Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Objective Assessment of Colonoscope 1 Manipulation Skills in Colonoscopy 2 Training 3

11 Objective: Manipulation of the colonoscope is a technical challenge for novice clinicians which is 12 best learned in a simulated environment. It involves the coordination of scope tip steering with 13 scope insertion, using a rotated image as reference. The purpose of this work is to develop and 14 validate a system which objectively assesses colonoscopy technical skills proficiency in an arbitrary 15 training environment, allowing novices to assess their technical proficiency prior to real patient 16 encounters. 17 Methods: We implemented a motion tracking setup to objectively analyze and assess the way 18 operators perform colonoscopies, including an analysis of wrist and elbow joint motions. 19 Subsequently, we conducted a validation study to verify whether our motion analysis could 20 discriminate novice colonoscopists from experts. Participants navigated a wooden bench-top 21 model using a standard colonoscope while their motions were tracked. 22 Results: The developed motion tracking setup allowed colonoscopists of varying levels of 23 proficiency to have their colonoscope manipulation assessed, and was able to be operated by a 24 trained non-technical operator. Novice operators had significantly greater median times (101.5s 25 vs. 31.5s) and number of hand movements (62.0 vs. 21.5) than experts. Experts, however, spent a 26 significantly greater proportion of time in extreme ranges of wrist and elbow joint motion than 27 novices. 28 Conclusion: We have developed and implemented a hand and joint motion analysis system that is 29 able to discriminate novices from experts based on objective measures of motion. These metrics 30 could, thus, serve as proxies for technical proficiency during training. 31 32
Mild kidney disease as a risk factor for major bleeding in patients with atrial fibrillation undergoing percutaneous coronary stenting

Summary Bleeding risk is increased in patients with atrial fibrillation (AF) and moderate to severe kidney disease (KD); however, the implication of mild KD on bleeding remains unclear. The aim of this study was to determine whether the presence of mild KD increases risk for major bleeding (MB) in patients with AF undergoing percutaneous coronary intervention with stent implantation (PCI-S). Two hundred eighty-five patients were included. Patients were classified into three kidney function groups: moderate to severe KD (n=91; <60 ml/min/1.73 m2), mild KD (n=139; 60–89 ml/min/1.73 m2) and non-KD (n=55; ≥90 ml/min/1.73 m2). Estimated glomerular filtration rate was calculated using the simplified Modification of Diet in Renal Disease equation. Patients were followed for one year, and the occurrence of MB was obtained in all. A total of 28 patients (9.8%) presented MB. MB complications examined as a function of KD groups revealed that there was a graded increase in MB with worsening renal function (non KD=1.8%, mild KD=7.9%, moderate to severe KD=17.6%; p <0.001). Multivariable Cox regression analysis showed that mild KD was associated with nearly a 2.5-fold (2.43 95% confidence interval 1.11–5.34, p=0.039) increase in the risk of MB as compared with non-KD patients. Other independent predictors of MB were moderate-severe KD, anaemia and triple antithrombotic therapy after PCI-S (C-index=0.76). In this population, mild KD confers a significantly increase in the risk for MB complications. Future studies should assess the potential role of incorporating mild KD into the bleeding risk scales to improve the stratification of these patients.
Ethno-Racial Variation in Recovery From Severe Mental Illness

