LLukas22/scidocs huggingface dataset:
Health Status and Self-care Outcomes After an Education-Support Intervention for People With Chronic Heart Failure.

BACKGROUND
The rising cost of hospitalizations for heart failure (HF) care mandates intervention models to address education for self-care success. The effectiveness of memory enhancement strategies to improve self-care and learning needs further examination.


OBJECTIVE
The objective of this study was to examine the effects of an education-support intervention delivered in the home setting, using strategies to improve health status and self-care in adults/older adults with class I to III HF. Our secondary purpose was to explore participants' subjective perceptions of the intervention.


METHODS
This study used a randomized, 2-group design. Fifty people were enrolled for 9 months and tested at 4 time points-baseline; after a 3-month education-support intervention; at 6 months, after 3 months of telephone/e-mail support; and 9 months, after a 3-month period of no contact. Advanced practice registered nurses delivered the intervention. Memory enhancement methods were built into the teaching materials and delivery of the intervention. We measured the intervention's effectiveness on health status outcomes (functional status, self-efficacy, quality of life, emotional state/depressive symptoms, and metamemory) and self-care outcomes (knowledge/knowledge retention, self-care ability). Subjects evaluated the usefulness of the intervention at the end of the study.


RESULTS
The mean age of the sample was 62.4 years, with a slight majority of female participants. Participants were well educated and had other concomitant diseases, including diabetes (48%) and an unexpected degree of obesity. The intervention group showed significant improvements in functional status, self-efficacy, and quality of life (Kansas City Cardiomyopathy Questionnaire); metamemory Change and Capacity subscales (Metamemory in Adulthood Questionnaire); self-care knowledge (HF Knowledge Test); and self-care (Self-care in Heart Failure Index). Participants in both groups improved in depressive scores (Geriatric Depression Scale).


CONCLUSIONS
An in-home intervention delivered by advanced practice registered nurses was successful in several health status and self-care outcomes, including functional status, self-efficacy, quality of life, metamemory, self-care status, and HF knowledge.
Comparison between anterior cervical discectomy fusion and cervical corpectomy fusion using titanium cages for reconstruction: analysis of outcome and long-term follow-up

Retrospective comparative study of 80 consecutive patients treated with either anterior cervical discectomy fusion (ACDF) or anterior cervical corpectomy fusion (ACCF) for multi-level cervical spondylosis. To compare clinical outcome, fusion rates, and complications of anterior cervical reconstruction of multi-level ACDF and single-/multi-level ACCF performed using titanium mesh cages (TMCs) filled with autograft and anterior cervical plates (ACPs). Reconstruction of the cervical spine after discectomy or corpectomy with titanium cages filled with autograft has become an acceptable alternative to both allograft and autograft; however, there is no data comparing the outcome of multi-level ACDF and single-/multi-level ACCF using this reconstruction. We evaluated 80 consecutive patients who underwent surgery for the treatment of multi-level cervical spondylosis at our institution from 1998 to 2001. In this series, 42 patients underwent multi-level ACDF (Group 1) and 38 patients underwent ACCF (Group 2). Interbody TMCs and local autograft bone with ACPs were used in both procedures. Medical records were reviewed to assess outcome. Clinical outcome was measured by Odom’s criteria. Operative time and blood loss were noted. Radiographs were obtained at 6 and 12 weeks, 6 months, 1 year, and 2 years (if necessary). Early hardware failures and pseudarthroses were noted. Cervical sagittal curvature was measured by Ishihara’s index at 1 year. Group 1 had a mean age 46.2 years (range 35–60 years). Group 2 had a mean age 50.1 years (range 35–70 years).The operative time was significantly lower (P < 0.001) and blood loss significantly higher (P < 0.001) in Group 2 than in Group 1. At a minimum of 1 year follow up, patients in both groups had equivalent improvement in their clinical symptoms. The fusion rates for Group 1 were 97.6 and 92.1% for Group 2. The rates of early hardware failure were higher in Group 2 (2.6%) than in Group 1 (0%). The fusion rates for Group 1 were not significantly higher than Group 2 (P > 0.28). There was one patient in Group 1 and 2 patients in Group 2 with pseudarthroses. Complication rates in Group 2 were not significantly higher (P > 0.341). Cervical lordosis was well-maintained (80%) in both groups. Both multi-level ACDF and ACCF with anterior cervical reconstruction using TMC filled with autograft and ACP for treatment of multi-level cervical spondylosis have high fusion rates and good clinical outcome. However, there is a higher rate of early hardware failure and pseudarthroses after ACCF than ACDF. Hence, in the absence of specific pathology requiring removal of vertebral body, multi-level ACDF using interbody cages and autologous bone graft could result in lower morbidity.
Abiotrophia/Granulicatella tubo-ovarian abscess in an adolescent virginal female.

