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    Effect on healthcare utilization and costs of spinal manual therapy for acute low back pain in routine care: A propensity score matched cohort study
    (San Francisco, California, US : PLOS, 2017) Walker, Jochen; Mertens, Ulf Kai; Schmidt, Carsten Oliver; Chenot, Jean-François
    Spinal manual therapy (SMT) is a popular treatment option for low back pain (LBP). The aim of our analysis was to evaluate the effects of manual therapy delivered by general practitioners and ambulatory orthopedic surgeons in routine care on follow up consultations, sick leave, health service utilization and costs for acute LBP compared to matched patients not receiving manual therapy. This is a propensity score matched cohort study based on health claims data. We identified a total of 113.652 adult patients with acute LBP and no coded red flags of whom 21.021 (18%) received SMT by physicians. In the final analysis 17.965 patients in each group could be matched. Balance on patients' coded characteristics, comorbidity and prior health service utilization was achieved. The provision of SMT for acute LBP had no relevant impact on follow up visits and days of sick leave for LBP in the index billing period and the following year. SMT was associated with a higher proportion of imaging studies for LBP (30.6% vs. 23%, SMD: 0.164 [95% CI 0.143-0.185]). SMT did not lead to meaningful savings by replacing other health services for LBP. SMT for acute non-specific LBP in routine care was not clinically meaningful effective to reduce sick leave and reconsultation rates compared to no SMT and did not lead to meaningful savings by replacing other health services from the perspective of health insurance. This does not imply that SMT is ineffective but might reflect a problem with selection of suitable patients and the quality and quantity of SMT in routine care. National Manual Medicine societies should state clearly that imaging is not routinely needed prior to SMT in patients with low suspicion of presence of red flags and monitor the quality of provided services.
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    Evaluation of combination protocols of the chemotherapeutic agent FX-9 with azacitidine, dichloroacetic acid, doxorubicin or carboplatin on prostate carcinoma cell lines
    (San Francisco, California, US : PLOS, 2021) Weiner, Franziska; Schille, Jan Torben; Hein, Jens Ingo; Wu, Xiao-Feng; Beller, Matthias; Junghanß, Christian; Murua Escobar, Hugo; Nolte, Ingo; Tilaoui, Mounir
    The isoquinolinamine FX-9 is a novel potential chemotherapeutic agent showing antiproliferative effects against hematologic and prostate cancer cell lines such as B- and T-acute lymphoblastic leukemia and prostate cancer (PC) of different species. Interestingly, FX-9 shows no hemolytic activity and low toxicity in benign adherent cells. The detailed FX-9 molecular mode of action is currently not fully understood. But application on neoplastic cells induces pro-apoptotic and antimitotic effects. Canine prostate cancer (cPC) represents a unique spontaneous occurring animal model for human androgen-independent PC. Human androgen-independent PC as well as cPC are currently not satisfactorily treatable with chemotherapeutic protocols. Accordingly, the evaluation of novel agent combinations bears significant potential for identifying novel treatment strategies. In this study, we combined FX-9 with the currently approved therapeutic agents doxorubicin, carboplatin, the demethylating substance azacitidine as well as further potentially antitumorigenic agents such as dichloroacetic acid (DCA) in order to evaluate the respective synergistic potential. The combinations with 1–5 μM FX-9 were evaluated regarding the effect after 72 hours on cell viability, cell count and apoptotic/necrotic cells in two human prostate cancer cell lines (LNCaP, PC-3) and a canine prostate cancer cell line (Adcarc1258) representing androgen-dependent and -independent PC/cPC forms. FX-9 in combination with azacitidine decreases cell viability and increases cell death with positive Bliss values. Furthermore, this decreases the cell count with neutral Bliss values on PC-3. Carboplatin in combination with FX-9 reduces cell viability with a neutral Bliss value and increases cell death on LNCaP with calculated positive Bliss values. DCA or doxorubicin in combination with FX-9 do not show synergistic or additive effects on the cell viability. Based on these results, azacitidine or carboplatin in combination with FX-9 offers synergistic/additive efficacy against prostate adenocarcinoma cell lines in vitro. The beneficial effects of both combinations are worth further investigation.