Objective: Purpose-driven studies examining the relationship between ethnicity, culture, and recovery are absent from the empirical literature. As such, the overall aim of this study was to examine ethno-racial variations in recovery perspectives. Specific objectives consist of comparing and contrasting ethno-racial variations in 1) definitions of recovery, 2) barriers to recovery, and 3) facilitators of recovery. Methods: We recruited people with severe mental illness from 2 broad ethno-racial groups (Caribbean-Canadian and Euro-Canadian) to partake in a qualitative interview on recovery (n = 47). Participants were asked to give their own definitions of recovery, as well as self-perceived barriers and facilitators. Interview transcripts were then subjected to thematic analysis. We compared and contrasted the distribution and salience of emerging themes between the Euro-Canadian and Caribbean-Canadian participants. Results: Recovery was consistently defined as a gradual process involving progress in key life domains including employment, social engagement, and community participation by both groups. This was underpinned by a growing future orientation. Stigma, financial strain, and psychiatric hospitalization were considered major barriers to recovery in both groups. Participants from both groups generally considered stated definitions of recovery to be simultaneous facilitators of recovery—employment and social engagement being the most frequently mentioned. God and religion were key facilitators for the Caribbean-Canadian group but not for Euro-Canadians. Conclusions: Definitions, barriers, and facilitators to recovery were generally shared among our sample, regardless of ethno-racial status, with the exception of God and religion.
Auditing Quality Characteristics and Accounting Conservatism: An Empirical Study of the Listed Companies in Egypt

The growing issues on the quality of audit and accounting conservatisms have long been regarded and seemed as a hot debated since both could impact on the capital market efficiency. This study aims to investigate the impact of the audit quality which is characterized by audit firm size, auditor specialization, and auditor tenure on accounting conservatisms in the financial reports of the more active 50 non-financial companies listed at Egyptian stock exchange across four years of period from 2007 to 2010. After controlling for company size, leverage and profitability, the results show that auditing quality characteristics (audit firm size, auditor specialization, and auditor tenure) have significant positive relation with accounting conservatism. On the other hand, no significant relationship is found between company size and accounting conservatism. Based on these results, the study provided recommendations to the interested parties.
A monocular-vision rear vehicle detection algorithm

A monocular vision based detection algorithm is presented to detect rear vehicles. Our detection algorithm consist of two main steps: knowledge based hypothesis generation and appearance based hypothesis verification. In the hypothesis generation step, a shadow extraction method is proposed based on contrast sensitivity to extract regions of interest (ROI), it can effectively solve the problems caused by casting shadow and illuminations. In the hypothesis verification step, one improved wavelet feature extraction approach based on HSV space was proposed. Moreover, in order to satisfy different application requirements, a new method based on probability density function is proposed to decide the decision boundary for Support Vector Machine. The algorithm was tested under various traffic scenes at different daytime, the result illustrated good performance.
TNF-like Ligand 1A (TL1A) Gene Knockout Leads to Ameliorated Collagen-Induced Arthritis in Mice: Implication of TL1A in Humoral Immune Responses

TNF-like ligand 1A (TL1A), also known as TNFSF15, is a member of the TNF superfamily. Its known receptor is death receptor 3 (DR3). In humans, TL1A also binds to a secreted TNF family member called decoy receptor 3, which interferes with the interaction between TL1A and DR3. TL1A/DR3 signal has been implicated in several autoimmune diseases in animal models as well as in clinical conditions. We generated TL1A gene knockout (KO) mice to assess its role in collagen-induced arthritis (CIA), a mouse model of human rheumatoid arthritis. The KO mice were fertile and had no visible anomalies. Their lymphoid organ size and cellularity, T and B cell subpopulations, Th cell and regulatory T cell development in vivo and in vitro, and antiviral immune responses were comparable to those of wild-type mice. However, the KO mice presented ameliorated CIA in terms of clinical scores, disease incidence, and pathological scores. The KO mice had reduced titers of pathogenic anti-collagen Abs in the sera. No apparent defect was found in the function of follicular Th cells. We revealed that plasma cells but not B cells expressed high levels of DR3 and were direct targets of TL1A. In the presence of TL1A, they survived better and produced more pathogenic Ab. This study presented novel knowledge about the role of TL1A in humoral immune responses and its mechanism of action in CIA pathogenesis.
Anxiety among adolescents and its affect on orthodontic compliance.

