Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Desempeño de los puntajes APACHE II y SAPS II para calcular la razón de mortalidad estandarizada en una Unidad de Cuidados Intensivos polivalente de la Argentina

OBJETIVO: Estudiar el desempeno del Acute Physiology and Chronic Health Evaluation II (APACHE II), y el Simplified Acute Physiologic Score (SAPS II) para el calculo de la razon de mortalidad estandarizada (RME) en nuestra UCI. DISENO: Estudio retrospectivo y observacional realizado entre el 01/01/2007 y el 31/12/2013. AMBITO: Unidad de Cuidados Intensivos polivalente. PACIENTES: Mayores de 18 anos, de ambos sexos, internados al menos durante 24 horas. INTERVENCIONES: Ninguna. VARIABLES DE INTERES: APACHE II, SAPS II, mortalidad, RME. RESULTADOS: Se analizaron 2.641 pacientes que reunieron todos los datos requeridos. Edad promedio: 50,14 (± 16,95) anos, varones: 67%, promedio de internacion: 6,79 (± 9,14) dias, mortalidad 23,82%. Mortalidad promedio estimada por APACHE II 21,8% (± 21,4) y por SAPS II 27,4% (± 29,1) (p 0,000). La RME para la poblacion estudiada utilizando APACHE II fue de 1,09 (IC 95%: 1,01-1,18) y SAPS II fue de 0,87 (IC 95%: 0,80-0,93). El APACHE II tuvo una adecuada calibracion pero no asi el SAPS II (Test de Hosmer-Lemeshow: p=0,4042 y p=0,0024 respectivamente). La discriminacion del APACHE II y SAPS II fue buena (AUC: 0,830 ±0,010, p < 0,001, IC 95% 0,811 – 0,849 y AUC: 0,836 ±0,001, p < 0,001, IC 95% 0,818 – 0,854 respectivamente). CONCLUSIONES: A partir de estos resultados podemos concluir que el APACHE II tuvo buena discriminacion y calibracion, mientras que el SAPS II tuvo buena discriminacion y mala calibracion. Por lo tanto, en nuestra UCI seria razonable el empleo del APACHE II para el calculo de la RME.
Trends and Outcomes After Same-Day Discharge After Percutaneous Coronary Interventions

Background— Despite the demonstrated safety of the same-day discharge (SDD) after percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI), uptake of this program has been relatively poor in the United States. We evaluated the temporal trends and variations in the utilization of SDD after PCI during the contemporary era. In addition, we evaluated the predictors of SDD (compared with next-day discharge) and the causes of readmission in these 2 patient cohorts. Methods and Results— Data were extracted from State Ambulatory Surgical Database and State Inpatient Database from Florida and New York ranging from 2009 to 2013. All adults undergoing PCI in an outpatient setting were included. Data were merged with the directory available from the American Hospital Association to obtain detailed information on hospital-related characteristics. Unplanned readmissions within 7 and 30 days constituted the coprimary outcomes. There was modest increase in the proportion of SDD after PCI from 2.5% in 2009 to 7.4% in 2013 (P-trend <0.001). SDD was more frequently used among male and younger patients with fewer comorbidities. There were considerable differences in the discharge practices among the different hospital types. Larger hospitals, teaching hospitals, and high PCI volume hospitals had higher utilization of SDD compared with their respective counterparts. SDD and next-day discharge cohorts had similar rates of unplanned readmissions, in-hospital mortality, and acute myocardial infarction during follow-up. Furthermore, uninsured patients had significantly lower odds of SDD along with higher incidence of unplanned readmission within 30 days after PCI compared with insured patients. Conclusions— During 2009 to 2013, there has been a modest increase in SDD after PCI. Several demographic and clinical characteristics play critical role in determination of SDD after PCI. There were significant disparities in discharge practices between different sex, racial, and insurance-based strata.
Novel single nucleotide polymorphism (9678G-->A) for linkage analysis of acute intermittent porphyria.

