Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Nitrogen Gas Purging for the Deoxygenation of Polyaromatic Hydrocarbon Solutions in Cyclohexane for Routine Fluorescence Analysis

During routine fluorescence analysis, the presence of dissolved oxygen in solutions can result in the dynamic quenching of a fluorophore's emission through collisional deexcitation of the fluorophore's excited state. In order to avoid this type of fluorescence quenching, dissolved oxygen is often removed from solutions by an inert gas purging procedure. However, the details and quantification of this purging process are often limited in fluorescence studies. In this work, standard 10 mm × 10 mm fluorescence cuvettes are filled with polyaromatic hydrocarbon (PAH) solutions in cyclohexane and purged using nitrogen gas, and the experimental purging parameters (nitrogen flow rate, amount of volatile solvent loss, and rate of oxygen removal) are measured and analyzed. For experimental conditions similar to those used in this study, we are able to provide useful guidelines for the deoxygenation of solutions, specifically the purge times required for solutions of fluorophores with various fluorescence lifetimes. Enhancement factors, or F0/F values (the ratio of fluorescence intensity of a completely deoxygenated solution to the fluorescence intensity of an aerated solution), for chrysene, phenanthrene, naphthalene, and pyrene solutions in cyclohexane were found to be 3.61 ± 0.02, 4.17 ± 0.02, 7.63 ± 0.07, and 21.81 ± 0.35, respectively.
Preferences for Mental Health Care: A Comparison of Older African Americans and Older Caucasians

Research on mental health service utilization patterns has shown that older adults underutilize outpatient services, particularly in minority populations. Greater reliance on inpatient services may result when a mental health problem can no longer be ignored. The goal of this study was to compare the attitudes and beliefs of African American and Caucasian older adults about mental health care and preferred providers. A 47-item survey was administered to a convenience sample of 1,598 primarily African Americans, recruited at 40 sites, including the study sample of 726 people older than age 50. Results showed that respondents of both races preferred advice from their family doctor, clergy, or a family member. African Americans preferred services in their doctor’s or clergy’s office, whereas Caucasians preferred a professional service provider’s office. Findings suggest that providers and policy makers consider the impact of age, culture, and ethnicity on mental health services provision.
Is There a Relationship Between Mini Mental Status Examination Scores and the Activities of Daily Living Abilities of Clients Presenting with Suspected Dementia?

ABSTRACT Introduction: The Mini Mental Status Examination (MMSE) is a commonly utilized cognitive screening assessment by occupational therapists working in both acute and sub-acute care environments. As MMSE scores are influenced by factors such as one's culture, language and education, this poses an issue when using MMSE scores to inform interventions for clients with culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) backgrounds. Is there an association between the MMSE and functional performance measures and does this relationship differ between CALD and non-CALD client groups? Aim: This study had two primary aims: (i) to investigate if the MMSE scores were significantly associated with the prehospital and inpatient functional performance of participants presenting with suspected dementia; and whether performance differences existed between CALD and non-CALD client groups, when completing the MMSE, Modified Barthel Index (MBI) and Activities of Daily Living Questionnaire (ADL-Q). Method: A sample of 28 participants suspected of having dementia were recruited from three acute care hospitals in Melbourne, Australia. The sample included 10 CALD and 18 English-speaking participants. Participants’ cognition was assessed using the MMSE and their functional performance was measured using the ADL-Q for their prehospital functional performance and the MBI for their inpatient level of functioning. Results were analyzed using Spearman's rho correlations and a Mann–Whitney U test of difference. Results: No significant correlations were found between the MMSE, MBI, or ADL-Q total scores, or the ADL-Q subscales. The Mann–Whitney U test revealed no significant differences between the CALD and non-CALD client group scores on the three measures. Conclusion: Cognitive scores and functional performance scores were not significantly associated. No significant differences between the CALD and non-CALD group were obtained.
Raman Mapping Using Advanced Line-Scanning Systems: Geological Applications

By allowing nondestructive chemical and structural imaging of heterogeneous samples with a micrometer spatial resolution, Raman mapping offers unique capabilities for assessing the spatial distribution of both mineral and organic phases within geological samples. Recently developed line-scanning Raman mapping techniques have made it possible to acquire Raman maps over large, millimeter-sized, zones of interest owing to a drastic decrease of the data acquisition time without losing spatial or spectral resolution. The synchronization of charge-coupled device (CCD) measurements with x,y motorized stage displacement has allowed dynamic line-scanning Raman mapping to be even more efficient: total acquisition time may be reduced by a factor higher than 100 compared to point-by-point mapping. Using two chemically and texturally complex geological samples, a fossil megaspore in a metamorphic rock and aragonite-garnet intergrowths in an Eclogitic marble, we compare here two recent versions of line-scanning Raman mapping systems and discuss their respective advantages and disadvantages in terms of acquisition time, image quality, spatial and imaging resolutions, and signal-to-noise ratio. We show that line-scanning Raman mapping techniques are particularly suitable for the characterization of such samples, which are representative of the general complexity of geological samples.
Comparison of Vibrational Circular Dichroism Instruments: Development of a New Dispersive VCD

