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AIM: To evaluate the clinical effects of using technetium-99 methylene diphosphonate(99Tc-MDP)with methylprednisolone to treat thyroid-associated ophthalmopathy(TAO). METHODS: We retrieved from 9 databases, from their foundation to March 2019, including Pubmed, the Cochrane Library, EMbase, ClinicalTrial.gov, Web of Science, CNKl, VIP database, China Biology Medicine disc, Wanfang database and collected the randomized controlled trail(RCT)of 99Tc-MDP combined with methylprednisolone for treatment of TAO. According to inclusion and exclusion criteria, two researchers retrieved the literature independently, extracted data and evaluate methodological quality. Meta analysis was performed by Review Manager 5.3 software.RESULTS: A total of 8 RCTs were identified with 644 patients. There was significant difference in the overall clinical effective rate between 99Tc-MDP combined with methylprednisolone and methylprednisolone alone(RR=1.14, 95% CI: 1.03-1.26, P=0.01). Significant difierence was found in the effective rate of proptosis between intravenous injection of 99Tc-MDP with methyprednisone and methyprednisone only(RR=1.28, 95% CI: 1.16-1.41, PRR=1.64, 95% CI: 1.04-2.58, P=0.03), but there was no significant difference in disturbance of ocular dyskinesia(P=0.37).CONCLUSION: Applying 99Tc-MDP combined with methylprednisolone is better than methylprednisolone alone for TAO with less adverse reaction, which appears to be an effective treatment for TAO.

AIM: To compare corneal curvature and astigmatism values identified with OPD-Scan Ⅲ, IOL Master, Pentacam and KR-8900 in cataract patients and to evaluate the consistencies and differences. METHODS: In this prospective clinical trial, 45 cataract patients(86 eyes), received treatment at the Department of Ophthalmology in our hospital from April 2017 to June 2017, underwent corneal parameters measurements with four instruments: OPD-Scan Ⅲ, Pentacam, IOL Master, and KR-8900. Measurements included corneal curvature(K1, K2, Km)and astigmatism parameters. The results were assessed using the paired samples t tests, Pearson coefficient, and Bland-Altman plots. RESULTS: The difference of K1 value measured by OPD-Scan Ⅲ and IOL Master was significant(P2 and Km values between OPD-Scan Ⅲ and Pentacam or IOL Master(PP>0.05). All biometry measurements revealed good liner correlation(r=0.408-0.980, P1, K2 and Km measured by OPD-Scan Ⅲ and KR-8900. CONCLUSION: OPD-Scan Ⅲ and KR-8900 can be interchangeable for the measurements of corneal curvature, while the others are not directly interchangeable. The astigmatic results obtained from OPD-Scan Ⅲ are not completely interchangeable with KR-8900, IOL Master or Pentacam.

AIM:To investigate the short-term effectiveness of orthokeratology(ortho-k)on controlling low-to-moderate myopic in Chinese children.METHODS: There were 271 subjects(271 eyes)enrolled in this study. In total, there were 141 cases aged 9.43±1.10 in the ortho-k group and the spherical equivalent refractive errors(SER)were -2.74±1.15D. The patients were examined at 1, 7, 30, and 90d after they started wearing the ortho-k lenses. There were 130 cases aged 9.37±1.00 enrolled in the control group, with the SER -2.88±1.39D, and the examinations occurred at 6, 12mo after they started wearing single-vision spectacles. Myopic progression was estimated from changes of axial length in both groups. The chi-square test, independent samples t-tests, paired t-tests, Spearman analysis were used to compare the data of the two groups. RESULTS: The axial elongation was 0.27±0.17mm in the ortho-k group after 1a which was significantly longer than that before wearing(PPPt-test). There was significant negative correlation between axial elongation and initial age in both groups during the one-year period(ortho-k group: rs=-0.309, Prs=-0.472,P0.36mm in 1a)were 38% in the ortho-k group and 76.5% in the control group, respectively; whereas those of the older group(aged 9.4～12.0)were lower, reaching 24.3% and 12.9% in the ortho-k and control groups. In patients with SER 5.00～6.00D, the axial elongation in ortho-k group was 57.1% lower than that in control group. CONCLUSION: Ortho-k lens is effective to control myopic progression in children with low-to-moderate myopia. In particular, it reduces the percentage of younger children with fast progression and has a better effect of controlling myopic progression with higher degrees of myopia.

This study addresses a new electric vehicle routing problem with time windows and recharging strategies (EVRPTW-RS), where two recharging policies (i.e., full or partial recharging) and three recharging technologies (i.e., normal, rapid, and ultra-rapid) are considered. For this problem, we first develop a mixed-integer linear programming model defined in a series of vertices including a depot, a series of recharging stations, and a set of customers. Due to the strong NP-hardness of EVRPTW-RS, a tailored adaptive large neighborhood search heuristic (ALNS) which contains a number of advanced efficient procedures tailored to handle the proposed problem is developed. Numerical experiments for benchmark instances generated based on the Greater Toronto Area and Ontario in Canada are conducted to evaluate the performance of the proposed model and ALNS. Computational results demonstrate that the ALNS is highly effective in solving EVRPTW-RS and outperforms commercial solver CPLEX. Moreover, the advantages of the proposed recharging strategies are illustrated and some recommendations are provided for stakeholders when using electric vehicles for delivery.

The aim of the present study was to evaluate the effects of the eukaryotic initiation factor 6 (eIF6) gene on the secretion of M2 macrophage fibrosis-associated factors and the expression levels of key proteases during scar repair. Male eIF6 wild-type (eIF6+/+) and knockout (eIF6+/-) C57BL/6 mice were intraperitoneally lavaged to obtain macrophages, which were induced to the M2 type using interleukin-4. Differences between the gene expression profiles of these macrophages were compared with gene microarrays, and the results were validated using reverse transcription-quantitative polymerase chain reaction analysis and ELISA. Compared with the eIF6+/- mice, the mRNA and protein expression levels of vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) and tissue inhibitor of metalloproteinase-2 (TIMP-2) in the M2 macrophages of the eIF6+/+ mice were significantly downregulated (P<0.05), whereas the mRNA and protein expression levels of matrix metalloproteinase-2 (MMP-2) were significantly upregulated (P<0.05). Therefore, the results indicated that eIF6 alleviated cicatrization, possibly by inhibiting the generation of VEGF, in order to prevent overgrowth of blood vessels and granulation tissues, and to regulate the MMP-2/TIMP-2 ratio to balance the degradation and deposition of the extracellular matrix. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]