bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Incidental Finding of Bilateral Ovarian Adrenal Rest Tumor in a Patient With Congenital Adrenal Hyperplasia: A Case Report and Brief Review
Authors: Bouzidi Lobna , Triki Meriam , Charfi Slim , Ameur Hana Ben , Dhaou Mahdi Ben , Bouaziz Touraya , Boudawara Tahya
Published: January 2021

Ovarian adrenal rest tumors (OART) are tumors that develop in females with congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH). In contrast to their counterpart in testicles, they are exceptional and few cases have been reported in the literature. In this report, we present clinicopathological findings of a female patient with CAH due to 21-hydroxylase deficiency who was incidentally diagnosed with OART with a review of the literature. The 14-year-old patient, who was raised as a boy, developed a virilizing syndrome with high testosterone levels that were attributed to non adherence to her replacement corticosteroid therapy. She consulted for sex reassignment surgery. Pelvic ultrasound was normal. She underwent hysterectomy and bilateral adnexectomy. No abnormalities were noticed during the operation. Grossly, both ovaries were variegated with well circumscribed and lobulated, brownish-yellow nodules. Histologically, the nodules were composed of nests of large polygonal cells with centrally located nuclei and prominent nucleoli. There was mild atypia and no crystals of Reinke. Thus, the findings of the histopathological examination were consistent with bilateral OART. Histological differential diagnosis of OART can be challenging particularly with leydig cell tumor, stromal luteoma and steroid cell tumors, not otherwise specified. OART must be considered in women with CAH and persistent virilizing symptoms despite negative imaging results.
Rise of the Machines? Customer Engagement in Automated Service Interactions
Authors: Hollebeek Linda D. , Sprott David E. , Brady Michael K.
Published: January 2021

Artificial intelligence (AI) is likely to spawn revolutionary transformational effects on service organizations, including by impacting the ways in which firms engage with their customers. In parallel, customer engagement (CE), which reflects customer interactions with brands, offerings, or firms, has risen to the top of many managers’ strategic wish lists in the last decade. However, despite literature-based advances made in both areas, AI and CE are largely investigated in isolation to date, yielding a paucity of insight into their interface. In response to this gap, this Special Issue offers a pioneering exploration of CE in automated or AI-based service interactions. Our editorial first reviews AI’s Industry 4.0 underpinnings, followed by an important AI typology that comprises robotic process automation (RPA), machine learning (ML), and deep learning (DL) applications. We then offer a high-level synopsis of existing CE research, followed by the development of a set of integrative propositions of CE in automated service interactions. Next, we introduce the Special Issue papers, which feature particular RPA, ML, or DL applications. We conclude with an overview of further research avenues in this growing area, which has the potential to develop into a powerful service research substream in the coming years.
Compassionate in Nature? Exploring Hotel Staff Third-Party Interventions in Instances of (In)Justice
Authors: Zoghbi-Manrique-de-Lara Pablo , Altman Yochanan , Guerra-Báez Rita M. , Colas Hervé
Published: January 2021

Prior research suggests that employees aware of their peers’ mistreatment by management and who themselves are target to such mistreatment help their peers more than employees who have been exposed only to peers’ mistreatment. However, no studies have tried to explain the way this process occurs. Suggesting that this help is performed compassionately, this study models personal and peers’ unjust treatment, empathic concern, and kindness following Kanov et al. compassion process: noticing, feeling, and responding. It hypothesizes that under interactions between personal and peers’ mistreatment staff are more empathically concerned about peers and, hence, amplify kindness out of compassion. Results supported empathic concern as a mediator and, hence, kindness as compassionate behavior. Unexpectedly, however, staff reduced (rather than increased) empathic concern and kindness. Tragedy-of-the-commons is invoked to explain these unexpected results. Simultaneous mistreatment could lead staff to perceive justice as a scarce common resource that is ultimately a source of dispute and uncooperativeness.
The Hegemony in Masculinity
Authors: King Neal , Calasanti Toni , Pietilä Ilkka , Ojala Hanna
Published: January 2021

Most citations to “hegemonic masculinity” focus on gender ideals and men’s attempts to justify domination. Few scholars have tested the theory that masculinity can be hegemonic in effect by gaining the overt consent of others to their domination. We specify this largely untested theory and use data from a pilot study of middle-age men for our demonstration of how to operationalize and recognize hegemony. We argue that scholars will find that effect at intersections of gender and other inequalities such as age. We show that, in their discussion of linked ideals of gender and age, three respondents mention domination of older men by younger men, and then both consent to that domination and accept personal responsibility for forestalling it through regimens of fitness, productivity, and health. We call for further research on the hegemony of masculinity via study of intersections of gender with such understudied inequities as age.
Yarning as protected space: relational accountability in research
Authors: Barlo Stuart , Boyd William (Bill) Edgar , Hughes Margaret , Wilson Shawn , Pelizzon Alessandro
Published: January 2021

