Investigation of the effect of different distilled water, rainwater and seawater mass ratios on coal spontaneous combustion characteristics.

When water comes into contact with coal, the risk of coal spontaneous combustion should be reassessed. In order to analyze the effect of distilled water, rainwater and seawater on the coal self-heating, thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) was applied to investigate the differences between the macroscopic oxidation properties of raw coal and water-immersed coal. The risk of coal spontaneous combustion increases after water immersion, but different types of water have different degrees of influence on the spontaneous combustion of coal. The microscopic pore structure and elemental changes on the surface of coal samples before and after water immersion were studied by Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM), low-pressure nitrogen gas adsorption (LP-N2GA) and Energy Dispersive Spectroscopy (EDS) experiments. Fourier infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) was used to investigate the change of active groups. The results show that the pore structure of coal samples immersed in water is much more developed than that of raw coal. In the low-temperature oxidation stage, moisture evaporation consumes much oxidation heat and inhibits the coal self-heating. After the stage, it promotes the coal spontaneous combustion. The content of the hydroxyl group increases, and the content of carbonyl and carboxyl decreases. The alkali metal elements can act as catalysts and active carriers of oxygen, enhancing the oxidation activity of coal. The results are helpful to understand the mechanism of different distilled water, rainwater and seawater mass ratios on coal spontaneous combustion and avoid potential self-heating after immersion.

Effectiveness of cognitive behavioral therapy in treating bipolar disorder: An updated meta-analysis with randomized controlled trials.

AIM: The aim of this updated meta-analysis was to further assess the effectiveness of cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) in treating bipolar disorder (BD). METHODS: We carried out a literature search on PubMed, Embase, and the Cochrane Library up to October 2015. We calculated the pooled relative risk of relapse rate and standard mean difference (SMD) of mean change (data at a follow-up time-point - baseline) of the Beck Depression Inventory, Beck Hopelessness Scale, Hamilton Rating Scale for Depression, Young Mania Rating Scale (YMRS) and Mania Rating Scale scores with their 95% confidence interval (95%CI). Subgroup analyses based on follow-up time were performed. RESULTS: Nine randomized controlled trials with 520 bipolar I or II disorder patients were reanalyzed. Overall analysis showed that CBT did not significantly reduce the relapse rate of BD or improve the level of depression. However, significant efficacy of CBT in improving severity of mania was proved based on the YMRS (SMD = -0.54, 95%CI, -1.03 to -0.06, P = 0.03) but not based on MRS. Subgroup analyses showed that CBT had short-term efficacy in reducing relapse rate of BD (at 6 months' follow-up: relative risk = 0.49, 95%CI: 0.29-0.81, P = 0.006) and improving severity of mania based on YMRS score (post-treatment: SMD = -0.30, 95%CI, -0.59 to -0.01, P = 0.04). CONCLUSION: Short-term efficacy of CBT in reducing relapse rate of BD and improving the severity of mania was proved. But these effects could be weakened by time. In addition, there was no effect of CBT on level of depression in BD.

The nature of prospective memory deficit in patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder.

We comprehensively examined prospective memory (PM) performance in patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), and explored the cognitive and psychopathological correlates of PM in this clinical population. Fifty-eight OCD patients and 58 healthy controls were assessed with computer-based PM tasks and related neurocognitive functions, and the participants also reported frequency of PM failures and compulsive behaviours in daily life. OCD patients had intact activity-based PM performance but had lower accuracy in time-based PM and longer reaction time to event-based PM cues compared to healthy controls. Among the neurocognitive functions, both the WCST (perseverative error) and the letter number span correlated with time-based PM. OCD patients reported similar number of PM failures in daily life as controls, which correlated with their intact event-based PM performance, suggesting a generally good insight into their PM functions. Neither clinician-assessed nor self-reported OCD symptoms correlated with PM performance. This study indicates that PM impairment tends to vary with the PM cue types in OCD patients. In addition, certain executive functions (i.e., mental shifting and updating) may contribute to time-based PM impairment in patients with OCD.

Clinical features of and risk factors for major depression with history of postpartum episodes in Han Chinese women: A retrospective study.

