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Background:. Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is a common public health problem worldwide. Recent studies have reported that socioeconomic status (SES) is related to the incidence of COPD. This study aimed to investigate the association between SES and COPD among adults in Jiangsu province, China, and to determine the possible direct and indirect effects of SES on the morbidity of COPD. Methods:. A cross-sectional study was conducted among adults aged 40 years and above between May and December of 2015 in Jiangsu province, China. Participants were selected using a multistage sampling approach. COPD, the outcome variable, was diagnosed by physicians based on spirometry, respiratory symptoms, and risk factors. Education, occupation, and monthly family average income (FAI) were used to separately indicate SES as the explanatory variable. Mixed-effects logistic regression models were introduced to calculate odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for examining the SES-COPD relationship. A pathway analysis was conducted to further explore the pulmonary function impairment of patients with different SES. Results:. The mean age of the 2421 participants was 56.63 ± 9.62 years. The prevalence of COPD was 11.8% (95% CI: 10.5%–13.1%) among the overall sample population. After adjustment for age, gender, residence, outdoor and indoor air pollution, body weight status, cigarette smoking, and potential study area-level clustering effects, educational attainment was negatively associated with COPD prevalence in men; white collars were at lower risk (OR: 0.60, 95% CI: 0.43–0.83) of experiencing COPD than blue collars; compared with those within the lower FAI subgroup, participants in the upper (OR: 0.68, 95% CI: 0.49–0.97) tertiles were less likely to experience COPD. Such negative associations between all these three SES indicators and COPD were significant among men only. Education, FAI, and occupation had direct or indirect effects on pulmonary function including post-bronchodilator forced expiratory volume in 1 s/forced vital capacity (FEV1/FVC), FEV1, FVC, and FEV1 percentage of predicted. Education, FAI, and occupation had indirect effects on pulmonary function indices of all participants mainly through smoking status, indoor air pollution, and outdoor air pollution. We also found that occupation could affect post-bronchodilator FEV1/FVC through body mass index. Conclusions:. Education, occupation, and FAI had an adverse relationship with COPD prevalence in Jiangsu province, China. SES has both direct and indirect associations with pulmonary function impairment. SES is of great significance for COPD morbidity. It is important that population-based COPD prevention strategies should be tailored for people with different SES.

Background Screening for upper gastrointestinal cancer (UGC) effectively reduces morbidity and mortality in gastric and oesophageal cancers. It is considered one of the effective measures for cancer control in China, but studies on its functional quality are lacking. Our study assessed the quality of screening service funded by Upper Gastrointestinal Cancer Early diagnosis and treatment (UGCEDAT) and its correlation in Yangzhong People’s hospital, China. Methods A cross-sectional study was conducted among 516 screening users at a screening centre in Yanghzong People’s hospital from April to July 2021. The service quality questionnaire (SERVQUAL) base on the service quality gap (SQG) model was adopted. We calculated the mean scores of perceptions and expectations and their gap. To determine the association between overall SQG and related features of participants, we used a multivariate logistic regression. Results The average scores of screening service users’ perceptions and expectations were 4.05 and 4.55, respectively. The SQG of five dimensions (tangibles, reliability, responsiveness, assurance and empathy) were negative, and the overall SQG was − 0.51. The responsiveness dimension had the largest gap, and tangibles had the smallest gap. Occupation status (AOR:0.575; CI:0.371–0.890), health self-assessment (AOR:4.965; CI:1.352–18.232), endoscopy experience (AOR:0.551; CI:0.377–0.806), distance from screening hospital (AOR:1.847; CI:1.249–2.733) and frequency of visit (AOR:1.646; CI:1.100-2.462) were associated with the overall SQG. Conclusions We observed a negative gap between perceptions and expectations of the function quality of screening service, implying a high dissatisfaction across different dimensions. Service providers should take adequate measures to bridge the dimension with the largest quality gap. Meanwhile, attention should be paid to identifying the influencing factors of the overall gap and the characteristics of dimensional expectations and perceived scores to improve the effectiveness of the intervention.

