Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Whiplash and Other Useful Illnesses

Andrew Malleson observes that “victimhood can bring much gratification. ” As he indicates, the high social status currently accorded to the victim is an important factor in the rise of “dissimulating disorders,” in which patients present chronic physical symptoms for which no organic cause can be found. ​found. Figure 1 Andrew Malleson McGill-Queen's University Press, £26.95, pp 544 ISBN 0 7735 2333 2 www.mqup. ca Rating: ★★★★ American psychiatry recognises three categories of these disorders: malingering, factitious disorders, and somatoform disorders. Malingering is where symptoms are intentionally produced with the aim of securing tangible benefits. The problem is the difficulty of distinguishing malingering from factitious disorders, in which symptoms are intentionally produced but where there is no apparent external incentive and the motivation seems to be unconscious. These conditions are in turn difficult to distinguish from somatoform disorders, in which both symptoms and motivation appear to arise from unconscious processes. As Malleson observes, perhaps the essential difference depends upon the effectiveness with which the victim can “deceive himself and therefore others. ” Malleson, a Canadian psychiatrist, discusses the “dissimulating disorders”—by any criterion one of the most important issues in contemporary medical practice—by focusing on the epidemic of whiplash neck injuries following minor car crashes. Through a comprehensive survey of the literature he exposes how doctors, alternative practitioners, scientists, lawyers, and patients have colluded in promoting a disorder that now afflicts millions and costs billions. While patients who sustain serious neck injuries have a good prognosis, minor collisions producing no demonstrable tissue damage now result in lifelong disability in around 10% of cases. Malleson regards whiplash as a modern combination of the 19th century conditions of “railway spine” and hysteria. He locates it as one of a family of fashionable conditions, including fibromyalgia, repetitive strain injury, chronic fatigue syndrome, occupational back pain, chronic pain syndrome, and post-traumatic stress disorder, which the medical profession has offered patients who are, either consciously or unconsciously, seeking an escape from the pressures of modern life into the roles of sickness and victimhood. As he shows in this elegantly written and profound book, these conditions risk degrading medicine and bankrupting health services; they elevate junk science and corrupt the law; worst of all, they condemn patients to disorders from which there is little hope of recovery. In one of his many aphorisms, Malleson captures the real menace of whiplash: “In perceiving a small auto collision as a cause of a persistent and disabling psychiatric disorder we diminish the calibre of our souls. We dissipate our human heritage of courage. ”
Brucellar and Tuberculous Spondylitis in 87 Adult Patients: A Descriptive and Comparative Case Series

Our aim was to compare the clinical and evaluative features of a series of cases with spondylitis of the 2 most frequent etiologies, brucellosis and tuberculosis, in Turkey. Of the 87 patients with spondylitis, 44 had brucellosis and 43 had tuberculosis. Patients with tuberculosis were more likely to have a history of pulmonary disease, longer time to diagnosis, and higher erythrocyte sedimentation rates and C-reactive protein levels. Fever, night sweating, and arthralgia were more frequent complaints in brucellosis, whereas weakness and neurological involvement were in tuberculous spondylitis. Vertebral destruction and compression, kyphosis, paraspinal masses, and cord compression were more frequent in tuberculosis. Sacroiliitis and discitis were significantly associated with brucellosis. Need for surgical treatment, unfavorable outcome, and death were more common in tuberculosis. In countries with high prevalence of both diseases, documented history, clinical presentation, laboratory and histological examination, and radiographic imaging can be highly suggestive and sufficient for empirical treatment.
The importance of balanced scorecards in hospitals

