LLukas22/scidocs huggingface dataset:
[Benefits and adverse effects of post-operative radiation therapy after radical cystectomy for patients with advanced bladder cancer].

BACKGROUND
The benefits and adverse effects of post-operative irradiation for advanced bladder cancer patients were investigated.


METHODS
Ten patients with pT3b, pT4 or pN+ bladder cancer who underwent radical cystectomy at Yamanashi Medical University hospital during 7 years and 3 months from October 1983 to December 1991 received adjuvant chemotherapy and radiotherapy (Group 1). During the same period, six patients with recurrent tumor after radical cystectomy were treated by radiotherapy (Group II). Stages of the primary tumors were pT2 in 1, pT3a in 2, pT3b in 6 and pT4 in 7 cases. In addition, 10 of 16 patients (63%) had positive nodes.


RESULTS
During the follow up period, seven patients died of cancer, and one died of other cause. As a result eight patients (5 in Group I, 3 in Group II) are alive. The cumulative 5-year survival rate is 50%. However, nine of the 16 patients (56%) suffered from the small bowel obstruction as an adverse effect of irradiation. Six patients required resection of the small bowel or bypass surgery.


CONCLUSIONS
Radiation after radical cystectomy seemed to be effective for the local control of the tumor, but the adverse effect to the digestive system was very severe and common.
Arterial elasticity and plasma levels of adiponectin and leptin in type 2 diabetic patients treated with thiazolidinediones

Background Thiazolidinediones (TZDs) improve peripheral insulin sensitivity, but the effect on arterial stiffness is less clear. The aim of the present study was to assess the differential effect of pioglitazone or rosiglitazone on arterial stiffness and plasma levels of adiponectin and leptin in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus. Methods Thirty-five type 2 diabetic subjects were randomly assigned to receive pioglitazone (30 mg/day; n = 14), rosiglitazone (4 mg/day; n = 11), or placebo (medical nutrition therapy; n = 10) for 12 weeks. Changes in plasma glucose, glycosylated hemoglobin, insulin resistance (HOMA-IR), total cholesterol, low-density lipoprotein cholesterol, high-density lipoprotein cholesterol, triglycerides, adiponectin, and leptin were evaluated at baseline and after 12 weeks. In parallel, large arterial compliance (C1) and small arterial compliance (C2) were measured at baseline and at the end of treatment period. Results At 12 weeks, the rosiglitazone (P = 0.026) and pioglitazone (P = 0.004) groups had a significant increase from baseline in adiponectin that was not seen in the medical nutrition therapy group. No significant changes in plasma leptin and in C1 and C2 elasticity indexes were observed over the entire study period in any of the treatment groups. Conclusions In this study of patients with type 2 diabetes, treatment with TZDs was associated with a significant improvement in adiponectin levels, although no significant effects were seen on leptin levels and arterial elasticity.
Prevalence of mastitis in dairy cows from smallholder farms in Zimbabwe.

A cross-sectional study was conducted to determine the prevalence of sub-clinical and clinical mastitis and the associated factors in cows from selected smallholder dairy farms in Zimbabwe. Physical examinations were conducted on all lactating cows for evidence of signs of clinical mastitis. Composite milk samples were collected from all lactating cows for bacterial culture and somatic cell counting. Cows were categorised as clinical if they exhibited clinical features of mastitis, or sub-clinical if no apparent signs were present but they had a positive bacterial isolation and a somatic cell count of at least 300 x 103 cells/mL. Farm-level factors were obtained through a structured questionnaire. The association of mastitis and animal- and herd-level factors were analysed using logistic regression. A total of 584 animals from 73 farms were tested. Overall, 21.1%(123/584) had mastitis, 16.3%(95/584) had sub-clinical mastitis and 4.8% (28/584) had clinical mastitis. Herd-level prevalence was 49.3%. Coagulase-negative staphylococci (27.6%),  Escherichia coli (25.2%),  Staphylococcus aureus(16.3%), Klebsiella spp. (15.5%) and Streptococcus spp. (1.6%) were the most common isolates. In individual cows, pure dairy herds (OR = 6.3) and dairy crosses (OR = 3.1) were more likely to have mastitis compared to Mashona cows. Farms that used pre-milking teat dipping were associated with reduced mastitis prevalence. Further research is needed on the prevalence of mastitis and a comparison of data for both smallholder and commercial dairy farms in all regions of Zimbabwe should be undertaken.
Local Data Characteristics in Learning Classifiers from Imbalanced Data

