Rejected

This observational study aimed at the significance of multi-level education in the treatment and prognosis of acute ischemic stroke. Multi-level stroke education was carried out among residents and medical staff for one year in Guancheng district. After 1 year, 519 patients with acute ischemic stroke admitted to The First People's Hospital of Zhengzhou were invited to the study, 272 patients from the Guancheng district were divided into the experimental group, and 247 patients who were not from the Guancheng district but in the neighborhood of The First People's Hospital of Zhengzhou were divided into the control group. Statistical methods were applied to analyze the degree of awareness of stroke, the time from onset to hospital, the route to hospital, the number of patients coming to the hospital within 4.5 h, the number of intravenous thrombolysis, door-to-needle time (DNT), modified Rankin scale (MRS) score, and the number of hemorrhagic transformation cases. After one year of multi-level systematic stroke education, there were significant differences in stroke awareness between the experimental group and the control group in terms of limb weakness (87.87 vs. 62.75%), speech inarticulation (78.3 vs. 55.06%), facial paralysis (69.12 vs. 38.06%), limb numbness (57.35 vs. 29.15%), consciousness disorder (62.50 vs. 42.11%), walking instability with severe dizziness (39.97 vs. 15.79%) (P<0.05). There was no statistical significant difference in unclear vision or blind eyes or severe headache (P>0.05). There were statistical differences between the two groups in the time from the onset to the hospital (14.82±17.67 vs. 25.92±25.23), emergency medical services (EMS) (36.02 vs. 16.19%), number of patients coming to the hospital within 4.5 h (67 vs. 32), venous thrombolysis cases (55 vs. 17), DNT time (42.43±17.30 vs. 63.35±26.53), hemorrhagic transformation cases (11 vs. 21), and MRS score grade ≥2 (230 vs. 169) (P<0.05). Multi-level education can effectively improve the patient's awareness of stroke, encourage more patients to use EMS system to the hospital. More patients were aware that they should reach the hospital within 4.5 h. It helps shorten DNT time and give more patients the opportunity to receive intravenous thrombolysis or intravascular thrombectomy, which may improve the prognosis and reduce hemorrhagic transformation without reducing mortality.

The commonest causes of nasal obstruction are rhinitis and chronic rhinosinusitis, which affect up to 30% and 14% of the adult population, respectively. The global financial burden is huge, estimated at $5 billion for rhinitis and $8.6 billion for chronic rhinosinusitis per annum in the USA. On referral for imaging, computed tomography (CT) is indicated initially when there is a suboptimal response to medical treatment of these mucosal diseases or there are "red flags," such as persistent unilateral obstruction, epistaxis, pain, and orbital or neurological symptoms. A mass visible at rhinoscopy or endoscopy in the nose or nasopharynx and lymphadenopathy are further indications. The anterior (cartilaginous) nose plays a key role in the aetiology of nasal obstruction as it accounts for 50-75% of the total resistance to airflow in the upper airway. It has been ignored in the imaging literature, but extensively evaluated by clinicians using a range of methods, including CT. Oblique reconstructions perpendicular to the parabolic curve of lamellar airflow provide accurate assessment of the anterior nose. A thorough and systematic approach to assessing the nose addresses the discrepancy between imaging and clinical evaluation of structural causes of nasal obstruction, especially septal deviation, reported in the surgical literature. Nasal tumours are a very uncommon cause of nasal obstruction; magnetic resonance imaging is commonly performed to assess their full extent and improve the specificity of diagnosis.

is a neurotropic fungus, which can cause devastating intracerebral infections with up to 100% fatality rate. It is difficult to isolate this fungus in laboratory as it grows slowly and requires diagnostic skills.

Background. Pain is one of the most common symptoms that weighs on life's quality and health expenditure. In a reality in which increasingly personalized therapies are needed, the early use of genetic tests that highlight the individual response to analgesic drugs could be a valuable help in clinical practice helping to reduce response times, to achieve a good level of analgesia and to reduce the risk of side effects and adverse events. The study aims to confront the clinical response to analgesic drugs with the result of pharmacogenetic testing in patients with persistent pain. Methods. This preliminary study compares the genetic results of pharmacological effectiveness and tolerability analyzed with a Pharmacogenetic Test with the results obtained in clinical practice in 5 patients suffering from acute and chronic pain. Results. Regarding the genetic results of the 5 samples analyzed, 2 reports were found to be completely comparable to what found in clinical practice, while 3 reports showed that the profile of tolerability and effectiveness were partially discordant. Conclusions. In light of the data, not completely overlapping with results observed in clinical practice, further studies would be appropriate in order to acquire more information on the use of the PGT in clinical practice.

Abdominal myofascial pain syndrome is an important cause of refractory chronic abdominal pain. It causes severe functional impairment resulting in significant patient distress and substantial health care costs, and it can be a challenge to treat. Opioid consumption is a recognized challenge in this cohort.

