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IntroductionLittle was known about the relationship between sleep disturbances and depressive and anxiety disorders, as well as the efficacy of treatment regimens.MethodsDuring 2021 to 2023, a total of 417 participants were screened by Hamilton Depression Rating Scale (HAMD-17) and Hamilton Anxiety Rating Scale (HAMA-14) for psychological status, and Pittsburgh sleep quality index (PSQI) assessment. 409 participants were finally enrolled, of which 188 (45.97%) were suffered from sleep disorders. All participants were received polysomnography (PSG) followed by six-week pharmacological treatment of escitalopram and zopiclone, and finally assessed by HAMD-17 and HAMA-14 for treatment efficacy.ResultPSG monitoring indicated that participants with depression experienced prolonged rapid eye movement sleep latency (REMSL) and increased wakefulness after sleep onset (WASO) (P=0.030 and P=0.002, respectively). Those with anxiety disorders demonstrated a significantly higher percentage of non-rapid eye movement sleep (NREM%) and reduced WASO (P=0.013 and P=0.001, respectively). After six-weeks pharmacological treatment, participants with or without sleep disorders exhibited with similar efficacy outcomes of depression and anxiety disorders (P>0.05). However, every point of PSQI increment at baseline would decrease 0.78 and 0.85 times of probability of effective pharmacological treatment of depression and anxiety disorders. Moreover, participants with both effective outcomes of depression and anxiety disorders were found significant shorter sleep onset latency (SOL) (P

ObjectiveTo investigate parental knowledge, attitudes, and practices (KAP) toward adolescent depression.MethodsA cross-sectional survey was conducted between October 2022 and October 2023 at The First Affiliated Hospital of Ningbo University among parents of adolescents diagnosed with depression. A self-administered questionnaire was used to collect the parents’ demographic characteristics and KAP toward adolescent depression.ResultsA total of 522 questionnaires were collected from parents of depressed adolescents. Among the participants, 383 (73.37%) were female. In addition, 426 participants (81.61%) had children aged 14–18. The mean knowledge, attitude, and practice scores were 9.09 ± 2.37 (possible range: 0–12), 37.04 ± 4.11 (possible range: 11–55), and 31.53 ± 3.84 (possible range: 8–40), respectively. There were significant positive correlations between knowledge and attitude (r = 0.225, p

BackgroundSubthreshold depression (sD) is prevalent in older populations in long-term care (LTC) settings, but psychological therapy in LTC settings in China is not readily available. Thus, internet-based cognitive behavioral therapy (ICBT) may be suitable for this population, but research on the efficacy of ICBT for older adults with sD, especially those living in LTC settings, is limited. ObjectiveThis study aimed to evaluate the efficacy and acceptability of ICBT treatment for sD among LTC residents in China. We also examined whether ICBT is as effective as group-based cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) for treating sD in this population. MethodsWe conducted a pragmatic randomized controlled trial, which included 18 LTC institutions. A total of 354 participants were randomized to ICBT, group-based CBT, or a waiting list and were followed up for 12 months. The primary outcome was self-reported depressive symptoms on the Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale (CES-D). Secondary outcomes were the scores of the Patient Health Questionnaire–9 (PHQ-9), Generalized Anxiety Disorder 7-Item (GAD-7), and Geriatric Depression Scale (GDS). A mixed-effects model was used to assess the efficacy of ICBT. ResultsThe ICBT group showed a significant improvement in self-reported depressive symptoms, which was maintained at the 12-month follow-up (all P

IntroductionFunctional neuroimaging could provide abundant information of underling pathophysiological mechanisms of the clinical triad including motor, cognitive and psychiatric impairment in Huntington's Disease (HD).MethodsWe performed a voxel-based meta-analysis using anisotropic effect size-signed differential mapping (AES-SDM) method.Results6 studies (78 symptomatic HD, 102 premanifest HD and 131 healthy controls) were included in total. Altered resting-state brain activity was primarily detected in the bilateral medial part of superior frontal gyrus, bilateral anterior cingulate/paracingulate gyrus, left insula, left striatum, right cortico-spinal projections area, right inferior temporal gyrus area, right thalamus, right cerebellum and right gyrus rectus area. Premanifest and symptomatic HD patients showed different alterative pattern in the subgroup analyses.DiscussionThe robust and consistent abnormalities in the specific brain regions identified in the current study could help to understand the pathophysiology of HD and explore reliable neuroimaging biomarkers for monitoring disease progression, or even predicting the onset of premanifest HD patients.

