bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Kajian Kelayakan Bendung Karet Sungai Pemali di Kabupaten Brebes
Authors: Pranida Pipit Skriptianata Putra
Published: April 2022

Bendung karet merupakan salah satu tipe bendung gerak, berfungsi untuk menaikkan muka air dan melepaskannya pada saat banjir. Bendung model ini dapat berisi udara atau air. Kembang kempisnya bendung karet terjadi secara otomatis jika muka air mencapai elevasi yang ditentukan, penentuan elevasi ini diatur dengan mekanisme tertentu. Pembangunan Bendung Karet Sungai Pemali merupakan upaya untuk memenuhi kebutuhan air di Kawasan Industri Brebes (KIB) dan juga untuk air baku di sekitar Sungai Pemali. Kebutuhan air industri 2,78 m3/dt dan kebutuhan air baku sebanyak 0,28 m3/dt. Tampungan dari genangan bendung karet hanya mampu menyuplai air baku maksimal sebesar sebesar 0,04 m3/detik dan sebaiknya diarahkan untuk pemenuhan kebutuhan air baku warga di sekitar bendung karet Sungai Pemali. Pembangunan Bendung Karet Sungai Pemali untuk pemenuhan air baku Kawasan Industri Brebes (KIB) di ketiga alternatif dinyatakan tidak layak secara hidrologi (neraca air defisit selama 6 bulan) dan tidak layak secara ekonomi (jarak yang jauh dengan KIB yang relatif jauh dan biaya konstruksi yang terlalu mahal sehingga tidak menguntungkan). Untuk pemenuhan air baku di Kawasan Industri Brebes (KIB) lebih efisien digunakan potensi air yang ada di 3 (tiga) sungai terdekat (Sungai Cisanggarung, Sungai Babakan, dan Sungai Kabuyutan) dengan mempertimbangkan neraca air di masing-masing sungai tersebut.
Successful management of a chronic posterior sternoclavicular joint dislocation with retrosternal compression syndrome: a case report and literature review
Authors: Feng Dongxu , Wang Xiaolong , Heng Lisong , Qiao Haifeng , Zhang Jun
Published: April 2022

Introduction: Posterior sternoclavicular dislocation is a rare injury that could cause retrosternal structures compression syndrome. Treatment of chronic posterior sternoclavicular dislocation is challenging. Case presentation: We report a 26-year-old posterior sternoclavicular dislocation male patient with10-year retrosternal compression syndrome who underwent sternoclavicular joint reconstruction with allo-tendon graft. During follow up, the clinical and radiologic outcome was good, he was highly satisfied with the treatment. Conclusions: Posterior sternoclavicular dislocation is extremely rare, any suspicion of this kind of injury should be tested with CT, figure-of-8 technique with tendon graft can be used successfully to treat posterior sternoclavicular dislocation.
Risk factors for postoperative delirium on oxygen delivery-guided perfusion
Authors: Mukaida Hiroshi , Matsushita Satoshi , Minami Yuki , Sato Go , Usuba Masato , Kondo Rinako , Asai Tohru , Amano Atsushi
Published: April 2022

Background:
Studies have demonstrated the efficacy of oxygen delivery-guided perfusion (ODGP) in preventing postoperative acute kidney injury, but the benefit of ODGP for delirium has not been confirmed. We retrospectively investigated the risk factors for postoperative delirium in patients who underwent ODGP (with oxygen delivery index [DO2i]>300 mL/min/m2).
Methods:
Consecutive patients who underwent on-pump cardiovascular surgery with ODGP between January 2018 and December 2020 were retrospectively analyzed. In addition to examining patients DO2i during cardiopulmonary bypass (CPB), we quantified the two primary DO2 components – hematocrit (Hct) and pump flow. Delirium was defined based on the Intensive Care Delirium Screening Checklist (ICDSC). Patients were divided into three groups: no delirium (ICDSC score = 0), subsyndromal delirium (ICDSC score = 1–3), and clinical delirium (ICDSC score ≥ 4).
Results:
Multivariate analysis identified only age and the cumulative time below the Hct threshold of 25% as predictive factors of postoperative delirium. Although patients with higher ICDSC scores had greater hemodilution during CPB, ODGP resulted in a higher pump flow, and DO2i was maintained above 300 mL/min/m2, with no significant difference between the three groups.
Conclusions:
A low Hct level during CPB with ODGP and age were independent predictors of postoperative delirium. Further investigations are needed to determine the ability of ODGP to prevent low Hct during CPB.
Application of physiologically-based pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamics modeling to predict drug-drug interactions of dronedarone as a perpetrator with oral anti-coagulants
Authors: Wen Haini , He Qing-feng , Jiao Zheng , Xiang Xiao-qiang , Yu Jian-guang
Published: April 2022

