Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Parental perspectives on hand, foot, and mouth disease among children in Hong Kong: a longitudinal study

Abstract Hand, foot, and mouth disease (HFMD), usually a self-limiting illness for young children, could cause a significant burden for parents because it can take up to 1–2 weeks for a sick child to recover. We conducted a two-wave longitudinal study over one summer peak season (May–July 2014) of HFMD to examine parents’ HFMD-related risk perceptions and protective responses. In total, 618 parents with at least one child aged ⩽12 years, recruited using randomly-dialled household telephone calls completed the baseline survey interview, 452 of whom subsequently completed the follow-up survey. Around two-thirds of participants perceived the chance of their child being infected by HFMD was ‘zero/very small/small’ but the likelihood of being hospitalized once infected was ‘somewhat likely/likely/very likely’. At follow-up, 82% reported washing child's hands frequently (Hygiene), 16% would keep their child away from school if HFMD cases were identified in school (Distancing) and 23% were ‘very likely/certainly’ to take the child for HFMD vaccination if available (Vaccination). Anticipated regret was consistently the strongest predictor for Hygiene (OR 3.34), and intention of Distancing (OR 2.58) and Vaccination (OR 3.16). Interventions focusing on anticipated regret may be effective to promote protective behaviour against HFMD among parents for their children.
An Opto-Structural Method to Estimate the Stress-Strain Field Induced by Cell Contraction on Substrates of Controlled Stiffness in Vitro

Purpose Mechanical properties of the extra-cellular matrix (ECM) such as stiffness mediate cell signaling, proliferation, migration, and differentiation. Within this context, we developed a method to estimate in vitro the stress-strain field induced by contraction of cardiovascular progenitor cells on substrates of controlled stiffness. Methods Two alginate-agarose hydrogels were polymerized and mechanically characterized under compression. The hydrogels showed different levels of stiffness, mimicking either normal or pathologic ECM of the cardiac tissue, with an average compressive equilibrium modulus of 3 and 25 kPa, respectively. To estimate substrate deformation induced by the adhering cells, fluorescent microspheres were included under the surface layer of the hydrogels as displacement trackers. The hydrogels were polymerized in multiwell plates and seeded with cells that were allowed to adhere for 24 hours. On the softer substrate, images of the substrate surface and the cells were acquired using time-lapse fluorescence microscopy. Image processing enabled tracking the microsphere movements and mapping local substrate deformation because of tensile stresses produced by the cells. The resulting tensile stresses could then be calculated from measured stiffness. Results and Conclusions The substrate strains ranged between a maximum contraction of –26.5% to a maximum stretching of 19.8%. The calculated stresses ranged between a maximum compression of –0.53 kPa to a maximum tension of 0.4 kPa (nN/μm2). These results may help to interpret experimental findings, showing important differences in cell morphology and expression of phenotypic markers, induced by culturing cells on substrates with different mechanical properties.
Utilization and Determinants of Adjuvant Therapy Among Older Patients Who Receive Curative Surgery for Pancreatic Cancer

Objective: We conducted a population-based study to describe the utilization, determinants, and survival effects of adjuvant therapies after surgery among older patients with pancreatic cancer. Methods: Using Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results-Medicare data, we identified patients older than 65 years who received surgical resection for pancreatic cancer during 1992-2002. We constructed multiple logistic regression models to examine patient, clinical, and hospital factors associated with receiving adjuvant therapy. Cox proportional hazards models were used to examine the effect of therapy on survival. Results: Approximately 49% of patients received adjuvant therapy after surgery. Patient factors associated with increased receipt of adjuvant therapy included more recent diagnosis, younger age, stage II disease, higher income, and geographic location. Hospital factors associated with increased receipt of adjuvant therapy included cooperative group membership and larger size. Adjuvant treatments associated with a significant reduction in 2-year mortality (relative to surgery alone) were chemoradiation or radiation alone but not chemotherapy alone. Conclusions: Our findings suggest that adjuvant chemoradiation and, to a lesser degree, radiation only are associated with a reduction in the risk of mortality among older patients who undergo surgery for pancreatic cancer. However, receipt of adjuvant therapy varied by period and geography as well as by certain patient and hospital factors.
Growth determinations for unattached bacteria in a contaminated aquifer