Learning classifiers from imbalanced data is still one of challenging tasks in machine learning and data mining. Data difficulty factors referring to internal and local characteristics of class distributions deteriorate performance of standard classifiers. Many of these factors may be approximated by analyzing the neighbourhood of the learning examples and identifying different types of examples from the minority class. In this paper, we follow recent research on developing such methods for assessing the types of examples which exploit either k-nearest neighbours or kernels. We discuss the approaches to tune the size of both kinds of neighborhoods depending on the data set characteristics and evaluate their usefulness in series of experiments with real-world and synthetic data sets. Furthermore, we claim that the proper analysis of these neighborhoods could be the basis for developing new specialized algorithms for imbalanced data. To illustrate it, we study generalizations of over-sampling in pre-processing methods and neighbourhood based ensembles.
An Overview of Resonant Circuits for Wireless Power Transfer

With ever-increasing concerns for the safety and convenience of the power supply, there is a fast growing interest in wireless power transfer (WPT) for industrial devices, consumer electronics, and electric vehicles (EVs). As the resonant circuit is one of the cores of both the near-field and far-field WPT systems, it is a pressing need for researchers to develop a high-efficiency high-frequency resonant circuit, especially for the mid-range near-field WPT system. In this paper, an overview of resonant circuits for the near-field WPT system is presented, with emphasis on the non-resonant converters with a resonant tank and resonant inverters with a resonant tank as well as compensation networks and selective resonant circuits. Moreover, some key issues including the zero-voltage switching, zero-voltage derivative switching and total harmonic distortion are addressed. With the increasing usage of wireless charging for EVs, bidirectional resonant inverters for WPT based vehicle-to-grid systems are elaborated.
Fluoropolymer-coated dacron versus PTFE grafts for femorofemoral crossover bypass: randomised trial.

OBJECTIVES
To investigate whether patency of a thin walled 8 mm fluoropassivated Dacron graft was similar to that of a standard 8mm PTFE graft for femorofemoral crossover bypass surgery.


DESIGN
A randomised multicentre clinical trial comparing two vascular grafts with participation of 10 departments of vascular surgery in Denmark, Sweden and Norway.


PATIENTS AND METHODS
198 patients were randomised to PTFE (n=107) or fluoropolymer-coated Dacron grafts (n=91), 63% underwent surgery for claudication, 27% for ischaemic rest pain and 10% for tissue loss. The median follow-up time was 24 months (IQR 19-26 months).


RESULTS
The primary patency rate of the two grafts was similar (log rank test: p=0.35). The primary patency rates (95% CI) for coated Dacron and PTFE grafts were 92% (86-98) and 94% (89-99) at 12 months and 87% (74-95) and 93% (87-99) at 24 months, respectively.


CONCLUSION
In patients with unilateral iliac artery disease not amenable to angioplasty, the femoral-femoral bypass is durable and effective. No difference in patency was found between the two graft materials (fluoropolymer coated Dacron and PTFE).
Community acquired versus hospital acquired hyponatremia in acute heart failure: Association with clinical characteristics and outcomes.

