ORCID Profile
0000-0002-1723-9646
Current Organisations
University of Technology Sydney
,
Chinese University of Hong Kong
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Publisher: Elsevier BV
Date: 05-2020
DOI: 10.1016/J.EUF.2019.08.008
Abstract: Little is known about the key composition of a successful tweet in urology. To investigate for predictors of engagement with urology content on Twitter. This was a cross-sectional study based on 2-wk Twitter data surrounding a major international urology conference. We examined the engagement for all original tweets containing the hashtags for the European Association of Urology conference ("#EAU19" and/or "#EAU2019"). Study outcomes included engagement with tweets, as measured by the number of "likes" and "retweets." Tweet- and Twitter user-related parameters of each in idual tweet were recorded. Multiple linear regression analyses were performed to investigate for predictors of likes and retweets. From March 9 to 22, 2019, there were a total of 37 222 tweets. Among them, 3534 were "original tweets" that had 31 889 likes and 10 031 retweets. On multivariable analysis, the word count, number of mentions, and presence of a photo were predictors of likes and retweets. An increasing number of hashtags were associated with fewer likes. The number of "followings" and "followers" of the contributor, and their time since joining Twitter did not have any associations with the number of likes or retweets. The major limitation of the study is the lack of assessment about the quality of the tweet content. Based on the Twitter data from a urology conference, we concluded that the word count, number of mentions, and presence of a photo within the tweet were associated with audience engagement. We could engage the audience more successfully by increasing the number of words and mentions, and including a photo within a tweet. The results formulated the basic principles in creating successful tweets for sharing urological knowledge.
Publisher: Ovid Technologies (Wolters Kluwer Health)
Date: 27-07-2011
Publisher: S. Karger AG
Date: 18-07-2014
DOI: 10.1159/000358732
Abstract: b i Objective: /i /b To review a series of inflammatory myofibroblastic tumours (IMTs) of the urinary bladder in 10 hospitals in Hong Kong. b i Methods: /i /b A database search in the pathology archives of 10 hospitals in Hong Kong from 1995 to 2013 was performed using the key words ‘inflammatory myofibroblastic tumour', ‘inflammatory pseudotumour' and ‘spindle cell lesion'. Patient characteristics, clinical features, histological features, immunohistochemical staining results and treatment outcomes were reviewed. b i Results: /i /b Nine cases of IMT of the urinary bladder were retrieved. The mean age was 45.4 ± 22.8 years (range 11-78). Eight patients (88.9%) presented with haematuria and 5 patients (55.6%) had anaemia with a mean haemoglobin level of 6.8 ± 1.3 g/dl. Histologically, the majority of patients (77.8%) had a compact spindle cell pattern. Anaplastic lymphoma kinase staining was positive in 75% of cases. During a mean follow-up period of 43.4 months (range 8-94), none of them developed any local recurrence or distant metastasis. b i Conclusions: /i /b A high index of suspicion of IMT should be maintained for young patients presenting with bleeding bladder tumours and significant anaemia. IMTs of the urinary bladder run a benign disease course, and good prognosis can be achieved after surgical resection.
Publisher: Elsevier BV
Date: 2018
DOI: 10.1016/J.KINT.2017.07.026
Abstract: Src activation has been associated with fibrogenesis after kidney injury. Macrophage-myofibroblast transition is a newly identified process to generate collagen-producing myofibroblasts locally in the kidney undergoing fibrosis in a TGF-β/Smad3-dependent manner. The potential role of the macrophage-myofibroblast transition in Src-mediated renal fibrosis is unknown. In studying this by RNA sequencing at single-cell resolution, we uncovered a unique Src-centric regulatory gene network as a key underlying mechanism of macrophage-myofibroblast transition. A total of 501 differentially expressed genes associated with macrophage-myofibroblast transition were identified. However, Smad3-knockout largely reduced the transcriptome ersity. More importantly, inhibition of Src largely suppresses ureteral obstruction-induced macrophage-myofibroblast transition in the injured kidney in vivo along with transforming growth factor-β1-induced elongated fibroblast-like morphology, α-smooth muscle actin expression and collagen production in bone marrow derived macrophages in vitro. Unexpectedly, we further uncovered that Src serves as a direct Smad3 target gene and also specifically up-regulated in macrophages during macrophage-myofibroblast transition. Thus, macrophage-myofibroblast transition contributes to Src-mediated tissue fibrosis. Hence, targeting Src may represent as a precision therapeutic strategy for macrophage-myofibroblast transition-driven fibrotic diseases.