BACKGROUND: We sought to investigate the clinical features of and risk factors for recurrent major depression (MD) with history of postpartum episodes (PPD) in Han Chinese women and the differences between first-onset postpartum MD (MD that has its first lifetime depressive episode in the postpartum period) and first-onset non-postpartum MD (MD with history of PPD and has its first lifetime depressive episode in a period other than postpartum). METHODS: Data were derived from the China, Oxford and Virginia Commonwealth University Experimental Research on Genetic Epidemiology (CONVERGE) study (N=6017 cases) and analyzed in two steps. We first examined the clinical features of and risk factors for MD patients with (N=981) or without (N=4410) a history of PPD. We then compared the differences between first-onset postpartum MD (N=583) and first-onset non-postpartum MD (N=398) in those with a history of PPD. Linear, logistic and multinomial logistic models were employed to measure the associations. RESULTS: A history of PPD was associated with more guilt feelings, greater psychiatric comorbidity, higher neuroticism, earlier onset and more chronicity (OR 0.2-2.8). Severe premenstrual symptoms (PMS) and more childbirths increased the risk of PPD, as did a family history of MD, childhood sexual abuse, stressful life events and lack of social support (OR 1.1-1.3). In the MD with history of PPD subsample, first-onset postpartum MD was associated with fewer recurrent major depressive episodes, less psychiatric comorbidity, lower neuroticism, less severe PMS and fewer disagreements with their husbands (OR 0.5-0.8), but more childbirths (OR 1.2). LIMITATIONS: Data were obtained retrospectively through interview and recall bias may have affected the results. CONCLUSIONS: MD with history of PPD in Han Chinese women is typically chronic and severe, with particular risk factors including severe PMS and more childbirths. First-onset postpartum MD and first-onset non-postpartum MD can be partly differentiated by their clinical features and risk factors, but are not clearly distinctive.

Smoking and major depressive disorder in Chinese women.

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the risk factors that contribute to smoking in female patients with major depressive disorder (MDD) and the clinical features in depressed smokers. METHODS: We examined the smoking status and clinical features in 6120 Han Chinese women with MDD (DSM-IV) between 30 and 60 years of age across China. Logistic regression was used to determine the association between clinical features of MDD and smoking status and between risk factors for MDD and smoking status. RESULTS: Among the recurrent MDD patients there were 216(3.6%) current smokers, 117 (2.0%) former smokers and 333(5.6%) lifetime smokers. Lifetime smokers had a slightly more severe illness, characterized by more episodes, longer duration, more comorbid illness (panic and phobias), with more DSM-IV A criteria and reported more symptoms of fatigue and suicidal ideation or attempts than never smokers. Some known risk factors for MDD were also differentially represented among smokers compared to non-smokers. Smokers reported more stressful life events, were more likely to report childhood sexual abuse, had higher levels of neuroticism and an increased rate of familial MDD. Only neuroticism was significantly related to nicotine dependence. CONCLUSIONS: Although depressed women smokers experience more severe illness, smoking rates remain low in MDD patients. Family history of MDD and environmental factors contribute to lifetime smoking in Chinese women, consistent with the hypothesis that the association of smoking and depression may be caused by common underlying factors.

[Association study of LIS1 and TSNAX genes with bipolar disorder in Chinese Han population].

OBJECTIVE: To assess the association of neural development-related genes LIS1and TSNAX with bipolar disorder in a Chinese Han population. METHODS: Three hundred and eight five patients (including 188 males and 197 females) from Guangzhou Brain Hospital with bipolar disorder meeting the Diagnostic and Statistic Manual of Bipolar Disorder (BDI) (Fourth Edition) criteria and 475 healthy controls from the local community were recruited. Ten single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) of the LIS1 and TSNAX genes were genotyped by GoldenGate genotyping assay on an Illumina Beadstation 500 machine. Association analyses of SNPs and haplotypes were performed with Plink 1.07 software. RESULTS: Analysis of the total sample has failed to find any association of SNP or haplotype of the two genes with BDI (P> 0.05). When patients were divided into subgroups with or without psychotic symptom, no significant association of the two genes was found with psychotic BDI or non-psychotic BDI (P> 0.05). No significant association was found between any SNP and haplotype of two genes and female BDI or male BDI, nor were significant association found between age of onset and LIS1 and TSNAX gene polymorphisms. CONCLUSION: Our results indicated that LIS1 and TSNAX genes are not associated with susceptibility to bipolar I disorder in Chinese Han population.

Association of affective temperaments measured by TEMPS-a with cognitive deficits in patients with bipolar disorder.

