Citations of microRNA Biomarker Articles That Were Retracted: A Systematic Review.

Importance: Retraction is a tool that journals can use to deter research misconduct and alert their audience to erroneous content published in the journals. However, retracted articles may continue to damage science if they are still cited as legitimate articles.

Objective: To characterize patterns of postretraction citations, particularly in microRNA biomarker research, a field with one of the highest rates of retraction.

The efficacy of Chinese herbal drugs for adults with angina pectoris: Bayesian network meta-analysis of 331 RCTs involving 36,467 individuals.

Ethnopharmacological Relevance: Hundreds of randomized controlled trials (RCT) on Chinese herbal drugs (CHDs) including Shexiang baoxin pill (BXP), compound Danshen dripping pill (DSP), compound Danshen tablet (DST), Suxiao jiuxin pill (JXP), Naoxintong capsule (NXT), Tongxinluo capsule (TXL), and Di'ao xinxuekang capsule (XXK) and conventional chemical drugs, such as isosorbide dinitrate (ISDN), for angina pectoris are available but have not been evaluated by a PRISMA-compliant network meta-analysis (NMA).

Aim Of The Study: This study aimed to compare the efficacy of nine anti-anginal drugs through NMA on RCTs.

Methods: RCTs of drug treatment for adult patients with angina pectoris for improvements in symptoms and electrocardiography were retrieved.

How efficacious are traditional Chinese medicine injections in treating angina pectoris? A network meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials.

Ethnopharmacological Relevance: Over 50 million adults in China suffer from angina pectoris, which are often treated with traditional Chinese medicine injections (TCMIs). However, the efficacies of TCMIs and conventional drugs as determined by randomized controlled trials (RCTs) were not rigorously compared with one another by network meta-analysis (NMA). This PRISMA-compliant NMA aimed to compare the efficacy and assess the evidence strengths of 24 TCMIs in treating adults with angina pectoris of RCTs.

MicroRNA biomarkers of type 2 diabetes: evidence synthesis from meta-analyses and pathway modelling.

Aims/hypothesis: MicroRNAs are being sought as biomarkers for the early identification of type 2 diabetes. This study aimed to synthesise the evidence from microRNA-type 2 diabetes association studies and microRNA-regulated type 2 diabetes pathway delineation studies that met stringent quality criteria to identify and validate microRNAs of both statistical and biological significance as type 2 diabetes biomarkers.

Methods: Eligible controlled studies on microRNA expression profiling of type 2 diabetes were retrieved from PubMed, ScienceDirect and Web of Science.

Big Data Reality Check (BDRC) for public health: to what extent the environmental health and health services research did meet the 'V' criteria for big data? A study protocol.

Introduction: Big data technologies have been talked up in the fields of science and medicine. The V-criteria (volume, variety, velocity and veracity, etc) for defining big data have been well-known and even quoted in most research articles; however, big data research into public health is often misrepresented due to certain common misconceptions. Such misrepresentations and misconceptions would mislead study designs, research findings and healthcare decision-making.

Putative Factors Interfering Cell Cycle Re-Entry in Alzheimer's Disease: An Omics Study with Differential Expression Meta-Analytics and Co-Expression Profiling.

Background: Neuronal cell cycle re-entry (CCR) is a mechanism, along with amyloid-β (Aβ) oligomers and hyperphosphorylated tau proteins, contributing to toxicity in Alzheimer's disease (AD).

Objective: This study aimed to examine the putative factors in CCR based on evidence corroboration by combining meta-analysis and co-expression analysis of omic data.

Methods: The differentially expressed genes (DEGs) and CCR-related modules were obtained through the differential analysis and co-expression of transcriptomic data, respectively.

Comparative efficacy of single-inhaler triple therapies for COPD: A protocol for systematic review and network meta-analysis.

Introduction: 2021 Global Initiative for Chronic Obstructive Lung Disease (GOLD) Reports recommends that patients with clinically significant symptoms and exacerbations of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) should escalate to triple therapy, a combined use of inhaled corticosteroids (ICS), long-acting muscarinic antagonists (LAMA) and long-acting b2-agonists (LABA)(ICS/LAMA/LABA). Triple therapy in fixed-dose combinations (FDCs), i.e.

Prediction of differentially expressed microRNAs in blood as potential biomarkers for Alzheimer's disease by meta-analysis and adaptive boosting ensemble learning.