In this article, we open up Yarning as a fundamentally relational methodology. We discuss key relationships involved in Indigenous research, including with participants, Country, Ancestors, data, history, and Knowledge. We argue that the principles and protocols associated with the deepest layers of yarning in an Indigenous Australian context create a protected space which supports the researcher to develop and maintain accountability in each of these research relationships. Protection and relational accountability in turn contribute to research which is trustworthy and has integrity. Woven throughout the article are excerpts of a yarn in which the first author reflects on his personal experience of this research methodology. We hope this device serves to demonstrate the way yarning as a relational process of communication helps to bring out deeper reflection and analysis and invoke accountability in all of our research relationships.
Evaluation of Long-Lasting Insecticidal Nets (DuraNet®) Under laboratory and Semi-Field Conditions Using Experimental Huts Against Anopheles Mosquitoes in Jimma Zone, Southwestern Ethiopia
Authors: Gebremariam Brhane , Birke Wondwosen , Zeine Wuhib , Ambelu Argaw , Yewhalaw Delenasaw
Published: January 2021

Background:

Long-Lasting Insecticidal Nets (LLINs) efficacy could be compromised due to a lot of influences together with user compliance and vector population insecticide resistance status. Thus, this study was to assess the biological efficacy of DuraNet® with the help of the World Health Organization cone bioassay and field experimental hut.

Methods:

A laboratory and a semi-field conditions experimental huts against Anopheles Mosquitoes were conducted in southwestern Ethiopia from September 2015 to January 2016. The bio efficacy of DuraNet® was evaluated using the WHO cone bioassay test and then its field efficacy was evaluated using experimental huts against the malaria vector population.

Results:

World Health Organization cone bioassay tests against pyrethroid-resistant An. arabiensis led to mean percent mortality and knockdown of 78% and 93%, respectively. Washing of DuraNet® successively reduced its efficacy from 93% knockdown (0 wash) to 45% knockdown (20 washes). Similarly, mean mortality decreased from 84% (0 wash) to 47% (20 washes). A total of 1575 female mosquitoes were collected over 40 nights out of which 1373(87.8%) were An. gambiae s.l., 116 (7.4%) were Anopheles coustani and 107 (6.8%) were An. pharoensis. The mean blood-feeding rate was significantly lower ( P < .001) in hut containing unwashed DuraNet® when compared to hut containing untreated DuraNet®. The mean mortality rate was significantly higher ( P < .001) in hut containing DuraNet® when compared to hut containing untreated DuraNet®. Unwashed DuraNet® showed the highest personal protection 88.7% and 100% against An. Arabiensis and An. pharoensis, respectively.

Conclusion:

Both DuraNet® and PermaNet 2.0 moderate efficacy against a pyrethroid-resistant population of An. arabiensis from Ethiopia. The bio efficacy of DuraNet® was found below the WHO recommendation. Therefore, the real impact of the observed insecticide resistance against DuraNet® to be further studied under phase-III trials, the need for new alternative vector control tools remains critical.
Atypical Presentation of Celiac Disease: Recurrent Acute Small Bowel Obstruction
Authors: R El Qadiry , A Lalaoui , H Nassih , I Aitsab , A Bourrahouat
Published: January 2021

Context:

Intussusception is the most common cause of small bowel obstruction in children under 4 years of age. Intussusception is not a widely recognized complication of celiac disease.

Case Report:

We present a clinical case of a 23-month-old boy with a 1-month history of watery diarrhea complicated by 2 episodes of intestinal obstruction, both had required surgery. He presented with acute and severe abdominal distention with bilious vomiting, and an appearance of intussusception on abdominal ultrasound. Upon further investigation, the diarrhea was found to be malabsorptive. The diagnosis of celiac disease was confirmed by the presence of specific serum autoantibodies (IgA Tissue transglutaminase and endomysium Antibodies >200 UI/ml with normal serum IgA level). He started a gluten-free diet and his symptoms were almost completely resolved.

Conclusion:

Recurrent intussusception may be associated with celiac disease, so celiac serology is recommended in children with recurrent intussusceptions. However, intestinal tuberculosis and lymphoma associated with enteropathy should be considered in the differential diagnosis. Intussusception in celiac disease is usually transient and should be managed expectantly rather than early surgical reduction.
Entertainment publics in the Philippines
Authors: Pertierra Anna Cristina
Published: January 2021

Since the late 1980s, Filipino entertainment television has assumed and maintained a dominance in national popular culture, which expanded in the digital era. The media landscape into which digital technologies were launched in the Philippines was largely set in the wake of the 1986 popular movement and change of government referred to as the EDSA revolution: television stations that had been sequestered under martial law were turned over to family-dominated commercial enterprises, and entertainment media proliferated. Building upon the long development of entertainment industries in the Philippines, new social media encounters with entertainment content generate expanded and engaged publics whose formation continues to operate upon a foundation of televisual media. This article considers the particular role that entertainment media plays in the formation of publics in which comedic, melodramatic and celebrity-led content generates networks of followers, users and viewers whose loyalty produces various forms of capital, including in notable cases political capital.
Glocal intimacies and the contradictions of mobile media access in the Philippines
Authors: Uy-Tioco Cecilia S , Cabañes Jason Vincent A
Published: January 2021