Tubo-ovarian abscess (TOA) is a common acute complication of pelvic inflammatory disease (PID). It can also develop as a complication of pelvic or abdominal surgery, malignancy, and intra-abdominal processes such as appendicitis. In premenopausal women, PID is the most common cause of tubo-ovarian abscess. We report a case of tubo-ovarian abscess in a virginal adolescent female with no past surgical history and no known history of appendicitis, inflammatory bowel disease, or cancer. Cultures of the tubo-ovarian abscess drainage grew Abiotrophia/Granulicatella species. This case supports including TOA in the broad differential diagnosis for abdominal pain with fever in adolescent females regardless of sexual history.
A Comparative Study of Data Mining Process Models (KDD, CRISP-DM and SEMMA)

Data Mining is about analyzing the huge amount data and extracting of information from it for different purposes. From the last few years the field of Data Mining becomes prominent and makes huge growth. There are different standard models for data mining. All these models are defined in sequential steps. These steps help in implementing the data mining tasks. In this paper we will compare these models and give brief understanding about them.
Hayek, social science, and politics: Reply to hill and Friedman

Abstract Hayek's case for the limits of economic agents’ knowledge does not, as Greg Hill seems to suggest, imply that government should be in the business of engaging in countercyclical fiscal policy or paternalistic corrections of people's pursuit of “imaginary goods.” In the latter case, markets have corrective learning mechanisms for consumer mistakes. In the former, public‐choice and public‐ignorance problems plague government efforts to correct the business cycle. The problem of public ignorance is, in turn, Jeffrey Friedman's topic, but he is unfair in condemning Hayek's abandonment of this problem in order to develop his thesis that a “planning mentality” was the source of the leftist ideas with which Hayek disagreed. Hayek was confronted by widely popular planning schemes that were endorsed by a great many of his colleagues, who were not ignorant of economics.
Performance based analysis between k-Means and Fuzzy C-Means clustering algorithms for connection oriented telecommunication data

Data mining is the process of discovering meaningful new correlation, patterns and trends by sifting through large amounts of data, using pattern recognition technologies as well as statistical and mathematical techniques. Cluster analysis is often used as one of the major data analysis technique widely applied for many practical applications in emerging areas of data mining. Two of the most delegated, partition based clustering algorithms namely k-Means and Fuzzy C-Means are analyzed in this research work. These algorithms are implemented by means of practical approach to analyze its performance, based on their computational time. The telecommunication data is the source data for this analysis. The connection oriented broad band data is used to find the performance of the chosen algorithms. The distance (Euclidian distance) between the server locations and their connections are rearranged after processing the data. The computational complexity (execution time) of each algorithm is analyzed and the results are compared with one another. By comparing the result of this practical approach, it was found that the results obtained are more accurate, easy to understand and above all the time taken to process the data was substantially high in Fuzzy C-Means algorithm than the k-Means. © 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Health-related quality of life and all-cause mortality in patients with diabetes on dialysis

BACKGROUND
This study tests the hypotheses that health-related quality of life (HRQOL) in prevalent dialysis patients with diabetes is lower than in dialysis patients without diabetes, and is at least as poor as diabetic patients with another severe complication, i.e. foot ulcers. This study also explores the mortality risk associated with diabetes in dialysis patients.


METHODS
HRQOL was assessed using the Short Form-36 Health Survey (SF-36), in a cross-sectional study of 301 prevalent dialysis patients (26% with diabetes), and compared with diabetic patients not on dialysis (n = 221), diabetic patients with foot ulcers (n = 127), and a sample of the general population (n = 5903). Mortality risk was assessed using a Kaplan-Meier plot and Cox proportional hazards analysis.


