Annals of medicine
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Comparative Study
Improvement in signs and symptoms of severe dry eye disease after dual therapy with high-potency steroids and 0.05% cyclosporine.
To evaluate the effectiveness and safety of combining 0.05% cyclosporine A (CsA) with high-potency steroids for treating severe dry eye disease (DED). ⋯ Dual therapy combining high-potency steroids and 0.05% CsA significantly improved the signs and symptoms of severe DED compared with 0.05% CsA monotherapy, without severe complications.
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Elderly patients with transfusion-dependent non-severe aplastic anemia (TD-NSAA) face limited treatment options owing to transplantation incompatibility and safety concerns. ⋯ The addition of AVA to CsA can significantly improve the OR or CR rate and platelet levels with acceptable side effects in elderly patients, which implies that the combination is a viable alternative for elderly patients with TD-NSAA.
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Optimizing transarterial chemoembolization (TACE) can enhance treatment efficacy for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). This study compares modified TACE (M-TACE), which combines a lipiodol-based emulsion and drug-eluting beads, with drug-eluting bead TACE (DEB-TACE) as initial therapies for solitary HCC. ⋯ M-TACE showed higher initial CR rates, lower LTP rates, and extended time to LTP compared to DEB-TACE, indicating its potential to enhance TACE effectiveness for solitary HCC.
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Thyroid nodules are common, and investigation is crucial for excluding malignancy. Increased intranodular vascularity is frequently observed in malignant tumors, which can be detected through increased skin surface temperatures using noninvasive infrared thermography. We aimed to develop a diagnostic tool for thyroid cancer using infrared thermal images combined with an artificial intelligence (AI) algorithm. ⋯ The infrared thermal images, assisted by an AI model, exhibit good performance in distinguishing thyroid malignancy from benign nodules. This imaging modality has great potential to be used as a noninvasive screening tool for adjunct evaluation of thyroid nodules.
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Cognitive function, including moral decision-making abilities, can be impaired by sleep loss. Blue-enriched light interventions have been shown to ameliorate cognitive impairment during night work. This study investigated whether the quality of moral decision-making during simulated night work differed for night work in blue-enriched white light, compared to warm white light. ⋯ The results indicate that moral decisions during simulated night work in warm white light, but not blue-enriched white light, become less mature and principle-oriented, and more rule-based compared to daytime, hence blue-enriched white light may function as a moderator. Further studies are needed, and the findings should be tentatively considered.Trial registration: ClinicalTrials.gov (ID: NCT03203538) Registered: 26/06/2017; https://clinicaltrials.gov/study/NCT03203538.