LLukas22/scidocs huggingface dataset:
Chest pain in the emergency room: value of the HEART score.

BACKGROUND
Chest pain is one of the most common causes of presentation to the emergency room. The diagnosis of non-ST-elevation acute coronary syndrome typically causes uncertainty. Classical considerations for risk stratification are History, ECG, Age, Risk factors and Troponin (HEART). Each can be scored with zero, one or two points, depending on the extent of the abnormality. The HEART score is the sum of these five considerations. Methods. Clinical data from 122 patients referred to the emergency room for chest pain were analysed. The predictive value of the HEART score for reaching an endpoint was evaluated in 120/122 patients.


RESULTS
Twenty-nine patients reached one or more endpoints: an acute myocardial infarction was diagnosed in 16 patients, 20 underwent revascularisation and two died. The HEART score in the patients with and without an endpoint was 6.51+/-1.84 and 3.71+/-1.83 (p<0.0001) respectively. A HEART score of 0-3 points holds a risk of 2.5% for an endpoint and supports an immediate discharge. With a risk of 20.3%, a HEART score of 4-6 points implies admission for clinical observation. A HEART score >/=7points, with a risk of 72.7%, supports early invasive strategies.


CONCLUSION
The HEART score facilitates accurate diagnostic and therapeutic choices. The HEART score is an easy, quick and reliable predictor of outcome in chest pain patients. (Neth Heart J 2008;16:191-6.).
Beliefs and personality disorders: an overview of the personality beliefs questionnaire.

OBJECTIVE
This article presents an overview of the Personality Beliefs Questionnaire (PBQ)--a 126-item self-report measure of beliefs associated with 10 personality disorders.


DESIGN
It consolidates the literature on the PBQ over the last 20 years to provide a summary of the psychometric status, revisions and applications of the PBQ scales.


RESULTS
The PBQ scales are psychometrically reliable (α = 77-94, test-retest stability r=.57-.93) and discriminate between individuals with and without a specific personality disorder. Two revisions have been made to the measure: A 14-item subscale measuring beliefs central to borderline personality disorder has been identified, and a short form version of the PBQ has been validated. The PBQ has been used to measure cognitive mechanisms of treatment outcomes, and has been found to be sensitive to changes in beliefs.


CONCLUSIONS
Given the proposed shift in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders Fifth Edition (DSM-5) to a dimensional conceptualization of psychological components of personality dysfunction, the PBQ is likely to remain relevant and useful for identifying such components in individuals with personality disorders.
Cost-Effectiveness of Triple Therapy Versus Etanercept Plus Methotrexate in Early Aggressive Rheumatoid Arthritis.

OBJECTIVE
To evaluate the cost-effectiveness of all 4 interventions in the Treatment of Early Aggressive Rheumatoid Arthritis (TEAR) clinical trial: immediate triple (IT), immediate etanercept (IE), step-up triple (ST), and step-up etanercept (SE). Step-up interventions started with methotrexate and added either etanercept or sulfasalazine plus hydroxychloroquine to patients with persistent disease activity.


METHODS
We built a Markov cohort model that uses individual-level data from the TEAR trial, published literature, and supplemental clinical data. Costs were in US dollars, benefits in quality-adjusted life years (QALYs), perspective was societal, and the time horizon was 5 years.


RESULTS
The immediate strategies were more efficacious than step-up strategies. SE and IE were more costly than ST and IT, primarily due to treatment cost differences. In addition, IT was the least expensive and most effective strategy when the time horizon was 1 and 2 years. When the time horizon was 5 years, IE was marginally more effective than IT (3.483 versus 3.476 QALYs), but IE was substantially more expensive than IT ($148,800 versus $52,600), producing an incremental cost-effectiveness ratio of $12.5 million per QALY. These results were robust to both one-way deterministic and joint probabilistic sensitivity analyses.


CONCLUSION
IT was highly cost-effective in the majority of scenarios. Although IE was more effective in 5 years, a substantial reduction in the cost of biologic agents was required in order for IE to become cost-effective in early aggressive RA under willingness-to-pay thresholds that most health care settings may find acceptable.
Binary PSO with mutation operator for feature selection using decision tree applied to spam detection

