Cancer recurrence is a significant clinical issue in cancer treatment. Psychological stress has been known to contribute to the incidence and progression of cancer; however, its effect on cancer recurrence remains inconclusive. We conducted a systematic review to examine the current evidence from the Medline (PubMed), Embase and Cochrane Library up to May 2021. Among 35 relevant articles, a total of 6 studies (10 data points) were finally selected, which enrolled 26,329 patients (26,219 breast cancer patients except hepatocellular carcinoma patients in 1 study), 4 cohort studies (8 data points) and 2 RCTs (2 data points). Among the 8 data points in cohort studies, four psychological stress-related factors (two ‘anxiety’, one ‘depression’, and one ‘hostility’) were shown to be moderately related with the risk for cancer recurrence, while ‘loss of partner’ resulted in opposite outcomes. The ‘emotional‘ and ‘mental’ health factors showed conflicting results, and an RCT-derived meta-analysis proved the positive efficiency of psychotherapies in reducing the cancer recurrence risk among breast cancer patients (HR = 0.52; 95% CI 0.33–0.84). Despite the limitations, this study produces comprehensive information about the effect of psychological stress on cancer recurrence and provides reference data to clinicians and scientists for further studies.

Background: Bee venom acupuncture (BVA) is an effective treatment method for various diseases. Bee venom, however, can cause adverse effects, even rarely including life-threatening anaphylaxis, so safety-related evidence is required. In this study, we systematically estimated the incidence rate of anaphylaxis in response to BVA. Methods: We searched eight databases (MEDLINE (Pubmed), EMBASE, Cochrane Central Register of Controlled, KISS, KMBASE, Koreamed, OASIS, and NDSL) and systematically reviewed the articles that met the inclusion/exclusion criteria. Results: Among 225 potentially relevant articles, 49 were selected for this study. The overall incidence rate of anaphylaxis in response to BVA was 0.045% (95% CI 0.028–0.062). Women (0.083%, 95% CI 0.010–0.157) showed a higher incidence rate than men (0.019%, 95% CI −0.018 to 0.055), while the incidence for patients who had a skin test conducted (0.041%, 95% CI 0.011–0.072) was not significantly different compared to that obtained for patients for which there was no information about a skin test (0.047%, 95% CI 0.026–0.067). The publication year affected the incidence rate: it was highest before 1999 (1.099%, 95% CI −1.043 to 3.241), lower between 2000 and 2009 (0.049%, 95% CI 0.025–0.073), and lowest between 2010 and 2021 (0.037% 95% CI 0.014–0.060). Conclusions: In this study, we provide reference data about risk size and factors of BVA-related anaphylaxis, which is essentially required for BVA application in clinics.

Background: Although most epidemiological studies have been conducted using a relatively small population or subjects who had medical screenings, the present study aimed to investigate the incidence and prevalence of MASLD (formerly NAFLD) in Korea using nationwide registry data provided by the Health Insurance Review and Assessment Service (HIRA). Methods: Using nationwide medical records provided by HIRA, we analyzed the entire dataset of patients with MASL (KCD10-K76.0) and MASH (KCD10-K75.8) from 2010 to 2021 and calculated the incidence and prevalence by year, age, and gender. The prevalence and incidence rates were calculated by analyzing the HIRA data covering almost the entire population of Korea for 12 years, from 2010 to 2021, with an average population of 50,856,244 during this period. Statistical analyses included calculating confidence intervals using Ulm’s formula and conducting sex- and age-specific analyses with a Cochran–Armitage test for trends. Results: The annual incidence of MASL/MASH increased significantly from 9.71/0.37 in 2010 to 13.95/5.52 per 1000 persons in 2021 (p < 0.01). The annual prevalence of MASL increased from 15.69 in 2010 to 34.23 per 1000 persons in 2021, while the annual prevalence of MASH increased from 0.49 to 9.79 per 1000 persons between 2010 and 2021 (p < 0.01). Regarding the sex-dimorphic feature of MASLD, there was a male predominance in those < 50 years old but a female predominance in those ≥ 50 years old for the incidence and prevalence of MASL and the incidence of MASH. Conclusion: The incidence of MASL increased by 3% to 4% every year, while the incidence of MASH increased 14.91-fold from 2010 to 2021. The increasing trend is noteworthy compared with previous reports.