Background
Concurrent use of dronedarone and oral anti-coagulants are common since both classes of medications are essential to atrial fibrillation (AF) management. Dronedarone is a moderate inhibitor of cytochrome P450 3A4 (CYP3A4) and P-glycoprotein (P-gp). All direct oral anticoagulants (DOACs) are P-gp substrates, and apixaban and rivaroxaban are in addition metabolized by CYP3A4. The current study aims to investigate the impact of dronedarone co-administration on exposure as well as bleeding risk of apixaban or rivaroxaban with physiologically based pharmacokinetic (PBPK) modeling.
Method
Modeling and simulation were conducted with Simcyp® Simulator. The input parameters required for dronedarone modeling were collected from literature. The developed dronedarone PBPK model was extensively validated with reported DDIs between dronedarone and CYP3A4 and P-gp substrates. After model validation, the model was applied to evaluate DDI potential of dronedarone on exposure and consequent increase in major bleeding risk of apixaban or rivaroxaban in both healthy subjects and AF patients with renal impairment.
Result
The developed PBPK models accurately describe dronedarone pharmacokinetics following single- oral dose in healthy subjects. The model also predicts DDIs between dronedarone and CYP3A4 and P-gp substrates well, with all fold errors less than 1.5. Co-administration of dronedarone would lead to a 1.23-fold increase and a 1.36-fold increase in AUC24h for rivaroxaban and apixaban in healthy subjects, respectively. In addition, patients with moderate and severe renal impairment co-administered with dronedarone and apixaban would have 1.78-fold and 1.89-fold increase of major bleeding risk, respectively. In contrast, while dronedarone would also increase exposure of rivaroxban in patients with moderate and severe renal impairment, increases in major bleeding risk were 1.18-fold and 1.3-fold, respectively..
Conclusions
Dronedarone co-administration would increase major bleeding risks of rivaroxban and apixban. Reduced apixaban dosing regimen of 3.75mg q12h was recommended when dronedarone is co-administered, for AF patients with both normal and impaired renal functions. Reduced rivaroxban dosing regimen of 10mg q24h was recommended when dronedarone is co-administered for AF patients with both moderate and severe impaired renal functions.
Whole genome non-invasive prenatal testing in prenatal screening algorithm: clinical experience from 12700 pregnancies
Authors: Baranova Elena E , Sagaydak Olesya V. , Galaktionova Alexandra M. , Kuznetsova Ekaterina S. , Kaplanova Madina T. , Makarova Maria V. , Belenikin Maxim S. , Olenev Anton S. , Songolova Ekaterina N.
Published: April 2022

BackgroundA fast adoption of a non–invasive prenatal testing (NIPT) in clinical practice is a global tendency last years. The aim of the study - to assess efficiency of using NIPT as a second-line first trimester screening test in Moscow.MethodsBased on the results of the first trimester combined prenatal screening 12700 pregnant women were classified as a high-risk (cut-off ≥1:100) and an intermediate-risk (cut-off 1:101 – 1:2500) groups followed by whole genome NIPT. Women from high-risk group and those who had positive NIPT results were considered for invasive prenatal diagnostic. Results258 (2,0%) samples with positive NIPT results were detected including 126 cases of trisomy 21 (T21), 40 cases of T18, 12 cases of T13, 41 cases of sex chromosome aneuploidies (SCAs) and 39 cases of rare autosomal aneuploidies (RAAs) and significant copy number variations (CNVs). Statistically significant associations (p<0.05) were revealed for fetal fraction (FF) and both for some patient’s (body mass index and weight) and fetus’s characteristics (sex and high risk of aneuploidies). NIPT showed high sensitivity and specificity for common trisomies and SCAs with an overall false positive rate 0.3%.ConclusionsNIPT demonstrated high sensitivity and specificity. As a second-line screening test it has shown high efficiency in detecting fetus chromosomal anomalies as well as it could potentially lower the number of invasive procedures in pregnant women.
Efficacy of care manager-led support for family caregivers of people with dementia during the COVID-19 pandemic: A randomized controlled study
Authors: Kazawa Kana , Kubo Tatsuhiko , Ohge Hiroki , Ishii Shinya
Published: April 2022

Background: A prolonged COVID-19 pandemic could exacerbate the risk of infection and undesirable effects associated with infection control measures of older people with dementia (PWD), and the care burden of families. In this study, we examined the efficacy of care manager-led information provision and practical support for families of older PWD who need care, regarding appropriate infection prevention, prevention of deterioration of cognitive and physical functions, and preparedness in cases of infection spread or infection during the pandemic.Methods: Fifty-three family members (aged ≥ 20 years) who were primary caregivers living with older PWD using public long-term care services were enrolled in an one-month randomized controlled trial. This duration was set based on behavior modification theory and with consideration of ethical issue that the most vulnerable people not benefiting from the intervention. The intervention group (IG) received care manager-led information provision and practical support, and the control group (CG) received usual care. Care burden (primary outcome) was measured using the Zarit Caregiver Burden Interview, and secondary outcomes were analyzed using Patient Health Questionnaire-9 (PHQ9), the Fear of COVID-19 Scale, and salivary α-amylase activity. Data were collected at baseline and after one month. Multiple regression analysis was conducted to examine the efficacy of the intervention. The participants evaluated the care managers’ support.Results: The participants were randomly divided into IG (n=27) and CG (n=26) groups. After the intervention, compared with the CG, there was a decrease in PHQ-9 (β = -.202, p = 0.044) and α-amylase activity in saliva (β = -.222, p = 0.097) in IG. IG also showed an increased fear of COVID-19 after the intervention (β = .261, p = 0.003). With the care managers’ support, 57.2% of the participants felt secure in their daily lives and 53.1% agreed that they were able to practice infection prevention suitable for older PWD.Conclusions: Our findings suggest that the care manager-led intervention may be useful for families of older PWD to enhance behavioral changes in preventing COVID-19 infection and improve their psychological outcomes in the COVID-19 era. Trial registration: This study was registered on April 2, 2021 (No. UMIN000043820)
Perception and Involvement of Residents in Improving Urban Greenery in Parakou and Porto-Novo Cities of Benin Republic
Authors: Alexis Akakpo Bokon ,   Appollonia A. Okhimamhe1, Orekan Vincent A.O.
Published: April 2022