Background: The COVID-19 pandemic has had a detrimental effect on the mental health of older adults living in nursing homes. Very few studies have examined the effects of Internet-based Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (ICBT) on older adults living in nursing homes during the pandemic. We conducted a feasibility study using a single-group design, to explore the effectiveness of ICBT on psychological distress in 137 older adults (without cognitive impairment) from 8 nursing homes in 4 southeast cities in China, between January and March 2020. Methods: Symptoms of depression, anxiety, general psychological distress, and functional disability were measured at baseline, post-treatment (5 weeks) and at a 1-month follow-up. Mixed-effects model was used to assess the effects of ICBT. Results: Statistically significant changes with large effect sizes were observed from pre- to post-treatment on the PHQ-9 (p

The motivation of this work is to help outpatients find their corresponding departments or clinics, thus, it needs to provide indoor positioning services with a room-level accuracy. Unlike wireless outdoor localization that is dominated by the global positioning system (GPS), wireless indoor localization is still an open issue. Many different schemes are being developed to meet the increasing demand for indoor localization services. In this paper, we investigated the AoA-based wireless indoor localization for outpatients’ wayfinding in a hospital, where Wi-Fi access points (APs) are deployed, in line, on the ceiling. The target position can be determined by a mobile device, like a smartphone, through an efficient geometric calculation with two known APs coordinates and the angles of the incident radios. All possible positions in which the target may appear have been comprehensively investigated, and the corresponding solutions were proven to be the same. Experimental results show that localization error was less than 2.5 m, about 80% of the time, which can satisfy the outpatients’ requirements for wayfinding.

Compared with conventional Class-A, Class-B, and Class-AB amplifiers, Class-D amplifier, also known as switching amplifier, employs pulse width modulation (PWM) technology and solid-state switching devices, capable of achieving much higher efficiency. However, PWM-based switching amplifier is usually designed for low-voltage application, offering a maximum output voltage of several hundred Volts. Therefore, a step-up transformer is indispensably adopted in PWM-based Class-D amplifier to produce high-voltage output. In this paper, a switching amplifier without step-up transformer is developed based on digital pulse step modulation (PSM) and hybrid multilevel converter. Under the control of input signal, cascaded power converters with separate DC sources operate in PSM switch mode to directly generate high-voltage and high-power output. The relevant topological structure, operating principle, and design scheme are introduced. Finally, a prototype system is built, which can provide power up to 1400 Watts and peak voltage up to ±1700 Volts. And the performance, including efficiency, linearity, and distortion, is evaluated by experimental tests.

Bioluminescence tomography (BLT) is a promising tool for studying physiological and pathological processes at cellular and molecular levels. In most clinical or preclinical practices, fine discretization is needed for recovering sources with acceptable resolution when solving BLT with finite element method (FEM). Nevertheless, uniformly fine meshes would cause large dataset and overfine meshes might aggravate the ill-posedness of BLT. Additionally, accurately quantitative information of density and power has not been simultaneously obtained so far. In this paper, we present a novel multilevel sparse reconstruction method based on adaptive FEM framework. In this method, permissible source region gradually reduces with adaptive local mesh refinement. By using sparse reconstruction with l1 regularization on multilevel adaptive meshes, simultaneous recovery of density and power as well as accurate source location can be achieved. Experimental results for heterogeneous phantom and mouse atlas model demonstrate its effectiveness and potentiality in the application of quantitative BLT.

In bioluminescence tomography (BLT), reconstruction of internal bioluminescent source distribution from the surface optical signals is an ill-posed inverse problem. In real BLT experiment, apart from the measurement noise, the system errors caused by geometry mismatch, numerical discretization, and optical modeling approximations are also inevitable, which may lead to large errors in the reconstruction results. Most regularization techniques such as Tikhonov method only consider measurement noise, whereas the influences of system errors have not been investigated. In this paper, the truncated total least squares method (TTLS) is introduced into BLT reconstruction, in which both system errors and measurement noise are taken into account. Based on the modified generalized cross validation (MGCV) criterion and residual error minimization, a practical parameter-choice scheme referred to as improved GCV (IGCV) is proposed for TTLS. Numerical simulations with different noise levels and physical experiments demonstrate the effectiveness and potential of TTLS combined with IGCV for solving the BLT inverse problem.

