Endovascular management of spontaneous axillary artery aneurysm: a case report and review of the literature

INTRODUCTION: Spontaneous atraumatic true axillary artery aneurysm is a relatively unusual disorder. Although most cases are asymptomatic, complications of axillary artery aneurysms may result in acute vascular insufficiency and neurological deficits. Prompt treatment, therefore, should be employed in the management of this condition. To date, the standard treatment for peripheral aneurysms is still surgical resection with end-to-end anastomosis. However, aneurysmectomy and interposition grafting with autologous or artificial vessels are more invasive and time-consuming. The ideal treatment for axillary artery aneurysm should be relatively noninvasive, safe and free of significant complications, cost-effective, cosmetically acceptable, and incur less absence from usual daily activities. Endovascular stent grafts have also been successfully used to treat these aneurysms. Management of select aneurysms using stent grafts has become more prevalent with the developing endoluminal technology. CASE PRESENTATION: We report a case of a spontaneous atraumatic axillary artery aneurysm where the patient was a 48-year-old ethnic Han Chinese woman with a gradually enlarging left axillary pulsatile mass. She was treated with endovascular stent grafts. The postoperative course of the patient was uneventful during the six-month follow-up. CONCLUSIONS: We show that there are significant early advantages with the endovascular management technique versus the conventional operation in the management of axillary artery aneurysm

The impact of influenza on the health related quality of life in China: an EQ-5D survey.

BACKGROUND: Influenza causes considerable morbidity and mortality in China, but its impact on the health-related quality of life (HRQoL) has not been previously measured. METHODS: We conducted a retrospective telephone survey to assess the impact of influenza on the HRQoL among outpatients and inpatients using the EuroQoL EQ-5D-3 L instrument. Participants were individuals with laboratory-confirmed influenza infection registered by the National Influenza-like-illness Surveillance Network in 2013. RESULTS: We interviewed 839 of 11,098 eligible influenza patients. After excluding those who were unable to complete the HRQoL for the registered influenza episode, 778 patients were included in the analysis. Both outpatients (n = 529) and inpatients (n = 249) most commonly reported problems with pain/discomfort (71.8% of outpatients and 71.9% of inpatients) and anxiety/depression (62.0% of outpatients and 75.1% of inpatients). For individual influenza outpatients, the mean health utility was 0.6142 (SD 0.2006), and the average quality adjusted life days (QALD) loss was 1.62 (SD 1.84) days. The HRQoL of influenza inpatients was worse (mean health utility 0.5851, SD 0.2197; mean QALD loss 3.51 days, SD 4.25) than that of outpatients (p < 0.05). The presence of underlying medical conditions lowered the HRQoL for both outpatients and inpatients (p < 0.05). CONCLUSIONS: Influenza illness had a substantial impact on HRQoL. QALD loss due to an acute influenza episode in younger children was comparable to that due to enterovirus A71-associated hand, foot and mouth disease. Our findings are key inputs into disease burden estimates and cost-effectiveness evaluations of influenza-related interventions in China

BAG Family Gene and Its Relationship with Lung Adenocarcinoma Susceptibility

Background and objective BAG genes (Bcl-2-associated athanogene) belong to a recently discovered multifunctional anti-apoptosis gene family that regulate various physiological processes which include apoptosis, tumorigenesis, neural differentiation, stress response and cell cycle and so on. The expression status of BAG family genes are related to certain tumor incidence and prognosis. The aim of this study is to explore the association of the BAG family gene expression status with the susceptibility of lung adenocarcinoma. Methods The gene expression data of BAG family genes from 29 cases of lung adenocarcinoma tissues and matched pericancerous lung tissess were generated by microarray chips. Cox regression was used to analyze the association between the expression of BAG family genes and the susceptibility of lung adenocarcinoma and the results were verified by GEO database. Results The expression levels of BAG-1, BAG-2, BAG-5 in cancer tissues were significantly downregulated compared with matched pericancerous lung tissues and were protective factors of lung adenocarcinoma (P &lt; 0.05, OR &lt; 1); while the expression level of BAG-4 in cancer tissues were remankably upregulated compared with the matched pericancerous lung tissues and was risk factor of lung adenocarcinoma (P &lt; 0.05, OR &gt; 1). Conclusion BAG-1, BAG-2, BAG-5 might be the potential protective factors while BAG-4 is possible risk factor of lung adenocarcinoma

An Empirical Test of CAPM: Evidence from Shanghai Stock Exchange 2001-2005

As a financial theory, the Capital Asset Pricing Model (CAPM) has dominated the academic literature and influenced greatly the field of finance and business in practice over four decades. This dissertation examines the validity of the CAPM in the Shanghai Stock Exchange (SSE) which is one of the two stock exchanges in the mainland China for the period Jan 2001-Dec 2005. Employing the approach proposed by Fama and MacBeth (1973) with modifications suggested by Pettengill et al. (1995), I reach a conclusion that is inconsistent with Fama and MacBeth (1973)'s finding as the unconditional CAPM is not valid in the SSE, while conditional CAPM is inapplicable either since there only exist weak insignificant beta-return relationship. Using beta as the only proxy for risk is questionable. In addition, after comparing the empirical SML with the theoretical SML under the conditional CAPM, the slope of the relationship between realized return and beta is less than that of the relationship between expected return and beta predicted by the CAPM with the SML is steeper positively in up market and flatter negatively in down market. In general, the CAPM does not hold in the Chinese stock market

Bipartite consensus for multi-agent networks of fractional diffusion PDEs via aperiodically intermittent boundary control

In this paper, the exponential bipartite consensus issue is investigated for multi-agent networks, whose dynamic is characterized by fractional diffusion partial differential equations (PDEs). The main contribution is that a novel exponential convergence principle is proposed for networks of fractional PDEs via aperiodically intermittent control scheme. First, under the aperiodically intermittent control strategy, an exponential convergence principle is developed for continuously differentiable function. Second, on the basis of the proposed convergence principle and the designed intermittent boundary control protocol, the exponential bipartite consensus condition is addressed in the form of linear matrix inequalities (LMIs). Compared with the existing works, the result of the exponential intermittent consensus presented in this paper is applied to the networks of PDEs. Finally, the high-speed aerospace vehicle model is applied to verify the effectiveness of the control protocol

Direct synthesis of benzylic amines by palladium-catalyzed carbonylative aminohomologation of aryl halides

Benzylic amines are valuable compounds with important applications in areas including pharmaceuticals and agrochemicals. The known procedures for their synthesis are limited by difficulties in functionalizing the parent aminomethyl groups. On the other hand, carbonylation reactions offer a potent method to introduce carbonyl groups and homologate carbon chains. However, carbonylative aminohomologation of aryl halides is challenging due to competing reactions and the need to balance multiple sequential steps. Here we report a palladium-catalyzed carbonylative aminohomologation reaction for the direct aminomethylation of aryl halides. The reaction proceeds via a tandem palladium-catalyzed formylation, followed by imine formation and formic acid-mediated reduction. Useful functional groups including chloride, bromide, ester, ketone, nitro, and cyano are compatible with this reaction. Both aryl iodides and bromides are suitable substrates and a wide range of synthetically useful amines are efficiently obtained in moderate to excellent yields