BACKGROUND: Affective temperaments such as cyclothymia, which may be the fundamental substrates for bipolar disorder and bipolar II in particular, have been reported to be associated with abnormalities in the regions that are related to cognitive deficits in bipolar disorder. However, few studies have examined the effects of affective temperaments on neuropsychological performance in individuals with bipolar disorder. METHOD: In a six-week prospective study, we administered Chinese version of TEMPS-A (Temperament Evaluation of Memphis, Pisa, San Diego-Autoquestionnair) to 93 patients with bipolar I depression, 135 patients with bipolar II depression, and 101 healthy controls. Cognitive function was assessed with a battery of neuropsychological tasks, including attention, processing speed, set shifting, planning, verbal working memory, verbal fluency, and visual spatial memory. Mixed-effects statistical models were used to assess the effects of affective temperaments on cognitive function. RESULTS: Bipolar patients with hyperthymic temperament showed greater cognitive deficits in set shifting (p=0.05) and verbal working memory (p=0.026) than did bipolar patients with non-predominant temperaments (predominant temperament was defined as one standard deviation above the mean). The differences in estimated marginal means were -0.624 (95% CI, -1.25 to 0) and -0.429 (95% CI, -0.81 to -0.05), respectively. Significant temperament X bipolar subtype interaction effects were observed for set shifting (Wald X(2)=18.161, p<0.001), planning (Wald X(2)=7.906, p=0.048), and visual spatial memory (Wald X(2)=16.418, p=0.001). LIMITATION: The anxious temperament was not evaluated. CONCLUSION: Our data suggest that hyperthymic temperament may be associated with cognitive deficits in some specific domains in bipolar disorder; and that the effect of temperaments may be different across subtypes of bipolar disorder.

Structural and diffusion property alterations in unaffected siblings of patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder.

Disrupted white matter integrity and abnormal cortical thickness are widely reported in the pathophysiology of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). However, the relationship between alterations in white matter connectivity and cortical thickness in OCD is unclear. In addition, the heritability of this relationship is poorly understood. To investigate the relationship of white matter microstructure with cortical thickness, we measure fractional anisotropy (FA) of white matter in 30 OCD patients, 19 unaffected siblings and 30 matched healthy controls. Then, we take those regions of significantly altered FA in OCD patients compared with healthy controls to perform fiber tracking. Next, we calculate the fiber quantity in the same tracts. Lastly, we compare cortical thickness in the target regions of those tracts. Patients with OCD exhibited decreased FA in cingulum, arcuate fibers near the superior parietal lobule, inferior longitudinal fasciculus near the right superior temporal gyrus and uncinate fasciculus. Siblings showed reduced FA in arcuate fibers near the superior parietal lobule and anterior limb of internal capsule. Significant reductions in both fiber quantities and cortical thickness in OCD patients and their unaffected siblings were also observed in the projected brain areas when using the arcuate fibers near the left superior parietal lobule as the starting points. Reduced FA in the left superior parietal lobule was observed not only in patients with OCD but also in their unaffected siblings. Originated from the superior parietal lobule, the number of fibers was also found to be decreased and the corresponding cortical regions were thinner relative to controls. The linkage between disrupted white matter integrity and the abnormal cortical thickness may be a vulnerability marker for OCD.

Childhood sexual abuse and the development of recurrent major depression in Chinese women.

BACKGROUND: Our prior study in Han Chinese women has shown that women with a history of childhood sexual abuse (CSA) are at increased risk for developing major depression (MD). Would this relationship be found in our whole data set? METHOD: Three levels of CSA (non-genital, genital, and intercourse) were assessed by self-report in two groups of Han Chinese women: 6017 clinically ascertained with recurrent MD and 5983 matched controls. Diagnostic and other risk factor information was assessed at personal interview. Odds ratios (ORs) were calculated by logistic regression. RESULTS: We confirmed earlier results by replicating prior analyses in 3,950 new recurrent MD cases. There were no significant differences between the two data sets. Any form of CSA was significantly associated with recurrent MD (OR 4.06, 95% confidence interval (CI) [3.19-5.24]). This association strengthened with increasing CSA severity: non-genital (OR 2.21, 95% CI 1.58-3.15), genital (OR 5.24, 95% CI 3.52-8.15) and intercourse (OR 10.65, 95% CI 5.56-23.71). Among the depressed women, those with CSA had an earlier age of onset, longer depressive episodes. Recurrent MD patients those with CSA had an increased risk for dysthymia (OR 1.60, 95%CI 1.11-2.27) and phobia (OR 1.41, 95%CI 1.09-1.80). Any form of CSA was significantly associated with suicidal ideation or attempt (OR 1.50, 95% CI 1.20-1.89) and feelings of worthlessness or guilt (OR 1.41, 95% CI 1.02-2.02). Intercourse (OR 3.47, 95%CI 1.66-8.22), use of force and threats (OR 1.95, 95%CI 1.05-3.82) and how strongly the victims were affected at the time (OR 1.39, 95%CI 1.20-1.64) were significantly associated with recurrent MD. CONCLUSIONS: In Chinese women CSA is strongly associated with recurrent MD and this association increases with greater severity of CSA. Depressed women with CSA have some specific clinical traits. Some features of CSA were associated with greater likelihood of developing recurrent MD.

