bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Imaginary World-Making in Adaptation and Therapy
Authors: Arviset Sébastien
Published: September 2023

In this chapter, I will argue that imaginary world-making understood as an authoring-forth can offer an interesting complement or alternative to narrative therapy and its re-authoring process, as well a new direction for therapists to assist patients in developing their adaptative capabilities. I will first explore what an author and co-authors are. Secondly, I will determine what the main characteristics of a narrative are. This will help bring into focus some of the problems that narrative re-authoring entails, since what patients are expected to produce, far from being personal, is in fact determined by a very precise and formalized literary paradigm. In the third part of this essay, while highlighting some of narrative therapy’s other problematic areas, I will argue that it can still be useful as a preliminary step in the therapeutic process, preparing patients for the authoring-forth of world-making, in order to adapt to, and build, their future, while switching from a narrow artistic paradigm to a holistic aesthetic one.
Spatial and Narrative Atmospheres
Authors: Bernegger Guenda
Published: September 2023

Atmosphere is a central dimension of the human experience, which plays a crucial role in medical practice: it affects the quality of the encounter as well as the patient’s trust in the therapist and the adherence to the treatment. Each atmosphere is influenced primarily by spatial, intersubjective, and narrative elements which affect what can or cannot happen within it. Particularly in the psychiatric context, the atmosphere turns out to be vitally important, from the diagnostic level to the therapeutic one. However, like other aesthetic dimensions included in clinical settings, its importance often goes unrecognized, with the resulting risk of uncontrolled, adverse clinical effects. The quality of care and the success of the treatment can instead significantly benefit from the understanding and control of the atmospheric component of clinical settings, with the support of the social aesthetics perspective, its epistemological framework, and its instruments.
Applied Social Aesthetics in Clinical Practice
Authors: Musalek Michael , Scheibenbogen Oliver
Published: September 2023

Social aesthetics understood as the science of sensuously experienced encounters and relationships in general and of interpersonal encounters and relationships in particular provides us with knowledge that in medical-therapeutic practice becomes a key pillar of human-centred approaches to prevention and treatment. It is thus not only a science, but also an art that can be unfolded and developed as applied social aesthetics. As social and communicative beings we are the ones who create our world. How this world of ours is constituted, how we are able to live and experience it, depends on all of us. For those who practise social aesthetics in medicine, the question of how to create and shape life is a constant one and puts social aesthetics at the heart of the medical approach. The chief areas of interest in applied social aesthetics in medicine are above all the style of initial contact with the patient, para-verbality in patient encounters and the elegance of diagnostics, most notably the attractiveness of treatment forms, social-aesthetic therapy goals, providing new possibilities for patients’ cosmopoiesis/cosmopoetics. In the cosmopoetic processes (= development and creation of a beautiful and joyful life) the general Will to Beauty plays a crucial role. The Will to Beauty appears on the one hand as a natural force which attracts us and provides the power which we need for solving our problems and on the other hand it can be used as a cultural force which enables us to create a better and more joyful life.
Inquiry on Hospitality, Compassion, and ‘Antlitz’ by Emmanuel Levinas
Authors: Benaroyo Lazare
Published: September 2023

In the context of contemporary debates on the philosophical foundations of medical practice, this chapter explores the anthropological, epistemological, and ethical dimensions of clinical activity. Against this background, I endeavour to show how Emmanuel Levinas’ conception of ethical responsibility may help us to grasp the ethical core of clinical care. I argue that the meaning Levinas gives to the terms face availability and hospitality is a central aspect related to this issue. The face is in this French philosopher’s view precisely this irreducibility of alterity that lights up its ethical meaning. Accordingly, responsibility, shaped by welcoming, availability, and hospitality is the ethical response to the interpellation of the other’s face. I suggest that Levinas’ philosophical insight constitutes a conception of ethical responsibility that may bear great significance to a renewed understanding of aesthetics and ethics of medical care.
Philosophical Aesthetics in Psychiatric Practice and Education
Authors: Laney Michael , Sadler John Z.
Published: September 2023

In this chapter we explore roles for philosophical aesthetics in contributing to excellent psychiatric practice and education. We situate aesthetics and aesthetic values alongside moral, epistemic, and pragmatic values in informing the quality of our clinical work, and by extension, the quality of our psychiatric educational efforts. After considering some of the fundamental concepts of aesthetics, we show how they are revealed in a range of clinical phenomena, from DSM diagnostic category descriptions, to moments in psychotherapy, to how we describe both compelling and dull clinical interviews. We consider aesthetic values as part of a clinical praxis where formally beautiful clinical skills can be described as ‘aesthetic virtues’ and explore how cultivating these aesthetic virtues could be built into psychiatric training.
Mental Illness in Literature between Phenomenology and Symbolism
Authors: Engelhardt Dietrich V.
Published: September 2023

