Aims: Our aim was to search for clinical predictors of good glycemic control in patients starting or intensifying oral hypoglycemic pharmacological therapy. Methods: A multicenter, prospective cohort of 499 diabetic subjects was enrolled in this study: patients with newly diagnosed diabetes (NDM group) or poor glycemic control with oral antidiabetic drugs (OADs) (PDM group). All subjects then started or intensified OADs therapy and followed up for 91 days. Glycemic control was determined according to HbA1c at day 91 with HbA1c <7% considered good. Results: The proportions of patients with good glycemic control after follow up for 91 days were 66.9% and 34.8% in NDM group and PDM group respectively. Logistic regression analysis showed that the change in GA at 28 days was the only predictor of good glycemic control in NDM patients (OR = 1.630, 95% CI 1300-2.044, P < 0.001). In PDM patients, changes in GA at 28 days, CPI, baseline HbA1c, diabetic duration, and BMI were all independent predictors of good glycemic control (All P < 0.05). Conclusions: GA decline is a good predictor of future success in newly diagnosed patients. In patients intensifying therapy, beside GA decline, other individualized clinical characteristics should also be considered. (C) 2018 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Cardiovascular autonomic neuropathy (CAN) is a debilitating condition occurring among diabetic patients especially those with long duration of disease. Whereas incidences and treatment of CAN has been well described for Western populations, fewer studies have been conducted among the Chinese. This study, therefore, aimed to assess the prevalence of CAN among sampled Chinese diabetic patients. Accordingly, 2,048 participants with a history of type 1 diabetes mellitus (T1DM, 73) and type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM, 1975) were randomly sampled from 13 hospitals. Patients' biodata were recorded, and autonomic nervous system function tests performed to aid in the preliminary diagnosis of CAN. The final CAN diagnosis was based on the Ewing's test in which heart rate variation (HRV) values were evaluated through deep-breathing (DB), lying-to-standing (LS) and Valsalva (V) tests. Systolic blood pressure (SBP) variation values were also evaluated through LS. In the T1DM group, 61.6% patients were diagnosed with CAN and no differences were observed in the baseline and clinical data between this group and those without CAN (P>0.05). In the T2DM group, 62.6% patients were diagnosed with CAN and statistically significant differences were found between the CAN and non- CAN group with regards to age, duration of diabetes, metformin treatment, retinopathy and hypertension history (P<0.05). The most common manifestations of CAN included weakness (28.6%), dizziness (23.4%), frequent urination (19.6%), upper body sweating (18.3%) and nocturia (15.9%). Additionally, duration of disease and age were independent risk factors for CAN in T1DM and T2DM, respectively. On diagnosis, a combination of the V test + LS test provided the highest sensitivity of detecting CAN among T1DM group (sensitivity=97.6%, AUC=0.887) while for T2DM category, DB test had the highest sensitivity (83.6%), and maximal AUC (0.856) was found with V test + DB test. The overall prevalence of diabetes with CAN in the study was up to 63%.

AimsThis study was to determine whether serum glycated albumin (GA) was a better indicator of glycemic control than hemoglobin A1c (HbA1c) when starting a new treatment regimen for type 2 diabetes.MethodsNewly diagnosed type 2 diabetes patients, or patients who had poor glycemic control with oral hypoglycemic agents, were enrolled at 10 hospitals in Beijing. Serum GA, HbA1c, fasting blood glucose (FBG), and C-peptide were assayed on Days 0, 14, 28, and 91 after treatment.ResultsFour hundred ninety-nine patients were enrolled. Mean FBG, GA and HbA1c decreased significantly in patients at Days 14, 28, and 91. In patients with improved glycemic control, the reduction of GA and HbA1c levels was 10.5±13.3% vs. 5.1±5.4% on Day 14, 16.0±13.4% vs. 9.0±7.0% on Day 28, and 18.0±16.7% vs. 18.3±9.4% on Day 91, respectively, compared with baseline values. Changes in GA on Day 14, 28 and 91 were all closely correlated with changes in HbA1c on Day 91. Change in GA on Day 14 was correlated with treatment effectiveness evaluated by HbA1c on Day 91.ConclusionsGA may be a useful marker for assessing glycemic control at an early stage of new diabetes treatment and assist in guiding adjustments to treatment and therapy.

Literature,achievements and other materials on acupuncture-moxibustion standardization research in recent years were collected and summarized domestically and overseas. The process of acupuncture-moxibustion standardization in China was reviewed through two phases. Also,we compared domestic acupuncture-moxibustion standardization study with the foreign one. It is considered that its domestic development is sound but challenged by world competition in its internationalization. Going forward,acupuncture-moxibustion standardization system is needed to be completed and become international. Contemporary techniques should be used including big data,artificial intelligence,internet of things,and cloud computing,etc., and its application engineering research will be improved so as to drive Chinese medicine modernization.

This study proposes the ontological reconstruction of the current clinical terminology of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM). It also provides an overview of preliminary work related to the said reconstruction, including the ontology-based analysis of TCM clinical terminology. We conclude that the ontological reconstruction of TCM clinical terminology provides a proper translation from the idealized organizational model to real-world implementation and to a formalized, shared, and knowledge-based framework.