Background: Blood circulating microRNAs that are specific for Alzheimer's disease (AD) can be identified from differentially expressed microRNAs (DEmiRNAs). However, non-reproducible and inconsistent reports of DEmiRNAs hinder biomarker development. The most reliable DEmiRNAs can be identified by meta-analysis.

MicroRNA biomarkers of type 2 diabetes: A protocol for corroborating evidence by computational genomics and meta-analyses.

Background: Few microRNAs were found consistently dysregulated in type 2 diabetes (T2D) that would gain confidence from Big Pharma to develop diagnostic or therapeutic biomarkers. This study aimed to corroborate evidence from eligible microRNAs-T2D association studies according to stringent quality criteria covering both biological and statistical significance in T2D for biomarker development.

Methods And Analyses: Controlled microRNA expression profiling studies on human with T2D will be retrieved from PubMed, ScienceDirect, and Embase for selecting the statistically significant microRNAs according to pre-specified search strategies and inclusion criteria.

MEPHAS: an interactive graphical user interface for medical and pharmaceutical statistical analysis with R and Shiny.

Background: Even though R is one of the most commonly used statistical computing environments, it lacks a graphical user interface (GUI) that appeals to students, researchers, lecturers, and practitioners in medicine and pharmacy for conducting standard data analytics. Current GUIs built on top of R, such as EZR and R-Commander, aim to facilitate R coding and visualization, but most of the functionalities are still accessed through a command-line interface (CLI). To assist practitioners of medicine and pharmacy and researchers to run most routines in fundamental statistical analysis, we developed an interactive GUI; i.

A Systematic Bioinformatics Workflow With Meta-Analytics Identified Potential Pathogenic Factors of Alzheimer's Disease.

Potential pathogenic factors, other than well-known , , and , can be further identified from transcriptomics studies of differentially expressed genes (DEGs) that are specific for Alzheimer's disease (AD), but findings are often inconsistent or even contradictory. Evidence corroboration by combining meta-analysis and bioinformatics methods may help to resolve existing inconsistencies and contradictions. This study aimed to demonstrate a systematic workflow for evidence synthesis of transcriptomic studies using both meta-analysis and bioinformatics methods to identify potential pathogenic factors.

Identification of certain Panax species to be potential substitutes for Panax notoginseng in hemostatic treatments.

Panax notoginseng (Burkill) F. H. Chen ex C.

Identification of Potential MicroRNA Biomarkers by Meta-analysis.

Meta-analysis statistically assesses the results (e.g., effect sizes) across independent studies that are conducted in accordance with similar protocols and objectives.

Building Molecular Interaction Networks from Microarray Data for Drug Target Screening.

Potential drug targets for the disease treatment can be identified from microarray studies on differential gene expression of patients and healthy participants. Here, we describe a method to use the information of differentially expressed (DE) genes obtained from microarray studies to build molecular interaction networks for identification of pivotal molecules as potential drug targets. The quality control and normalization of the microarray data are conducted with R packages simpleaffy and affy, respectively.

How Efficacious is Danshen (Salvia miltiorrhiza) Dripping Pill in Treating Angina Pectoris? Evidence Assessment for Meta-Analysis of Randomized Controlled Trials.

Background: More than 230 randomized controlled trials (RCTs) of danshen dripping pill (DSP) and isosorbide dinitrate (ISDN) in treating angina pectoris after the first preferred reporting items for systematic reviews and meta-analyses-compliant comprehensive meta-analysis were published in 2010. Other meta-analyses had flaws in study selection, statistical meta-analysis, and evidence assessment. This study completed the meta-analysis with an extensive assessment of the evidence.

Is self-monitoring of blood glucose effective in improving glycaemic control in type 2 diabetes without insulin treatment: a meta-analysis of randomised controlled trials.

Objective: The present study aimed to verify the effectiveness of self-monitoring of blood glucose (SMBG) in patients with non-insulin-treated type 2 diabetes (T2D).

Methods: A comprehensive literature search was conducted in PubMed, Cochrane Library, Web of Science, ScienceDirect and ClinicalTrials.gov from their respective inception dates to 26 October 2015.

Comparative efficacy of selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRI) in treating major depressive disorder: a protocol for network meta-analysis of randomised controlled trials.

