bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Utilization of Genetic Testing for RET Mutations in Patients with Medullary Thyroid Carcinoma: a Single‐Center Experience
Authors: Parkhurst Emily , Calonico Elise , Abboy Sridevi 
Published: June 2018

AbstractMedullary thyroid carcinoma (MTC) is often due to the hereditary condition multiple endocrine neoplasia type 2 (MEN2) and it is standard of care to offer genetic testing to all diagnosed patients. This study used the Kaiser Permanente integrated medical record system to identify patients at risk for MEN2, assess adherence to clinical practice guidelines, and offer genetic counseling and testing. A query of the electronic medical records system identified patients with MTC. All patients with MTC who had not had RET gene testing, as well as patients who had positive RET gene testing, but had not yet had genetic counseling, were contacted and offered a genetics consultation. The query identified 142 patients with MTC. Fifty‐six (40%) of those patients had not had the RET testing that all endocrine professional groups recommend. Forty‐nine patients were eligible for the outreach, and, from this, 14 patients were scheduled for genetic counseling. Of the 94 individuals at our institution who had RET genetic testing, 25 (27%) were positive for a mutation. Of the 82 apparently sporadic cases, 13 (16%) carried a RET mutation. A family history of endocrine cancer and younger age at diagnosis significantly increased the risk carrying a RET mutation. However, approximately half of RET‐positive patients did not have a significant family history of cancer and one‐third were over age 50 at diagnosis. This study concludes that a significant proportion of patients with MTC are not receiving standard of care genetic testing and reinforces previous research that sporadic‐appearing cases of MTC are often, in fact, hereditary.
Imaging Approach to the Diagnosis of Acute Appendicitis in a Group of Teaching Hospitals with 24/7 In-house Availability of Ultrasound Technologist: Effect of Timing of Request on Imaging Modality
Authors: Alzahrani Hassan , Maghdoori Babak , Islam Shadman , Maghdoori Sara , Atri Mostafa 
Published: June 2018

Purpose The study sought determine effect of requisition timing on the initial-choice imaging modality in appendicitis evaluation. Methods This was an institutional review board–approved retrospective study, encompassing 3 University of Toronto teaching hospitals, offering 24/7 radiology coverage. All surgically proven appendicitis cases, from 2012-2014, were included and presurgical ultrasound (US) or computed tomography (CT) reports were analysed. Examinations were all requested by the emergency department, performed by the same technologists and reviewed or finalized by the same radiology group (residents fellows or attending). Two coverage categories, namely regular hours (8 am-5 pm, Monday-Friday) or after hours (5 pm-8 am, Monday-Friday and weekends) were compared. The percentage of the starting modality (US or CT), the rate of CT following an indeterminate US, and the sensitivity of each modality was compared between the 2 categories, utilising Mann-Whitney U and chi-square tests. Results Presurgical US or CT studies of 494 patients, from February 2012-August 2014, were evaluated. Regular-hours and after-hours coverage demonstrated 174 (89:85 women:men) and 320 (141:179 women:men; P < .04) patients. The average age, 37.9 ± 17.1 women versus 35.2 ± 13.7 men was not statistically different ( P = .8). Regular hours included 89 of 174 (51.1%) of US-only examinations, 50 of 174 (29%) of CT-only examinations, and 35 of 174 (20%) of US examinations followed by CT examinations. After hours included 147 of 320 (46%) of US-only examinations, 147 of 320 (46%) of CT-only examinations, and 26 of 320 (8%) of US examinations followed by CT examinations ( P < .001). The total diagnostic sensitivities for US and CT were 86% (81% regular hours, 90% after hours; P = .041) and 99.2% (100% regular hours, 99% after hours; P > .05), respectively. Conclusions US was less utilised in acute appendicitis detection after hours, although its diagnostic sensitivity was better than regular-hours coverage.
Age of onset and quality of life among males and females with schizophrenia: A national study
Authors: Rotstein Anat , Roe David , Gelkopf Marc , Levine Stephen Z. 
Published: June 2018