Publisher: Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Date: 16-07-2012
DOI: 10.1038/ONC.2012.251
Abstract: Cystic fibrosis (CF) transmembrane conductance regulator (CFTR) is expressed in the epithelial cells of a wide range of organs/tissues from which most cancers are derived. Although accumulating reports have indicated the association of cancer incidence with genetic variations in CFTR gene, the exact role of CFTR in cancer development and the possible underlying mechanism have not been elucidated. Here, we report that CFTR expression is significantly decreased in both prostate cancer cell lines and human prostate cancer tissue s les. Overexpression of CFTR in prostate cancer cell lines suppresses tumor progression (cell growth, adhesion and migration), whereas knockdown of CFTR leads to enhanced malignancies both in vitro and in vivo. In addition, we demonstrate that CFTR knockdown-enhanced cell proliferation, cell invasion and migration are significantly reversed by antibodies against either urokinase plasminogen activator (uPA) or uPA receptor (uPAR), which are known to be involved in various malignant traits of cancer development. More interestingly, overexpression of CFTR suppresses uPA by upregulating the recently described tumor suppressor microRNA-193b (miR-193b), and overexpression of pre-miR-193b significantly reverses CFTR knockdown-enhanced malignant phenotype and abrogates elevated uPA activity in prostate cancer cell line. Finally, we show that CFTR gene transfer results in significant tumor repression in prostate cancer xenografts in vivo. Taken together, the present study has demonstrated a previously undefined tumor-suppressing role of CFTR and its involvement in regulation of miR-193b in prostate cancer development.
Publisher: Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Date: 15-07-2021
DOI: 10.1038/S41391-021-00429-X
Abstract: To investigate the value of machine learning(ML) in enhancing prostate cancer(PCa) diagnosis. Consecutive systematic prostate biopsies performed from Jan 2003-June 2017 were used as the training cohort, and prospective biopsies performed from July 2017-November 2019 were used as validation cohort. Men were included if PSA was 0.4-50 ng/mL, and information of digital rectal examination (DRE), Transrectal ultrasound(TRUS) prostate volume, TRUS abnormality were known. Clinically significant PCa(csPCa) was defined as Gleason 3 + 4 or above cancers. Area-under-curve (AUC) of receiver-operating characteristics (ROC) was compared between PSA, PSA density, European Randomized Study of Screening for Prostate Cancer (ERSPC) risk calculator (ERSPC-RC), and various ML techniques using PSA, DRE and TRUS information. ML techniques used included XGBoost, LightGBM, Catboost, Support vector machine (SVM), Logistic regression (LR), and Random Forest (RF), where cost sensitive learning was applied. Training and validation cohorts included 3881 and 778 consecutive men, respectively. RF model performed better than other ML techniques and PSA, PSA density and ERSPC-RC for prediction of PCa or csPCa in the validation cohort. In csPCa prediction, AUC of PSA, PSA density, ERSPC-RC and RF was 0.71, 0.80, 0.83 and 0.88 respectively. At 90-95% sensitivity for csPCa, RF model achieved a negative predictive value (NPV) of 97.5-98.0% and avoided 38.3-52.2% unnecessary biopsies. Decision curve analyses (DCA) showed RF model provided net clinical benefit over PSA, PSA density and ERSPC-RC. By using the same clinical parameters, ML techniques performed better than ERSPC-RC or PSA density in csPCa predictions, and could avoid up to 50% unnecessary biopsies.