Background In China, stomach cancer is the third most common cancer and the third leading cause of cancer death. Few studies have examined Chinese stomach cancer patients’ medical expenses and their associated trends. The Cancer Screening Program in Urban China (CanSPUC) is a Major Public Health Project funded by the central government. Through this project, we have extracted patients’ medical expenses from hospital billing data to examine the costs of the first course treatments (which refers to 2 months before and 10 months after the date of cancer diagnosis) in Chinese patients with stomach cancer and the associated trends. Methods The expense data of 14,692 urban Chinese patients with stomach cancer were collected from 40 hospitals in 13 provinces. We estimated the inflation-adjusted medical expenses per patient during 2002–2011. We described the time trends of medical expenses at the country-level, and those trends by subgroup, and analyzed the compositions of medical expenses. We constructed the Generalized Linear Mixed (GLM) regression model with Poisson distribution to examine the factors that were associated with medical expenses per patient. Results The average medical expenses of the first course treatments were about 43,249 CNY (6851 USD) in 2011, more than twice of that in 2002. The expenses increased by an average annual rate of 7.4%. Longer stay during hospitalization and an increased number of episodes of care are the two main contributors to the expense increase. The upward trend of medical expenses was observed in almost all patient subgroups. Drug expenses accounted for over half of the medical expenses. Conclusions The average medical expenses of the first course (2 months before and 10 months after the date of cancer diagnosis) treatments per stomach cancer patient in urban China in 2011 were doubled during the previous 10 years, and about twice as high as the per capita disposable income of urban households in the same year. Such high expenses indicate that it makes economic sense to invest in cancer prevention and control in China. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (10.1186/s12885-018-4357-y) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Objective: This study aims to understand the medical expenditure for liver cancer during 2002-2011 in urban areas of China. Materials and Methods: This is a retrospective study. Based on a stratified cluster sampling method, a medical expenditure survey collected basic personal information from related medical records. Two-tailed independent sample t-test, variance analysis, and Student–Newman–Keuls Tests were used in cost analysis for the corresponding data types. Results: A total of 12,342 liver cancer patients were included in the analysis. Overall average medical expenditure per case for liver cancer diagnosis and treatment in China has increased from ¥21, 950 to ¥40, 386 over the study period. For each liver cancer patient diagnosed between 2009 and 2011, the average expenditures were 29,332 CNY for stage I, 35,754 CNY for stage II, 34,288 CNY for stage III, and 30,275 CNY for stage IV diseases (P < 0.001). Pharmaceuticals accounted for the biggest part of the medical expenditure and it rose from 48.01% to 52.96% during these ten years, and the share of nursing fee expenses was the lowest (around 1%). Over the entire 10-year data period, the per capita expenditure of the east region (32,983 CNY) was higher than that of the west region (26,219 CNY) and slightly higher than the central region (31,018 CNY, P < 0.001). Discussion: As a major cancer in China, liver cancer accounts for a large portion of health economic burden and its medical expenditure is heavy for families. Early diagnosis and treatment for liver cancer will save medical expenditure. Conclusion: The economic burden of liver cancer is high in China and related medical expenditure has increased.

ObjectivesTo describe the prevalence of modifiable risk factors for upper digestive tract cancer (UDTC) and its coprevalence, and investigate relevant influencing factors of modifiable UDTC risk factors coprevalence among residents aged 40–69 years in Yangzhong city, China.DesignCross-sectional study.ParticipantsA total of 21 175 participants aged 40–69 years were enrolled in the study. 1962 subjects were excluded due to missing age, marital status or some other selected information. Eventually, 19 213 participants were available for the present analysis.Main outcomes measuresPrevalence and coprevalence of eight modifiable UDTC risk factors (overweight or obesity, current smoking, excessive alcohol consumption, insufficient vegetables intake, insufficient fruit intake and the consumption of pickled, fried and hot food) were analysed.ResultsThe prevalence of overweight/obesity, current smoking, excessive alcohol consumption, insufficient vegetables intake, insufficient fruit intake and the consumption of pickled, fried and hot food in this study was 45.3%, 24.1%, 16.2%, 66.1%, 94.5%, 68.1%, 36.0% and 88.4%, respectively. Nearly all (99.9%) participants showed one or more UDTC risk factors, 98.6% of the participants showed at least two risk factors, 92.2% of the participants had at least three risk factors and 69.7% of the participants had four or more risk factors. Multivariate logistic regression analysis revealed that men, younger age, single, higher education, higher annual family income and smaller household size were more likely to present modifiable UDTC risk factors coprevalence.ConclusionsThe prevalence and coprevalence of modifiable UDTC risk factors are high among participants in Yangzhong city. Extra attention must be paid to these groups who are susceptible to risk factors coprevalence during screening progress. Relative departments also need to make significant public health programmes that aim to decrease modifiable UDTC risk factors coprevalence among residents aged 40–69 years from high-risk areas of UDTC.

