Coach-Supported Internet-Based Cognitive Therapy for Social Anxiety Disorder in Hong Kong: Development, Training, and Pilot Clinical Outcomes.

Internet-based Cognitive Therapy for Social Anxiety Disorder (iCT-SAD), a treatment that is normally supported by therapists, has been modified for delivery by trained coaches without mental health practitioner qualifications and has shown promising efficacy for patients in Hong Kong.

Clinical and subthreshold depression in an epidemiologic sample of adolescents.

Objective: Understanding the clinical continuum of depression (encompassing Major Depressive Disorder (MDD) and Subthreshold Depression (SD)) is fundamental to developing detection and prevention, especially among adolescents where onset is common. Using an epidemiologic adolescent sample, this study examined the prevalence of MDD and SD, and compared psychosocial outcomes with healthy controls (HCs).

Method: A total of 2295 adolescents aged 12-17 were randomly selected from schools across Hong Kong.

Immunological and fibrotic profiling in the NOD.c3c4 murine model of autoimmune cholangitis.

Primary Biliary Cholangitis (PBC) is a chronic autoimmune liver disease characterized by intrahepatic bile duct destruction, progressive cholestasis, and fibrosis, accompanied by elevated anti-mitochondrial antibodies (AMAs) and IgM. While multiple mouse models have been developed to study PBC pathogenesis, no single model fully recapitulates all aspects of human disease. Among these, the NOD.

Revealing the Diverse Allergenic Protein Repertoire of Six Widely Consumed Crab Species: A Species-Specific Allergen in King Crab.

Background: Shellfish allergy poses a significant health risk affecting up to 2% of the global population. Comprehensive allergen profiling across species is crucial for improving diagnostics and therapies, given the challenges posed by cross-reactivity. This study aims to identify and compare the allergen profiles of six widely consumed edible crab species.

Autism epidemiology in Hong Kong children and youths aged 6-17: Implications on autism screening and sex differences in the community.

Epidemiological studies on autism lack representation from Asia. We estimated the prevalence of autism among children and youths in Hong Kong using a two-stage approach. In addition, we evaluated the psychometric properties of the screening instrument and explored sex differences within an epidemiological context.

The Treatment of Primary Biliary Cholangitis: Time for Personalized Medicine.

Primary Biliary Cholangitis is an autoimmune liver disease distinguished by Anti-mitochondrial Antibodies and chronic non-suppurative lymphocytic microcholangitis. UDCA remains the exclusively recommended initial therapy for PBC. However, 40% of patients experience either incomplete biochemical response or intolerance to UDCA, which represents poorer outcomes and increased mortality.

Common and rare variant analyses implicate late-infancy cerebellar development and immune genes in ADHD.

Objective: Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is a common neuropsychiatric disorder with a significant genetic component. The latest genome-wide association study (GWAS) meta-analysis of ADHD identified 27 whole-genome significant risk loci in the European population. However, genetic risk factors for ADHD are less well-characterized in the Asian population, especially for low-frequency / rare variants.

Prevalence and correlates of depression and anxiety in caregivers of children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder during the fifth wave of COVID-19 and school closure in Hong Kong.

Background: Caregivers of children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) are vulnerable to increased psychological distress during COVID-19. However, specific pandemic- and child-related factors contributing to their poor mental health have not been fully investigated. We aimed to comprehensively examine prevalence and correlates of depression and anxiety among caregivers of ADHD children in Hong-Kong during the peak of fifth pandemic wave with territory-wide school closure.

Fish Allergenicity Ladder and Parvalbumin Epitopes for Predicting Clinical Cross-Reactivity and Reintroduction in Chinese Population.

Background: IgE-mediated fish allergy has long been considered an umbrella term due to the high cross-reactivity of parvalbumin, the major fish allergen. Yet, clinical tolerance to certain fish highlights allergenicity differences. In this study, we sought to construct a fish allergenicity ladder and identify fish parvalbumin epitopes to improve the diagnosis of fish allergy.

Twelve-month prevalence of DSM-5 mental disorders and the psychosocial correlates- a child and adolescent psychiatric epidemiologic survey in Hong Kong SAR.

Background: Childhood and adolescence, as critically important developmental stages, set the premise for the lifelong trajectory of health and well-being. Epidemiologic evidence abounds in purporting that half of all lifetime mental disorders begin in adolescence. Epidemiologic data based on structured clinical diagnostic assessments are disproportionately scarce in Asian countries that host fast-growing youth population along a wide socioeconomic spectrum in the course of globalisation.

Inhalant Mediated Allergy: Immunobiology, Clinical Manifestations and Diagnosis.

Inhalant allergen-mediated respiratory diseases, including asthma and allergic rhinitis, have become increasing global health issues. While air pollution is believed to favor allergic sensitization and intensify clinical symptoms of allergy, allergen sensitization can vary highly with geographical location, climate, and lifestyle differences. Pollen sensitization is higher in European countries, while dust mite is more common in regions with high humidity.

Immunobiology of bile and cholangiocytes.