Purpose – The purpose of this study is to examine the importance of balanced scorecard (BSC) in Swedish emergency hospitals, that is, to describe its prevalence and its use in these hospitals. Methodology/approach – The study is based on a questionnaire administered to financial managers in all of Sweden's emergency hospitals. The questionnaire investigates the prevalence of the BSC, the reasons for its implementation, and how BSC is used. Findings – The study shows that 65% of Swedish emergency hospitals use the BSC. The use of the BSC was motivated by a need to make strategy clear and to obtain a more comprehensive view of organizational performance. BSC is used mainly for measurements connected to the organizations' strategy and to create goal congruence. Performance monitoring is only of secondary importance, even though emergency hospitals with more than five years' experience with the BSC tend to use it for that purpose. The BSC is almost never used in the hospitals' reward systems. Research implications – The findings suggest that BSC in hospitals is mainly important for implementing strategy and stimulating strategy discussions that create goal congruence. Performance monitoring is only of secondary importance, but becomes increasingly important for seasoned BSC users. Originality/value of paper – Few studies have surveyed the importance of BSC in healthcare organizations. By pointing out the importance of BSC in Swedish healthcare, this paper calls for similar studies in other healthcare contexts.
A qualitative exploration of orientation: perceptions of novice nurses

Orientation to novice nurses' first work experience marks the beginning of a very important part of their transition experience from student to practicing nurse. This naturalistic inquiry explores the experiences of seven novice nurses who have recently completed an orientation program for their first work experience. Participants in this study were employed in five different hospitals in St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada. The novice nurses graduated with a Bachelor of Nursing (BN) degree in 2010 or 2011. A voice-centered relational method was used for data analysis. Most of the novice nurses felt prepared to assume the role of the nurse following the completion of the orientation program. Previous experiences during nursing school played an important role in how prepared novice nurses felt to begin their first work experience. Support from multiple mentors and co-workers were instrumental to the novice nurse transition experience. The findings of this research have implications for nursing practice, education and administration. Partnerships between schools of nursing and health care institutions with regards to the curriculum and selection of clinical placements for novice nurses can address many of the issues identified.
How changes in subjective general health predict future time perspective, and development and generativity motives over the lifespan

In this study, we used the lifespan theories of selection optimization and compensation (SOC) and the socio-emotional selectivity theory (SST) to integrate the disengagement and activity perspectives on aging and to explain intra-individual changes in work motivation. A two-wave longitudinal survey study was conducted among 600 Dutch university employees to test relations between intra-individual changes in subjective general health, future time perspective (FTP), and generativity and development motives. In line with the two lifespan theories, two processes were found. First, consistent with the disengagement perspective on aging, losses in subjective general health negatively predicted open-ended FTP, and open-ended FTP was positively associated with an increase in growth motives. Secondly, consistent with the activity perspective on aging, losses in subjective general health positively predicted limited FTP, and limited FTP was positively associated with an increase in generativity motives. In addition, initial open-ended FTP predicted future open-ended FTP through a change in subjective general health. Finally, these relations were found to differ across age groups, and thus over the lifespan. More specifically, losses in subjective general health and increases in limited FTP particularly result in lower development motives and higher generativity motives among middle-aged workers, indicating that interventions aimed at preventing losses in health are probably most effective for maintaining development motives in this group.
EFFECT OF MUSIC ON SEDATION DURING LOCAL UROLOGICAL

The aim of this study was to evaluate the sedative effects of music on bispectral index values, propofol consumption and patient satisfaction during local urological surgeries. The study protocol was approved by the medical ethical committee of our hospital and a written consent was obtained from each patient. Sixty male patients undergoing local urological procedures under sedation were randomly assigned into two groups: In group I (n=30), sedation was given to patients while they were wearing earphones without any music and in group II (n=30), sedation was given to patients while they were listening to music via earphones. 0.4 mg/kg propofol was given to all patients at the beginning of the operation and 1 mg kg -1 h -1 propofol infusion was started. Patient controlled analgesia device was adjusted to infuse 0.3 mg kg-1 propofol according the patients’ demands. Visual analog patient satisfaction scale was used to evaluate patient satisfaction. The total propofol consumption and demand of the patients were noted using the records of the PCA device. The propofol consumption of the patients in group II were lower when compared with group I and patient satisfaction was better in Group II (p values < 0.05). Listening to music during local urological procedures was effective in reducing patients’ anxiety, pain and sedative drug dose. Accordingly, this simple and cost-effective method can be used to support patients’ sedation during local procedures. (Anatol J Clin Investig 2009:3(2);131-
Sparse Tensor Core: Algorithm and Hardware Co-Design for Vector-wise Sparse Neural Networks on Modern GPUs

