1 . Using a headset at home to deliver a low electrical current to the brain can relieve symptoms of depression. The approach, called transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS), is effective when used several times a week for half an hour at a time.

Previous trials have shown that the therapy works under medical supervision in a clinic or lab. Now, a randomised trial has demonstrated that a tDCS headset can also reduce depression symptoms when worn at home.

Several forms of electrical brain stimulation may have the potential to treat depression. With tDCS, sponge electrodes are placed on the left and right sides of the forehead, causing a mild current to flow from the left to the right. This makes brain cells on the left side more likely to fire, with some studies suggesting that activity in this region is low in people with depression.

Repeated sessions of stimulation may lead to longer term changes in the brain cells, increasing their activity levels, says team member Cynthia Fu at the University of East London. Affecting activity in this region probably alters activity in multiple areas, she says. “There are probably many brain regions causing depression.”

To see if people can benefit from using such a device at home, the team randomly assigned 174 people with moderate or severe depression to receive either a full session of stimulation from the headset or stimulation from the same device that lasted just a few seconds. People felt their skin aching at the start and end of each session.

While the depression symptoms of both groups improved on a 52-point scale, those who got the real treatment showed the most benefit, by about 9 points compared with 7, a degree of difference that is similar to that seen with antidepressants (抗抑郁药), “We found people liked having it at home,” says Fu. “Participants could build it into their day.”

1. What is the function of the headset?

A．Curing depression in patients.	B．Testing the degree of depression.
C．Adjusting brain’s electrical current.	D．Reducing symptoms of depression.

2. How does the tDCS approach work?

A．By making the left-brain cells active.	B．By causing a strong electrical current.
C．By changing the brain wave’s direction.	D．By stimulating all brain regions repeatedly.

3. What does the underlined word “alters” in paragraph 4 mean?

A．Monitors.

B．Disturbs.

C．Limits.

D．Changes.

4. What can be learned about the participants from the last two paragraphs?

A．They feel relieved to some extent.	B．They remain relaxed in the session.
C．They use different kinds of headsets.	D．They are bound to rely on the headsets.

2 . SarahRose Black isn’t a doctor or a nurse. Since 2013 she has played an important role for patients at the center as a music therapist (治疗师). One day, a nurse at a medical centre asked her if she could reach out to a patient who refused to take part in any activities. “He’s angry with us, and we wonder if you might have an interest in it.” the nurse told her.

The next day, Black offered to play music for the patient. “If you don’t like it, you can tell me to leave.” she said. After thinking for a while, the man wrote down the names of some music he liked and then looked out the window. However, as Black began to play one of his favorites, he cried. She stopped playing, saying, "Do you want me to continue?" "Certainly," he said through tears.

“It was as if the music went places," recalls Black.” He shared afterwards that he’d been holding in so much and had been unable to talk about anything —but the music felt like a hug."

It has been shown that music can be medicine. A study conducted in Barcelona’s Hospital del Mar found patients receiving music therapy experienced obvious decreases in anxiety and breathing difficulties, as well as an increase in feelings of well-being.

At the Dr Bob Kemp Hospice in Hamilton, Ont., music therapy is widely used. Doug Mattina experienced a music-therapy program when his father spent his last days there. "During the treatment, my mom and I danced around my dad’s bed. He would request high kicks from us as he clapped along. He was so weak that he sometimes fell asleep, but he was happy. It meant a lot to us." Mattina says.

Music has an especially important effect on sick children. Ruth Hunston, a music therapist at a children’s hospital, says her program gives patients back some sense of control. "When children are in hospital, their worlds get much smaller," she explains. "Music allows them to create something themselves."

Music does count in treatment, but Black notes that people actually connect with music for their whole lives.“ We have a heartbeat, so we have a drum inside us; we are born to be musical,”she says,“ Music relieves our sadness in ways words cannot.”