Hyponatremia is the commonest electrolyte abnormality in patients hospitalized with heart failure (HF) [1] with a prevalence of 19%–25% [2–4]. It is a result of either increased neurohormonal activation that reflects the severity of HF [5] or due to effect of diuretics. Admission hyponatremia in acute HF is a poor prognostic indicator associated with prolonged hospital stay, higher rates of rehospitalization [6–8], and higher short and long term mortality [2,4,9]. There is scant data that compares community acquired hyponatremia (CAH) and hospital acquired hyponatremia (HAH) in HF. Shchekochikhin and colleagues showed that HAH is also associatedwith increased in-hospitalmortality and length of stay similar to what have been described with CAH [10]. However, no study examined intermediate-term post-discharge outcomes. We hypothesized that HAH has favorable post-discharge outcome compared with CAH in HF. In this analysis we compared the characteristics and intermediate-term outcomes of patients with acute systolic HF with either CAH or HAH. The study is an analysis from the Evaluation Study of Congestive Heart Failure and Pulmonary Artery Catheterization Effectiveness (ESCAPE) trial. Briefly, the ESCAPE trial is a National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute (NHLBI)-sponsored multicenter study that randomized 433 patients with acute systolic HF to clinical assessment alone versus clinical assessment guided by pulmonary artery catheterization (PAC). The study showed that the PAC did not improve or worsen HF outcomes. Design, rationale, and results of the ESCAPE trial have been previously published [11,12]. Sodium level was measured at multiple time points including hospital admission and discharge. We defined CAH as a serum sodium
Adherence to a low-sodium diet in patients with heart failure is best when family members also follow the diet: a multicenter observational study.

BACKGROUND
Adherence to a low-sodium diet (LSD) is difficult without continuous support from spouses or family members. Whether having a family member follow an LSD improves patient adherence has not been tested objectively.


OBJECTIVE
The aim of this study was to examine the effect of family adherence to an LSD on patient adherence to an LSD and to examine whether this effect differed by relationship status and living arrangement.


METHODS
In this secondary data analysis, we analyzed data from 379 outpatients with heart failure who had objective evidence of adherence to an LSD (ie, a 24-hour urinary sodium excretion). The t test, analysis of variance, and logistic regressions were used to compare levels of adherence among groups that were categorized by family adherence to an LSD, relationship status, and living arrangement with family member and to predict the likelihood of being adherent to an LSD (24-hour urinary sodium excretion <3000 mg) by the groups.


RESULTS
Compared with patients whose family did not follow an LSD, patients whose family member followed an LSD had lower average urinary sodium excretion (3651 vs 4280 mg; P = .003) and were 1.6 times more likely to be adherent to an LSD (95% confidence interval, 1.03-2.4; P = .035). Patients whose spouses followed the LSD had lower sodium excretion than did patients whose spouses did not follow the LSD (3730 vs 4534 mg; P = .012). Patients whose nonspousal family member followed an LSD were 4 times more likely to be adherent than were patients whose spousal member did not follow an LSD (odds ratio, 3.94; 95% confidence interval, 1.81-8.58; P = .001).


CONCLUSIONS
Living with a spouse or other family member improved patient adherence to LSD only when the spouse or family member also followed the LSD. These results suggest that interventions aimed at improving LSD adherence should target patient and family member dyads to encourage family members to follow the LSD with patients.
Nusinersen versus Sham Control in Later-Onset Spinal Muscular Atrophy.

BACKGROUND
Nusinersen is an antisense oligonucleotide drug that modulates pre-messenger RNA splicing of the survival motor neuron 2 ( SMN2) gene. It has been developed for the treatment of spinal muscular atrophy (SMA).


METHODS
We conducted a multicenter, double-blind, sham-controlled, phase 3 trial of nusinersen in 126 children with SMA who had symptom onset after 6 months of age. The children were randomly assigned, in a 2:1 ratio, to undergo intrathecal administration of nusinersen at a dose of 12 mg (nusinersen group) or a sham procedure (control group) on days 1, 29, 85, and 274. The primary end point was the least-squares mean change from baseline in the Hammersmith Functional Motor Scale-Expanded (HFMSE) score at 15 months of treatment; HFMSE scores range from 0 to 66, with higher scores indicating better motor function. Secondary end points included the percentage of children with a clinically meaningful increase from baseline in the HFMSE score (≥3 points), an outcome that indicates improvement in at least two motor skills.