Deep neural networks have become the compelling solution for the applications such as image classification, object detection, speech recognition, and machine translation. However, the great success comes at the cost of excessive computation due to the over-provisioned parameter space. To improve the computation efficiency of neural networks, many pruning techniques have been proposed to reduce the amount of multiply-accumulate (MAC) operations, which results in high sparsity in the networks. Unfortunately, the sparse neural networks often run slower than their dense counterparts on modern GPUs due to their poor device utilization rate. In particular, as the sophisticated hardware primitives (e.g., Tensor Core) have been deployed to boost the performance of dense matrix multiplication by an order of magnitude, the performance of sparse neural networks lags behind significantly. In this work, we propose an algorithm and hardware co-design methodology to accelerate the sparse neural networks. A novel pruning algorithm is devised to improve the workload balance and reduce the decoding overhead of the sparse neural networks. Meanwhile, new instructions and micro-architecture optimization are proposed in Tensor Core to adapt to the structurally sparse neural networks. Our experimental results show that the pruning algorithm can achieve 63% performance gain with model accuracy sustained. Furthermore, the hardware optimization gives an additional 58% performance gain with negligible area overhead.
Novel molecular imaging approaches in the management of head and neck cancer

rationale. Various lymphoscintigraphic imaging protocols exist for sentinel node (SN) identification in early stage oral cancer. This study aimed to evaluate the clinical value of performing additional late lymphoscintigraphic imaging. methods. We retrospectively analysed early (directly following injection of 99mTc-Nanocoll) and late (2 – 4 h after injection) imaging results of 60 early stage (T1-T2, cN0) oral cancer patients scheduled for SN procedure. Lymphoscintigraphic results of late imaging were categorized in: (a) no visualization of additional hotspots considered to be SNs; (b) additional hotspots visualized that are considered to be SNs and (c) hotspots visualized only during late imaging. Histopathological results of the harvested SNs were related to the corresponding hotspot. results. In all patients (n=60) lymphoscintigraphy was able to visualize a hotspot that was identified as a SN. In 51/60 (85%) patients, early imaging was able to visualize at least one hotspot, whereas in 9/60 (15%) patients, mostly with oral cavity tumours other than mobile tongue and floor of mouth tumours, only late imaging was able to visualize hotspots. In 14/51 (27%) patients, late imaging resulted in additionally visualized hotspots marked as SNs, resulting in a more extensive surgical procedure. These additionally removed SNs appeared to be of no clinical relevance, as all SNs identified during early imaging correctly predicted whether the neck was positive or negative for cancer. Conclusion. Results of this study indicate that additional late lymphoscintigraphic imaging should be performed only in selected cases. Thesis Heuveling_DEFINITIEF. indd 28 20-1-2014 9:10:01
Errors, Biases and Overconfidence in Artificial Emotional Modeling

With the diffusion and successful new implementation of several machine learning techniques, together with the substantial cost decrease of sensors, also included in mobile devices, the field of emotional analysis and modeling has boosted. Apps, web apps, brain-scanning devices, and Artificial Intelligence assistants often include emotion recognition features or emotional behaviors, but new researches contain, maintain, or create several design errors, which analysis is the main aim of this paper.
Manifestaciones clínicas de la hipercolesterolemia familiar en una población mediterránea

