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Whereas the development of ADAS seeks to improve driver's overall performance with a particular focus on traffic safety improvement; with it comes the requirement and opportunity to objectively evaluate the effectiveness of the technology in improving safety and overall road traffic efficiency. This study evaluates the effectiveness of ADAS in improving driver's risk perception in near-crash events using a novel metric from risk homeostasis theory (RHT) – Safety Margins, as an indicator. By designing a function that captures the initial and maximum risk-level of drivers when involved in a critical driving event while driving on a field operational test (FOT) route in Wuhan China; a comparison of the risk-level of drivers when ADAS was on as against when ADAS was off can be made, enabling an effective evaluation of the impact of ADAS on driver's risk perception and consequent risk mitigation. The results show that ADAS has a positive impact on the low-risk group and moderate-risk group for all drivers, but a negative impact on the high-risk group for skilled drivers. The impact evaluation is done under varying risk-levels of near-crash events with drivers of different driving experiences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: To observe the difference between the combination therapy of alpha-interferon (IFN-alpha) therapy Yixuesheng Capsule and the monotherapy of IFN-alpha in treatment of chronic hepatitis B., Method: A total of 288 patients with HBeAg-positive chronic hepatitis B proven by liver biopsy were included in this study. During the individualized therapy, they received hypodermic injection of IFN-alpha 1b, with 5 MU x time(-1) and three times x w(-1). Of them, 125 patients received combination therapy with Yixuesheng Capsule for three months, with 1.0 g/time and three times/d; and 163 patients received only IFN-alpha 1b (the IFN-alpha monotherapy group). After the course of therapy, all patients were followed up for at least 24 months. The intention-to-treat analysis was adopted for statistic analysis., Result: The two groups showed no statistical significance by gender, age, liver necroinflammation grading, liver fibrosis staging, serum ALT levels, serum HBV DNA levels and IFN-alpha therapy course. The whole course and the 24-month follow-up visit cover all of 112 patients in the combination treatment group and 141 cases in the IFN-alpha monotherapy group. The response rates of the combination treatment group and the IFN-alpha monotherapy group were 48.0% (60/125) and 35.0% (57/163) (x = 4.980, P = 0.026) at the end of treatment, respectively, 45.6% (57/125) and 33.1% (54/163) (x2 = 4.645, P =0.031) at the end of 12-month-follow-up period, respectively, and 38.4% (48/125) and 32.5% (53/163) (x2 = 1.076, P = 0.300) at the end of 24-month follow-up period, respectively., Conclusion: The combination treatment with IFN-alpha and Yixuesheng Capsule shows a slightly better sustained efficacy on HBeAg-positive chronic hepatitis B patients compared with IFN-alpha monotherapy.