CASE PRESENTATION: A 78-year-old Han Chinese man living in a nursing home was diagnosed with fecal impaction; his initial symptom was overflow diarrhea, which is a rare occurrence with regard to fecal impaction. Nevertheless, we were able to effectively treat this situation by employing a new medical device that presents a novel method for addressing fecal impaction.
CONCLUSION: Early identification of fecal impaction with atypical symptoms is crucial to provide proper emergency management. A safe and noninvasive treatment method, especially for elderly patients with fecal impaction, should be chosen.
PURPOSE: The present study seeks to determine if TLP would prevent HFD-induced NAFLD in vivo and its underlying mechanisms from the perspectives of gut microbiota, metabolites, and hepatic inflammation.
METHODS: TLP was subjected to extraction and chemo-profiling, and in vivo evaluation in HFD-fed rats on hepatic lipid and inflammation, intestinal microbiota, short-chain fatty acids (SCFAs) and permeability, and body weight and fat content profiles.
RESULTS: The TLP was primarily constituted of gallic acid, corilagin and chebulagic acid. Orally administered HFD-fed rats with TLP were characterized by the growth of Ligilactobacillus and Akkermansia, and SCFAs (acetic/propionic/butyric acid) secretion which led to increased claudin-1 and zonula occludens-1 expression that reduced the mucosal permeability to migration of lipopolysaccharides (LPS) into blood and liver. Coupling with hepatic cholesterol and triglyceride lowering actions, the TLP mitigated both inflammatory (ALT, AST, IL-1β, IL-6 and TNF-α) and pro-inflammatory (TLR4, MYD88 and NF-κB P65) activities of liver, and sequel to histopathological development of NAFLD in a dose-dependent fashion.
CONCLUSION: TLP is promisingly an effective therapy to prevent NAFLD through modulating gut microbiota, mucosal permeability and SCFAs secretion with liver fat and inflammatory responses.
SETTING AND SAMPLE POPULATION: Orthodontic population from the Faculty of Dentistry of the University of Hong Kong.
METHODS: Thirty-four skeletal class II patients treated with the HGA (17 patients, mean age 10.6 ± 1.5 years) and the Herbst (17 patients, mean age 11.0 ± 1.4 years) were matched for sex, age, overjet, skeletal class and mandibular divergence. The patients received lateral cephalometric radiographs (LCRs) at the beginning of treatment (T1 ), after treatment (T2 ) and at follow-up (T3 ). In the HGA group, patients underwent LCRs 7 months before the beginning of treatment (T0 ), which were used as growth reference for intra-group comparison. Paired Student's t tests were used for intra- and inter-group comparisons (α = .05).
RESULTS: Treatment changes (T2 -T1 ) did not differ significantly between the groups. However, at follow-up (T3 -T1 ) the Herbst group showed a smaller increase than the HGA group in the vertical position of the hyoid bone relative to the Frankfort plane (P = .013) and mandibular plane (P = .013).
CONCLUSIONS: There were no significant differences in the upper airway, hyoid bone position and craniofacial morphology between the groups at the end of treatment. However, the Herbst may provide better long-term control of the vertical position of the hyoid bone than the HGA in children with skeletal class II malocclusion.
METHODS: We carried out a systematic search of all available RCTs up to June 2019 in the following electronic databases: PubMed, Scopus, Web of Science and Google Scholar. Pooled weight mean difference (WMD) of the included studies was estimated using random-effects model.
RESULTS: A total of 27 articles were included in this meta-analysis, with walnuts dosage ranging from 15 to 108 g/d for 2 wk to 2 y. Overall, interventions with walnut intake did not alter waist circumference (WC) (WMD: -0.193 cm, 95 % CI: -1.03, 0.64, p = 0.651), body weight (BW) (0.083 kg, 95 % CI: -0.032, 0.198, p = 0.159), body mass index (BMI) (WMD: -0.40 kg/m,295 % CI: -0.244, 0.164, p = 0.703), and fat mass (FM) (WMD: 0.28 %, 95 % CI: -0.49, 1.06, p = 0.476). Following dose-response evaluation, reduced BW (Coef.= -1.62, p = 0.001), BMI (Coef.= -1.24, p = 0.041) and WC (Coef.= -5.39, p = 0.038) were significantly observed through walnut intake up to 35 g/day. However, the number of studies can be limited as to the individual analysis of the measures through the dose-response fashion.
CONCLUSIONS: Overall, results from this meta-analysis suggest that interventions with walnut intake does not alter BW, BMI, FM, and WC. To date, there is no discernible evidence to support walnut intake for improving anthropometric indicators of weight loss.