A dispersive vibrational circular dichroism (VCD) instrument has been designed and optimized for the measurement of mid-infrared (MIR) bands such as the amide I and amide II vibrational modes of peptides and proteins. The major design considerations were to construct a compact VCD instrument for biological molecules, to increase signal-to-noise (S/N) ratio, to simultaneously collect and digitize the sample transmission and polarization modulation signals, and to digitally ratio them to yield a VCD spectrum. These were realized by assembling new components using design factors adapted from previous VCD instruments. A collection of spectra for peptides and proteins having different dominant secondary structures (alpha-helix, beta-sheet, and random coil) measured for identical samples under the same conditions showed that the new instrument had substantially improved S/N as compared with our previous dispersive VCD instrument These instruments both provide protein VCD for the amide I that are comparable to or somewhat better than those measurable with commercial Fourier transform (FT) VCD instruments if just the amide I band in the spectra is obtained at modest resolution (8 cm−1) with the same total data collection time on each type of instrument.
The use of community-based data in health planning in Mexico and Central America

Sentinel site surveillance methodology is used in Nicaragua Honduras El Salvador Guatemala Panama and in the Mexican state of Guerrero to collect reliable planning-oriented health information at community level. Limited resources available for health measurement can be concentrated in these sites which when taken together reflect the diversity of health condition; some sites include health facilities and others do not in proportion with the coverage of the population at large. Changes in health status over time have been measured in relation to coverage with health care activities using repeatable problem-specific cycles of household interviews. A key consideration is the development of methodologies and tools to facilitate the decentralization of capabilities of questionnaire design and the organization and analysis of data. Infant and child mortality are key concerns but the methodology has also been used to investigate other mortality and morbidity in relation to coverage and costs of health services and knowledge attitudes and practices related to priority diseases at the community level. These data cannot easily be obtained from sources other than community surveys and the sentinel site framework allows for their collection in a manner than facilitates systematic planning under conditions of limited resources including limited capabilities of handling data and of making it available for planning. (Authors).
EFFECTSOFONE-LUNGVENTILATIONONCARDIAC AUTONOMICNERVOUSACTIVITYASEVALUATEDBY POWERSPECTRAL ANALYSISOFHEARTRATE VARIABILITY

The purpose of this prospective study was to evaluate the eiects of one-lung ventilation on the activity of the cardiac autonomic nervous system. Ten adult patients who underwent thoracotomy were endotracheally intubated with a double-lumen tube under general anesthesia using iso£urane. After induction of anesthesia, a continuous, 256-sec electrocardiogram (ECG) was obtained during bilateral lung ventilation (control) followed by recordings during one-lung ventilation of each side. Using the R^R interval tachograms obtained for the 256-sec ECGs, low frequency (LF: 0.04^0.15 Hz) and high frequency (HF: 0.15^0.40 Hz) bands of the spectral density of the heart rate variability and the HF/LF ratio were analyzed using the fast Fourier transform algorithm. Log(HF), which indicates parasympathetic activity, increased during one-lung ventilation on each side, but did not diier between ventilated sides. Log(LF), which represents sympa- thetic and parasympathetic activity, increased similarly to log(HF) on both sides. Log(HF/LF), the balance of the sym- pathetic and parasympathetic activity, did not change during one-lung ventilation. We suggest that one-lung ventilation alone does not substantially aiect the cardiac autonomic nervous system.
Patients' Perceived Health and Anxiety Pre and Post Implantable Cardioverter Defibrillator Insertion

Background: Previous research has shown that implantable cardioverter defibrillators (ICD) can improve patient's quality of life and life-satisfaction. Aim: This small-scale study aimed to compare patients' self-assessed health and anxiety before and one month after ICD insertion and measure whether or not ICD patients suffer from depression. Methods: Eighteen consecutive participants assessed health, anxiety and depression at two occasions: (i) the day of ICD implantation; and (ii) one month post ICD insertion. Health was assessed by EuroQol visual analogue scale (EQ VAS) and Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS) was used to assess depression and anxiety. Results: The results showed a statistically significant increase in post ICD insertion values of health and decrease in values of anxiety compared to pre ICD insertion values. No difference was found regarding depression. Conclusion: The findings indicate that patients' perceived health increase and anxiety decrease after an ICD insertion. However, more and larger studies are needed.
Keeping up-to-date: continuing education, practice improvement strategies, and evidence-based physiotherapy practice

