Causality of Hashimoto's thyroiditis to Thyroid cancer: A two-sample Mendelian randomization study.

BACKGROUND: Observational studies have indicated an association between Hashimoto's thyroiditis (HT) and the risk of thyroid cancer (TC); however, the causality and direction of these effects in genetics remain unclear. Therefore, our study aims to investigate the relationship between genetic susceptibility to HT and thyroid cancer through a bidirectional Mendelian randomization (MR) approach using twin samples. METHODS: MR analysis was conducted using genetic instruments associated with HT, selected from a comprehensive genome-wide association meta-analysis involving a total of 756,000 individuals of European and East Asian descent. The dataset for TC comprised 1.486 million individuals, including both European and East Asian populations. Single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) closely linked to HT were derived from genome-wide association studies (GWAS). Two-sample, bi-directional MR analyses were applied to assess the causal association between HT and thyroid cancer, using inverse-variance weighted (IVW) methods, and MR Egger, weighted median, simple mode, and weighted mode. Furthermore, sensitivity analyses were conducted employing the MR-Egger regression model, weighted median method, MR-PRESSO, and leave-one-out technique. RESULTS: MR analyses revealed no evidence of a causal relationship between HT and TC in either European or East Asian populations (all P > 0.1). However, bidirectional MR analysis demonstrated a causal relationship between TC and HT in the European population (OR=1.0838,95%CI:1.0346, 11354, P=0.000686). CONCLUSION: This MR analysis indicates a lack of evidence supporting an association between genetically predicted HT and the risk of developing TC. In contrast, there is evidence of a causal relationship between genetically predicted TC and HT.

Association of circulating vitamin levels with thyroid diseases: a Mendelian randomization study.

Background: Previous observational studies have shown conflicting results of vitamins supplementation for thyroid diseases. The causal relationships between vitamins and thyroid diseases are unclear. Therefore, we conducted a two-sample bidirectional Mendelian randomization (MR) study to explore association of circulating vitamin levels with thyroid diseases. Methods: We performed a bidirectional MR analysis using genome-wide association study (GWAS) data. Genetic tool variables for circulating vitamin levels include vitamins A, B9, B12, C, D, and E, Genetic tool variables of thyroid diseases include autoimmune hyperthyroidism, autoimmune hypothyroidism, thyroid nodules (TNs), and Thyroid cancer (TC). Inverse-variance weighted multiplicative random effects (IVW-RE) was mainly used for MR Analysis, weighted median (WM) and MR Egger were used as supplementary methods to evaluate the relationships between circulating vitamin levels and thyroid diseases. Sensitivity and pluripotency were evaluated by Cochran's Q test, MR-PRESSO, Radial MR, MR-Egger regression and leave-one-out analysis. Results: Positive MR evidence suggested that circulating vitamin C level is a protective factor in autoimmune hypothyroidism (ORIVW-RE=0.69, 95%CI: 0.58-0.83, p = 1.05E-04). Reverse MR Evidence showed that genetic susceptibility to autoimmune hyperthyroidism is associated with reduced level of circulating vitamin A(ORIVW-RE = 0.97, 95% CI: 0.95-1.00, p = 4.38E-02), genetic susceptibility of TNs was associated with an increased level of circulating vitamin D (ORIVW-RE = 1.02, 95% CI: 1.00-1.03, p = 6.86E-03). No causal and reverse causal relationship was detected between other circulating vitamin levels and thyroid diseases. Conclusion: Our findings provide genetic evidence supporting a bi-directional causal relationship between circulating vitamin levels and thyroid diseases. These findings provide information for the clinical application of vitamins prevention and treatment of thyroid diseases.

Efficacy and safety of ultrasound-assisted wound debridement in the treatment of diabetic foot ulcers: a systematic review and meta-analysis of 11 randomized controlled trials.

Objective: Research data suggests that ultrasound-assisted wound debridement (UAWD) can effectively promote the healing of diabetic foot ulcers (DFU). However, existing research is not consistent with this viewpoint. Therefore, we conducted this study to investigate the effect of UAWD on the healing of diabetic foot ulcers. Methods: From the establishment of the database to January 2024, we searched 8 databases to study the effectiveness and safety of UAWD in the treatment of DFU. Two authors independently screened the qualifications of the articles, while two authors extracted relevant data. Statistical analysis was conducted using Review Manager 5.4 and STATA 18.0 software. Results: A total of 11 randomized controlled studies were included, with 6 countries and 696 participants participating. Our findings showed that UAWD was associated with a significant benefit in healing rate (OR = 2.60, 95% CI: [1.67, 4.03], P < 0.0001, I2 = 25%), wound healing time (MD = -11.94, 95% CI: [-23.65, -0.23], P = 0.05, I2 = 99%), percentage reduction in wound size (MD = 14.2, 95% CI: [10.8, 17.6], P = 0.47, I2 = 32%), effectiveness of treatment (OR = 10.3, 95% CI: [4.68, 22.66], P < 0.00001, I2 = 0%). Moreover, UAWD did not cause any significant adverse reactions. However, there was no obvious difference in wound blood perfusion (MD = 0.25, 95% CI: [-0.01, 0.52], P = 0.06, I2 = 90%), transcutaneous oxygen partial pressure (MD = 14.34, 95% CI: [-10.03, 38.71], P = 0.25, I2 = 98%). Conclusion: UAWD can significantly improve wound healing rate, shorten wound healing time, accelerate wound area reduction, and improve clinical treatment effectiveness without significant adverse reactions. Although there is no significant difference in transcutaneous oxygen pressure and wound blood flow perfusion between UAWD and SWC. So we look forward to more scientifically blinded, placebo-controlled, high-quality studies in the future, to enable researchers to obtain more complete and accurate analytical data, in order to improve the scientific and credibility of the evidence. Systematic review registration: https://www.crd.york.ac.uk/prospero/, identifier CRD42024501198.

Consumers' willingness to pay premium under the influence of consumer community culture: From the perspective of the content creator.

With the rise of live streaming commerce, the relationship between consumers and content creators on the short-video platforms has become closer, forming a peculiar culture and language in each consumer community, which promotes the short-video platforms to become a natural breeding ground for forming consumer communities. While such communities give birth to its own language and culture from the interaction between content creators and consumers, this kind of co-creation can not only enhance the consumers' trust to improve commodity premium space, but also strengthen the ties within the community and spread the information outside the communities, and consequently, expand community scale. Based on the view of the value co-creation from the language and culture among content creators and consumers in the communities, this study starts from the point of product type, employs consumers' Willingness to pay premium (WoPP) as a proxy variable of brand advocacy in the co-creation of cultural and language values in consumer communities, and conducts three single-factor experiments between two groups. By analyzing the experimental results, this study identified the influence under the potential relationship mechanism, social comparison, and found another variable that can moderate the relationship, consumer trust, portrays the relationship between the product types of the live streaming commerce and the consumers' WoPP, and explores the mediating effect of social comparison and the moderate effect of consumer trust effect. This paper also analyzes and discusses the WoPP caused by the co-creation of cultural and language values co-created by creators and consumer communities.