RESULTS
Self-assessed vitality, general and mental health, and physical function were significantly lower in dialysis patients with diabetes than in those without. Vitality (p = 0.011) and general health (p <0.001) was impaired in diabetic patients receiving dialysis compared to diabetic patients with foot ulcers, but other subscales did not differ. Diabetes was a significant predictor for mortality in dialysis patients, with a hazard ratio (HR) of 1.6 (95% CI 1.0-2.5) after adjustment for age, dialysis vintage and coronary artery disease. Mental aspects of HRQOL were an independent predictor of mortality in diabetic patients receiving dialysis after adjusting for age and dialysis vintage (HR 2.2, 95% CI 1.0-5.0).


CONCLUSIONS
Physical aspects of HRQOL were perceived very low in dialysis patients with diabetes, and lower than in other dialysis patients and diabetic patients without dialysis. Mental aspects predicted mortality in dialysis patients with diabetes. Increased awareness and measures to assist physical function impairment may be particularly important in diabetes patients on dialysis.
Model-Based Deep Brain Stimulation Programming for Parkinson's Disease: The GUIDE Pilot Study.

BACKGROUND
Achieving optimal results following deep brain stimulation (DBS) typically involves several months of programming sessions. The Graphical User Interface for DBS Evaluation (GUIDE) study explored whether a visual programming system could help clinicians accurately predetermine ideal stimulation settings in DBS patients with Parkinson's disease.


METHODS
A multicenter prospective, observational study was designed that utilized a blinded Unified Parkinson's Disease Rating Scale (UPDRS)-III examination to prospectively assess whether DBS settings derived using a neuroanatomically based computer model (Model) could provide comparable efficacy to those determined through traditional, monopolar review-based programming (Clinical). We retrospectively compared the neuroanatomical regions of stimulation, power consumption and time spent on programming using both methods.


RESULTS
The average improvement in UPDRS-III scores was 10.4 ± 7.8 for the Model settings and 11.7 ± 8.7 for the Clinical settings. The difference between the mean UPDRS-III scores with the Model versus the Clinical settings was 0.26 and not statistically significant (p = 0.9866). Power consumption for the Model settings was 48.7 ± 22 μW versus 76.1 ± 46.5 μW for the Clinical settings. The mean time spent programming using the Model approach was 31 ± 16 s versus 41.4 ± 29.1 min using the Clinical approach.


CONCLUSION
The Model-based DBS settings provided similar benefit to the Clinical settings based on UPDRS-III scores and were often arrived at in less time and required less power than the Clinical settings.
A Novel Grid-Connected PV System Based on MMC to Get the Maximum Power Under Partial Shading Conditions

In the case of partial shading, the output power of the unshaded PV modules will be decreased by the influence of the shaded PV modules in one branch. In order to solve this problem, this paper proposes a novel topology for a PV power generation system by connecting a PV module to the capacitor in each submodule of a modular multilevel converter parallel. As partial shading occurs, the maximum power can be extracted by regulating the capacitor voltage to the maximum power point voltage. With this proposed topology, the maximum power tracking controller, the redundancy module controller, the voltage stability controller, and the grid-connected controller are studied. Simulation and experiment results show that comparing to the traditional topology, the proposed topology can greatly improve the output power of the PV system under the conditions of partial shading and features with low-voltage stress and high efficiency.
A CMOS Tunable Transimpedance Amplifier

A tunable transimpedance amplifier (TIA) is presented in this letter. By incorporating a mechanism for gain and bandwidth tuning, the TIA can be adjusted to achieve optimum circuit performance with a lowest bit-error-rate (BER) for high-speed applications. The proposed circuit is implemented in a 0.18-mum CMOS process. Consuming a dc power of 34mW from a 2.0-V supply voltage, the fabricated TIA exhibits a variable -3-dB bandwidth from 3.9 to 7.6GHz while maintaining a transimpedance gain of 52dBOmega. With a 7.5-Gb/s 231-1 pseudo-random bit sequence, the measured input sensitivity of the TIA is -19 dBm at a BER of 10-12
Providing Streaming Joins as a Service at Facebook

