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To evaluate and map the reporting and methodological quality of network meta-analysis (NMA) on acupuncture.Published acupuncture NMAs were searched through eight databases from inception to February 2022. The reporting and methodological quality of included studies was assessed using the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses for Network Meta-Analysis (PRISMA-NMA) statement and the Assessment of Multiple Systematic Reviews 2 (AMSTAR-2) checklist.A total of 113 NMAs were identified. Most (99, 87.61%) studies were performed in China. Most studies focused on multiple acupuncture techniques (82.30%), and the main studied ailments were pain and poststroke sequelae (20.24%). The median (interquartile range (IQR)) score of the reporting quality was 26.5 (25-28.5). However, poor reporting rates in the protocol and registration (33.63%) and geometry of the network (35.40%), especially for China-based studies, were identified. The methodological quality of only 2 (1.77%) English studies was high. The reporting rate of Chinese studies was below 15% on each of items 4, 7, 10, and 12.The reporting quality of the NMAs was moderate, but the methodological quality was very low. The reporting and methodological quality of future NMAs, especially for Chinese studies, need further improvement.

Fuel-driven dissipative self-assembly, which is a well-established concept in recent years, refers to out-of-equilibrium molecular self-assembly initiated and supported by the addition of active molecules (chemical fuel). It widely exists in nature since many tempo-rary, active micro- or nanostructures in living bodies are generated by the dissipative self-assembly of biomolecules. Therefore, the study on dissipative self-assembly provides a good opportunity to have an insight into the microscopic mechanism of living organisms. In the meantime, dissipative assembly is thought to be a potential pathway to achieve dynamic, temporary supramolecular materials. Recently, a number of temporary materials have been developed with the aid of strategies for realizing dissipative self-assembly. Some of their properties, including solubility, stiffness, turbidity, color, or self-healing ability, change upon the addition of chemical fuel but spontaneously restore with chemical fuel consumption. The dynamic of these materials brings them various unprecedented functions. In this review, the principles of fabricating a fuel-driven temporary material are first reviewed and subsequently, recent examples of fuel-driven temporary materials are emphatically summarized, including gels, self-erased inks, nanoreactors, self-healing materials, and nanochannels. Finally, the challenges of developing fuel-driven temporary materials and some perspectives on the function and application of such kind of materials are discussed.

The aim of this study was to explore and analyze the main features of the top 100 most-cited original articles, systematic reviews (SRs)/meta-analyses (MAs) in the field of robotic surgery, through scientometric analysis. VOSviewer and Excel 2019 were employed to conduct this scientometric study. We found that the majority of original articles (72/100) were published during the 2000s, while the majority of the top 100 most-cited SRs/MAs (91/100) during the 2010s. The USA was the most dominant country (n = 78), Henry Ford Health System was the most productive institution (n = 10), and Menon M was the largest contributing first author (n = 5) of the top 100 most-cited original articles. The USA was the most dominant country (n = 33), University of Padua was the most productive institution (n = 9), and Ficarra V was the largest contributing first author (n = 4) of the top 100 most-cited SRs/MAs. The top 100 most-cited original articles in robotic surgery have focused on the feasibility, outcomes and learning curve of robotic surgery for various neoplasms and cancers. The top 100 most-cited SRs/MAs have focused on the differences between robotic surgery and other types of surgery, with respect to the learning curve, costs, outcomes and experience in treating neoplasms, cancer and other diseases. In the future, the formation of cross-institutional and cross-disciplinary cooperation teams should be promoted and corresponding regulations and standards for specific diseases should be developed to regulate and promote the development of robotic surgery.

Objective This study collected randomized controlled trials (RCTs) published in the social sciences in China and assessed their risk of bias and reporting quality. Study Design and Setting Three databases were systematically searched for publications from January 2000 to June 2020 for RCTs in the social sciences published by Chinese researchers. The risk of bias was assessed using the Cochrane Collaboration Risk of Bias Tool (CCRBT), and reporting quality was assessed using the Consolidated Standards of Reporting Trials for Social and Psychological Interventions (CONSORT-SPI). Results A total of 316 RCTs were identified, including 204 articles in English and 112 articles in Chinese. The most frequently researched interventions focused on education (33.9%), and the most frequently studied population were students (32.9%). Eighty-seven percent of RCTs had intermediate reporting quality. Twenty-four of the 43 CONSORT-SPI sub-items had a compliance rate of less than 50%. Most RCTs had an unclear risk of bias for blinding outcome assessors (84.5%), blinding participants and personnel (82.9%), allocation concealment (73.1%), and random sequence generation (68.0%). A low proportion of CONSORT-SPI items were reported and, high proportion of the papers had unclear risk of bias. Conclusion The quality and reporting of RCTs in the social sciences needs improvement in China, especially for reporting methods and results. Most studies had an unclear risk of bias as they lacked important methodological information.

