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Abstract. Homocysteine has been recognized as a risk factor for atherosclerosis and cardiovascular diseases. Adropin is a newly-identified energy homeostasis protein with a potential protective effect against coronary artery disease (CAD). This study attempted to measure the correlation between serum homocysteine and adropin levels in patients with CAD, and to ascertain how the two hormones could affect the severity of coronary atherosclerosis. A cohort of CAD patients who had undergone coronary angiography was prospectively recruited. The serum homocysteine and adropin levels of the patients were measured and the severity of coronary atherosclerosis was quantified with the SYNTAX score. The data were analyzed with a generalized structural equation model. In total, 170 consecutive patients were recruited with a mean serum homocysteine level of 15.9±8.3 µmol/l, and 76 (44.7%) patients were identified as hyperhomocysteinemic with a serum homocysteine level >15 µmol/l. Serum homocysteine level was found to be significantly negatively correlated with serum adropin level (r=-0.169, P=0.028). Patients with hyperhomocysteinemia had lower serum adropin levels and higher SYNTAX scores than patients without hyperhomocysteinemia. Further analysis with a generalized structural equation model showed that adropin was significantly associated with hyperhomocysteinemia (adjusted odds ratio: 0.95, 95% confidence interval: 0.93 to 0.98; P=0.002), which in turn was significantly associated with the SYNTAX score (coefficient: 4.71, 95% confidence interval: 1.39 to 8.03; P=0.005). In conclusion, the serum homocysteine level was inversely correlated with the serum adropin level in patients with CAD. A low serum adropin level was associated with hyperhomocysteinemia and more severe coronary atherosclerosis, as reflected by a higher SYNTAX score.

Background:The purpose of this systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) were to gather data to evaluate the efficacy and safety of topical tranexamic acid (TXA) versus intravenous (IV) TXA for blood loss after a total knee arthroplasty (TKA).Methods:Electronic databases: Pubmed, Web of Science, Cochrane library, and Embase from inception to June 2016 were searched. RCTs that comparing topical with IV TXA for blood loss control in patients prepared for TKA were included in this meta-analysis. The Cochrane risk of bias tool was used to appraise risk of bias. The primary outcomes were needed for transfusion, total blood loss, and blood loss in drainage. Secondary outcomes are hemoglobin (Hb) value at 24-hour post TKA and complication (deep venous thrombosis [DVT] and infection). The efficacy of blood loss was tested by total blood loss, drainage volume, Hb drop, and the Hb value at 24 hours after TKA. The safety was measured by the occurrence of DVT and infection. Continuous outcomes were expressed as the mean difference with the respective 95% confidence intervals (CIs). Discontinuous outcomes were expressed as the relative risk with 95% CIs. Stata 12.0 software (Stata Corp., College Station, TX) was used for the meta-analysis.Results:A total of 14 articles involving 1390 patients were finally included for this meta-analysis. The pooled results revealed that there were no significant difference between the need for transfusion, total blood loss, blood loss in drainage, Hb value at 24-hour post TKA, the occurrence of complications (infection and DVT) between topical administration of TXA and IV TXA.Conclusion:Topical TXA has similar efficacy for blood loss control to IV TXA without sacrificing safety in TKA. However, the dose of topical TXA and IV TXA is different, thus, optimal timing and dose of TXA are still needed to explore the maximum effect of TXA.

Background:In the current meta-analysis, we aim to assess the effect of high-sensitive C-reactive protein (hs-CRP) on in-stent restenosis (ISR) outcome in patients receiving stent implantation.Methods:Embase, PubMed, and Cochrane databases were searched through October 2016 using the keywords “high-sensitive C-reactive protein,” “in-stent restenosis.” An odds ratio (OR) of on ISR endpoints among patients receiving stent implantation was calculated using random-effects models.Results:In the meta-analysis of 6 prospective observational studies, there are 1156 coronary heart disease (CHD) patients, a total of 885 stents were implanted and 194 ISR events had been followed up for 6 to 12 months; high-sensitive C-reactive protein levels are associated with the prediction of in-stent restenosis among patients receiving stent implantation. The OR of hs-CRP for ISR was 1.16 [95% confidence interval (CI), 1.01–1.30, P < .05].Conclusions:This meta-analysis shows that higher levels of hs-CRP are associated with an increased risk of ISR and indicate a poorer prognosis in CHD patients after stent implantation.

