AIM To evaluate the short-term outcomes and quality of life(Qo L) in gastric cancer patients undergoing digestive tract construction using the isoperistaltic jejunum-latercut overlap method(IJOM) after totally laparos...AIM To evaluate the short-term outcomes and quality of life(Qo L) in gastric cancer patients undergoing digestive tract construction using the isoperistaltic jejunum-latercut overlap method(IJOM) after totally laparoscopic total gastrectomy(TLTG).METHODS A total of 507 patients who underwent laparoscopic gastrectomy(D2) from January 2014 to March 2016 were originally included in the study. The patients were divided into two groups to undergo digestive tract construction using either IJOM after TLTG(group T, n = 51) or Roux-en-Y anastomosis after laparoscopic-assisted total gastrectomy(LATG)(group A, n = 456). The short-term outcomes and Qo L were compared between the two groups after 1:2 propensity-score matching(PSM). We used a questionnaire to assess Qo L.RESULTS Before matching, age, sex, tumor size, tumor location, preoperative albumin and blood loss were significantly different between the two groups(P < 0.05). After PSM, the patients were well balanced in terms of their clinicopathological characteristics, although both blood loss and in-hospital postoperative days in group T were significantly lower than those in group A(P < 0.05). After matching, group T reported better Qo L in the domains of pain and dysphagia. Among the items evaluating pain and dysphagia, group T tended to report better Qo L("Have you felt pain" and "Have you had difficulty eating solid food")(P < 0.05).CONCLUSION The IJOM for digestive tract reconstruction after TLTG is associated with reduced blood loss and less pain and dysphagia, thus improving Qo L after laparoscopic gastrectomy.展开更多
A survey was conducted in 2011 in the major date growing regions of Saudi Arabia to identify and evaluate date palms with fruit characteristics preferred by the producers and consumers. The regions in the Kingdom surv...A survey was conducted in 2011 in the major date growing regions of Saudi Arabia to identify and evaluate date palms with fruit characteristics preferred by the producers and consumers. The regions in the Kingdom surveyed for this purpose were Al-Zulfi, Al-Hassa, Najran, Al-Madinah Al-Munawarah and AI-Qassim. Seventy palms from seedlings were initially identified for the study based on the following fruit characteristics, i.e., fruit length, breadth, weight, color, taste, texture, sugar content, external appearance and also the market value. Subsequently, 12 palms （Al-Afiah, Duhiba, Adbah, Aliah, Shamshula, Masifat Al-Asedy, Suwaid, Batlyah, AI-Nassar, Hussan, Sukariyat Al-Zulfi and Al-Hamat） mainly from the Zulfi and Riyadh regions were found to meet the required standards with potential for commercial date farming. Among these, fruits of Adbah had the highest total sugars of 72.9% followed by Duhiba with a total sugar content of 71.9%. Fruit length was maximum （49.1 mm） in the variety Allah, while the fruits of the variety Hussan recorded the maximum weight of 19.5 g. Furthermore, it is pertinent to mention that fruit size of the 12 selected cultivars was generally large and comparable to Majdool, a well-known date palm cultivar of North Africa. The fruits of the selected cultivars were also tasty and can be stored separately.展开更多
We consider the problem of restoring images corrupted by Poisson noise. Under the framework of maximum a posteriori estimator, the problem can be converted into a minimization problem where the objective function is c...We consider the problem of restoring images corrupted by Poisson noise. Under the framework of maximum a posteriori estimator, the problem can be converted into a minimization problem where the objective function is composed of a Kullback-Leibler(KL)-divergence term for the Poisson noise and a total variation(TV) regularization term. Due to the logarithm function in the KL-divergence term, the non-differentiability of TV term and the positivity constraint on the images, it is not easy to design stable and efficiency algorithm for the problem. Recently, many researchers proposed to solve the problem by alternating direction method of multipliers(ADMM). Since the approach introduces some auxiliary variables and requires the solution of some linear systems, the iterative procedure can be complicated. Here we formulate the problem as two new constrained minimax problems and solve them by Chambolle-Pock's first order primal-dual approach. The convergence of our approach is guaranteed by their theory. Comparing with ADMM approaches, our approach requires about half of the auxiliary variables and is matrix-inversion free. Numerical results show that our proposed algorithms are efficient and outperform the ADMM approach.展开更多
