Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Determinants of social functioning in bipolar disorder.

BACKGROUND Evidence indicates that social outcomes in bipolar disorders (BP) are poorer than previously assumed. This study explores determinants of the quality and quantity of social activity. METHODS Seventy-seven subjects with BP completed self-report and observer-rated questionnaires assessing demographic and clinical factors, personality and social functioning. RESULTS Quality of functioning and spectrum of activity were found to be independent. The best determinants of the quality of functioning, accounting for 33% of the variance, were premorbid neuroticism and the current level of depressive symptoms. Only 30% of subjects were active in all social domains, and the quantity of social activity was largely explained by social circumstances, namely, living with someone else and later age of illness onset. CONCLUSIONS The implications of these findings are discussed in this paper. We suggest that future studies need to differentiate between factors associated with the quality of functioning as compared with the quantity of social activity.
Transnational Influences in the Transition from Communism

A British political scientist examines a variety of transnational influences on the transition from Communism in Europe. Attention is devoted to Western influences on Eastern Europe, the impact of the West on Soviet decision-makers, the influence of East European countries on each other, and the significance of transformative change in the Soviet Union for the East European transitions. The author explores the relative impact of each factor on different aspects of the transitions.
Differential Selection of Single-Step AmpC or Efflux Mutants of Pseudomonas aeruginosa by Using Cefepime, Ceftazidime, or Ceftobiprole

ABSTRACT Single-step Pseudomonas aeruginosa mutants, selected with ceftobiprole, ceftazidime, or cefepime, were generated at frequencies of 10−6 to <10−9 at two and four times the MIC. The chromosomal AmpC β-lactamase activity was increased in all ceftazidime-selected mutants. Mutants selected with cefepime either increased AmpC activity or upregulated expression of the mexXY efflux genes. Mutants selected with ceftobiprole did not overexpress AmpC; 90% of these produced elevated levels of mexXY RNA, indicating that increased efflux, not AmpC derepression, is the predominant response to ceftobiprole during first-step mutations in P. aeruginosa.
Gallstone fragmentation during biliary lithotripsy: effect of stone composition and structure.

In vitro lithotripsy with the Siemens Lithostar was conducted on 36 radiolucent or minimally calcified gallstones housed in an anthropomorphic phantom. The ease and pattern of fragmentation were correlated with global composition for the entire stone, regional or microcomposition (determined by Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy), and microstructure (determined by scanning electron microscopy). Stones made up of more than 62% cholesterol required 50% more shock waves to pulverize all fragments to 0.3 cm or less than did stones of less than 62% cholesterol (p less than .01). An inverse relationship was found between the number of shock waves needed for fragmentation and the cholesterol content (r = .77). Although a broad range of fragmentation responses occurred, little variation was seen in the ease of fragmentation within stone families. The majority of stones fractured along radially oriented cholesterol plates, but one third of stones treated showed initial chipping or flaking at the periphery before radial fracture. This type of peripheral erosion most often occurred in stones with peripheral pigment rims. These stones required more shock waves and lagged in pulverization compared with more homogeneous cholesterol stones. The efficiency of fragmentation during biliary lithotripsy correlates with the stones' global cholesterol content. A stone's architecture, as reflected by its regional composition and microstructure, partially predicts the mechanism of fragmentation. These in vitro data may be useful in further refining criteria for selecting patients and understanding the fragmentation process.
Epistemological controversies in the analytic field elucidated by the theological realm

This article proposes to address certain epistemological controversies in psychoanalysis by elucidating them through the religious field. The theological field serves the author as the repressed, which indicates the latent stakes that continue to do work at the heart of these debates. The goal is to show how debates that take place on the epistemological level bring into confrontation different anthropological concepts and discursive traditions that have their roots in religious discourses. The principal hypothesis of the author is that the dissident theories of psychoanalysis can be understood as a return to a pre‐monotheistic theological conception or to an idolatrous practice that aims, primarily, to undo castration. This hypothesis will be used to elucidate the debates with two authors: Adler and Rank. The author shows how these theorists, by leaving analytical ground, connect their theories to pre‐monotheistic conceptions and highlight conceptual tools that are characteristic to them.
Role of G protein signaling in the formation of the fibrin(ogen)–integrin αIIbβ3–actin cytoskeleton complex in platelets

