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Li-Ping Yin,1 Fan Wang,2 Qian Li,2 Xiao-Ning Feng,3 Yan-Ling Li,2 Ling-Ling Li2 1Department of Oncology, The First Hospital Xingtai, Xingtai, Hebei, 054001, People’s Republic of China; 2Department of Tuberculosis, Affiliated Hospital of Hebei University, Baoding, Hebei, 071000, People’s Republic of China; 3Dosing Center, Affiliated Hospital of Hebei University, Baoding, Hebei, 071000, People’s Republic of ChinaCorrespondence: Ling-Ling Li, Department of Tuberculosis, Affiliated Hospital of Hebei University, No. 648 of Dongfeng East Road, Lianchi District, Baoding, Hebei, 071000, People’s Republic of China, Email lin1697g@126.comBackground: Patient safety is an important aspect of healthcare delivery and is critical to healthcare quality. An assessment of the attitudes of nursing staff in infectious diseases wards towards patient safety may identify deficiencies and allow for the development of educational programmes to train nursing staff to participate in good patient safety practices.Objective: To explore the current situation and influencing factors on nurses’ attitudes towards patient safety in infectious diseases wards.Methods: This cross-sectional study enrolled 446 nurses from infectious diseases wards in eight hospitals in the Hebei Province to participate in an electronic questionnaire survey from October to December 2020. The Chinese version of the safety attitude questionnaire was used to gather the opinions of these participants, and SPSS 22.0 statistical software was used to analyse the data.Results: The average score of safety attitudes towards patients was 3.59 ± 0.30. The scores for each dimension, from high to low, were as follows: management perception: 3.77 ± 0.42 points, pressure perception: 3.77 ± 0.42 points, safety atmosphere: 3.57 ± 0.43 points, job satisfaction: 3.57 ± 0.43 points, teamwork: 3.55 ± 0.50 points and working conditions: 3.50 ± 0.45 points. The results of the multiple stepwise regression analysis showed that the influential factors on nurses’ attitudes towards patient safety in infectious diseases wards were as follows: night shift working (β = 11.885, P = 0.000), years of nursing experience (β = 2.862, P = 0.001), education level (β = 4.462, P = 0.001) and marital status (β = 3.871, P = 1.002), which together explained 33.5% of the total variance.Conclusion: Nurses’ attitudes towards patient safety in infectious diseases wards were moderately high. Night shift work, years of nursing experience, education level and marital status affected nurses’ attitudes towards patient safety. Managers should focus on these groups of nurses and improve their working conditions and job satisfaction to further enhance patient safety.Keywords: infectious diseases wards, the nurse, patient safety attitude, influencing factors

Background: Children under five are the vulnerable population most at risk of being infected with Plasmodium parasites, especially in the Sahel region. Seasonal malaria chemoprevention (SMC) recommended by World Health Organization (WHO), has proven to be a highly effective intervention to prevent malaria. Given more deaths reported during the COVID-19 pandemic than in previous years due to the disruptions to essential medical services, it is, therefore, necessary to seek a more coordinated and integrated approach to increasing the pace, coverage and resilience of SMC. Towards this end, fully leverage the resources of major players in the global fight against malaria, such as China could accelerate the SMC process in Africa., Methods: We searched PubMed, MEDLINE, Web of Science, and Embase for research articles and the Institutional Repository for Information Sharing of WHO for reports on SMC. We used gap analysis to investigate the challenges and gaps of SMC since COVID-19. Through the above methods to explore China's prospective contribution to SMC., Results: A total of 68 research articles and reports were found. Through gap analysis, we found that despite the delays in the SMC campaign, 11.8 million children received SMC in 2020. However, there remained some challenges: (1) a shortage of fully covered monthly courses; (2) lack of adherence to the second and third doses of amodiaquine; (3) four courses of SMC are not sufficient to cover the entire malaria transmission season in areas where the peak transmission lasts longer; (4) additional interventions are needed to consolidate SMC efforts. China was certified malaria-free by WHO in 2021, and its experience and expertise in malaria elimination can be shared with high-burden countries. With the potential to join the multilateral cooperation in SMC, including the supply of quality-assured health commodities, know-how transfer and experience sharing, China is expected to contribute to the ongoing scale-up of SMC., Conclusions: A combination of necessary preventive and curative activities may prove beneficial both for targeted populations and for health system strengthening in the long run. More actions are entailed to promote the partnership and China can be one of the main contributors with various roles., (© 2023. The Author(s).)