1. How did the patient react to Black’s appearance?

A．He asked her to leave.	B．He cried and hugged her.
C．He handed her a list of songs.	D．He turned away and walked to the window.

2. What do the underlined words “went places” in Paragraph 3 mean?

A．Got faster.

B．Went wrong.

C．Worked well.

D．Slowed down.

3. What is mentioned about Doug Mattina’s father?

A．He often did high kicks.	B．He was once a music therapist.
C．He didn’t like talking about his illness.	D．He fell in and out of sleep in the treatment.

4. How does music therapy help children according to Hunston?

A．It improves their social ability.	B．It helps them create something.
C．It helps them enjoy a sound sleep.	D．It excites their interest in medical treatment.

5. Which of the following can best describe Black?

A．Thoughtful and helpful.	B．Strong and talented.
C．Intelligent and honest.	D．Hardworking and humorous.

3 . With the development of the Internet, many of our activities take place online. Medicine is no exception. Patients can visit doctors by phone call and video chat. Online searches for telehealth increased sharply.

Online visits are best suited to simple tasks, like refilling prescriptions (doctor’s orders), as well as diagnosing (诊断) and treating conditions that rely on a doctor’s sense of sight — pink eye, rashes, etc. — or a patient’s description of symptoms, such as back pain. Telehealth also works better at monitoring chronic (慢性的) conditions, such as congestive heart failure, where doctors don’t need to provide a new diagnosis but simply check up on patients, monitor symptoms and discuss the side effects of medication. Diabetes (糖尿病) is also a good fit: people can upload blood sugar levels, dosing, and other information for a doctor to review electronically.

Mental health service is easy to access digitally, too, though it comes with advantages and disadvantages. On the one hand, doctors may not be able to see body language, which can sometimes be a clue to understanding a client’s well being, and a poor Internet connection can be particularly unfavorable during a difficult conversation. On the other hand, there are patients who like it better. “Some health care providers even say having that extra bit of distance makes people more honest and less stressed to talk about difficult topics,” says Annette Totten, a professor who has studied telehealth.

When done right, Totten’s research shows telehealth benefits both health care providers and patients. It can significantly reduce hospital admissions, which frees beds for people in need of special care. And it’s a lot more convenient for patients, adds Michelle Greiver, a family doctor.

1. How is the medicine industry changing?

A．convenient

B．popular

C．difficult

D．digital

2. What kind of disease is fit for a virtual medical visit?

A．Heart attack

B．High fever

C．Uncomfortable eye

D．Back injury

3. Why do some mental health patients prefer online service according to the passage?

A．Because it reduces their pressure.

B．Because it saves them transportation cost.

C．Because it saves them time on the road.

D．Because it makes it easier for them to contact the doctor.

4. What’s the author’s attitude toward online medical visits?

A．Negative.

B．Supportive.

C．Doubtful.

D．Uncertain.

5. Which aspect of online healthcare does the text focus on?

A．application

B．effects

C．development

D．advantages

4 . In the not-so-distant future, the doctors who treat our diseases might be tiny machines that swim through our bodies. Movies like Fantastic Voyage have long played with the idea of making machines the size of a single cell (细胞) — today advances in robotics have brought the idea ever closer to reality. In my lab, I’m just trying to build such intelligent, or smart, microrobots.

Tiny organisms (living things) , such as bacteria (细菌), have many intelligent behaviors, and if we can make robots copy some of them, it’s very exciting. The way bacteria travel across their environment is unbelievable. At first, they kind of just aimlessly move around, but when they start sensing food, like an amino acid (氨基酸) they will move gradually in that direction. As a roboticist, you could imagine making tiny robots that can do the same thing.

For example, look at something like E. coli (大肠杆菌). It has receptors on its surface that can sense amino acids around it. It can change how it’s moving. It can rebuild or repair itself. In fact, E.coli does all these sowell that some researchers are using it as part of their tiny machines. They are having their microrobots get free rides from it, and letting it do all the sensing for them and direct their movements.

