Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Children's attentional skills 5 years post-TBI.

OBJECTIVE While a small number of research papers have reported findings on attentional deficits following pediatric traumatic brain injury (TBI), no study to date has reported findings in this area at 5 years post-TBI in very young children. This study examined attentional skills in a group of children who had sustained a mild, moderate, or severe TBI between the ages of 2 and 7 years. METHODS The sample comprised 70 children, 54 of these had sustained a TBI and 16 the non-injured control group. Children were assessed 5 years post-TBI, with focus on tests of attentional ability. RESULTS Attentional and processing speed (PS) deficits do occur and persist up to 5 years post-TBI, particularly following severe TBI in early childhood. Predictors of attentional outcomes varied depending on the component of attention investigated. CONCLUSIONS Those skills developing or emerging at time of injury (e.g., sustained attention, shifting attention, divided attention, PS) are more compromised and may not develop at a normal rate of post-injury.
Distinctive Association of p16INK4a Overexpression With Penile Intraepithelial Neoplasia Depicting Warty and/or Basaloid Features: A Study of 141 Cases Evaluating a New Nomenclature

From the pathogenic point of view, penile cancers may be grouped in human papillomavirus-related and unrelated tumors, each one of them with distinctive morphologic features. The former are predominantly composed of small, undifferentiated basaloid cells, with more or less prominent koilocytic changes, and the latter of keratinizing differentiated squamous cells. The same cellular types are observed in precancerous lesions. On the basis of these observations, we constructed a novel nomenclature for penile precancerous lesions and classified them as penile intraepithelial neoplasia (PeIN) of differentiated, warty, basaloid, and warty-basaloid types. The aim of this study was to test the usefulness of immunohistochemical p16INK4a overexpression, considered as a surrogate for high-risk human papillomavirus infection, using this classification system. We pathologically evaluated 141 patients with PeIN, associated (123 cases) and unassociated (18 cases) with invasive cancer. Distribution of PeIN types was: differentiated, 72%; basaloid, 9%; warty-basaloid, 7%; warty, 4%; and mixed, 7%. There was a striking similarity in the morphology of in situ and invasive squamous cell carcinomas. Differentiated PeIN was commonly associated with usual, verrucous, papillary, and other low-grade keratinizing variants of squamous cell carcinoma whereas in basaloid and warty carcinomas the presence of in situ lesions with similar morphology was habitual. We evaluated p16INK4a overexpression using a 4-tiered (0, 1, 2, and 3) pattern-based system. To properly distinguish differentiated PeIN from in situ lesions with warty and/or basaloid features only pattern 3, which requires full-thickness staining in all epithelial cells, was considered positive. Using this approach, there was a significant association of the negative patterns and differentiated PeIN and of the positive pattern and warty, basaloid, and warty-basaloid PeIN (P<0.0001). Basaloid variant had the strongest association. The sensitivity rate of p16INK4a positivity for discriminating types of PeIN was of 82%, with a specificity of 100% and an accuracy of 95%. Lichen sclerosus was identified in 42 cases and their epithelial component was p16INK4a negative in all cases. Although more studies are necessary to confirm these observations, p16INK4a overexpression seems to be a useful tool for discriminating differentiated from warty, basaloid, and warty-basaloid PeIN.
Nottingham Clinico-Pathological Response Index (NPRI) after Neoadjuvant Chemotherapy (Neo-ACT) Accurately Predicts Clinical Outcome in Locally Advanced Breast Cancer