The waveguide Fabry-Perot interferometer (FPI) (see, e.g., in Phys. Rev. Lett.113, 243601 (2015)10.1103/PhysRevLett.115.243601 and Nature569, 692 (2019)10.1038/s41586-019-1196-1), instead of the free space's one, have been demonstrated for the sensitive quantum parameter estimations. Here, we propose a waveguide Mach-Zehnder interferometer (MZI) to further enhance the sensitivity of the relevant parameter estimations. The configuration is formed by two one-dimensional waveguides coupled sequentially to two atomic mirrors, which are served as the beam splitters of the waveguide photons to control the probabilities of the photons being transferred from one waveguide to another. Due to the quantum interference of the waveguide photons, the acquired phase of the photons when they pass through a phase shifter can be sensitively estimated by measuring either the transmitted or reflected probabilities of the transporting photons. Interestingly, we show that, with the proposed waveguide MZI the sensitivity of the quantum parameter estimation could be further optimized, compared with the waveguide FPI, in the same condition. The feasibility of the proposal, with the current atom-waveguide integrated technique, is also discussed.

Quantum illumination is a binary hypothesis testing to detect a possible low-reflective object. Theoretically, both cat state illumination and Gaussian-state illumination possess the upper bound of 3dB sensitivity gain, over the usual coherent state illumination, for the significantly low illuminating intensity. Here, we investigate further how to enhance the quantum advantage of quantum illumination by optimizing the illuminating cat states for larger illuminating intensity. By comparing the quantum Fisher information or error exponent, we show that the sensitivity of the quantum illumination with generic cat states proposed here can be optimized further, and the 10.3% sensitive enhancement over the previous cat state illumination can be obtained.

Background: Aberrant cytokeratin 7 expression by hepatocytes (CK7 + Hs) is the hallmark characteristic of cholestasis diseases, especially in ductopenia diseases such as primary biliary cholangitis (PBC). This study attempted to evaluate the differences and relationships between the clinical and histological features of aberrant cytokeratin 7 (CK7) expression by hepatocytes in PBC patients., Methods: The clinicopathological data of patients diagnosed with PBC at the Second Hospital of Nanjing between January 2016 and September 2018 were analysed with SPSS 20.0., Results: Eighty-nine PBC patients who underwent liver biopsy were enrolled in this study, and 15, 29 and 45 patients had aberrant CK7 expression by hepatocytes (CK7 + Hs (2 +), CK7 + Hs (1 +), and CK7 - Hs, respectively). There were significant differences in TB, DB, ALP, TA, IgM, interface activity, and ductopenia grade between patients with CK7 - Hs and CK7 + Hs (2 +) (P < 0.05). The ductopenia grade was also significantly different between patients with CK7 + Hs (2 +) and CK7 + Hs (1 +) according to sex (P < 0.05). Upon merging the data of CK7 + Hs (2 +) and CK7 + Hs (1 +) into CK7 + Hs, we found significant differences in AMA, AMA-M2, anti-gp210, TB, DB, ALP, TA, IgM, fibrosis, and ductopenia grade between CK7 + Hs and CK7 - Hs (P < 0.05). The odds ratios (ORs) (and 95% confidence intervals (CIs)) of CK7 + Hs according to anti-gp210, ductopenia grade, and interface activity were 6.413 (95% CI 1.363-30.162), 4.145 (95% CI 1.898-9.052) and 3.247 (95% CI 1.556-6.775), respectively (P < 0.05). Spearman's rank correlation according to interface activity and ductopenia grade in patients with CK7 + Hs (2 + , 1 + , 0) was r = 0.359 (P = 0.001) and r = 0.396 (P < 0.001), respectively., Conclusion: CK7 + Hs serves as a cholestasis index of PBC and are associated with the ductopenia grade and interface activity. Aberrant cytokeratin 7 expression by hepatocytes can predict the ductopenia grade in primary biliary cholangitis., (© 2022. The Author(s).)