Like clustering analysis, community detection aims at assigning nodes in a network into different communities. Fdp is a recently proposed density-based clustering algorithm which does not need the number of clusters as prior input and the result is insensitive to its parameter. However, Fdp cannot be directly applied to community detection due to its inability to recognize the community centers in the network. To solve the problem, a new community detection method (named IsoFdp) is proposed in this paper. First, we use Isomap technique to map the network data into a low dimensional manifold which can reveal diverse pair-wised similarity. Then Fdp is applied to detect the communities in networks. An improved partition density function is proposed to select the proper number of communities automatically. We test our method on both synthetic and real-world networks, and the results demonstrate the effectiveness of our algorithm over the state-of-the-art methods.

Background and Purpose— CLEC-2 (C-type lectin-like receptor 2) is a C-type lectin receptor highly expressed on platelets with the prominent involvement in platelet activation, which was increased in coronary heart disease. Given the role of platelet activation in ischemic stroke and the connections between coronary heart disease and ischemic stroke, CLEC-2 might be a candidate marker of ischemic stroke. Here, we aimed to examine the prognostic significance of CLEC-2 in patients with acute ischemic stroke (AIS). Methods— Three hundred fifty-two patients with AIS within 7 days and 112 healthy controls were prospectively studied. Plasma CLEC-2 (pCLEC-2) and some conventional risk factors of stroke were examined. Stroke progression was defined as any new neurological symptoms/signs or any neurological worsening within 7 days after stroke onset, and poor prognosis was defined as modified Rankin Scale scores >2 at 90 days. The association between pCLEC-2 and stroke progression/prognosis was evaluated using regression models. Results— Patients with AIS had a significantly higher level of pCLEC-2 than that of healthy controls ( P <0.05). Patients with AIS with progressive stroke or poor prognosis had a much higher level of pCLEC-2 compared with those with stable stroke or good prognosis (all P <0.05). Increasing pCLEC-2 was significantly associated with an increased risk of stroke progression (odds ratio, 1.97; 95% CI, 1.11–3.50; P =0.021) and poor prognosis (odds ratio, 1.70; 95% CI, 1.17–2.48; P =0.006). Patients with the highest pCLEC-2 level were 7- to 8-fold more likely to have stroke progression compared with the lowest quartile (odds ratio, 7.69; 95% CI, 1.43–41.41). Patients with the highest pCLEC-2 level were also more likely to have poor prognosis at 90 days (odds ratio, 5.58; 95% CI, 1.76–17.68). The optimal cutoff points of pCLEC-2 for predicting stroke progression and poor prognosis were 235.48 and 207.08 pg/mL, respectively. Conclusions— Increased pCLEC-2 was associated with stroke progression and poor prognosis at 90 days significantly, which indicates the prognostic role of pCLEC-2 in AIS. However, it needs to be confirmed in large-scale studies.

Analyzing social systems, particularly financial markets, using a complex network approach has become one of the most popular fields within econophysics. A similar trend is currently appearing within the econometrics and finance communities, as well. In this study, we present a state-of-the-art method for analyzing the structure and risk within stock markets, treating them as complex networks using model-free, nonlinear dependency measures based on information theory. This study is the first network analysis of the stock market in Shanghai using a nonlinear network methodology. Further, it is often assumed that markets outside the United States and Western Europe are inherently riskier. We find that the Chinese stock market is not structurally risky, contradicting this popular opinion. We use partial mutual information to create filtered networks representing the Shanghai stock exchange, comparing them to networks based on Pearson's correlation. Consequently, we discuss the structure and characteristics of both the presented methods and the Shanghai stock exchange. This paper provides an insight into the cutting edge methodology designed for analyzing complex financial networks, as well as analyzing the structure of the market in Shanghai and, as such, is of interest to both researchers and financial analysts.

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