Extending synthetic control method for multiple treated units: an application to environmental intervention

Taking the environmental interventions on air quality at G20 Hangzhou Summit as a natural experiment, this paper innovatively establishes an extended synthetic control method with multiple units to evaluate the dynamic treatment effects on air quality improvement at the Summit. The method constructs datadriven weights according to the fluctuation of urban air quality to obtain a more robust and stable estimation with smaller root mean squared prediction error (RMSPE). By minimising RMSPE for pre-intervention model fitting, the study takes nine cities under policy intervention in Zhejiang as treatment cities, and 45 key cities without policy intervention as control cities during 201501–201706 as the final improved experimental scheme. The policy effect of environmental regulations on the average monthly air quality composite index of treated cities in Zhejiang is -0.84 during 201607–201702; while no significant treatment effect is observed since 201702. The results indicate that the environmental policy for the G20 Hangzhou Summit lasted a relatively short period, and it had a significant short-term improvement effect while losing its long-term improving effect on air quality in treated cities. The identification validates the extended synthetic control method with multiple units could also be applied to the policy effect evaluation in other areas

MFTR-Net: A Multi-Level Features Network with Targeted Regularization for Large-Scale Point Cloud Classification

There are some irregular and disordered noise points in large-scale point clouds, and the accuracy of existing large-scale point cloud classification methods still needs further improvement. This paper proposes a network named MFTR-Net, which considers the local point cloud’s eigenvalue calculation. The eigenvalues of 3D point cloud data and the 2D eigenvalues of projected point clouds on different planes are calculated to express the local feature relationship between adjacent point clouds. A regular point cloud feature image is constructed and inputs into the designed convolutional neural network. The network adds TargetDrop to be more robust. The experimental result shows that our methods can learn more high-dimensional feature information, further improving point cloud classification, and our approach can achieve 98.0% accuracy with the Oakland 3D dataset

Revealing Schematic Map Designs with Preservation of Relativity in Node Position and Segment Length in Existing Official Maps

Schematic maps have widely been used for representing transport networks. In the schematization process, preserving the relative position of nodes and the relative length of segments are considered highly important for constructing spatial cognition. Some researchers have regarded these as general principles of automated schematization. However, in-depth investigations into the conversion of these general principles into specific schematic network map designs are still lacking. This study aimed to empirically investigate how the two relative relations are preserved in existing manually produced schematic maps to better understand and interpret designer thinking. Official underground network maps of 32 cities were used in this study. The results revealed that (1) relative relations were largely preserved with a preservation ratio of approximately 80%, and the global preservation ratios of two relative relations were significantly higher than those of local preservation; (2) the preservation of relative position took priority over the preservation of relative length for the schematic maps with significant enlargement of dense regions; and (3) a reference object may be used for preserving relative relations, for example, the center region or major axis. The findings of this study will assist in developing and/or optimizing design rules for automated schematization while preserving relative relations

Regular use of low-dose of opioids after gastrointestinal surgery may lead to postoperative gastrointestinal tract dysfunction in children: a Chinese national regional health center experience sharing

Abstract Background The need for pain management is increasing in pediatrics, but the side effects of overuse or abuse of analgesics can be harmful to children’s health and even life-threatening in severe cases. Methods Patients who underwent resection of Meckel’s diverticulum at the Children’s Hospital of Chongqing Medical University from July 1, 2019, to July 1, 2022, were included in this study. Opioids were administered through patient-controlled analgesia (PCA). Based on the preoperative choices made by the legal guardians, patients were stratified into two groups: PCA Group (PCAG) and Non-PCA Group (NPCAG). Data pertaining to the clinical characteristics and prognoses of these patients were subsequently collected and analyzed to assess the impact of opioid administration. Results In the study, a total of 126 patients were enrolled, with 72 allocated to the Patient-Controlled Analgesia Group (PCAG) and 54 to the Non-Patient-Controlled Analgesia Group (NPCAG). When compared to the NPCAG, the PCAG exhibited a longer duration of postoperative fasting (median 72 vs. 62 h, p = 0.044) and increased utilization of laxatives (12[16.7%] vs. 2[3.7%], p = 0.022). However, the PCAG also experienced higher incidences of intestinal stasis and abnormal intestinal dilation (13[18.1%] vs. 3[5.6%], p = 0.037). No statistically significant differences were observed in pain assessments at the conclusion of the surgical procedure (0 vs. 1[1.9%], p = 0.429) or within the first 24 h postoperatively (16[22.2%] vs. 18[33.3%], p = 0.164). Additionally, NPCAG patients did not necessitate increased administration of rescue analgesics (2[2.8%] vs. 4[7.4%], p = 0.432). Conclusions The administration of opioids did not demonstrably ameliorate postoperative pain but was associated with a heightened incidence of postoperative gastrointestinal tract dysfunction. The retrospective nature of the current research should be considered and should be clarified further

Influencing Pedestrians’ Route Choice Using Route Shape Simplification

Pedestrians’ route choice is critical for several purposes, while deliberately changing map representations can influence map users’ route choice. Simplifying routes’ geometric shapes is one way to achieve this. However, the other geometric characteristics of routes (e.g., the relative distance of different routes, differences in initial orientation, the number of intersections, and the direction changes) also influence pedestrians’ route choice, per relevant research. Hence, this study conducted an experimental investigation to examine the influence of route shape simplification on pedestrians’ route choice, under various geometric characteristics conditions. The results of the statistical tests and correlation analyses showed that (1) route shape simplification has a significant influence on route choice; (2) larger relative distance and direction changes reduce shape simplification’s influence, while the number of intersections and differences in initial orientation have weak effects; (3) 1.3 times the relative distance may be the threshold for the selection of recommended routes, and the improvement of visual continuity at route nodes may prove more influential. The results of this study can support the applicability of shape simplification to influence route choice

