Prognostic factors and long term results of neo adjuvant therapy followed by surgery in stage IIIA N2 non-small cell lung cancer patients

Prognosis of stage IIIA N2 non-small cell lung cancer [NSCLC] remains poor despite the changes in therapeutic strategies. To assess long term results of neo adjuvant therapy followed by surgery for patients with stage IIIA N2 NSCLC and to analyze factors influencing survival. The methods adopted include: Retrospective review of medical records of 91 patients with stage IIIA N2 NSCLC, who received neo adjuvant therapy followed by surgery; collection of information on demographic information, staging procedure, preoperative therapy, clinical response, type of resection, pathologic response of tumor, status of lymph nodes and adjuvant chemotherapy; survival analysis by Kaplan-Meier and calculation of prognostic factors using log-rank and Cox regression model. All patients received a platinum-based chemotherapy and 23 [29.1%] had an associated radiotherapy. Eighty four patients underwent thoracotomy. Median survival was 26 months [95%CI, 22.6-30.8 months] with three and five year survival rates of 31.6 and 20.9%, respectively. Prognostic factors for survival on univariate analysis was clinical response [P= 0.032], complete resection [P= 0.002], pathologic tumor response [P< 0.001], and lymph nodal down staging [P= 0.001]. Multivariate analyses identified complete resection, pathologic tumor response and lymph nodal down staging as independent prognostic factors. Survival of patients with stage IIIA N2 NSCLC who received neo adjuvant therapy is significantly influenced by clinical response, complete resection, pathologic tumor response, and lymph nodal down staging. These results can be helpful in guiding standard clinical practice and evaluating the outcome of neo adjuvant therapy followed by surgery in patients with stage IIIA N2 NSCLC

Determination of the inhibitory activity of angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitor captopril by high performance capillary electrophoresis / 药学学报

<p><b>AIM</b>To establish a method for determinate of the inhibitory activity of angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitor captopril by high performance capillary electrophoresis.</p><p><b>METHODS</b>The characteristic absorptive wavelength of hippuric acid determined by ultraviolet spectrophotometer is 228 nm. The method employed a melted capillary column, 50 mmol.L-1 phosphoric acid (pH 8.3) buffer solution, inject pressure 4.8 kPa, inject time 3 s, separation voltage 20 kV and detection wavelength 228 nm.</p><p><b>RESULTS</b>The reactant and resultant was separated completed within 7 min. IC50 of captopril was 0.019 mumol.L-1. Captopril is a competitive inhibitor, which was proved by enzyme reaction dynamics.</p><p><b>CONCLUSION</b>The method was shown to be accurate, simple and rapid and can be used for determination of the inhibitory activity of captopril.</p>