Advancements in minimally invasive surgery for adolescent idiopathic scoliosis: A case series and literature review.

Objectives: Minimally invasive surgery (MIS) has emerged as a promising alternative to conventional open techniques in the management of adolescent idiopathic scoliosis (AIS).

Materials And Methods: This study presents a case series of six patients who underwent MIS for AIS at a spine center, employing a synergistic blend of intraoperative fluoroscopy, cone-beam computed tomography scans, and three-dimensional navigation technology. The surgical procedures were meticulously guided, with a focus on ensuring safety and precision in posterior pedicle fixation.

Revealing the catalytic oxidation mechanism of CO on α-FeO surfaces: an thermodynamic study.

Significant research efforts have been devoted to improving the efficiency of catalytic carbon monoxide (CO) oxidation over α-FeO-based catalysts, but details of the underlying mechanism are still under debate. Here we apply the thermodynamic method (AITM) within the density functional theory framework to investigate the phase diagram of α-FeO(0001) surfaces with various terminations and the catalytic mechanism of CO oxidation on these surfaces. By extending the conventional AITM to consider the charge state of surface defects, we build the phase diagram of α-FeO(0001) surfaces in relation to the Fermi energy as well as the oxygen chemical potential, which makes it possible to explain the influence of point defects on the surface morphology and to predict the existence of the experimentally observed functional sites such as the ferryl group (FeO) and oxygen vacancies.

Evaluation of the Effect of Momelotinib on Cardiac Repolarization: A Thorough QT Study.

A randomized, partially blinded, placebo-controlled, crossover study in 48 healthy adults assessed the effect of momelotinib on the heart rate-corrected QT interval (QTc) using the Fridericia formula (QTcF). QTc was evaluated for momelotinib 200 mg (therapeutic dose), momelotinib 800 mg (supratherapeutic dose), moxifloxacin 400 mg (positive control), and placebo. Pharmacokinetic profiles of momelotinib and its active metabolite M21 were evaluated.

Effectiveness of app-based cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia on preventing major depressive disorder in youth with insomnia and subclinical depression: A randomized clinical trial.

Background: Increasing evidence suggests that insomnia plays an important role in the development of depression, supporting insomnia intervention as a promising approach to prevent depression in youth. This randomized controlled trial evaluated the effectiveness of app-based cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia (CBT-I) in preventing future onset of major depressive disorder (MDD) in youth.

Methods And Findings: This was a randomized, assessor-blind, parallel group-controlled trial in Chinese youth (aged 15-25 years) with insomnia disorder and subclinical depressive symptoms.

Assessment of psychological health effects of nurses during 2022-2023 of the COVID-19 pandemic: a descriptive study in Southern Taiwan.

Background: Nurses on the frontlines of the pandemic have increased workloads, burnout, and virus exposure, leading to mental health challenges and a lack of resources for patient care. Mental health support for nurses during the COVID-19 outbreak has become a priority. This study evaluated psychological health outcomes of among nurses during the 2022-2023 COVID-19 pandemic in Taiwan, focusing on personal and work-related fatigue as key contributors to emotional distress.

Antibody-drug conjugates targeting SSEA-4 inhibits growth and migration of SSEA-4 positive breast cancer cells.

Although breast cancer treatment has evolved significantly in recent years, drug resistance remains a major challenge. To identify new targets for breast cancer, we found that stage-specific embryonic antigen 4 (SSEA-4) is expressed in all subtypes of breast cancer cell lines, and the increased expression of the associated enzymes β3GalT5 and ST3Gal2 correlates with poor recurrence-free survival (RFS) in breast cancer. We also found that SSEA-4 antibodies can be rapidly internalized into breast cancer cells, a property that makes SSEA-4 an attractive target for antibody-drug conjugates (ADCs).

Excessive Initial Renal Function Decline Following Sodium-Glucose Cotransporter-2 Inhibitor Treatment Predicts Major Adverse Cardiorenal Outcomes.

Objective: To investigate how estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) decline following sodium-glucose cotransporter-2 inhibitors (SGLT2i) initiation predicts long-term cardiorenal outcomes.

Methods: From 2016 to 2020, a longitudinal cohort of 4942 diabetic patients treated with SGLT2i were enrolled and followed until December 2021. Patients were categorized into mild (≤30%), moderate (>30%∼≤40%) and severe (>40%) decline groups by the maximal eGFR change between 2 to 12 weeks after SGLT2i treatment.