Abstract Effective platelet function requires formation of a physical link between fibrin(ogen), integrin αIIbβ3, and cytoplasmic actin filaments. We investigated the role of the Gαq, Gαi, and Gα12/13 families of heterotrimeric GTP-binding proteins (G proteins) in the assembly of a ligand–αIIbβ3–actin cytoskeleton complex. Selective and combined activation of the G proteins was achieved by using combinations of various platelet agonists and inhibitors. Formation and stability of fibrinogen–αIIbβ3 interaction were evaluated by the extent of platelet aggregation and the rate of eptifibatide-induced platelet disaggregation; association of αIIbβ3 with the cytoskeleton was analyzed by western blot. Formation of the fibrin–αIIbβ3–actin cytoskeleton complex was evaluated by rotational thromboelastometry assay in which clot formation was induced by the mixture of reptilase and factor XIIIa. We demonstrated that involvement of heterotrimeric G proteins in the formation of the ligand–αIIbβ3–cytoskeleton complex depends on whether fibrinogen or fibrin serves as the integrin ligand. Formation of the fibrinogen–αIIbβ3–cytoskeleton complex requires combined activation of at least two G protein pathways while the maximal αIIbβ3–cytoskeleton association and the strongest αIIbβ3–fibrinogen binding supporting irreversible platelet aggregation require combined activation of all three—Gαq, Gαi, and Gα12/13—G protein families. In contrast, formation of the fibrin–αIIbβ3–cytoskeleton complex mediating clot retraction is critically dependent on the activation of the Gαi family, especially on the activation of Gαz.
Bone health and HIV in resource-limited settings: a scoping review

Purpose of reviewSub-Saharan Africa and other resource-limited settings (RLS) bear the greatest burden of the HIV epidemic globally. Advantageously, the expanding access to antiretroviral therapy (ART) has resulted in increased survival of HIV individuals in the last 2 decades. Data from resource rich settings provide evidence of increased risk of comorbid conditions such as osteoporosis and fragility fractures among HIV-infected populations. We provide the first review of published and presented data synthesizing the current state of knowledge on bone health and HIV in RLS. Recent findingsWith few exceptions, we found a high prevalence of low bone mineral density (BMD) and hypovitaminosis D among HIV-infected populations in both RLS and resource rich settings. Although most recognized risk factors for bone loss are similar across settings, in certain RLS there is a high prevalence of both non-HIV-specific risk factors and HIV-specific risk factors, including advanced HIV disease and widespread use of ART, including tenofovir disoproxil fumarate, a non-BMD sparing ART. Of great concern, we neither found published data on the effect of tenofovir disoproxil fumarate initiation on BMD, nor any data on incidence and prevalence of fractures among HIV-infected populations in RLS. SummaryTo date, the prevalence and squeal of metabolic bone diseases in RLS are poorly described. This review highlights important gaps in our knowledge about HIV-associated bone health comorbidities in RLS. This creates an urgent need for targeted research that can inform HIV care and management guidelines in RLS. Video abstract:http://links.lww. com/COHA/A9.
Diagnostic Profiles of Patients Differentially Failing Executive Functioning Measures

Objective: Limited research exists to explain differential executive functioning impairment in clinical populations, particularly between the Wisconsin Card Sorting Task (WCST) and the Trail Making Test (TMT). Methods: The distribution of clinical diagnoses was examined in patients failing none, one, or both tasks, and executive task performance was compared among dementia-related diagnoses. Two hundred and sixty-six participants received evaluations through an Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center, which included executive tasks. Dementia-related diagnoses were established through consensus. Results: Chi-square analyses indicated that TMT failure, with or without WCST failure, possessed higher associations with dementia diagnoses. Repeated measures analysis of variance similarly indicated that participants with dementia, especially mild and moderate severity, performed worse on TMT. Conclusions: Executive dysfunction was observed in dementia-related diagnoses, and TMT failure was implicated in dementia in higher proportions than WCST impairment. Trail Making Test appears more sensitive than WCST for assessing executive impairment across diagnoses, especially when time and resources are limited in screening and clinical settings.
Ethical Dilemmas: The Experiences of Israeli Nurses

