Int J Med Sci
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Modern medical imaging facilitates the diagnosis and treatment of human diseases. However, few people are aware of the cons of radiation exposure from medical imaging. Emerging evidence reveals that cumulative doses of radiation exposure will increase the morbidity and mortality of pertaining cancer. ⋯ Accumulating evidence highlights reduced cancer risks of radiation exposure for AIS patients with low/zero radiation imaging modalities proposed, amongst which easy conversion from anterior-posterior (AP) to posterior-anterior (PA) projection for whole-spine radiographs should be stressed. It can greatly reduce radiation doses without compromising the quality of diagnostic imaging. Tight collimation combined with PA projection can further reduce radiation harms, and need to be spread to benefit people globally.
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Meta Analysis Comparative Study
Catheter Ablation Compared with Medical Therapy for Atrial Fibrillation with Heart Failure: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis of Randomized Controlled Trials.
Background: The optimal strategy for patients with coexisting atrial fibrillation (AF) and heart failure (HF) was not settled. Our purpose was to conduct a systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials to evaluate the effect of catheter ablation compared with medical therapy for AF on mortality, HF hospitalization, left ventricular (LV) function, and quality of life among patients with HF and AF. Materials and Methods: We searched Pubmed (1966 to September 20, 2019), EMBASE (1966 to September 20, 2019), the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (CENTRAL), and ClinicalTrials.gov for randomized controlled trials with a comparison of catheter ablation for AF with medical therapy among patients with coexisting AF and HF. ⋯ Our final analysis included 6 randomized control trials with 775 patients. Results: Pooled results from the random-effects model showed that compared with medical therapy for AF, catheter ablation was associated with reduced all-cause mortality (RR 0.52, 95%Cl, 0.35 to 0.76) and HF hospitalization (RR 0.56, 95%Cl, 0.44 to 0.71), as well as increased LV ejection fraction (LVEF), distance walked in six minutes, and improvements in quality of life. Conclusions: This updated meta-analysis showed that compared to medical therapy, catheter ablation for AF was associated with significant benefits in several key clinical and biomarker endpoints, including reductions in all-cause mortality and HF hospitalization.
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Traditional drugs are facing bottlenecks of lower solubility, absorption, and especially the inefficient organs or cells targeting during the precision medicine era. It is urgently needed to discover and establish new methods or strategies to modify old drugs or create new ones against the above defects. With the support of nanotechnology, the solubility, absorption and targeting of traditional drugs were greatly improved by modifying and fabricating with various types of nanoparticles to some extent, though many shortages remain. In this mini-review we will focus on advances in several most commonly used nanoparticles, from their nature and design, to drug delivery system and clinical application, that they overcome heterogeneous barriers in precision medicine, thereby ultimately improve patient outcome overall.
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Long non-coding RNAs (LncRNAs) act as regulators and play important roles in a variety of biological processes. These regulators constitute a huge information network among genes and participate in the pathophysiological process of human diseases. Increasing evidence has demonstrated that LncRNA, as an oncogene or tumor suppressor gene, is closely related to the occurrence and development of tumors. ⋯ Moreover, its genetic polymorphism is believed to affect the susceptibility of a population to the corresponding cancer species. This article summarizes the role of Linc00673 in different human cancers and its molecular mechanisms with a focus on the characteristics of Linc00673 and the existing literature on it while highlighting the future research directions for Linc00673. Linc00673 has the potential to become a feasible clinical diagnostic and prognostic marker toward providing a new molecular therapeutic target for cancer patients.
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Lung disorders are a leading cause of morbidity and death worldwide. For many disease conditions, no effective and curative treatment options are available. Mesenchymal stromal cell (MSC)-based therapy is one of the cutting-edge topics in medical research today. ⋯ In particular, a total of 110 MSC-based clinical applications, either completed clinical trials with safety and early efficacy results reported or ongoing worldwide clinical trials of pulmonary diseases, are systematically summarized following preferred reporting items for systematic reviews and meta-analyses (PRISMA) guidelines, including acute/viral pulmonary disease, community-acquired pneumonia (CAP), chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), bronchopulmonary dysplasia (BPD), interstitial lung diseases (ILD), chronic pulmonary fibrosis, bronchiolitis obliterans syndrome (BOS) and lung cancer. The results of recent clinical studies suggest that MSCs are a promising therapeutic approach for the treatment of lung diseases. Nevertheless, large-scale clinical trials and evaluation of long-term effects are necessary in further studies.