Purpose: There is a need to identify more sensitive clinicopathologic criteria to assess the response to neoadjuvant chemotherapy (Neo-ACT) and guide subsequent adjuvant therapy. Experimental Design: We performed a clinicopathologic assessment of 426 patients who had completed Neo-ACT for locally advanced breast cancer (LABC) with a median follow-up of 70 months. Patients were divided into a training set treated with anthracycline combination chemotherapy (n = 172); an internal validation set treated with anthracycline and taxane (n = 129); and an external validation set treated with anthracycline with or without taxane (n = 125). Results: A multivariate Cox regression model demonstrated the absence of fibrosis, presence of lymphovascular invasion, increasing number of lymph node metastases, and administration of hormone therapy were significantly associated with short breast cancer–specific survival (BCSS) and disease-free survival (DFS); Ps < 0.01, while reduction of tumor size was associated with DFS (P = 0.022). Nottingham Clinico-Pathological Response Indexes (NPRI) were calculated, and four prognostic groups (NPRI-PG) were identified. Patients in prognostic group 2 (NPRI-PG2) for BCSS (66 of 172; 38.4%) have the same prognosis as those who achieved pathologic complete response (pCR; NPRI-PG1; 15%). Receiver-operating characteristic (ROC) curves indicated that the NPRI outperformed the currently used prognostic factors and adding the NPRI improved their performance as a predictor for both BCSS (area under the curve [AUC], 0.88) and DFS (AUC, 0.87). Conclusions: The NPRI predicts BCSS and DFS, with a higher sensitivity than pCR. The NPRI can also improve the sensitivity and specificity of clinicopathologic response as a study endpoint, for assessing response to Neo-ACT, and can serve as a valuable tool for the discovery of future predictive molecular markers. Clin Cancer Res; 21(5); 1052–62. ©2014 AACR.
Inverse relationship between percentage body weight change and finishing time in 643 forty-two-kilometre marathon runners

Objective The purpose of this study was to determine the relationship between athletic performance and the change in body weight (BW) during a 42 km marathon in a large cohort of runners. Methods The study took place during the 2009 Mont Saint-Michel Marathon (France). 643 marathon finishers (560 males and 83 females) were studied. The change in BW during the race was calculated from measurements of each runner's BW immediately before and after the race. Results BW loss was 2.3±2.2% (mean±SEM) (p<0.01). BW loss was −3.1±1.9% for runners finishing the marathon in less than 3 h; −2.5±2.1% for runners finishing between 3 and 4 h; and −1.8±2.4% for runners who required more than 4 h to complete the marathon. The degree of BW loss was linearly related to 42 km race finishing time (p<0.0000001). Neither age nor gender influenced BW loss during the race. Conclusions BW loss during the marathon was inversely related to race finishing time in 643 marathon runners and was >3% in runners completing the race in less than 3 h. These data are not compatible with laboratory-derived data suggesting that BW loss greater than 2% during exercise impairs athletic performance. They match an extensive body of evidence showing that the most successful athletes in marathon and ultra-marathon running and triathlon events are frequently those who lose substantially more than 3–4% BW during competition.
Blood-based biomarkers of adverse perinatal outcomes in maternal obesity

Abstract Objective: Increasing maternal weight has been shown to predict adverse perinatal outcome, including increases in the relative risk of fetal death, stillbirth, neonatal death, perinatal death and infant death. In order to better understand the pathophysiological factors associated with obesity during pregnancy, the role of biomarkers associated with adverse outcomes in obese pregnant women is under investigation. The purpose of this review study was to examine potential biomarkers that could serve as effective screening strategies in obese pregnant women to reduce fetal and neonatal morbidity, as well as maternal morbidity. Methods: Electronic databases (Pubmed, Embase) were searched for previously published research studies that investigated biomarkers associated with perinatal outcomes in obese pregnant women and the putative mechanisms underlying biomarker effects on pregnancy outcomes. Results: It is evident that while several biomarkers predict perinatal complications in obese pregnant women, none fulfilled the criteria to be considered clinically useful. Conclusion: There is a critical need for reliable blood-based biomarkers associated with an increased risk of adverse perinatal outcomes in obese pregnant women.
Common Competencies for All Healthcare Managers: The Healthcare Leadership Alliance Model