Associations of educational attainment, occupation, social class and major depressive disorder among Han Chinese women.

BACKGROUND: The prevalence of major depressive disorder (MDD) is higher in those with low levels of educational attainment, the unemployed and those with low social status. However the extent to which these factors cause MDD is unclear. Most of the available data comes from studies in developed countries, and these findings may not extrapolate to developing countries. Examining the relationship between MDD and socio economic status in China is likely to add to the debate because of the radical economic and social changes occurring in China over the last 30 years. PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: We report results from 3,639 Chinese women with recurrent MDD and 3,800 controls. Highly significant odds ratios (ORs) were observed between MDD and full time employment (OR = 0.36, 95% CI = 0.25-0.46, logP = 78), social status (OR = 0.83, 95% CI = 0.77-0.87, logP = 13.3) and education attainment (OR = 0.90, 95% CI = 0.86-0.90, logP = 6.8). We found a monotonic relationship between increasing age and increasing levels of educational attainment. Those with only primary school education have significantly more episodes of MDD (mean 6.5, P-value = 0.009) and have a clinically more severe disorder, while those with higher educational attainment are likely to manifest more comorbid anxiety disorders. CONCLUSIONS: In China lower socioeconomic position is associated with increased rates of MDD, as it is elsewhere in the world. Significantly more episodes of MDD occur among those with lower educational attainment (rather than longer episodes of disease), consistent with the hypothesis that the lower socioeconomic position increases the likelihood of developing MDD. The phenomenology of MDD varies according to the degree of educational attainment: higher educational attainment not only appears to protect against MDD but alters its presentation, to a more anxious phenotype.

The use of 15-point hypomanic checklist in differentiating bipolar I and bipolar II disorder from major depressive disorder.

OBJECTIVES: Individuals with bipolar disorder (BP) are often misdiagnosed with major depressive disorder (MDD). In this study, we developed a Chinese version of 15-point hypomania scale (HCL-15) in order to determine its sensitivity and specificity in the diagnosis of BP and BP-II in particular. METHODS: A total of 623 individuals suffering a major depressive episode (MDE) were systematically interviewed with both Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV-TR Axis I Disorders, Patient Edition, and HCL-15. A cutoff score of 8 or more in HCL-15 was suggested for BP. RESULTS: Of the 623 depressed patients, 115 (18.5%) actually required a diagnosis of BP-I, and another 159 (25.5%) could be more appropriately diagnosed with BP-II, according to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition, criteria. The sensitivity of 15-HCL in detection of BP-II was 0.78 and 0.46 for BP-I; the specificity was 0.9 and 0.69, respectively. The specificity of HCL-15 for BP versus MDD was as high as 0.93. Approximately 60%-80% of all questions in the HCL-15 questionnaire revealed positive responses from patients, while items 11 and 12, measuring the consumption of alcohol, coffee and cigarettes, demonstrated a low positive response rate. CONCLUSIONS: The HCL-15 assessment scale was fairly sensitive and highly specific for a BP-II diagnosis but not for a BP-I diagnosis. Some items in the HCL-15 symptom list need to be further modified to better fit Chinese culture and customs. The HCL-15 scale could be a useful tool in clinical practice for screening individuals with BP-II in order to avoid a misdiagnosis of MDD.

Suicidal risk factors of recurrent major depression in Han Chinese women.

The relationship between suicidality and major depression is complex. Socio- demography, clinical features, comorbidity, clinical symptoms, and stressful life events are important factors influencing suicide in major depression, but these are not well defined. Thus, the aim of the present study was to assess the associations between the above-mentioned factors and suicide ideation, suicide plan, and suicide attempt in 6008 Han Chinese women with recurrent major depression (MD). Patients with any suicidality had significantly more MD symptoms, a significantly greater number of stressful life events, a positive family history of MD, a greater number of episodes, a significant experience of melancholia, and earlier age of onset. Comorbidity with dysthymia, generalized anxiety disorder (GAD), social phobia, and animal phobia was seen in suicidal patients. The present findings indicate that specific factors act to increase the likelihood of suicide in MD. Our results may help improve the clinical assessment of suicide risk in depressed patients, especially for women.

