Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The Warwick-Edinburgh Mental Well-being Scale (WEMWBS): a valid and reliable tool for measuring mental well-being in diverse populations and projects

Background The outcomes framework for the new public health and mental health strategies in England (Healthy Lives Healthy People and No Health without Mental Health) both propose monitoring positive mental health. The Office of National Statistics is currently consulting on approaches to the measurement of wellbeing. Public mental health projects and interventions at local level require measurement of mental wellbeing The Warwick-Edinburgh Mental Wellbeing Scale (WEMWBS) is a possible candidate. Methods WEMWBS was developed in 2007 following UK evaluation of a longer mental wellbeing measure (Affectometer 2), a review of the literature and the support of a multidisciplinary expert panel. It comprises 14 positively worded items relating only to positive attributes of mental health. Quantitative validation has been undertaken in student (n=354) and adult (16 yrs plus; n=2075) UK populations and mixed method evaluations in teenage (13–15 years) and UK dwelling Pakistani and Chinese groups. Results Initial evaluation showed good content validity; confirmatory factor analysis supported a single factor hypothesis (GFI =0.93, AGFI=0.8, RMSEA=0.055); Cronbach's α (0.89) suggested the possibility of item redundancy; item total correlations ranged from 0.52 and 0.80; the distribution was near normal; there were no floor or ceiling effects; test-retest reliability was high (0.83) and the scale discriminated population groups in a way which was consistent with results of other surveys. WEMWBS correlated with criterion scales to the expected extent and in the expected direction. WEMWBS was not RASCH compatible but a reduced 7 item scale, Short Warwick-Edinburgh Mental Wellbeing Scale (SWEMWBS) was resolved which met RASCH model requirements. Quantitative evaluations showed the scale to be robust in Chinese and Pakistani groups and in teenagers. Qualitative evaluation broadly supported these findings and offered insights into mental wellbeing across different groups. WEMWBS is sensitive to change in evaluations of diverse public health interventions and programmes including general lifestyle interventions and parenting programmes. It is also sensitive to change in psychiatric populations. Conclusions In addition to offering rigour for research and evaluation in public mental health, WEMWBS' positive focus offers a developmental perspective, helping to orientate policy makers, programme participants and survey respondents towards mental wellbeing and enabling identification of protective and promoting factors.
Literature review to inform the future digitisation of Jobcentre Plus service delivery

One of the stated priorities for Jobcentre Plus in 2011/12 is to work towards delivering more of its services online and in formats that enable customers to access them by a range of means (Jobcentre Plus, 2010). This review was commissioned to provide Jobcentre Plus with an evidence-based foundation to help it meet this aim. In particular, it aimed to provide help to Jobcentre Plus in its thinking about how it might: • understand and respond to the current and projected levels and means of access to the internet in the UK (see Chapter 2); • improve the ‘customer appetite’ and willingness to use the internet, particularly among its customers who are potentially digitally excluded (see Chapter 3); and • learn lessons from the way in which online services have been provided by ‘leading edge’ organisations and the way in which e-Government has developed internationally and is developing in the UK (see Chapter 4). This summary highlights the key issues emerging from the review and concludes with an indication of some of the possible implications for Jobcentre Plus to consider as it develops its strategy for digitisation over the next few years. The summary is structured thematically in line with the main body of the report.
Towards Engineering a Web-Scale Multimedia Service: A Case Study Using Spark

Computing power has now become abundant with multi-core machines, grids and clouds, but it remains a challenge to harness the available power and move towards gracefully handling web-scale datasets. Several researchers have used automatically distributed computing frameworks, notably Hadoop and Spark, for processing multimedia material, but mostly using small collections on small clusters. In this paper, we describe the engineering process for a prototype of a (near) web-scale multimedia service using the Spark framework running on the AWS cloud service. We present experimental results using up to 43 billion SIFT feature vectors from the public YFCC 100M collection, making this the largest high-dimensional feature vector collection reported in the literature. The design of the prototype and performance results demonstrate both the flexibility and scalability of the Spark framework for implementing multimedia services.
A Negative Association between Social Support and Depression in the Elderly Population of Amirkola City

