Given a passage classify if the passage has a definite objective/aim/goal or not. Output '1' if the passage has a defininte objective/aim/goal and output '0' if the passage does not have a definite objective/aim/goal.
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Question: To investigate the effects of quercetin, an herbal flavonoid, on LPS-induced delay in spontaneous apoptosis, adhesion molecules (CD62L, CD11b/CD18) expression of neutrophils, and superoxide (O(2)(-)) generation by LPS-primed fMLP-induced human neutrophils.', 'Neutrophils were incubated in the presence or absence of lipopolysaccharide (LPS) at a final concentration of 1 microg/ml for 24 hours. Some wells with neutrophils were pre-treated with quecetin at the final concentration ranging from 0-100 microM for 30 min and then 1 microg/ml LPS was added into the cultures for 24 hours. The apoptosis of neutrophils was evaluated by flowcytometry analysis of propidum iodide (PI)-staining of the nuclei and annexin V staining of phosphatidylserine (PS) in the cell membrane. Agarose gel electrophoresis of low molecular weight DNA was performed to analyze DNA fragmentation. The effects of quercetin on adhesion molecules were detected by using flowcytometry analysis. The generation of O(2) (-) by LPS-primed fMLP-induced neutrophils was determined by reduced cytochrome c assay.', 'LPS markedly inhibited the spontaneous apoptosis of neutrophils, but the inhibitory effect was abrogated after the pre-treatment of neutrophils with quercetin (approximately 40 microM) for 30 min. Quercetin (40 microM) also prevented LPS-induced down-regulation of CD62L expression, up-regulation of CD11b/CD18 expression, and O(2) (-) generation by fMLP-induced neutrophils.

Answer: 1


Question: Previous studies regarding the outcome of laparoscopic cholecystectomy (LC) in men have reported inconsistent findings. We conducted this prospective study to test the hypothesis that the outcome of LC is worse in men than women.', 'Between 1997 and 2002, a total of 391 consecutive LCs were performed by a single surgeon at King Fahd Hospital of the University. We collected and analyzed data including age, gender, body mass index (kg/m(2)), the American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA) class, mode of admission (elective or emergency), indication for LC (chronic or acute cholecystitis [AC]), comorbid disease, previous abdominal surgery, conversion to open cholecystectomy, complications, operation time, and length of postoperative hospital stay.', 'Bivariate analysis showed that both genders were matched for age, ASA class and mode of admission. The incidences of AC (P = 0.003) and comorbid disease (P = 0.031) were significantly higher in men. Women were significantly more obese than men (P < 0.001) and had a higher incidence of previous abdominal surgery (P = 0.017). There were no statistical differences between genders with regard to rates of conversion (P = 0.372) and complications (P = 0.647) and operation time (P = 0.063). The postoperative stay was significantly longer in men than women (P = 0.001). Logistic regression analysis showed that male gender was not an independent predictor of conversion (Odds ratio [OR] = 0.37 and P = 0.43) or complications (OR = 0.42, P = 0.42). Linear regression analysis showed that male gender was not an independent predictor of the operation time, but was associated with a longer postoperative stay (P = 0.02).

Answer: 1


Question: Neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NACT) improves the prognosis of patients with esophageal cancer who respond, but it is not effective in nonresponders. Therefore, it is crucial to establish a reliable method of predicting response before initiation of chemotherapy. Hypercoagulability, which is thought to be because of upregulation of tissue factor (TF) in cancer cells, was reported to be associated with chemoresistance. The aim of this study was to investigate the association between TF expression and response to NACT in esophageal cancer.', 'In 67 patients with advanced esophageal cancer, TF expression in pretreatment biopsy samples was evaluated immunohistochemically and correlated with clinicopathologic factors and response to chemotherapy.', 'TF was expressed by 43.3% of the tumors, but there were no correlations observed with any clinicopathologic parameters examined. Clinical and histologic responses to chemotherapy were significantly worse in TF-positive patients compared with TF-negative patients. Multivariate analysis revealed that TF expression was significantly associated with a poor clinical response (P\xa0=\xa00.0431). TF expression was also independently associated with poor progression-free survival (P\xa0=\xa00.0353).

Answer:
0