AbstractBackground:Age of onset is considered central to understanding the course of schizophrenia, yet little is known regarding its association with quality of life in general, and specifically among males and females.Aims:To examine the association between the age of schizophrenia onset and quality of life, in general, and among males and females, using data from a national sample and competing statistical models.Methods:Participants with a diagnosis of schizophrenia (N = 1624) completed the Manchester Short Assessment of Quality of Life (MSA-QoL) and were rated on a parallel measure by their professional caregivers (N = 578). Multiple regression analysis models were computed for self-appraised quality of life, and mixed models with random intercepts were used for caregivers. Six competing models were tested for parsimony for each rating source. Three models without adjustment and three models adjusted for confounding variables. Sensitivity analyses were conducted for males and females separately.Results:Age of onset was statistically significantly (P <.05) negatively associated with self-appraised and caregiver-appraised quality of life on aggregate and among females. Among males, a significant (P <.01) quadratic effect of onset age on self-appraised quality of life demonstrated a negative association up to onset age of 36.67 years, after which the association was positive.ConclusionsAn earlier age of onset is associated with a better quality of life in schizophrenia which is tentatively explained by social decline. Specific trends in psychiatric symptom severity may account for this association among females while social advantages may account for the particular results found among males.
TENNESSEE BEEF PRODUCERS' WILLINGNESS TO PARTICIPATE IN A STATE-BRANDED BEEF PROGRAM
Authors: MCLEOD ELIZABETH , JENSEN KIMBERLY , GRIFFITH ANDREW P. , DELONG KAREN L. 
Published: June 2018

AbstractTennessee cattle producer willingness to participate in a hypothetical Tennessee Branded Beef Program (TBBP) was examined using 2016 survey data. Willingness to participate in the TBBP was modeled using a probit model. Among those willing to participate, a Tobit model was used to estimate the pounds of live-weight beef producers were willing to supply into a TBBP. Age, production practices, and risk attitudes influenced willingness to participate. Among those willing to participate, projected TBBP supply per farm averaged 32,329 pounds and was influenced by on-farm animal units, production practices, perceived barriers, risk attitudes, and consequentiality beliefs.
P.075 Inflammatory Myositis associated with Myasthenia Gravis with and without thymic pathology: case series and literature review
Authors: Huang K , Mezei M , Shojania K , Amiri N , Dehghan N , Chapman K 
Published: June 2018

Background: The association of myasthenia gravis (MG) and inflammatory myositis (IM) is rare and often only one of the diseases is diagnosed. Methods: In this study, we reviewed medical records of patients seen at NMDU from 2004 to 2017 who had diagnosis of concurrent MG and IM. The data is presented descriptively. -Results: We identified 7 patients with MG-IM overlap. Clinical features, laboratory and pathology data of the patients are summarized in Table 1. Conclusions: This is one of the largest case series with MG-IM overlap. It is very important to recognize such association and the different pattern of muscle involvement because therapies may be adjusted to treat both conditions. In patients with thymic pathology, conventional disease modifying agents, IVIG and glucocorticoid in addition to thymoma resection appear to be effective. In patients with refractory MG and myositis who were AChR negative, rituximab may be effective.
Understanding the effect of ultraviolet light intensity on disinfection performance through the use of ultraviolet measurements and simulation
Authors: Tande Brian M. , Pringle Todd A. , Rutala William A. , Gergen Maria F. , Weber David J. 
Published: June 2018

AbstractWe measured the disinfection of MRSA and Clostridium difficile spores using an ultraviolet C (UV-C) device, and we correlated those results to measurements and computer simulations of UV-C surface intensity. The results demonstrate both large differences in UV light intensity across various surfaces and how this leads to significant differences in disinfection.
Building Capacity for Global Tobacco Treatment: International Frontline Provider Perspectives
Authors: Gomide Henrique P. , Richter Kimber P. , Cruvinel Erica , Martins Leonardo Fernandes ,   The International Relations Committee of ATTUD
Published: June 2018