We’re already using smaller and smaller medical tools for operations, like catheters (long thin pipes) that can travel deep into your brain to treat a tumor (肿瘤) or a blood clot. Next, we will put microrobots into the body that can travel into even smaller spaces and treat disease at an early stage. Imagine a device that can treat a blood clot deep in your brain that can’t be reached with existing catheters.

It’s important to note, though, that we may not actually need something as powerful as artificial intelligence (AI) in these cases. You can still build an extremely useful microrobot with a low degree of intelligence. For example: If a microrobot notices a tumor, it can slowly move in that direction, and carry medicine directly to that part. It might only have the intelligence of bacteria but could still be unbelievably effective.

1. Which of the following inspires the author’s work?

A．Bacteria’s ability to stay alive.	B．Movies about tiny machines.
C．Tiny organisms’ behaviors.	D．New advances in robotics.

2. What are some researchers doing according to paragraph 3?

A．Letting E.coli work for their tiny robots.	B．Using microrobots to sense amino acids.
C．Asking robots to direct bacteria’s movements.	D．Changing tiny machines into bacteria’s drivers.

3. What does the author think of existing catheters?

A．They are unlikely to be widely used by doctors.

B．They are unable to get to tinier areas in the body.

C．They will be smaller than microrobots in the future.

D．They can help doctors treat disease at an earlier stage.

4. Why does the author give the example in the last paragraph?

A．To show microrobots can treat tumors very easily.

B．To show AIs important role in developing tiny robots.

C．To explain the connection between AI and microrobots.

D．To explain limited intelligence is enough for microrobots.

5 . A lack of scientific evidence has led some to question whether herbs used in traditional Chinese medicines (TCMs) actually relieve people’s illnesses. A new study, published in the journal Science Advances, might start to challenge that view. Scientists have developed a new tool that could be used to predict the effectiveness of these herbs. They’ve begun to confirm some of its predictions using clinical data from patients treated in a traditional Chinese medicine hospital.

“To our knowledge, this is the first scientific theory to explain how a traditional medicine system works,” lead study author Xiao Gan, a researcher at the Nanjing University of Information Science & Technology in China said.

In the new study, the authors looked at genes (基因) thought to be responsible for causing specific symptoms (症状) of disease. They relied on an already published dataset that connected the dots between disease symptoms and the underlying genes and proteins that give rise to those illnesses. Pulling this data together, the researchers were able to score how well these herbs might relieve specific symptoms of the disease. These scores were based on how close the herbs’ target proteins were to the proteins associated with various symptoms.

The authors then compared their predictions to herbs recognized by the Chinese Pharmacopoeia as effective against specific disease symptoms. They also used the model to review prescriptions(处方) that patients at the Hubei Provincial Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine in Wuhan received while being treated for liver disease. Gan said the herbs that they identified as effective from the two data sources supported their model’s predictions. The authors also used their model to identify potential new applications for the herbs, beyond what’s already recommended by the Chinese Pharmacopoeia.

Testing natural products in clinical trials can be costly, so it is helpful to use computer simulations (模拟) to identify potential drug targets, said Xiang-Qun Xie, a professor at the University of Pittsburgh. Xie pointed out more data are needed to support these findings and that it would be useful to study how TCM herbs and modern medications may interact in patients who take them at the same time.

1. What is the purpose of the new study?

A．To study the side effects of TCM herbs.

B．To analyze the genetic makeup of TCM herbs.

C．To forecast the effectiveness of TCM herbs.

D．To compare TCM herbs with modern medications.

2. How did the researchers score TCM herbs in the study?

A．By analyzing their chemical makeup.

B．By carrying out clinical trials on patients.

C．By asking patients about their experiences of using them.

D．By comparing their target proteins with disease-related proteins.

3. What can be inferred about the study from paragraph 4?

A．Some TCM herbs tested by the model are rarely used.