Purpose: To explore the effects of octreotide (OCT) on oxidative stress, inflammation and apoptosis in hypoxia/reoxygenation (H/R)-induced cerebral infarction. Methods: The in vitro model of cerebral infarction was established by treating N2A cells with hypoxia for 4 h and reoxygenation for 24 h. The viability of N2A cells was determined by CCK-8 assay. The cells were divided into 3 groups: control group, H/R group, and H/R+OCT group. The cells in H/R+OCT group were pretreated with OCT (60 ng/mL) before H/R treatment. The oxidative stress of N2A cells were assessed by determining the levels of superoxide dismutase (SOD), glutathione peroxidase (GSHPx), catalase (CAT), reactive oxygen species (ROS) and malondialdehyde (MDA). Inflammation of N2A cells was evaluated by evaluating the levels of TNF-α, IL-1β, IL-6, and IL-8, while the apoptosis of N2A cells was assessed by flow cytometry. Western blot analysis was used to determine the expression of Bcl-2, Bax, TLR4, MyD88, and NF-κB. Results: Octreotide treatment significantly reduced the level of oxidative stress. The inflammation of N2A cells caused by hypoxia/reoxygenation was inhibited by treatment with octreotide. Apoptosis of N2A cells was also inhibited by octreotide treatment. Hypoxia/reoxygenation activated TLR4/MyD88/NF-κB signaling pathway, while octreotide inhibits the activation of this pathway. Conclusion: The results reveal that octreotide inhibits hypoxia/reoxygenation-induced oxidative stress, as well as the inflammation, and apoptosis of N2A cells by inhibiting TLR4/MyD88/NF-κB signaling pathway. Thus, these findings may provide new insights into the treatment of cerebral infarction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: To investigate the effects and mechanism of action of venlafaxine on neuronal apoptosis of depressed rats. Methods: Rats were randomly divided into normal control (NC) group, depressed rats (depression) group or venlafaxine-treatment group. Changes in body weight and sucrose preference ratio were recorded and behaviors in open field test (OFT) were observed in each group. Pathological changes in and the apoptosis rate of the cerebral neurons, and the activity of extracellular signal-regulated kinase 1 (ERK1)/ERK2 pathway were observed under a microscope. Results: At weeks 2 and 4, the body weight and water consumption of rats in depression group dropped below those of rats in NC group. On the other hand, at week 2, the body weight and water consumption of rats in venlafaxine-treatment group were significantly higher than those of rats in depression group (p < 0.05). Besides, depression group had randomly arranged neuron cells and a thinner cell layer, while venlafaxine-treatment group had a relatively regular hippocampal neural cell arrangement and a thicker cell layer. Moreover, cell apoptosis rate was higher in depression group than in that NC group, and lower in venlafaxine-treatment group than that in depression group (p < 0.05). Finally, the protein expressions of phosphorylated (p)-ERK1 and p-ERK2 were significantly higher in depression group than those in NC group (p<0.05), and distinctly lower in venlafaxine-treatment group than those in depression group (p <0.05). Conclusion: By suppressing the activity of ERK1/ERK2 pathway, venlafaxine relieves the symptoms of depression and repairs neuronal injuries in rats, thereby suppressing neuronal apoptosis. Thus, these findings provide a novel approach for the development of new antidepressants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The poly(N-vinylcarbozole) (PVK)/tris(8-hydroxy-quinoline) aluminium (Alq3) blend thin films that exhibit asynchronism or simultaneity of transient electroluminescence (EL) onset of PVK and Alq3 under pulsed voltage, depending on the relative composition concentration or the extent of phase separation of blends, have been investigated. The resultant mobility of Alq3 rich regions of blends (doped with Alq3 concentration of several per cent, such as 2 wt% Alq3 and 1.0 wt% Alq3 with heat treatment) is larger than that of PVK rich regions of the same blends due to the percolation path formed by Alq3 when the doping concentration or the phase separation of blends is high enough. When the hopping rate of carriers from PVK to PVK sites is equivalent to or larger than that of Alq3 molecules, such as doping concentration of 0.2 and 1 wt% of Alq3 without heat treatment, the resultant mobility of blends is determined by PVK and their luminescence is synchronous. Transient EL is an effective method for the detection of spatial distribution variation of the product of mobility and electric field of blends in a range of doping concentrations depending on the different orders of luminescence of dopants and host. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Charles Bonnet syndrome (CBS) is characterised by recurrent vivid visual hallucinations in the presence of normal cognition. We present a case of CBS secondary to eye patching following Pars Plana Vitrectomy with an unusually acute onset in a 48-year-old woman. She presented with formed visual hallucinations that started less than 30 min after patching of her left eye. The patch was removed after 2 d, and these hallucinations persisted 2 d following eye patch removal. It is important that the ophthalmic surgeon be aware of the potential for development of CBS and offer appropriate referral and reassurance should it occur. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: Colitis is a kind of chronic non-specific inflammatory disease with increasing morbidity worldwide. Rhizoma atractylodis is the dry rhizome of Atractylodes lancea, which is often used to treat inflammations, but its connection with colitis is yet to be understood. Thus, the study was to confirm the functions of Rhizoma atractylodis on colitis cell progression. Methods: Cells of human colonic epithelial cell line, NCM460 were induced by trinitrobenzene sulfonic acid (TNBs) to create inflammatory TNBs-NCM460 model groups, while untreated NCM460 cells were taken as normal control group. Varying concentrations (0, 20, 50 and 100 µmol/L) of Rhizoma atractylodis were added to pretreat the NCM460 cells before exposure to TNBs. RT-qPCR and Elisa methods detected the mRNA expression and protein concentrations of IL-6 and TNF-a and Western blot analyses were utilized to measure protein levels of NF-κB. Results: Rhizoma atractylodis suppressed the Il-6 and TNF-a, which were induced by TNBs. Furthermore, the NF-κB pathway was inactivated in the cells with the pretreatment of hizoma atractylodis. Conclusion: Rhizoma atractylodis inhibited inflammatory cytokines IL-6 and TNF-a through NF-κB inactivation. Therefore, rhizoma atractylodism might be a complementary medication in colitis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]