Introduction: Many countries are enacting tobacco treatment training, guidelines and policies in order to fulfil Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) treaty agreements. This study tapped the perspectives of international treatment providers to identify challenges and recommendations for improvement.Methods: The cross-sectional survey included closed- and open-ended items. Distribution included professional listservs (ATTUD; Global Bridges; ENSH Global) and word-of-mouth. The survey collected data using an open-source platform (Enketo Smart Paper/Ona). We used R for quantitative analysis and Google Sheets to categorize open-ended responses.Results: There were 155 respondents from 49 countries. Most (78.6%) provided direct services. Almost half (48.1%) reported receiving less than 6 hours of tobacco treatment training; respondents from low and lower-middle income countries (LMICs) received significantly less training (Fisher's p < 0.014). Likewise, among all respondents, 43% rated poor access to treatment; this rose to 100% among LMICs (Fisher's p < 0.001). To improve treatment and training, respondents suggested increasing government funding for pharmacotherapy and behavioural services; providing training in local languages and in the treatment of smokeless tobacco forms; trainee certification and access to online support for providers.Conclusions: Globally, half of front-line treatment providers reported having poor access to training; this was true for all providers in LMICs and most in upper middle-income countries. Existing online trainings, available mainly in English, could be migrated to open-access formats to permit countries to tailor them to their local needs and languages. Countries in geographical proximity or historical linguistic/political alliances could forge cross-country mentoring relationships and mutual support for training.
SALT HRS Discovery of the Binary Nucleus of the Etched Hourglass Nebula MyCn 18
Authors: Miszalski Brent , Manick Rajeev , Mikołajewska Joanna , Van Winckel Hans , Iłkiewicz Krystian 
Published: June 2018

AbstractThe shaping of various morphological features of planetary nebulae is increasingly linked to the role of binary central stars. Identifying a binary within a planetary nebula offers a powerful tool with which to directly investigate the formation mechanisms behind these features. The Etched Hourglass Nebula, MyCn 18, is the archetype for several binary-linked morphological features, yet it has no identified binary nucleus. It has the fastest jets seen in a planetary nebula of 630 km s−1, a central star position offset from the nebula centre, and a bipolar nebula with a very narrow waist. Here we report on the Southern African Large Telescope High Resolution Spectrograph detection of radial velocity variability in the nucleus of MyCn 18 with an orbital period of 18.15 ± 0.04 d and a semi-amplitude of 11.0 ± 0.3 km s−1. Adopting an orbital inclination of 38 ± 5° and a primary mass of 0.6 ± 0.1 M⊙ yields a secondary mass of 0.19 ± 0.05 M⊙ corresponding to an M5V companion. The detached nature of the binary rules out a classical nova as the origin of the jets and the offset central star as hypothesised in the literature. Furthermore, scenarios that produce the offset central star during the AGB and that form narrow waist bipolar nebulae result in orbital separations 80–800 times larger than observed in MyCn 18. The inner hourglass and jets may have formed from part of the common envelope ejecta that remained bound to the binary system in a circumbinary disk, whereas the offset central star position may best be explained by proper motion. Detailed simulations of MyCn 18 are encouraged that are compatible with the binary nucleus to further investigate its complex formation history.
Greater Dietary Inflammatory Index score is associated with higher likelihood of chronic kidney disease
Authors: Mazidi Mohsen , Shivappa Nitin , Wirth Michael D. , Hebert James R. , Kengne Andre P. 
Published: June 2018