Accumulating evidence showed that probiotics therapy might be effective in treating diarrhea-predominant irritable bowel syndrome (IBS-D). This study aimed to evaluate the effectiveness and safety of probiotics therapy for the treatment of IBS-D.We performed a comprehensive literature search in eight electronic databases, and gray literature from inception to August 4, 2021. Randomized controlled trials (RCTs) of probiotics therapy for the treatment of IBS-D were included and the quality was assessed using the risk of bias tool recommended by the Cochrane Handbook version 5.1.0. RevMan 5.4 software was used to perform the meta-analysis on the outcomes of IBS-D symptoms, abdominal pain, quality of life, and abdominal distension. The Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation (GRADE) approach was used to assess the certainty of evidence.Ten RCTs evaluating 943 patients were identified. Only one study had unclear risk of bias, while nine studies had a high risk of bias. The meta-analysis results showed that, compared to the placebo, probiotics therapy significantly decreased the score of IBS-D symptoms (SMD = - 0.55, 95% CI: [- 0.83, - 0.27], P 0.05), abdominal pain (SMD = - 0.43, 95% CI: [- 0.57, - 0.29], P 0.05), and abdominal distension (SMD = - 0.45, 95%CI: [- 0.81, - 0.09], P 0.05). There was no statistical difference in the quality of life. However, all the certainty of evidence was very low.Very low certainty evidence showed that probiotics might be an effective treatment for improving the IBS-D symptoms, abdominal pain, and abdominal distension, in adult IBS-D patients. However, these conclusions should be supported by high-quality evidence.

BackgroundIn the last 30 years, significant progress in the field of surgery has been achieved with the advent of robotic surgery. In this study, we aimed to conduct a bibliometric analysis to identify the distribution and characteristics overall and of the top 100 most-cited studies about robotic surgery versus open surgery.MethodsA systematic search was conducted on March 26, 2021 using Web of Science Core Collection. Two reviewers independently screened documents, and the top 100 most-cited studies were identified. Excel 2019 and VOSviewer were used to collect the data, and visual information was obtained.ResultsA total of 2306 documents were searched from the Web of Science Core Collection, and 1065 journals and 2913 institutes were extracted. A significant growth was observed in the last 15 years. The number of citations from the United States accounted for 33.31% of the total number of citations. There were nine American institutes and one Swedish institute in the top 10 institutes. Four journals in the field of urology or gynecology were present in the top 10 published journals. Few global communications between authors, institutes, and countries authors were observed.ConclusionThe lack of close cooperation among scientific research institutions may have affected the industrialization process of surgical robots. Some developing countries, including South America and Africa, should seize the development opportunity of robotic surgery to improve the level of domestic research on robotic surgery.

This meta-analysis aimed to evaluate the value of the chest digital drainage system for the postoperative management of patients who have undergone pulmonary resection.We searched the PubMed, EMBASE, the Cochrane Library, and Web of Science databases for included randomized controlled trials (RCTs) on the application of digital drainage systems versus the analog drainage system for patients with lung disease after pulmonary resection. Dichotomous variables were evaluated using risk ratios (RRs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs), and mean and standardized mean differences (MDs and SMDs, respectively) with 95% CIs were used to calculate continuous variables. Statistical analyses were performed using Stata and RevMan software.In total, 12 RCTs involving 2000 patients were analyzed. Significant differences in duration of chest tube placement (SMD = -0.49; 95% CI = -0.78 to -0.20), length of hospital stay (MD =-0.79 days; 95% CI = -1.24 to -0.34), and number of chest tube clamping tests (RR = 0.74; 95% CI = 0.36-1.49) were observed between the two groups, which did not significant differ in the occurrence of prolonged air leak or cardiopulmonary complication rate.The digital chest drainage system is mainly advantageous in the duration of chest tube placement, length of hospital stay, and number of chest tube clamping tests. Future research should evaluate the requirements and economic impact of using digital system in routine clinical practice.