Psychiatry is a central topic of literature. From ancient times to the present day the mental patient and his illness, the psychiatrist and his therapy, the psychiatric institution and the reactions of society are described and interpreted. The literary texts cover the entire range from phenomenon to symbolism and are affected by the changes of time and place. Aesthetics and ethics are connected, the literary descriptions and interpretations are confronted with the psychiatric or scientific understanding—both influence and stimulate each other. Psychiatry itself combines art (ars) and science (scientia), literature on the other hand can support diagnosis and therapy. In the medium of literature, mental illness appears as a physical, psychological, social, and mental or cultural phenomenon, as a factual as well as normative judgement. In its differentiated, and at the same time broad and holistic perspective, literature offers a fascinating and essential approach to mental illness for laypeople and psychiatrists alike, contributes to medical humanities as humane and human medicine.
Virgil’s Keepsakes
Authors: Mattoni Silvio
Published: September 2023

The theme of memory is especially active in the books of poetry Borges published over the last twenty-five years of his life, but it is a motif that lasted a lifetime. Someone remembers or someone is remembered, and in that improbable coincidence lies the justification for poetry. Thus, writing does not seek permanence or posterity but rather to approach that point where words touch the essential elements of an existence. In the course of oblivion, there are words or verses that are forgotten and repeated, but there the thread of memory of the poet Virgil appears and disappears, passes from inner experience to a verse, or, through a verse, is returned to the imminence of an aesthetic revelation. This chapter sheds light on that long relationship with a classic poet who, for Borges, unites some of literature’s most vital possibilities.
Borges in the Eastern Bloc
Authors: Scholz László
Published: September 2023

This chapter explores the most relevant features of Borges’s presence in Central and Eastern Europe chronologically, from his earliest translations to the collapse of the Eastern Bloc in 1991. The theoretical framework is based on relationships between center and periphery and the mechanisms of polysystems. The chapter discusses different forms of censorship and self-censorship, as well as the various ruses editors used to evade Soviet control during the period known as “the Thaw.” Muscovites’ image of Latin American literature, as well as the decisive function carried out by Mitteleuropa in the westernization of the Bloc, are also discussed.
Borges and the Formation of the Literary Global South
Authors: Corwin Jay
Published: September 2023

The geopolitical term “Global South” encompasses Latin America, Africa, Oceania, the Middle East, and South and Southeast Asia. Questions of the reception and reaction to Borges’s writing and influence in these areas, particularly outside of Latin America, are of great interest especially in consideration of the aesthetic gems from these regions that play a large part in Borges’s fiction: The Thousand and One Nights, the Old Testament, the Qur’an, and Classical Persian poetry, among other writings. Consequently, it may be argued that because Borges repurposes and inlays his fiction with classical texts, history, and religions from these regions, his influences on successive generations of writers from the Global South are both pertinent and inevitable. Claims of “orientalism” and “Islamophobia” have been laid unsuccessfully by critics unfamiliar with Borges’s broader oeuvre (Ian Almond) after having been rejected in the text that re-envisions the term “orientalism” (Said). Primary and secondary influences of Borges are inevitable in writers from the Global South and further afield who have adopted late twentieth-century aesthetic values that may be attributed partly or entirely to the writings of Borges.
Borges in French Theory
Authors: Bosteels Bruno
Published: September 2023

Starting in the early 1960s, Jorge Luis Borges quickly became a celebrity among French thinkers. Philosophers such as Gilles Deleuze, Jacques Derrida, Jean-François Lyotard, and Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe; historians such as Michel Foucault; semiologists such as Julia Kristeva; or sociologists such as Jean Baudrillard all had recourse at one point or another to ideas and formulations from the Argentine writer. In addition to the appeal of Borges’s unique style of writing and thinking, two lines of affinity brought about this unexpected confluence of interests: the shared critique of the subjectivity of “man,” or of the human at the center of the discourse of the human sciences, and the critique of language as “mimesis,” or as the imitation or representation of the real. However, what soon thereafter in the Anglophone world would come to be known as “French theory,” by giving entrance to Borges in some of its most significant early texts, may well have been welcoming into its midst the uncanny force of a Trojan horse. Indeed, the Argentine’s own theoretical and philosophical commitments always tended to favor a tradition that for the longest time was anathema to the whole Parisian philosophical scene, namely, the tradition of New England pragmatism. However, the point of contrasting the two is not to signal a supposed misreading so much as to see what we can learn from this about some of Borges’s most famous readers in France.
Digital Religion Futures
Authors: Cheong Pauline Hope , Campbell Heidi A.
Published: September 2023

This chapter considers the complexities surrounding the future of digital religion. It notes that an integrative understanding of lived religious experiences involving creative complexities and tensions illustrates also the understanding of evolving physical and virtual ontologies. Thus, the emergence of numerous religious human and machinic actors serves as a key element of ontological development, adaptation, and innovation. Everyday religious practices evolved alongside a growing diversity of platform adoption during the global COVID-19 pandemic. Moreover, growing numbers of religious communities now exist in a hybrid form, providing their members with digital and offline services as ways to engage. The chapter discusses how much work is needed in addressing the complexities of gender and agency in digital religion in the future.
Attention, Memory, and the Imagination
Authors: Timalsina Sthaneshwar
Published: September 2023

