolism. Moreover, estrogen levels also influence the composition as well as the diversity of gut microbiota. In normal condition, the gmGUS-estrogen crosstalk maintains body homeostasis of physiological estrogen level. Once this homeostasis is broken, the estrogen metabolism will be disturbed, resulting in estrogen-related diseases, such as gynecological cancers, menopausal syndrome, etc. together with gut microbial dysbiosis, which may accelerate these pathological processes. In this review, we highlight the regulatory role of gmGUS on the physical estrogen metabolism and estrogen-related diseases, summarize the present evidence of the interaction between gmGUS and estrogen metabolism, and unwrap the potential mechanisms behind them. Finally, gmGUS may become a potential biomarker for early diagnosis of estrogen-induced diseases. Regulating gmGUS activity or transplanting gmGUS-producing microbes shows promise for treating estrogen-related diseases.

Inflammation-Related Epigenetic Modification: The Bridge Between Immune and Metabolism in Type 2 Diabetes.

T2DM, as a typical metabolic inflammatory disease, is under the joint regulation of environmental factors and genetics, combining with a variety of epigenetic changes. Apart from epigenetic changes of islet ß cells and glycometabolic tissues or organs, the inflammation-related epigenetics is also the core pathomechanism leading to ß-cell dysfunction and insulin resistance. In this review, we focus on the epigenetic modification of immune cells' proliferation, recruitment, differentiation and function, providing an overview of the key genes which regulated by DNA methylation, histone modifications, and non-coding RNA in the respect of T2DM. Meanwhile, we further summarize the present situation of T2DM epigenetic research and elucidate its prospect in T2DM clinical diagnosis and treatment.

CTLA-4 rs5742909 polymorphism and cervical cancer risk: A meta-analysis.

BACKGROUND: Number of studies have been performed to evaluate the relationship between the cytotoxic T-lymphocyte associated antigen-4 (CTLA-4) gene variant rs5742909 polymorphism and cervical cancer risk, but the sample size was small and the results were conflicting. This meta-analysis was conducted to comprehensively evaluate the overall association. METHODS: PubMed, Web of Science, Embase, China Biology Medical Literature database, China National Knowledge Infrastructure, WanFang, and Weipu databases were searched before July 31, 2018. The strength of associations was assessed using odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs). All of the statistical analyses were conducted using Review Manager 5.3 and Stata 14.0. RESULTS: Eleven studies involved 3899 cases and 4608 controls. Overall, significant association was observed between the CTLA-4 gene variant rs5742909 polymorphism and cervical cancer (T vs C: OR = 1.40, 95% CI = 1.12-1.76; TT vs CC: OR = 2.22, 95% CI = 1.13-4.37; TT vs CT+CC: OR = 1.96, 95% CI = 1.03-3.74; TT+CT vs CC: OR = 1.47, 95% CI = 1.14-1.90). In subgroup analysis by ethnic group, a statistically significant association was observed in Asians (T vs C: OR = 1.56, 95% CI = 1.22-1.99), but not in Caucasians (T vs C: OR = 1.19, 95% CI = 0.87-1.62). The sensitivity analysis confirmed the reliability and stability of the meta-analysis. CONCLUSION: our meta-analysis supports that the CTLA-4 gene variant rs5742909 polymorphism might contribute to individual susceptibility to cervical cancer in Asians.

[The relationship between HalphaD-5 and HbetaD-2 in infertile women's fimbriae tubes with adhesions and atresias].

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the expression and relationship of human alpha defensin-5 (HalphaD-5) and human beta defensin-2 (HbetaD-2) in human fimbriae tubes with adhesions and atresias. METHODS: The tissue samples were collected from 30 human fimbriae tubes with adhesions and atresias, and 30 cases without adhesions and atresias. The expression of HalphaD-5 and HbetaD-2 in fimbriae tube tissue were measured by immunohistochemical SP methods. Image pro-plus 6.0 software was used to test the average IOD value of positive staining. Differences of HalphaD-5 and HbetaD-2 expressions were analyzed by independent-samples T test. The relationship between HalphaD-5 and HbetaD-2 was analyzed by Pearson correlation. RESULTS: We found that HalphaD-5 and HbetaD-2 mainly expressed in the epithelial cells which face to lumen, mostly in the cytochylema. Both two groups expressed HalphaD-5 and HbetaD-2, but the degrees were different. Compared with human fimbriae tubes without adhesions or atresias, the expressions of HalphaD-5 and HbetaD-2 increased significantly in adhesion cases (P(HalphaD--5) = 0.000, P(HbetaD--2) = 0.02). In the group without adhesion, there was a positive correlation between HalphaD-5 and HbetaD-2 (r = 0.404, P = 0.027), while in the adhesion group, there was no correlation between HalphaD-5 and HbetaD-2 (P = 0.089). CONCLUSION: HalphaD-5 and HbetaD-2 may protect fimbriae tubes during the pathological process of microorganisms attack.

[The expression and significance of TGF-beta 1 and its receptors in infertile women's fimbriae tubes with adhesions and atresias].

OBJECTIVE: To profile the expression of transforming growth factor-beta1 (TGF-beta1) and its receptors (TGF-beta R1 and TGF-beta R2) in human fimbriae tubes to valuate the role of TGF-beta 1 signal system in adhesions and atresias formation of infertile women's fimbriae tubes. METHODS: The expressions of TGF-beta 1 and its receptors (TGF-beta R1 and TGF-beta R2) in fimbriae tubes were measured by immunohistochemical SP methods in 30 human fimbriae tube with adhesions and 15 cases without adhesions. The average integrated optical density (IOD) value of positive staining was tested by Image pro-plus 6.0 software. The results were analyzed with independ-samples T test and Pearson correlation. RESULTS: TGF-beta 1, TGF-beta R1 and TGF-beta R2 chiefly expressed in the epithelial cells, also expressed in the vascular endothelial cells and fibroblasts. Compared with human fimbriae tubes without adhesions or atresias, the expression of these three molecules all increased significantly in adhesion cases (P<0.05). In adhesion group, there was a positive correlation between TGF-beta 1 and TGF-beta R1, TGF-beta 1 and TGF-beta R2 (P<0.05), but no correlation between TGF-beta R1 and TGF-beta R2 (P<0.05), while there was no correlation among these three factors in control group. CONCLUSION: TGF-beta 1 signal system may be an important ring-joint in adhesions formation of human fimbriae tube.