LLukas22/scidocs huggingface dataset:
Time to challenge the spurious hierarchy of systematic over narrative reviews?

Systematic reviews are generally placed above narrative reviews in an assumed hierarchy of secondary research evidence. We argue that systematic reviews and narrative reviews serve different purposes and should be viewed as complementary. Conventional systematic reviews address narrowly focused questions; their key contribution is summarising data. Narrative reviews provide interpretation and critique; their key contribution is deepening understanding. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.
Concurrent Use of Hypnotic Drugs and Chinese Herbal Medicine Therapies among Taiwanese Adults with Insomnia Symptoms: A Population-Based Study

Background. The increased practice of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) worldwide has raised concerns regarding herb-drug interactions. The purpose of our study is to analyze the concurrent use of Chinese herbal products (CHPs) among Taiwanese insomnia patients taking hypnotic drugs. Methods. The usage, frequency of services, and CHP prescribed among 53,949 insomnia sufferers were evaluated from a random sample of 1 million beneficiaries in the National Health Insurance Research Database. A logistic regression method was used to identify the factors that were associated with the coprescription of a CHP and a hypnotic drug. Cox proportional hazards regressions were performed to calculate the hazard ratios (HRs) of hip fracture between the two groups. Results. More than 1 of every 3 hypnotic users also used a CHP concurrently. Jia-Wei-Xiao-Yao-San (Augmented Rambling Powder) and Suan-Zao-Ren-Tang (Zizyphus Combination) were the 2 most commonly used CHPs that were coadministered with hypnotic drugs. The HR of hip fracture for hypnotic-drug users who used a CHP concurrently was 0.57-fold (95% CI = 0.47-0.69) that of hypnotic-drug users who did not use a CHP. Conclusion. Exploring potential CHP-drug interactions and integrating both healthcare approaches might be beneficial for the overall health and quality of life of insomnia sufferers.
Copy-move forgery detection: Survey, challenges and future directions

The authenticity and reliability of digital images are increasingly important due to the ease in modifying such images. Thus, the capability to identify image manipulation is a current research focus, and a key domain in digital image authentication is Copy-Move Forgery Detection (CMFD). Copy-move forgery is the process of copying and pasting from one region to another location within the same image. In this paper, we survey the recent developments in CMFD, and describe the entire CMFD process involved. Specifically, we characterize the common CMFD workflow of feature extraction and matching process using block or keypoint-based approaches. Instead of listing the datasets and validations used in the literature, we also categorize the types of copied regions. Finally, we also outline a number of future research directions. Graphical abstract
Emission characteristics of an electricity generation system in diesel alone and dual fuel modes.

Emission characteristics of a diesel engine in diesel alone and dual mode (with producer gas) at di0erent load conditions are presented in this paper. Concentration of pollutants such as carbon monoxide (CO), oxides of nitrogen (NOx), sulphur dioxide (SO2), hydrocarbons (HC) and particulates in the 5ue gas were monitored and emission factors have been derived. In addition to the emission characteristics, diesel replacement rate at di0erent loads has been estimated. It was observed that the emissions increase at low-load conditions. It has been found that CO content in the 5ue gas increase in dual fuel operation, more so at part loads. NOx and SO2 concentration decrease in dual fuel mode.
Efficacy and safety of once monthly ibandronate treatment in patients with reduced bone mineral density--ESTHER study.

INTRODUCTION
Osteoporosis usually affects post-menopausal women. Treatment is individualized and requires an approach that will provide long-term compliance to prevent fractures. Studies conducted so far suggest inadequate compliance and persistence in weekly bisphosphonate treatment (under 43% after a year of treatment). Ibandronate, as a powerful bisphosphonate, has made it possible for the first time to treat osteoporosis with a single tablet per month.


OBJECTIVE
Study of efficacy, safety and tolerance of ibandronate applied once a month in female patients with decreased bone mineral density (BMD).