Background: The tissues and organs of premature infants are immature and easily damaged by external adverse factors, leading to functional development disorders and abnormalities. Besides, the incidence of premature babies in various countries has an increasing trend, with the incidence rate exceeding 10%., Objective: This study aims to investigate the neurodevelopment and the incidence of various developmental delays, cerebral palsy, autism spectrum disorder, and audio-visual impairment in premature infants under 34 weeks of gestation from birth to 2 years of age, so as to provide the basis for early intervention of premature infants in the clinic., Methods: A cohort of premature infants was established using 263 premature infants with a gestational age of 28-33 + 6 weeks who were born alive from March 1, 2018, to February 28, 2019, in four tertiary hospitals in Shenzhen. In addition, 263 full-term infants of the same sex who were born in the same period in the four hospitals were randomly selected and paired in a ratio of 1 : 1 as the control group. The subjects were assessed for neurodevelopment using the Gesell test scale at 6, 12, 18, and 24 months after birth (premature infants were corrected for months). We calculated the neurodevelopmental indicators of children in each month of age and the incidence of various developmental delays, cerebral palsy, autism spectrum disorder, and audio-visual impairment in the two groups., Results: The results of this study showed that the cohort of premature infants with birth gestational age less than 34 weeks had higher adaptive, fine motor, and personal-social energy domain development quotient (DQ) values from the corrected gestational age of 6 months to the corrected gestational age of 24 months after birth compared with the full-term cohort. And it also achieved catch-up growth in neurological development, but the detection rates of neurodevelopmental abnormalities at the corrected gestational age of 12 and 24 months were higher than those in the full-term cohort., Conclusion: It is important to reduce the disability rate and degree of premature infants by strengthening the systematic management, early promotion and supervision, as well as early intervention for preterm infants with developmental abnormalities who were born at gestational age less than 34 weeks after birth., Competing Interests: The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article., (Copyright © 2022 Hui-Li Li et al.)

Background: This study aims to assess the efficacy and safety of weekly paclitaxel (WP) for the treatment of advanced ovarian cancer (AOC)., Methods: This study will systematically search bibliographic databases (MEDLINE, EMBASE, Cochrane Library, Web of Science, CINAHL, PSYCINFO, Allied and Complementary Medicine Database, CNKI, WANGFANG, and Chinese Biomedical Literature Database) and other literature sources from inception to the March 1, 2020 without language and publication time limitations. Two authors will independently complete all literature selection, data collection, and study quality evaluation. Any disagreements will be solved by a third author through discussion. We will analyze data by RevMan V.5.3 software., Results: This study will systematically generate a comprehensive summary on the efficacy and safety of WP for the treatment of AOC., Conclusion: This study may provide beneficial evidence of WP for the treatment of AOC., Systematic Review Registration: INPLASY202040193.

Background: Lower mean platelet volume (MPV) is an indicator of platelet activity in the setting of tumor development. This study was to assess the relationship between preoperative MPV and survival outcomes of patients with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) following liver transplantation (LT)., Methods: The demographic and clinical characteristics of 304 HCC patients following LT were retrieved from an LT database. All the patients were divided into the normal and lower MPV groups according to the median MPV. The factors were first analyzed using a Kaplan-Meier survival analysis, then the factors with P < 0.10 were selected for multivariate Cox regression analysis and were used to define the independent risk factors for poor prognosis., Results: The 1-, 3-, and 5-year tumor free survival was 95.34%, 74.67% and 69.29% in the normal MPV group, respectively, and 95.40%, 59.97% and 42.94% in the lower MPV group, respectively (P < 0.01). No significant difference was observed in post-LT complications between the normal and lower MPV groups. Portal vein tumor thrombosis (PVTT) [hazard ratio (HR = 2.24; 95% confidence interval: 1.46-3.43; P < 0.01) and lower MPV (HR = 1.58; 95% confidence interval: 1.05-2.36; P = 0.03) were identified as independent prognostic risk factors for recipient survival., Conclusion: Preoperative lower MPV is a risk indicator of HCC patients survival outcomes after LT., (Copyright © 2019. Published by Elsevier B.V.)

DNA methylation is a significant epigenetic mechanism involving processes of transferring a methyl group onto cytosine or adenine. Such DNA modification catalyzed by methyltransferase (MTase) plays important roles in the modulation of gene expression and other cellular activities. Herein, we develop a simple and sensitive biosensing platform for the detection of DNA MTase activity by using only two oligonucleotides. The fluorophore labeled molecular beacon (MB) can be methylated by MTase and subsequently cleaved by endonuclease DpnI at the stem, giving a shortened MB. The shortened MB can then hybridize with a primer DNA, initiating a cycle of strand displacement amplification (SDA) reactions. The obtained SDA products can unfold new MB and initiate another cycle of SDA reaction. Therefore, continuous enlargement of SDA and exponential amplification of the fluorescence signal are achieved. Because the triple functions of substrate, template and probe are elegantly integrated in one oligonucleotide, only two oligonucleotides are necessary for multiple amplification cycles, which not only reduces the complexity of the system, but also overcomes the laborious and cumbersome operation that is always a challenge in conventional methods. This platform exhibits an extremely low limit of detection of 3.3 × 10 -6 U mL -1 , which is the lowest to our knowledge. The proposed MTase-sensing platform was also demonstrated to perform well in a real-time monitoring mode, which can achieve a further simplified and high-throughput detection. The sensing strategy might be extended to the activity detection of other enzymes, thus showing great application potential in bioanalysis and clinical diagnosis.