Today's healthcare executives and leaders must have management talent sophisticated enough to match the increased complexity of the healthcare environment. Executives are expected to demonstrate measurable outcomes and effectiveness and to practice evidence-based management. At the same time, academic and professional programs are emphasizing the attainment of competencies related to workplace effectiveness. The shift to evidence-based management has led to numerous efforts to define the competencies most appropriate for healthcare. The Healthcare Leadership Alliance (HLA), a consortium of six major professional membership organizations, used the research from and experience with their individual credentialing processes to posit five competency domains common among all practicing healthcare managers: (1) communication and relationship management, (2) professionalism, (3) leadership, (4) knowledge of the healthcare system, and (5) business skills and knowledge. The HLA engaged in a formal process to delineate the knowledge, skills, and abilities within each domain and to determine which of these competencies were core or common among the membership of all HLA associations and which were specialty or specific to the members of one or more HLA organizations. This process produced 300 competency statements, which were then organized into the Competency Directory, a unique and interactive database that can be used for assessing individual and organizational competencies. Overall, this work helps to unify the field of healthcare management and provides a lexicon and a basis for collaboration among different types of healthcare executives. This article discusses the steps that the HLA followed. It also presents the HLA Competency Directory; its application and relevance to the practitioner and academic communities; and its strengths, limitations, and potential.
OrthologID: automation of genome-scale ortholog identification within a parsimony framework

MOTIVATION The determination of gene orthology is a prerequisite for mining and utilizing the rapidly increasing amount of sequence data for genome-scale phylogenetics and comparative genomic studies. Until now, most researchers use pairwise distance comparisons algorithms, such as BLAST, COG, RBH, RSD and INPARANOID, to determine gene orthology. In contrast, orthology determination within a character-based phylogenetic framework has not been utilized on a genomic scale owing to the lack of efficiency and automation. RESULTS We have developed OrthologID, a Web application that automates the labor-intensive procedures of gene orthology determination within a character-based phylogenetic framework, thus making character-based orthology determination on a genomic scale possible. In addition to generating gene family trees and determining orthologous gene sets for complete genomes, OrthologID can also identify diagnostic characters that define each orthologous gene set, as well as diagnostic characters that are responsible for classifying query sequences from other genomes into specific orthology groups. The OrthologID database currently includes several complete plant genomes, including Arabidopsis thaliana, Oryza sativa, Populus trichocarpa, as well as a unicellular outgroup, Chlamydomonas reinhardtii. To improve the general utility of OrthologID beyond plant species, we plan to expand our sequence database to include the fully sequenced genomes of prokaryotes and other non-plant eukaryotes. AVAILABILITY http://nypg.bio. nyu.edu/orthologid/
Psychological mediators of bupropion sustained-release treatment for smoking cessation.

AIM The study aimed to test simultaneously our understanding of the effects of bupropion sustained-release (SR) treatment on putative mediators and our understanding of determinants of post-quit abstinence, including withdrawal distress, cigarette craving, positive affect and subjective reactions to cigarettes smoked during a lapse. The specificity of bupropion SR effects was also tested in exploratory analyses. DESIGN Data from a randomized, placebo-controlled clinical trial of bupropion SR were submitted to mediation analyses. SETTING Center for Tobacco Research and Intervention, Madison, WI, USA. PARTICIPANTS A total of 403 adult, daily smokers without contraindications to bupropion SR use. INTERVENTION Participants were assigned randomly to receive a 9-week course of bupropion SR or placebo pill and to receive eight brief individual counseling sessions or no counseling. MEASUREMENTS Ecological momentary assessment ratings of smoking behavior and putative mediators were collected pre- and post-quit. FINDINGS Results of structural equation and hierarchical linear models did not support the hypothesis that bupropion SR treatment improves short-term abstinence by reducing withdrawal distress or affecting the subjective effects of a lapse cigarette, but provided partial support for mediation by cigarette craving reduction and enhanced positive affect. Bupropion SR effects on point-prevalence abstinence at 1 month post-quit were also mediated partially by enhanced motivation to quit and self-efficacy. CONCLUSIONS Results provided some support for models of bupropion SR treatment and relapse and suggested that motivational processes may partially account for bupropion SR efficacy.
Muscle Fatigability During a Sustained Index Finger Abduction and Depression Scores Are Associated With Perceived Fatigue in Patients With Relapsing-Remitting Multiple Sclerosis