α-Ketoglutarate dehydrogenase is a therapeutic vulnerability in acute myeloid leukemia.

Perturbations in intermediary metabolism contribute to the pathogenesis of acute myeloid leukemia (AML) and can produce therapeutically actionable dependencies. Here, we probed whether alpha-ketoglutarate (aKG) metabolism represents a specific vulnerability in AML. Using functional genomics, metabolomics, and mouse models, we identified the aKG dehydrogenase complex, which catalyzes the conversion of aKG to succinyl CoA, as a molecular dependency across multiple models of adverse-risk AML.

Histamine N-methyltransferase (HNMT) as a potential auxiliary biomarker for predicting adaptability to anti-HER2 drug treatment in breast cancer patients.

Background: Up to 23% of breast cancer patients recurred within a decade after trastuzumab treatment. Conversely, one trial found that patients with low HER2 expression and metastatic breast cancer had a positive response to trastuzumab-deruxtecan (T-Dxd). This indicates that relying solely on HER2 as a single diagnostic marker to predict the efficacy of anti-HER2 drugs is insufficient.

Blood eosinophil count and treatment patterns of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease patients in South Korea using real-world data.

Background/aims: Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) management guidelines have increasingly emphasised the importance of exacerbation prevention, and the role of blood eosinophil count (BEC) as a biomarker for inhaled corticosteroids (ICS) response. This study aimed to describe the distribution and stability of BEC and understand real-world treatment patterns among COPD patients in South Korea.

Methods: This was a retrospective database analysis using data obtained from the KOrea COPD Subgroup Study (KOCOSS) registry between January 2012 and August 2018.

Medication Hazards and Outcome Patterns of Pediatric Drug-Associated Liver Injury in Taiwan: An Analysis of 1998-2017 Spontaneous Adverse Drug Reaction Reports.

Background And Objectives: Accumulating pediatric efficacy and safety data on drug use is inherently challenging yet essential. This study aimed to analyze the frequency and compute the odds of pediatric drug-associated liver injury across age groups (early childhood, middle childhood, and adolescence) and therapeutic categories using adverse drug reactions (ADRs) reporting data spanning nearly two decades.

Methods: We analyzed the reports of suspected ADRs occurring in children and adolescents in the Taiwan National Adverse Drug Reaction Reporting System during the period from May 1998 until July 2017.

Echocardiography interpretation training and internal medicine milestones: A pilot study.

Background/purpose: The competency-based Internal Medicine Milestones (IMM) assesses physician training outcomes through six key competencies. This pilot study introduced IMM concepts through an echocardiography report interpretation course for postgraduate students (PGYs) and residents (Rs). We aimed to help young physicians understand and track competency development as they receive cardiovascular training, with a view to expanding IMM usage for all junior physicians.

Multi-Omic Atlas reveals cytotoxic phenotype and ROS-linked metabolic quiescence as key features of CTL-resistant HIV-infected CD4 T-cells.

Cytotoxic T-lymphocytes (CTL) exert sustained pressure on reservoirs of HIV-infected cells that persist through years of antiretroviral therapy (ART). This selects for latently infected cells, but also potentially for cells that express HIV but possess intrinsic CTL resistance. We demonstrate that such resistance exists in HIV-infected CD4 T-cells that survive rigorous CTL attack and map CTL susceptibility to cell identities and states defined by single-cell multi-omics and functional metabolic profiling.

BACH2-driven tissue resident memory programs promote HIV-1 persistence.

Transcription repressor BACH2 redirects short-lived terminally differentiated effector into long-lived memory cells. We postulate that BACH2-mediated long-lived memory programs promote HIV-1 persistence in gut CD4+ T cells. We coupled single-cell DOGMA-seq and TREK-seq to capture chromatin accessibility, transcriptome, surface proteins, T cell receptor, HIV-1 DNA and HIV-1 RNA in 100,744 gut T cells from ten aviremic HIV-1+ individuals and five HIV-1- donors.

Biochemical dissection of a fungal highly reducing polyketide synthase condensing region reveals basis for acyl group selection.

