Reliability and Validity of Chinese Version of the Perceived Competence Scale for Disaster Mental Health Workforce: A Cross-Sectional Study

Objective@#This study aimed to translate the English version of the Perceived Competence Scale for Disaster Mental Health Workforce (PCS-DMHW) into Chinese, and to test its reliability and validity in Chinese mental health workers. @*Methods@#With the consent of Professor Choi, Keimyung University, Korea, and the authorization of the scale, the English version of PCS-DMHW was translated, retranslated and culturally debugged to form the Chinese version of PCS-DMHW. The general information questionnaire and the Chinese version of PCS-DMHW scale were used to investigate 706 mental health workforce from 9 tertiary hospitals in Sichuan province in China from March 24, 2020 to April 14, 2020. The Cronbach’s α coefficient was used to evaluate the internal consistency reliability of the scale, and the test-retest correlation coefficient r was used to evaluate the test-retest reliability of the scale. The content validity indexes (CVI) and exploratory factor analysis (EFA) was used separately for evaluating the content validity and structure validity of the scale. @*Results@#The Cronbach’s α coefficient of the Chinese version of PCS-DMHW total scale, individual competences and organizational competences subscale was 0.978, 0.956, and 0.964, respectively. The test-retest reliability of the total scale, individual competences and organizational competences subscale was 0.949, 0.932 and 0.927, respectively. The item-level CVI of all scale were ranged from 0.833–1.000, the scale-level CVI (S-CVI)/universal agreement of the total scale, individual competences and organizational competences subscale was 0.833, 0.875, and 0.857, respectively, and the S-CVI/average was 0.972, 0.979, and 0.976, respectively. EFA showed that two principal components were extracted from the subscale of individual competences and organizational competences. @*Conclusion@#The Chinese version of PCS-DMHW has good reliability and validity, and can be widely used in China.

Novel Truncating and Missense Variants in SEMA6B in Patients With Early-Onset Epilepsy.

Progressive myoclonic epilepsy (PME) is a rare neurodegenerative disease, characterized by myoclonic seizures and tonic clonic seizures, with genetical and phenotypical heterogeneity. The semaphorin 6B (SEMA6B) gene has been recently reported a causal gene of PME. Independent studies are warranted to further support these findings. Here we report that one nonsense variant in NM_032108.3 exon17 c.2056C > T (p.Gln686∗) and one missense variant in exon14 c.1483G > T (p.Gly495Trp) of SEMA6B, both occurring de novo, underlie early-onset epilepsy with variable severity and different response to treatment in two patients. In vitro analyses have demonstrated that the nonsense variant, p.Gln686∗, results in a truncated protein with remarkably increased expression compared to that of the wild type. The truncated protein presented more homogeneous and failed to locate in the plasma membrane. The missense variant p.Gly495Trp affects evolutionarily conserved amino acid and is located in the sema domain, a key functional domain of SEMA6B. It was predicted to perturb the SEMA6B function by altering the tertiary structure of mutant protein, although neither change of protein length and expression nor difference of cellular distribution was observed. Co-immunoprecipitation studies have demonstrated that both variants influence protein binding of SEMA6B and PlxnA2 with varying degrees. Our results provide further evidence to support the initial findings of SEMA6B being causal to epilepsy and indicate that mediating Semaphorin/Plexin signaling is the potential mechanism of the SEMA6B-related disease.

Effects of four Chinese herb extracts on cell proliferation in IEC-6 cells of rats and their glucose absorption / 中草药

Objective To study the effects of Chinese herb extracts on cell proliferation and glucose absorption in intestinal epithelial cell line(IEC-6 cells) of rats.Methods The extracts of four Chinese herbs,including Herba Agastaches(HA),Rhizoma Atractylodis(RA), Cortex Phellodendri(CP),and Gypsum Fibrosum(GF),were made.Their suitable concentration on the cell proliferation in IEC-6 cells was determined by MTT method,and glucose absorption and the activity of Na+,K+-ATPase in IEC-6 cells were assayed.A method of real time PCR was applied to the determination of SGLT1 and GLUT2 mRNA expression in the cells.Results Chinese herb extracts treatment altered the cell proliferation in a dose-dependent manner.Moreover,RA volatile oil(50 ?g/mL) and CP alkaloid(10 ?g/mL) treatment increased glucose absorption and the activity of Na+,K+-ATPase genes(P0.05).Conclusion The three extracts treatment,including RA volatile oil,CP aklaloid,and HA volatile oil,could increase glucose absorption and the expression of glucose transport carrier genes,but their regulative mechanism are not totally the same.