Acute intermittent porphyria (AIP) is an autosomal dominant inborn error of metabolism caused by a partial deficiency of the third enzyme of the heme biosynthetic pathway, hydroxymethylbilane synthase (EC 4.3.1.8.; HMBS). This enzyme catalyzes the condensation of four molecules of porphobilinogen to a tetrapyrrole hydroxymethylbilane. Clinically, AIP is characterized by acute attacks of neurological disorders manifesting as abdominal pain, hypertension, tachycardia, peripheral neuropathy, and mental dysfunction. Biochemical diagnosis of AIP relies on increased urinary porphobilinogen and fecal porphyrin excretion within the health-related reference interval. The definitive diagnosis requires the assay of red blood cell (RBC) HMBS activity (1). AIP is a genetic disease characterized by poor penetrance; therefore, identification of presymptomatic AIP carriers in families with manifesting individuals is of utmost clinical importance because avoidance of precipitating agents, e.g., drugs and alcohol, can prevent the occurrence of the first porphyric attacks, which may be life-threatening. However, the identification of AIP carriers by assaying the RBC HMBS activity is problematic because there is substantial overlap between the enzyme activities of healthy individuals and patients with AIP (2). In addition, in one variant of AIP, the decreased enzyme activity is confined to …
Agent Based Activity Monitoring System - ABAMS

Multi-agent system (MAS) is a system composed of several agents, collectively capable of achieving goals that are difficult to achieve by an individual agent or monolithic system. MAS is ideal for a network-like application for its flexibility, distributed nature, and modifiability, without the need for detailed rewriting of the application. In this paper, we have proposed agent based activity monitoring system (ABAMS) for the monitoring of resources over a network, suitable for network of networks; commonly known as CAN (campus area network). The system is fully autonomous and once initialized with the given rules and domain knowledge ABAMS manages resources on its own with the help of mobile agents.
Correlation of Magnetic Properties and Residual Stress Distribution Monitored by X-Ray and Neutron Diffraction in Welded AISI 1008 Steel Sheets

In this paper, two identical American Iron and Steel Institute 1008 steels sheets were welded together in a butt joint configuration, with the welding line direction parallel to the rolling direction. The sheets were welded using the electron-beam welding technique. Stress distribution was monitored in the surface and the bulk of the welded samples using X-ray Bragg-Brentano and neutron diffraction methods, respectively. Accordingly, surface and bulk magnetic properties, namely magnetic Barkhausen noise and quasi-dc permeability, were monitored in the same area. Both surface and bulk magnetic measurements exhibit good agreement with the surface and bulk stress measurements obtained by the diffraction methods, after a proper calibration procedure. Complementary measurements with scanning electron microscopy and Vicker's microhardness tester provide similar good agreement between the microstructural characterization and the residual stress distribution.
"UNTIL ALL THE DATA ARE IN" A Chapter in the History of American Archaeology

In the 1930s Paul Radin argued that Franz Boas refrained from generalizing, claimed that the time was not ripe because all the data were not yet available, and believed that once all the data were available they would speak for themselves. This characterization was applied in the 1940s by Clyde Kluckhohn and his student Walter Taylor to the work of culture historian A. V. Kidder. Processual archaeologists obtained the idea that culture historians in general used the unripe time argument based on philosopher of science Carl Hempel's description of the first step of inductive reasoning as "gathering all the facts," and they used Kluckhohn's and Taylor's characterizations as substantiating evidence. Processualists likely reasoned that because culture historians operated inductively and thus sought to gather all the facts before they interpreted the archaeological record, culture historians also called upon the unripe time argument to warrant their hesitancy to draw conclusions. Evidence that culture historians in fact said they needed more data before drawing conclusions is rare, and in many cases possible evidence is readily interpreted as an unrigorously developed concern for sample sufficiency in the modern sense of a statistically representative sample. The unripe time characterization of pre-1960 archaeology served as one of several warrants for abandonment of the culture history approach in favor of processual archaeology and facilitated the rapid adoption of processualism.
Diffusion tensor magnetic resonance imaging in very early onset pediatric multiple sclerosis

