Are case reports valuable?Exploring their role in evidence based medicine and patient care

Case reports,often overlooked in evidence-based medicine(EBM),play a pivotal role in healthcare research.They provide unique insights into rare conditions,novel treatments,and adverse effects,serving as valuable educational tools and generating new hypothesis.Despite their limitations in generalizability,case reports contribute significantly to evidence-based practice by offering detailed clinical information and fostering critical thinking among healthcare professionals.By acknowledging their limitations and adhering to reporting guidelines,case reports can contribute significantly to medical knowledge and patient care within the evolving landscape of EBM.This editorial explores the intrinsic value of case reports in EBM and patient care.

EVIDENCE-BASED MEDICINE AND THE CLINICAL STUDY ON ACUPUNCTURE AND MOXIBUSTION

In this article, the authors hold that the evidence based medicine(EBM) is a new medical action produced at the historic moment in clinical practice, which is promoting development of the medicine and even the whole life science in a fully new train of thought and method. Further the briefly introduced contents are the effect of EBM, the difficulty of utilizing in the acupuncture clinical practice and how to resolve them. It is highly recommended that the doctors of the acupuncture science field should study EBM and its effect and difficulties in practice as earlier as possible, insistently assimilate new knowledge and keep abreast of the times’ progress to facilitate the further development of acupunctology.

Evidence based medicine:clinical trials that guide the management of ST-elevation myocardial infarction of elderly patients

Cardiovascular disease is the most frequent diagnosis in elderly people and is the leading cause of death in both men and women older than 65 years. Every year in the United States more than 700,000 patients arrive at the emergency room with ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction(STEMI). About 60 percent of hospital admissions for AMI are of people older than 65 years. Their in-hospital, 1-month,and 1-year mortality is high. 1 In this article, we will provide a review on clinical trials that guide the management of STelevation myocardial infarction of the elderly patients.……

COVID-19: Off-label therapies based on mechanism of action while waiting for evidence-based medicine recommendations

The world pandemic due to coronavirus disease 2019,known as COVID-19,embodies a high rate of disease transmission that causes a critical hospitalization overload.As of May 15,2020,the disease has been the cause of more than 4 million infections and more than 280000 deaths all over the world.At the beginning,we underestimated the disease;now,we have sufficient information and it is clear that it is not just a respiratory disease.In fact,if a prompt treatment is not initiated,the disease may evolve towards an abnormal immune response and cytokine storm with an important thrombophilic pattern.Therefore,we think that while waiting for certainties to be established by evidence-based medicine,it is not ethical to not try off-label therapies for some of the well-known drugs,as they could have some efficacy based on their mechanisms of action.

Hepatocellular carcinoma and evidence-based surgery

Transplantation cannot be considered the most important therapeutic procedure for hepatocellular carcinoma （HCC）. In France, no more than 2% of patients with HCC undergo a transplantation. Randomized conb＇olled trial must assess the benefit to risk ratio of various potentially ＂curative＂ treatment procedures （transplantation, resection, radiofrequency ablation）.

Using clinical cases to guide healthcare

Evidence-based practice(EBP)has been the gold standard in healthcare for nearly three centuries and aims to assist physicians in providing the safest and most effective healthcare for their patients.The well-established hierarchy of evidence lists systematic reviews and meta-analyses at the top however these methodologies are not always appropriate or possible and in these instances case-control studies,case series and case reports are utilised to support EBP.Case-control studies allow simultaneous study of multiple risk factors and can be performed rapidly and relatively cheaply.A recent example was during the Coronavirus pandemic where case-control studies were used to assess the efficacy of personal protective equipment for healthcare workers.Case series and case reports also play a role in EBP and are particularly useful to study rare diseases such as inflammatory bowel disease in transgender and gender non-conforming individuals.They are also vital in generating and disseminating early signals and encouraging further research.Whilst these methodologies have weaknesses,particularly with regards to bias and loss of patient confidentiality for rare pathologies,they have an important part to play in EBP and when appropriately utilised can significantly impact upon clinical practice.