Introduction. Fatigue is a common and debilitating symptom in patients with multiple sclerosis (MS). Self-reported levels of perceived fatigue are associated with both patient characteristics and clinical measures. Pilot analysis indicated that muscle fatigability combined with depression scores was highly associated with perceived fatigue in patients with MS. Studies that combine physiological and psychological constructs to explain MS-related fatigue are scarce. Therefore, the present study aimed to evaluate the robustness of the association between perceived fatigue, muscle fatigability, and depression scores in MS. Methods. Eighty-six patients with relapsing-remitting MS completed 2 fatigue questionnaires (Fatigue Severity Scale [FSS] and Modified Fatigue Impact Scale [MFIS]) and a depression questionnaire (Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale [HADS]). Maximal index finger abduction force (maximum voluntary contraction [MVC]) was measured, as well as muscle fatigability during a 2-minutes sustained maximal contraction. Multivariable regression analyses were used to analyze the association between perceived fatigue, and muscle fatigability and depression scores. Results. Perceived fatigue was associated with depression, muscle fatigability, and, depending on the questionnaire, to sex or to MVC. The model explained 40% and 48% of the variation in perception of fatigue as indexed with FSS questionnaire (rpartial: HADS 0.45, muscle fatigability 0.45, MVC −0.14, sex 0.32), and MFIS physical questionnaire (rpartial: HADS 0.59, muscle fatigability 0.49, MVC −0.38), respectively. Conclusions. The found association accentuates the importance of including both physiological fatigability-related and psychological mood–related constructs in models to explain perceived fatigue in patients with MS. The model also directs future research toward applying effortful conditions and emphasizes the importance of assessing different constructs when evaluating rehabilitation strategies to reduce MS-related fatigue.
Validation of self-reported hearing loss. The Blue Mountains Hearing Study.

PURPOSE Large-scale epidemiological studies have often used self-report to estimate prevalence of age-related hearing loss. However, few large population-based studies have validated self-report against measured hearing loss. Our study aimed to assess the performance of a single question and a brief hearing handicap questionnaire in identifying individuals with hearing loss, against the gold standard of pure-tone audiometry. METHODS We examined 2015 residents, aged 55-99 years, living in the west of Sydney, Australia, who participated in the Blue Mountains Hearing Study during 1997-1999. Audiologists administered a comprehensive questionnaire, including the question: 'Do you feel you have a hearing loss? ' The Shortened Hearing Handicap Inventory for Elderly (HHIE-S) was also administered during the hearing examination, which included pure-tone audiometry. The single question and HHIE-S were compared with measured losses at levels >25, >40 and >60 decibels hearing level (dBHL) to indicate mild, moderate and marked hearing impairment, for pure-tone averages (PTA) of responses to 500, 1000, 2000 and 4000 Hz. RESULTS The single question yielded reasonable sensitivity and specificity for hearing impairment, and was minimally affected by age and gender. HHIE-S scores >8 had lower sensitivity but higher specificity and positive predictive value. The HHIE-S performed slightly better in younger than older subjects and performed better for moderate hearing impairment. CONCLUSIONS In this older population with a high prevalence of hearing loss (39.4%), both a question about hearing and the HHIE-S appeared sufficiently sensitive and specific to provide reasonable estimates of hearing loss prevalence. Both could be recommended for use in epidemiological studies that aim to assess the magnitude of the burden caused by age-related sensory impairment but cannot measure hearing loss by audiometry.
Descriptor discretized Lyapunov functional method: analysis and design

Abstract Stability and state-feedback stabilization of linear systems with constant delays are considered. The system under consideration may be unstable without delay, but it becomes asymptotically stable for positive values of the delay. A new descriptor discretized Lyapunov Krasovskii Functional (LKF) method is introduced, which combines the application of the complete LKF and the discretization method of K. Gu with the descriptor model transformation. For the first time the new method allows to apply the discretized LKF method to synthesis problems. Moreover, the analysis of systems with polytopic time-invariant uncertainties is less restrictive by the new discretized method. Sufficient conditions for stability and stabilization are derived in terms of Linear Matrix Inequalities (LMIs). Numerical examples illustrate the efficiency of the new method.
Effect of Meal Eating Compared to Nibbling upon Atherosclerosis in Chickens