In this study I explored ethical dilemmas in nursing to gain a better understanding of nurses’ work and their professional status. Qualitative data on ethical dilemmas were collected by interviewing 52 nurses in 18 hospitals and health maintenance organizations. The transcribed interviews were analyzed using a stepwise method. Results indicate a large number of dilemmas that can be divided into five main categories: caring vs. following formal codes; fair process vs. fair outcome; organizational standards vs. family agenda; autonomy vs. deference to higher authority, and guarding secrecy vs. duty to report. The study findings might enhance nurses’ ability to cope with ethical dilemmas and bring about change in their professional status. In addition, the results might guide nurses and their supervisors toward developing practitioner programs for nurses that deal with ethical aspects. All these might reduce the expected shortage of nurses and improve the ability of the system to provide quality health care.
A novel design technique for biorthogonal filterbank systems

In this correspondence, we present a design technique for the cosine-modulated FIR biorthogonal filter bank systems. The system achieves perfect reconstruction with a given analysis or synthesis prototype filter. In particular, if the analysis filter is a good approximation of an ideal lowpass filter, then so is the synthesis filter, and the difference is a measure of ideality of the lowpass analysis filter. The advantage of the technique is that we have more freedom in the choice of prototype filters.
The Effect of National Culture on Auditor-in-Charge Involvement

SUMMARY: Regulators and professional accounting bodies have identified auditor-in-charge involvement as one of the key indicators of audit quality. A potentially important, yet overlooked, issue is that auditor-in-charge involvement is affected by numerous contextual factors. In this study, we aim at advancing our understanding of what affects differences in auditor-in-charge involvement by focusing on the influence of national culture in general and power distance, (in-group) collectivism, and uncertainty avoidance in particular. Based on archival, proprietary data from a Big 4 audit firm comprising time-record data of 2,251 individual audit engagements in 50 countries, we find robust evidence supporting our expectations that differences in the extent of auditor-in-charge involvement are negatively associated with power distance and (in-group) collectivism, and positively with uncertainty avoidance. An implication of our findings is that, while the extent of auditor-in-charge involvement may serve as a .
Different elimination patterns of β‐trace protein, β2‐microglobulin and cystatin C in haemodialysis, haemodiafiltration and haemofiltration

Objective. Low molecular mass proteins (LMMP) are putative uraemic toxins, but their elimination is negligible in standard haemodialysis (HD). In this study, we used β2‐microglobulin, cystatin C and β‐trace protein, which differ in molecular mass and charge, to characterize the elimination patterns of three different dialysis modalities. Material and methods. Plasma samples were obtained at the start, 30 min after the start, at the end of the dialysis treatment and 30 min after termination of the dialysis session. Seventeen patients were treated with low‐flux HD, 13 with post‐dilution haemodiafiltration (HDF) and 8 with pre‐dilution haemofiltration (HF). The changes in concentrations of the three LMMPs were monitored and expressed as percentages of the concentrations at the start of treatments. Results. Conventional HD with low‐flux membranes showed a high elimination of small molecules (urea and creatinine), but did not reduce the levels of the three LMMPs studied. During HDF and HF, there was a significant decrease in the plasma levels of cystatin C (to 28 % and 44 %, respectively) (p<0.001) and of β2‐microglobulin (to 23 % and 33 %, respectively) (p<0.001). However, the level of β‐trace protein was significantly reduced (to 65 %) only after HDF. Conclusions. The three dialysis modalities showed significantly different elimination patterns for the LMMPs studied. Elimination of β‐trace protein was lower than those of cystatin C and β2‐microglobulin both in HDF and HF. β‐trace protein was only moderately eliminated by HDF and not at all by HF, and may be a useful marker in the evaluation of different convective therapies.
Towards a Nondualistic Approach to Multisystem Illness