In this paper, we proposed a novel spam detection method that focused on reducing the false positive error of mislabeling nonspam as spam. First, we used the wrapper-based feature selection method to extract crucial features. Second, the decision tree was chosen as the classifier model with C4.5 as the training algorithm. Third, the cost matrix was introduced to give different weights to two error types, i.e., the false positive and the false negative errors. We define the weight parameter as a to adjust the relative importance of the two error types. Fourth, K-fold cross validation was employed to reduce out-ofsample error. Finally, the binary PSO with mutation operator (MBPSO) was used as the subset search strategy. Our experimental dataset contains 6000 emails, which were collected during the year of 2012. We conducted a Kolmogorov–Smirnov hypothesis test on the capital-run-length related features and found that all the p values were less than 0.001. Afterwards, we found a = 7 was the most appropriate in our model. Among seven meta-heuristic algorithms, we demonstrated the MBPSO is superior to GA, RSA, PSO, and BPSO in terms of classification performance. The sensitivity, specificity, and accuracy of the decision tree with feature selection by MBPSO were 91.02%, 97.51%, and 94.27%, respectively. We also compared the MBPSO with conventional feature selection methods such as SFS and SBS. The results showed that the MBPSO performs better than SFS and SBS. We also demonstrated that wrappers are more effective than filters with regard to classification performance indexes. It was clearly shown that the proposed method is effective, and it can reduce the false positive error without compromising the sensitivity and accuracy values. 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Placebos without Deception: A Randomized Controlled Trial in Irritable Bowel Syndrome

BACKGROUND
Placebo treatment can significantly influence subjective symptoms. However, it is widely believed that response to placebo requires concealment or deception. We tested whether open-label placebo (non-deceptive and non-concealed administration) is superior to a no-treatment control with matched patient-provider interactions in the treatment of irritable bowel syndrome (IBS).


METHODS
Two-group, randomized, controlled three week trial (August 2009-April 2010) conducted at a single academic center, involving 80 primarily female (70%) patients, mean age 47 ± 18 with IBS diagnosed by Rome III criteria and with a score ≥ 150 on the IBS Symptom Severity Scale (IBS-SSS). Patients were randomized to either open-label placebo pills presented as "placebo pills made of an inert substance, like sugar pills, that have been shown in clinical studies to produce significant improvement in IBS symptoms through mind-body self-healing processes" or no-treatment controls with the same quality of interaction with providers. The primary outcome was IBS Global Improvement Scale (IBS-GIS). Secondary measures were IBS Symptom Severity Scale (IBS-SSS), IBS Adequate Relief (IBS-AR) and IBS Quality of Life (IBS-QoL).


FINDINGS
Open-label placebo produced significantly higher mean (±SD) global improvement scores (IBS-GIS) at both 11-day midpoint (5.2 ± 1.0 vs. 4.0 ± 1.1, p<.001) and at 21-day endpoint (5.0 ± 1.5 vs. 3.9 ± 1.3, p = .002). Significant results were also observed at both time points for reduced symptom severity (IBS-SSS, p = .008 and p = .03) and adequate relief (IBS-AR, p = .02 and p = .03); and a trend favoring open-label placebo was observed for quality of life (IBS-QoL) at the 21-day endpoint (p = .08).


CONCLUSION
Placebos administered without deception may be an effective treatment for IBS. Further research is warranted in IBS, and perhaps other conditions, to elucidate whether physicians can benefit patients using placebos consistent with informed consent.


TRIAL REGISTRATION
ClinicalTrials.gov NCT01010191.
Evaluation of a learner-designed course for teaching health research skills in Ghana

BACKGROUND
In developing countries the ability to conduct locally-relevant health research and high quality education are key tools in the fight against poverty. The objective of our study was to evaluate the effectiveness of a novel UK accredited, learner-designed research skills course delivered in a teaching hospital in Ghana.


METHODS
Study participants were 15 mixed speciality health professionals from Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital, Kumasi, Ghana. Effectiveness measures included process, content and outcome indicators to evaluate changes in learners' confidence and competence in research, and assessment of the impact of the course on changing research-related thinking and behaviour. Results were verified using two independent methods.


RESULTS
14/15 learners gained research competence assessed against UK Quality Assurance Agency criteria. After the course there was a 36% increase in the groups' positive responses to statements concerning confidence in research-related attitudes, intentions and actions. The greatest improvement (45% increase) was in learners' actions, which focused on strengthening institutional research capacity. 79% of paired before/after responses indicated positive changes in individual learners' research-related attitudes (n = 53), 81% in intention (n = 52) and 85% in action (n = 52). The course had increased learners' confidence to start and manage research, and enhanced life-long skills such as reflective practice and self-confidence. Doing their own research within the work environment, reflecting on personal research experiences and utilising peer support and pooled knowledge were critical elements that promoted learning.