BACKGROUND: Familial hypercholesterolemia is defined by a genetically elevated concentration of plasma cholesterol. This is a descriptive and retrospective study to evaluate the prevalence of clinical manifestations of FH clinically diagnosed in our setting. PATIENTS AND METHODS: 114 non-related patients, from lipid clinics, entered into the study. Analytical criteria were total cholesterol over 7.8 mmol/l (300 mg/dl), triglycerides under 2.8 mmol/l (250 mg/dl), and at least one first-degree relative bearing the same lipid profile. Clinical history, antropometric measurements, lipid deposits and profile, treatment and its effects on lipid levels were recorded. Lipoprotein (a) concentration, apolipoprotein E (apo E) genotype and the presence of apo B-3500 mutations were analysed. RESULTS: Mean total cholesterol was 9.05 (1.58) mmol/l, LDL-cholesterol 7.09 (1.64) mmol/l, HDL-cholesterol 1.33 (0.45) mmol/l and triglyceride 1.38 (0.59) mmol/l. Xanthomas were found in 11.4% of the participants, 12.2% showed xanthelasmas and corneal arch was present in 27.1% of them. The 16.8% of the patients were suffering from ischaemic cardiopathy. Patients with corneal arch had higher concentrations of total and LDL-cholesterol (7.6 [1.9] vs 6.8 [1.5] mmol/l [p = 0.04]). A 57.9% of the patients with ischaemic heart disease had at least one first degree relative with the same complaint (p < 0.05). The apo B-3500 mutation was not found in this population. The apo E3/E4 genotype was present in 16.1% of the patients and total and LDL cholesterol concentrations were higher in them than in patients with the apo E3/E3 genotype (p < 0.05). In the multivariate analysis, the most important risk factors associated with ischaemic cardiopathy were the smoking habit (odds ratio [OR] = 20.59; CI: 3.3-111.2), corneal arch (OR = 7.27; 95% CI: 1.08-27.1). HDL-cholesterol concentrations were negatively associated with the existence of ischaemic heart disease (OR = 0.21; 95% CI: 0.03-1.15). CONCLUSIONS: The presence of ischaemic heart disease and lipids deposits in clinically diagnosed patients of familial hypercholesterolemia in our country is lower than description from others non Mediterranean, being the corneal arch the most prevalent sign. The smoking habit, corneal arch and the presence of familial antecessors with ischaemic heart disease were associated with ischaemic myocardiopathy in our patients.
Prioritization Strategy for Government's Website Information Quality: Case Study: Indonesia National Public Procurement Agency

National Public Procurement Agency (NPPA) is one of Indonesian Government Agency which uses website as their service to citizen to share information related with regulation, organizations profile, and function. Information quality (IQ) in government website has becomes one of key determinant to user satisfaction. Therefore in this study, we aim to investigate which IQ characteristics that users find important, affect user's satisfaction, and should be prioritized to optimized user's satisfaction. In this study, we use Importance Performance Analysis (IPA) quadrant to find prioritized IQ characteristics then we do theory analysis to find it's relation to user overall satisfaction. The result shows that most important IQ characteristics are believability, reliability, and validity of information. This study also finds that comprehensiveness, currency, flexibility, and value added in information should be prioritized to be improved. Furthermore, believability of information, reliability of information, information accuracy, validity of information, robustness of information, amount of uptime information, credible source of information, perceived value of information, type of language used is interpretable, essentialness of information, efficiency of information, information has added value which significantly and positively contribute to user overall satisfaction. This paper raises idea to do further research in IQ characteristics for e-government.
Association of Oncogenic Viruses in Liver Cirrhosis: North India. -