Social Determinants of Health (SDH) Research Center, Babol University of Medical Sciences, Babol, Iran. Department of Community Medicine, Social Determinants of Health (SDH) Research Centre, Babol University of Medical Sciences, Babol, Iran. 3 Department of Epidemiology and Geriatric Medicine, Centre for Education and Research on Ageing, Concord Hospital, University of Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. 4 Department of Psychiatry, Babol University of Medical Sciences, Babol, Iran.
Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms Associated with Coronary Heart Disease Predict Incident Ischemic Stroke in the Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities Study

Ischemic stroke and coronary heart disease (CHD) may share genetic factors contributing to a common etiology. This study investigates whether 51 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) associated with CHD in multiple antecedent studies are associated with incident ischemic stroke in the Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities (ARIC) study. From the multiethnic ARIC cohort of 14,215 individuals, 495 validated ischemic strokes were identified. Cox proportional hazards models, adjusted for age and gender, identified three SNPs in Whites and two SNPs in Blacks associated with incident stroke (p ≤ 0.05). The rs11628722 polymorphism in SERPINA9 was associated with incident stroke in Whites and Blacks, even after taking into account traditional risk factors. The idea that ischemic stroke and CHD may share some common genetic factors, such as variation in SERPINA9, should be investigated in other studies.
Is the Madrid Sonographic Enthesitis Index Useful for Differentiating Psoriatic Arthritis from Psoriasis Alone and Healthy Controls?

Objective. To assess the usefulness of the MAdrid Sonographic Enthesitis Index (MASEI) in classifying patients as having psoriatic arthritis (PsA) and comparing entheseal abnormalities between patients with PsA, psoriasis alone (PsC), and healthy controls (HC). Methods. Patients with PsC were assessed to exclude inflammatory arthritis. The MASEI scoring system was used to quantify the extent of ultrasonographic (US) entheseal abnormalities. The total MASEI score was categorized into items that reflected inflammatory abnormalities (MASEI-inflammatory) and chronic damage (MASEI-damage). Nonparametric tests were used to compare MASEI scores across the groups. A cutoff point of MASEI ≥ 20 was used to calculate the sensitivity and specificity of the MASEI to classify patients as having PsA. Results. Patients with PsA (n = 50), PsC (n = 66), and HC (n = 60) were assessed. Total MASEI scores were higher in patients with PsA than in those with PsC, and both those groups were higher than HC (p < 0.0001). MASEI-inflammatory showed a similar trend (p < 0.0001). MASEI-damage was higher in patients with PsA compared to both patients with PsC and HC (p < 0.0001); however, no difference was observed between patients with PsC and HC. No significant difference in MASEI scores was found across the 3 groups in patients with a body mass index > 30. The sensitivity of the MASEI score to correctly classify patients as having PsA was 30% and the specificity was 95% when compared to HC and 89% when compared to PsC. Conclusion. The severity of US entheseal abnormalities is highest in patients with PsA followed by PsC and is lowest in healthy controls. MASEI can specifically classify patients as having PsA.
Inducers of cross-linked actin networks in trabecular meshwork cells.

