Background: The main objective of the current study was to gain insight into the heterogeneity and profiles of depressive symptoms in Chinese individuals aged 45 and over and to determine the optimal cut-off point for the 10-item Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale (CES-D-10) to provide a reference for future practical application.Methods: The participants were 16,997 Chinese community-dwelling adults aged 45 years or older who completed survey interviews for the 2018 China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study. The current study utilised latent profile analysis (LPA) to identify distinct profiles based on participants’ responses to CES-D-10 items, and receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analyses were applied to determine the optimal cut-off point for the CES-D-10 scale.Results: A three-profile solution was suggested as the optimum and included a “minimal depression” group (63.1%), “mild depression” group (23.4%) and “moderate-severe depression” group (13.5%); 36.9% (95% CI: 36.2 ∼ 37.6%) were considered at risk for probable depression. The “minimal depression” group was viewed as “non-cases,” and the remaining were viewed as “cases” that served as the reference standard for the ROC analysis, which obtained an AUC value of 97.8% (95% CI: 97.7–98.0%) and identified an optimal cut-off point of 10 (sensitivity:91.93%, specificity: 92.76%, and accuracy: 92.45).Conclusion: The identification of these distinct profiles underscores the heterogeneity in depressive symptoms among Chinese middle-aged and older adults. The CES-D-10 scale was demonstrated to have acceptable psychometric properties, with a cut-off point of 10 recommended for future research and practical application.

Autophagy, characterized by the elevator of autophagy-related gene 14 (ATG14) and the dysregulation of autophagy-related proteins, contributes to the cisplatin (DDP) resistance in ovarian cancer. Forkhead box protein P1 (FOXP1), which is a well-defined transcription factor, is reported to have the oncogenic effect on ovarian cancer. This study aims to identify the effect of miR-29c-3p/FOXP1/ATG14 pathway in regulating autophagy and DDP resistance in ovarian cancer. The expressions of miR-29c-3p, FOXP1, ATG14 and autophagy-related proteins were detected in DDP-sensitive ovarian cancer cell lines (SKOV3 and A2780) and DDP-resistant cell lines (SKOV3/DDP and A2780/DDP). Cell viability was detected using the MTT assay. The therapeutic effect of miR-29c-3p overexpression was observed in the xenograft model of nude mice.Compared with DDP-sensitive cells, miR-29c-3p was decreased in DDP-resistant cells, and an enhancement of FOXP1, ATG14, autophagy, and drug resistance was shown in DDP-resistant cells. The anti-resistant effect of miR-29c-3p was observed as overexpressing miR-29c-3p inhibited cell viability of DDP-resistant cells. Moreover, FOXP1 was a target of miR-29c-3p, which was confirmed by the luciferase reporter assay, and ATG14 was transactivated by FOXP1, which was confirmed by the ChIP assay. Overexpression of miR-29c-3p increased DDP sensitivity by downregulating FOXP1/ATG14 in vitro. The tumor volume was reduced after the injection of miR-29c-3p-overexpressing SKOV3/DDP cells in vivo. Overexpression of miR-29c-3p inhibited autophagy and DDP resistance partly via downregulating FOXP1/ATG14 pathway, suggesting miR-29c-3p as a novel target in overcoming DDP resistance in ovarian cancer.

Previous studies have suggested that metformin may be useful for preventing and treating endometrial cancer (EC), while the results have been inconsistent. This systematic review and meta-analysis aimed to investigate the association between metformin use and risk and prognosis of patients with EC. PubMed, Embase, and the Cochrane Library databases were searched for observational studies evaluating the effect of metformin on EC prevention or treatment. The odds ratio (OR) was used for analyzing risks, and the hazard ratio (HR) was used for analyzing survival outcomes. A random-effects model was used for data analysis. Seven studies reported data on EC risk. The pooled results suggested that metformin was not significantly associated with a lower risk of EC [OR = 1.05, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.82–1.35, P = 0.70]. For patients with diabetes, metformin showed no advantage in reducing the EC risk compared with other interventions (OR = 0.99, 95% CI 0.78–1.26, P = 0.95). Further, seven studies were included for survival analysis. The pooled data showed that metformin could significantly improve the overall survival of patients with EC (HR = 0.61, 95% CI 0.48–0.77, P < 0.05) and reduce the risk of EC recurrence (OR = 0.50, 95% CI 0.28–0.92, P < 0.05) Finally, we noted metformin was associated with significantly improving the overall survival of EC patients among diabetes (HR = 0.47; 95%CI 0.33–0.67, P < 0.05). This meta-analysis did not prove that metformin was beneficial for preventing EC. However, metformin could prolong the overall survival of patients with EC and reduce their risk of cancer relapse.

Cervical cancer (CC) remains one of the leading malignancies afflicting females worldwide, with its aetiology associated with long‐term papillomavirus infection. Recent studies have shifted their focus and research attention to the relationship between long non‐coding RNAs (lncRNAs) and CC therapeutic. Thus, the aim of the current study was to investigate the underlying mechanism of lncRNA LINC01305 on the cell invasion, migration and epithelial‐mesenchymal transition (EMT) of CC cells via modulation of the PI3K/Akt signalling pathway by targeting tenascin‐X B (TNXB). The expressions of LINC01305, TNXB, MMP2, MMP9, E‐cadherin, vimentin, PI3K, Akt, p‐PI3K, p‐Akt and TNXB were detected in this study. After which, the cell invasion and migration abilities of the CC cells were determined respectively. Bioinformatics and the application of a dual luciferase reporter gene assay provided verification indicating that TNXB is the target gene of lncRNA LINC01305. Reverse transcription quantitative polymerase chain reaction (RT‐qPCR) and western blot analysis methods revealed that the expressions of MMP2, MMP9, vimentin, PI3K, Akt, p‐PI3K and p‐Akt were decreased following the down‐regulation of LncRNA LINC01305 or overexpression of TNXB. LncRNA LINC01305 silencing or TNXB overexpression was noted to decrease the migration and invasion of SiHa cells. Taken together, the key findings of the current study present evidence suggesting that lncRNA LINC01305 silencing suppresses EMT, invasion and migration via repressing the PI3K/Akt signalling pathway by means of targeting TNXB in CC cells, which ultimately provides novel insight and identification of potential therapeutic targets for CC.

Our study aims to evaluate programmed cell death ligand-1 (PD-L1) expression and its prognostic significance in cervical cancer (CC), endometrial cancer (EC) and ovarian cancer (OC). Several electronic databases were searched. Fixed effects models or random effects models were employed to calculate the pooled prevalence of PD-L1 positivity and pooled hazard ratios (HRs) as appropriate. Heterogeneity and publication bias were also assessed. The pooled prevalence of PD-L1 positivity was 58.1%, 33.8% and 37.5% for CC, EC and OC patients, respectively. There were significant differences in the pooled estimates after stratification by PD-L1-positive assessment criteria and antibody clones. PD-L1 positivity was associated with worse OS in CC and EC patients and poorer progression-free survival (PFS) in CC patients. The prevalence of PD-L1-positive expression was considerably high in CC and modestly high in EC and OC patients. PD-L1 expression has the potential to be a prognostic biomarker for predicting the clinical outcomes of patients with CC and EC but not OC.

Aim: To reveal the prognostic significance of serum albumin (ALB) concentration in endometrial cancer (EC) patients in China. Patients & methods: 345 EC patients were enrolled in a single center, a...