Background/Aim: Chronic infections with hepatitis B virus (HBV) and hepatitis C virus (HCV) are well-recognized risk factors for cirrhosis and liver cancer. Approximately 7% of the world’s population is infected with HBV and 3% with HCV. In India it has been reported high prevalence of HBV of 55% and HCV of 25.8% in patients with CLD. The estimates of their contributions to worldwide disease burden have been lacking basically in India. Thus it has great importance to analyze the association of hepatitis viruses (Mainly HBV & HCV) in liver cancer. Methods: A total of 250 patients of liver cirrhosis were enrolled in our study. These patients were analyzed for hepatitis viruses (B & C) with the help of rapid kit. For the conformation of cancer they must go for the liver function test including α-feto protein as well as by histopathological study for the presence of hepatocellular carcinoma. Results: Hepatitis B and Hepatitis C have been detected in 212 (84.8%) and 38 (15.2%) respectively 250 liver cirrhosis patients. There is no any viruses are found in association of liver cancer. Liver cancer is more common among men than women regardless of race or ethnicity. Conclusions: The study shows that there are HBV infection is more than the HCV infections account for the majority of cirrhosis and primary liver cancer in India, which needs national programs to prevent new infections and provide medical management and treatment for those already infected.
Blended Agents: Manipulation of Physical Objects within Mixed Reality Environments and Beyond

Mixed reality (MR) environments allow real users and virtual agents to coexist within the same virtually augmented physical space. While tracking of different body parts such as the user’s head and hands allows virtual objects to show plausible reactions to actions of the real user, virtual agents only have a very limited influence on their physical environment. In this paper, we introduce the concept of blended agents, which are capable of manipulations of physical properties related to the object’s location and surface material. We present two prototypic implementations of virtual-physical interactions using robotic actuators and thermochromic ink. As both interactions show considerably different characteristics, e.g., with regard to their persistence, explicability, and observability, we performed a user study to investigate their effects on subjective measures such as the agent’s perceived social and spatial presence. In the context of a golf scenario, participants were interacting with a blended agent that was capable of virtual-physical manipulations such as hitting a golf ball and writing on physical paper. A statistical analysis of quantitative data did not yield any significant differences between blended agents and VAs without physical capabilities. However, qualitative feedback of the participants indicates that persistent manipulations improve both the perceived realism of the agent and the overall user experience.
Serum antichlamydial antibodies and tubal factor infertility

Objective : A hospital based prospective study was conducted at the Minimal Access Gynaecology Surgery (MAGS) unit at Omdurman Maternity Hospital from October 2008 December 2009 to look into serum antichlamydial antibodies and correlate the results to tubal pathology. Method : Sera of 175 subfertile women who all underwent a laparoscopy with tubal testing to assess the grade of tubal pathology, were tested for the presence of immunoglobulin Iggy& IgM antibodies for Chlamydia trachomatis using ELISA as well as C-reactive protein (CRP). Results : IgG, IgM and CRP, all serological markers of persistent infection were significantly more relevant in women with tubal pathology as compared to those without tubal pathology. The predictive value of the currently used screening test for tubal pathology I (g) G could be significantly improved by adding CRP test. Conclusion : Chlamydia trachomatis infection must be recognized as an important risk factor for infertility in Sudanese women. Further studies are needed to obtain more epidemiologic data about the spread of Chlamydia trachomatis among adolescent and young Sudanese women and to guide effective prevention and intervention measures including screening for Chlamydia trachomatis with specific methods and early treatment can avoid the severe squeals of this disease. *Corresponding author: Department of Obstetrics&Gynaecology, Alzaiem Alazhari University, Khartoum. Sudan.Email:wisnab3@yahoo.com.
A Virtual Reality Based Gas Assessment Application for Training Gas Engineers

Once a gas leak is reported, the rescue operation usually requires safe and precise identification of a leak source and stopping it. However, it is risky to train new gas engineers in a real gas leak situation. This paper aims to address this challenge by proposing a virtual reality (VR) based Gas Assessments and Training (GAT) Application (App) that helps gas engineers gain practical experience on correct gas safety procedures. The GAT App will also train gas engineers to make timely decisions and practice relevant safety measures when dealing with an actual gas leak. Sixteen gas engineers evaluated the GAT App. All the participants carried out several tasks with the GAT App and completed System Usability Scale (SUS) questionnaires afterwards. The data revealed an average SUS score of 84.06, which indicates that the gas engineers enjoyed using the GAT App and will recommend it to their colleagues. However, there is a need for more user testing for result generalisation.