Objectives: Active myelination during childhood may influence the impact of multiple sclerosis (MS) on brain structural integrity. We studied normal-appearing white matter (NAWM) in children with MS onset before age 12 years using diffusion tensor (DT) magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Methods: DT MRI scans were obtained from 22 MS children with their first attack before age 12 years, and 31 healthy controls from two referral centers. Using probabilistic tractography, brain tissue integrity within interhemispheric, intrahemispheric, and projection tracts was compared between patients and site-matched controls. The impact of disease and age at MRI on tract NAWM fractional anisotropy (FA) and mean diffusivity (MD) values was evaluated using linear models. Results: Compared to controls, pediatric MS patients had reduced FA and increased MD of the bilateral superior longitudinal fasciculus and corpus callosum (CC), without center-by-group interaction. CC NAWM average FA was correlated with brain T2 lesion volume. In controls, the majority of the tracts analyzed showed a significant increase of FA and decrease of MD with age. Such a linear correlation was lost in patients. Conclusions: In very young pediatric MS patients, DT MRI abnormalities affect brain WM tracts differentially, and are only partially correlated with focal WM lesions. Impaired maturation of WM tracts with age may be an additional factor contributing to these findings.
Improved accuracy in differentiating malignant from benign mammographic abnormalities

Although several refinements have been reported for breast magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), there has been no uniform agreement by researchers on the optimal method. The authors report a simple and effective MRI method that incorporated the best qualities of other breast MRI methods yet eliminated the complexity of dynamic sequences and computer subtraction. This new method used fat‐suppression, a 3D technique, a dedicated breast coil, and quantitation of lesion enhancement.
A Good Death

The Institute of Medicine defines a good death a “one that is free from avoidable death and suffering for patients, families and caregivers in general accordance with the patients’ and families’ wishes. ”. The current system creates barriers to reducing the stress and suffering that accompany a patient’s end of life. Data and eHealth technology, if it were more accessible, could help patients, families, and caregivers to cope with end of life issues.
List-mode-based reconstruction for respiratory motion correction in PET using non-rigid body transformations

Respiratory motion in emission tomography leads to reduced image quality. Developed correction methodology has been concentrating on the use of respiratory synchronized acquisitions leading to gated frames. Such frames, however, are of low signal-to-noise ratio as a result of containing reduced statistics. In this work, we describe the implementation of an elastic transformation within a list-mode-based reconstruction for the correction of respiratory motion over the thorax, allowing the use of all data available throughout a respiratory motion average acquisition. The developed algorithm was evaluated using datasets of the NCAT phantom generated at different points throughout the respiratory cycle. List-mode-data-based PET-simulated frames were subsequently produced by combining the NCAT datasets with Monte Carlo simulation. A non-rigid registration algorithm based on B-spline basis functions was employed to derive transformation parameters accounting for the respiratory motion using the NCAT dynamic CT images. The displacement matrices derived were subsequently applied during the image reconstruction of the original emission list mode data. Two different implementations for the incorporation of the elastic transformations within the one-pass list mode EM (OPL-EM) algorithm were developed and evaluated. The corrected images were compared with those produced using an affine transformation of list mode data prior to reconstruction, as well as with uncorrected respiratory motion average images. Results demonstrate that although both correction techniques considered lead to significant improvements in accounting for respiratory motion artefacts in the lung fields, the elastic-transformation-based correction leads to a more uniform improvement across the lungs for different lesion sizes and locations.
Multi-institutional phase I/II trial of stereotactic body radiation therapy for lung metastases.