Growth rates of unattached bacteria in groundwater contaminated with treated sewage and collected at various distances from the source of contamination were estimated by using frequency of dividing cells and tritiated-thymidine uptake and compared with growth rates obtained with unsupplemented, closed-bottle incubations. Estimates of bacterial generation times [(In 2)/mu] along a 3-km-long transect in oxygen-depleted (0.1 to 0.7 mg of dissolved oxygen liter-1) groundwater ranged from 16 h at 0.26 km downgradient from an on-land, treated-sewage outfall to 139 h at 1.6 km and correlated with bacterial abundance (r2 = 0.88 at P less than 0.001). Partitioning of assimilated thymidine into nucleic acid generally decreased with distance from the contaminant source, and one population in heavily contaminated groundwater assimilated little thymidine during a 20-h incubation. Several assumptions commonly made when frequency of dividing cells and tritiated-thymidine uptake are used were not applicable to the groundwater samples.
Do Children Cope Better Than Adults with Potentially Traumatic Stress? A 40-Year Follow-Up of Holocaust Survivors

Abstract Anecdotal reports suggest that child survivors of the Nazi persecution are functioning well as adults. Ratings of their parents by a randomly selected community sample of young adult Ashkenazi Jews on a scale that measured Schizoid, Paranoid, Depressive/Masochistic and Type A/Normal Aggressive symptoms permitted verification of these reports. Among the parents were groups who were children, adolescents, or young adults in 1945, at the end of World War II. Child-survivor parents did not differ from native-born parents on these measures 40 years later, whereas, consistent with the empirical findings of others, survivors who were adolescents or young adults at the end of the war manifested more paranoid and depressive/masochistic symptoms than native-born parents. To explain this possible greater long-term resilience among those who were child survivors, reference is made to later caretakers, endowment, cognitive and social development, and psychodynamics.
[An intervention to improve diabetes control in Chile].

OBJECTIVE Previous research has shown that controlling blood glucose improves short-term and long-term outcomes among patients who have either type 1 or type 2 diabetes. The objective of this study was to investigate, in a developing country, the effectiveness of an intervention that included patient education, self-monitoring of blood glucose, and determination of the level of glycosylated hemoglobin (HbA1c). METHODS The patients were grouped into three categories, taking into account such clinical manifestations as the duration of their diabetes, its treatment, and their hospitalization history. After the inclusion and exclusion criteria were applied, the persons were randomly assigned to two groups. One group (210 patients) received the educational intervention, and the control group (206 patients) received customary care. The intervention group received educational information needed for self-monitoring of blood glucose and for the self-evaluation of positive and negative behaviors related to metabolic control of the disease. RESULTS The two groups were similar with respect to age (mean of 52.3 and 50.5 years) and to the proportion of patients with type 1 diabetes (13.8% and 16.0%). There were no initial differences in the average concentration of HbA1c in the two groups (8.9% +/- 0.1% and 8.9% +/- 1.4%). A total of 50 persons dropped out of the study, 14.8% of those in the intervention group and 9.2% of those in the control group. In the intervention group, compliance with dietary recommendations increased by 43.5%, from 57.5% at the beginning of the study to 82.5% at the end (P < 0.001); in the control group there was also a change but it was not significant. Although patients with a high initial HbA1c concentration were underrepresented in this study, the average HbA1c concentration declined significantly in the intervention group (-0.4% +/- 1.1%, P = 0.001) but not in the control group (-0.1% +/- 0.1%). CONCLUSIONS In one developing country, educating patients about diabetes helped improve metabolic control, a fact that can be attributed mainly to the intervention's positive impact on those persons' diet.
Distal spinal and bulbar muscular atrophy caused by dynactin mutation