PURPOSE It is well established that the unusual actin arrangements known as cross-linked actin networks (CLANs) can be induced by dexamethasone (DEX) in trabecular meshwork (TM) cells. Recent work reporting their presence in elderly glaucomatous and nonglaucomatous tissue, however, has highlighted the presence of other inducers. In this study, the authors sought to identify CLAN induction agents that may be present within and around the outflow system. METHODS Studies were conducted on confluent bovine TM (BTM) cells in culture, and actin was stained with Alexa-Fluor 488 phalloidin to identify CLANs in the target cells. The CLAN-inducing potential of aqueous humor was expanded and included investigation of transforming growth factor-beta 2 (TGF-β2). The effect of decorin and fetal calf serum (FCS) on BTM cell cytoskeleton was also investigated, and all were compared with DEX with an exposure period of up to 7 days. RESULTS CLAN numbers were increased after 7 days of exposure to TGF-β2 (45%), aqueous humor (37%), and decorin (69%). Even FCS had some modest CLAN-inducing ability (reaching 12%) in BTM cells. Neutralization of TGF-β2 reduced CLAN incidence in aqueous humor conditions to baseline (12%) levels. Blocking TGF-β2 receptors reduced CLAN formation in TM cells by 25% to 30%, whereas the inhibition of Smad3 negated CLAN incidence. CONCLUSIONS In this study the authors identified TGF-β2 as a CLAN-inducing component present in aqueous humor. Decorin was also implicated as another CLAN-inducing agent and it was confirmed that FCS has CLAN-inducing properties.
The ethics of boxing

Editor,—I read the article on sport medicine and the ethics of boxing1 with disappointment this month. It rehearsed arguments that are already familiar to sports physicians faced with difficult decisions about how to approach boxing, without taking things further on. In addition, there are medical, social, and ethical points that are not fully addressed in the article. Medically, epidemiological studies have established that there are a number of popular sports in which the injury and mortality statistics are greater than in boxing. A ban or boycott in rugby, equestrianism, or formula one car racing has not been contemplated by the medical profession. Socially, the background of most doctors ensures that, unlike some other high risk sports, the cultural significance of boxing in some parts of our society is extremely poorly understood. Boxing represents a relatively safe and desirable alternative to other possible activities for some young people, and it is often the continuation …
PD09-03: Phase I/II Study of BKM120 in Combination with Trastuzumab in Patients with HER2 Overexpressing Metastatic Breast Cancer Resistant to Trastuzumab-Containing Therapy.

Introduction: HER2 amplification can activate the phosphatidylinositol-3-kinase (PI3K) pathway in breast cancer. Furthermore, trastuzumab (T) resistance can be associated with loss/deregulation of PTEN, which also causes activation of PI3K pathway signaling. BKM120, a potent orally bioavailable pan-class I PI3K inhibitor, could reverse resistance to T in vitro. Furthermore, administration of BKM120 with T demonstrated synergistic activity in preclinical models. The potential for combining BKM120 with T in heavily pretreated HER2+ metastatic breast cancer (MBC) patients (pts) will be determined in this study to substantiate the hypothesis for future development. Methods: HER2+ MBC pts resistant to T-containing therapy (progression on or within 4 weeks since last T administration) received treatment in the dose-escalation portion of this multicenter trial. Prior anti-HER2−directed therapies were allowed. The primary objective was to determine the maximum tolerated dose (MTD) of BKM120 in combination with the standard dose of weekly T. A Bayesian logistic regression model with overdose control guided the dose escalation. Results: Seventeen pts with MBC have been enrolled: 5 at 50 mg/day and 12 at 100 mg/day dose of BKM120. Escalation was conducted up to the MTD level of single agent BKM120, 100 mg/day. Patient characteristics: median age 46 years (range 34–70); most pts were heavily pretreated (reported range of prior chemotherapy lines 1–4). In preliminary results (cut-off date 1 st June 2011), 7 pts discontinued treatment. BKM120 in combination with T showed a mean peak drug concentration and half-life similar to single-agent BKM120. T trough levels remained above the single agent efficacy threshold. Only one dose-limiting toxicity (G3 asthenia) was reported at the BKM120 dose of 100 mg/day. The MTD was determined to be 100 mg/day. Reported G3 adverse events were asthenia, altered mood, rash, GGT increase, hypokalemia, and hypersensitivity in 1pt each. No G4 toxicity has been observed so far. With regards to activity, 2 partial responses (1 confirmed) and 3 occurrences of disease stabilization have been observed. Conclusions: BKM120 in combination with T in heavily pretreated HER2+ MBC pts with T-resistance has an acceptable safety profile and has shown encouraging preliminary activity. The Phase II portion of the study is ongoing. An updated analysis of efficacy, the potential correlation with PI3K pathway alteration status overlaying HER2 activation, and pharmacodynamics study will be presented. Citation Information: Cancer Res 2011;71(24 Suppl):Abstract nr PD09-03.
Doctoring the Mind: Why psychiatric treatments fail

