Prospective study on comparing two methods: for dynamic monitoring of minimal residual disease in acute promyelocytic leukemia / 中国实验血液学杂志

This study was purposed to comparatively analyse the value of PCR and FCM for dynamic monitoring minimal residual disease (MRD) of acute promyelocytic leukemia. The patients with acute promyelocytic leukemia hospitalized in our hospital from January 2011 to December 2012 were observed and all achieved complete remission after remission induction therapy. Before the chemotherapy, the bone marrow cell morphology examination, polymerase-chain reaction (PCR) and multi-parameter flow cytometry (FCM) were performed for each patient. Then the detection results were statistically analyzed. The 477 specimens were achieved from 159 detections for 48 patients. The results showed that 3 specimens were found to be relapsed by bone marrow cell examination, and other specimens were complete remission;PCR detection confirmed 7 positive, and the FCM confirmed 19 positive. There wasn't significant difference between PCR and FCM by kappa test (P > 0.05). It is concluded that FCM is as sensitive as PCR in evaluating the treatment effect of acute promyelocytic leukemia.

Metabolic syndrome is an independent risk factor for cardiovascular disease events in patients with ischemic stroke / 中华心血管病杂志

<p><b>OBJECTIVE</b>To explore the association between metabolic syndrome (MS) and risk of cardiovascular disease events (CVD) in patients with ischemic stroke.</p><p><b>METHOD</b>A total of 1087 patients with ischemic stroke were enrolled from 5 community-based medical centres and underwent baseline evaluation on risk factors of stroke during the period of Jan. 2003 to Dec. 2006. After baseline survey, all patients were followed up until Dec 31, 2008 and new CVD events were recorded. MS was defined using CDS criteria. Proportional hazard models were used to assess the HRs and 95% CI of CVD events associated with MS and other components.</p><p><b>RESULTS</b>The prevalence of MS was 40.4% at baseline. During an average follow-up of 3.5 years, 178 patients developed new CVD events. After adjusted for age, gender, smoking, drinking, marriage status, education level, hospitalization, recurrence of stroke, stroke duration, depression, cognition impairment and ADL, MS remains the independent predictor for the risk of CVD events. Compared with patients with non-MS, the risk of CVD events increased by 44% (HR: 1.44, 95%CI: 1.06 - 1.95). The risk of CVD also increased with the number of MS components. Compared with patients with 1 or less than 1 components of MS, the risk of CVD events increased by 30% (HR: 1.30, 95% CI: 0.83 - 2.04) in those with 2 components and by 69% (HR: 1.69, 95%CI: 1.11 - 2.56) in those with 3 or more components of MS. Hypertension and hyperglycemia and impaired fasting glucose also served as independent risk factors for CVD event (all P < 0.001).</p><p><b>CONCLUSIONS</b>MS was independently associated with increased risk of CVD events in patients with ischemic stroke. There was a dose-response relationship between the numbers of MS components and the risk of CVD event.</p>