METHODS
The prospective study was conducted in 34 centres in Serbia covering the total of 370 women with reduced BMD with ibandronate once a month. Demographic data, risk factors for osteoporosis, mode of diagnosis establishment, previous treatment for osteoporosis and concomitant diseases were investigated. Efficacy of the treatment was evaluated by T-score value after 12 months versus the baseline values. Tolerance of the treatment, compliance and adverse effects were recorded.


RESULTS
The sample included 97.5% post-menopausal women, 92.7% with osteoporosis. In 80% of the cases, the diagnosis was established by DXA measurement. In more than 90% of the sample, the level of physical activity was unsatisfactory, and 70% had an accompanying risk factor for osteoporosis in addition to menopause. After 12 months of treatment, 100% compliance was recorded in 84% of the patients and significant reduction (p < 0.0001) of the bone mineral loss, regardless of the previous aminobisphosphonate treatment. The treatment was tolerated well, with no serious adverse reactions. Some, mainly gastrointestinal complaints, registered in the first month (6%), were significantly relieved (p < 0.0001) after 12 months of treatment (1%).


CONCLUSION
Ibandronate manifested significant improvement of the BMD after 12 months of treatment of patients with decreased BMD, with good tolerance and excellent treatment compliance.
A longitudinal study of electronic cigarette users.

OBJECTIVE
To assess behavior change over 12 months in users of e-cigarettes ("vapers").


METHODS
Longitudinal Internet survey, 2011 to 2013. Participants were enrolled on websites dedicated to e-cigarettes and smoking cessation. We assessed use of e-cigarettes and tobacco among the same cohort at baseline, after one month (n=477) and one year (n=367).


RESULTS
Most participants (72%) were former smokers, and 76% were using e-cigarettes daily. At baseline, current users had been using e-cigarettes for 3 months, took 150 puffs/day on their e-cigarette and used refill liquids containing 16 mg/ml of nicotine, on average. Almost all the daily vapers at baseline were still vaping daily after one month (98%) and one year (89%). Of those who had been vaping daily for less than one month at baseline, 93% were still vaping daily after one month, and 81% after one year. In daily vapers, the number of puffs/day on e-cigarettes remained unchanged between baseline and one year. Among former smokers who were vaping daily at baseline, 6% had relapsed to smoking after one month and also 6% after one year. Among dual users (smokers who were vaping daily at baseline), 22% had stopped smoking after one month and 46% after one year. In dual users who were still smoking at follow-up, cigarette consumption decreased by 5.3 cig/day after one month (from 11.3 to 6.0 cig./day, p=0.006), but remained unchanged between baseline and 1-year follow-up.


CONCLUSIONS
E-cigarettes may contribute to relapse prevention in former smokers and smoking cessation in current smokers.
Transforming to a Quality Culture: The Henry Ford Production System

We describe the cultural transformation of the surgical pathology laboratory at Henry Ford Hospital, Detroit, MI, to one that has adopted an expectation for empowered workers to see their daily work in the context of continually learning and making effective process improvements that are designed and tested by the scientific method. This transformation has been achieved by creating an organizational and educational framework for implementing guiding principles originally systematized as the basis of lean manufacturing by our founder, Henry Ford, at the turn of the century, and incorporating the innovations of the Toyota Production System. We present novel data collection techniques to establish baseline states by which to gauge the success of changes and lessons from rapid process improvement studies. Herein, we share our experiences, lessons learned, and successes to date in the pathology-based Henry Ford Production System. We do not make changes for the sake of making them, but we never fail to make a change once it is demonstrated that the new way is better than the old way. We hold it our duty to permit nothing to stand in the way of progress. —Henry Ford1 The Laboratory as Production Line In a sense, the pathology laboratory is a production line dedicated as much to reverse manufacturing, that is, reducing human parts into their basic components for analysis, as to then manufacturing or synthesizing those pieces of data back into an informational product for subsequent therapeutic decision making. Yet, surgical pathology laboratories struggle to consistently meet 2-day turnaround times for this only product. Not even 80% of the simplest of routine biopsy specimens were completed in 1 working day in the 1993 College of American Pathologists Q-Probes study performed by 525 surgical pathology laboratories.2 Despite the throughput and efficiency pressures of modern health care delivery, that performance level in biopsy turnaround time in our own laboratory has remained largely unchanged in the subsequent 13 years. The focus on quality improvement in anatomic pathology during the last 17 years has been on the identification of benchmarks of performance that describe current practice and has attempted to satisfy accreditation requirements for continuous quality improvement.3 This often has meant striving to perform at median or mean benchmark performance levels. Multi-institutional, peer-derived goals, like Q-Probes or QTracks, often set the bar too low, aiming to match mediocre performance, and are without granular data allowing insight for laboratory leaders to recognize and adopt best practices.4 Transforming to a Quality Culture The Henry Ford Production System Richard J. Zarbo, MD, DMD, and Rita D’Angelo, MS, ASQE, SSBB
Impact of gate induced drain leakage on overall leakage of submicrometer CMOS VLSI circuits