B．The model may be used to develop new medicines.

C．The data sources used by the model are not big enough.

D．More models should be created to review prescriptions.

4. What might Xiang-Qun Xie agree with?

A．Researchers should try to cut the cost of their study.

B．It is necessary to find new ways to figure out potential drug targets.

C．The weaknesses of computer simulations in drug development are ignored.

D．The interaction between TCM herbs and modern medications needs to be studied.

7 . Researchers at MIT created a high-tech pill that starts to vibrate (震动) once it makes contact with liquid in the user’s stomach and make him or her feel full. The pill was reportedly thought up by Shriya Srinivasan, currently an assistant professor of bioengineering at Harvard University.

VIBES, short for Vibrating Ingestible BioEleotronic Stimulator, was only recently made public in a study published in the Science Journal, but it is already being announced by the media as the future of weight loss. Although it has yet to be tested on humans, trials on pigs have achieved very hopeful results. After about 30 minutes of VIBES activity, pigs consumed on average almost 40 percent less food in the next half hour than they did without the smart pill. Apparently, the revolutionary device works by activating stretch receptors in the stomach, modeling the presence of food. This in turn signals the hypothalamus (下丘脑) to increase the levels of hormones that make us feel full. The vibrating stimulator, which is about the size of a vitamin pill, is powered by an encased battery and activated either by the gastric fluid (胃液) breaking down a coat around the pill, or by an incorporated timer. After producing the desired effect, the pill exits the body with other solid waste:

The good news is that it is expected to have a cost in the cents to one dollar range, and researchers say that it may eventually be possible to implant the stimulator and thus remove the need for people to constantly swallow it.

“Our study demonstrates the effectiveness of a low-cost, non-operative intervention to reduce food intake and ca lorie consumption. The device functions effectively in the stomach and leading to fullness,” said Giovanni Traverso, co-author of the study. “The device has the potential to revolutionize options for weight loss treatment. However, future studies will need to explore the physiological effects of the device before it’s available for patients.”

Researchers are now exploring ways to scale up the producing of VIBES capsules which could enable clinical trials in humans.

1. What is the outcome of taking the pill?

A．Liquid production.	B．Food storage.
C．Sensation of fullness.	D．Recovery of users.

2. Which aspect of the device is mentioned in paragraph 2?

A．Its working principle.	B．Its intelligence.
C．Its testing history.	D．Its side effect.

3. What is the researchers’ ultimate goal of the device?

A．To produce gastric fluid with it.	B．To destroy the coat around it.
C．To fix it in human body.	D．To remove solid waste from it.

4. What is Giovanni Traverso’s attitude towards the future of the device?

A．Worried.

B．Cautious.

C．Doubtful.

D．Confused.

8 . A man with advanced Parkinson’s disease (帕金森氏症) is now able to walk almost normally again thanks to electrodes implanted (电极植入) in his spinal cord (脊椎), researchers said on Monday. The medical first was achieved by Swiss researchers who had previously pioneered similar breakthroughs to help disabled people walk again.

“This could be a game-changing technology to help bring back movement in people with advanced Parkinson’s,” said David Dexter, research director at Parkinson’s UK.

Marc Gauthier, the 62-year-old patient who lives in France, has suffered from the brain disorder for about 30 years. Like more than 90 percent of people with advanced Parkinson’s, Mar c has had great difficulty walking. What are known as “freezing” experiences — during which patients are unable to move for a limited time, putting them at risk of falling — are particularly awful, Marc told AFP.

Much remains unknown about Parkinson’s disease, making treatment difficult. But the disease can seriously affect the lives of patients, sometimes keeping them to bed or a wheelchair. So when the opportunity came to go through an operation in Switzerland, Marc gladly accepted the chance.

“Now I can do whatever I want,” Marc says. “I can go for a walk and go out shopping by myself.” He adds that he can now walk much more easily — he is even planning a trip to Brazil — but it still requires concentration, particularly when climbing upstairs.