PURPOSE To evaluate the efficacy and tolerability of high-dose stereotactic body radiation therapy (SBRT) for the treatment of patients with one to three lung metastases. PATIENTS AND METHODS Patients with one to three lung metastases with cumulative maximum tumor diameter smaller than 7 cm were enrolled and treated on a multi-institutional phase I/II clinical trial in which they received SBRT delivered in 3 fractions. In phase I, the total dose was safely escalated from 48 to 60 Gy. The phase II dose was 60 Gy. The primary end point was local control. Lesions with at least 6 months of radiographic follow-up were considered assessable for local control. Secondary end points included toxicity and survival. RESULTS Thirty-eight patients with 63 lesions were enrolled and treated at three participating institutions. Seventy-one percent had received at least one prior systemic regimen for metastatic disease and 34% had received at least two prior regimens (range, zero to five). Two patients had local recurrence after prior surgical resection. There was no grade 4 toxicity. The incidence of any grade 3 toxicity was 8% (three of 38). Symptomatic pneumonitis occurred in one patient (2.6%). Fifty lesions were assessable for local control. Median follow-up for assessable lesions was 15.4 months (range, 6 to 48 months). The median gross tumor volume was 4.2 mL (range, 0.2 to 52.3 mL). Actuarial local control at one and two years after SBRT was 100% and 96%, respectively. Local progression occurred in one patient, 13 months after SBRT. Median survival was 19 months. CONCLUSION This multi-institutional phase I/II trial demonstrates that high-dose SBRT is safe and effective for the treatment of patients with one to three lung metastases.
Grilliot's trick in Nonstandard Analysis

The technique known as Grilliot's trick constitutes a template for explicitly defining the Turing jump functional $(\exists^2)$ in terms of a given effectively discontinuous type two functional. In this paper, we discuss the standard extensionality trick: a technique similar to Grilliot's trick in Nonstandard Analysis. This nonstandard trick proceeds by deriving from the existence of certain nonstandard discontinuous functionals, the Transfer principle from Nonstandard analysis limited to $\Pi_1^0$-formulas; from this (generally ineffective) implication, we obtain an effective implication expressing the Turing jump functional in terms of a discontinuous functional (and no longer involving Nonstandard Analysis). The advantage of our nonstandard approach is that one obtains effective content without paying attention to effective content. We also discuss a new class of functionals which all seem to fall outside the established categories. These functionals directly derive from the Standard Part axiom of Nonstandard Analysis.
Birefringence-balanced polarimetric optical fiber sensor for high-temperature measurement.

A birefringence-balanced polarimetric multimode fiber temperature sensor is proposed and demonstrated. Two single-crystal sapphire rods are incorporated into the sensor head. They are connected end to end in such a way that the slow axis of the first rod is aligned with the fast axis of the second rod, referred to as the referencing rod. Since the lengths of the two rods are chosen to be almost the same, the original birefringence of the first rod is balanced by that of the second rod. A light-emitting diode serves as the light source. This sensor has been experimentally demonstrated for high-temperature measurements as high as 1500°C. A sensitivity of 5°C has been obtained.
Model-based Strategic Knowledge Elicitation

Strategic problems are difficult. They often only exist in the mental models of some top managers. They are typically too vague to be given a precise meaning, yet at the same time concrete enough to cause discomfort. They cannot be discarded but they cannot be tackled either because the means for diagnostic and solution are lacking. The body of knowledge of strategy offers little help, in the sense that a set of tools for strategic problem solving does not exist, in practice. In science and engineering, problem solving is model-based. In the past, the social sciences and management have discarded model building due to its inherent difficulties. Today, the means are available to elicit knowledge about the symptoms of strategic problems, create a model to obtain a solution, and produce an implementation plan.
Unintended Effects of Estate Taxation on Wealth Inequality

Intergenerational wealth transmission occurs not only at the end of life (bequests) but also throughout the life cycle (inter-vivos transfers). This paper documents that bequests are largely accidental, and inter-vivos transfers are intentional and negatively correlated with the recipient’s current income. This paper builds and estimates a general-equilibrium lifecycle model of intergenerational wealth transfers, where parents potentially value inter-vivos transfers differently from bequests. The model renders a response in inter-vivos transfers to estate tax changes close to the data. Under the current U.S. tax codes, increasing the estate tax does not necessarily reduce top wealth inequality. Instead, it could potentially increase inequality with a sufficiently strong response in inter-vivos transfers. Such a response is partly caused by differential tax treatment between inter-vivos transfers and bequests, and partly amplified by the wealthier people responding more due to the preference curvature for both transfers.
Students' Perception of Faculty Involvement in the Rural Hospital Preceptorship Experience