This article looks at mobile media access in the Philippines and the kind of social intimacies that have emerged from it. To frame our discussion, we use the concept of ‘glocal intimacies’. This pertains to how mobile technologies have normalised and intensified the entanglement of people’s relationships of closeness with the ever-shifting and constantly negotiated flows between global modernity and local everyday life. We show that the uneven access that Filipinos have has led to equally uneven ways in which they imagine and enact intimate relationships. Drawing on case studies emblematic of the country’s key income clusters, we point out the emergence of a contradictory situation, wherein those with relatively high-quality access are those who are least dependent on mobile media for their glocal intimacies. Meanwhile, those with relatively low-quality access are those who are actually most dependent on mobile-mediated communication for such intimacies.
Global movement for Black lives: A conversation between Awino Okech and Shereen Essof
Authors: Okech Awino , Essof Shereen
Published: January 2021

This conversation reflects on the importance of transnational Black solidarity in a global moment where the COVID-19 pandemic has exposed structural inequalities that sustain Black death and the global movement for Black lives has focussed attention on anti-Blackness. We reflect on the legacies of past and contemporary Black, Indigenous, People of Colour activism and the role that this has played in strengthening transnational efforts to deal with colonialism, imperialism and patriarchy. In highlighting how anti-Blackness is sustained across different institutions - from the academy to social movements, we centre Black feminist movements’ role in building radical visions of equitable and transformative worlds through a focus on the nexus between patriarchy, capitalism and white supremacy. Black feminist visions we argue are geared at disrupting and transforming current power structures to advance justice and create liberatory futures. A central part of these liberatory futures lies in building collective power that is rooted in the political values of solidarity, hope and joy.
Revisit stock price bubbles in the COVID-19 period: Further evidence from Taiwan’s and Mainland China’s tourism industries
Authors: Wang Mei-Chih , Chang Tsangyao , Min Jennifer
Published: January 2021

This study applies both the sup augmented Dickey–Fuller (SADF) and the generalized SADF tests to investigate whether bubbles exist in the Taiwan’s and Mainland China’s tourism stock markets, focusing on the COVID-19 period. We use the weekly stock price index during the periods of January 4, 2000 to April 27, 2020 in Taiwan and August 13, 2007 to April 27, 2020 in Mainland China, respectively. Empirical results demonstrate the existence of bubbles in the Taiwan tourism stock market during some subsample periods, including the recent COVID-19 outbreak. In contrast with our findings concerning Taiwan, our empirical results found that the COVID-19 outbreak had no impact on the tourism stock market of Mainland China. Especially important, we found that the fourth bubble in the Taiwan stock market began from March 23, 2020, and grew gradually, bursting on March 30, 2020. Our results have important policy implications for investors who attempt to invest in the tourism stock market.
Cased-based modelling and scenario simulation for ex-post evaluation
Authors: Schimpf Corey , Barbrook-Johnson Pete , Castellani Brian
Published: January 2021

Despite 20 years of increasing acceptance, implementing complexity-appropriate methods for ex-post evaluation remains a challenge: instead of focusing on complex interventions, methods need to help evaluators better explore how policies (no matter how simple) take place in real-world, open, dynamic systems where many intertwined factors about the cases being targeted affect outcomes in numerous ways. To assist in this advance, we developed case-based scenario simulation, a new visually intuitive evaluation tool grounded in a data-driven, case-based, computational modelling approach, which evaluators can use to explore counterfactuals, status-quo trends, and what-if scenarios for some potential set of real or imagined interventions. To demonstrate the value and versatility of case-based scenario simulation we explore four published evaluations that differ in design (cross sectional, longitudinal, and experimental) and purpose (learning or accountability), and present a prospective view of how case-based scenario simulation could support and enhance evaluators’ efforts in these complex contexts.
Don’t panic: Bringing complexity thinking to UK Government evaluation guidance
Authors: Bicket Martha , Hills Dione , Wilkinson Helen , Penn Alexandra
Published: January 2021

Central government guidance seeks to ensure and enhance the quality of practice and decision-making across – and sometimes beyond – government. The Magenta Book, published by HM Treasury, is the key UK Government resource on policy evaluation, setting out central government guidance on how to evaluate policies, projects and programmes. The UK Centre for the Evaluation of Complexity Across the Nexus was invited to contribute its expertise to the UK Government’s 2020 update of the Magenta Book by developing an accompanying guide on policy evaluation and ‘complexity’. A small multidisciplinary team worked together to produce a set of guidance, going through multiple stages of work and drawing on a variety of sources including academic and practitioner literature and experts and stakeholders in the fields of evaluation, policy and complexity. It also drew on Centre for the Evaluation of Complexity Across the Nexus’ own work developing and testing evaluation methods for dealing with complexity in evaluation. The resulting Magenta Book 2020 Supplementary Guide: Handling Complexity in Policy Evaluation explores the implications of complexity for policy and evaluation and how evaluation can help to navigate complexity. This article, designed primarily for practitioners who might be interested in this guidance and how it was developed, describes the processes involved, particularly related to the interdisciplinary dialogue and consultation with other key stakeholders that this involved. It also briefly outlines the content and key messages in the guidance, with reflections on the experiences of the authors in developing the guide – including the challenges and insights that arose during the process, particularly around the challenges of communicating complexity to a broad audience of readers.
Changing attitudes towards teletherapy in Austrian therapists during the COVID-19 pandemic
Authors: Rettinger Lena , Klupper Carissa , Werner Franz , Putz Peter
Published: January 2021