RESULTS
In the prespecified interim analysis, there was a least-squares mean increase from baseline to month 15 in the HFMSE score in the nusinersen group (by 4.0 points) and a least-squares mean decrease in the control group (by -1.9 points), with a significant between-group difference favoring nusinersen (least-squares mean difference in change, 5.9 points; 95% confidence interval, 3.7 to 8.1; P<0.001). This result prompted early termination of the trial. Results of the final analysis were consistent with results of the interim analysis. In the final analysis, 57% of the children in the nusinersen group as compared with 26% in the control group had an increase from baseline to month 15 in the HFMSE score of at least 3 points (P<0.001), and the overall incidence of adverse events was similar in the nusinersen group and the control group (93% and 100%, respectively).


CONCLUSIONS
Among children with later-onset SMA, those who received nusinersen had significant and clinically meaningful improvement in motor function as compared with those in the control group. (Funded by Biogen and Ionis Pharmaceuticals; CHERISH ClinicalTrials.gov number, NCT02292537 .).
LABORATORY INVESTIGATION OF THROMBOPHILIA

Ph. D. Sandra Margeti} Department of Laboratory Haematology and Coagulation Clinical Institute of Chemistry Medical School University Hospital Sestre milosrdnice Vinogradska 29 10 000 Zagreb, Croatia Tel: +385 1 3787 115 Fax: +385 1 3768 280 e-mail: margeticsandraagmail.com Summary: Laboratory investigation of thrombophilia is aimed at detecting the well-established hereditary and acquired causes of venous thromboembolism, including activated protein C resistance/factor V Leiden mutation, prothrombin G20210A mutation, deficiencies of the physio logical anticoagulants antithrombin, protein C and protein S, the presence of antiphospholipid antibodies and increased plasma levels of homocysteine and coagulation factor VIII. In contrast, investigation of dysfibrinogenemia, a very rare thrombophilic risk factor, should only be considered in a patient with evidence of familial or recurrent thrombosis in the absence of all evaluated risk factors mentioned above. At this time, thrombophilia investigation is not recommended for other potential hereditary or acquired risk factors whose association with increased risk for thrombosis has not been proven sufficiently to date. In order to ensure clinical relevance of testing and to avoid any misinterpretation of results, laboratory investigation of thrombophilia should always be performed in accordance with the recommended guidelines on testing regarding the careful selection of patients, time of testing and assays and assay methods used. The aim of this review is to summarize the most important aspects on thrombophilia testing, including whom and when to test, what assays and assay methods to use and all other variables that should be considered when performing laboratory investigation of thrombophilia.
CPU Sim 3.1: A tool for simulating computer architectures for computer organization classes

CPU Sim 3.1 is an educational software package written in Java foruse in CS3 courses. CPU Sim provides students an active learningenvironment in which they can design, modify, and compare variouscomputer architectures at the register-transfer level and higher.They can run assembly language or machine language programs forthose architectures through simulation. CPU Sim is a completedevelopment environment, including dialog boxes for designing theCPU architecture, a text editor for editing assembly languageprograms, an assembler, several display windows for viewing theregisters and RAMs during the execution of programs, and manydebugging features such as the ability to step forward or backwardduring execution, inspecting and optionally changing the values inthe registers and RAMs after each step. These features andsuggested uses of CPU Sim in CS3 classes are discussed.
The paradoxical effects of workforce shortages on rural interprofessional practice.

RATIONALE AND AIM
While interprofessional practice has been promoted as a solution to the challenges besetting rural health services, current evidence does not offer a clear explanation as to why it is effective in some domains and yet is not successful in others. At the same time, rural clinicians are frequently faced with major workforce pressures and this has a significant influence on professional practice. The aim of this study was to explore how these pressures impact on rural interprofessional practice.