Urban sustainable development is a feat to achieve, particularly within African nations. Current patterns of urban expansion are creating multiple problems to urban greenery and quality of life. Assuming urban resident’s perception varies between and within cities, this paper claims to document resident’s perceptions on the existing greenery spaces, the prerogative for environmental safeguard, and the determinant of resident’s willingness for urban greenery improvement within the cities of Parakou and Porto-Novo in Benin. A semi-structured interview was conducted with 400 people in each city. The test χ2 was applied to understand the independence between cities and city boroughs. Correspondence analysis was also used to display some relationships and binary logistic regression to examine the variables that explain people’s willingness to get involved in improving urban greenery in each city. The results revealed that around 80% of existing urban greeneries are mostly located in the core of the town and the state of the density and diversity of these greenery areas were differently perceived in the districts of each city. The main benefits lost from urban greenery were air quality (45.25%) for Parakou and cooling effect (74%) for Porto-Novo and the causes of these losses depended also on the cities and the districts within the cities. Public participation was perceived to be low (> 85%) and the institutional cooperation with local communities must be improved to foster the involvement of people in urban greenery development. This study is relevant to support literature data and to further studies. It will also serve as a guideline for policymakers, urban planners, and managers, cityscape architects, and projects of urban sustainability regarding the urban greenery in the Republic of Benin.
Nurse’s Perception Regarding Challenges in Home Care During COVID-19: A Qualitative Study
Authors: Ghezeljeh Tahereh Najafi , Shahrestanaki* Sahar Keyvanloo , majdabadi Zahra Amrollah , Fakhari Ehsan
Published: April 2022

Background: The Covid-19 pandemic has posed several challenges to the world's healthcare systems, especially nursing, including home care nursing problems.Objective: The purpose of this study was to explain nurses' perceptions of the challenges of home care in the Covid-19 pandemic.Methods: The present study was a qualitative study with a conventional content analysis approach conducted from November 2020 to September 2021. Participants included 16 home care nurses who were purposefully selected based on eligibility criteria. After obtaining ethical authorization, the data were collected through semi-structured interviews. MAXQDA Version 10 software was used for data mangement. Data analysis was performed using Granheim and Lundman five-step method. Guba and Lincoln criteria were utilized for trustworthiness. Findings: The seven main categories obtained in this study included “the onset of a new chapter: from avoidance to relapse”, “burnout”, “vortex of moral distress”, “social stigma”, “difficulty in breaking the transmission chain”, “care inhibitors related to patient and family” and “support deficiency: crisis of home care nursing agencies in crisis”.Conclusion: The results showed that nurses working in-home care during the Covid-19 pandemic had experienced several challenges in various fields. Identifying these challenges in the Covid-19 pandemic can help improve the quality of home care nursing and strengthen the field for applied research and planning in this area.
Electrostatic Nonlinear Dispersive Parametric Mode Interaction
Authors: Sun Xiaopeng , Zhou Xin , Ren Xingjing , Li Lan , Miao Tongqiao , Lu Kuo , Wu Xuezhong , Xiao Dingbang
Published: April 2022

Understanding and controlling the nonlinear coupling in micro/nanomechanical resonators are of great importance to the exploitation of advanced devices. The recently observed electrostatic nonlinear parametric coupling is a very interesting topic. However, the theoretical model of the electrostatic parametric coupling still remains unclear. This paper explicitly derives the model and the electrostatically induced dispersive parametric coupling which reveals the ability of tuning the bifurcation topology of capacitive resonators is analyzed based on the multiple-time-scale method. A novel displacement-to-frequency transduction scheme based on this electrostatic dispersive parametric coupling effect is proposed. The transduction sensitivity is theoretically given, which indicates that this electrostatic dispersive transduction scheme can provide even more design freedoms than the existing displacement-to-frequency transduction scheme based on tension modulation. In addition, a bifurcation reversal effect is predicted in the strong actuated states of the dispersive parametric coupled system, which reveals the ability of tuning the bifurcation topology of capacitive resonators.
Antibiotic prescribing patterns for children's outpatient department of primary care institutions in Southwest China
Authors: Wang Wenju , Chang Yue , Yu Shitao , Zhou Xunrong , Wang Lei , He Xun , Zhou Hanni
Published: April 2022

Background
The problem of inappropriate use of antibiotics in children is common in many countries. The purpose of the study was to explore patterns of antibiotic prescribing in children’s outpatient clinics in primary care institutions.
Methods
We obtained prescription data from 75 primary care institutions in Guizhou province recorded by the hospital information system in 2020. The classification of incorrect spectrum of antibiotics, unnecessary use and combined use of antibiotics was based on the Guiding Principle of Clinical Use of Antibiotics (2015, China) and guidelines from the USA Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Potential risk factors for inappropriate use of antibiotics were identified using a bivariate cross table. The generalized estimation equation was used to identify independent predictors controlling irrational use of antibiotics.
Results
A total of 158,267 antibiotic prescriptions were retrieved. Acute upper respiratory tract infections were the most common diseases, accounting for 74.9% of all prescriptions. The main antibiotic group used was penicillins (63.7%), followed by cephalosporins (18.8%). Of 137,284 visits, 30.2% of antibiotic prescriptions were appropriate and the percentage of unnecessary use, incorrect spectrum of antibiotics and combined use of antibiotics was 63.8%, 3.6% and 2.4%, respectively. Physicians with lower professional titles and more than 40 years of work duration were relatively more likely to prescribe inappropriate antibiotics.
Conclusion
The inappropriate use of antibiotics in children is still prominent in primary care institutions of China. The education and training of physicians and caregivers in these institutions should be strengthened.
Effect of intraoperative amino acid infusion on postoperative acute kidney injury after open abdominal aortic aneurysm repair: a retrospective cohort study
Authors: Kazawa Masahiro , Kabata Daijiro , Shintani Ayumi , Minami Kimito , Sasaki Hiroaki , Matsuda Hitoshi , Yoshitani Kenji , Ohnishi Yoshihiko
Published: April 2022