Fungal highly reducing polyketide synthases (hrPKSs) are remarkable multidomain enzymes that catalyse the biosynthesis of a diverse range of structurally complex compounds. During biosynthesis, the ketosynthase (KS) and acyltransferase (AT) domains of the condensing region are visited by the acyl carrier protein (ACP) domain during every cycle, catalysing chain priming and elongation reactions. Despite their significance, our comprehension of how these steps contribute to biosynthetic fidelity remains poorly understood.

DOME: Directional medical embedding vectors from Electronic Health Records.

Motivation: The increasing availability of Electronic Health Record (EHR) systems has created enormous potential for translational research. Recent developments in representation learning techniques have led to effective large-scale representations of EHR concepts along with knowledge graphs that empower downstream EHR studies. However, most existing methods require training with patient-level data, limiting their abilities to expand the training with multi-institutional EHR data.

Molecular Hydrogen as a Potential Adjunctive Therapy to Improve Renal Function and Reduce Fatigue in an Elderly Patient With Chronic Comorbidities: A Case Report.

Background/aim: Hydrogen therapy has demonstrated potential as an antioxidant and anti-inflammatory intervention, particularly in the management of chronic diseases such as chronic kidney disease (CKD) and autoimmune conditions. This case report presents the possible therapeutic benefits of molecular hydrogen capsule treatment in enhancing renal function and alleviating chronic fatigue in an elderly female with coronary artery disease (CAD), type 2 diabetes mellitus (DM) complicated by nephropathy, and systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE). The aim of this study was to investigate the efficacy of adjunctive hydrogen therapy in an elderly patient with multiple chronic comorbidities.

Precision Assessment of Anti-NMDA Receptor Encephalitis: A Case Report on Integrating Clinical Course, Immunophenotyping, and Comprehensive Symptomatology in a Pediatric Patient With Adjunctive Hydrogen Therapy.

Background/aim: Anti-N-methyl-D-aspartate receptor (NMDAR) encephalitis, though rare, is the most common form of autoimmune encephalitis, predominantly affecting young individuals, particularly females. Standard treatments include corticosteroids, intravenous immunoglobulins (IVIG), and plasmapheresis, with rituximab recommended for those unresponsive to first-line therapies. However, reliable biomarkers for clinical assessment remain elusive.

SAM-dPCR: Accurate and Generalist Nuclei Acid Quantification Leveraging the Zero-Shot Segment Anything Model.

Digital PCR (dPCR) has transformed nucleic acid diagnostics by enabling the absolute quantification of rare mutations and target sequences. However, traditional dPCR detection methods, such as those involving flow cytometry and fluorescence imaging, may face challenges due to high costs, complexity, limited accuracy, and slow processing speeds. In this study, SAM-dPCR is introduced, a training-free open-source bioanalysis paradigm that offers swift and precise absolute quantification of biological samples.

Interferon-ε loss is elusive 9p21 link to immune-cold tumors, resistant to immune-checkpoint therapy and endogenous CXCL9/10 induction.

Introduction: Copy-number (CN) loss of chromosome 9p, or parts thereof, impair immune response and confer ICT resistance by direct elimination of immune-regulatory genes on this arm, notably IFNγ genes at 9p24.1, and type-I interferon (IFN-I) genes at 9p21.3.

Exploring the behavioural determinants of compliance in resilient high-caries-risk patients who improved caries severity.

Background: The caries severity in childhood may predict caries conditions in the future and even in adulthood in caries risk models. Nevertheless, the rate of recurrent caries after treatment of severe early childhood caries is high and correlated with behavioural factors, rather than clinical indicators. Compliance with the caries control programme has been demonstrated to prevent root caries development in head and neck cancer patients, suggesting that compliance with treatment protocols is a more important key to bringing about successful outcomes than treatment protocols themselves.

A Review of the Beetle Genus of Taiwan, with Description of a New Species (Coleoptera, Latridiidae).

The genus in Taiwan was previously known to contain three species, Johnson, Johnson, and (Fabricius). Johnson and Johnson are known from the Palearctic, and (Fabricius) is a cosmopolitan species. In this study, the genus in Taiwan is reviewed for the first time, with three species being recognized, including two recorded species, Johnson and Johnson, and a species new to science, sp.

Chatbot-Based Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Program for University Students With Depressive Symptoms: Intervention Development and Pilot Evaluation.

Background: Depression is a growing concern among university students. Chatbots provide flexible, accessible, personalized psychosocial support. Delivering Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) sessions via chatbots may reduce depressive symptoms in university students.