Psychometric properties of the Chinese (Mandarin) TEMPS-A: a population study of 985 non-clinical subjects in China.

BACKGROUND: The TEMPS-A (Temperament Evaluation of Memphis, Pisa, Paris and San Diego) is a 110-item auto-questionnaire (self-rated) which consists of five temperament scales: depressive, cyclothymic, hyperthymic, irritable and anxious temperaments. It has been translated into over 25 languages and validated in at least 12, with broad cross-cultural cogency. This is a first attempt to validate the TEMPS-A in a very large Chinese population speaking Mandarin. METHODS: The Chinese TEMPS-A was adapted from the original English version following a rigorous process of forward translation and backward translation (after the approval of the English back translation by H.S.A. and K.K.A.), it was administered to 985 non-clinical Chinese subjects aged between 18-60 years (53.8% female) in four communities in Guangzhou City, China. A subset of 105 subjects was retested approximately six weeks later. Standard psychometric tests of reliability and validation were performed. RESULTS: The test-retest reliability for depressive (0.74), cyclothymic (0.71), hyperthymic (0.67), irritable (0.66) and anxious (0.83) were respectively as shown in the parentheses. For internal consistency, Chronbach alphas coefficients were 0.68, 0.85, 0.82, 0.83 and 0.87, respectively. Exploratory factor analysis revealed 2 super factors, Factor I loading on anxious, cyclothymic, irritable, and depressive temperaments; and Factor II loading on hyperthymic. Depressive, cyclothymic, irritable and anxious temperaments were correlated with each other. Males had significantly higher scores than females for the hyperthymic and irritable temperaments. The prevalence of the dominant depressive (2.9%), cyclothymic (5.6%), hyperthymic (1.3%), irritable (7.0%) and anxious (5.3%) temperaments were respectively as shown in the parentheses. LIMITATIONS: Although it is likely that generalizability of our scale is good for the entire Mandarin-speaking ethnic composition of China today, future research is needed to establish this conclusively. CONCLUSION: The Chinese TEMPS-A standardized on one of the largest non-clinical samples in any of the other national studies to date, has good internal consistency, coheres well with validated versions in other languages. The findings suggest that it is a psychometrically sound instrument to assess affective temperaments in clinical and biological studies in China.

Clinical features of patients with dysthymia in a large cohort of Han Chinese women with recurrent major depression.

BACKGROUND: Dysthymia is a form of chronic mild depression that has a complex relationship with major depressive disorder (MDD). Here we investigate the role of environmental risk factors, including stressful life events and parenting style, in patients with both MDD and dysthymia. We ask whether these risk factors act in the same way in MDD with and without dysthymia. RESULTS: We examined the clinical features in 5,950 Han Chinese women with MDD between 30-60 years of age across China. We confirmed earlier results by replicating prior analyses in 3,950 new MDD cases. There were no significant differences between the two data sets. We identified sixteen stressful life events that significantly increase the risk of dysthymia, given the presence of MDD. Low parental warmth, from either mother or father, increases the risk of dysthymia. Highly threatening but short-lived threats (such as rape) are more specific for MDD than dysthymia. While for MDD more severe life events show the largest odds ratio versus controls, this was not seen for cases of MDD with or without dysthymia. CONCLUSIONS: There are increased rates of stressful life events in MDD with dysthymia, but the impact of life events on susceptibility to dysthymia with MDD differs from that seen for MDD alone. The pattern does not fit a simple dose-response relationship, suggesting that there are moderating factors involved in the relationship between environmental precipitants and the onset of dysthymia. It is possible that severe life events in childhood events index a general susceptibility to chronic depression, rather than acting specifically as risk factors for dysthymia.

Brain structural abnormalities in obsessive-compulsive disorder: converging evidence from white matter and grey matter.

INTRODUCTION: Specific cortico-striato-thalamic circuits are hypothesised to underlie the aetiology of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). However, findings from neuroimaging studies have been inconsistent. In the current study, we attempted to provide a complete overview of structural alterations in OCD by conducting signed differential mapping (SDM) meta-analysis on grey matter and white matter studies of patients with OCD based on voxel-based morphometry (VBM) studies and diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) studies. METHODS: Fifteen VBM and seven DTI case-control studies were included in this meta-analysis. SDM meta-analyses were performed to assess grey matter volume and white matter integrity changes in OCD patients and healthy controls. RESULTS: We found that OCD patients had smaller grey matter volume than health controls in the frontal eye fields, medial frontal gyrus and anterior cingulate cortex. However, we showed that there was an increase in the grey matter volume in the lenticular nucleus, caudate nucleus and a small region in the right superior parietal lobule. OCD patients also had a lower fractional anisotropy (FA) in the cingulum bundles, inferior fronto-occipital fasciculus, and superior longitudinal fasciculus, while increased FA in the left uncinate fasciculus. CONCLUSIONS: The current findings confirm the structural abnormalities of cortico-striato-thalamic circuits in OCD.

