Glucolipid metabolism improvement in impaired glucose tolerance subjects consuming a Quinoa-based diet: a randomized parallel clinical trial.

Purpose: To investigate the effects of quinoa on glucose and lipid metabolism, and the prognosis in people with impaired glucose tolerance. Methods: One hundred and thirty-eight patients diagnosed with impaired glucose tolerance following a glucose tolerance test in Guangzhou Cadre Health Management Center were selected and randomly divided into quinoa intervention and control groups, according to the digital table method. After 1 year of follow-up, the differences in blood glucose, blood lipid, glycosylated hemoglobin and other indicators were compared. The disease prognosis between the two groups was also compared. Results: The 2 h postprandial blood glucose, glycosylated hemoglobin, insulin resistance index, total cholesterol, low-density lipoprotein cholesterol, body mass index, waist circumference, systolic and diastolic blood pressure after intervention in the quinoa group were significantly lower than before intervention. In contrast, high-density lipoprotein cholesterol was higher than before intervention and is statistically significant (p < 0.05). After 1 year of follow-up, the control group's glycosylated hemoglobin and body mass index are higher than before intervention, and are statistically significant (p < 0.05). The 2 h postprandial blood glucose, glycosylated hemoglobin, insulin resistance index, body mass index, and mean diastolic blood pressure in the quinoa group are statistically significantly lower than in the control group, while high-density lipoprotein cholesterol is higher (p < 0.05). The rate of conversion to diabetes for participants in the quinoa group (7.8%) is statistically significantly lower than in the control group (20.3%) (χ2 = 12.760, p = 0.002). Logistic regression analysis showed that quinoa consumption is a protective factor against delaying the progression of diabetes (p < 0.05). Conclusion: Adding quinoa to staple food intake can reduce postprandial blood glucose, and improve lipid metabolism and insulin resistance, delaying the progression of diabetes in people with impaired glucose tolerance.

Baseline Objective Malnutritional Indices as Immune-Nutritional Predictors of Long-Term Recurrence in Patients with Acute Ischemic Stroke.

Background: The controlling nutritional status (CONUT) score and the prognostic nutritional index (PNI) score were designed as indicators of patients' immune-nutritional status. This study aimed to investigate the prognostic impact of the CONUT and PNI scores on long-term recurrent ischemic stroke (RIS) and adverse outcomes for adults with acute ischemic stroke (AIS). Methods: This retrospective study enrolled 991 AIS patients. Multivariable Cox regression models were used to assess the relationships of the malnutritional indices and RIS and major cardiovascular events (MACEs). Results: During a median follow-up at 44 months (IQR 39−49 months), 203 (19.2%) patients had RIS and 261 (26.3%) had MACEs. Compared with normal nutritional status, moderate to severe malnutrition was significantly related to an increased risk of RIS in the CONUT score (adjusted hazard ratio (HR) 3.472, 95% confidence interval (CI) 2.223−5.432, p < 0.001). A higher PNI value tertile (tertile two, adjusted HR 0.295, 95% CI 0.202−0.430; tertile three, adjusted HR 0.445, 95% CI 0.308−0.632, all p < 0.001) was related to a lower risk of RIS. Similar results were found for MACEs. The PNI exhibited nonlinear association with the RIS and both two malnutritional indices improved the model's discrimination when added to the model with other clinical risk factors. Conclusions: This study demonstrated that the CONUT and PNI are promising, straightforward screening indicators to identify AIS patients with impaired immune-nutritional status at higher risk of long-term RIS and MACEs.

Efficacy of Antihypertensive Therapy in the Acute Stage of Cerebral Infarction - A Prospective, Randomized Control Trial.

BACKGROUND: This study investigated whether patients in the acute stage of cerebral infarction (ACI) might benefit from single-drug antihypertensive therapy (AT) without the use of preset target levels. METHODS: A total of 320 ACI patients were randomly divided into an AT group and a control group (group C) (160 patients in each group). The AT group received single antihypertensive drug treatment after the first 48 hours of onset with 5 mg of amlodipine besylate or 150 mg of irbesartan once a day. The primary end-point event was mortality on the 14th day and in the 6th month after onset, significant dependent-survival status (SDS, Barthel Index ≤ 60), mortality/disability ratio (modified Rankin Scale ≥ 3), and recurrence rate of cardio-cerebral vascular events (RR-CVE). RESULTS: The National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale (NIHSS) score was 8.39 ± 3.21 vs. 8.16 ± 3.27 in the AT and C groups on entry to the study. On day 14, there were no significant differences in mortality (2.5% vs. 3.1%, p = 0.9994), SDS (50.0% vs. 49.0%, p = 0.864), and mortality/disability ratio (61.3% vs. 66.3%, p = 0.352) between the two groups, however the RR-CVE in the AT group was lower than in group C (4.4% vs. 11.9%, p = 0.014). In month 6, there were no significant difference in mortality rate between the two groups (3.1% vs. 3.8%, p = 0.767), however the SDS (23.4% vs. 34.4%, p = 0.033), mortality/disability ratio (32.1% vs. 45.0%, p = 0.018), and RR-CVE in group AT were lower than in group C (10.7% vs. 19.4%, p = 0.030). CONCLUSIONS: Appropriate AT for patients with ACI does not worsen the disease condition and may improve the prognosis for the patients with moderate or mild stroke severity.

The Common Element Effect of Abstract-to-Abstract Mapping in Language Processing.

Since the 1990s, there has been much discussion about how concepts are learned and processed. Many researchers believe that the experienced bodily states (i.e., embodied experiences) should be an important factor that affects concepts' learning and use, and metaphorical mappings between abstract concepts, such as TIME and POWER, and concrete concepts, such as SPATIAL ORIENTATION, STRUCTURED EXPERIENCEs, etc., suggest the abstract-concrete concepts' connections. In most of the recent literature, we can find common elements (e.g., concrete concepts) shared by different abstract-concrete metaphorical expressions. Therefore, we assumed that mappings might also be found between two abstract concepts that share common elements, though they have no symbolic connections. In the present study, two lexical decision tasks were arranged and the priming effect between TIME and ABSTRACT ACTIONs was used as an index to test our hypothesis. Results showed a robust priming effect when a target verb and its prime belonged to the same duration type (TIME consistent condition). These findings suggest that mapping between concepts was affected by common elements. We propose a dynamic model in which mappings between concepts are influenced by common elements, including symbolic or embodied information. What kind of elements (linguistic or embodied) can be used would depend on how difficult it is for a concept to be learned or accessed.