BACKGROUND Investigations have suggested that poor compliance could be an indicator of poor relationship with family and could be related to the person's personality traits. AIM The aim of this study was to determine the effect of parents attitude, the anxiety during treatment and self-confidence/self-care of the patient on cooperation during orthodontic treatment. MATERIALS AND METHODS The study material consisted of questionnaires completed by 82 adolescent patients and their parents. The patients were divided into two groups of 42 compliant and 40 non-compliant patients. The above-mentioned questionnaires were State-Trait Anxiety Inventory-STAI, Piers-Harris Children's Self Concept Scale and The Exercise of Self-Care Agency for the patients and Mc Master Family Assessment Device and Parental Attitude Research Instrument-PARI for the parents. RESULTS The problem solving and caring attitude of the father and his determinative role in the family had a positive influence on the compliance of the child. The patients who showed better compliance also had a lower state of anxiety, which could also be explained by the positive effect of the attitude of the father in the family. CONCLUSION It would be useful to overcome the increased state of anxiety of the child in the orthodontic clinic by using educational and relaxation techniques. Besides, it would be wise to ask the father to be present at the first appointment during part of the education of the child.
Impact of Attitude on Employees Performance: A Study of Textile Industry in Punjab, Pakistan

Enhancement in employee performance is the major dilemma of organizations in current environment. Reason behind this improvement is pecuniary profit and competitive advantage. Employees are the basic source of profit and competitive advantage. So organizational activities involve in enhancing their employee performance is actually has the motive of organizational performance enhancement. Different psychological and environmental factors affect the employee performance. Current study is based on the effect of attitude on employee performance. This study include the attitude related factors (behaviors of employees and leaders, job satisfaction, job commitment, motivation and training) to investigate their impact on employee performance. A self administered questionnaire was used to collect the data from textile sector of Punjab, Pakistan with response rate of 83%. Result shows that all attitude related factors positively effect the employee performance. Motivation and job commitment has highly significant impact of performance of employees. As a result organizations should value their experienced personnel and devise effective retention policy by giving competitive salary, experienced base pay and experienced based promotion. That will increase the overall performance of the organization.
Age-related Differences in Countermovement Vertical Jump in Soccer Players 8-31 Years Old: the Role of Fat-free Mass

The aim of this study was to examine the effect of age on leg muscle power in male soccer players and to provide reference data. Male soccer players, all members of competitive soccer clubs and classified into six age groups (younger than 10 yr, U10, n = 17; U12, n = 27; U14, n = 70; U16, n = 92; U18, n = 33; older than 18 yr, Adults, n=36), participated in our study. They were examined for anthropometric characteristics, body composition, and performed the arm-swing countermovement vertical jump (CVJ) as a measure of leg muscle power. A one-way analysis of variance revealed significant differences between age groups with respect to CVJ (F5,269 = 76.46, p < 0.001, η2 = 0.59). Our findings indicated that the older the age group, the higher the CVJ (e.g., 19.8±3.9 cm in U10, 30.0±5.9 cm in U14 and 41.8±6.0 cm in adult group). This result was in agreement with the significant and large correlation coefficient between age and CVJ (r = 0.68, p < 0.001). Although the cross-sectional design of our study did not allow inferring causal relationship between age and CVJ, it is reasonable to support that there are large gains in leg muscle power with development in soccer players. These gains are accompanied by large increase of FFM during the same period. The findings of this study could be useful for coaches and trainers in the context of talent identification and training optimization.
Nitric oxide and renal nerves: comparison of effects on renal circulation and sodium excretion in anesthetized rats.

