Browsing by Author "Wang, Y."

Now showing 1 - 3 of 3
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    Glycan Biomarkers for Rheumatoid Arthritis and Its Remission Status in Han Chinese Patients.
    (2016-06) Sebastian, A.; Alzain, M. A.; Asweto, Collins O.; Song, H.; Cui, L.; Yu, X.; Ge, S.; Dong, H.; Rao, P.; Wang, H.; Fang, H.; Gao, Q.; Zhang, J.; He, D.; Guo, X.; Song, M.; Wang, Y.; Wang, W.
    Rheumatoid arthritis (RA), a systemic, chronic, and progressive inflammatory autoimmune disease, affects up to 1.0% of the world population doubling mortality rate of patients and is a major global health burden. Worrisomely, we lack robust diagnostics of RA and its remission status. Research with the next-generation biomarker technology platforms such as glycomics offers new promises in this context. We report here a clinical case–control study comprising 128 patients suffering from chronic RA (80.22% in remission, 19.78% active clinically) and 195 gender- and age-matched controls, with a view to the putative glycan biomarkers of RA as well as its activity or remission status in Han Chinese RA patients. Hydrophilic interaction liquid chromatography–ultra-performance liquid chromatography (HILIC-UPLC) was used for the analysis of IgG glycans. The regression model identified the glycans that predict RA status, while a receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis validated the sensitivity and prediction power. Among the total 24 glycan peaks (GP1–GP24), ROC analysis showed only GP1 prediction to be highly sensitive with an area under the curve (AUC) = 0.881. Even though GP21 and GP22 could predict active status among the RA cases (p < 0.05), they had lower sensitivity of prediction with an AUC = 0.658. Taken together, these observations suggest that GP1 might have potential as a putative biomarker for RA in the Han Chinese population, while the change in IgG glycosylation shows association with the RA active and remission states. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first glycomics study with respect to disease activity and remission states in RA.
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    The Malaysian health care system: Ecology, plans, and reforms.
    (2016-01) Sebastian, A.; Alzain, M. A.; Asweto, Collins O.; Mahara, G.; Guo, X.; Song, M.; Wang, Y.; Wang, W.
    Malaysia is on its way to achieving developed nation status in the next 4 years. Currently, Malaysia is on track for three Millennium Development Goals (MDG1, MDG4, and MDG7). The maternal mortality rate, infant mortality rate, and mortality rate of children younger than 5 years improved from 25.6% (2012) to 6.6% (2013), and 7.7% (2012) per 100,000 live births, respectively whereas immunization coverage for infants increased to an average of 90%. As of 2013 the ratio of physicians to patients improved to 1:633 while the ratio of health facilities to the population was 1:10,272. The current government administration has proposed a reform in the form of the 10th Malaysian Plan coining the term "One Care for One Malaysia" as the newly improved and reorganized health care plan, where efficiency, effectiveness, and equity are the main focus. This review illustrates Malaysia's transition from pre-independence to the current state, and its health and socioeconomic achievement as a country. It aims to contribute knowledge through identifying the plans and reforms by the Malaysian government while highlighting the challenges faced as a nation.
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    Telomere Length and Accelerated Biological Aging in the China Suboptimal Health Cohort: A Case-Control Study
    (Mary Ann Liebert, Inc, 2017-06) Alzain, M. A.; Asweto, Collins O.; Zhang, J.; Fang, H. H.; Zhao, Z.; Guo, X.; Song, M.; Zhou, Y.; Chang, N.; Wang, Y.; Wang, W.
    Suboptimal health status (SHS) has been linked to cardiovascular risk factors, psychosocial stress, and unhealthy lifestyle. These factors also contribute to the shortening of telomere length (TL). A case–control study was conducted to examine the association between subjective health measures of SHS from the behavior perspective and also objective measures of TL at molecular level. SHS (cases = 294) was matched by age, sex, and body mass index with ideal health (controls = 294) using a propensity score matching method. Suboptimal health status questionnaire-25 (SHSQ-25) was used in the community-based health survey. A quantitative polymerase chain reaction was used to measure relative telomere length (RTL). Shorter RTL was found among the SHS group compared to the ideal health group ( p < 0.05). SHS was almost four times likely to be in the first quartile (odds ratio [OR] = 3.81; 95% confidence interval [CI] 2.21–6.56), almost thrice in second quartile (OR = 2.84; 95% CI 1.65–4.90), and almost twice likely to be in the third quartile (OR = 1.71; 95% CI 1.00– 2.94) compared to the fourth quartile (the longest) of RTL after adjusting for socioeconomic, dietary intake, anthropometric, blood pressure, and biochemistry variables ( p < 0.05). Notably, SHS score was negatively correlated with RTL (r=-0.218, p < 0.05). Our study confirms an association between SHS and short RTL. Combination of subjective (SHS) and objective (RTL) measures is a novel tool for health aging investigation. Therefore, SHSQ-25 could be used as a screening tool for measuring biological aging in low-income countries at community level where the expensive technique for RTL measurement is not applicable.