In this paper, the impact of gate induced drain leakage (GIDL) on the overall leakage of submicrometer VLSI circuits is studied. GIDL constitutes a serious constraint, with regards to off-state current, in scaled down complimentary metal–oxide–semiconductor (CMOS) devices for DRAM and/or EEPROM applications. Our research shows that the GIDL current is also a serious problem in scaled CMOS digital VLSI circuits. We present the experimental and simulation data of GIDL current as a function of 0.35m CMOS technology parameters and layout of CMOS standard cells. The obtained results show that a poorly designed standard cell library for VLSI application may result in extremely high leakage current and poor yield.
Comments on quantum cosmology with extrinsic time

Abstract The closed de Sitter universe is used to present a way to deal with the deparametrization and quantization of cosmological models with extrinsic time.
Clinical features and patency rates of Remedy® biodegradable peripheral stents

OBJECTIVE
The aim of this study was to investigate the midterm results of Remedy® biodegradable stents, which have recently come into use for lower-extremity arterial occlusive disease.


METHODS
Sixty-five patients, who underwent surgical intervention in various cardiovascular surgery clinics throughout Turkey, were included in the study. The total number of stents used was 92. The mean age of the patients was 64.11 ± 24.13 years (20-82), and 16 (24.6%) were female. The mean number of stents per patient was 1.42, and 70.7% of the lesions were TASC type A. Patients were followed for a mean of 32 months. Sixty-five patients underwent a control examination using either digital subtraction angiography or colour Doppler ultrasonography. In-stent restenosis was defined as ≥ 50% stenosis in the stent area in asymptomatic patients. The procedure was repeated if the degree of stenosis was ≥ 70%.


RESULTS
During the follow-up period, restenosis (≥50% stenosis) was observed in seven patients (10.7%). The patency rate after secondary intervention was 100%, and there was no loss of limbs in any patient. Restenosis was observed in six patients with superficial femoral artery stents, and in one patient with a popliteal arterial stent.


CONCLUSION
Our experience shows that Remedy® biodegradable peripheral stents were safe and effective in our cohort of patients, with acceptable patency rates.
P-selectin-mediated platelet activation promotes adhesion of non-small cell lung carcinoma cells on vascular endothelial cells under flow