BACKGROUND An array of vasoconstrictor and vasodilator agents have the potential to control intrarenal circulation; however, their relative functional importance is unclear. We compared here the importance of nitric oxide and renal nerves in studies involving sequential blockade of nitric oxide synthesis and renal denervation. METHODS In anesthetized rats, N-nitro-L-arginine methylester (L-NAME) was used for nonselective inhibition of nitric oxide synthesis and 7-nitroindazole (7-NI) for inactivation of neuronal isoform of nitric oxide synthase (nNOS). Acute unilateral renal denervation was performed noninvasively enabling observation of rapid changes. Renal cortical and medullary blood flow was determined by laser Doppler flowmetry. RESULTS L-NAME decreased medullary blood flow and cortical blood flow, by 22% to 24%, whereas after 7-NI, medullary blood flow decreased by 22% and cortical blood flow about 10% (all changes significant). In untreated rats denervation significantly increased cortical blood flow (10% to 15%) but not medullary blood flow. In rats treated with L-NAME denervation partly prevented the post-inhibitor decrease in cortical blood flow but not in medullary blood flow. After 7-NI treatment, the decrease in cortical blood flow and medullary blood flow did not occur or a partial restoration of flow was seen. The denervation natriuresis was intact under L-NAME but attenuated following 7-NI. CONCLUSION A reduction of medullary blood flow after 7-NI, similar as after L-NAME, suggests that nitric oxide generated by nNOS is mainly responsible for adequate perfusion of the medulla whereas activity of nNOS and other isoform(s) is required to maintain cortical blood flow. Renal denervation partly restored cortical blood flow reduced by nitric oxide blockade. For medullary blood flow, such restoration was seen only after inactivation of nNOS alone, suggesting an intrinsic interaction of this isoform and renal nerves.
Cytoskeletal Transport in the Aging Brain: Focus on the Cholinergic System

There is now compelling evidence for the aging-related breakdown of cytoskeletal support in neurons. Similarly affected are the principal components of the intracellular microtubule system, the transport units involved in active shuttle of organelles and molecules in an antero- and retrograde manner, and the proteins stabilizing the cytoskeleton and providing trophic support. Here, we review the basic organization of the cytoskeleton, and describe its elements and their interactions. We then critically assess the role of these cytoskeletal proteins in physiological aging and aging-related malfunction. Our focus is on the microtubule-associated protein tau, for which comprehensive investigations suggest a critical role in neurodegenerative diseases, for instance tauopathies. These diseases frequently lead to cognitive decline and are often paralleled by reductions in cholinergic neurotransmission. We propose this reduction to be due to destabilization of the cytoskeleton and protein transport mechanisms in these neurons. Therefore, maintenance of the neuronal cytoskeleton during aging may prevent or delay neurodegeneration as well as cognitive decline during physiological aging.
Emergency department staff and susceptibility to pertussis: A seroprevalence study

Objective: To determine the proportion of ED staff who are susceptible to pertussis. There was evidence that some winter leave in southern Tasmania might be a reason of pertussis infection among unimmunized staff. This results in loss of individual earning and loss of availability of staff during the peak demand periods in the ED. There is evidence in the literature that underdiagnosis and undertreatment of pertussis occurs worldwide.
Violence perpetrated by women who use methamphetamine

Methamphetamine (meth) is widely recognized as being associated with violence and aggression. This association is found among women and men, with rates of meth-related violence among women possibly being equal to or even exceeding rates among men. This study examined female-perpetrated violence from the phenomenological point of view of 30 women (aged 18–45 years; mean age of 28.5 years) in residential treatment for meth dependence. Of the 30 participants, 80% (n = 24) reported experiencing violence in their lifetimes: 67% (n = 20) had violence perpetrated against them, and 57% (n = 17) had perpetrated violence. Most participants described perpetrating violence when they were ‘coming down’ off of meth (i.e. withdrawing). Five women (29%) attributed their violent behaviors to meth and said they would not have been violent had they not been using meth. In contrast, 10 women (59%) described pre-existing ‘anger issues’ that were ‘enhanced’ by meth. This article describes the timing of meth-related violence, bi-directional violence, men's responses to female-perpetrated violence, aggression in the context of sexual activities, and violence perpetrated against non-partners. A biopsychosocial theoretical framework is useful to interpret the complex explanations that women provide for their perpetration of violence under the influence of chronic meth use.
HMPV infections are frequently accompanied by co‐infections

