Prince of Wales Hospital

Brain care score and retinal health: structural and metabolic insights from the UK Biobank

The retina is an extension of the central nervous system and a recognized indicator of systemic health, yet the link between the brain care score (BCS) and retinal health remains unclear. In this study, we aimed to assess the associations of BCS with retinal layer thickness and r...

Dietary and Nutritional Considerations for Metabolic Dysfunction-Associated Steatotic Liver Disease in Psoriasis and Hidradenitis Suppurativa: A Narrative Review

Metabolic dysfunction-associated steatotic liver disease (MASLD) is increasingly recognised in patients with chronic inflammatory skin disease, particularly psoriasis, for which epidemiological evidence of increased MASLD prevalence is relatively strong; corresponding data in hid...

Evaluation of 18 S rRNA as an endogenous control in OpenArray® plasma RNA qPCR workflows

Abstract Background Reliable qPCR analysis depends on stable endogenous controls, particularly in high-throughput pre-amplification workflows where technical bias may arise. The suitability of highly abundant 18 S rRNA as a reference gene in multiplex OpenArray ® platforms remain...

Ethnic and Racial Variations in Thyroid Eye Disease: Clinical Features and Management

Background: Thyroid eye disease (TED) is an autoimmune orbital disorder with a broad clinical spectrum, ranging from mild symptoms to sight-threatening complications. Increasing evidence demonstrates variation in disease presentation and severity across populations, with implicat...

Association of Polyunsaturated Fatty Acids and Incident Glaucoma: The UK Biobank, Multi Omics, and Therapeutic Strategies Study

ABSTRACT Purpose To investigate the associations and causal effects of polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) with incident glaucoma and identify intervention thresholds and therapeutic strategies. Methods This prospective study included 451,199 glaucoma‐free UK Biobank participants...

Astigmatism Types Effects on Internal Astigmatism and Compensation in Children: Hong Kong Children Eye Study

Abstract Introduction Astigmatism is highly prevalent among schoolchildren in Hong Kong. Children demonstrate distinct patterns of internal astigmatism (IA) to compensate for corneal astigmatism (CA). This study aims to investigate the associations among astigmatism subtypes, IA...

Mitral Valve Lithotripsy With SmartCrack Balloon for Severe Calcified Mitral Stenosis: First‐in‐Human Experience

Background Mitral stenosis due to mitral annular calcification and calcific rheumatic heart disease (CRHD) remains challenging to treat. This first‐in‐human study evaluated the safety and feasibility of the dedicated SmartCrack lithotripsy balloon in patients with severe mitral s...

L‐Cysteine and N‐Acetylcysteine Supplementation Improves Clinical Outcome in a Patient With COXPD10

ABSTRACT MTO1 is a nuclear gene that encodes a mitochondrial protein essential for modifying mitochondrial transfer RNAs (tRNAs) and stabilizing codon‐anticodon interactions to ensure accurate and efficient mitochondrial protein synthesis and oxidative phosphorylation. Mitochondr...

Noninvasive surrogate endpoints in MASH trials: current perspectives and challenges

Abstract Background Metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis (MASH) is a leading cause of cirrhosis and liver-related morbidity. Current regulatory pathways rely on histology and long-term clinical outcomes, but repeated liver biopsy is noninvasive and poorly reproducible...

HER2-low metastatic breast cancers: clinic-pathological characteristics, metastatic sites, and survival impact on biomarker discordance

Abstract Trastuzumab Deruxtecan has shown promising results in patients with HER2-low and -ultralow (UL) metastatic breast cancers, attracting extensive research on these tumors. While most studies focus on primary tumors, there is limited data on metastatic disease. Here, we aim...

Randomised phase III trials of cancer prevention drugs: a systematic review and prediction of trial success

BACKGROUND: Pharmacological cancer risk reduction has received far less investment than therapeutic oncology and only a few agents have entered routine practice. Understanding the predictors of positive outcomes of previous trials and issues faced is critical to future developmen...

Outcomes of Asian and Caucasian patients with type A aortic intramural haematoma: a multicentre registry analysis

Background Outcomes of aortic intramural haematoma (IMH) have shown disparities between Asian and Caucasian patients. We evaluated the heterogeneity of treatment effects in Asian and Caucasian patients with type A IMH. Methods This multicentre registry included individual patient...

Prognostic Role of Adverse Events in a Worldwide Population of Patients with Biliary Tract Cancer Treated with Chemo-Immunotherapy

Background: Biliary tract cancers (BTCs) are aggressive malignancies with limited treatment options. The addition of durvalumab or pembrolizumab to cisplatin–gemcitabine improves overall survival (OS), but validated biomarkers of benefit remain limited. Immune-mediated adverse ev...

A CCCTC-binding factor (CTCF)-fatty acid desaturase 1 (FADS1) axis regulates oncogenic energy metabolism in hepatocellular carcinoma

CCCTC-binding factor (CTCF) is a highly conserved DNA-binding protein crucial for 3D genome organization and gene regulation. Previous studies have shown that CTCF overexpression in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is associated with poor prognosis. This study aimed to elucidate th...

Association between delusions, belief flexibility, and cognitive control in schizophrenia – a 6-month repeated-measures study

Abstract Background There is robust evidence that belief inflexibility is critical to the maintenance of delusion conviction. While cognitive control abilities (inhibitory control, mental set shifting, and working memory updating) are instrumental to information processing in gen...

Cost utility analysis of two BK polyomavirus screening strategies: quantitative polymerase chain reaction vs 2-stage approach

Screening for BK polyomavirus (BKPyV) with quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) or a 2-stage approach with urine cytology followed by qPCR are acceptable strategies. However, the magnitude of the health benefits and incremental cost of adopting these 2 screening strategi...

Issues in the clinical assessment and management of people living with motor neurone disease (MND): a survey of Australian healthcare professionals

Objective: To inform the development of the Australian MND Guideline, this study aimed to identify challenges Australian healthcare professionals (HCPs) face in the clinical assessment and management of people living with MND (plwMND) including where practice varies from evidence...

Tibial cortex transverse transport accelerates diabetic wound healing via systemic mobilization of non-classical monocytes

Aims: To clarify the immunomodulatory mechanisms by which tibial cortex transverse transport (TTT) accelerates wound healing in a type 2 diabetic rat model, with particular focus on the dynamics of subsets of monocytes and macrophages. Methods: A total of 186 male Sprague-Dawley...