Impaired axonal transport has been postulated to play a role in the pathophysiology of multiple neurodegenerative disorders. In this report, we describe the results of clinical and neuropathological studies in a family with an inherited form of motor neuron disease caused by mutation in the p150Glued subunit of dynactin, a microtubule motor protein essential for retrograde axonal transport. Affected family members had a distinct clinical phenotype characterized by early bilateral vocal fold paralysis affecting the adductor and abductor laryngeal muscles. They later experienced weakness and atrophy in the face, hands, and distal legs. The extremity involvement was greater in the hands than in the legs, and it had a particular predilection for the thenar muscles. No clinical or electrophysiological sensory abnormality existed; however, skin biopsy results showed morphological abnormalities of epidermal nerve fibers. An autopsy study of one patient showed motor neuron degeneration and axonal loss in the ventral horn of the spinal cord and hypoglossal nucleus of the medulla. Immunohistochemistry showed abnormal inclusions of dynactin and dynein in motor neurons. This mutation of dynactin, a ubiquitously expressed protein, causes a unique pattern of motor neuron degeneration that is associated with the accumulation of dynein and dynactin in neuronal inclusions. Ann Neurol 2005;57:687–694
Administrative data are not sensitive for the detection of peripheral artery disease in the community

We sought to evaluate whether case ascertainment using administrative health data would be a feasible way to identify peripheral artery disease (PAD) patients from the community. Subjects’ ankle–brachial index (ABI) scores from two previous prospective observational studies were linked with International Classification of Diseases (ICD) and Canadian Classification of Interventions (CCI) codes from three administrative databases from April 2002 to March 2012, including the Alberta Inpatient Hospital Database (ICD-10-CA/CCI), Ambulatory Care Database (ICD-10-CA/CCI), and the Practitioner Payments Database (ICD-9-CM). We calculated diagnostic statistics for putative case definitions of PAD consisting of individual code or sets of codes, using an ABI score ⩽ 0.90 as the gold standard. Multivariate logistic regression was performed to investigate additional predictive factors for PAD. Different combinations of diagnostic codes and predictive factors were explored to find out the best algorithms for identifying a PAD study cohort. A total of 1459 patients were included in our analysis. The average age was 63.5 years, 66% were male, and the prevalence of PAD was 8.1%. The highest sensitivity of 34.7% was obtained using the algorithm of at least one ICD diagnostic or procedure code, with specificity 91.9%, positive predictive value (PPV) 27.5% and negative predictive value (NPV) 94.1%. The algorithm achieving the highest PPV of 65% was age ⩾ 70 years and at least one code within 443.9 (ICD-9-CM), I73.9, I79.2 (ICD-10-CA/CCI), or all procedure codes, validated with ABI < 1.0 (sensitivity 5.56%, specificity 99.4% and NPV 84.6%). In conclusion, ascertaining PAD using administrative data scores was insensitive compared with the ABI, limiting the use of administrative data in the community setting.
A Randomized Controlled Trial to Assess Effectiveness of a Spiritually-Based Intervention to Help Chronically Ill Adults

Objective: Creative, cost-effective ways are needed to help older adults deal effectively with chronic diseases. Spiritual beliefs and practices are often used to deal with health problems. We evaluated whether a minimal intervention, consisting of a video and workbook encouraging use of patient spiritual coping, would be inoffensive and improve perceived health status. Methods: A randomized clinical trial of 100 older, chronically ill adults were assigned to a Spiritual (SPIRIT) or Educational (EDUC—standard cardiac risk reduction) intervention. Individuals in each group were shown a 28–minute video and given a workbook to complete over 4 weeks. Selected psychosocial and health outcome measures were administered at baseline and 6 weeks later. Results: Participants were mostly female (62%), with a mean age of 65.8 α 9.6 years and had an average of three chronic illnesses. More than 90% were Christian. At baseline, frequent daily spiritual experiences (DSE) were associated with being African American (p < .05) and increased pain (p < .01) and co-morbidities (p < .01). Energy increased significantly (p < .05) in the SPIRIT group and decreased in the EDUC group. Improvements in pain, mood, health perceptions, illness intrusiveness, and self-efficacy were not statistically significant. Conclusions: A minimal intervention encouraging spiritual coping was inoffensive to patients, associated with increased energy, and required no additional clinician time.
Vitamin D and Cancer: Diversity, Complexity, and Still a Ways to Go

