Background: This systematic review was aimed to evaluate the efficacy and safety of cupping therapy for treating patients with knee osteoarthritis (KOA). Methods: The following databases were searched from their inception until June 2017: the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, PubMed, EMBASE, and 4 Chinese databases (Wan Fang Data, Chinese Biomedical Literature Database (CBM), VeiPu, and China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI)). Randomized controlled trials (RCTs) assessing the effects of cupping therapy on KOA were included in this systematic review. A quantitative synthesis of the RCTs was conducted using RevMan 5.3 software. Study selection and data extraction and validation were performed independently by 2 reviewers. Cochrane criteria for risk of bias were used to assess the methodological quality of the trials. Results: A total of 5 studies met our inclusion criteria. We analyzed the data from these 5 RCTs involving 535 participants. All included studies were judged to be at high risk for bias. Dry cupping therapy plus Western medicine therapy was more effective than Western therapy alone in reducing the pain scores (mean difference (MD) = -1.79, 95% confidence interval (CI) -2.40 to -1.18; p < 0.01). In addition, the study participants in the dry cupping therapy plus Western medicine therapy group showed significantly greater improvements in the pain (MD = -0.73, 95% CI -1.61 to -0.41; p < 0.01), stiffness (MD = -0.94, 95% CI -1.30 to -0.58; p < 0.01), and physical function (MD = -10.07, 95% CI -13.45 to -6.69; p < 0.01) domains of the Western Ontario and McMaster Universities Osteoarthritis Index (WOMAC) compared to participants in the Western medicine therapy group. Moreover, when compared with Western medicine therapy alone, a meta-analysis of 4 RCTs suggested statistically significant favorable effects of wet cupping therapy plus Western medicine on the Lequesne Algofunctional Index (LAI) (MD = -3.44, 95% CI -4.21 to -2.68; p < 0.01). Conclusion: There is weak evidence to support the hypothesis that cupping therapy has beneficial effects on reducing the pain intensity and improving the physical function in patients with KOA.
Postoperative sleep disturbance and fatigue following radical mastectomy were high risks for prolonged convalescence in patients with breast cancer. The present study was designed to observe the effect of intraoperative use of dexmedetomidine on postoperative sleep, fatigue and recovery following radical mastectomy under general anesthesia. Forty-seven patients were randomized into two groups that were maintained with propofol/remifentanil/Ringer’s solution (Control group), or propofol/remifentanil/Dexmedetomidine (DEX group) for surgery under general anesthesia. During the first night following surgery, patients receiving dexmedetomine spent more time sleeping when compared with those form the Control group. During the first week following operation, when compared with the Control group, patients from the DEX group had a higher score of global 40-item recovery questionnaire on day 3 following operation, and lower 9-question fatigue severity scores on day 3 and day 7 following operation. In conclusion, intraoperative use of dexmedetomidine is sufficient to improve postoperative sleep disorder, promote postoperative recovery. The adverse effect of dexmedetomidine on sleep disturbance might be contributed to its recovery-promoting effect.
Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer-related death worldwide. MicroRNAs (miRNAs) in circulating small extracellular vesicles (sEVs) have been suggested to be potential biomarkers for cancer diagnosis. The present study was designed to explore whether plasma-derived sEV miRNAs could be utilized as diagnostic biomarkers for differentiating between early-stage small cell lung cancer (SCLC) and early-stage non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). We compared the miRNA profiles of plasma-derived sEVs from healthy individuals, patients with early-stage SCLC and patients with early-stage NSCLC. Next-generation sequencing was used to screen for differentially expressed miRNAs (DEMs). Gene ontology (GO) and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) pathway analyses were used to predict the potential functions of these DEMs. Weighted gene coexpression network analysis (WGCNA) was used to identify the different pathology-related miRNA modules. We found that 22 DEMs were significantly different among healthy individuals, patients with early-stage SCLC, and patients with early-stage NSCLC. We selected six representative DEMs for validation by qRT‒PCR, which confirmed that miRNA-483-3p derived from plasma sEVs could be used as a potential biomarker for the diagnosis of early-stage SCLC, miRNA-152-3p and miRNA-1277-5p could be used for the diagnosis of early-stage NSCLC respectively.
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