CONCLUSION
Learners in Ghana were able to design and undertake a novel course that developed individual and institutional research capacity and met international standards. Learning by doing and a supportive peer community at work were critical elements in promoting learning in this environment where tutors were scarce. Our study provides a model for delivering and evaluating innovative educational interventions in developing countries to assess whether they meet external quality criteria and achieve their objectives.
Vertex Stimulation as a Control Site for Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation: A Concurrent TMS/fMRI Study

BACKGROUND
A common control condition for transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) studies is to apply stimulation at the vertex. An assumption of vertex stimulation is that it has relatively little influence over on-going brain processes involved in most experimental tasks, however there has been little attempt to measure neural changes linked to vertex TMS. Here we directly test this assumption by using a concurrent TMS/fMRI paradigm in which we investigate fMRI blood-oxygenation-level-dependent (BOLD) signal changes across the whole brain linked to vertex stimulation.


METHODS
Thirty-two healthy participants to part in this study. Twenty-one were stimulated at the vertex, at 120% of resting motor threshold (RMT), with short bursts of 1 Hz TMS, while functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) BOLD images were acquired. As a control condition, we delivered TMS pulses over the left primary motor cortex using identical parameters to 11 other participants.


RESULTS
Vertex stimulation did not evoke increased BOLD activation at the stimulated site. By contrast we observed widespread BOLD deactivations across the brain, including regions within the default mode network (DMN). To examine the effects of vertex stimulation a functional connectivity analysis was conducted.


CONCLUSION
The results demonstrated that stimulating the vertex with suprathreshold TMS reduced neural activity in brain regions related to the DMN but did not influence the functional connectivity of this network. Our findings provide brain imaging evidence in support of the use of vertex simulation as a control condition in TMS but confirm that vertex TMS induces regional widespread decreases in BOLD activation.
LibGuides. World Geography Cultural Presentation. Resources.

Students will cover 5 aspects of a region or country's culture, build an itinerary for a trip to the country, and present their findings to the class.
Report of an unsual case of anophthalmia and craniofacial cleft in a newborn with Toxoplasma gondii congenital infection

BACKGROUND
We present one unusual case of anophthalmia and craniofacial cleft, probably due to congenital toxoplasmosis only.


CASE PRESENTATION
A two-month-old male had a twin in utero who disappeared between the 7th and the 14th week of gestation. At birth, the baby presented anophthalmia and craniofacial cleft, and no sign compatible with genetic or exposition/deficiency problems, like the Wolf-Hirschhorn syndrome or maternal vitamin A deficiency. Congenital toxoplasmosis was confirmed by the presence of IgM abs and IgG neo-antibodies in western blot, as well as by real time PCR in blood. CMV infection was also discarded by PCR and IgM negative results. Structures suggestive of T. gondii pseudocysts were observed in a biopsy taken during the first functional/esthetic surgery.


CONCLUSIONS
We conclude that this is a rare case of anophthalmia combined with craniofacial cleft due to congenital toxoplasmosis, that must be considered by physicians. This has not been reported before.
Computational State Space Models for Activity and Intention Recognition. A Feasibility Study

BACKGROUND
Computational state space models (CSSMs) enable the knowledge-based construction of Bayesian filters for recognizing intentions and reconstructing activities of human protagonists in application domains such as smart environments, assisted living, or security. Computational, i. e., algorithmic, representations allow the construction of increasingly complex human behaviour models. However, the symbolic models used in CSSMs potentially suffer from combinatorial explosion, rendering inference intractable outside of the limited experimental settings investigated in present research. The objective of this study was to obtain data on the feasibility of CSSM-based inference in domains of realistic complexity.


METHODS
A typical instrumental activity of daily living was used as a trial scenario. As primary sensor modality, wearable inertial measurement units were employed. The results achievable by CSSM methods were evaluated by comparison with those obtained from established training-based methods (hidden Markov models, HMMs) using Wilcoxon signed rank tests. The influence of modeling factors on CSSM performance was analyzed via repeated measures analysis of variance.


RESULTS
The symbolic domain model was found to have more than 10(8) states, exceeding the complexity of models considered in previous research by at least three orders of magnitude. Nevertheless, if factors and procedures governing the inference process were suitably chosen, CSSMs outperformed HMMs. Specifically, inference methods used in previous studies (particle filters) were found to perform substantially inferior in comparison to a marginal filtering procedure.


CONCLUSIONS
Our results suggest that the combinatorial explosion caused by rich CSSM models does not inevitably lead to intractable inference or inferior performance. This means that the potential benefits of CSSM models (knowledge-based model construction, model reusability, reduced need for training data) are available without performance penalty. However, our results also show that research on CSSMs needs to consider sufficiently complex domains in order to understand the effects of design decisions such as choice of heuristics or inference procedure on performance.
An Absorbing Markov Chain approach to understanding the microbial role in soil carbon stabilization