METHOD
This study is part of a larger project investigating factors that enhance and detract from effective interprofessional working. We utilised a modified realistic evaluation approach to analyse the context, mechanisms and outcomes of rural interprofessional practice. Approval for this study was granted by an accredited research ethics committee. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 22 rural clinicians who were purposively recruited from a range of settings, roles, locations and professions.


FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION
We found that clinicians often invested in interprofessional practice because of the need to manage intense workloads and this necessitated sharing of responsibilities across disciplines and blurring of role boundaries. Paradoxically, participants noted that workload pressures hampered interprofessional working if there were long-term skill shortages. Sharing workload and responsibility is an important motivator for rural practitioners to engage in interprofessional practice; however, this driver is only effective under circumstances where there are sufficient resources to facilitate collaboration. In the context of intransient resource challenges, rural health service managers would be best to focus on enabling IPP through facilitating role understanding and respect between clinicians. This is most feasible via informal workplace learning and allowing time for teams to reflect on collaborative processes.
Natural Language Explanations in Human-Collaborative Systems

As autonomous systems and people collaborate more, it is evident that there is an increasing need for systems that are transparent and explicable. Especially in critical decisionmaking applications such as those employed in autonomous vehicles or in-home robotic eldercare, it is important for robots to be coherent and articulate what decisions they are making as well as why they arrived at such decisions. While research has suggested the need for explanations for years [7], there is an increasing interest in explaining machine learning and autonomous behavior. There have been contributions in making classification systems more intelligible (e.g., [6, 10]). In robotics, there has been work in enabling agents to explain task failures [3], to generate task plans that are optimized for explanation [13], and to explain why no plan can be found to begin with [2]. Additionally, there have been contributions towards enabling robots to summarize their experiences and generate natural language descriptions of them [11, 9]. These approaches place emphasis on allowing users to specify their preferences with respect to the level of detail they desire. We also argue that natural language communication is an appealing medium for articulating decision-making for several reasons. First, as robots are increasingly being used by non-expert average users rather than computer science experts, we should aim for interaction modalities that they are most comfortable with including language. Second, natural language affords us the ability to provide rich descriptions and explanations of often-complex robot behavior. However, the richness of natural language also means it can be challenging to generate “good” explanations. We are interested in developing approaches to generating and evaluating natural language explanations of robot behavior in order to improve human-robot collaboration.
Association between Change in Normal Appearing White Matter Metabolites and Intrathecal Inflammation in Natalizumab-Treated Multiple Sclerosis

BACKGROUND
Multiple sclerosis (MS) is associated not only with focal inflammatory lesions but also diffuse pathology in the central nervous system (CNS). Since there is no firm association between the amount of focal inflammatory lesions and disease severity, diffuse pathology in normal appearing white matter (NAWM) may be crucial for disease progression. Immunomodulating treatments for MS reduce the number of focal lesions, but possible effects on diffuse white matter pathology are less studied. Furthermore, it is not known whether intrathecal levels of inflammatory or neurodegenerative markers are associated with development of pathology in NAWM.


METHODS
Quantitative proton magnetic resonance spectroscopy ((1)H-MRS) was used to investigate NAWM in 27 patients with relapsing MS before and after one year of treatment with natalizumab as well as NAWM in 20 healthy controls at baseline. Changes in (1)H-MRS metabolite concentrations during treatment were also correlated with a panel of intrathecal markers of inflammation and neurodegeneration in 24 of these 27 patients.


RESULTS
The group levels of (1)H-MRS metabolite concentrations were unchanged pre- to posttreatment, but a pattern of high magnitude correlation coefficients (r = 0.43-0.67, p<0.0005-0.03) were found between changes in individual metabolite concentrations (total creatine and total choline) and levels of pro-inflammatory markers (IL-1β and CXCL8).


CONCLUSIONS
Despite a clinical improvement and a global decrease in levels of inflammatory markers in cerebrospinal fluid during treatment, high levels of pro-inflammatory CXCL8 and IL-1β were associated with an increase in (1)H-MRS metabolites indicative of continued gliosis development and membrane turnover in NAWM.