Introduction

Telehealth and its usage strongly depend on regulatory frameworks and user acceptance. During the COVID-19 pandemic, physiotherapists, occupational therapists, speech-language therapists and their patients experienced restrictions regarding the usual face-to-face therapy. Teletherapy has become a highly discussed medium for providing therapy services. This study aimed at assessing Austrian therapists’ attitudes towards teletherapy, including perceived barriers, during and before the COVID-19 lockdown. Further interest referred to therapists’ technical affinity and experiences with the application of teletherapy.

Methods

Therapists ( n = 325) completed an online survey amid the COVID-19 lockdown in 2020. Retrospective indications referred to the time prior to the lockdown. Ratings were opposed across the three therapeutic professions. Subgroup analyses investigated the role of gender and age regarding technical affinity. Measures included custom-made attitudinal statements towards teletherapy and the standardized TA-EG survey.

Results

The COVID-19 lockdown caused attitude changes towards teletherapy – for example, in terms of interest ( r = 0.57, p > 0.01), perceived skills for performance of teletherapy ( r = 0.33, p > 0.01) and perceived need for physical contact with patients ( r = 0.35, p > 0.01). Regarding technical affinity, women reported significantly higher values than men did ( r = 0.32, p > 0.01). Nearly half of the participants already applied teletherapy, with mainly positive ratings regarding perceived skills and feasibility. Barriers identified were missing or unstable reimbursement policies by insurance companies and therapeutic software with guaranteed data security.

Discussion

Austrian therapists indicate a relatively high level of telehealth positivity, with an improvement in the course of the COVID-19 lockdown. However, therapists outline the need for stable reimbursement policies and secure software solutions.
Soluble urokinase-type plasminogen activator receptor predicts peripheral artery disease severity and outcomes
Authors: Höbaus Clemens , Ursli Martin , Yussef Sarah Mohammed , Wrba Thomas , Koppensteiner Renate , Schernthaner Gerit-Holger
Published: January 2021

Soluble urokinase-type plasminogen activator receptor (suPAR) is associated with chronic kidney disease (CKD) severity and peripheral artery disease (PAD). We hypothesize an association of PAD severity and suPAR in patients without advanced CKD and further risk stratification according to the Kidney Disease: Improving Global Outcomes (KDIGO) guidelines. For study purposes, suPAR was measured in 334 PAD patients (34% women, age 69 (62–78) years, eGFR 68 ± 20 mL/min/1.72 m2) by commercial ELISA. Patients were followed for 10 years to assess long-term all-cause survival by Cox regression. Higher suPAR levels were associated with lower ankle–brachial index ( R = −0.215, p = 0.001) in patients with PAD without media-sclerosis ( n = 236). suPAR levels inversely correlated with decreased glomerular filtration rate ( R = −0.476, p < 0.001) and directly correlated with urinary albumin-to-creatinine ratio ( R = 0.207, p < 0.001). Furthermore, higher suPAR levels associated with a higher KDIGO risk score ( p < 0.001). Baseline suPAR was significantly associated with all-cause mortality (HR 1.40 (95% CI 1.16–1.68), p < 0.001) over 10 years. suPAR remained associated with mortality (HR 1.29 (1.03–1.61), p = 0.026) after multivariable adjustment for age, sex, cardiovascular risk factors, and eGFR. Future research may define a standard role for suPAR assessment in PAD’s work-up and treatment, especially in patients with CKD.
The feminist politics of Meghan Markle: Brexit, femininity and the nation in crisis
Authors: Weidhase Nathalie
Published: January 2021

This article examines the relationship between femininity, popular feminism and the monarchy in the United Kingdom in a time of national and political crisis. Since her entry into the royal family as Prince Harry’s fiancée in November 2017, Meghan Markle has been the subject of much hyped and often problematic media coverage. Celebrated as a feminist, Markle is seen as rejuvenating the British monarchy by injecting some much-needed diversity and progressive politics. Based on the analysis of UK broadsheet and tabloid coverage between 2016 and 2018, this article argues that her embodiment of royal femininity is part of a UK image revamp after a Brexit referendum campaign in 2016 steeped in imperial nostalgia, the aftermath of which saw a rise in reported hate crimes and loss of international reputation. However, her articulations of progressive racialised and feminised politics are equally considered a threat to the cohesion of the royal family, and by extension the nation. As such, Markle’s mediated royal femininity is overburdened with meaning from both ends of the political spectrum, and highlights the gendered dimensions of dominant Brexit discourses. This article emphasises popular media and culture as a terrain in which the ideological work of Brexit (and its resistance) is done.
Habermas on Rawls and the normative foundations of democracy
Authors: Kędziora Krzysztof
Published: January 2021