There is an increasing interest in understanding the etiology and treatment of patients who present with multiple chronic symptoms. The thesis of this comment is that the understanding of these problems and progress on effective treatment will be greatly enhanced by emerging new models that go beyond dualistic distinctions like those between organic versus functional disorders and psychological versus physiological causation. The outline of this new model includes a focus on common neurobiological and behavioral mechanisms that operate across disorders including altered pain modulation, affect regulation, and illness coping. Exciting new areas of research include functional and structural brain imaging studies and more recent studies linking imaging with genetic markers, behavior, and autonomic responses. These new studies, carried out across illness populations, hold great promise to tie together the data on psychosocial, genetic, and biological mechanisms of these complicated clinical problems.
Intergenerational money and time transfers by gender in Spain: Who are the actual dependents?

Background: The analysis of intergenerational transfers can shed light on the interaction between population age structure and welfare. Nevertheless, a thorough examination of this issue requires consideration of both monetary (market) and time (non-market) transfers. Objective: We analyse market and non-market production, consumption, and transfers by age and gender for Spain from 2009−2010 using National (Time) Transfer Accounts (NTA and NTTA) methodology. Methods: Using National Accounts, microdata from different surveys, and the Time Use Survey, we estimate age and sex-specific profiles of monetary and time production and consumption for Spain. Consequently, a surplus or deficit and the resulting transfers are obtained. Results: We observe higher labour income for men with respect to women throughout the age profile. Nevertheless, women spend more hours in total (market and non-market activities) than men. This division drives an asymmetry in private transfers. While men are net donors of money to other age groups during their working life, women are net donors of time to other household members (mainly children and their partners) over their lives. Conclusions: The inclusion of the non-market economy in the analysis of intergenerational transfers is crucial to observe real inequalities between genders throughout the life cycle. This challenges the ‘economic dependency’ of women based on a market economy. The results suggest that the public sector in Spain should reinforce policies that take into account women’s contribution to the welfare of other population groups, and call for policies that reconcile professional and family obligations.
Internal Partial Discharge and Material Degradation

Partial discharge (PD) pulses are considered to be generated after application of overvoltage across a cavity. Their magnitude is proportional to the n-th power of overvoltage. It decreases with an increase in cavity space and moisture content. Very long time lags for PD inception, such as even a day, was confirmed. This phenomenon is associated with PD's statistical time lag in the number of free electrons in the gas (O2, N2). Oxygen and nitrogen exhibit their distinctive features. Nitrogen and moisture generate swarming micro PD pulses, while oxygen causes large PD pulses. Nitrogen PD tends to produce local degradation, i.e., pits, while oxygen PD contributed to uniform erosion. Oxygen is presumed to be almost all consumed in a closed cavity by PD at its early stage, leaving nitrogen, moisture and other gases behind to facilitate swarming micro PD to take place. Pits are followed by treeing. A new measure, i.e., the skewness of the profile of a PD pulse train can be used to check whether insulation is treed or not. A new CIGRE electrode is highly recommended to assess the resistance of insulating materials against internal PD.
Protection of Endogenous Vitamin E and Beta-Carotene by Aminoguanidine upon Oxidation of Human Low-Density Lipoproteins by ·OH/O2·−