Tantric visualization practices based on specific images and sounds, as well as the philosophies behind these practices, provide a window for exploring the scope of attention, memory, and imagination in their intentional and extended forms. If ongoing research in the field of cognitive science can help us understand and contextualize these otherwise esoteric practices, then these exercises can also provide empirical evidence for extending the scope of research in these areas of cognitive research. Just as neural analysis can tell us more about a real physiological impact of extended visualization practices, the practitioners can give us their internal phenomenological account of specific experiences corresponding to those physiological states. Rather than simply understanding the neural correlates of everyday experiences, the benefit of focusing on the effects of sustained meditative practices expands the horizon of human consciousness by excavating the limits of the human mind in even its extended state.
Ella Lyman Cabot’s Everyday Ethics
Authors: Matherne Samantha
Published: September 2023

This chapter explores the basic ethical view that Lyman Cabot defends in her first book, Everyday Ethics. After situating her approach to ethics against the backdrop of the American idealist and pragmatist traditions she responds to, it lays out her account of the broad scope of ethics, the role that individualism and self-expression play in ethics, and various ethical characteristics and capacities she thinks we should avoid (e.g., blind habit and prejudice) and cultivate (sympathy, imagination, and open-mindedness). It also addresses Lyman Cabot’s response to a challenge that her ethical program might seem to face, the challenge of self-centeredness, and the theory of self and our relation to others that she develops in this context. Finally, it investigates the emphasis that she places on the role of vision in our ethical lives, including how the way we see is shaped by our individual interests and purposes and how we should learn to see others and ethical opportunities the world affords.
Risk Assessment, Intervention, and Guidance for First Responders and Medical Settings
Authors: Westers Nicholas J. , Tinsley Brittany
Published: September 2023

Healthcare providers in medical settings often serve as first responders in treating individuals who engage in nonsuicidal self-injury (NSSI). This chapter highlights the importance of interpersonal style, self-awareness, and how medical professionals can and should screen for NSSI. It then introduces risk assessment models and highlights important questions for first responders to integrate into their interviews with patients to determine next steps in care. This chapter offers sample questions to use in clinical practice and extends these to a discussion about how first responders can effectively intervene, care for wounds, and provide brief, targeted medical advice to those who self-injure. It discusses challenges, recommendations, and future considerations related to NSSI risk assessment research and ends with a discussion about ethical concerns. This chapter considers the perspective of individuals with lived experience of NSSI and encourages first responders to reflect on how their clinical care may be perceived by those who self-injure at all points of the medical encounter. Key takeaways include:
Promising Approaches to Prevention and Intervention in Higher Education
Authors: Morena Alexandra L. , Trisal Akshay V. , Lloyd-Richardson Elizabeth E.
Published: September 2023

This chapter aims to briefly summarize existing research examining NSSI among those attending university, highlighting the prevalence and other significant descriptive characteristics of NSSI on college campuses, risk factors, and the key characteristics linking NSSI and suicidal behavior. The authors acknowledge a wide range of prevention and intervention strategies that can and should be employed for university students and that capitalize on the strengths offered by integrating key stakeholders (e.g., peers, faculty, and campus counseling services). The authors explore and describe brief peer- and classroom-based intervention strategies that are currently implemented in the university context. Additionally, the authors offer recommendations for improving existing strategies to more explicitly include NSSI-specific content along with future considerations for improving prevention and universal interventions in the university context, and how doing so can directly target and promote NSSI prevention among university students. Although the research in the area of individual-level intervention approaches is limited, university settings offer promising opportunities to deliver multifaceted approaches designed to offer multiple “doses” of intervention to support students’ mental health throughout their years attending university and beyond.
Digital Interventions for Nonsuicidal Self-Injury
Authors: Kruzan Kaylee P. , Whitlock Janis L.
Published: September 2023

This chapter focuses on digital interventions for nonsuicidal self-injury. In line with the presence and influence of new media in daily life, Internet-based websites and applications have become popular places for clinical and broader public health interventions. The proliferation of new digital technologies has resulted in considerations about how to best design resources capable of meeting people in online spaces and how to augment the accessibility of existing evidence-based interventions. Thus, researchers, clinicians, and other health service professionals must be aware of how to assess the strengths and limitations of digital offerings. The chapter discusses existing clinical trials of digital interventions, such as Autobiographical Self-Enhancement Training (ASET) and Self-injury: Treatment, Assessment and Recovery (STAR). It also considers user engagement, safety, privacy, risk management, ethics, and the accessibility of digital interventions.
Cross-Cultural Representations of NSSI
Authors: Wilson Marc Stewart
Published: September 2023