The debate between Jürgen Habermas and John Rawls concerns the question of how to do political philosophy under conditions of cultural pluralism, if the aim of political philosophy is to uncover the normative foundation of a modern liberal democracy. Rawls’s political liberalism tries to bypass the problem of pluralism, using the intellectual device of the veil of ignorance, and yet paradoxically at the same time it treats it as something given and as an arbiter of justification within the political conception of justice. Habermas argues that Rawls not only incorrectly operationalizes the moral point of view from which we discern what is just but also fails to capture the specificity of democracy which is given by internal relations between politics and law. This deprives Rawls’s political philosophy of the conceptual tools needed to articulate the normative foundation of democracy.
Anti-populism during the Yellow Vest protests: From combatting the Rassemblement National to dealing with street populists
Authors: Hamdaoui Soraya
Published: January 2021

This article analyses the anti-populist strategy of La République en marche! (LREM) during the Yellow Vest protests by comparing it with the one used against the Rassemblement National (RN), France’s main populist party. It argues that while the political elites of LREM have ostracised and strongly demonised the RN to contain its progression, their reaction to the populist protest movement was more balanced and cautious. As they were facing ordinary citizens asking for more fiscal justice and direct democracy rather than radical right politicians of the RN, LREM behaved in a more conciliatory way and softened their rhetoric of demonisation. Overall, the article distinguishes two types of anti-populism: an adversarial one to face a populist party and an accommodative one to deal with a populist social movement.
Initial response mechanism and local contact stiffness analysis of the floating two-stage buffer collision-prevention system under ship colliding
Authors: Lu Kai , Chen Xu-Jun , Gao Zhen , Cheng Liang-Yu , Wu Guang-Huai
Published: January 2021

A floating two-stage buffer collision-prevention system (FTBCPS) has been proposed to reduce the impact loads on the bridge pier in this paper. The anti-collision process can be mainly divided into two stages. First, reduce the ship velocity and change the ship initial moving direction with the stretching and fracture of the polyester ropes. Second, consume the ship kinetic energy with the huge damage and deformation of the FTBCPS and the ship. The main feature of the FTBCPS lies in the first stage and most of the ship kinetic energy can be dissipated before the ship directly impacts on the bridge pier. The contact stiffness value between the ship and the FTBCPS can be a significant factor in the first stage and the calculation method of it is the focus of this paper. The contact force, the internal force and the general equation of motion have been given in the first part. The structure model of the ship and the FTBCPS are then established in the ANSYS Workbench. After that, 38 typical load cases of the ship impacting on the FTBCPS are conducted in LS-DYNA. The reduction processes of the ship kinetic energy and the ship velocity in different load cases have been investigated. It can be summarized that the impact angle and the ship initial velocity are the main factors in the energy and velocity dissipation process. Moreover, the local impact force-depth curves have also been studied and the impact angle is found to be the only significant factor on the ship impact process. Next, the impact force-depth curves with different impact angles are fitted and the contact stiffness values are accordingly calculated. Finally, the impact depth range, the validity of the local simulation results and the consistency of the fitted stiffness value are verified respectively, demonstrating that the fitted stiffness values are applicable in the global analysis.
Textures of diversity: Socio-material arrangements, atmosphere, and social inclusion in a multi-ethnic neighbourhood
Authors: Kuruoğlu Alev Pinar , Woodward Ian
Published: January 2021

Research within literatures on multiculturalism and cosmopolitanism has moved beyond studying the institutional basis and discursive negotiations of differences towards an understanding of the embodied and practical dimensions of everyday social interactions. An emergent literature has also started to consider the role of vibrant material agents, atmosphere, and their environmental contexts in understanding diversity spaces. We wish to contribute to this literature through a visual and material ethnographic approach, taking two cafes in Copenhagen, Denmark as emblematic cases. We locate these sites in the particular socio-cultural space of Nørrebro – a neighbourhood characterised by the ethnic diversity of its inhabitants, but also by political tensions, government-supported gentrification, and community-driven restructuring and rebuilding. Taking an ecological approach to these spaces, we argue that socio-material arrangements may serve to solve or express diversity through the aesthetic organisation of human and non-human actors. We interpret such material forms as co-constitutive agents of diversity politics.
Prolonged iatrogenic thoracic duct chylous fistula in neck surgery: conservative management or surgery? A literature review
Authors: Parmeggiani Domenico , Gualtieri Giorgia , Terracciano Gianmattia , Gambardella Claudio , Parisi Simona , Brusciano Luigi , Ruggiero Roberto , Docimo Ludovico
Published: January 2021

Background:

Thoracic duct chylous fistula is a rare complication following neck surgery, especially for malignant disease. Despite its low incidence, it can be a life-threatening postoperative complication increasing the risk of infection, bleeding, hypovolemia, electrolyte imbalance, and malnutrition. Currently, the management of thoracic duct fistula is not standardized yet. It can range from conservative to surgical approaches, and even when surgery indication occurs, there is no unanimous agreement on timing and operative steps, so the surgical approach still remains mostly subjective, in accordance with clinical conditions of the patients and with surgeon’s experience.