Background: The incidence of acute kidney injury (AKI) after open abdominal aortic aneurysm (AAA) repair is reportedly higher than the incidence after general surgery. Amino acid infusion has been shown to increase renal blood flow, thus protecting the kidneys. Therefore, we hypothesized that intraoperative amino acid infusion, which was used to maintain body temperature, is associated with a lower incidence of postoperative AKI. The aim of this study was to validate this hypothesis. Methods: In this retrospective, observational, single-center cohort study, we included patients who underwent open AAA repair between January 2007 and April 2019. Perioperative data were abstracted from medical records. The primary outcome was AKI diagnosed according to Kidney Disease: Improving Global Outcomes criteria. Secondary outcomes were creatinine-AKI diagnosed based on serum creatinine alone and postoperative serum creatinine trajectory. A Fine and Gray proportional hazards regression analysis was conducted to examine the relationship between amino acid infusion and AKI. Similarly, multivariable logistic regression was performed for creatinine-AKI. Postoperative serum creatinine trajectory was assessed using a multivariable non-linear regression model with the Huber-White method.Results: Of 696 patients, 310 patients received an amino acid infusion. Most patients received an amino acid infusion of 20 g. The amino acid group had a lower prevalence of AKI (24.7% vs. 25.3%; adjusted Hazard Ratio (HR)=0.86; 95% CI, 0.67–1.11; P=0.24) and creatinine-AKI (23.5% vs. 19.2%; adjusted odds ratio (OR)=0.84; 95% CI, 0.50–1.43; P=0.52) than the control group, but the differences were not statistically significant. Postoperative serum creatinine levels were significantly lower in the amino acid infusion group on postoperative days 5 and 6.Conclusions: Intraoperative amino acid infusion has a tendency to reduce the incidence of postoperative AKI among patients undergoing open AAA repair. However, we could not show a statistically significant difference.Trial registration: UMIN000038527, 09/11/2019
Design approach of shear strengthened masonry: welded wire meshes, Reticulatus and cementitious plastering methods
Authors: Thamboo Julian , Corradi Marco , Poologanathan Keerthan
Published: April 2022

Masonry often requires strengthening to withstand against extreme actions such as earthquakes, cyclones and flooding. Recently, new solutions have been developed to strengthen masonry, such as Fabric Reinforced Cementitious Matrixes (FRCM) and Fibre Reinforced Polymers (FRP). However, other strengthening systems such as Welded Wire Meshing (WWM), Reticulatus and Plastering with Cementitious matrixes/mortar (CP) have been also practiced, conversely no systematic design guidelines are available for these methods. In this study, an attempt has been made to establish rational design approaches to predict the shear resistance of WWM, Reticulatus and CP strengthening systems. Three sets of experimental database have been developed for design verification. The effectiveness of these strengthening methods was appraised by comparing their structural performances. The available formulations to predict the shear resistance of unreinforced masonry (URM) and CP strengthened masonry were assessed against the established database, and suitable modifications were proposed to effectively account the contribution of cementitious matrix. A unified approach to estimate the shear strength was proposed based on the contribution of URM, CP and reinforcements. The design approach is shown to conservatively predict the shear strength of reinforced masonry.
Nomograms for predicting survival outcomes in patients with bladder mucinous adenocarcinoma: a large population-based investigation
Authors: Song Wu , Pan Jian , Li Ying-Rui , Lei Qi-Fang , Wang Feng , Dai Rui-Xiang , Wang Yu , Liang Guan-Can
Published: April 2022

Introduction: Bladder mucinous adenocarcinoma (BMA) is a very few histological subtypes has an invasive disease progression and poor clinical prognosis. The aim of this study was to investigate prognostic clinicopathological factors in patients with BMA and to develop a nomogram model using a large population-based cancer database.Patients and Methods: A total of 426 patients with BMA with adequate tumor data were determined in the Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results (SEER) database from 2004 to 2017. Univariate and multivariate Cox regression models were used to identify independent risk factors for constructing the nomograms to forecast the overall survival (OS) and cancer-specific survival (CSS) in BMA patients.Results: Compared with transitional cell carcinoma (TCC), BMA patients are younger and have larger tumors. BMA Patients were also be inclined to experience advanced T stage, lymph node metastasis, and distant metastasis. Older age, poorly differentiated histological grade, extravesical tumor, lymphatic metastasis, distant metastasis, and larger tumor volume were unassociated risk factors, and hence integrated into the models. The C-index values of the nomograms to predict OS and CSS were 0.708 and 0.741, respectively.Conclusion: Two prognostic nomograms were developed that provided an individual prediction of OS and CSS for BMA patients, which may help clinicians make treatment plans.
Assessment of formats and completeness of paper-based referral letters among urban hospitals in Rwanda: A retrospective baseline study
Authors: Kalume Zamzam , Jansen Bart , Nyssen Marc , Cornelis Jan , Verbeke Frank , Niyoyita Jean Paul
Published: April 2022