Much of what we know about nonsuicidal self-injury is based on research and practice from cultures that can be described as Western and English-speaking, but there is increasing appreciation of the need to step outside these traditional boundaries. This chapter summarizes research comparing nonsuicidal self-injury characteristics and correlates across four “families” of research: explicit comparisons across nations, considering minority groups within nations, conducted on non-Western/English-speaking nations, and among indigenous minorities. This research highlights variation that may be attributable to culture but that may not have been fully informed by what “culture” means. Therefore, the author explores how cultural and cross-cultural research can contribute to our understanding, with particular attention to the notion of “cultural scripts” in the context of mental health in general, and nonsuicidal self-injury in particular. Finally, the author considers nonsuicidal self-injury in cultural contexts that aren’t defined, as has traditionally been done, by national or ethnic distinctions.
Contract Farming, Agribusiness, and Land in Africa
Authors: Amanor Kojo S.
Published: September 2023

This chapter examines the impact of contract farming on land relations in Africa in the light of recent debates on this topic. It argues against the thesis that contract farming provides a more equitable solution to agricultural modernization than does the expansion of large estates and provides avenues for smallholder farmers to be incorporated into agribusiness food chains. It shows that contract farming often integrates smallholder farmers on unfavorable terms in which most of the surplus value is captured by agribusiness. Agribusiness also supports the expansion of medium-scale farmers and enterprises into agri-food chains to lower costs of production through higher turnover and as a way of integrating smallholder farmers into agrarian value chains. As a result of the concentration in agribusiness, the relationship between transnational corporations and farmers is mediated by subsidiaries and service providers, including civil society organizations, financial institutions, farm enterprises, and input suppliers. Several of these intermediaries have a direct interest in accumulating land, often at the expense of the rural poor. This expropriation of land is often shrouded under various community-participation models and benefit-sharing arrangements that enable the commercial entities to gain control of valuable resources, while the communities retain formal titles to land. The chapter shows that these developments have been facilitated by recent governance reforms that promote market-based reform but frown upon socially redistributive reform. To understand these transformations, the chapter traces the history of contract farming in Africa and the changes that have occurred throughout the process of liberal market reform.
An Explorative Study on State-Owned Museum Performance in Italy
Authors: Dubini Paola , Monti Alberto
Published: September 2023

State-owned museums are complex organizations that have traditionally focused on research and conservation, on the one hand, and cultural diplomacy and national identity enhancement, on the other. In recent years, their role has evolved around valorization activities such as tourist attraction, education, and inclusion. This chapter explores the evolution of governance for this specific type of organization, which in Italy remains under strict government control, while necessarily opening up to a broader set of stakeholders. In this context, the interplay between the director and the board affects the museum’s performance. Specifically, the chapter focuses on the role of directors’ gender, nationality, and human capital characteristics (represented by their international experience and curatorial experience with Italian heritage) and on how directors interact with a board that has diverse (as opposed to homogeneous) competencies and experiences. In an exploratory analysis of the first thirty Italian autonomous museums created by law between 2014 and 2016, the chapter shows that the effects of directors’ human capital and gender are enhanced by the presence of a board with a complementary set of competencies. From a policy perspective, the results suggest that paying attention during the appointment and selection phases both to the director’s effective autonomy and characteristics and to the ways in which the board members’ profiles complement those factors helps foster a more effective valorization.
Introduction to The Oxford Handbook of Arts and Cultural Management
Authors: Jung Yuha , Vakharia Neville , Vecco Marilena
Published: September 2023

This chapter provides an entry to and overview of the Oxford Handbook of Arts and Cultural Management, serving as a reader’s guide to its contents and contributors. The chapter describes the complex nature of arts and cultural management as a field of study that draws from various disciplines and practices. As a result, the study of arts and cultural management is interdisciplinary. This complexity can be seen through the book’s diverse contributors, who span a broad range of disciplinary backgrounds, academic fields, experience levels, and geographies. The chapter also elucidates the need for a comprehensive and contemporary look at research in arts and cultural management, describing each of the book’s ten sections and the themes that emerged from each chapter. Despite the diversity of content and contributors, there will always be a need for additional topics and perspectives that better reflect the global context of this field and include important voices that are not currently reflected herein. As such, future directions are suggested to ensure that arts and cultural research can be more broadly shared, integrated, and global in its reach.
Investigating Syntactic Structure and Processing in the Auditory Modality
Authors: Breen Mara , Carlson Katy
Published: September 2023

When researchers study syntax through speech production and perception experiments, they face new theoretical, practical, and methodological questions. This chapter will inform syntax researchers about the challenges in using prosody in the auditory modality, and provide guidance on practically addressing these challenges. Section 1 describes theoretical questions raised by auditory studies for syntax. Section 2 discusses practical and methodological challenges for auditory research. Section 3 describes how studies using auditory stimuli, varying both pitch accents and prosodic boundaries, inform our understanding of sentence interpretation, which has consequences for the study of syntactic structures. Section 4 reviews recent work on implicit prosody, which suggests that many of the challenges encountered in auditory paradigms are also present in silent reading methods.
Cyber sexual harassment against women and impact on health. A cross-sectional study in a representative population sample
Authors: Benítez-Hidalgo Vivian , Henares-Montiel Jesús , Ruiz-Pérez Isabel , Pastor-Moreno Guadalupe
Published: September 2023

Background

This study focuses on the frequency of cyber sexual harassment (CSH) and examines its link with five health impact indicators (self-perceived health, medication, suicidal ideation, suicide attempts and use of health services).