Abstract Lisfi, D. , Bonnefont-Rousselot, D. , Fernet, M. , Jore, D. , Delattre, J. and Gardès-Albert, M. Protection of Endogenous Vitamin E and Beta-Carotene by Aminoguanidine upon Oxidation of Human Low-Density Lipoproteins by ·OH/O2·−. This study was designed to evaluate the antioxidant effect of aminoguanidine toward human low-density lipoproteins (LDLs) initiated by oxygenated free radicals (·OH/O2·−) generated by gamma radiolysis. Initial radiolytic yields related to the markers of lipid peroxidation [i.e. decrease in endogenous α-tocopherol and β-carotene, formation of thiobarbituric acid-reactive substances (TBARS) and conjugated dienes] were determined in 3 g liter−1 LDLs (expressed as total LDL concentration) in the absence and presence of 10 different concentrations of aminoguanidine (from 0.04 to 5 mmol liter−1). Fluorescence and relative electrophoretic mobility of oxidized LDLs were also studied as markers that indirectly reflect the attack of the protein moiety of LDLs (namely apolipoprotein B). Our data clearly showed the inhibitory effect of aminoguanidine on lipid peroxidation induced in LDLs by ·OH/O2·− in a concentration-dependent manner. This effect probably resulted from a scavenging activity of aminoguanidine toward ·OH. In contrast, aminoguanidine did not appear to react significantly with O2·−, which resulted in a poor residual lipid peroxidation. Our data led us to determine an optimum [aminoguanidine]/[LDL] ratio ranging from 250 to 500 to obtain the best in vitro protection of LDLs under our experimental conditions. It is also of great interest that aminoguanidine was able to protect endogenous α-tocopherol and β-carotene of LDLs upon ·OH/O2·−-induced oxidation.
The Clinical Decision Support Consortium

Clinical decision support (CDS) can impact the outcomes of care when used at the point of care in electronic medical records (EMR). CDS has been shown to increase quality and patient safety, improve adherence to guidelines for prevention and treatment, and avoid medication errors. Systematic reviews have shown that CDS can be useful across a variety of clinical purposes and topics. Despite broad national policy objectives to increase EMR adoption in the US, current adoption of advanced clinical decision support is limited due to a variety of reasons, including: limited implementation of EMR, CPOE, PHR, etc., difficulty developing clinical practice guidelines ready for implementation in EMR, lack of standards, absence of a central repository or knowledge resource, poor support for CDS in commercial EMRs, challenges in integrating CDS into the clinical workflow, and limited understanding of organizational and cultural issues relating to clinical decision support. To better understand and overcome these barriers, and accelerate the translation of clinical practice guideline knowledge into CDS in EMRs, the CDS Consortium is established to assess, define, demonstrate, and evaluate best practices for knowledge management and clinical decision support in healthcare information technology at scale - across multiple ambulatory care settings and EHR technology platforms.
Osmotically Sensitive Brucella in Infected Normal and Immune Macrophages

When Brucella suis is grown in tissue cultures of normal guinea pig macrophages, the Brucella multiplies significantly without the induction of osmotically sensitive forms. In immune macrophages in the presence of normal guinea pig serum, there is a reduction in the number of intracellular Brucella and no multiplication is seen over a 72-hr period. After 6 hr of exposure to immune macrophages, however, approximately 50% of the surviving intracellular Brucella are osmotically sensitive, i.e., they will survive and grow only on medium containing 0.2 m sucrose. Brucella grown in immune macrophages, in the presence of rabbit antiserum against whole guinea pig serum, show the presence of osmotically sensitive forms, although at a reduced level compared to the number seen with immune macrophages in normal guinea pig serum.
Undermining Gender Equality: Female Attrition from Private Law Practice

The number of women in the legal profession has grown tremendously over the last 40 years, with women now representing about half of all law school graduates. Despite the decades-long pipeline of women into the profession, women's representation among law firm partnerships remains dismally low. One key reason identified for women's minority presence among law firm partners is the high level of attrition of women associates from law firms. This high rate of female attrition undermines efforts to achieve gender equality in the legal profession. Using a survey of 1,270 law graduates, we employ piecewise constant exponential hazard regression models to explore gendered career paths from private law practice. Our analysis reveals that, for both men and women, the time leading up to partnership decisions sees many lawyers exit private practice, but women continue to leave private practice long after partnership decisions are made. Gender differences in leaving private practice also surface with reference to cohorts, areas of law, billable hours, firm sizes, and career gaps. Notably, working in criminal law augmented women's risk of leaving private practice, but not for men, while taking time away from practice for reasons other than parental leaves, hastens both men's and women's exits from private practice.