Journal of Holistic Integrative Pharmacy最新文献

Pogostemon cablin (Blanco) Benth. and Agastache rugosa (Fisch. et Mey.) O. Ktze. are commonly used traditional Chinese medicines. They belong to the family Lamiaceae and have very similar macroscopical features, making it difficult to differentiate them. To establish a discriminatory method for P. cablin of various origins that has abundant in chemical components and has high medicinal value, we utilized near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) in this study to gather spectral information in the ranging from 4000 to 12,000 cm⁻¹. Subsequently, we employed principal component and cluster analyses to develop qualitative discriminant models. The results showed that spectral pretreatment improved the classification and aggregation characteristics of P. cablin and A. rugosa in principal component and cluster analyses. The percentage of samples correctly classified using the principal component analysis in calibration and validation set was 99.9 ​%. This study results demonstrate that NIRS with pattern recognition can be utilized as a simple and rapid method for distinguishing between P. cablin and non-P. cablin, as well as A. rugosa.

Abrus precatorius is a leguminous plant with high medicinal value. Its leaves are rich in flavonoids. There only are limited reports on the extraction process and quality assessment of total flavonoids in Abrus precatorius leaves (APL). This study presents the extraction process of total flavonoids in APL and its optimisation by response surface methodology (RSM). High-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) and UV methods were used to determine the total flavonoid content and their differences were compared. The feasible extraction parameters of total flavonoids from APL were found to be 50% ethanol, a liquid-solid ratio of 50:1, an extraction time of 60 ​min and two extraction cycles. The number of extraction cycles was the main influencing factor. The total flavonoid content as determined by this optimised process was 69.0 ​mg/g by HPLC and 41.7 ​mg/g by UV. There was a significant difference between the total flavonoid content determined by the UV method and HPLC. A comparative analysis of 29 samples in RSM and 14 batches of APL showed that the total flavonoid content as determined by UV was only about half of that determined by HPLC. The factors that influence this difference and potential solutions to this challenge were discussed. The results of this study could lay a foundation for the quality assessment, standardisation, development and utilisation of flavonoids in APL.

Objective

The objective of this study was to conduct a comprehensive pan-cancer analysis of Protein tyrosine phosphatase 4A (PTP4As), specifically PTP4A1, PTP4A2, and PTP4A3, to investigate their aberrant expression, genomic alterations, prognostic values, and molecular functions. The aim was to evaluate the roles of PTP4As in cancer development and progression, as previous research has primarily focused on PTP4A3 and yielded inconsistent results regarding their expression in cancers.

Methods

A meticulous and extensive analysis of PTP4As was performed across diverse cancer types. mRNA expression levels of PTP4A isoforms were examined, and correlations between protein expression and mRNA expression were investigated. Genomic alterations affecting PTP4As, such as amplification, were analyzed. Survival analysis was conducted to assess the prognostic values of PTP4As in different cancers. Additionally, pathway enrichment analysis was performed to identify signaling pathways and biological processes associated with PTP4A2 and PTP4A3.

Results

The analysis revealed that PTP4A3 exhibited the most prevalent up-regulation at the mRNA level among the PTP4A isoforms. PTP4A2 mRNA expression in cancer generally displayed an up-regulated trend. However, inconsistent results were observed for PTP4A1 expression, even within the same cancer type but across different datasets, indicating the need for further investigation. The correlation between PTP4As protein expression and mRNA expression was found to be weak, indicating the complexity of their regulatory mechanisms. Genomic analysis showed that amplification was the major type of alteration affecting PTP4As, although it did not always translate into higher expression. Survival analysis revealed that high PTP4As expression was typically associated with unfavorable prognoses in several cancers, although exceptions existed. Pathway enrichment analysis unveiled novel signaling pathways and biological processes potentially influenced by PTP4As.

Conclusion

The pan-cancer analysis of PTP4As provided insights into their aberrant expression, genomic alterations, prognostic values, and molecular functions. PTP4A3 exhibited the most prevalent up-regulation, while PTP4A2 showed a general up-regulated trend. Inconsistent results were observed for PTP4A1 expression, warranting further investigation. These findings contribute to our understanding of the molecular mechanisms through which PTP4As may contribute to cancer pathogenesis.

Objective

This study aims to investigate the different treatment protocols for ankylosing spondylitis (AS) in the clinic. In this paper, finger point therapy and thalidomide were proposed to be used in the treatment of the disease, and the effects were evaluated.

Methods

Sixty-eight patients with AS were randomly divided into two groups: the control group and the treatment group, with 34 cases in each group. The two groups were given different medication regimens to compare the differences in symptoms and signs and efficacy after different regimens were implemented.

Results

After treatment, the experimental outcomes of the Schober test, occipital wall distance, finger-ground test, blood sedimentation, C-reactive protein, IL-6, TNF-α, and ASDAS index level in the treatment group were significantly different from those in the control group (P<0.05), and the treatment group's overall effective rate was 100% significantly higher than that of the control group (χ²=7.988, P< 0.05).

Conclusion

The symptoms and signs of patients with AS could be significantly improved by thalidomide with finger point therapy.