Background
Patient referral is a process in which a healthcare provider decides to seek assistance at a higher level of care. Paper-based referrals predominantly used in low-income countries hardly follow any procedures. This causes a major gap in communication, coordination, and continuity of care between primary and specialized levels, leading to poor access, delay, duplication and unnecessary costs. The goal of this study is to assess the formats and completeness of existing paper-based referral letters to improve health information exchange, coordination, and continuity of care for the hospitals in the urban environment of Kigali.
Methods
A retrospective exploratory research was conducted in eight public and three private healthcare facilities in the city of Kigali from July 2019 to July 2021. A purposive sampling method was used to select referral letters from patients’ files. A data capture sheet was designed according to the contents of the referral letters and were analyzed descriptively.
Results
In public hospitals, there were five updated referral letters in total agreement with world health organization (WHO) standards of which two (neonatal transfer form and patient monitoring transfer form) were not used. There was also one old format that was used by most hospitals and another format designed and used by a district hospital (DH) separately. Three formats were designed and used by private hospitals (PH) individually. A total of 2,304 referral letters were perused and the results show that “external transfer” forms were completed at 58,8%; “antenatal, delivery, and postnatal external transfer” forms at 47,5%; “internal transfer” forms at 46,6%; “Fiche de référence / Contre reference” forms at 46,0%; district hospital (DH2) at 73,4%. Referrals by private hospitals (PH1, PH2 and PH3) were completed at 97,7%, 70,7%, and 0.0% respectively.
Conclusions
There were inconsistencies in the format of the available referral letters used by public hospitals though some of them were incompatible with WHO standards. Additionally, there were deficits in the completeness of referral letters. There is a need to disseminate the national patient referral guideline in public hospitals with emphasis on referral feedback, referral registry, triage, archiving, and regular training organization.
Landslide susceptibility mapping using machine learning techniques and comparison of their performance at Ziz upper watershed, Southeastern Morocco
Authors: manaouch mohamed , Sadiki Mohamed , Aghad Mohamed , Batchi Mohcine , Karkouri Jamal Al
Published: April 2022

Landslides pose a serious threat to humans, their infrastructure and property, especially in mountainous areas. In Morocco, these risks have attracted more attention due to their harms. The current study aims to use machine learning techniques (MLTs) including Multi-Layer Perceptron (MLP), Adaptive Boosting (AdaBoost), Random Forest (RF), Instance-Based K (IBK), Naïve Bayes (NB) and Decision Tree (J48) to model landslide susceptibility and to compare their performance. Initially, 144 landslide sites were inventoried. Then, thirteen factors related to landslides were considered. Finally, the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC-ROC) method was used to compare models’ performance. The results showed that AUC values for six MLTs range from 53.0% for RF to 96.1% for J48. Both J48 (AUC = 96.1%) and NB (AUC = 89.5%) showed the best performance compared to the others. The results of this work and the generated landslide susceptibility maps can help decision makers to avoid high susceptible areas.
SPOP promotes cervical cancer progress by inducing PD-1 move away from PD-L1 in spatial localization
Authors: Wu Jiangchun , Wu Yong , Guo Qinhao , Chen Siyu , Wang Simin , Zhu Jun , Wu Xiaohua , Ju Xingzhu
Published: April 2022

Background
Metastasis is a major obstacle in treatment of cervical cancer (CC), and gene SPOP mediated regulatory effect is found to be involved in metastasis. However, its mechanisms have not been fully elucidated.
Methods
We performed proteomic sequencing, immunohistochemical staining (IHC) and scoring of SPOP in cancer tissues of 180 patients with 2009 FIGO stage IB1-IIA2 CC, and compared the expression of SPOP between pelvic lymph node (pLN) metastasis group and non-pLN metastasis group. We divided the data into two groups by SPOP expression, compared overall survival (OS) and relapse- free survival (RFS) of patients. In vitro, cells were carried out to determine whether SPOP overexpression or knockdown could affect the proliferation, cloning, wounding and Tanswell assays. Finally, the possible mechanism of pLN metastasis of CC was explored by analyzing the differences in the number and distance of various immune targets.
Results
SPOP is upregulated in CC with pLN metastasis and negatively associated with patient outcome. In vitro, SPOP promotes CC cell proliferation, invasion. Through further analysis, we found that there was no significant difference in the number of PD-1 and PD-L1 between the two groups, but the number of PD-1 in the range of PD-L1 100um was significantly increased.
Conclusion
This study presents that SPOP can inhibit the immune microenvironment by promoting PD-1 to move away from PD-L1, thereby promoting pLN metastasis of CC, resulting in worse OS and RFS in patients.
Prognostic factors for renal function deterioration during palliative first-line chemotherapy for metastatic colorectal cancer
Authors: Lim Ah Reum , Kim Jwa Hoon , Hyun Myung Han , Kim Yeul Hong , Lee Soohyeon
Published: April 2022

