Quantitative Evaluation of the Substantially Variable Morphology and Function of the Left Atrial Appendage and Its Relation with Adjacent Structures.

Objective: To investigate quantitatively the morphology, anatomy and function of the left atrial appendage (LAA) and its relation with adjacent structures.

Materials And Methods: A total of 860 patients (533 men, 62.0%, age 55.

Symptomatic intracranial vertebral artery atherosclerotic stenosis (≥70%) with concurrent contralateral vertebral atherosclerotic diseases in 88 patients treated with the intracranial stenting.

Purpose: To investigate the safety, effect and instent restenosis rate of Wingspan stenting in treating patients with intracranial vertebral artery atherosclerotic stenosis (70-99%) concurrent with contralateral vertebral artery atherosclerotic diseases.

Materials And Methods: Eighty-eight patients with severe symptomatic intracranial vertebral artery atherosclerotic stenosis (≥70%) combined with contralateral vertebral artery atherosclerotic diseases were treated with the Wingpsan stent. All the baseline, cerebral angiography, success rate, perioperative complications, clinical and imaging follow-up data were prospectively analyzed.

Clinical Implantation with the novel D-13 prosthesis for inguinal hernioplasty: A retrospective cohort study.

Introduction: Using a mesh to repair inguinal hernias is now a standard procedure that is widely accepted as superior to primary suture repair. Although a variety of meshes are available, individual meshes may have their own unattractive features. This retrospective study examines the efficacy of our originally designed D-13 prosthesis, which is used in patients with inguinal hernias.

Resveratrol synergistically augments anti-tumor effect of 5-FU in vitro and in vivo by increasing S-phase arrest and tumor apoptosis.

Many studies have shown that natural dietary agents, in combination with chemical agents, can improve the therapeutic response of cancers to chemotherapy and reduce the associated side-effects. In the present study, we investigated the therapeutic potential and mechanisms of anticancer effects for the combination of 5-fluorouracil (5-FU) and resveratrol (Res). In these studies, we employed the cancer cell lines TE-1 and A431 and an animal model of skin cancer.

N-terminal pro-brain natriuretic peptide and cardiac troponin I for the prognostic utility in elderly patients with severe sepsis or septic shock in intensive care unit: A retrospective study.

Backgrounds: Using biomarkers to predict mortality in patient with severe sepsis or septic shock is of importance, as these patients frequently have high mortality and unsatisfied outcome. N-terminal pro-brain natriuretic peptide (NT-proBNP) and cardiac troponin I (cTnI) play extremely important roles in prognostic value in the mortality of severe sepsis and septic shock.

Aims: The present study was retrospectively designed to evaluate the predicting mortality of NT-proBNP and cTnI in elderly patients with severe sepsis or septic shock administered in the intensive care unit (ICU) and also to evaluate whether the predicting ability of Acute Physiology and Chronic Health Evaluation II (APACHE-II) score or C-reactive protein (CRP) was increased in combination with the biomarkers.

Microcatheter looping facilitates access to both the acutely angled parent artery and cerebral aneurysms for effective embolization.

Aneurysms with an acutely angled parent artery are difficult to access for coiling. This study aimed to investigate the safety and effectiveness of microcatheter looping for embolization of cerebral aneurysms with access difficulty. Ten patients (male:female=5:5) with cerebral aneurysms treated with the microcatheter looping technique were analyzed retrospectively.

The stent-assisted coil-jailing technique facilitates efficient embolization of tiny cerebral aneurysms.

Objective: Tiny cerebral aneurysms are difficult to embolize because the aneurysm's sac is too small for a single small coil, and coils within the aneurysm may escape from the confinement of a stent. This study was performed to introduce the stent-assisted coil-jailing technique and to investigate its effect on the coil embolization of tiny intracranial aneurysms.

Materials And Methods: Sixteen patients with tiny intracranial aneurysms treated with the stent-assisted coil-jailing technique between January 2011 and December 2013 were retrospectively reviewed and followed-up.

The clinical absolute and relative scoring system-a quantitative scale measuring myasthenia gravis severity and outcome used in the traditional Chinese medicine.

Myasthenia gravis (MG) is a chronic autoimmune disease caused by autoantigen against the nicotine acetylcholine receptor at the neuromuscular junction. With modern treatment facilities, the treatment effect and outcome for MG has been greatly improved with MG and non-MG patients enjoying the same life expectancy. Many classifications of disease distribution and severity have been set up and tested all over the world, mainly in the western world.

Shenqi fuzheng injection alleviates the transient worsening caused by steroids pulse therapy in treating myasthenia gravis.

Purpose. To evaluate the treatment effect and side effect of Shenqi Fuzheng Injection (SFI) on alleviating transient worsening of myasthenia gravis (MG) symptoms caused by high-dose steroids pulse therapy. Methods.