基金Supported by National Key Clinical Specialty Discipline Construction program of China,No.[2012]649Key Project of Science and Technology Plan of Fujian Province,No.2014Y0025
文摘AIM To evaluate the short-term outcomes and quality of life(Qo L) in gastric cancer patients undergoing digestive tract construction using the isoperistaltic jejunum-latercut overlap method(IJOM) after totally laparoscopic total gastrectomy(TLTG).METHODS A total of 507 patients who underwent laparoscopic gastrectomy(D2) from January 2014 to March 2016 were originally included in the study. The patients were divided into two groups to undergo digestive tract construction using either IJOM after TLTG(group T, n = 51) or Roux-en-Y anastomosis after laparoscopic-assisted total gastrectomy(LATG)(group A, n = 456). The short-term outcomes and Qo L were compared between the two groups after 1:2 propensity-score matching(PSM). We used a questionnaire to assess Qo L.RESULTS Before matching, age, sex, tumor size, tumor location, preoperative albumin and blood loss were significantly different between the two groups(P < 0.05). After PSM, the patients were well balanced in terms of their clinicopathological characteristics, although both blood loss and in-hospital postoperative days in group T were significantly lower than those in group A(P < 0.05). After matching, group T reported better Qo L in the domains of pain and dysphagia. Among the items evaluating pain and dysphagia, group T tended to report better Qo L("Have you felt pain" and "Have you had difficulty eating solid food")(P < 0.05).CONCLUSION The IJOM for digestive tract reconstruction after TLTG is associated with reduced blood loss and less pain and dysphagia, thus improving Qo L after laparoscopic gastrectomy.
文摘A survey was conducted in 2011 in the major date growing regions of Saudi Arabia to identify and evaluate date palms with fruit characteristics preferred by the producers and consumers. The regions in the Kingdom surveyed for this purpose were Al-Zulfi, Al-Hassa, Najran, Al-Madinah Al-Munawarah and AI-Qassim. Seventy palms from seedlings were initially identified for the study based on the following fruit characteristics, i.e., fruit length, breadth, weight, color, taste, texture, sugar content, external appearance and also the market value. Subsequently, 12 palms （Al-Afiah, Duhiba, Adbah, Aliah, Shamshula, Masifat Al-Asedy, Suwaid, Batlyah, AI-Nassar, Hussan, Sukariyat Al-Zulfi and Al-Hamat） mainly from the Zulfi and Riyadh regions were found to meet the required standards with potential for commercial date farming. Among these, fruits of Adbah had the highest total sugars of 72.9% followed by Duhiba with a total sugar content of 71.9%. Fruit length was maximum （49.1 mm） in the variety Allah, while the fruits of the variety Hussan recorded the maximum weight of 19.5 g. Furthermore, it is pertinent to mention that fruit size of the 12 selected cultivars was generally large and comparable to Majdool, a well-known date palm cultivar of North Africa. The fruits of the selected cultivars were also tasty and can be stored separately.
基金supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China(Grant Nos.1136103011271049 and 11271049)+5 种基金the Project Sponsored by the Scientific Research Foundation for the Returned Overseas Chinese ScholarsState Education Ministry(Grant Nos.CUHK400412HKBU502814211911and 12302714)Hong Kong Research Grants Council(Grant No.Ao E/M-05/12)FRGs of Hong Kong Baptist University
文摘We consider the problem of restoring images corrupted by Poisson noise. Under the framework of maximum a posteriori estimator, the problem can be converted into a minimization problem where the objective function is composed of a Kullback-Leibler(KL)-divergence term for the Poisson noise and a total variation(TV) regularization term. Due to the logarithm function in the KL-divergence term, the non-differentiability of TV term and the positivity constraint on the images, it is not easy to design stable and efficiency algorithm for the problem. Recently, many researchers proposed to solve the problem by alternating direction method of multipliers(ADMM). Since the approach introduces some auxiliary variables and requires the solution of some linear systems, the iterative procedure can be complicated. Here we formulate the problem as two new constrained minimax problems and solve them by Chambolle-Pock's first order primal-dual approach. The convergence of our approach is guaranteed by their theory. Comparing with ADMM approaches, our approach requires about half of the auxiliary variables and is matrix-inversion free. Numerical results show that our proposed algorithms are efficient and outperform the ADMM approach.