Purpose
Effective first-line therapy is a key determinant of long-term treatment outcomes in patients with metastatic colorectal cancer (mCRC). We assessed changes in renal function for 1 year among patients diagnosed with mCRC who received first-line chemotherapy. Further, we analyzed the prognostic factors and effect of each chemotherapy regimen on the renal function of the patients.
Methods
We retrospectively investigated patients with mCRC who were treated with a standard triplet regimen (FOLFOX/FOLFIRI with bevacizumab/cetuximab) in the first-line setting at Korea University Anam Hospital from 2015 to 2020. We checked renal function at 3-month intervals for 12 months. We calculated changes in eGFR (△eGFR, estimated glomerular filtration rate) and compared them with clinical factors such as age, sex, chronic disease, body mass index (BMI), disease status, baseline proteinuria, and first-line chemotherapy regimen.
Results
Among 472 patients with mCRC, the median eGFR at baseline was 90.9 mL/min/1.73 m2; it was significantly lower (80.1 mL/min/1.73 m2, p < 0.001) at 12 months after chemotherapy initiation. Particularly, the eGFR of patients treated with FOLFIRI + Bevacizumab was 74.9 mL/min/1.73 m2. The 1-year incidence rate of acute kidney injury (AKI) was 9.1%, with the lowest occurrence in patients receiving FOLFOX/cetuximab (2.1%) and the highest in those receiving FOLFIRI + bevacizumab (19.2%). Renal dysfunction was more frequent with FOLFIRI + bevacizumab as compared to the other regimens. Additionally, old age, low BMI, and proteinuria at baseline were also associated with a decreased eGFR.
Conclusions
These findings can serve as important factors when selecting the first-line chemotherapy regimen for patients with mCRC.
Project Emery: Humanizing Patient Experience through Arts Expressive Activity among Clinically Isolated Patients in a Large Referral Hospital in Qatar
Authors: Logrono Kenneth Jun , Narag Katrina , Capaspas April Vincent , Mulla Jakir , Zu'bi Belal Salem , Swallmeh Esmat , Piol Diana Lynn , Sarmiento Djoanne
Published: April 2022

Project Emery is a project and a strategy aimed to humanize the patient experience at Hamad General Hospital (HGH), which emphasized the need to translate compassionate and safe care into a tangible experience specifically for patients in isolation rooms. The evolving concept of "humanizing patient care" create a value improvement initiative for patients, treating them as individuals rather than just patients. Nearly all patients (80%) experienced anxiety as a result of isolation during the pandemic, and two-thirds (60%) reported a significant high level of anxiety, stress, and worry. To address the mental health challenges, art therapy inspired by patient Emery is offered as a tool to support patients during periods of isolation. The project is aimed to improve the patient engagement through increasing access to the arts as a means of expressing their thoughts and feelings about treatment and being hospitalized. The IHI Model of Improvement was utilized on this quality improvement initiative. A qualitative method was conducted using individual, semi-structured interviews. All interviews were transcribed verbatim for thematic analysis. Results have showed that 99% of 166 patients who voluntarily participate the arts activity had high engagement scores and would highly recommend the activity to the others. There are four common themes taken from patient interviews, 1) strengthens patient’s positive feelings, 2.) vent out feelings and concerns through storytelling, and narratives, 3.) optimizes nurse-patient communication; and 4.) activity for patient engagement.
Long-term comparative outcome analysis of a Robot-Assisted Laparoscopic Prostatectomy with Retropubic Radical Prostatectomy by a single surgeon
Authors: Tillu Neeraja , Kulkarni Jagdeesh
Published: April 2022

ObjectiveWe aimed to give a comprehensive outcome analysis of robot assisted laparoscopic prostatectomies (RALP) performed by a single surgeon and compared it to retropubic radical prostatectomies (RRP) done by the same surgeon in a high-volume center.Materials and MethodsPreoperative, perioperative, and postoperative data were collected prospectively and compared with retrospective retropubic radical prostatectomy data. Perioperative, oncological data and functional results in the first year were compared between the two groups. There were 547 RARPs between 4th August 2011 to 31st December 2018, and 428 RRPs between 1st January 1996 to 31st December 2009 which were included in this review.ResultsWhile the operation time was in favor of the open group (196 vs 160 min, p<0.01), the estimated blood loss (188 vs 316ml, p<0.01), blood transfusion rate (3% vs 7% p=0.021), hospital stay (4 days vs 7 days) and mean catheter duration (12 vs 15 days) were in favor of the robotic group. Majority of the complications belonged to Clavien-Dindo group II in both groups and rates were not significantly different. (p=0.33) 12-month continence rate was in favor of RALP group (98.3% vs 99.2%, p <0.01). Overall survival of the RALP cohort at 24 months was 99.8%, 60 months 96.1%, 84 months 87.3% , 96 months 81.3%), 108 months was 79.5%. Overall survival at 24 months was 99.8%, 60 months 96.1%, 84 months 87.3%, 96 months 81.3%, and 108 months was 79.5%.ConclusionRALP is a safe, minimally invasive technically feasible procedure with comparable functional and oncological outcomes. Our study showed superior perioperative and continence outcomes in RALP. However, despite its growing popularity, RRP still remains the gold standard in India due to its affordability and accessibility.
Malacoplakia of the bladder combined with infected renal calculi: A case report
Authors: Xu Wujun , He Qunjun , Wang Yi , Chen Xian , Xia Baopiao , Zeng Xuqiang , Wang Binhui , Fang Yong , Liu Shulin
Published: April 2022