AbstractChronic kidney disease (CKD) is described as a progressive alteration of kidney function, resulting from multiple factors, including behaviours. We investigated the association of the Dietary Inflammatory Index (DII®) with prevalent CKD in adult Americans. National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey participants with measured data on kidney function markers from 2005 to 2012 were included in this study. Prevalent CKD was based on an estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) <60 ml/min per 1·73 m2or urinary albumin/creatinine≥30 mg/g. Energy-adjusted DII (E-DIITM) scores were calculated from 24-h dietary recalls. Statistical analyses accounted for the survey design and sample weights. We included 21 649 participants, with 1634 (6·8 %) having prevalent CKD. Participants with high E-DII scores had greater BMI, fasting blood glucose and systolic blood pressure, and were more likely to be diabetic or hypertensive (allP<0·001) compared with those with lower E-DII scores. In regression models adjusted for age, sex, race, fasting blood glucose, blood pressure, BMI, hypertension and diabetes status, mean eGFR significantly decreased across increasing quartiles of E-DII, whereas serum uric acid level and log urinary albumin:creatinine ratio significantly increased (allP<0·001). Prevalent CKD increased from 5·3 % in the lowest to 9·3 % in the highest E-DII quartile (P=0·02). In multivariable-adjusted logistic regression models, the odds of prevalent CKD were 29 % higher in the highest compared with the lowest E-DII quartile. Pro-inflammatory diet is associated with declining kidney function and high prevalence of CKD. Dietary changes that reduce inflammation have a potential to prevent CKD.
Use of an electronic malnutrition screening tool in a hospital setting: effects on knowledge, attitudes and perceived practices of healthcare staff
Authors: Eglseer Doris , Halfens Ruud J. G. , Lohrmann Christa 
Published: June 2018

AbstractMalnutrition risk screening is essential for the adequate identification and treatment of malnourished hospitalised patients. The aim of this study was to determine the effect of the use of an electronic malnutrition screening tool on the knowledge, attitudes and perceived practices (KAP) of a pool of nurses, nurses’ aides and physicians. A controlled study using a pre-test–post-test design was carried out in two Austrian hospitals. The hospital that was assigned to the intervention group used the Graz malnutrition screening tool. The hospital that was assigned to the control group received no intervention. To collect data, a questionnaire was filled out by the study participants at baseline (T0) and 1 month after the implementation (T1) to assess KAP. All data were analysed using descriptive statistics, χ2 tests, Wilcoxon signed-rank tests and Student’s t tests. A total of 269 nurses, nurses’ aides and physicians participated in the study and completed the questionnaires at T0, and 190 people at T1. The sum score for the KAP questionnaire changed significantly after the implementation of the malnutrition screening tool in the intervention group (P<0·001), but not in the control group. The use of a valid and reliable malnutrition screening tool effectively improved the KAP of healthcare staff. The KAP described here are essential for providing successful nutritional care in malnourished patients, and improving these factors may result in improved patient outcomes. To attain these outcomes, stakeholders, as well as members of all professions involved in multidisciplinary nutritional care, must invest significant efforts.
Guns or Money? Defense Co-operation and Bilateral Lending as Coevolving Networks
Authors: Kinne Brandon J , Bunte Jonas B. 
Published: June 2018

AbstractHow are defense co-operation and economic co-operation related? To answer this question, this article analyzes the coevolution of defense co-operation agreements (DCAs) and government-to-government loans. It argues that governments pursue two distinct sets of interests. At thebilateral level,governments use issue linkages and side payments to encourage spillover from defense co-operation to economic co-operation, and vice versa. That is, governments’ bilateral interests in DCAs and loans are largely complementary. However, at thenetwork level,interests may diverge. Specifically, governments use DCAs to build clubs of like-minded defense collaborators or ‘security communities’, while they use loans to impose asymmetric forms of political authority or ‘hierarchies’. In some contexts, these network-level interests are, like bilateral interests, complementary. For example, defense partners rely on loans to co-ordinate their foreign policies and better respond to security threats, and debtors rely on lending patterns to identify suitable defense partners. In other cases, however, these interests strongly conflict. For example, governments that are highly active in the loan network are especially likely to rely on asymmetric exercises of political authority, which is incompatible with the network-level goal of using DCAs to establish communities of defense collaborators. Similarly, governments that are highly active in the DCA network are, due to their complex multilateral political commitments, less vulnerable to the asymmetric influences that loans enable. To empirically test these claims, the study develops a longitudinal model of multiplex network coevolution. Overall, the results show that while economic and defense co-operation often reinforce one another, they sometimes conflict in unexpected ways.
The Potter's Field
Authors: Denyer Willis Graham 
Published: June 2018