Neurological soft signs in obsessive-compulsive disorder: the effect of co-morbid psychosis and evidence for familiality.

Patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) have increased rates of neurological soft signs (NSS) when compared to healthy controls. However, previous findings have been confounded by the presence of co-morbidity with disorders themselves associated with increased NSS, such as schizophrenia. Moreover, it remains unclear whether NSS in OCD reflect a vulnerability to this disorder. This study aimed to examine: 1) the severity of NSS in patients with OCD alone, in patients with OCD and co-morbid psychosis (schizophrenia or bipolar disorders), and in healthy controls; and b) whether unaffected first-degree relatives of patients with OCD also demonstrate a higher prevalence rate of NSS than healthy controls. NSS were assessed with the Cambridge Neurological Inventory (CNI) in 100 patients with OCD, 38 patients with OCD and psychosis (22 with bipolar disorders and 16 with schizophrenia), and 101 healthy controls. Forty-seven unaffected first-degree relatives of patients with OCD only were also administered the CNI. Patients with OCD showed significantly higher scores in motor coordination and total NSS than controls, and patients with OCD co-morbid with psychosis also showed significantly higher scores in motor coordination and total NSS than controls. Although there were no differences in NSS between patients with OCD only and OCD and psychosis as a whole, patients with OCD co-morbid with schizophrenia showed significantly higher scores in motor coordination than patients with OCD, patients with OCD and bipolar disorder, and healthy controls. Unaffected first-degree relatives only showed a higher prevalence rate than healthy controls in specific motor coordination signs, such as Opposition and Extinction. These findings suggest that patients with OCD exhibit more NSS than healthy controls, and that motor coordination signs may be even more extensive when OCD is co-morbid with psychosis. Some of these abnormalities may be indicative of a vulnerability to these disorders, as indicated by their presence in un-affected first-degree relatives.

The Chinese version of the Obsessive-Compulsive Inventory-Revised scale: replication and extension to non-clinical and clinical individuals with OCD symptoms.

BACKGROUND: The Obsessive-Compulsive Inventory-Revised (OCI-R) was designed to evaluate the severity of obsessive-compulsive symptoms in both clinical and non-clinical samples. The aim of the study was to evaluate the psychometric properties of a Chinese version of this scale. METHODS: The Chinese version of the OCI-R was administered to both a non-clinical sample (209 undergraduate students) and a clinical sample (56 obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) patients). Confirmatory factor analysis was conducted to examine the construct validity of the OCI-R in the non-clinical sample. The internal consistency at baseline and test-retest reliabilities at 4-week interval was examined in both the non-clinical and clinical samples. RESULTS: The confirmatory factor analysis of the non-clinical sample confirmed a 6-factor model suggested by the original authors of the instrument (df = 120, RMSEA = 0.068, CFI = 0.88, NNFI = 0.85, GFI = 0.89). The internal consistency and test-retest reliability were at an acceptable range for both the non-clinical and clinical samples. The OCI-R also showed good clinical discrimination for patients with OCD from healthy controls. CONCLUSIONS: The Chinese version of the OCI-R is a valid and reliable instrument for measuring OCD symptoms in the Chinese context.

[Gln192Arg polymorphism of the paraoxonase-1 gene is not associated with Alzheimer's disease in Chinese].

OBJECTIVE: To explore the relationship between paraoxonase-1 (PON1) gene Gln192Arg polymorphism and sporadic Alzheimer's disease (AD) in Chinese. METHODS: A total of 165 AD patients and 174 age-matched control subjects were enrolled in this study for examination of PON1 Gln192Arg and apolipoprotein E gene polymorphisms using polymerase chain reaction-restriction fragment length polymorphism (PCR-RFLP). RESULTS: The distribution of PON1 allelic and genotypic frequencies did not significantly differ between AD patients and the control subjects, even after the stratification by ApoE-epsilon4 status. CONCLUSION: Gln192Arg polymorphism of the PON1 gene is not associated with sporadic AD in Chinese.