Aims:

The aim of the study was to search into Literature a common accepted behaviour in thoracic duct chylous fistula occurring.

Methods:

A literature review was carried out. Conservative treatments include fasting associated with total parental nutrition or low-fat diet, compressive dressings, and octreotide administration. If conservative treatment fails, in order to avoid dangerous consequences, functional repair of the thoracic duct injury with lymphovenous microanastomosis should be the preferred solution, rather than an approach that obliterates the thoracic duct or lymphatic–chylous pathways, such as thoracic duct embolization, therapeutic lymphangiography, and thoracic duct ligation.

Conclusions:

In our experience, patients undergone thyroidectomy and neck dissection for thyroid-differentiated cancer, who report an unrecognized thoracic duct chylous fistula after surgery, must be treated via integrated conservative and surgical treatment. A literature review about thoracic duct chylous fistula following neck surgery, focusing on the current management and therapeutic approach, was furthermore carried out, in order to delineate the actual therapeutic options in case of thoracic duct chylous fistula occurrence.
Validity and reliability testing of the Indonesian version of the eHealth Literacy Scale during the COVID-19 pandemic
Authors: Wijaya Maria Cellina , Kloping Yudhistira Pradnyan
Published: January 2021

Nowadays, it is common for people to look for health care information on the internet. The eHealth Literacy Scale (eHEALS) is commonly used to measure eHealth literacy. As of the publication of this study, the Indonesian version for eHEALS has not been published even though eHealth literacy is necessary, especially in the current COVID-19 pandemic. We aimed to evaluate the validity and reliability of the Indonesian version of eHEALS (I-eHEALS). A total of 100 respondents in East Java were involved in this cross-sectional study. Pearson-product moment correlation method and construct validity were used to validate the results. The reliability was determined based on the Cronbach’s alpha internal consistency measurement and intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC). The Pearson correlation analysis results are significantly higher ( r > 0.254, p < 0.01) compared to the critical value table. Single factors accounting for 57.66% variance in the scales exhibit a unidimensional latent structure. The internal consistency between items is excellent as shown by the Cronbach’s alpha coefficient (0.91). The ICC analysis shows an acceptable result (0.552, p < 0.01). The I-eHEALS is valid and reliable to be used for evaluating the eHealth literacy of the Indonesian population.
Design and evaluation of mobile scenario based learning in the self-management of chronic pain
Authors: Koulas Ioannis , Billis Antonis , Kousouri Nikoletta , Vasilopoulos Vasilis , Lykotsetas Evangelos , Kola Dimitris , Dafli Eleni , Spachos Dimitris , Bamidis Panagiotis
Published: January 2021

Chronic pain is a lifelong issue, being one of the main causes of disability, affecting a great number of people worldwide, many of which often avoid seeking medical advice from pain experts and/or demonstrate poor adherence to their therapeutic plan. One of the most important steps in achieving a manageable course of disease, is the ability of self-management. We aimed at applying a method of systematic patient education and self-management through the use of Virtual Patients (VPs), a well-established method for educating medical doctors and students but never before targeting patients. Two VPs scenarios were designed, tested and evaluated by patients with rheumatic disorders, achieving a SUS score of 88/100 “Best Imaginable”, alongside with positive reviews from the participants. The positive feedback from the patients supports the potential of VP educational paradigm to educate these patients and equip them with disease coping skills and strategies.
Identifying strategies to overcome roadblocks to utilising near real-time healthcare and administrative data to create a Scotland-wide learning health system
Authors: Mukherjee Mome , Cresswell Kathrin , Sheikh Aziz
Published: January 2021

Creating a learning health system could help reduce variations in quality of care. Success is dependent on timely access to health data. To explore the barriers and facilitators to timely access to patients’ data, we conducted in-depth semi-structured interviews with 37 purposively sampled participants from government, the NHS and academia across Scotland. Interviews were analysed using the framework approach. Participants were of the view that Scotland could play a leading role in the exploitation of routine data to drive forward service improvements, but highlighted major impediments: (i) persistence of paper-based records and a variety of information systems; (ii) the need for a proportionate approach to managing information governance; and (iii) the need for support structures to facilitate accrual, processing, linking, analysis and timely use and reuse of data for patient benefit. There is a pressing need to digitise and integrate existing health information infrastructures, guided by a nationwide proportionate information governance approach and the need to enhance technological and human capabilities to support these efforts.
Sensor-based platforms for remote management of chronic diseases in developing regions: A qualitative approach examining the perspectives of healthcare professionals
Authors: Basholli Adelina , Lagkas Thomas , Bath Peter A , Eleftherakis George
Published: January 2021