AbstractI unpack the “potter's field” as an everyday practice and a category, especially as it operates in the material treatment of bodies as a mirror of life. I examine this space of “worthlessness” as it exists in liberal capitalism. From the potter's fields of São Paulo, Brazil, I consider how these are, in fact, mundane mass graves, made politically useful as a means to obscure important bodies alongside those who are, today, the subjects of terror. I then ask how the rise of the uncertified potter's field—a burial field for disposable bodies, not made legal by the state—is inseparable from recent historical and contemporary conditions of political abandonment. The uncertified field is made easy by a politics of abandonment, and becomes useful to state institutions as a material invocation of responsibility, interred elsewhere, while nonetheless advancing a larger logic of governance and political will in our times.
“Hail the Census Night”: Trust and Political Imagination in the 1960 Population Census of Ghana
Authors: Serra Gerardo 
Published: June 2018

AbstractThe article uses the first population census of postcolonial Ghana to analyze the relationship between statistics and the process of imagining the nation-state. In contrast with much historical and sociological literature, which conceptualizes the relationship between census-taking and state formation in terms of identification, classification, and quantification, the departure point of this analysis is the importance of gaining the trust of the counted subjects. In Ghana, where the possibility of obtaining accurate population returns had been severely hindered by people's distrust in the state, the 1960 population census saw the organization of a capillary education campaign in schools and in the press. By dissecting the iconographies emerging from the Census Education and Enlightenment Campaign, the article makes three contributions. First, it shows that understanding the concrete ways in which statistics inform political imagination requires an expansion of the field of observation beyond the statistical machinery and other “centers of calculation.” Second, complementing James Ferguson's understanding of “development discourse” as an “anti-politics machine,” it is argued that the possibility of making the people of Ghana “census minded” depended on the construction of a much richer set of inherently political representations about the nature of the postcolonial state. Finally, it shows the importance of critically interrogating the political implications acquired by the reception of global statistical practices. It does so by documenting the multiple ways in which the international standards promoted by the United Nations became entwined with the transformation of Ghanaian politics through the mobilization of children and press propaganda.
From conversation to connection: a cross-case analysis of life-story work with five couples where one partner has semantic dementia
Authors: Kindell Jackie , Wilkinson Ray , Keady John 
Published: June 2018

AbstractSemantic dementia causes progressive communication difficulties that significantly impact on the person and their family. There is a paucity of research examining conversation skills in this condition and associated interventions to support interaction, such as life-story work. This study used a multiple case study design to: (a) explore the everyday conversation experiences of five individuals with semantic dementia and their spouses; and (b) examine how intervention using interaction-focused life-story work could support communication needs. A total of 74 home visits were conducted over a longitudinal period. An innovative combination of conversation analysis of video and audio data alongside biographical interviewing was used. Information derived from these strands was utilised to design an individually tailored life-story intervention. Cross-case analysis examined the contribution of life-story work to interaction and other aspects of care. Results showed that a range of challenges and skills were present within conversation. Life-story work was delivered in all cases using a variety of formats and the work could be conceptualised under various points of connection: interactional, emotional, new, practical and future. Detailed assessment was important to define aims for intervention and appropriate format(s) for life-story work for the individual concerned. Outcomes for communication in this study were not solely about supporting the telling of facts about the person's life but represented a broader focus to facilitate embodied and emotional connections. This study demonstrates that creativity within life-story work is important to foster social interaction, beyond information exchange, using both verbal and non-verbal behaviours. In addition, video data show promise for exploring in-the-moment outcomes for research and practice, particularly to capture the non-verbal dimensions of this work.