Background

Presenilin enhancer-2 (PSENEN, PEN-2), one of the four components of the γ-secretase complex, has been increasingly revealed to be significant in cancer types such as pancreatic cancer, gastric cancer, and breast cancer. However, the pan-cancer clinical relevance of PSENEN remains unclear.

Methods

Raw data on PSENEN expression in normal and cancer tissues were obtained from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TGCA) database and Genotype-Tissue Expression Project (GTEx). The difference of PSENEN expression was analyzed using data from the TCGA repository and TIMER2 database. Meanwhile, Cox regression analysis and KM plotter were used to analyze the pan-cancer prognostic significance of PSENEN. We also analyzed the correlation between PSENEN expression and tumor immune infiltration using the TIMER and XCELL algorithms. Moreover, we used the TISIDB database to determine PSENEN expression in different immune and molecular subtypes of human cancers. Pan-cancer analysis of genetic alteration of PSENEN was performed using online tools such as cBioPortal and UALCAN. Finally, six Gene Expression Omnibus datasets from the Gene Expression Profiling Interactive Analysis database were used to validate the expression level of PSENEN in lung adenocarcinoma (LUAD).

Results

Contrary to nonmalignant tissues, the expression level of PSENEN was significantly upregulated in the cancerous tissues in 22 cancer types. Elevated PSENEN expression was correlated with worse overall survival in 7 cancer types and with worse disease-specific survival in 8 of them. By using xCell algorithm, TIMER algorithm, and Spearman's correlation analysis, we found that PSENEN expression was closely correlated with the infiltration of immune cells across all cancer types. Moreover, aberrant PSENEN expression was associated with 60 immune checkpoint pathway-related genes, microsatellite instability, and tumor mutation burden in various cancer types. Besides, PSENEN expression was significantly associated with different immune subtypes and molecular subtypes of various human cancers. Notably, ovarian epithelial tumor samples demonstrated the highest frequency of PSENEN mutation among all cancer types.

Conclusions

Our pan-cancer analysis demonstrated that PSENEN might serve as a prognostic biomarker and revealed the importance of an in-depth understanding of the oncogenic role of PSENEN in various malignancies.

Objective

Pharmaceutical care is based on pharmacy, effective organization, and the management of drugs and patients throughout the medication process, to promote the scientific and rational use of drugs. This study evaluated the clinical application value of pharmaceutical care in gestational diabetes mellitus through meta-analysis.

Methods

Using “gestational diabetes mellitus + pharmacist/pharmaceutical care/pharmaceutical service” as the search term, the CNKI, Wanfang, VIP, PubMed, and Wed of Science databases were searched from the establishment of the database to September 1, 2022. Quality assessment and meta-analysis were performed on the randomized controlled trial (RCTs) that met the inclusion conditions.

Results

A total of 1 092 patients were included from nine studies. The results showed that pharmaceutical care could improve the incidence of adverse drug events, medication compliance, medication deviation, satisfaction rate of blood glucose control, pregnancy-induced hypertension, polyhydramnios, premature membrane rupture, macrosomia, premature delivery, neonatal hypoglycemia, and neonatal asphyxia [(P<0.000 1)][relative risk degree (RR)=0.63, P<0.000 1], 95% confidence interval (CI) (0.52–0.76); RR=1.18, 95%CI (1.11–1.26); RR=0.65, 95%CI (0.56,0–76); RR=1.20, 95%CI (1.11–1.29); RR=0.28, 95%CI (0.17–0.44); RR=0.29, 95%CI (0.18–0.45); RR=0.24, 95%CI (0.13–0.46); RR=0.32, 95%CI (0.20–0.52); RR=0.35, 95%CI (0.24–0.52); RR=0.38, 95%CI (0.25–0.58); RR=0.36, 95%CI (0.23–0.56); RR=0.29, 95%CI (0.17–0.49), respectively]. In the pharmaceutical care group, the rate of mastery of self-management skills, the incidence of neonatal hyperbilirubinemia, and the incidence of fetal distress were all better than those in the traditional medical care group, the difference was statistically significant (0.000 01<P<=0.05) [RR=1.35, 95%CI (1.11–1.64), P<0.003; RR=0.46, 95%CI (0.22–0.93), P<0.05; RR=0.24, 95%CI (0.13–0.46), P<0.000 1]. After excluding the articles with high heterogeneity, the analysis showed that gestational diabetes women in the pharmaceutical care group had higher rates of self-management skills, cesarean section, and neonatal hyperbilirubinemia than those in the traditional medical care group; these differences were statistically significant (P<0.000 01) [RR=1.45, 95%CI (1.27–1.67); RR=0.73, 95%CI (0.64–0.84); RR=0.32, 95%CI (0.18–0.58)].

Conclusion

Pharmaceutical care can improve the maternal and fetal outcomes of gestational diabetes mellitus.