The continuous monitoring of chronic diseases serves as one of the cornerstones in the efforts to improve the quality of life of patients and maintain the healthcare services provided to them. This study aims to provide an in-depth understanding of the perspectives of healthcare professionals on using sensor-based networks (SBN) used for remote and continuous monitoring of patients with chronic illness in Kosovo, a developing country. A qualitative research method was used to interview 26 healthcare professionals. The study results demonstrate the positive attitudes of participants to using SBN, and considers their concerns on the impact of these platforms on the patient’s life, the number of visits in the medical centre, data privacy concerning interactions between patients and their medical personnel and the costs of the platform. Further to that, the study makes an important contribution to knowledge by identifying the challenges and drawbacks of these platforms and provides recommendations for system designers.
Hate as a ‘hook’: The political and affective economy of ‘hate journalism’
Authors: Siapera Eugenia , Papadopoulou Lambrini
Published: January 2021

The article looks to identify and contextualise the shift of journalism towards emotion in terms of broader socio-political shifts. It focuses on ‘hate journalism’, a term we use to describe a new kind of journalism that emerged in Greece during the debt crisis years and is ideologically close to neo-fascist, and ethnonationalist political positions. We understand hate as an action oriented socio-cultural practice and examine the conditions of production and deployment of hate through focusing on Makeleio, the most successful example of this kind of journalism. Within this context, hate is produced and circulated as a ‘hook’ to attract and entice users, by mirroring their emotions; it further constitutes a means of producing and diffusing ideology by helping readers manage uncertainty through putting forward authoritarian solutions. In doing so, hate journalism is involved in social reproduction processes by which (Greek) society produces and sustains itself as ethnically pure, culturally Christian, and gendered as masculine and virile. Readers are invited to recognise themselves and their practices and vernacular, to be consoled and offered solace and comfort within an unmoored world. They, in turn, offer support to this journalism through consuming it.
Prediction of dipole sources and aeroacoustics field for tandem cylinder flow field based on DBEM/hybrid LES
Authors: Zheng Zhengyu
Published: January 2021

In this paper, the DBEM/Hybrid LES（Directly Boundary Element Method/Hybrid Large Eddy Simulation）technique is applied to predict the aerodynamic noise generated by tandem circular cylinders immersed in a three-dimensional turbulent flow. Utilizing the Lighthill's Acoustic Analogy, the flow pressure fluctuation near the surface of the cylinder is converted into acoustic dipole sources. Taking the dipole sound sources as the actual sound sources, the aeroacoustic field is simulated and analyzed by DBEM. The research shows that: The strong dipole sources are distributed in the collision zone of the downstream cylindrical surface, where the upstream cylinder's shedding vortex colliding to downstream cylinder surface. Both of the amplitude-frequency response and the phase-frequency response of dipole acoustic source are obtained, which is helpful for further research on aerodynamics noise interference and suppression. Good comparisons are obtained between numerical results and BART (Basic Aerodynamic Research Tunnel) experimental data published by NASA.
Laboratory investigation of a bridge scour monitoring method using decentralized modal analysis
Authors: Khan Muhammad Arslan , McCrum Daniel P , Prendergast Luke J , OBrien Eugene J , Fitzgerald Paul C , Kim Chul-Woo
Published: January 2021

Scour is a significant issue for bridges worldwide that influences the global stiffness of bridge structures and hence alters the dynamic behaviour of these systems. For the first time, this article presents a new approach to detect bridge scour at shallow pad foundations, using a decentralized modal analysis approach through re-deployable accelerometers to extract modal information. A numerical model of a bridge with four simply supported spans on piers is created to test the approach. Scour is modelled as a reduction in foundation stiffness under a given pier. A passing half-car vehicle model is simulated to excite the bridge in phases of measurement to obtain segments of the mode shape using output-only modal analysis. Two points of the bridge are used to obtain modal amplitudes in each phase, which are combined to estimate the global mode shape. A damage indicator is postulated based on fitting curves to the mode shapes, using maximum likelihood, which can locate scour damage. The root mean square difference between the healthy and scoured mode shape curves exhibits an almost linear increase with increasing foundation stiffness loss under scour. Experimental tests have been carried out on a scaled model bridge to validate the approach presented in this article.
Universal basic income revisited: COVID-19, biopolitical trade-offs, and the expropriation of digital academic labour
Authors: Reveley James
Published: January 2021