Feel lonely? What about reading books? Book is one of the greatest friends to accompany while in your lonely time. When you have no friends and activities somewhere and sometimes, reading book can be a great choice. This is not only for spending the time, it will increase the knowledge. Of course the b=benefits to take will relate to what kind of book that you are reading. And now, we will concern you to try reading doctoring the mind why psychiatric treatments fail as one of the reading material to finish quickly.
Sociodemographic Characteristics, Lifestyle Factors, and Nutrient Intake by Taking Vitamin/mineral Supplements

Taking vitamin and mineral supplements is increasingly common with the rapid economic growth. The aim of this study was to determine the prevalence of vitamin and mineral supplement use among adults aged 20 or older from the third Korean National Health and Nutrition Survey data and to explore the effect of sociodemographic and lifestyle factors as well as nutrient intake on taking supplements. People who had participated in both a health questionnaire and a nutritional survey were selected, and 2,871 men and 3,555 women were finally included in this analysis. Both men and women with a higher level of education, those residing in a metropolitan area, and those with higher income were more likely to take supplements. Health behaviors were not significantly associated with taking supplements. Mean nutrient intake of all nutrients except energy intake was not significantly different in men or women taking supplements after adjusting for age, education, marital status, resident area, smoking, and energy intake. Compared to Dietary Reference Intake (DRI) for Koreans, most vitamins and minerals, except vitamin B 2 and calcium, were consumed at higher than the Recommended Intake (RI) without supplements. In conclusion, taking supplements such as vitamin B2 and calcium may promote health and prevent disease. However, the type and frequency of other vitamin and mineral supplements consumed should be considered with caution.
VEGF inhibition: latest developments

Rapid advances have been made in the field of macular degeneration in recent years. The treatment of this condition has been revolutionized with the introduction of VEGF inhibition therapy – first pegaptanib sodium and, more recently, ranibizumab and bevacizumab. However, the pivotal clinical trials have revealed the need for multiple treatments over prolonged periods of time. Thus, the delivery of VEGF inhibition therapies regardless of the cost of the drug has important economic implications in a world where a growing elderly population has placed an enormous strain on healthcare resources. This economic burden is due to the fact that the number of patients who would potentially benefit is high, there is a necessity for repeated drug delivery and monitoring and there is no clear indication of when treatment and monitoring may be stopped. Future studies should be designed to address these uncertainties and provide guidance to clinicians on how to achieve optimal management without compromising on functional outcomes.
Air quality and pediatric emergency room visits for asthma in Atlanta, Georgia

Pediatric emergency room visits for asthma were studied in relation to air quality indices in a spatio-temporal investigation of approximately 130,000 visits (approximately 6,000 for asthma) to the major emergency care centers in Atlanta, Georgia, during the summers of 1993-1995. Generalized estimating equations, logistic regression, and Bayesian models were fitted to the data. In logistic regression models comparing estimated exposures of asthma cases with those of the nonasthma patients, controlling for temporal and demographic covariates and using residential zip code to link patients to spatially resolved ozone levels, the estimated relative risk per 20 parts per billion (ppb) increase in the maximum 8-hour ozone level was 1.04 (p 100 ppb vs. 60 microg/m3 vs. <20 microg/m3: odds ratio = 1.26, p = 0.004). In models with ozone and PM10, both terms became nonsignificant because of collinearity of the variables (r= 0.75). The other analytical approaches yielded consistent findings. This study supports accumulating evidence regarding the relation of air pollution to childhood asthma exacerbation.
Abstraction, Sensory-Motor Coordination, and the Reality Gap in Evolutionary Robotics