Stream processing applications reduce the latency of batch data pipelines and enable engineers to quickly identify production issues. Many times, a service can log data to distinct streams, even if they relate to the same real-world event (e.g., a search on Facebook’s search bar). Furthermore, the logging of related events can appear on the server side with different delay, causing one stream to be significantly behind the other in terms of logged event times for a given log entry. To be able to stitch this information together with low latency, we need to be able to join two different streams where each stream may have its own characteristics regarding the degree in which its data is out-of-order. Doing so in a streaming fashion is challenging as a join operator consumes lots of memory, especially with significant data volumes. This paper describes an end-to-end streaming join service that addresses the challenges above through a streaming join operator that uses an adaptive stream synchronization algorithm that is able to handle the different distributions we observe in real-world streams regarding their event times. This synchronization scheme paces the parsing of new data and reduces overall operator memory footprint while still providing high accuracy. We have integrated this into a streaming SQL system and have successfully reduced the latency of several batch pipelines using this approach. PVLDB Reference Format: G. Jacques-Silva, R. Lei, L. Cheng, G. J. Chen, K. Ching, T. Hu, Y. Mei, K. Wilfong, R. Shetty, S. Yilmaz, A. Banerjee, B. Heintz, S. Iyer, A. Jaiswal. Providing Streaming Joins as a Service at Facebook. PVLDB, 11 (12): 1809-1821, 2018. DOI: : https://doi.org/10.14778/3229863.3229869
Solid modeling of polyhedral objects by Layered Depth-Normal Images on the GPU

We introduce a novel solid modeling framework taking advantage of the architecture of parallel computing onmodern graphics hardware. Solidmodels in this framework are represented by an extension of the ray representation — Layered Depth-Normal Images (LDNI), which inherits the good properties of Boolean simplicity, localization and domain decoupling. The defect of ray representation in computational intensity has been overcome by the newly developed parallel algorithms running on the graphics hardware equipped with Graphics Processing Unit (GPU). The LDNI for a solid model whose boundary is representedby a closedpolygonalmesh canbe generated efficientlywith thehelp of hardware accelerated sampling. The parallel algorithm for computing Boolean operations on two LDNI solids runs well on modern graphics hardware. A parallel algorithm is also introduced in this paper to convert LDNI solids to sharp-feature preserved polygonal mesh surfaces, which can be used in downstream applications (e.g., finite element analysis). Different from those GPU-based techniques for rendering CSG-tree of solid models Hable and Rossignac (2007, 2005) [1,2], we compute and store the shape of objects in solid modeling completely on graphics hardware. This greatly eliminates the communication bottleneck between the graphics memory and the main memory. © 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Constructivism and its implications for curriculum theory and practice

Under the banner of constructivism, aworld-wide change in the orientation to school learning has taken place. In the context of the constructivist movement an important question is how curriculum studies should view such concepts as d̀evelopment’ and ìmplementation’. If students and teachers together construct or enact their own curricula, what are the consequences in terms of curriculum theory and practice? What is the state of practice with respect to teaching and learning from a constructivist point of view?
Dynamic vehicle routing using genetic algorithms

Many difficult combinatorial optimization problems have been modeled as static problems. However, in practice, many problems are dynamic and changing, while some decisions have to be made before all the design data are known. For example, in the Dynamic Vehicle Routing Problem (DVRP), new customer orders appear over time, and new routes must be reconfigured while executing the current solution. Montemanni et al. [1] considered a DVRP as an extension to the standard vehicle routing problem (VRP) by decomposing a DVRP as a sequence of static VRPs, and then solving them with an ant colony system (ACS) algorithm. This paper presents a genetic algorithm (GA) methodology for providing solutions for the DVRP model employed in [1]. The effectiveness of the proposed GA is evaluated using a set of benchmarks found in the literature. Compared with a tabu search approach implemented herein and the aforementioned ACS, the proposed GA methodology performs better in minimizing travel costs.
Final results of the multicenter, prospective Axium MicroFX for Endovascular Repair of IntraCranial Aneurysm Study (AMERICA).

BACKGROUND
We previously performed a multicenter prospective single-arm trial of 100 patients treated with Axium MicroFX Coils (ev3; Plymouth, Minnesota, USA), AMERICA: Axium MicroFX for Endovascular Repair of IntraCranial Aneurysm study. Initial angiographic and clinical outcomes were excellent. The final results are presented herein.