The Practice and Exploration of Applying EBM to Bilingual Teaching of Medical Genetics at OSBCM

In the process of teaching medical genetics of undergraduate clinical medicine, the practice and exploration of applying EBM to the bilingual teaching of OSBCM medical genetics are carried out. Using CBL and PBL as the carrier can make up for the shortcomings of a single teaching mode, synthesize the advantages of multiple teaching modes. It starts from integrating the basic theoretical knowledge of medicine and clinical practice knowledge, improving students’ bilingual level of medical genetics, cultivating students’ literature retrieval ability, and promoting early clinical, multi-clinical and repeated clinical consciousness for medical students. Therefore, it is more conducive to cultivate students’ ability to learn independently, accurately analyze and solve problems, improve medical students’ clinical thinking ability and scientific research awareness, improve medical students’ ability of international communication, and lay a solid foundation for improving medical students’ future post competence, innovative spirit and lifelong learning ability.

Insulin sensitizers in treatment of nonalcoholic fatty liver disease:Systematic review

AIM: To summarize the evidence available for the clinical effectiveness of insulin sensitizers in the treatment of nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) systematically. METHODS: Relevant articles were located using computer-assisted searches of Medline (1966-March 2006), EMBASE (1988-March 2006), CINAHL (1982-March 2003), Educational Resource Information Center (1966-March 2006), Library, Information Science & Technology Abstracts (1967-March 2006), Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, Database of Abstracts of Reviews of Effects (1994-2006), dissertations in ProQuest and FirstSearch databases. Manual searches were made in the abstracts from meetings of the American Gastroenterological Association (1999-2006), and the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases (2003-2005). Studies were retrieved using the following selection criteria: (1) clinical trials using insulin sensitizers in subjects with NAFLD, (2) adult patients, (3) published as full manuscripts or abstracts, and (4) English, Spanish, German, and French languages only. Data were abstracted independently by two reviewers following standardized procedures. A face-to- face comparison of data was conducted to ensure the completeness and reliability of the abstraction process. RESULTS: Nine studies were included, six using metformin and three using thiazolidinediones. Only two studies were placebo-controlled trials. The mediansample size for all studies was 18 subjects. In the placebo-controlled trials, metformin improved insulin resistance markers and liver function tests, but not histological scores. In the single-arm trials, metformin and thiazolidinediones improved insulin resistance markers and liver function tests, and beneficial histological changes were reported. There is limited high-quality information available from which to draw categorical conclusions about the clinical use of insulin sensitizers in NAFLD.CONCLUSION: Current information indicates that the use of insulin sensitizers in NAFLD improves insulin resistance and liver function. Histological changes must be corroborated in randomized controlled trials.

China Association of Acupuncture–Moxibustion Evidence-based clinical practice guideline of acupuncture and moxibustion: Primary dysmenorrhea

Dysmenorrhea refers to periodic abdominal pain,or radiating to lumbosacral region.For the severe case,it is intolerable,combined with nausea and vomiting sometimes.This disease is commonly seen in unmarried young women.Epidemiological studies have shown that dysmenorrhea is the most common gynecological disease,especially in young women[1].Acupuncture and moxibustion have a long history in the treatm ent of primary dysmenorrhea(hereinafter referred to as PD),and compared with medication,the advantages are presented in the treatment.Entrusted by the Standardization Working Committee of China Association for Acupuncture and Moxibustion(CAAM),Department of Acupuncture and Moxibustion,Dongzhimen Hospital,Beijing University of Traditional Chinese Medicine has undertaken the drafting of Evidence-Based Clinical Practice Guideline of Acupuncture and Moxibustion:Primary Dysmenorrhea(hereinafter referred to as the Guideline).The Guideline was issued in 2014 by CAAM.It summarizes the research achievements in acupuncture-moxibustion treatm ent for dysmenorrhea in recent decades and is intended to standardize the clinical regimen of treatm ent with acupuncture and moxibustion so as to improve the clinical effect.

The Importance of Evidence for the Integration of Traditional and Complementary Medicine into Western Healthcare?

Policy makers should consider improving access to treatments normally considered outside of healthcare in the west, particularly given the recent WHO strategy. However, research on integrating traditional and complementary medicines(T&CM) into conventional health care is lacking. T& CM approaches, may provide a cost effective option given the increase in chronic diseases with evidence of effectiveness of T& CM being key if such approaches are to be offered as part of integrative patient care, in most countries, an integrated healthcare approach is unavailable to patients. Evidence based clinical guidelines on T& CM should influence care provision. However evidence that is available may not even be cited. Poor use of evidence may possibly be a reflection of lack of knowledge and/or biases of guideline developers but additionally stakeholders vary in their perceived need for evidence to implement health policy change. Journal editors should focus on publishing high quality manuscripts, with clear rationales, design and reporting frameworks. Researchers should consider carrying out careful feasibility studies prior to conducting trials taking into account the UK Medical Research Council's framework on complex interventions. Examples of feasibility studies highlighting their importance for trial design are given in this paper. If preparation for more definitive studies is conducted this will in turn improve the quality of research being designed, executed and published and subsequently encourage the inclusion of evidence by guideline developers. Robust evidence is necessary in order to inform governments' health policies providing appropriate T&CM interventions which can ultimately help to provide best patient care.