Introduction: The malacoplakia of the bladder is a rare chronic acquired infection- associated granulomatous disease and even less common in combination with urinary stones. Case Presentation: We report the case of a 58-year-old female patient with malacoplakia of the bladder combined with renal calculi. The patient was admitted to the hospital with bilateral low back pain for one month and space-occupying lesions of the bladder for three days. Preoperative imaging suggested space-occupying lesions of the bladder: high probability of bladder cancer. Following the anti-infection treatment, the transurethral electrodesiccation was performed on the space-occupying lesions of the bladder. Pathological examination confirmed the diagnosis of malacoplakia of the bladder. Left-sided percutaneous nephrolithotomy was performed electively to remove the predisposing factors of infection. After the operation, the patient continued to receive anti-infection treatment for two months. The patient had a good prognosis in the six-month follow-up.Conclusions: Malacoplakia of the bladder is easily misdiagnosed as bladder cancer before operation, and the diagnosis depends on pathological diagnosis. Complete removal of urinary calculi, infection and other inducing factors, is beneficial to the treatment of malacoplakia of the bladder.
Superresolving, artifact-free optical coherence tomography with deconvolution-random phase modulation
Authors: liu linbo , Ge Xin , chen Si , kan lin , ni guangming , bo en , wang lulu
Published: April 2022

Deconvolution is widely used to improve resolution in microscopy. Unfortunately, deconvolution in optical coherence tomography (OCT) is sensitive to noise which inherently results in additive artifacts. These artifacts severely impair the fidelity of deconvolved images and limit its use in OCT imaging. Here we propose a framework that encodes numerical random phase masks in the Fourier space of a deconvolved OCT image, to produce a sub-resolution image with the artifacts removed. The optimized joint operation of an iterative Richardson-Lucy deconvolution and a numerical synthesis of random phase masks (RPM), termed as Deconv-RPM, enables a 2.7-fold enhancement in both transverse and axial resolutions. We demonstrate that the Deconv-RPM method allows imaging previously unresolved cellular-level details in the human labial mucosa in vivo with significantly improved clarity.
Effect of a uterine manipulator on the incidence of lymphovascular propagation (LVSI) in treatment of endometrial cancer
Authors: Dókuš Karol , Hudec Boris , Urdzík Peter , Školka Richard , Koňarčíková Tatiana , Smitka Michal
Published: April 2022

Background Endometrial cancers are among the epithelial malignancies of the lining in the uterine cavity. The invasion of carcinoma into the lymphovascular space (LVSI – lymphovascular space invasion) is considered a risk factor for the course of the disease. In our study, we investigated the potential effect of an intrauterine manipulator on the presence of LVSI in a definitive preparation.Methods Based on the inclusion and exclusion criteria, we were retrospectively evaluating 170 female patients. During endoscopic procedures we use a uterine manipulator. As the primary objectives were determined to be the finding of the difference in the incidence of LVSI in female patients with and without an intrauterine manipulator. As the secondary objective was set to determine the effect of a type of an intrauterine manipulator on the incidence of LVSI. Tertiary we analysed grading of tumor, myometrial invasion and method of obtaining primary histology in connection to the incidence of LVSI. Results We used logistic regression to identify the risk factors for LVSI. Using a manipulator during a surgery was not associated with the occurrence of LVSI (with a manipulator vs. without, 11.5% vs. 21.7%; OR 1.8; 95% CI 0.73–4.39; p = 0.199). The type of method used to obtain the primary histology had a statistically significant effect on the incidence of LVSI in our set (hysteroscopy vs. curettage; OR 4.27; 95% CI 1.39–13.07; p value = 0.011); grading and TNM (especially the grading G2 and G3 and TNM 1b).Conclusions In our study we have not confirmed the effect of a uterine manipulator on the possible increase of LVSI positive cases. Similar results have been published in other studies. The secondary analysis indicated a higher incidence of LVSI in the female patients diagnosed with curettage than in those who underwent hysteroscopy. Further studies will be needed to confirm this phenomenon.
Multi-level cellular and functional annotation of single-cell transcriptomes
Authors: Han Hong , Mikolajewicz Nicholas , Brown Kevin , Moffat Jason
Published: April 2022

Single-cell RNA-sequencing (scRNA-seq) offers unprecedented insight into heterogenous biology, allowing for the interrogation of cellular populations and gene expression programs at single-cell resolution. Here, we introduce scPipeline, a single-cell analytic toolbox that offers modular workflows for multi-level cellular annotation and user-friendly analysis reports. Novel methods that are introduced to facilitate scRNA-seq annotation include: (i) co-dependency index (CDI)-based differential expression; (ii) cluster resolution optimization using a marker-specificity criterion; (iii) marker-based cell-type annotation with Miko scoring; and (iv) gene program discovery using scale-free shared nearest neighbor network (SSN) analysis. Our unsupervised and supervised procedures were validated using a diverse collection of scRNA-seq datasets and we provide illustrative examples of cellular and transcriptomic annotation of developmental and immunological scRNA-seq atlases. Overall, scPipeline provides a flexible computational framework for in-depth scRNA-seq analysis.
Construction of a transposase accessible chromatin landscape reveals chromatin state of repeat elements and potential causal variant for complex traits in pigs
Authors: Jiang Tao , Ling Ziqi , Zhou Zhimin , Chen Xiaoyun , Chen Liqing , Liu Sha , Sun Yingchun , Yang Jiawen , Yang Bin , Huang Jianzhen , Huang Lusheng
Published: April 2022

