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Background: Constitution is a valuable part of traditional Chinese medicine theory; it is defined as the internal foundation for the occurrence, development, transformation and outcome of diseases, and has its characteristic gut microbiota. Previous study showed that deficiency constitution was related to lower Hb counts. However, no research has examined how alterations in the gut microbiome induced by deficiency constitution may increase the tendency for anemia., Methods: We used a multiomics strategy to identify and quantify taxonomies and compounds found under deficient constitution individuals and further explore the possible pathological factors that affect red blood cell indices., Results: ① People with deficient constitution showed lower hemoglobin (Hb), more Firmicutes, less Bacteroidetes, and higher α diversity. ② We identified Escherichia coli , Clostridium bolteae , Ruminococcus gnavus , Streptococcus parasanguinis and Flavonifractor plautii as potential biomarkers of deficient constitution. ③ Slackia piriformis , Clostridium_sp_L2_50 and Bacteroides plebeius were enriched in balanced-constitution individuals, and Parabacteroides goldsteinii was the key bacterial marker of balanced constitution. ④ Flavonifractor plautii may be a protective factor against the tendency for anemia among deficient individuals. ⑤ Ruminococcus gnavus may be the shared microbe base of deficiency constitution-related the tendency for anemia. ⑥ The microorganism abundance of the anaerobic phenotype was lower in deficient constitution group. ⑦ Alterations in the microbiome of deficient-constitution individuals were associated with worse health status and a greater risk of anemia, involving intestinal barrier function, metabolism and immune responses, regulated by short-chain fatty acids and bile acid production., Conclusion: The composition of the gut microbiome was altered in people with deficient constitution, which may explain their poor health status and tendency toward anemia., Competing Interests: LHa and XJ is employed by Kangmeihuada GeneTech Co., Ltd. The remaining authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2024 Liang, Chen, Lin, Huang, Qiu, Sun, Yuan, Xu, Chen, Xu, Shang, Deng, Liu, Tan, He, Li, Deng, Zhang, Guan, Liang, Fang, Jiang, Han, Huang and Yang.)

Background and Aims: Chronic kidney disease (CKD) usually occurs during the chronic infection of hepatitis B virus (HBV). However, the risk factors of CKD in an HBV population have not been completely demonstrated. Our present study aimed to investigate the risk factors of CKD in chronic HBV infection using a hospital based cross-sectional study in the northern area of China., Methods: During January 2013 to December 2017, a total of 94 patients with CKD complicated by chronic HBV infection were consecutively enrolled in the study, as well as 548 age- and sex-matched hepatitis B patients without CKD who were enrolled as controls. Univariate and multivariate regression analyses were used to determine the effects of each variable after adjusting for cofounding factors., Results: Multivariate analysis showed that HBeAg-positive status (odds ratio [OR]=2.099, 95% CI 1.128-3.907), dyslipidemia (OR: 3.025, 95% CI 1.747-5.239), and hypertension (OR: 12.523, 95% CI 6.283-24.958) were independently associated with the incidence of CKD, while duration of HBV infection (≥240 months) (OR: 0.401, 95% CI 0.179-0.894), Log 10 HBsAg (OR: 0.514, 95% CI 0.336-0.786), and coronary heart disease (OR: 0.078, 95% CI 0.008-0.768) were protective factors for the incidence of CKD. Duration of HBV infection, Log 10 HBsAg, HBeAg-positive status and dyslipidemia remained the risk factors for CKD after adjusting for diabetes mellitus, hypertension, and coronary heart disease., Conclusions: Duration of HBV infection, Log 10 HBsAg, HBeAg-positive status and dyslipidemia contributed to the incidence of CKD during chronic HBV infection in a Chinese population., Competing Interests: YCF has been an associate editor of Journal of Clinical and Translational Hepatology since 2013.The other authors have no conflicts of interest related to this publication., (© 2022 Authors.)

Background: In this study, we use association rules to explore the latent rules and patterns of prescribing and adjusting the ingredients of herbal decoctions based on empirical herbal formula of Chinese Medicine (CM)., Materials and Methods: The consideration and development of CM prescriptions based on the knowledge of CM doctors are analyzed. The study contained three stages. The first stage is to identify the chief symptoms to a specific empirical herbal formula, which can serve as the key indication for herb addition and cancellation. The second stage is to conduct a case study on the empirical CM herbal formula for insomnia. Doctors will add extra ingredients or cancel some of them by CM syndrome diagnosis. The last stage of the study is to divide the observed cases into the effective group and ineffective group based on the assessed clinical effect by doctors. The patterns during the diagnosis and treatment are selected by the applied algorithm and the relations between clinical symptoms or indications and herb choosing principles will be selected by the association rules algorithm., Results: Totally 40 patients were observed in this study: 28 patients were considered effective after treatment and the remaining 12 were ineffective. 206 patterns related to clinical indications of Chinese Medicine were checked and screened with each observed case. In the analysis of the effective group, we used the algorithm of association rules to select combinations between 28 herbal adjustment strategies of the empirical herbal formula and the 190 patterns of individual clinical manifestations. During this stage, 11 common patterns were eliminated and 5 major symptoms for insomnia remained. 12 association rules were identified which included 5 herbal adjustment strategies., Conclusion: The association rules method is an effective algorithm to explore the latent relations between clinical indications and herbal adjustment strategies for the study on empirical herbal formulas.