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The objective of this study was to assess whether vitamin D (VD) treatment alters the overall all-cause and cardiovascular mortalities in a chronic kidney disease (CKD) population. We systematically searched PubMed, EMBASE, Web of Science, and Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials without language restriction, until the publication date of 22 February 2016. All related literatures that compared VD treatment with non-VD treatment and reported the mortality of patients with CKD (including those undergoing dialysis) were identified. Pooled risk ratios (RR) and 95% confidence intervals (CI) were calculated by using the random- and fixed-effects models. Randomised controlled trials (RCTs) that used the intention-to-treat principle and observational studies (OSs) were analysed separately. For this study, 38 studies involving 223 429 patients (17 RCTs, n=1819 and 21 OSs, n=221610) were included. In the OSs, VD treatment was significantly associated with reductions in both all-cause and cardiovascular mortalities; however, such significant association was not found in the RCTs. The existing RCTs do not provide sufficient or precise evidence that VD supplementation affects the mortality of patients with CKD, although subsets of patients that could potentially benefit from VD treatment can be identified by using the existing data from the RCTs. Nevertheless, large-size RCTs are needed in the future to assess any potential differences in survival prospectively., Author(s): R J Lu [sup.1] , S M Zhu [sup.1] , F L Tang [sup.1] , X S Zhu [sup.2] , Z D Fan [sup.1] , G L Wang [sup.2] [...]

In this study, a two-step annealing method is advanced to produce high-quality ZnO films with excellent structural, electrical, and optical properties. The effects of oxygen and nitrogen annealing on the properties of undoped ZnO films are reversible to each other and are attributed to the creation and annihilation of extrinsic trap states of antisite oxygen OZn and oxygen vacancies VO, which result from the chemisorption and desorption of oxygen, respectively. Moreover, annealing in nitrogen causes slight nitrogen incorporation, subsequently increasing the resistivity and inducing compressive stress in the film. The key to this two-step method is to keep the chemisorption and desorption of oxygen in equilibrium. Due to the similarity of annealing ambient with the growth condition, this process can be transplanted and employed in the in situ preparation of high-quality ZnO epilayers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Anesthetic management of patients with dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM) is a challenge to the anesthesiologist, due to poor left systolic function, ventricular enlargement, risk of malignant arrhythmias and sudden cardiac death. Therefore, preoperative assessment and appropriate anesthetic management are important in patients with DCM. This review describes the preoperative evaluation and anesthesia considerations of patients with DCM undergoing non-cardiac surgery. Patient pathophysiology and clinical status, such as ventricular function, degree of myocardial fibrosis, resting heart rate and high-sensitivity C-reactive protein can affect survival rates. Advanced monitoring devices, such as transesophageal echocardiography and cardiac resynchronization therapy can be used to assess ventricular function and myocardial fibrosis. Thoracic epidural blockade can improve ventricular function. In summary, the optimal anesthetic management of patients with dilated cardiomyopathy requires good preoperative assessment, close perioperative monitoring, suitable anesthetic, optimization fluid management, and stable hemodynamic status. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]