The biliary tract is now recognized as an immune organ, and within the biliary tract, both bile and cholangiocytes play a key role in maintaining immune defense and homeostasis. First, immunoreactive proteins such as secretory IgA provide local antimicrobial effects. Second, bile acids (BAs) protect the biliary tree from immune-related injury through receptor signaling, mainly via the membrane-bound receptor TGR5 on cholangiocytes.

Minimal change disease following autologous stem cell transplant for Hodgkin lymphoma.

Nephrotic syndrome is characterised by heavy proteinuria secondary to glomerular injury. It is an uncommon but serious complication of allogeneic haematopoietic stem cell transplant (HSCT), but rarely reported after autologous HSCT. Here, we report the case of a man in his mid-20s who presented with significant peripheral oedema 2 months after autologous HSCT for Hodgkin lymphoma.

Choice of activation protocol impacts the yield and quality of CAR T cell product, particularly with older individuals.

Objectives: In clinical chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cell therapy, one of the strongest correlates of favorable patient responses is lower levels of differentiation in T cells from the peripheral blood mononuclear cell (PBMC) starting material or the CAR T cell product. T cells from older patients are inherently more differentiated, but we hypothesised that specific activation protocols could be used to limit CAR T cell differentiation during manufacturing, particularly in older patients.

Methods: We used PBMCs from young (20-30 years old) and older (60+ years old) healthy donors to generate CAR T cells using two activation protocols: soluble anti-(α) CD3 monoclonal antibody (mAb) immune complexes of αCD3 and αCD28 mAbs.

A 12-Year Review of Upper Extremity Deep Vein Thrombosis-Are They the Same as Lower Extremity Deep Vein Thrombosis?

Upper extremity deep vein thrombosis (UEDVT) is uncommon but not insignificant. The current literature is limited, and the management is largely extrapolated from the treatment of lower extremity DVTs (LEDVT). : A retrospective review was conducted on patients diagnosed with UEDVT at Northern Health, Victoria, Australia, between December 2010 and December 2022.

Multikingdom and functional gut microbiota markers for autism spectrum disorder.

Associations between the gut microbiome and autism spectrum disorder (ASD) have been investigated although most studies have focused on the bacterial component of the microbiome. Whether gut archaea, fungi and viruses, or function of the gut microbiome, is altered in ASD is unclear. Here we performed metagenomic sequencing on faecal samples from 1,627 children (aged 1-13 years, 24.

Prevalence of autism in first-episode psychosis in two Hong Kong teaching hospitals.

Autistic features are commonly observed in children and adolescents with first-episode psychosis, but they are sometimes overlooked by clinicians and caregivers. By comprehensively examining the clinical profiles of 103 children and adolescents (below 18 years old) with first-episode psychosis and conducting the Autism Diagnostic Interview-Revised (the 'gold standard' autism diagnostic tool) with their primary caregivers, we showed that around 28% of patients with first-episode psychosis had a comorbid autism diagnosis, and boys were 3.57 times more likely to have first-episode psychosis-autism spectrum disorder comorbidity than girls.

Gut Microbiota-Derived Butyrate Induces Epigenetic and Metabolic Reprogramming in Myeloid-Derived Suppressor Cells to Alleviate Primary Biliary Cholangitis.

Background & Aims: Gut dysbiosis and myeloid-derived suppressor cells (MDSCs) are implicated in primary biliary cholangitis (PBC) pathogenesis. However, it remains unknown whether gut microbiota or their metabolites can modulate MDSCs homeostasis to rectify immune dysregulation in PBC.

Methods: We measured fecal short-chain fatty acids levels using targeted gas chromatography-mass spectrometry and analyzed circulating MDSCs using flow cytometry in 2 independent PBC cohorts.

Shrimp Extract Exacerbates Allergic Immune Responses in Mice: Implications on Clinical Diagnosis of Shellfish Allergy.

Tropomyosin has been identified as the major cross-reactive shellfish allergen, but recent studies showed the presence of other clinically relevant allergens. This study aims at determining the allergic immune responses of mice sensitized with raw and boiled shrimp extracts in comparison to recombinant tropomyosin (rTM). Female Balb/c mice were intragastrically sensitized and challenged with raw, boiled shrimp or rTM.

Conventional type 1 dendritic cells are essential for the development of primary biliary cholangitis.

Background & Aims: Primary biliary cholangitis (PBC) is a progressive-cholestatic autoimmune liver disease. Dendritic cells (DC) are professional antigen-presenting cells and their prominent presence around damaged bile ducts of PBC patients are documented. cDC1 is a rare subset of DC known for its cross-presentation abilities and interleukin 12 production.

Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder and dopamine receptor D4 (DRD4) exon 3 variable number of tandem repeats (VNTR) 2-repeat allele.

To investigate the association of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) with the 48-base pair (bp) variable number of tandem repeats (VNTR) in exon 3 of the dopamine receptor D4 (DRD4) gene, we genotyped 240 ADHD patients and their parents from Hong Kong. The 4R allele was most common, followed by 2R. We examined association between the 2R allele (relative to 4R) and ADHD by Transmission Disequilibrium Test (TDT).