The objective of this article is to provide information about evidence-based practice, continuing education, or practice improvement strategies to assist physiotherapists in becoming life-long learners and improving the care they provide to clients. Several theories and empirical evidence relating to different behaviour change strategies are presented. An examination of the similarities across theories of behaviour change together with the evidence presented can provide direction for planning or choosing change strategies. Behaviour change is complex with many interacting influences on behaviour including personal characteristics, the practice environment, and the local community. Several theories suggest that a behavioural diagnosis is useful to identify potential problems that might impede any proposed change. Multifaceted interventions involving several interventions are more effective than single strategies. Didactic lectures and written educational materials alone are unlikely to result in practice change. Physiotherapists should ensure that assessment procedures and treatments that lack support from sound research and are inconsistent with biological and physiological mechanisms are not provided to clients. Changing practice can be difficult, but multifaceted strategies can be effective if potential facilitators and barriers to the change process are analyzed. Physiotherapists need to critically assess the merits of continuing education courses and choose strategies that are most likely to improve practice.
Using qualitative methods for conducting a systematic review

With the advent of evidence-based practice in the health services the need to review the current way in which health care is delivered and, by association, the need to examine the education of health care professionals has arisen. The case for evidence-based education is now advocated (Campbell and Johnson 1999). With an increasing emphasis upon inter-professional and inter-agency collaboration, a search for evidence to justify inter-professional education in order to promote such collaborative practice is necessary. However, the evidence base in this field has been subject to wide criticism for its lack of rigorous research data (Pirrie and Wilson 1999). A search for systematic reviews revealed none published at the time of this work although contact with the Cochrane Collaboration revealed a group of researchers currently conducting a systematic review. But, to date, they have found no studies that merited inclusion because they all failed to meet the criteria for study design laid down by the Collaboration (Barr 1998). The need to embark on a parallel exercise aimed at systematically reviewing what Chapple and Rogers (1998) refer to as ‘soft’ data – that is to say data that is not rigorous or scientific – was therefore required. This paper describes how such a task was undertaken for a review of inter-professional education. It describes a strategy designed to overcome the barriers currently associated with integrating narrative literature into a systematic review and can be described as an alternative, but analogous, strategy, to that developed for evidence based practice.
The Prevention of Cervical Cancer in Africa

In this article we aim to draw attention to the burden of cervical cancer in Africa for reproductive health and review strategies for prevention, including appropriate noncytology-based cervical screening and prophylactic human papillomavirus vaccination. We consider the heavy burden of disease attributable to human papillomavirus infection borne by developing countries, particularly in Africa. Following identification of the human papillomavirus as the infectious etiological agent and elucidation of the long natural history of cervical neoplasia, cervical cancer is now one of the most preventable of all cancers. Opportunities for primary prevention by prophylactic vaccination and secondary prevention by appropriate cervical screening are discussed, together with the importance of population coverage. Qualitative work on attitudes towards cervical cancer prevention, education needs, the creation of an environment for informed choice and uptake are essential aspects of effective prevention programs. Cervical cancer poses a huge health burden in Africa. It is a disease that is eminently preventable given political will, the availability of affordable vaccines, appropriate cervical screening and access to cheap, point-of-care human papillomavirus testing. There are a number of unanswered questions for the prevention of cervical cancer and a need for demonstration projects to address these and further develop prevention strategies.
Metabolic syndrome and insulin signaling in kidney

Metabolic syndrome (MetS) is now recognized as a big threat for human health. It has been a problem in developed countries for decades and also emerging similarly in developing countries. It has been also called as “Syndrome X”, “Deadly quartet”, “Reaven’s syndrome”. Essentially these are of the same clinical status, in which insulin resistance is the common condition. In such condition hyperinsulinemia occurs, which may have potential influence on other organs and tissues, including kidney – glomeruli and tubules - , cardiovascular systems, liver, muscles. This review will focus on the influence of MetS on the point of insulin resistance and its influence of kidney, especially proximal tubules and glomeruli.
Managing Sexually Transmitted Infections in Pregnant Women

Sexually transmitted infections (STIs) constitute a major public health problem in the UK and may result in very costly complications. Many STIs pose the risk of a number of adverse pregnancy outcomes including miscarriage, still birth, preterm delivery, low birth weight and ophthalmia neonatorum. National guidelines for the management of STIs are produced and regularly revised by the British Association of Sexual Heath and HIV. This review outlines the latest recommended treatment options during pregnancy for the commonly encountered STIs.
Older Adults' Use of Medical and Alternative Care