Research Advance and Prospects of Evidence-Based Acupuncture Science in China

Acupuncture is a traditional empirical medicine, and evidence-based medicine（EBM） is a new medical method and development of the empirical medicine. Since 1990s, Chinese acupuncture workers began to absorb and use the methods and principles of EBM to guide acupuncture clinical research and practice. Now more and more domestic acupuncture clinicians use and follow the methods and principles of EBM. On the systemic review of acupuncture-associated articles in Cochrane library, previously effective acupuncture therapy lacks adequate evidences, which may be related to the low quality of randomized controlled trials（RCTs）. In the future, only developing specialized team of acupuncture clinical research and clinical research center can radically elevate the levels of acupuncture clinical research and evaluation. Meanwhile, developing China＇s evidence-based acupuncture should base itself on the characteristics of acupuncture, such as emphasis on original research in ancient books, high-quality single RCTs and systemic review of non-randomized researches.

Clinical research of traditional Chinese medicine in big data era

With the advent of big data era, our thinking, technology and methodology are being transformed. Data-intensive scientific discovery based on big data, named ＂The Fourth Paradigm,＂ has become a new paradigm of scientific research. Along with the development and application of the Internet information technology in the field of healthcare, individual health records, clinical data of diagnosis and treatment, and genomic data have been accumulated dramatically, which generates big data in medical field for clinical research and assessment. With the support of big data, the defects and weakness may be overcome in the methodology of the conventional clinical evaluation based on sampling. Our research target shifts from the ＂causality inference＂ to ＂correlativity analysis.＂ This not only facilitates the evaluation of individualized treatment, disease prediction, prevention and prognosis, but also is suitable for the practice of preventive healthcare and symptom pattern differentiation for treatment in terms of traditional Chinese medicine （TCM）, and for the post-marketing evaluation of Chinese patent medicines. To conduct clinical studies involved in big data in TCM domain, top level design is needed and should be performed orderly. The fundamental construction and innovation studies should be strengthened in the sections of data platform creation, data analysis technology and big-data professionals fostering and training.

Integrative Medicine——Traditional Chinese Medicine,A Model?

The paper explores the concept of integrative medicine（IM） in relation to complementary and alternative medicine（CAM）.It contrasts IM available in China to its availability in the West.The second part of the paper highlights tools which could facilitate opportunities for IM.The paper concludes with a plea to ensure and maintain the integrity of traditional Chinese medical practice,and to continue to increase developing the evidence base through a funded European Coordination Action between EU member states and China.

Quality assessment of clinical guidelines in China： 1993-2010

Background Clinical practice guidelines （CPGs） play an important role in healthcare in China as well as in the world. However, the current status and trends of Chinese CPGs are unknown. The aim of this study was to systematically review the present situation and the quality of Chinese CPGs published in the peer-reviewed medical literature. Methods To identify Chinese CPGs, a systematic search of relevant literature databases （CBM, WANFANG, VIP, and CNKI） was performed for the period January 1978 to December 2010. We used the AGREE II instrument to assess the quality of the included guidelines. Results We evaluated 269 guidelines published in 115 medical journals from 1993 to 2010 and produced by 256 different developers. Only four guidelines （1%） described the systematic methods for searching and selecting the evidence, 14 （5%） guidelines indicated an explicit link between the supporting evidence and the recommendations, only one guideline used the Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation （GRADE） system. Thirty-one guidelines （12%） mentioned updates and the average frequency of update was 5.5 years; none described a procedure for updating the guideline. From the assessment with the Appraisal of Guidelines for Research and Ecaluation II （AGREE II）, the mean scores were low for the domains ＂scope and purpose＂ （19%） and ＂clarity of presentation＂ （26%） and very low for the other domains （＂rigour of development＂ 7%, ＂stakeholder involvement＂ 8%, ＂applicability＂ 6% and ＂editorial independence＂ 2%）. Conclusions Compared with other studies on the quality of guidelines assessed with the AGREE instrument in other countries, Chinese CPGs received lower scores, which indicates a relatively poor quality of the guidelines. However, there was some increase over time.