Quantum coherence is one of the old but always important concepts in quantum mechanics, and now it has been regarded as a necessary resource for quantum information processing and quantum metrology. However, the question of how to quantify the quantum coherence has just been paid the attention recently (see, e.g., Baumgratz et al. PRL, 113. 140401 (2014)). In this paper we verify that the well-known quantum Fisher information (QFI) can be utilized to quantify the quantum coherence, as it satisfies the monotonicity under the typical incoherent operations and the convexity under the mixing of the quantum states. Differing from most of the pure axiomatic methods, quantifying quantum coherence by QFI could be experimentally testable, as the bound of the QFI is practically measurable. The validity of our proposal is specifically demonstrated with the typical phase-damping and depolarizing evolution processes of a generic single-qubit state, and also by comparing it with the other quantifying methods proposed previously.

Background: The last decade has witnessed great progress in living donor liver transplantation worldwide. However, biliary complications are more common in partial liver transplantation than in whole liver transplantation. This is due to an impaired blood supply of the hilar bile duct during organ procurement and recipient surgery, commonly encountered anatomical variations, a relatively small graft duct, and complicated surgical techniques used in biliary reconstruction., Data Sources: MEDLINE and PubMed were searched for articles on "living donor liver transplantation", "biliary complication", "anatomical variation", "biliary reconstruction", "stenting" and related topics., Result: In this review, biliary complications were analyzed with respect to anatomical variation, surgical techniques in biliary reconstruction, and protection of the arterial plexus of the hilar bile duct., Conclusion: Transecting the donor bile duct at the right place to secure a larger bile duct stump, anastomosing techniques, and stenting methods as well as preserving the blood supply to the bile duct are all important in reducing biliary complications.

Background: Hepatic artery thrombosis (HAT) is a frequent complication following liver transplantation, but it is rarely caused by arcuate ligament compression of the celiac artery. This article mainly describes our experience in managing a patient with celiac artery stenosis and HAT after liver transplantation., Methods: A 44-year-old man with a 15-year history of hepatitis B was admitted to our hospital for hepatocellular carcinoma. Before the operation, he received transarterial chemoembolization once, and pretransplant MR angiography indicated a suspected stenosis at the initiation of the celiac artery, while color Doppler showed normal blood flow in the arterial system. In this case, orthotopic liver transplantation was performed for radical cure of hepatocellular carcinoma. However, B-ultrasonography detected poor blood flow in the intra- and extra-hepatic artery on the first posttransplant day, and during exploratory laparotomy a thrombus was found in the hepatic artery. Thus, re-transplantation was conducted with a bypass between the graft hepatic artery and the recipient abdominal aorta with the donor's splenic artery., Results: The patient made an uneventful recovery and color Doppler showed good blood flow in the artery and portal system. Histology confirmed extensive thrombosis in the left and right hepatic artery of the explanted graft, indicating HAT., Conclusions: Although HAT caused by celiac trunk compression is rarely reported in liver transplantation, the diagnosis should be considered in patients with pretransplant hepatic artery stenosis on angiography and abnormal blood flow on B-ultrasonography. Once HAT is formed, treatment such as thrombectomy or re-transplantation should be performed as early as possible.

Background: A safe and effective preservation solution is a precondition for liver transplantation, which is accepted as the radical treatment for patients with end-stage liver disease. The increasing use of marginal donors and non-heart beating donors as well as the establishment of a national organ allocation network call for better preservation. New preservation solutions like histidine-tryptophan-ketoglutarate (HTK) solution and Celsior solution have been introduced to liver preservation, and protective gene intervention and other modifications have also been investigated. In this article, we review recent advances in liver preservation solutions., Data Sources: An English-language literature search was conducted using MEDLINE (1990-2005) on liver preservation solution, biliary complication, protective gene and other related subjects., Results: Although the high viscosity of the University of Wisconsin (UW) solution proved harmful to the hepatic microcirculation, three solutions showed equivalent preservation effects. When the cold ischemia time was short, there were no significant differences among the three solutions in the incidence of biliary complications. So far, modifications of preservation solutions have achieved great success. Several types of protective genes like A20, Bcl-2, Bcl-X(L) and HO-1 were reported to have definite liver protective effects. The addition of other substrates like TNF-alpha antibody, tacrolimus (FK506) and fructose-1,6-bisphosphate (FBP) can also improve the preservation effect. However, addition of insulin to UW solution is harmful to the graft., Conclusions: In centers with highly-developed transplantation techniques, HTK and Celsior solutions are acceptable in liver preservation. Protective gene modification and addition of substrates like TNF-alpha antibody, FK506 and FBP are prominent approaches to improve liver preservation.