Background:Bronchial asthma is one of the most common chronic diseases in the world and has become a serious public health problem. Combination therapy has become the first choice for clinical treatment of bronchial asthma. In addition to the combined use of routine medication, traditional Chinese medicine as an adjuvant therapy is also considered. Xiaoqinglong Decoction (XQLD) is an effective prescription of traditional Chinese medicine in treating asthma, and there are more and more clinical reports about its combination with western medicine in treating asthma. Therefore, we designed this study protocol to evaluate the adjuvant role of XQLD in the treatment of bronchial asthma.Method:The following electronic databases will be systematically searched from inception to April 2019: PubMed, EMBASE database, Cochrane Library, China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI), Wan Fang, Chinese Scientific Journals Database (VIP), and China Biology Medicine disc, (CBM). And the following primary outcomes will be tested, including effective rate (ER), pulmonary function (FEV1, PEF, FEV1/FVC), adverse reactions (AR). RevMan5 software will be used for literature quality evaluation and stata14.0 software will be used for data synthesis and analysis.Result:To evaluate the efficacy and safety of Xiaoqinglong decoction in combination therapy by observing the outcomes of efficacy, adverse reactions and pulmonary function.Conclusion:This study protocol will be used to evaluate the efficacy and safety of XQLD in combination with conventional drugs in the treatment of bronchial asthma, as well as the adjuvant role of XQLD in combination.PROSPERO registration number:CRD42019133549

Aims: Contrast-enhanced voiding urosonography (ceVUS) is a well-established imaging modality for the diagnosis of vesicoureteral reflux (VUR). However, discrepancies of grading diagnosis of VUR exist due to the qualitative grading criteria currently used in clinics. This study aimed to evaluate numerical markers for a quantitative VUR grading system.Material and methods: CeVUS images of grade II-VVUR were analysed. A quantitative indicator, i.e. sectional area ratio (SAR), on the imaging section with maximum cross-section area and the presence of kidney hilum was calculated to distinguish different grades of VUR. The diagnostic performance of SAR was evaluated using receiver operating characteristic curve (ROC) analysis, and the maximum Youden Index was used to determine the optimal cut-off values.Results: A total of 63 patients with 126 PelviUreteral Units were enrolled. The SAR value increased significantly along with the increase of VUR grade. SAR had an excellent diagnostic performance in grading VUR. For differentiating VUR of grade II vs III, III vs IV and IV vs V, the area under the ROC curve values of SAR were 0.967, 0.943 and 0.865, respectively, while the optimal SAR cut-off values were 14.3%, 34.9% and 51.0%, respectively. The quantitative grading system based on the optimal SAR cut-off values showed excellent consistency with the qualitative grading system of VUR currently used in clinic.Conclusions: The numerical indicator SAR calculated from ceVUS may be used to establish a quantitative VUR grading system with excellent diagnostic performance and can potentially serve as a reliable tool for the evaluation and follow-up of VUR.

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