Vitamin D has taken a center-stage role in our basic and population research quest for the panacea for all human maladies, including cancer, yet sufficient evidence for a beneficial role has existed only for bone health. This Commentary discusses and places into a broader context the report of Chandler and colleagues that found a protective association for higher vitamin D status in colorectal cancer in women, consistent with most other cohort studies but not with limited supplementation trial data. Little human evidence exists for the preventive potential in other malignancies, including breast cancer, with the exception of possible benefit in bladder cancer and an adverse serologic association with prostate cancer (pancreatic cancer risk may be similarly influenced) that is supported by vitamin D genetic data. Current vitamin D trials are examining high-dose supplementation (i.e., 1,600–3,333 IU daily) for effects on multiple outcomes, but they may not have sufficient power to test efficacy in colorectal or other specific malignancies and are unlikely to inform any benefit for higher physiologic levels. A more complete understanding of vitamin D and human carcinogenesis will come from multifaceted lines of research, including elucidation of organ site–specific biologic mechanisms, prospective serologic analyses, testing of vitamin D–related genetic variation, and short-term clinical–metabolic biomarker studies of multidose vitamin D supplementation, including metabolomic profiling of controlled supplementation in these and past or ongoing trials. Cancer Prev Res; 8(8); 657–61. ©2015 AACR. See related article by Chandler et al., p. 675
Sex-Based Assessment of Patient Presentation, Lesion Characteristics, and Treatment Modalities in Patients Undergoing Peripheral Vascular Intervention

Background— Limited evidence suggests that women and men might be treated differently for peripheral arterial disease. This analysis evaluated sex-based differences in disease presentation and its effect on treatment modality among patients who underwent endovascular treatment for peripheral arterial disease. Methods and Results— Using national registry data from the Vascular Quality Initiative between 2010 and 2013, we examined patient, limb, and artery characteristics by sex through descriptive statistics. We studied 26 750 procedures performed in 23 820 patients to treat 30 545 limbs and 44 804 arteries. Women presented at an older age (69 versus 67 years; P<0.001) and were less often current or former smokers (72% versus 85%; P<0.001). Transatlantic Inter-Society Consensus classification was similar among men and women (Transatlantic Inter-Society Consensus C or D: 37% in men versus 37% in women; P=0.81), as was mean occlusion length (4.5 cm in men versus 4.6 cm in women; P=0.04), even after accounting for lesion location. Women more frequently underwent treatment for rest pain (11% in men versus 16% in women; P<0.001) versus claudication (59% in men versus 53% in women; P<0.001) or tissue loss (28% in men versus 27% in women; P=0.75). Treatment modality did not differ by sex but was associated with disease severity (P for trend <0.001) and lesion location (P for trend <0.001). Conclusions— Women undergo peripheral endovascular intervention for peripheral arterial disease at an older age with critical limb ischemia. Treatment modalities do not vary by sex but are determined by disease severity and site. Although there exist sex differences in presentation, these differences do not lead to differential treatment for women with peripheral arterial disease.
How smart is smart? Theoretical and empirical considerations on implementing smart city objectives – a case study of Dutch railway station areas

The current widespread attention on the concept of smart city in both policy and practice has stimulated academic discussion regarding the scope and applicability of this concept. An important question is whether cities and regions are truly advanced in implementing the concept in their policies and practices relative to its conceptual elaborations in academia. The aim of this paper is to analyse this congruence between theory and practice in the context of the ongoing transformations of railway station areas in European urban regions. Based on in-depth interviewing using aspects of Q-methodology, this paper investigates whether and how smart city concepts are implemented by stakeholders in three station redevelopment projects in the Netherlands. The results show that the current implementation of smart city concepts in practice is varied but modest and not (yet) very advanced. Knowledge exchange and innovations are currently hampered by a lack of acceptance and know-how among stakeholders, as well as by institutional and competitive constraints. For instance, stakeholders stress that data privacy regulations should be well organized before further implementation can occur. Transparency about how and what data are used may create more willingness among users to assist in developing and accepting new data technologies. However, the technologies are not yet completely developed, and concerns about the “loss” of personal privacy are holding back the widespread and advanced use of data supplied technologies. Although stakeholders seem to be aware of the opportunities the smart city concept offers, for now, the widespread implementation of innovative and advanced smart city concepts remains in the future.
Respect the technique: Status-based respect increases minority group social cohesion with majority groups, while also increasing minority collective action tendencies