Objective

Alpinia Officinarum and Euodia Rutaecarpap are two traditional Chinese herbs with warm nature, usually called interior-warming medicinal and widely used to treat cold syndrome for a long history. The purpose of this study is to explore the effects of Alpinia Officinarum and Euodia Rutaecarpap on irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) rats with spleen-stomach deficiency cold syndrome, and to clarify the link between “warming the middle to alleviate pain” and transient receptor potential channel A1 (TRPA1), M8 (TRPM8).

Methods

IBS rat model with spleen-stomach deficiency cold syndrome was established by cold diarrhea and restraint stress. Rats were randomly divided into the normal group, model group, positive group (pinaverium bromide), Alpinia Officinarum group and Euodia Rutaecarpa group. After continuous modeling and administration for seven days, body weight, loose stool grades, activity of ATP enzyme, pathological morphology of gastrointestinal tissue were evaluated. The expression of TRPA1 and TRPM8 in spinal ganglion, stomach and colon tissue of rats were detected by RT-PCR and immunohistochemistry.

Results

The IBS model with spleen-stomach deficiency cold syndrome caused increase in the number of diarrhea and loss in the body weight in rats. Compared with the normal group, the loose stool grades of model group was significantly increased (P<0.01), Na⁺-K⁺-ATP and Ca²⁺-Mg²⁺-ATP activity of erythrocyte membrane were significantly decreased (P<0.01). However, compared with the model group, Alpinia Officinarum and Euodia Rutaecarpa obviously reduced the loose stool grades (P<0.05 or P<0.01), and obviously increased the activity of Na⁺-K⁺-ATP and Ca²⁺-Mg²⁺-ATP (P<0.05). The expression of TRPA1 and TRPM8 in spinal ganglia and colon tissue of the model group was markedly enhanced (P<0.01), but Alpinia Officinarum and Euodia Rutaecarpa significantly inhibited these overexpression.

Conclusion

The effect of interior-warming and alleviating pain of Alpinia Officinarum and Euodia Rutaecarpa on IBS model may be mainly achieved by regulating the abnormal expression of TRPA1 and TRPM8. Thus, these results could support the fact that interior-warming medicinal such as Alpinia Officinarum and Euodia Rutaecarpa are traditionally used to cure spleen-stomach deficiency cold syndrome.

Periodic changes in the environmental conditions affect significantly on the biosynthesis of bioactive compounds and the therapeutic potential in medicinal plants. Although Berberis lycium is being extensively used against various ailments, specifically infectious diseases, impact of seasonal variations on its polyphenolic contents and antibacterial activities has rarely been explored yet. Consequently, present study was focused on the determination of phenolics and flavonoids content and antibacterial activities in the root and stem bark of B. lycium harvested throughout the year from same location (Abbottabad) using standard analytical approaches. Relatively, stem bark had high concentration of total phenolics than root bark, but in the case of total flavonoids there was no significant difference. In root bark, the highest concentration of TPC was in the month of December (373.5±0.58 mg GAE/100 g DW), while stem bark exhibited highest concentration of TPC (476.1±13.7 mg GAE/100 g DW) in the month of January. In root bark, TFC ranged from 32.00±7.62 to 124.5±5.58 mg QE/100 g DW with highest concentration in April. Whereas, in stem bark, TFC varied from 19.51±4.94 to 135.50±7.11 mg QE/100 g DW, with highest concentration in the month of April. Likewise, in January, November and December inhibition potential was maximum against Escherichia coli and Staphylococcus aureus both in root and stem bark samples. Although, significant associations were observed between total phenolics and antibacterial activities. However total phenolics, total flavonoids, and antibacterial activities depicted negative correlations with growing conditions viz. temperature, rain fall and humidity. Our findings confirm the impact of seasonal variations on the phytochemical composition and bioactive potential in medicinal plants. Specifically, to get maximum health benefits from B. lycium, winter season could be more appropriate in the Himalayan region.

Objective

Objective To analyze the differential expression and prognosis of Solute Carrier Family 47 Member 1 (SLC47A1) in human pan-cancer using bioinformatic methods to explore the prognostic value of SLC47A1 for human pan-cancer and to determine its immune regulatory role.

Methods

The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) pan-cancer database was used to analyze the diagnostic and prognostic value of SLC47A1, as well as its expression patterns. Pearson correlation analysis was used to evaluate the relationship between SLC47A1 and stromal scores, immune scores, tumor mutation burden (TMB), and microsatellite instability (MSI). The correlation between SLC47A1 and specific tumor immune subtypes was analyzed using the Tumor-Immune System Interactions Database (TISIDB). Analysis of differential methylation of SLC47A1 and prognostic analyses were performed using the Disease Meth and TCGA Pan-Cancer databases.

Results

SLC47A1 was abnormally expressed in 17 tumors and shows low expression levels in 11 tumor tissues. Low expression of SLC47A1 was associated with poor prognosis and diagnosis. Moreover, SLC47A1 was also involved in tumor microenvironment regulation. SLC47A1 methylation was disordered in 15 tumors, and disordered methylation was associated with survival.

Conclusion

Overall, these results indicate that SLC47A1 may serve as an important prognostic biomarker and may correlate with tumor immunity in human pan-cancer.