Faculty in Canadian undergraduate nursing programs have come to rely on preceptorship as the primary model for teaching and learning during the final clinical course. A focused ethnography was completed in order to examine undergraduate nursing students' experience of rural hospital preceptorship in western Canada. Data analysis revealed that students perceive nursing faculty involvement and support to be peripheral to the clinical experience. Strategies aimed at clarifying the faculty role and nursing programs' involvement are presented as a means to enhance the rural hospital learning experience.
Is Entrepreneurial Orientation a Global Construct? A Multi-Country Study of Entrepreneurial Orientation, Growth Strategy, and Performance

The role of entrepreneurial orientation (EO) in influencing firm behavior is one of the primary areas of attention for the burgeoning stream of international entrepreneurship research. This study examines two research questions: (1) Is the EO construct generalizable to countries beyond North America? (2) If EO is generalizable, what is its relationship to firm performance in international contexts? Using a sample of 1,045 firms from 17 countries on 4 continents, we found support for the uni-dimensional entrepreneurial posture construct noting that it significantly predicted firm profitability and changes in net worth.
Thickness and Surface Density of Extracellular Polymers on Acidithiobacillus ferrooxidans

ABSTRACT In vivo force microscopy measurements of Acidithiobacillus ferrooxidans revealed a repulsive force that was due to the presence of extracellular polymers on the bacterium's surface. Measured force-distance profiles were fit to steric force theory to estimate the density and thickness values of these exopolymers. The polymer densities were 3.4 × 1016 to 7.1 × 1016 molecules m−2, and the equilibrium thickness was 29 nm.
IL-4–producing B cells regulate T helper cell dichotomy in type 1- and type 2-controlled diseases

Significance Cutaneous leishmaniasis and schistosomiasis are neglected tropical diseases for which there are no effective vaccines and limited treatment strategies. To develop vaccine and therapeutic alternatives, a detailed understanding of host immunity is essential. We show a role for IL-4Rα–responsive B cells in host susceptibility to Leishmania major and protection against Schistosoma mansoni infection through the production of early IL-4, which in turn regulates Th2 cell polarization and disease outcome in mice. These important findings highlight the significant impacts that B cell-specific IL-4Rα and IL-4 responsiveness have in the context of type 1 (L. major) and type 2 (S. mansoni) pathogens. Thus, vaccine and therapeutic development should aim to target both B and T cell immunity for optimal efficacy. Interleukin-4 (IL-4)–induced T helper (Th) 2 cells promote susceptibility to the protozoan parasite Leishmania major, while conferring immunity to the intestinal trematode Schistosoma mansoni. Here, we report that abrogation of IL-4 receptor alpha (IL-4Rα) signaling on B cells in BALB/c mice (mb1creIL-4Rα–/lox) transformed nonhealer BALB/c to a healer phenotype with an early type 1 and dramatically reduced type 2 immune response and an absence of ulceration and necrosis during cutaneous leishmaniasis. From adoptive reconstitution and mixed bone-marrow chimera studies in B cell-deficient (µMT) mice, we reveal a central role for B cell-derived IL-4 and IL-4Rα in the optimal induction of the susceptible type 2 phenotype to L. major infection. We further demonstrate that the absence of IL-4Rα signaling on B cells exacerbated S. mansoni-induced mortality and pathology in BALB/c mice, due to a diminished type 2 immune response. In both disease models, IL-4Rα–responsive B cells displayed increased IL-4 production as early as day 1 after infection. Together, these results demonstrate that IL-4–producing and IL-4Rα–responsive B cells are critical in regulating and assisting early T helper dichotomy toward Th2 responses, which are detrimental in cutaneous leishmaniasis but beneficial in acute schistosomiasis.
Retransmitting lost measurements to improve remote estimation

In this work, we consider the problem of remotely estimating a discrete-time system over a communication system with packet losses. To improve the estimates, we propose to acknowledge received measurement packets and retransmit lost measurements within the next measurement packet. Although previous works found no benefit in acknowledging and retransmitting measurement packets, we show that by a proper design of the retransmission scheme, it is possible to get optimal estimates without huge data transfers or preprocessing the measurements within the sensor.