METHODS
AMERICA is a multicenter, prospective single-arm trial evaluating the safety and efficacy of the ev3 Axium MicroFX coil system in 100 separate aneurysms between April 2010 and October 2012. Trial endpoints were 3-6 month angiographic occlusion and clinical status, as reported by treatment center.


RESULTS
Mean follow-up was 157.9 days (median 153.5, range 1-445, SEM 9.3 days). At last follow-up imaging, 90.6% of all aneurysms, 90% of unruptured aneurysms, and 93.3% of ruptured aneurysms had Raymond grade I or II occlusion. Progression to further occlusion (lower Raymond occlusion grade) occurred in 29/85 aneurysms (34.1%). Aneurysm recurrence occurred in 11/85 aneurysms (12.9%). Ninety-nine per cent of patients treated electively and 68.7% of ruptured patients had a modified Rankin score of 0-2. Delayed adverse events (AEs), occurring after discharge and during the follow-up period, occurred in 10% of patients. In total, two AEs (one severe and one moderate) were potentially related to the device, thereby providing a 2% device-related AE rate.


CONCLUSIONS
In this prospective, multicenter series of 100 aneurysms treated with Axium MicroFX PGLA (polyglycolic/polylactic acid) coils, 3-6 month angiographic occlusion and clinical outcomes were excellent. This study suggests that Axium MicroFX PGLA coils are safe and effective in the treatment of intracranial aneurysms.
Ofatumumab is active in patients with fludarabine-refractory CLL irrespective of prior rituximab: results from the phase 2 international study.

Ofatumumab, the human CD20 monoclonal antibody that binds a distinct epitope from rituximab, has demonstrated clinical benefit as monotherapy for patients with chronic lymphocytic leukemia refractory to fludarabine and alemtuzumab (FA-ref) and patients refractory to fludarabine with bulky (> 5 cm) lymph nodes (BF-ref). To potentially gain insight into outcomes in patients previously treated with or refractory to rituximab, we performed an ad hoc retrospective analysis in the final 96 FA-ref and 111 BF-ref patients. There were 117 patients previously treated with rituximab (98 rituximab-refractory); 89 patients were rituximab-naive. For rituximab-treated, rituximab-refractory, and rituximab-naive patients, overall response rate was 43%, 44%, and 53%; median progression-free survival was 5.3, 5.5, and 5.6 months; and median overall survival was 15.5, 15.5, and 20.2 months. There were no significant differences in ofatumumab-related infusion reactions, or hematologic or infectious adverse events between subgroups. In summary, ofatumumab monotherapy was effective and well tolerated in patients with fludarabine-refractory chronic lymphocytic leukemia, including in patients with previous rituximab exposure. This trial was registered at www.clinicaltrials.gov as #NCT00349349.
Clinical Utility of Plasma Glypican-3 and Osteopontin as Biomarkers of Hepatocellular Carcinoma

BACKGROUND/AIMS
α-Fetoprotein (AFP) is the biomarker most widely used to detect hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), despite its suboptimal diagnostic accuracy. Glypican-3 (GPC3) and osteopontin (OPN) are secreted glycoproteins that are reportedly associated with tumorigenesis and metastasis. This study was conducted to evaluate the clinical utility of using plasma GPC3 and OPN as diagnostic biomarkers for HCC.


METHODS
We measured the plasma levels of GPC3 and OPN in 120 HCC and 40 chronic liver disease (CLD) patients via an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. The diagnostic accuracy of each tumor marker was evaluated using receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis.


RESULTS
The GPC3 levels in the HCC patients (75.8 ng/mL) were significantly higher (p=0.020) than the levels in patients with CLD (66.4 ng/mL). The area under the ROC curve (AUROC) values for GPC3 and OPN were 0.62 and 0.51, respectively. In subgroup analyses, including subgroups of HCC patients with low serum AFP and PIVKA II levels, the AUROC of GPC3 remained relatively high (0.66), and GPC3 showed a high sensitivity (62.1%) for detecting small HCC tumors.


CONCLUSIONS
The plasma levels of GPC3 and OPN demonstrated low diagnostic accuracy for HCC. However, GPC3 may have a complementary role in diagnosing HCC in patients with nondiagnostic levels of conventional tumor markers and with small-sized tumors.
Dust particle detection in traffic surveillance video using motion singularity analysis

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