Background: Significant advances have been achieved in the outcomes of patients with myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS) after both HLA-matched sibling donor transplants (MSDT) and non-MSDT in the past few years, the latter including HLA-matched unrelated donor (MUDT) and haplo-identical donor transplants (HIDT). Methods: We retrospectively analyzed the data of 85 consecutive patients with MDS who received allogeneic HSCT between Dec 2007 and Apr 2014 in our center. These patients comprised 38 (44.7%) who received MSDT, 29 (34.1%) MUDT, and 18 (21.2%) HIDT. Results: The median follow-up was 30.0 months. Over all, the median overall survival (OS) was 60.2 months and the probabilities of OS at the first, second and fifth year were 63%, 57% and 48%, respectively. Median OS post transplant (OSPT) was 57.2 months and the probabilities of OSPT at the first, second and fifth year were 58%, 55% and 48%, respectively. Relapses occurred in 16 patients (18.8%), and the cumulative incidence of relapse at the first, second and third year were 14%, 23% and 27%, respectively. The survival of patients receiving non-MSDT was superior to that of MSDT, median OSPT being 84.0 months and 23.6 months, respectively (P=0.042); And the similar result was observed when we analyzed the OS of patients who underwent non-MSDT or MSDT (median OS: 120 months vs. 27.0 months; P=0.028). We also found that using antithymocyte globulin (ATG) in conditioning regimens significantly improved survival after non-MSDT, with better OS and OSPT (P=0.016 and P=0.025). Furthermore, we compared OS or OSPT of patients who received non-MSDT with ATG (n=38) and MSDT without ATG (n=37). Our results showed that using ATG in conditioning regimen significantly improved survival of non-MSDT, with better OSPT (median OS: 84.0 months vs. 23.0 months; P=0.026) and OS (median OS: 120 months vs. 25.1 months; P=0.016). Conclusions: These data suggest that, non-MSDT could be a valid alternative when MSDT is not available, and ATG may improve the survival of MDS patients after non-MSDT. Disclosures No relevant conflicts of interest to declare.

The network coding system COPE [1] shows us the improvements obtained by COPE-type network coding in wireless networks. In this paper, by introducing 802.11 interference model, we analyze the maximal multi-commodity flow problem in wireless network coding and put forward a new scheduling mechanism 802.11st which has higher throughput for multihop wireless networks with network coding. We use linear programming to compute the maximum multi-commodity flow of multiple unicast flows in which the constraints are rebuilt according to the new scheduling mechanism.

Objectives: The aim of this study was to describe and analyze the incidence and mortality of female breast cancer in Jiangsu Province of China. Methods: Incidence and mortality data for female breast cancer and corresponding population statistics from eligible cancer registries in Jiangsu from 2006 to 2010 were collected and analyzed. Crude rates, age-specific rates and age-standardized rates of incidence and mortality were calculated, and annual present changes (APCs) were estimated to describe the time trends. Results: From 2006 to 2010, 11,013 new cases and 3,068 deaths of female breast cancer were identified in selected cancer registry areas of Jiangsu. The annual average crude incidence and age-standardized incidence by world population (ASW) were 25.2/ and 17.9/100,000 respectively. The annual average crude and ASW for mortality rates were 7.03/ and 4.81/100,000. The incidence was higher in urban areas than that in rural areas, and this was consistent in all age groups. No significant difference was observed in mortality between urban and rural areas. Two peaks were observed when looking at age-specific rates, one at 50-59 years and another at over 85 years. During the 5 years, incidence and mortality increased with APCs of 4.47% and 6.89%, respectively. Compared to the national level, Jiangsu is an area with relatively low risk of female breast cancer. Conclusion: Breast cancer has become a main public health problem among Chinese females. More prevention and control activities should be conducted to reduce the burden of this disease, even in relatively low risk areas like Jiangsu.

In this paper, we study the maximum multicast set scheduling problem in a plane wireless network under the physical interference model. Specifically, from a given set of multicast transmissions, select a maximum set of multicast transmissions with largest sum of receivers, where each receiver of a multicast transmission is interference-free from other transmissions subject to the physical interference constraint. This problem is known to be NP-hard and in this paper we develop an approximation algorithm with constant approximation bound guarantee. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first multicast scheduling algorithm under the physical interference model. For ease of implementation in distributed settings, we focus on the problem in an oblivious power assignment setting.

In a practical wireless network, the coding opportunities may be reduced by limited decoding buffers. In this paper, we introduce a new scheme called decoding buffer management (DBM) in practical wireless network coding. The DBM is composed of two parts named respectively decoding buffer filtering and packet information distributing. By decoding buffer filtering, the packets invaluable for future coding/decoding are filtered instead of storing in decoding buffer. Meanwhile, through packet information distributing, the overhead brought by packet information announcing is further reduced. We evaluate the proposed scheme on a regular 4×4 grid wireless network. Comparing with COPE, the simulation results show that when decoding buffers are limited, the DBM has up to 6.7 times coding opportunities while the amount of the packets stored in decoding buffers is reduced by up to 88% and the amount for packet information announcing is reduced by over 95%.