Methods

Analyzing the data provided by the 2019 Macro-survey on violence against women in Spain, two items of which refer to CSH. It was conducted in Spain on a representative sample of 9568 women aged over 16 years old.

Results

A total of 9.15% of the women surveyed had experienced CSH at some point in their lives. Being under 25 years old, having higher education, not being in a relationship, having no religious beliefs and having a certified disability are sociodemographic characteristics associated with a higher risk of CSH. Women who have experienced other forms of gender-based violence also show an increased risk. Female victims of CSH reported higher rates of suicidal ideation (20% versus 9.79% in non-victims of CSH) and suicidal attempts (7.20% versus 1.74% in non-victims of CSH).

Conclusions

These findings have significant implications for the design of preventive health polices, which should incorporate strategies to address CSH as part of the continuum of multiple interrelated forms of gender violence that affect women and girls throughout their lives.
Kilovoltage X-ray beam quality effect on the relative response of alanine pellet dosemeters
Authors: Hjørringgaard Jakob G , Ankjærgaard Christina , Miller Arne , Andersen Claus E
Published: September 2023

Determination of beam quality correction factors is crucial for performing accurate alanine pellet dosimetry in non-reference fields. For some complex irradiation geometries, interpolation from literature data is more convenient than an experimental approach to establish these factors. Here we investigate the validity of extracting quality correction factors from literature data based on information on beam qualifiers such as half-value layer (HVL) or effective energy ${E}_{\text{eff}}$. A combination of Monte Carlo calculated dose ratios and a microdosimetric assessment of the relative efficiency allows for numerical evaluation of quality correction factors for a wide array of X-ray qualities. The computational analysis demonstrates that the average energy of the X-ray beam is optimal for characterizing the relative response. Special care should be taken when using the common X-ray beam qualifiers HVL or ${E}_{\text{eff}}$ to determine quality correction factors from literature data.
Implications of “flash” radiotherapy for biodosimetry
Authors: Swarts Steven G , Flood Ann Barry , Swartz Harold M
Published: September 2023

Extremely high dose rate radiation delivery (FLASH) for cancer treatment has been shown to produce less damage to normal tissues while having the same radiotoxic effect on tumor tissue (referred to as the FLASH effect). Research on the FLASH effect has two very pertinent implications for the field of biodosimetry: (1) FLASH is a good model to simulate delivery of prompt radiation from the initial moments after detonating a nuclear weapon and (2) the FLASH effect elucidates how dose rate impacts the biological mechanisms that underlie most types of biological biodosimetry. The impact of dose rate will likely differ for different types of biodosimetry, depending on the specific underlying mechanisms. The greatest impact of FLASH effects is likely to occur for assays based on biological responses to radiation damage, but the consequences of differential effects of dose rates on the accuracy of dose estimates has not been taken into account.
Gamma irradiation effect on some asthma drugs: EPR detection of radiosterilization
Authors: Emel Ece , Ayhan Ozmen , Recep Biyik , Ulku Sayin
Published: September 2023

Among many sterilization methods, radiosterilization is a preferred method in the pharmaceutical industry because of its advantages. However, the detection of radiosterilization of drugs is a growing concern for many government regulatory agencies around the world because of changes in the drug’s structure because of exposure to radiation. Electron Paramagnetic Resonance (EPR) proved to be a very sensitive technique to discriminate between irradiated and nonirradiated drugs and detect radicals for days even to years. In this study, the focus is on the detection of radiosterilization of irradiated three asthma drugs (Airfix, Ventolin and Prednol) by using EPR spectroscopy. Regarding the commercial aspects of drugs, it was found that radicals can be detected at least 2 y after irradiation. Therefore, paramagnetic centers formed by the effect of radiation in the samples were determined and the stability of these centers was examined for 2 y by performing the fading study.
Association between single nucleotide polymorphism of DNA damage repair related genes and radiosensitivity in healthy individuals
Authors: Yuan Yayi , Liu Xiaoming , Dong Yuyang , Zhang Ruifeng , Meng Qianqian , Dang Xuhong , Li Lin , Ren Yue , Dong Juancong
Published: September 2023