Both the production and regression of experimental atherosclerosis, as influenced by eating habits, were studied in the chicken. Birds were either allowed free access to food 24 hours/day (“nibblers”) or only for two one-hour periods per day (“meal eaters”). In the induction experiments, it was found that the meal eaters exhibited double the serum cholesterol levels and seven times the severity of coronary atherosclerosis as the nibblers. In studies designed to explore the effects of these eating habits on the regression of established atherosclerosis, lesions were induced in the usual way by feeding an atherogenic diet under the conditions of meal eating. Then the birds were put on regular mash and divided into two groups: meal eaters and nibblers. Meal eating a regular mash diet was associated with (a) slower rate of fall of serum cholesterol levels to normal, and (b) a marked decrease in the rate of healing of the coronary lesions as compared to nibbling. It is concluded that the manner of ingestion of the diet plays a significant role in accentuating the production and in inhibiting the regression of experimental atherosclerosis.
Stepwise Enhancement and Higher-Order Programming in Prolog

This paper presents two views of stepwise enhancement, one a pragmatic syntax-based approach and the other a semantic approach based on higher-order functions and relating to shape and polytypism. The approaches are outlined, and the perhaps surprisingly close relationship between the two described. By combining the advantages of both approaches, it is shown how more code in both functional and logic programming languages can be constructed in a systematic way. We describe a prototype system that allows higher-order predicate definitions to be produced automatically from type definitions or Horn clause skeletons and relate some experiences in using higherorder programming in Prolog.
Climatic variability and the population dynamics of historical hunter–gatherers: The case of Sami of Northern Finland

Our current knowledge on climate‐mediated effects on human population dynamics is based on preindustrial agrarian societies where climate‐induced crop failures had a major impact on fertility and mortality rates. However, because most of the human evolutionary history has been shaped by hunter–gatherer lifestyle relying on diverse plant and animal food sources, it is also important to understand how climate affected the population dynamics of hunter–gatherers. We thus studied whether climate, measured as a reconstructed annual mean temperature, had concurrent or delayed effects on the key components of population dynamics, annual births and deaths, in three historical (1722–1850) Sami populations of Northern Finland that depended mainly on fishing, hunting, and reindeer herding for their livelihood. We found only weak concurrent effects of mean temperature on annual births and deaths, although in general warm years correlated with increased birth and reduced mortality rates. Likewise, temperature‐mediated delayed effects were mainly absent: in one population only, a warm previous year tended to reduce the number of births. By contrast, annual numbers of births and deaths were more closely associated, as indicated by negative correlations between births and deaths up to three previous years. To summarize, in contrast to historical agrarian societies, the population dynamics of historical Sami seemed to be only weakly associated with annual mean temperature, which may indicate that these populations, probably due to their dietary breadth, were rather unaffected by climatic variation. Am. J. Hum. Biol., 2007. © 2007 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
An almost-surely terminating polynomial protocol for asynchronous byzantine agreement with optimal resilience

Consider an asynchronous system with private channels and n processes, up to t of which may be faulty. We settle a longstanding open question by providing a Byzantine agreement protocol that simultaneously achieves three properties: (optimal) resilience: it works as long as n>3t;(almost-sure) termination: with probability one, all nonfaulty processes terminate;(polynomial) efficiency: the expected computation time, memory consumption, message size, and number of messages sent are all polynomial in n. Earlier protocols have achieved only two of these three properties. In particular, the protocol of Bracha is not polynomially efficient, the protocol of Feldman and Micali is not optimally resilient, and the protocol of Canetti and Rabin does not have almost-sure termination. Our protocol utilizes a new primitive called shunning (asynchronous) verifiable secret sharing (SVSS), which ensures, roughly speaking, that either a secret is successfully shared or a new faulty process is ignored from this point onwards by some nonfaulty process.