Based on randomized controlled trials, a network meta-analysis was conducted to compare treatment effects across varenicline and related smoking interventions.English databases were screened for randomized controlled trials reporting the effect of varenicline as treatment for smoking. The risk of bias in included trials was assessed using the Cochrane Handbook tool. Stata 15.1 software was used to perform network meta-analysis, and the GRADE approach was used to assess the evidence credibility on the tobacco treatment effects of different interventions.Thirty-four studies involving 26,130 smokers were included in the network meta-analysis. Varenicline and 11 other interventions were reported, yielding 66 pairs of comparisons. Network meta-analysis showed that varenicline monotherapy or its combination with other interventions were superior in achieving smoking cessation compared to bupropion, nicotine replacement therapy, counselling, and placebo. Furthermore, compared to the varenicline, evident abstinence superiority was found in varenicline + bupropion (odds ratio = 1.49, 95% confidence interval [1.02, 2.18]). Finally, the surface under the cumulative ranking curve value indicated that varenicline + bupropion has the highest probability to become the best intervention.Varenicline monotherapy increased the odds of smoking cessation further than bupropion monotherapy, nicotine replacement therapy, counselling, and placebo, while varenicline combined with other interventions may even achieve a better abstinence effect. More credible evidence has been reported indicating that the combination of varenicline and bupropion is a superior treatment for smoking.

Minimally invasive surgery includes traditional laparoscopic and robot-assisted surgery. Although many studies related to robotic surgery and laparoscopic surgery have been published, when doing our search, scientometric studies that focus on related robotic surgery versus laparoscopic surgery were limited. In this study, we aimed to analyze and review the research hots and research status of robotic surgery versus laparoscopic surgery. We searched publications that involved robotic surgery versus laparoscopic surgery in the Web of Science database from 1980 to May 23, 2020. The top 100 publications were published in 2012 with the number of 17 and citations ranged from 618 to 64. Published across 34 different journals, namely European urology (n = 17) and others, the greatest contribution among 36 institutes was made by the Cleveland Clinic (n = 11). Of the top 100 publications, a total of 429 unique words were identified and the most frequently occurring keyword was laparoscopy (n = 33). The co-occurrence of keywords in the top 100 publications indicated that the study of diseases mainly focused on prostatectomy, complications, prostate cancer, retropubic prostatectomy, nephron-sparing surgery, lymph-node dissection, total mesenteric excision, sexual function, rectal cancer, and assisted distal gastrectomy. In recent years, comparative research on robot and laparoscopic surgery has decreased and most studies focus on cancer.

Aims A systematic review and meta-analysis was conducted to evaluate the effects of repeated transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) on smokers with schizophrenia. Methods Only Randomized Controlled Trials (RCTs) with rTMS on smokers with schizophrenia were included. The risk of bias of the included studies were assessed using Cochrane Risk of Bias tool. Outcome indicators include changes in smoking behavior, psychiatric symptoms, and depressive symptoms. The meta-analysis was performed using RevMan 5.3 software. The Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development and Evaluation (GRADE) system was used to evaluate the quality of the evidence. Findings Six RCTs involving 571 smokers were included. The methodological quality results showed that two RCTs were assessed as high risk of bias, three were low, and seven were unclear. The meta-analysis showed that, comparing with sham rTMS, active rTMS significantly decreased the average daily number of cigarettes smoked (6 trials, MD = -8.50, 95% CI [-11.93, -5.06], very low quality) and the FTND score (4 trials, MD= -2.71, 95% CI [-3.22, -2.21], high quality). Meanwhile, rTMS improved the general psychiatric symptoms score (4 trials, MD= -1.89, 95%CI [-3.32, -0.47], moderate quality), and did not relieve the depressive symptoms score (2 trials, MD=-2.90, 95% CI [-8.72, 2.93], P = 0.33, very low quality). Conclusions rTMS might provide effective support for smokers with schizophrenia. It could reduce the craving for tobacco and might improve psychological symptoms. However, this conclusion needs more research and high evidence to support.