One of the major challenges of evolutionary robotics is to transfer robot controllers evolved in simulation to robots in the real world. In this article, we investigate abstraction of the sensory inputs and motor actions as a tool to tackle this problem. Abstraction in robots is simply the use of preprocessed sensory inputs and low-level closed-loop control systems that execute higher-level motor commands. To demonstrate the impact abstraction could have, we evolved two controllers with different levels of abstraction to solve a task of forming an asymmetric triangle with a homogeneous swarm of micro air vehicles. The results show that although both controllers can effectively complete the task in simulation, the controller with the lower level of abstraction is not effective on the real vehicle, due to the reality gap. The controller with the higher level of abstraction is, however, effective both in simulation and in reality, suggesting that abstraction can be a useful tool in making evolved behavior robust to the reality gap. Additionally, abstraction aided in reducing the computational complexity of the simulation environment, speeding up the optimization process. Preeminently, we show that the optimized behavior exploits the environment (in this case the identical behavior of the other robots) and performs input shaping to allow the vehicles to fly into and maintain the required formation, demonstrating clear sensory-motor coordination. This shows that the power of the genetic optimization to find complex correlations is not necessarily lost through abstraction as some have suggested.
The Toll way to hypertension: role of the innate immune response

The involvement of pro-inflammatory processes in cardiovascular disease such as hypertension is a well accepted concept. Human hypertension is associated with increased levels of circulating cytokines and their participation in the associated target organ damage has clearly been demonstrated. Recent evidence suggests that at least in animal models of hypertension, components of the adaptive immune system such as T cells are activated and infiltrate target organs, promoting inflammation and thus participating in the maintenance of increased blood pressure. However there is a paucity of information on the role of the innate immune response in hypertension. Moreover, the identity of the original stimuli responsible for the immune system activation as well as the chronology of these events during hypertension pathogenesis is unknown. The current paradigm is that the immune system is activated by danger signals originating from stressed or injured cells and tissues which release molecules (damage-associated molecular patterns or DAMPs) recognized by pattern recognition receptors, such as Toll like receptors, on antigen-presenting cells (APCs). APCs in turn activate the adaptive immune response and both kinds of response will lead to release of pro-inflammatory factors, such as cytokines and chemokines. During hypertension, cytokine/chemokine signaling in the kidney and vasculature may cause further injury and release of DAMPs continuously, resulting in a sustained chronic inflammatory process. In the present review, we describe recent research supporting the hypothesis of the immune system activation as a causative factor of hypertension, with a special focus on the involvement of the innate immune response in the initiation of hypertension and the hypertensive vascular and renal dysfunction.
Impact of reduced levels of APE1 transcripts on the survival of patients with urothelial carcinoma of the bladder

Molecular evidence indicates that alterations in genes involved in the maintenance of genome stability may be related to susceptibility to bladder carcinoma. Our goal was to evaluate the prognostic role of base excision repair (BER) genes in a cohort of patients diagnosed with primary urothelial carcinoma of the bladder (UCB). The levels of all APE1, XRCC1 and POLB transcripts were detected by quantitative real-time PCR (qPCR) technique in tumor samples from 52 patients undergoing transurethral resection (TUR) for primary UCB at the Department of Urology, Brazilian National Cancer Institute, Rio de Janeiro. Increased levels of APE1, XRCC1 and POLB transcripts were significantly associated with high-grade tumors when compared to these levels in low-grade tumors (p<0.01) and could be attributed to different mechanisms of transcriptional regulation as a response to tumorigenesis and oxidative stress. By analyzing the collected data in the present study, regardless of pathological grade or stage, univariate analysis revealed that the reduced levels of APE1 transcripts were significantly associated with cancer-specific mortality (p=0.032). Furthermore, the variant genotype (TG/GG) of the APE1 T1349G polymorphism was observed in 75% of a subset of patients who concomitantly experienced reduced levels of the APE1 transcript and death and/or recurrence events. Taken together, our data reinforce the idea that human DNA repair mechanisms must be finely regulated in order to avoid instability leading to tumorigenesis and poor clinical outcomes in UCB patients.