Lung cancer is a severe disease threatening human health worldwide. Distant             hematogenous metastasis results in poor prognosis and death of lung cancer patients.             In the present study, we investigated the effect of circulatory platelets (PLTs)             on hematogenous metastasis of non-small cell lung carcinoma (NSCLC). Laser scanning             confocal microscopy was employed to assay the expression of P-selectin in lung             cancer tissue, paracancerous tissue and distant tissue, respectively. Meanwhile,             fluorescence-activated cell sorting (FACS) was used to determine P-selectin activation             in peripheral blood. Purified PLTs were co-cultured with A549 cells and human             vascular endothelial cells (HuvECs). Subsequently, the formation of PLT-lung cancer             cell complexes and their effects on rolling and adhesion of A549 on the surface             of vascular endothelium were assayed. Integrin α3, α5, β1, ICAM-1 and VCAM-1 mRNAs             and proteins were measured by reverse RT-PCR and western blot analysis, respectively.             The expression of P-selectin in lung adenocarcinoma tissue was significantly stronger             compared to that in paracancerous and distant tissues. P-selectin activation in             peripheral blood in lung adenocarcinoma was markedly enhanced. The rolling rate             of A549 on HuvECs was significantly slowed down after co-culture of activated             PLTs and A549 cells. The mRNA and protein levels of integrin α3, α5, β1, ICAM-1             and VCAM-1 were significantly increased after the co-culture. In conclusion, the             PLT-lung cancer cell complexes protected the lung cancer cells from mechanical             injury under blood flow. Furthermore, up-regulated integrin α3, α5, β1 and endothelial             cell adhesion molecules ICAM-1 and VCAM-1 promoted the adhesion of A549 on vascular             endothelial cells, which may be responsible for hematogenous metastasis of lung             cancer.
Analysis of Ball Bearings under Dynamic Loading Using Non- Destructive Technique of Thermography

Roller bearing defect is a major factor of failure in rotating machinery that affects proper functioning of system which results in substantial time and economic losses. Therefore, condition monitoring of roller bearing is important and the study of severity of defects are necessarily required in order to avoid catastrophic consequences. Defects monitoring during dynamic loading conditions of rotational machineries with the use of contactless, non-destructive infrared thermographic method is proposed. By using a rotating ball bearing, passive thermographic experiment was performed as an alternative technique to proceed the condition monitoring. Based on the results, the temperature characteristics of the ball bearing under dynamic loading conditions were analyzed thoroughly. Also, a comparison of these results was done for different bearings with characteristic defects. As a result, it was confirmed that infrared thermography method could be adopted to monitor and diagnose the faults by evaluating quantitatively and qualitatively the temperature characteristics according to the condition of the ball bearing.
Comparison of main control strategies for DC/DC stage of bidirectional vehicle charger

This paper presents comparison of two control algorithms for DC/DC converters in vehicle chargers. It presents operation in phase-shifting algorithm and resonant LLC algorithm, their implementation, and test results.
Depth Estimation via Affinity Learned with Convolutional Spatial Propagation Network

Depth estimation from a single image is a fundamental problem in computer vision. In this paper, we propose a simple yet effective convolutional spatial propagation network (CSPN) to learn the affinity matrix for depth prediction. Specifically, we adopt an efficient linear propagation model, where the propagation is performed with a manner of recurrent convolutional operation, and the affinity among neighboring pixels is learned through a deep convolutional neural network (CNN). We apply the designed CSPN to two depth estimation tasks given a single image: (1) Refine the depth output from existing state-of-the-art (SOTA) methods; (2) Convert sparse depth samples to a dense depth map by embedding the depth samples within the propagation procedure. The second task is inspired by the availability of LiDAR that provides sparse but accurate depth measurements. We experimented the proposed CSPN over the popular NYU v2 [1] and KITTI [2] datasets, where we show that our proposed approach improves not only quality (e.g., 30% more reduction in depth error), but also speed (e.g., 2 to 5× faster) of depth maps than previous SOTA methods.
A case of multiple sclerosis improvement following removal of heavy metal intoxication

Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a chronic progressive disease of the central nervous system (CNS) provoking disability and neurological symptoms. The exact causes of SM are unknown, even if it is characterized by focal inflammatory lesions in CNS accompanied by autoimmune reaction against myelin. Indeed, many drugs able to modulate the immune response of patients have been used to treat MS. More recently, toxic metals have been proposed as possible causes of neurodegenerative diseases. The objective of this study is to investigate in vivo the impact of heavy metal intoxication in MS progression. We studied the case of a patient affected by MS, who has been unsuccessfully treated for some years with current therapies. We examined his levels of toxic heavy metals in the urine, following intravenous “challenge” with the chelating agent calcium disodium ethylene diamine tetraacetic acid (EDTA).The patient displayed elevated levels of aluminium, lead and mercury in the urine. Indeed, he was subjected to treatment with EDTA twice a month. Under treatment, the patient revealed in time improved symptoms suggestive of MS remission. The clinical data correlated with the reduction of heavy metal levels in the urine to normal range values. Our case report suggests that levels of toxic metals can be tested in patients affected by neurodegenerative diseases as MS.
Intelligent Lighting System using Visible-Light Communication Technology