Introduction: There have been inconsistent findings from randomised controlled trials (RCTs) and systematic reviews on the efficacies of selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) as the first-line treatment of major depressive disorder (MDD). Besides inconsistencies among randomised controlled trials (RCTs), their risks of bias and evidence grading have seldom been evaluated in meta-analysis. This study aims to compare the efficacy of SSRIs by conducting a Bayesian network meta-analysis, which will be the most comprehensive evaluation of evidence to resolve the inconsistency among previous studies.

Ligand-based virtual screening and inductive learning for identification of SIRT1 inhibitors in natural products.

Sirtuin 1 (SIRT1) is a nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide-dependent deacetylase, and its dysregulation can lead to ageing, diabetes, and cancer. From 346 experimentally confirmed SIRT1 inhibitors, an inhibitor structure pattern was generated by inductive logic programming (ILP) with DMax Chemistry Assistant software. The pattern contained amide, amine, and hetero-aromatic five-membered rings, each of which had a hetero-atom and an unsubstituted atom at a distance of 2.

Comparative Efficacy of Tongxinluo Capsule and Beta-Blockers in Treating Angina Pectoris: Meta-Analysis of Randomized Controlled Trials.

Objective: There have been no systematic reviews, let alone meta-analyses, of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) comparing tongxinluo capsule (TXL) and beta-blockers in treating angina pectoris. This study aimed to evaluate the efficacy of TXL and beta-blockers in treating angina pectoris by a meta-analysis of eligible RCTs.

Methods: The RCTs comparing TXL with beta-blockers (including metoprolol) in treating angina pectoris were searched and retrieved from databases including PubMed, Chinese National Knowledge Infrastructure, and WanFang Data.

Glycaemic control efficacy of oral antidiabetic drugs in treating type 2 diabetes: a protocol for network meta-analysis.

Introduction: Past studies of network meta-analysis focused on evaluating drug combinations in treating type 2 diabetes but not on evaluating antidiabetic drugs in monotherapy. Clinical guidelines (eg, NICE (National Institute of Health and Care Excellence) clinical guidelines 66 and 87) were based only on the findings of individual clinical trials and pairwise meta-analysis in evaluating monotherapy. This study aims to fill this gap of research by conducting a Bayesian network meta-analysis to compare major antidiabetic drugs, including metformin, glimepiride, glyburide, glipizide, repaglinide, nateglinide, sitagliptin, vildagliptin, saxagliptin and SGLT-2 (sodium-glucose transporter-2) inhibitors.

Identification of microRNA biomarkers in type 2 diabetes: a meta-analysis of controlled profiling studies.

Aims/hypothesis: The aim was to identify potential microRNA (miRNA) biomarkers of type 2 diabetes.

Methods: Controlled studies were retrieved from PubMed to compare miRNA expression profiles of type 2 diabetes and nondiabetic control samples. Meta-analysis under a random effects model was conducted.

Drug efficacy in treating stable angina pectoris: a protocol for network meta-analysis of randomised controlled trials.

Introduction: There were 11 pairwise meta-analysis on the efficacy of β-blockers (including atenolol, propranolol, bisoprolol, metoprolol and nadolol), calcium channel blockers (including amlodipine, diltiazem, felodipine, nifedipine and verapamil), and nitrates (including isosorbide dinitrate, isosorbide mononitrate and nitroglycerin) in treating stable angina pectoris. No network meta-analytic study has been published to evaluate the efficacies of these antianginal drugs. Current clinical guidelines (eg, National Institute of Health and Care Excellence (NICE) clinical guideline 126) are only based on the findings of limited clinical trials and pairwise meta-analysis.

The efficacy of dapagliflozin combined with hypoglycaemic drugs in treating type 2 diabetes mellitus: meta-analysis of randomised controlled trials.

Objectives: This meta-analysis aimed to evaluate whether dapagliflozin is synergistic with other antidiabetic drugs without body weight gain.

Setting: Randomised controlled trial (RCT) reports were retrieved from PubMed, Cochrane Library, EMBASE, ClinicalTrials.gov, Google Scholar and Google.

Transcriptome analysis in venom gland of the predatory giant ant Dinoponera quadriceps: insights into the polypeptide toxin arsenal of hymenopterans.

Background: Dinoponera quadriceps is a predatory giant ant that inhabits the Neotropical region and subdues its prey (insects) with stings that deliver a toxic cocktail of molecules. Human accidents occasionally occur and cause local pain and systemic symptoms. A comprehensive study of the D.