Garcia-Garcia et al., recently reported on their findings in a Spanish cohort of 101 pediatric patients hospitalized for HMPV-related respiratory tract infections. Although this article is highly confirmative to their previous study and our matched pairs analysis, it contains some interesting observations and conclusions we would like to comment on. As in our study, the authors have not found a significant difference in the clinical severity between HMPV and RSV-infections, although they did not used a matched pairs approach but a random sample of 95 hospitalized infants—aged <2 and documented as RSV-infected. In addition, they observed a high rate (29.7%) of coinfections with at least one other viral respiratory pathogen. In earlier publications, and also in the reviewer’s comments to our own publication such high rates of coinfections were called ‘strikingly high. ’ Coinfections may be detected more frequently in hospitalized patients simply as a result of a more sophisticated diagnostic approach. In our study 39 patients (44.3 %) with a coinfection were observed, none of them displayed a more severe clinical course than mono-infected patients.Moreover, other studies described striking coinfection rates of up to 70% of patients, although in smaller cohorts (e.g., Ref. [4]). Most interestingly, the coinfected cohort of patients observed by Garcia-Garcia et al. also did not show a more severe clinical course. This is in contrast to earlier observations (reviewed byKahn [5] and Schildgen et al. [6]), but in high agreement with our study. This controversially discussed observation consequently has to be investigated more in detail, probably by the use of an appropriate animal model system. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Lack of binding of human C3, in its native state, to C3b receptors.

To understand better the role of C3 in opsonization, we investigated the binding of purified C3 and C3b to C3b receptors. To ensure that only physiologically relevant binding would be detected, we assayed the ability of isolated proteins to inhibit formation of rosettes between EA(lgM)C4b3b and normal, viable human polymorpho- nuclear leukocytes. Freshly prepared C3, with specific hemolytic activity equal to that of serum, was capable of only 30% inhibition at
Investment Risk, CDS Insurance, and Firm Financing

This paper develops a model of CDS demand when investment is subject to economic fluctuations and verification is imperfect. We show that CDS overinsurance (insurance in excess of renegotiation proceeds) is procyclical and allows for greater financing of firms with positive NPV projects. In bad times, CDS overinsurance triggers the early liquidation of firms with low continuation values. Our analysis explains the optimality of CDS contracting and reconciles evidence showing that CDSs are most beneficial for firms that are safer and have higher continuation values. The model generates a number of empirical predictions and provides insights on the regulation of CDS markets.
Speech perception results for children with implants with different levels of preoperative residual hearing.

OBJECTIVE Many reports have established that hearing-impaired children using the Nucleus 22-channel cochlear implant may show both significant benefits to lipreading and significant scores on open-set words and sentences using electrical stimulation only. These findings have raised questions about whether severely or severely-to-profoundly deaf children should be candidates for cochlear implants. To study this question, postoperative results for implanted children with different levels of preoperative residual hearing were evaluated in terms of speech perception benefits. STUDY DESIGN/SETTING A retrospective study of the first 117 children, sequentially, to undergo implantation in the Melbourne and Sydney Cochlear Implant Clinics was undertaken. All children had been assessed by and received their implants in a tertiary referral centre. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES To assess aided residual hearing, the children were grouped into four categories of hearing on the basis of their aided residual hearing thresholds measured preoperatively. To assess benefits, the scores of children on standard speech perception tests were reviewed. As different tests were used for children with different ages and language skills, children were grouped into categories according to the level of postoperative speech perception benefit. RESULTS The results showed that children in the higher categories of aided preoperative residual hearing showed significant scores on open-set word and sentence perception tests using the implant alone. For children in lower categories of aided residual hearing, results were variable within the groups. More than 90% of children with implants with aided residual hearing thresholds in the speech range above 1 kHz achieved open-set understanding of words and sentences. CONCLUSION While the results of this preliminary study confirm previous findings of differential outcomes for children with different levels of preoperative residual hearing, they suggest that children with severe to profound hearing impairments should be considered for cochlear implantation.