The Swiss team, led by surgeon Jocelyne Bloch and neuroscientist Gregoire Courtine , implanted a complex system of electrodes called a “neuroprosthesis (神经假体)” at important points along Marc’s spinal cord. The neuroprosthesis was first tested on animals, and then implanted in Marc, who has used it for roughly eight hours a day over nearly two years.

The Swiss team has expanded their experiment to a group of six Parkinson’s patients, aiming to know how it could help others, given the disease affects people in different ways. However, treatment using the implant could be quite expensive, potentially limiting how many patients would have access.

1. What is David Dexter’s attitude to the Swiss breakthrough?

A．Unconcerned.

B．Doubtful.

C．Positive.

D．Unclear.

2. What can Marc do after the surgery?

A．Volunteer as a tour guide in Brazil.	B．Run to his heart’s content.
C．Go to the supermarket alone.	D．Make a phone call while climbing the stairs.

3. What do we know about the surgery?

A．It was first tested on Marc Gauthier.	B．It is hardly affordable for ordinary people.
C．It has been performed on many patients.	D．It was done by researchers in the UK.

4. What is the best title for the text?

A．A Spinal Implant Allows a Parkinson’s Patient to Walk Again

B．Parkinson’s Patients Have to Deal With Difficulties in Life

C．Swiss Experts Have Created a Drug to Treat Parkinson’s

D．New Technology Prevents People From Developing Parkinson’s

9 . Shenzhen in Guangdong province has become the first city in China to allow specialist nurses to prescribe (开药方) selected drugs and order tests, in a move that is expected to increase efficiencies in the healthcare system and reduce the patient-load burden on physicians.

Under a new rule in October that took effect in January, eligible nurses will be permitted to order examinations, treatments considering their expert skills and knowledge of specialist nursing or community healthcare. Their prescriptions must be based on existing diagnoses (诊断) made by physicians.

To become a nursing specialist, applicants should have a bachelor’s degree in nursing, five years of working experience, obtained an advanced nursing qualification and have attended a months-long specialist training program and passed a final test.

“Medical institutions must review inappropriate prescriptions given by nurses,” said the regulation. “Nursing specialists who are found to have given three or more improper prescriptions will have their prescribing power stopped for three to six months and will have to undergo retraining before regaining the authorization,” it added.

“Considering the difference in professional positioning, medical education background and work experience between physicians and nurses, it is necessary to fully analyze the necessity and practicability of the nurses’ prescriptive authority,” the commission said.

Zhou Wensi has a bachelor’s degree in nursing and is now a specialist nurse in periodontitis (牙周炎) , or gum disease, at Shenzhen Stomatology Hospital in the city’s Pingshan district.

“Our hospital has not begun allowing us to prescribe. If the rule goes into effect in the future, we’ll likely be able to directly prescribe mouthwash, anti-inflammatory drugs and painkillers to patients,” she said.

   However, she also noted that most patients visiting the hospital are in need of treatment delivered by doctors with assistance from nurses like her, so the new regulation is not expected to have a major impact.

1. Why does Shenzhen give permission for specialist nurses’ special rights?

A．To improve the overall ability of the specialist nurses.

B．To speed up the development of the healthcare system.

C．To enhance the work efficiency and lighten doctors’ load.

D．To respond to the demands of doctors, nurses and patients.

2. What does the word “eligible” underlined in the second paragraph refer to?

A．well-recognized

B．Qualified

C．flexible

D．hard-working

3. What do we learn about the new regulation?

A．A specialist nurse should follow the rules strictly.

B．No institutions take charge of the prescriptions .

C．Not all specialist nurses can prescribe drugs freely .

D．A specialist nurse always has the prescribing power.

4. What is Zhou Wensi’s attitude toward the prospect of nurses’ prescribing drugs?

A．Doubtful.

B．Indifferent.

C．Neutral.

D．Hopeful.