This article reports on a study of 77 older adults, 35 of them patients of family physicians and the other 42 patients of alternative practitioners. We compare the two groups along a number of dimensions and identify differences in health problems, social characteristics, practitioners consulted, reasons for choice of therapy and practitioner, pathways taken to care, and length and frequency of practitioner visits. The data show that few older adults sought care fromalternative practitioners and that those who did so had distinctive social and health characteristics. All the older adults began their search for care with conventional medical doctors. Most remain within the medical system. Those who moved beyond it had not found relief from their chronic problems and also had access to wider sources of information about alternatives, provided mainly by family and friends. The pathways followed by patients of alternative practitioners were complex and varied, but these patients did not forsake medical care.
Búsqueda intencionada y reclasificación de muertes maternas en México: el efecto en la distribución de las causas

Objective. To correct the misclassification and improve the quality of information on maternal mortality in Mexico. Materials and methods. Using clinical records and verbal autopsies, we studied all deaths certified as maternal deaths as well as a selection of deaths of women of childbearing age whose causes were considered as suspected of hiding a maternal death, all of which occurred during 2011 within Mexico. Results. The deliberate search of maternal deaths and reclassification allowed the rescue of just over 100 deaths that were not originally registered or coded as maternal and confirmed or corrected the causes of death recorded on death certificates as confirmed maternal deaths. This procedure also allowed the reclassification of 297 maternal deaths of women in the groundwork of the National Institute of Statistics and Geography. Conclusions. International Search and Reclassification of Maternal Deaths is a very useful procedure for improving the classification of cases that were not classified as maternal deaths and the effect was greater with the coding of indirect obstetric deaths.
Treatment of Vaginal Atrophy

Vaginal or vulvovaginal atrophy is a widespread but poorly recognized condition of peri- and post-menopausal women. It causes urogenital symptoms of dryness, reduced lubrication, itching, burning, irritable bladder symptoms and painful intercourse. This impacts quality of life and sexual health, but increases with time rather than reduces, as with most other menopausal symptoms. With early identification, treatments can improve these symptoms and reverse the physical changes. However, when embedded, bladder and sexual changes have occurred and these may be more difficult to remedy. Therefore, it is important to educate both healthcare professionals and women about these symptoms and advise on the range of interventions available.
Ebastine in chronic urticaria: A double-blind placebo-controlled study

The effect of ebastine 10 mg once daily was studied in a double-blind comparison with placebo in 204 patients with chronic urticaria. Symptom severity, as assessed by both investigator and patient, was significantly reduced by ebastine after 7 and 14 days of treatment. The drug was well tolerated in the majority of patients, with the overall incidence of side-effects not significantly different to that of placebo. It is concluded that ebastine represents an effective and well-tolerated alternative to other non-sedating antihis-tamines in the treatment of chronic urticaria.
Plasmonics for Nanoimaging and Nanospectroscopy

The science of surface plasmon polaritons, known as “plasmonics,” is reviewed from the viewpoint of applied spectroscopy. In this discussion, noble metals are regarded as reservoirs of photons exhibiting the functions of photon confinement and field enhancement at metallic nanostructures. The functions of surface plasmons are described in detail with an historical overview, and the applications of plasmonics to a variety of industry and sciences are shown. The slow light effect of surface plasmons is also discussed for nanoimaging capability of the near-field optical microscopy and tip-enhanced Raman microscopy. The future issues of plasmonics are also shown, including metamaterials and the extension to the ultraviolet and terahertz regions.
THE FMRFamide-LIKE NEUROPEPTIDE OF APLYSIA IS FMRFamide.

The head ganglia from 350 Aplysia brasiliana were extracted and purified by gel (Sephadex G-15) and cation exchange (CM-Sephadex) chromatography; the fractions were examined with radioimmunoassays (RIA) for the molluscan neuropeptides, FMRFamide and SCPB. Immunoreactive (ir-) FMRFamide (but not ir-SCPB) coeluted with authentic FMRFamide from both chromatographic columns. The amino acid composition of the purified peptide was: Phe 2: Arg 1: Met 1. Digestion of purified ir-FMRFamide with carboxypeptidase Y indicated that the four residues were in the same sequence as occurs in FMRFamide. The dose-response curves for purified and synthetic FMRFamide on the radula protractor muscle of Busycon contrarium were coincident, as were their inhibition binding curves in the FMRFamide RIA. The highest concentrations of ir-FMRFamide were in the pedal and pleural ganglia; but SCPB was concentrated in the buccal ganglion. Synthetic SCPB has no effect on the radula protractor muscle of Busycon or the isolated heart of Mercenaria. In conclusion, the FMRFamide-like peptide in the gastropod Aplysia is FMRFamide, so this peptide has now been identified in two molluscan classes. Moreover, the proposed structural relationship between FMRFamide and SCPB is fortuitous, and these two peptides should have different physiological functions in Aplysia.