In recent years, various types of equipment have become more intelligent. In this research, we propose an intelligent lighting system using visible-light communication technology for direct communication between lighting fixtures and illuminance sensors in order to provide the necessary illuminance to a desired location. We actually constructed an experiment simulator based on this concept and verified the effectiveness of the newly developed control method. Verification tests were conducted using an optimization algorithm specialized for lighting control, and the results showed that the various illuminance sensors converged to the preset target illuminance in a very short time. We also confirmed that the system can respond adaptively to the movement of illuminance sensors
Difference between Carcinoma of the Lower Esophagus and the Cardia

We analyzed the records of patients with carcinoma of the lower esophagus and cardia. Mediastinal node involvement was found in 43% of the patients with squamous cell carcinoma of the lower esophagus, and the 5-year survival after mediastinal dissection for patients with mediastinal node involvement was 27%. Mediastinal node involvement was found in 19% of the patients with adenocarcinoma of the cardia involving the esophagus, and no patients with mediastinal node involvement survived more than 2 years. When the patients had mediastinal node involvement, survival curves were significantly different. There were large differences between these tumors in terms of the extent of lymph node involvement and the survival of patients with mediastinal lymph node involvement. It is incorrect to consider the behavior of these tumors identical and to treat the conditions similarly.
Prehospital cardiac arrest and the adverse effect of male gender, but not age, on outcome.

OBJECTIVE
To analyze the incidence and outcome of prehospital cardiac arrest as it correlated to gender and age as a secondary end point in an interventional clinical trial.


METHODS
This prospective, randomized, double-blinded clinical intervention trial enrolled 874 prehospital cardiopulmonary arrest patients encountered by prehospital urban, suburban, and rural regional emergency medical service (EMS) areas. This trial evaluated outcome and profiled demographic predictors of cardiac arrest patients refractory to defibrillation with intravenous access who underwent standard advanced cardiac life support (ACLS) intervention and empiric early administration of bicarbonate. Survival was measured to the emergency department (ED), and data analysis used chi-square with Pearson correlation.


RESULTS
The overall survival rate was 14.2%. There was no age correlate to survival, with an average age of 67.4 for both groups. Male patients had a 2.4-fold increased incidence (70.7 vs. 29.3%, p = 0.001) of arrest, which was associated with a 60% increase in mortality (19.6% vs. 11.8, p = 0.004) compared with women. The risk of unfavorable outcome was increased for men (OR 1.826, 95% CI 1.182-2.821; RR 1.097, 95% CI 1.025-1.180) on univariate analysis. There appeared to be no intergroup differences found with other historical variables, such as the presence of myocardial infarction (MI), hypertension (HTN), diabetes mellitus (DM), congestive heart failure (CHF), and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), which were analyzed. However, HTN was found more commonly (2.2 times) in men (69.1 vs. 30.9%) than in women but did not correlate with survival.


CONCLUSIONS
Male gender, but not age, is associated with both an increased incidence and a worsened outcome in prehospital cardiac arrest.
On Estimating the State of a Finite Level Quantum System

We revisit the problem of mutually unbiased measurements in the context of estimating the unknown state of a $d$-level quantum system, first studied by W. K. Wootters and B. D. fields[7] in 1989 and later investigated by S. Bandyopadhyay et al [3] in 2001 and A. O. Pittenger and M. H. Rubin [6] in 2003. Our approach is based directly on the Weyl operators in the $L^2$-space over a finite field when $d=p^r$ is the power of a prime. When $d$ is not a prime power we sacrifice a bit of optimality and construct a recovery operator for reconstructing the unknown state from the probabilities of elementary events in different measurements.