Radiosensitivity in humans can influence radiation-induced normal tissue toxicity. As radiosensitivity has a genetic predisposition, we aimed to investigate the possible association between four single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) sites and the radiosensitivity in healthy people. We genotyped four selected SNPs: TRIP12 (rs13018957), UIMC1 (rs1700490) and POLN (rs2022302), and analyzed the association between SNP and the radiosensitivity in healthy people. We distinguished radiosensitivity by chromosome aberration analysis in healthy individuals. Healthy donors were classified into three groups based on chromosomal aberrations: resistant, normal and sensitive. Using the normal group as a reference, the genotypes CT and CC of rs13018957 (CT: OR = 26.13; CC: OR = 15.97), AA of rs1700490 (OR = 32.22) and AG of rs2022302 (OR = 13.98) were risk factors for radiosensitivity. The outcomes of the present study suggest that four SNPs are associated with radiosensitivity. This study lends insights to the underlying mechanisms of radiosensitivity and improves our ability to identify radiosensitive individuals.
Zebrafish as a high throughput model for organ preservation and transplantation research
Authors: Da Silveira Cavalcante Luciana , Lopera Higuita Manuela , González‐Rosa Juan Manuel , Marques Beatriz , To Samantha , Pendexter Casie A. , Cronin Stephanie E. J. , Gopinathan Kaustav A. , de Vries Reinier J. , Ellett Felix , Uygun Korkut , Langenau David M. , Toner Mehmet , Tessier Shannon N.
Published: September 2023

Despite decades of effort, the preservation of complex organs for transplantation remains a significant barrier that exacerbates the organ shortage crisis. Progress in organ preservation research is significantly hindered by suboptimal research tools that force investigators to sacrifice translatability over throughput. For instance, simple model systems, such as single cell monolayers or co‐cultures, lack native tissue structure and functional assessment, while mammalian whole organs are complex systems with confounding variables not compatible with high‐throughput experimentation. In response, diverse fields and industries have bridged this experimental gap through the development of rich and robust resources for the use of zebrafish as a model organism. Through this study, we aim to demonstrate the value zebrafish pose for the fields of solid organ preservation and transplantation, especially with respect to experimental transplantation efforts. A wide array of methods were customized and validated for preservation‐specific experimentation utilizing zebrafish, including the development of assays at multiple developmental stages (larvae and adult), methods for loading and unloading preservation agents, and the development of viability scores to quantify functional outcomes. Using this platform, the largest and most comprehensive screen of cryoprotectant agents (CPAs) was performed to determine their toxicity and efficiency at preserving complex organ systems using a high subzero approach called partial freezing (i.e., storage in the frozen state at −10°C). As a result, adult zebrafish cardiac function was successfully preserved after 5 days of partial freezing storage. In combination, the methods and techniques developed have the potential to drive and accelerate research in the fields of solid organ preservation and transplantation.
Recent developments in the synovial fibroblast pathobiology field in rheumatoid arthritis
Authors: Neumann Elena , Heck Corinna , Müller-Ladner Ulf
Published: September 2023

Purpose of review

Synovial fibroblasts are the central cells of connective tissue homeostasis. In rheumatoid arthritis (RA) tissue, synovial fibroblasts are activated because of the proinflammatory environment very early in the disease. Epigenetic alterations in RASF result in a permanently activated stage, and activated RASF are involved in many processes of RA pathophysiology. Therefore, several recent findings of the last 18 months with focus on RASF activation and function are summarized.

Recent findings

RASF activation because of a profoundly altered epigenome leads to an invasive phenotype with increased migration, adhesion and invasion into cartilage, which was further characterized in several studies. RASF subtypes and subtype dynamics were evaluated using high-resolution techniques to better understand RASF pathophysiology. Many studies addressing interactions with immune or stromal cell types have been published showing that RASF interact with many different cell types contributing not only to their own activation and pro-inflammatory response but also to the activation of the other cells.

Highly interesting findings revealing mechanisms of RASF activation and altered functions have been published, RASF subsets further characterized, and interactions with cell types elucidated, which all contribute to a better understanding of the role of RASF in RA development and progression.
Preservation of Eschar Prevents Excessive Wound Healing by Reducing M2 Macrophages Polarization
Authors: Shi Mingyue , Lu Yao , Mohyeddin Ali , Qi Fazhi , Pan Yuyan
Published: September 2023

Background:

Removal of the eschar has gradually become a consensus on treatments of deep dermal necrosis after skin trauma in recent years, whereas exaggerated scar contracture and tissue proliferation developed during healing have received little attention. Here, the authors investigated the effects of eschar on excessive wound healing of small dermal damage and focused on the role M2 macrophages played, hoping to offer a theoretical basis to improve patients’ cosmetic satisfaction.

Methods:

A mouse dorsal wound model (n = 12) was established by electric heating pads heating for 20 seconds on each side of the spine, and the left side was the preserved group. Macrophage numbers, expression of wound-healing-associated proteins, and inflammatory cytokine levels were assessed at different time points by immunohistochemistry and quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction. A co-culture system of M2 macrophages and myofibroblasts was created in vitro. Immunohistochemistry, real-time polymerase chain reaction, and Western blot were performed to evaluate the proliferation, migration, and protein expression of myofibroblasts.

Results:

Preserving eschar inhibited contraction-associated proteins (α-smooth muscle actin and vimentin) and collagen expression, inflammatory cytokine (IL-1β, IL-10, TFN-α, and IL-4) expression, and M2 macrophage infiltration. Mechanistically, M2 macrophages potentially contributed to excessive wound healing by promoting myofibroblasts proliferation, migration, and production of contraction-associated proteins.