Glut1 deficiency syndrome (Glut1DS) is a brain energy failure syndrome caused by impaired glucose transport across brain tissue barriers. Glucose diffusion across tissue barriers is facilitated by a family of proteins including glucose transporter type 1 (Glut1). Patients are treated effectively with ketogenic diet therapies (KDT) that provide a supplemental fuel, namely ketone bodies, for brain energy metabolism. The increasing complexity of Glut1DS, since its original description in 1991, now demands an international consensus statement regarding diagnosis and treatment. International experts (n = 23) developed a consensus statement utilizing their collective professional experience, responses to a standardized questionnaire, and serial discussions of wide-ranging issues related to Glut1DS. Key clinical features signaling the onset of Glut1DS are eye-head movement abnormalities, seizures, neurodevelopmental impairment, deceleration of head growth, and movement disorders. Diagnosis is confirmed by the presence of these clinical signs, hypoglycorrhachia documented by lumbar puncture, and genetic analysis showing pathogenic variants. KDT represent standard choices with Glut1DS-specific recommendations regarding duration, composition, and management. Ongoing research has identified future interventions to restore Glut1 protein content and function. linical manifestations are influenced by patient age, genetic complexity, and novel therapeutic interventions. All clinical phenotypes will benefit from a better understanding of Glut1DS natural history throughout the life cycle and from improved guidelines facilitating early diagnosis and prompt treatment. Often, the presenting seizures are treated initially with antiseizure drugs before the cause of the epilepsy is ascertained and appropriate KDT are initiated. Initial drug treatment fails to treat the underlying metabolic disturbance during early brain development, contributing to the long-term disease burden. Impaired development of the brain microvasculature is one such complication of delayed Glut1DS treatment in the postnatal period. This international consensus statement should facilitate prompt diagnosis and guide best standard of care for Glut1DS throughout the life cycle.

This clinical policy from the American College of Emergency Physicians addresses key issues in opioid management in adult patients presenting to the emergency department. A writing subcommittee conducted a systematic review of the literature to derive evidence-based recommendations to answer the following clinical questions: (1) In adult patients experiencing opioid withdrawal, is emergency department-administered buprenorphine as effective for the management of opioid withdrawal compared with alternative management strategies? (2) In adult patients experiencing an acute painful condition, do the benefits of prescribing a short course of opioids on discharge from the emergency department outweigh the potential harms? (3) In adult patients with an acute exacerbation of noncancer chronic pain, do the benefits of prescribing a short course of opioids on discharge from the emergency department outweigh the potential harms? (4) In adult patients with an acute episode of pain being discharged from the emergency department, do the harms of a short concomitant course of opioids and muscle relaxants/sedative-hypnotics outweigh the benefits? Evidence was graded and recommendations were made based on the strength of the available data.

The use of Shi Xiao San (SXS), composed of and , can be traced back to the Song dynasty. Traditionally, SXS has been used to treat irregular menstruation, pelvic pain, progressive dysmenorrhea, and postpartum lochiorrhea. The management of adenomyosis (AM) is challenging and to the best of our knowledge there are currently no effective therapeutic strategies. Therefore, the aim of the present study was to investigate the effect of SXS on the development of adenomyosis in a mouse model. AM was induced in 60 neonatal female ICR mice by administering tamoxifen; 10 randomly selected mice were used for model identification via histopathological examination and 10 mice treated with the solvent alone were used as the normal controls. A total of sixty days after birth, the mice treated with AM were randomly divided into four groups and administered one of the following treatments: Low-dose SXS (55 mg/kg); high-dose SXS (110 mg/kg); danazol (1 mg/20 g body weight); or no treatment (model group); at the same time, the normal control group received no treatment. After 2 months of treatment, hotplate and tail-flick tests were used to assess the response to noxious thermal stimuli in the mice, and plasma samples were collected to measure corticosterone levels. Hematoxylin and eosin staining scores of myometrial infiltration and the number of AM nodules were evaluated. Furthermore, the expression of genes associated with AM-related pain was also analyzed. The results from the present study indicated that treatment with SXS decreased myometrial infiltration, alleviated generalized hyperalgesia, and lowered plasma corticosterone levels in mice with induced AM. These findings suggest that SXS effectively attenuated the development of AM, and may serve as a promising treatment approach for AM treatment.

Joint conditions pose an important public health problem as they are a leading cause of pain, functional limitation and physical disability. Oxidative stress is related to the pathogenesis of many chronic diseases affecting the joints such as rheumatoid arthritis and osteoarthritis. Cells have developed adaptive protection mechanisms to maintain homeostasis such as nuclear factor erythroid 2 (NF-E2)-related transcription factor (Nrf2) which regulates the transcription of many genes involved in redox balance, detoxification, metabolism and inflammation. Activation of Nrf2 results in the synthesis of heme oxygenase-1 (HO-1) leading to the formation of a number of bioactive metabolites, mainly CO, biliverdin and bilirubin. Ample evidence supports the notion that Nrf2 and HO-1 can confer protection against oxidative stress and inflammatory and immune responses in joint tissues. As a consequence, this pathway may control the activation and metabolism of articular cells to play a regulatory role in joint destruction thus offering new opportunities for better treatments. Further studies are necessary to identify improved strategies to regulate Nrf2 and HO-1 activation in order to enable the development of drugs with therapeutic applications in joint diseases.

Observational studies have shown that migraine has been associated with patent foramen ovale (PFO). Whilst studies investigating PFO closure for the treatment of migraine have been neutral, there is some evidence that symptoms of migraine may improve if the PFO was closed after ischemic stroke.