Background
A comprehensive landscape of chromatin states for multiple mammalian tissues is essential for elucidating the molecular mechanism underlying regulatory variants on complex traits. However, the genome-wide chromatin accessibility has been only reported in limited tissue types in pigs.
Results
Here we report a genome-wide landscape of chromatin accessibility of 20 tissues in two female pigs at ages of 6 months using ATAC-seq, and identified 557,273 merged peaks, which greatly expanded the pig regulatory element repository. We revealed tissue-specific regulatory elements, which were associated with tissue-relevant biological function. We identified both positive and negative significant correlations between the regulatory elements and gene transcripts, which showed distinct distributions in terms of their strength and distances from corresponding genes. We investigated the presence of transposable elements in open chromatin regions across all tissues, these included identifications of porcine endogenous retroviruses exhibiting high accessibility in liver and homology of porcine specific virus sequences to universally accessible TEs. Furthermore, we prioritized a potential causal variant for polyunsaturated fatty acid in the muscle.
Conclusions
Our data provides a novel multi-tissue accessible chromatin landscape that serve as an important resource for interpreting regulatory sequences in tissue specific and conserved biological function, as well as regulatory variants underlying variation in complex traits associated loci in pigs.
Near‑infrared spectroscopy of plasma amino acids with chemometrics towards breast cancer discrimination
Authors: Zhu Liying , Qian Wen , Li Haizhi , Li Chengcheng , Huang Changyudong , Zhang Yiqiong , Duan Yunfeng , Wang Shuang , Xu YongJie , Zhang Jingzhi , Liu Mi , Li Xing , Pan Wei
Published: April 2022

Breast cancer(BC) is the most prevalent cancer and the second-leading cause of cancer-related death for women in the worldwide. BC cells need more amino acids to meet the demand of rapid proliferation. In this paper, we focus on the role of near‑infrared (NIR) spectroscopy to analyse blood plasma samples of breast cancer patients to differentiate healthy controls. The possibility of quantitative detection of 20 amino acids in breast cancer plasma by NIR spectroscopy was investigated for the first time in this study. 180 samples (80 BC patients, 30 benign breast disease patients and 70 healthy controls) were analysed. Canonical correlation analysis (CCA) was used to analyse the relationship between clinical biochemical parameters and amino acid metabolic profile for BC patients. In this study, plasma glutamine, histidine, threonine, proline, phenylalanine content of BC patients was higher than healthy control plasma (p < 0.05) by NIR spectroscopy. There was overall correlation (r = 0.935) between three clinical parameters(age, albumin, total triglyceride) and four amino acids (glutamic acid, tyrosine, valine and lysine) from BC patients. In this study，we have built quantitative and qualitative model which is used to detect plasma amino acids of BC patients by NIR spectroscopy has good performance. It fully demonstrated the great potential and advantages of NIR spectroscopy combined with chemometrics in breast cancer research, which can provide a new research strategy and technical platform for the study of plasma amino acid metabolism in breast cancer patients, and provide basic experimental data reference for clinical diagnosis and treatment of breast cancer patients.
Avalanche Criticality in LaAlO3: The Effect of Aspect Ratio
Authors: Scott John J. R. , Casals Blai , Luo King-Fa , Haq Atta , Mariotti Davide , Salje Ekhard K. H. , Arredondo Miryam
Published: April 2022

Ferroic domain dynamics, as a function of external stimuli, can be collectively described as scale-invariant avalanches characterised by a critical exponent that are sensitive to the complexity of the domain microstructure. The understanding and manipulation of these avalanches lies at the heart of developing novel applications such as neuromorphic computing. Here we combine in situ heating optical observations and mean-field analysis to investigate the collective domain behaviour in pure-ferroelastic lanthanum aluminate (LaAlO3) as a function of aspect ratio, the ratio of sample length to width, where the movement of the domains is predominantly driven by thermal stresses via thermal expansion/contraction during heat cycling. Our observations demonstrate that the aspect ratio induces i) distinctive domain microstructures at room temperature, ii) a deviation of dynamical behaviour at high temperatures and iii) critical exponent mixing in the higher aspect ratio samples that accompanies this behaviour. While the critical exponents of each aspect ratio fall within mean-field predicted values, we highlight the effect that the aspect ratio has in inducing exponent mixing. Hence, furthering our understanding towards tuning and controlling avalanches is crucial for fundamental and applied research.
Evaluation of the efficiency of DEEP-LSTM model in estimating evaporation from the pan in dry areas and its comparison with MLP model
Authors: Samii Amirhossein , Karami Hojat , Ghazvinian Hamidreza , Safari Amirsaeed , DadrasAjirlou Yashar
Published: April 2022

The importance of evaporation estimation in water resources and agricultural studies is undeniable. Evaporation pans (EP) are used as an indicator to determine the evaporation of lakes and reservoirs around the world due to the ease of interpreting its data. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the efficiency of the Long- Short Term Memory (LSTM) model to estimate evaporation from a pan and compare it with the Multilayer Perceptron (MLP) model in Semnan and Garmsar. For this purpose, daily meteorological data recorded between 2000 and 2018 (18 consecutive years) in Semnan and Garmsar synoptic stations were used. Minimum and maximum air temperature (Tmax, Tmin), wind speed (WS), sunshine hours (SH), air pressure (PA), relative humidity (RH) were selected as input data and evaporation data from the pan (EP) was considered as the output of the case. Also, in modeling both networks in the input section, 4 different scenarios were used. The two studied models were evaluated by the evaluation criteria of coefficient of determination (R2), root mean square error (RMSE) and mean absolute error (MAE). The results showed that among the studied scenarios, the fourth scenario (considering all input parameters) had the highest R2 and the lowest RMSE and MAE. In general, the two models performed well in predicting the rate of evaporation. Also, in both stations, the LSTM model had more R2 and less RMSE and MAE than the MLP model.