Conclusion:

Eschar preservation in wounds could reduce inflammation and negatively modulate myofibroblasts by inhibiting M2 macrophage polarization and infiltration, preventing excessive wound contraction and collagen deposition.
Nose-Ocomial Pulmonary Edema: A Rare Complication of Oxymetazoline
Authors: Godbe Kerilyn N. , Sinik Lauren M. , Lemons Douglas V. , Sokol Jason A.
Published: September 2023

A 72-year-old female with epiphora presented for outpatient punctoplasty with probing and lacrimal stent placement. Oxymetazoline was administered intranasally and the case was completed in standard fashion. Postoperatively, the patient desaturated with a workup revealing elevated cardiac enzymes, pulmonary congestion, and sinus bradycardia. However, the final cardiac testing was noncontributory, suggesting flash pulmonary edema secondary to intranasal oxymetazoline. This case highlights a rare presentation of pulmonary compromise secondary to oxymetazoline, emphasizing the importance of intraoperative and postoperative vigilance in simple outpatient procedures.
Effects of Biologics on Mental Health and Health-Related Quality of Life in Patients With Psoriasis: A Repeated Cross-Sectional Survey in Chinese Population
Authors: Liu Jie , Wang Xuan , Yu Xiao-Ling , Lin Zhi-Miao , Yuan Li-Yan , Yang Bin
Published: September 2023

Objective:

Psoriasis is a chronic inflammatory systemic disease that severely impacts patients’ quality of life (QoL) and psychological health. While biologics have been shown to be effective in treating psoriatic lesions, thus improving QoL, real-life data regarding such effects remain scant. We administered a repeated cross-sectional survey to assess the effects of 8 weeks of biologics treatment on the QoL and mental health status of patients with moderate-to-severe plaque psoriasis.

Methods:

From March to May 2022, patients with moderate-to-severe plaque psoriasis were enrolled and treated with biologics in the outpatient clinic at the Dermatology Hospital of Southern Medical University. Assessments were performed before treatment and after 4 and 8 weeks of treatment with biologics. Psoriasis severity, QoL, and mental health status were evaluated using the Psoriasis Area and Severity Index (PASI), Dermatology Life Quality Index (DLQI), 36-Item Short-form Health Survey (SF-36), and Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS). A multivariate generalized estimating equations (GEE) analysis was used to account for repeated measures and to determine the effects of treatment duration and type of biological agent on relevant indicators.

Results:

Among the 78 enrolled patients, the ranges of pretreatment scores were 4.6 to 46.8 for the PASI, 1 to 30 for the DLQI, 31.5 to 100.0 for the physical component score (PCS) of the SF-36, 16.6 to 100.0 for the mental component score (MCS) of the SF-36, 0 to 15 for the HADS-A, and 0 to 17 for the HADS-D. After 8 weeks of biologics treatment, 98.7% (77/78) of patients had obtained PASI 75. All assessed scores changed over time (GEE,P< 0.001). Moreover, there were group-by-time interaction effects for the DLQI score (GEE,P= 0.023) and PCS (GEE,P= 0.029). The HADS-A and HADS-D scores were both decreased at week 8 compared with pretreatment values. Correlation analyses revealed that higher DLQI scores were associated with lower levels of QoL and higher levels of anxiety or depression.

Conclusion:

Biologics are not only effective in the treatment of skin lesions but also exert beneficial effects upon the QoL and mental health of patients with psoriasis as determined in the short-term assessments conducted in this study.
Epidemiology of leprosy in China, 2021: an update
Authors: Shi Ying , Sun Pei-Wen , Wang Le , Wang Hong-Sheng , Yu Mei-Wen , Gu Heng
Published: September 2023

Objective:

To describe the epidemiological characteristics of leprosy in China in 2021 and provide essential information for future national leprosy control and prevention strategies.

Methods:

We collected epidemiological data of leprosy from 31 provinces, autonomous regions, and municipalities of China (except for Hong Kong, Macao, and Taiwan) provided by the Leprosy Management Information System. We performed a comparative analysis of the epidemiological features of patients with leprosy including age, sex, geographical distribution, and grade of disability.

Results:

In total, 374 newly detected leprosy cases were reported nationwide in China in 2021, giving an incidence rate of 0.27 per million population, which represented a decrease of 7.9% compared with 2020. Among the population with leprosy in 2021 that comprised 238 males (63.6%) and 136 females (36.4%), 1.9% (7/374) were children younger than 15 years, 92.8% (347/374) had multibacillary leprosy, and 18.2% (68/374) had grade 2 disability. More than half of the new leprosy cases (54.8%, 205/374) were distributed in southwest China. There were 33 relapsed leprosy cases reported in 2021. By the end of 2021, there were 1,897 registered leprosy cases reported nationwide, giving a prevalence rate of 1.35 per million population.