BBPpred : sequence-based prediction of blood-brain barrier peptides with feature representation learning and logistic regression

Blood-brain barrier peptides (BBPs) have a large range of biomedical applications since they can cross the blood-brain barrier based on different mechanisms. As experimental methods for the identification of BBPs are laborious and expensive, computational approaches are necessary to be developed for predicting BBPs. In this work, we describe a computational method, BBPpred (blood-brain barrier peptides prediction), that can efficiently identify BBPs using logistic regression. We investigate a wide variety of features from amino acid sequence information, and then a feature learning method is adopted to represent the informative features. To improve the prediction performance, seven informative features are selected for classification by eliminating redundant and irrelevant features. In addition, we specifically create two benchmark data sets (training and independent test), which contain a total of 119 BBPs from public databases and the literature. On the training data set, BBPpred shows promising performances with an AUC score of 0.8764 and an AUPR score of 0.8757 using the 10-fold cross-validation. We also test our new method on the independent test data set and obtain a favorable performance. We envision that BBPpred will be a useful tool for identifying, annotating, and characterizing BBPs. BBPpred is freely available at http://BBPpred.xialab.info

Shufeng Jiedu capsule for acute exacerbation of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease: a protocol of multicentre, randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial

Introduction: chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) represents one of the leading causes of death worldwide. Published clinical trials suggest that the Chinese patent herbal medicine Shufeng Jiedu capsule (SFJD) is safe and may be effective for treating acute exacerbations of COPD (AECOPD). However, these effects have been reported with low or very low certainty evidence. This trial aims to evaluate the effectiveness and safety of SFJD for AECOPD. Methods and analysis: this study is designed as a multicentre, randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial. Three hundred patients with moderate or severe hospitalised AECOPD will be recruited in Beijing, Shanghai and Hefei. Participants will be randomly assigned to SFJD and usual care or placebo and usual care at a ratio of 1:1. SFJD and placebo will be administered orally four capsules three times daily for 7 consecutive days followed by an 8-week follow-up period. The primary outcome will be COPD symptom severity as measured by the EXAcerbation of Chronic Pulmonary Disease Tool score. Secondary outcomes include clinical symptoms, quality of life, length of hospital stay, a total dose of antibiotics, the frequency of recurrence of AECOPD, haematological biomarkers, death and adverse events. This study will answer the question of whether SFJD was safe to use and will improve symptoms in people with AECOPD, and will therefore reduce the necessity for antibiotics, the risk and duration of admission to hospital, and the risk of recurrence. Ethics and dissemination: the ethics committee of the first affiliated hospital of Anhui Medical University, Beijing University of Chinese Medicine affiliated Dongzhimen hospital and fifth people's hospital of Shanghai Fudan University approved the study protocol. Informed written consent will be obtained from all the participants. The results of this trial will be disseminated at academic conferences and in peer-reviewed publications. Trial registration number: ISRCTN99049821.</p

Shufeng Jiedu capsules for treating acute exacerbations of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease: a systematic review and meta-analysis

Background: Chinese herbal medicine is widely used in combination with usual care for acute exacerbation of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (AECOPD) in China. Shufeng Jiedu capsule (SFJD) is a Chinese patent medicine. The effectiveness and safety of SFJD for AECOPD remains uncertain.Methods: A systematic review of randomized control trials was performed. We included trials in patients diagnosed with AECOPD, who received SFJD as a single intervention or in combination with usual treatment. PubMed, Cochrane Library, EMBASE, CINAHL and four Chinese databases were searched from inception to April 2019. Two reviewers independently screened studies, extracted study data and assessed risk of bias. Meta-analysis was performed using RevMan 5.3 software. We performed subgroup analyses and sensitivity analyses according to the predefined protocol. Quality of evidence was assessed using GRADE.Results: 13 RCTs (1,036 patients, of which 936 were inpatients) were included. The mean age ranged from 52 to 67 and approximately 60% of patients were male. These RCTs had a high risk of bias due to lack of blinding and other factors. SFJD combined with usual care (including antimicrobials) compared to usual care alone was associated with a significant reduction in treatment failure, from 20.1% to 8.3% (11 trials; 815 patients; relative risk 0.43, 95% confidence interval [CI] 0.30 to 0.62) and duration of hospital admission (2 trials; 79 patients; mean difference -4.35 days, 95% CI -5.28 to -3.43 days; low certainty ). Low or very low certainty evidence suggested benefit from SFJD compared to controls in terms of PaCO2, PaO2, FEV1/FVC ratio, clinical symptoms, white cell counts, inflammatory markers and health related quality of life. No significant difference in adverse events was found in a pooled analysis. Conclusion: For hospitalized adults with AECOPD, SFJD may reduce treatment failure, shorten hospital stay, and improve symptoms and signs. However, the quality of the evidence is very low to low due to the potential risk of bias and inconsistency among included trials. Further large, high quality RCTs are needed