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the biopolitical trade-offs inherent to contemporary capitalism are cascading down to higher education. Based on insights derived from theories of digitalized capitalism, this article argues that the emergency shift of educational activities online has much potential to heighten the expropriation of digital academic labour. The net result is an intensification of the master process of digitally driven academic proletarianization. At the same time, the reopening of campuses in countries and regions with high infection rates demonstrably puts academics and others at risk. Both of these developments provide reasons, the article maintains, to support the introduction of universal basic income (UBI). After drawing the crucial distinction between UBI as an emergency response and UBI as an institutionally frame-breaking initiative, the latter – non-emergency UBI – is advocated as a solution to the increasingly binaristic choice between work and life in the neoliberal university and beyond.
A Bayesian Measurement of Political Connection and Entrepreneur Preference on Trade and Competition
Authors: Feng Yilang
Published: January 2021

This article investigates how political connection shapes firm owner preference on economic openness and international competition in China, a topic that is getting increasingly relevant today amid China’s trade disputes with its trading partners over the nature of the country’s business-government relations. Politically connected entrepreneurs and their enterprises usually exploit and benefit from their political resources, but this can lead to both supporting and opposing views on expanding trade liberalization. To solve this puzzle, this article proposes a theory that focuses on (1) a selection effect of political connection on firm productivity and (2) trade-related institutional development in China. With survey data on China joining the world trade organization, I develop a modified Bayesian item response theory model to measure political connection and find that Chinese politically connected entrepreneurs held a less supportive view before joining the world trade organization than their less connected counterparts. This suggests an anticipation that the imminent opening would neutralize the privileges of politically connected entrepreneurs. By looking at trade liberalization, this article offers a firm level analysis that political opposition to sustained economic reform may derive from the short-term winners, instead of the losers, in transitional societies.
Risk Factors and Effectiveness of Implemented Academic Interventions on Student Retention at a Hispanic-Serving Institution
Authors: Brown Daniel A. , Soto Julio G. , Anand Sulekha , Weimer Nicholas E. , Black Victoria A.
Published: January 2021

We examined three large freshman cohorts from Texas State University, a Hispanic-Serving Institution (HSI), to identify risk factors that might affect academic retention. Risk factors supported by empirical studies such as first-generation, ethnicity, gender, financial aid need, high school performance, and living off campus were examined. We also determined the effectiveness of four academic interventions in achieving retention of students that were on academic probation for two consecutive semesters. Statistical analyses demonstrated that being a first-generation college student and receiving financial aid were significant risks for attrition in all cohorts. Living off-campus and being an URM student were not. Retention in two cohorts was dependent on the combinations of three peer mentoring, two academic coaching, and two to three academic advising sessions. A probation predictive model was developed. Finally, we discussed the importance of examining risk factors and interventions that are tailored to each academic institution.
Amyloid Precursor Protein Variant, E665D, Associated With Unique Clinical and Biomarker Phenotype
Authors: Abbatemarco Justin R. , Jones Stephen E. , Larvie Mykol , Bekris Lynn M. , Khrestian Maria E. , Krishnan Kamini , Leverenz James B.
Published: January 2021

We describe a clinical, imaging and biomarker phenotype associated with an amyloid precursor gene (APP) E665D variant in a 45-year-old man with progressive cognitive and behavioral dysfunction. Brain MRI showed bilateral, confluent T2 hyperintensities predominantly in the anterior white matter. Amyloid imaging and CSF testing were consistent with amyloid deposition. 7 Tesla MRI revealed cerebral microhemorrhages suggestive of cerebral amyloid angiopathy (CAA). Contrary to previous reports, this case raises the possibility that the APP E665D genetic change may be pathogenic, particularly given the abnormal Alzheimer’s disease biomarkers observed in the cerebrospinal fluid, positive amyloid imaging and imaging evidence for CAA in a relatively young patient with progressive cognitive decline.
Role of Complete Duplex Ultrasound to Diagnose Deep Vein Thrombosis in COVID-19 Critical Patients
Authors: Pozzi Matteo , Giani Marco , Fumagalli Benedetta , Calabria Mariangela , Leni Davide , Segramora Vittorio , Bellani Giacomo , Foti Giuseppe
Published: January 2021

An increased risk of deep vein thrombosis (DVT) has been reported in critical COVID-19 patients, despite adequate thromboprophylaxis, and most of DVT are probably asymptomatic. As a screening approach has been advocated, the best examination protocol is unknown. The objective of this study is to assess the role of a Complete Duplex Ultrasound (CDUS) examination in detecting DVT in a large population of COVID-19 patients admitted to intensive care unit (ICU) for respiratory failure. Single-center retrospective study of 145 COVID-19 patients admitted to ICU. DVT was assessed with a CDUS performed by experienced radiologist after ICU admission. DVT was confirmed in 38 patients (26%). Most DVT were distal to the knee (66%), while only 16% were proximal. At the time of the examination, 55% of the patients received full-dose anticoagulation, while 45% received thromboprophylaxis, and there were no differences in anticoagulation regimen between positive and negative patients. Patients with DVT had higher dimers compared with those with negative CDUS ( P < .002). The observed frequency of DVT is high despite adequate anticoagulation. A comprehensive and experienced ultrasound examination protocol can allow to recognize a large number of distal DVT otherwise missed, albeit their clinical significance is unknown.