Publisher: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
Date: 11-08-2020
Abstract: Macrophage–myofibroblast transition (MMT) is a newly discovered pathogenic process by which TGF-β1/Smad3 signaling promotes tissue scarring. However, systemic targeting of Smad3 may impair host T cell immunity therefore, it is preferable to focus on downstream mechanisms to identify antifibrotic therapies that avoid targeting Smad3 per se. In this study, we revealed a brain-specific transcription factor Pou4f1 as the key regulator by which TGF-β1/Smad3 signaling executes MMT. Macrophage-specific silencing of Pou4f1 effectively blocked progression of renal fibrosis in two mouse kidney disease models. Thus, Pou4f1 represents a therapeutic target in MMT-driven renal diseases.
Publisher: American Diabetes Association
Date: 04-12-2014
DOI: 10.2337/DB14-1391
Abstract: Heme oxygenase-1 (HO-1) exerts vasoprotective effects. Such benefit in diabetic vasculopathy, however, remains unclear. We hypothesize that bilirubin mediates HO-1–induced vascular benefits in diabetes. Diabetic db/db mice were treated with hemin (HO-1 inducer) for 2 weeks, and aortas were isolated for functional and molecular assays. Nitric oxide (NO) production was measured in cultured endothelial cells. Hemin treatment augmented endothelium-dependent relaxations (EDRs) and elevated Akt and endothelial NO synthase (eNOS) phosphorylation in db/db mouse aortas, which were reversed by the HO-1 inhibitor SnMP or HO-1 silencing virus. Hemin treatment increased serum bilirubin, and ex vivo bilirubin treatment improved relaxations in diabetic mouse aortas, which was reversed by the Akt inhibitor. Biliverdin reductase silencing virus attenuated the effect of hemin. Chronic bilirubin treatment improved EDRs in db/db mouse aortas. Hemin and bilirubin reversed high glucose–induced reductions in Akt and eNOS phosphorylation and NO production. The effect of hemin but not bilirubin was inhibited by biliverdin reductase silencing virus. Furthermore, bilirubin augmented EDRs in renal arteries from diabetic patients. In summary, HO-1–induced restoration of endothelial function in diabetic mice is most likely mediated by bilirubin, which preserves NO bioavailability through the Akt/eNOS/NO cascade, suggesting bilirubin as a potential therapeutic target for clinical intervention of diabetic vasculopathy.
Publisher: Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Date: 21-11-2022
DOI: 10.1038/S41391-022-00610-W
Abstract: Lower urinary tract symptoms (LUTS) are common complaint in urology practice and affecting the quality of life for patients. This article aims to perform a systematic review and meta-analysis on the global prevalence of LUTS overall, and according to different patient characteristics. We searched MEDLINE and Embase for population-based epidemiological studies reporting the prevalence of LUTS from inception to 1 Jan 2021. Studies which: (1) have enough information on s le size and prevalence (2) investigate in iduals aged 15 or above and (3) have clear diagnostic criteria for LUTS. We extracted the following information: year of publication name of the first author study period region of recruitment race age range sex severity symptoms and criteria. We pooled rate estimates with exact binomial and test score-based confidence intervals (CIs) using proportions with a random-effects model. We included 222 studies from 36 countries involving 1,692,110 s les and 632,933 patients with LUTS. The overall prevalence of any and moderate-to-severe LUTS was 63.2% (95% CI = 58.0-68.1) and 31.3% (95% CI = 28.8-33.8), respectively. The most common symptom was storage symptoms (56.7% 95% CI = 51.0-62.4), followed by voiding symptoms (36.4% 95% CI = 27.8-45.4) and post-micturition symptoms (30.7% 95% CI = 19.2-43.6). A higher prevalence of moderate-to-severe LUTS was observed in male subjects (35.2% 95% CI = 32.1-38.5) and in iduals aged ≥60 (39.0% 95% CI = 33.4-44.8 I This study was the first comprehensive meta-analysis examining the global prevalence of LUTS. We identified a high level of LUTS prevalence in the general population, with a higher burden in male subjects, older in iduals, and the Asian population. There has been an increasing trend in the prevalence of LUTS since the 1990s.
Publisher: Research Square Platform LLC
Date: 08-09-2023
No related grants have been discovered for Chi-Fai Ng.