Smoking is responsible for 9 out of 10 deaths related to chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and this number can be reduced by quitting smoking. In this study, the effect of different interventions on smoking cessation of patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease was assessed through a network meta-analysis.Eight databases were searched to obtain randomized controlled trials involving different interventions for smoking cessation in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease patients. The Cochrane Handbook tool was employed to assess the risk bias of included studies. Network meta-analysis was performed using STATA software.A total of 23 studies involving 13,480 patients were included. Eight studies were rated as having a high risk of bias, seven studies had a low risk, and in eight studies, the risk was unclear. All studies employed 13 different interventions, including eight monotherapies and five combination therapies. Network meta-analysis showed that a combination of behavioral therapy and pharmacotherapy was superior in achieving patients' smoking cessation compared to monotherapy. Moreover, varenicline was more helpful for smoking cessation than other single interventions. The final surface under the cumulative ranking curve value indicated that cognitive behavior therapy combined with bupropion achieved the best smoking cessation effect.The obtained results indicate that a combination of behavioral therapy and pharmacotherapy is most powerful in helping chronic obstructive pulmonary disease patients to quit smoking. Researchers should focus more on the safety of pharmacotherapeutic interventions. Moreover, more high-quality trials investigating the stability of evidence levels of different interventions on abstinence must be conducted.

A network meta-analysis (NMA) was conducted to investigate the effect of varenicline (VAR), bupropion (BUP), and nicotine replacement therapy (NRT) on smoking cessation.Eight databases were searched in May 2021, and only randomized controlled trials (RCTs) using varenicline, bupropion, or NRT (single or combined) for smoking cessation were included. The risk of bias in the included RCTs was assessed using the Cochrane Handbook tool. Stata 15.1 software was used to perform NMA, and the quality of the evidence was evaluated using Confidence in Network Meta-analysis (CINeMA).Twenty RCTs involving 16,702 smokers were included. The risk of bias results showed that 10 RCTs were rated as high, three were low, and seven were unclear. A total of 21 pairs were compared based on seven interventions. The NMA showed that, compared to the placebo (PLA), the other six interventions had significant efficacy in smoking cessation, where VAR + BUP showed the best effect of all treatments (odds ratio (OR) = 6.08, 95% confidence interval (CI) [3.47, 10.66]). Moreover, VAR + BUP was superior to VAR + NRT (OR = 1.66, 95% CI [1.07, 2.59]) and the three monotherapies (VAR, BUP, and NRT). In the monotherapies, the results of pairwise comparisons of VAR, BUP, and NRT did not show significant differences. Finally, the surface under the cumulative ranking curve (SUCRA) value indicated that VAR + BUP had the greatest probability of becoming the best intervention.The efficacy of VAR, BUP, and NRT alone increased the odds of smoking abstinence better than the placebo, combined interventions were superior to monotherapy, and VAR combined with other interventions had a better smoking cessation effect.

Background Pharmacotherapies are widely used for smoking cessation. However, their effect on smoking cessation for people with alcohol dependence remains unclear. Objective This study aimed to explore the effects of pharmacotherapies on smoking cessation for people with alcohol dependence. Methods Five electronic databases were searched in January 2021 for randomized controlled trials (RCTs) reporting the use of pharmacotherapies to promote smoking cessation in people with alcohol dependence. The risk of bias was assessed using the Cochrane tool. RevMan version 5.3 was used to perform meta-analyses of the changes in smoking behavior, and the GRADE approach was used to assess the certainty of the evidence. Results Nine RCTs involving 908 smokers with alcohol dependence were identified. Eight RCTs were published in the United States, and one was from Canada. The risk of bias was rated as low in three studies and unclear in the remaining six. The results of the meta-analysis showed that, compared with the placebo group, Varenicline had a significant effect on short-term smoking cessation (three RCTs, OR = 6.27, 95% CI: [2.49, 15.78], p < 0.05, very low certainty). Naltrexone had no significant effect on smoking cessation in short-term or long-term observations (three RCTs, OR = 0.99, 95% CI: [0.54, 1.81], p = 0.97, moderate certainty), and Topiramate had no significant effect (two RCTs, OR = 1.56, 95% CI: [0.67, 3.46], p > 0.05, low certainty). Only one trial reported that Bupropion had no effect on smoking cessation. Conclusion Varenicline may have a positive effect on smoking cessation in people with alcohol dependence. However, Naltrexone, Topiramate, and Bupropion seem to have no clear effect on increasing smoking abstinence among drinkers. The small number of studies and the low certainty of evidence indicate that caution is required in interpreting the results.