The number of studies focused on the transformation and sequestration of soil organic carbon (C) has dramatically increased in recent years due to growing interest in understanding the global C cycle. While it is readily accepted that terrestrial C dynamics are heavily influenced by the catabolic and anabolic activities of microorganisms, the incorporation of microbial biomass components into stable soil C pools (via microbial living cells and necromass) has received less attention. Nevertheless, microbialderived C inputs to soils are now increasingly recognized as playing a far greater role in stabilization of soil organic matter than previously believed. Our understanding, however, is limited by the difficulties associated with studying microbial turnover in soils. Here, we describe the use of an Absorbing Markov Chain (AMC) to model the dynamics of soil C transformations among three microbial states: living microbial biomass, microbial necromass, and C removed from living and dead microbial sources. We find that AMC provides a powerful quantitative approach that allows prediction of how C will be distributed among these three states, and how long it will take for the entire amount of initial C to pass through the biomass and necromass pools and be moved into atmosphere. Further, assuming constant C inputs to the model, we can predict how C is eventually distributed, along with how much C sequestrated in soil is microbial-derived. Our work represents a first step in attempting to quantify the flow of C through microbial pathways, and has the potential to increase our understanding of the microbial role in soil C dynamics.
Effects of low-fat hard cheese enriched with plant stanol esters on serum lipids and apolipoprotein B in mildly hypercholesterolaemic subjects

Objective:To investigate the cholesterol-lowering effects of a low-fat cheese enriched with plant stanol esters in mildly hypercholesterolaemic subjects, as part of their normal diet.Design:A randomized double-blind parallel-group study.Setting:Valio Ltd, Helsinki.Subjects:Sixty-seven mildly hypercholesterolaemic volunteers (24 men, 43 women) participated in the study, which all of them completed.Interventions:The subjects were randomly assigned to the plant stanol ester group or the control group. During the 5-week intervention, the subjects in the stanol group consumed a cheese enriched with 2 g of plant stanols per day, and the subjects in the control group, a control cheese with no plant stanols.Results:In the stanol ester group, as compared to the control group, both serum total and low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol decreased significantly, that is, by 5.8% (−0.32 mmol/l, 95% CI −0.50 to −0.15 mmol/l, P<0.001) and 10.3% (−0.36 mmol/l, 95% CI −0.53 to −0.18 mmol/l, P<0.001), respectively. There were no significant changes in high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL), triglycerides or apolipoprotein B concentrations between the groups.Conclusion:Cheese enriched with 2 g of plant stanol in the form of fatty acid esters decreases serum total and LDL cholesterol significantly.
Are blockchains immune to all malicious attacks ?

Background: In recent years, blockchain technology has attracted considerable attention. It records cryptographic transactions in a public ledger that is difficult to alter and compromise because of the distributed consensus. As a result, blockchain is believed to resist fraud and hacking. Results: This work explores the types of fraud and malicious activities that can be prevented by blockchain technology and identifies attacks to which blockchain remains vulnerable. Conclusions: This study recommends appropriate defensive measures and calls for further research into the techniques for fighting malicious activities related to blockchains.
Imbalanced Malware Images Classification: a CNN based Approach

Deep convolutional neural networks (CNNs) can be applied to malware binary detection through images classification. The performance, however, is degraded due to the imbalance of malware families (classes). To mitigate this issue, we propose a simple yet effective weighted softmax loss which can be employed as the final layer of deep CNNs. The original softmax loss is weighted, and the weight value can be determined according to class size. A scaling parameter is also included in computing the weight. Proper selection of this parameter has been studied and an empirical option is given. The weighted loss aims at alleviating the impact of data imbalance in an end-to-end learning fashion. To validate the efficacy, we deploy the proposed weighted loss in a pre-trained deep CNN model and fine-tune it to achieve promising results on malware images classification. Extensive experiments also indicate that the new loss function can fit other typical CNNs with an improved classification performance. Keywords— Deep Learning, Malware Images, Convolutional Neural Networks, CNN, Image Classification, Imbalanced Data Classification, Softmaxloss
Why do teens spend real money in virtual worlds? A consumption values and developmental psychology perspective on virtual consumption

Monetizing the users base is a major business challenge in social media, online social networking and online entertainment. Many of these services employ the freemium business model i.e. offer a free access to the service and try to generate revenue from selling premium user accounts with exclusive features or selling virtual items. However, the value users create by virtual purchasing is not well understood. Furthermore, young people constitute an important user segment for online social networking services that has not received proportionate attention in the literature. This study draws on Theory of Consumption Values and developmental psychology to elucidate the value teenage users create by spending money in a social virtual world (SVW) that employs the freemium business model in parallel with selling virtual items. The benefits of the premium user account, decoration, status, and boosted enjoyment of the user experience were the most common reasons for teenagers’ purchasing within an SVW. From teenagers’ developmental standpoint, virtual purchasing facilitates identity experiments and membership of peer groups. The results also reveal social hierarchies and discrimination among the users. © 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.