ABSTRACT The present work explores the implications of respect for social change. Social change can be achieved via improved attitudes between minority and majority groups (i.e., social cohesion) or via action taken by minority groups (i.e., collective action). Recent work suggests that the social cohesion route to social change, in particular an emphasis on commonality, may be incompatible with the collective action route to social change. We suggest that social-cohesion strategies rooted in status-based respect may allow for social cohesion and collective action. We experimentally investigated the relative effects of a majority group communicating status-based respect and commonality, as compared to a control, on minority group members’ social cohesion with the majority group and willingness to engage in collective action. Status-based respect increased positive attitudes toward a majority group, relative to commonality and control, but was also associated with increased collective action tendencies. Implications for social change are discussed.
Review of Korean workplace gender policy literature from 1989 to 2014

Abstract This paper systematically investigates the English literature on the study of the South Korean Government’s gender policies concerning Korean workplaces and has found that the scope and quantity of the relevant published research on this topic has greatly increased over the years. This research reviews 66 articles that were published in the literature of academic journals and non-governmental organizations from 1989 to 2014 and is meant to serve as a reference compilation of specific characteristics on the topic for interested international academics and policy-makers. Findings include a growing interest in the field of knowledge with most articles being published in roughly the last decade and on an increasingly diverse selection of topics. In addition, most articles are quantitative, though they are based on secondary data provided by the Korean Government, extant literature or the Occupational Wage Survey. Furthermore, this paper reviews the literature’s primary limitations and key words as well as outlines the future topics the academics wished to address.
Thrombin‐activated platelets induce proliferation of human skin fibroblasts by stimulating autocrine production of insulin‐like growth factor‐1

Platelet components have found successful clinical utilization to initiate or to accelerate tissue‐repair mechanisms. However, the molecular pathways by which platelet factors contribute to tissue regeneration have not been fully elucidated. We have studied the effect of thrombin‐activated platelets (TAPs) on cell growth in vivo and in cultured cell systems. Application of TAPs to ulcerative skin lesions of diabetic patients induced local activation of ERK1/2 and Akt/ PKB. Moreover, when applied to cultured human skin fibroblasts, TAPs promoted cell growth and DNA synthesis and activated platelet‐derived growth factor (PDGF) and insulin‐like growth factor (IGF)‐1 receptor tyrosine kinases. PDGF was released by TAPs and rapidly achieved a plateau. At variance, the release of IGF‐1 was mainly provided by the TAPs‐stimulated fibroblasts and progressively increased up to 48 h. The PDGF‐R blocker Ag1296 reduced the activation of Akt/PKB and, at a lesser extent, of ERK1/2. Conversely, inhibition of IGF‐1 signaling by Ag1024 and expression of a dominant‐negative IGF‐1R mutant selectively reduced the stimulation of ERK1/2 by TAPs and fibroblast‐released factors, with minor changes of Akt/PKB activity. Thus, platelet factors promote fibroblast growth by acutely activating Akt/PKB and ERK1/2. Sustained activation of ERK1/2, however, requires autocrine production of IGF‐1 by TAPs‐stimulated fibroblasts. —Giacco, F. , Perruolo, G. , D'Agostino, E. , Fratellanza, G. , Perna, E. , Misso, S. , Saldalamacchia, G. , Oriente, F. , Fiory, F. , Miele, C. , Formisano, S. , Beguinot, F. , Formisano, P. Thrombin‐activated platelets induce proliferation of human skin fibroblasts by stimulating autocrine production of insulin‐like growth factor‐1. FASEB J. 20, E1763–E1772 (2006)