Conclusion:

The leprosy epidemic in China shows a downward trend in terms of the prevalence and incidence rates. However, the high prevalence of leprosy in southwest China is still a matter of concern.
An extensive review of vitiligo-associated conditions
Authors: Premkumar Madhavi , Bhaskar Kalarani Iyshwarya , Mohammed Vajagathali , Veerabathiran Ramakrishnan
Published: September 2023

Vitiligo is an autoimmune disorder caused by the destruction of melanocytes in various body regions. Numerous diseases may accompany vitiligo. The prevalence of vitiligo varies among geographical regions and shows no relation to sex or age. However, vitiligo most commonly affects people aged 10 to 30 years. The clinical symptoms of vitiligo include irregular patches on the skin and various diseases associated with this disorder. The present review focuses on the clinical effects and risk factors of vitiligo-associated conditions and the current therapeutics for treating vitiligo. This systematic review was performed based on the PRISMA guidelines and articles published from 2000 to 2023 in several electronic databases (Web of Science, PubMed, PsycINFO, and others). The most clinically significant diseases associated with vitiligo are alopecia areata, autoimmune thyroid disease, Addison's disease, and type 1 diabetes mellitus. No targeted population is specifically prone to vitiligo; it does not affect any particular race or sex. Hence, awareness of the diseases associated with vitiligo is necessary to control them through various medical and surgical treatments with the proper facilities.
Pooled Phase 2 and 3 Efficacy and Safety Data on Budesonide Oral Suspension in Adolescents with Eosinophilic Esophagitis
Authors: Mukkada Vincent A. , Gupta Sandeep K. , Gold Benjamin D. , Dellon Evan S. , Collins Margaret H. , Katzka David A. , Falk Gary W. , Williams James , Zhang Wenwen , Boules Mena , Hirano Ikuo , Desai Nirav K.
Published: September 2023

Objectives:

The objective of this study was to evaluate the efficacy and safety of budesonide oral suspension (BOS) in adolescents with eosinophilic esophagitis (EoE).

Methods:

This post hoc analysis pooled data from two 12-week, randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled studies of BOS 2.0 mg twice daily (b.i.d.) (phase 2, NCT01642212; phase 3, NCT02605837) in patients aged 11–17 years with EoE and dysphagia. Efficacy endpoints included histologic (≤6, ≤1, and <15 eosinophils per high-power field [eos/hpf]), dysphagia symptom (≥30% reduction in Dysphagia Symptom Questionnaire [DSQ] scores from baseline), and clinicopathologic (≤6 eos/hpf and ≥30% reduction in DSQ scores from baseline) responses at week 12. Change from baseline to week 12 in peak eosinophil counts, DSQ scores, EoE Histology Scoring System (EoEHSS) grade (severity) and stage (extent) total score ratios (TSRs), and total EoE Endoscopic Reference Scores (EREFS) were assessed. Safety outcomes were also examined.

Results:

Overall, 76 adolescents were included (BOS, n = 45; placebo, n = 31). Significantly more patients who received BOS than placebo achieved histologic responses (≤6 eos/hpf: 46.7% vs 6.5%; ≤1 eos/hpf: 42.2% vs 0.0%; <15 eos/hpf: 53.3% vs 9.7%; P < 0.001) and a clinicopathologic response (31.1% vs 3.2%; P = 0.003) at week 12. More BOS-treated than placebo-treated patients achieved a dysphagia symptom response at week 12 (68.9% vs 58.1%; not statistically significant P = 0.314). BOS-treated patients had significantly greater reductions in EoEHSS grade and stage TSRs (P < 0.001) and total EREFS (P = 0.021) from baseline to week 12 than placebo-treated patients. BOS was well tolerated, with no clinically meaningful differences in adverse events versus placebo.

Conclusions:

BOS 2.0 mg b.i.d. significantly improved most efficacy outcomes in adolescents with EoE versus placebo.
A live-cell ergosterol reporter for visualization of the effects of fluconazole on a human fungal pathogen
Authors: Serrano Antonio , Basante-Bedoya Miguel A. , Bassilana Martine , Arkowitz Robert A.
Published: September 2023

Ergosterol, an essential plasma membrane amphipathic lipid, is a major component of the fungal plasma membrane. Most fungal pathogens are sensitive to azole drugs that target ergosterol biosynthesis and resistance/tolerance to azoles is increasingly problematic. Candida albicans is the most prevalent etiology of candidiasis and, in this fungal pathogen, ergosterol rich sub-domains are likely to include sphingolipids, as well as specific membrane proteins, such as multidrug transporters. To investigate the dynamics of ergosterol during the cell cycle and whether drug treatment affects these dynamics in this opportunistic pathogen, we adapted the D4H (domain 4 of the perfringolysin O bacterial toxin) reporter for studying sterol-rich membrane domains. We show that D4H provides a direct readout for the cellular effects of fluconazole and that highly polarized ergosterol is not critical for budding or filamentous growth.