bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Perceptions of supportive communication in Chinese patients with cancer: experiences and expectations
Authors: Liu Jun‐E , Mok Esther , Wong Thomas 
Published: September 2005

Aim.  This paper reports the findings of a study exploring the experiences and expectations of patients with cancer of supportive communication in the context of Chinese culture.Background.  Patients with cancer experience psychological distress, particularly in the initial period after diagnosis. Supportive communication can positively affect their psychological adjustment. Previous studies have reported the functions, contents, types and sources of informational support for patients with cancer in Western studies, but patients from different cultural backgrounds who have cancer might have different preferences in seeking support.Methods.  Semi‐structured interviews were carried out with a convenience sample of 20 Chinese patients with cancer during 2002. Content analysis was used to identify themes within the data.Findings.  Chinese patients with cancer have a substantial need to receive informational and emotional support during the period of their hospitalization. Their support networks include doctors, nurses, family members, relatives and fellow patients. The expectations of support from different sources varied according to the nature of the relationship between patients with cancer and providers of support. Patients were active in seeking information and they perceived communication with doctors, nurses and fellow patients as beneficial. Most would only express emotional needs to their close family members and did not expect healthcare professionals to provide emotional support. However, interviewees perceived the caring behaviours of nurses and the emotional support of fellow patients as two important sources of support.Conclusion.  For Chinese patients, coping with illness and misfortune is largely a private and family affair, and most of them did not expect nurses to meet their emotional needs. Nurses should be aware of the type, timing and source of supportive communication that Chinese patients find valuable. This will help them to provide the appropriate support to meet patients’ needs.
Parents' intentions to use paediatric nurse practitioner services in an emergency department
Authors: Forgeron Paula , Martin‐Misener Ruth 
Published: September 2005

Aim.  This paper reports on a study investigating the factors which influence parental intent to use the services of a paediatric nurse practitioner in an emergency department.Background.  Research has shown that nurse practitioners provide quality care to paediatric and adult primary care and non‐urgent emergency patients. Although there are studies that assess patient satisfaction with nurse practitioner care, there are few that report on what factors initially influence the public to use these services. No studies have examined the factors that affect parental decision‐making to access nurse practitioner care in emergency settings for their children.Methods.  A questionnaire was completed by 100 parents who visited a tertiary paediatric emergency department for their child's non‐urgent emergency care needs. Information captured included demographic variables, role responsibility tasks that parents would be willing to have a nurse practitioner provide, and parents’ perceptions of the characteristics of the nurse practitioner role. Descriptive statistics and logistic regression were used to analyse the demographic data, percentiles were compiled for the role responsibility tasks, and logistic regression was used to analyse parents’ perceptions of the characteristics of the nurse practitioner role. The data were collected in 2002.Results.  Eighty‐three per cent of parents indicated their intention to access nurse practitioner services for a variety of childhood symptoms. Logistic regression revealed that the compatibility of nurse practitioner services with parents’ beliefs and needs was the most statistically significant (P < 0·05) independent variable predicting parental intent to use these services. Demographic variables did not have a statistically significant influence.Conclusions.  The public does not seem to understand fully the scope of nursing practice, and this is a concern if people are to feel comfortable with expanded roles for nurses. Thus, the public should be given information that not only describes the role of nurse practitioners, but also includes facts about the scope of practice of Registered Nurses as this may be helpful in producing a favourable attitude towards nurse practitioner care.
Perioperative nurses’ attitudes toward the use of nursing diagnoses in documentation
Authors: Junttila Kristiina , Salanterä Sanna , Hupli Maija 
Published: September 2005

Aim. This paper reports a study of nurses’ attitudes towards the use of nursing diagnoses in perioperative documentation and the factors affecting these attitudes.Background. There are both international and national requests for nurses to move from natural language‐based narrative documentation to electronic documentation and clinical use of nursing classifications. However, nurses’ attitudes toward nursing classifications have not been widely studied.Methods. A questionnaire was distributed to a purposive sample of perioperative nurses (n = 146) who had participated in clinical testing of nursing diagnoses. The response rate was 60% (n = 87). The data were collected in 2003.Results. In general, nurses’ attitudes toward nursing diagnoses were positive. Those over 40 years of age who had clinical experience from 10 to 19 years, postbasic nursing education and previous knowledge of nursing diagnoses were most positive in their attitudes. However, the use of nursing diagnoses in perioperative practice was not seen as either necessary or accurate in describing patients’ problems. Furthermore, the documentation of perioperative routines was seen as time‐consuming and frustrating.Conclusions. Nursing classifications should be included in both preregistration nursing curricula and in‐service educational programmes to ensure theoretical knowledge of and practical skills in standardized clinical languages. The perioperative nursing diagnoses should be reviewed to fit better with clinical practice. In addition, current perioperative documentation practices should be reconsidered and updated as appropriate to address clinical requirements better.
Spouse's life situation after partner's stroke event: psychometric testing of a questionnaire
Authors: Larson Jenny , Franzén‐Dahlin Åsa , Billing Ewa , Murray Veronica , Wredling Regina 
Published: September 2005

Aim.  This paper reports a study to validate and test the reliability of a questionnaire constructed to evaluate the life situation of spouses after their partners have had a stroke.Background.  Stroke is a disease with great consequences for survivors and their families. Most survivors return home after the hospitalization and rehabilitation due to the stroke event. Relatives, primarily spouses, often feel obligated to care for the survivor at home, providing emotional support or assisting the person in activities of daily living. More specific information is needed about the spouse's life situation after the stroke event in order to develop effective supportive strategies.Methods.  Psychometric testing of the Life Situation Questionnaire was undertaken with 99 spouses of stroke survivors. The 13‐item questionnaire consists of four subscales: ‘Worries’, ‘Powerlessness’, ‘Personal adjustment’ and ‘Social isolation’.Results.  Item analysis showed that each item correlated with its own subscale (r = 0·63–0·78). The instrument had high internal consistency, with Cronbach's alphas of 0·80–0·86 and reasonable high congruent validity when correlated with a Wellbeing instrument, with a correlation of 0·59 (P = 0·001). Exploratory factor analysis confirmed the subscales, accounting for 77% of the variance.Conclusion.  The Life Situation Questionnaire is a valid and reliable instrument, and could serve as an assessment tool after a stroke event to identify family caregivers who have problems in their life situations and need support from healthcare services.
Developing a tool to appraise fetal monitoring guidelines for women at low obstetric risk
Authors: Hindley Carol , Hinsliff Sophie W. , Thomson Ann M. 
Published: September 2005

Aim.  The aim of this paper is to report the development and use of a tool to appraise guidelines for fetal heart rate monitoring and discuss the findings generated in the appraisal process.Background.  Expert guidance on the appropriate method of monitoring the fetal heart in labour has been available for some time. However, practices not based on evidence were continuing routinely in the United Kingdom.Methods.  We produced an 18‐item tool for the appraisal of guidelines. Heads of Midwifery Services were asked to send the guideline currently in use. Twenty‐four out of 28 responded, and sent 32 guidelines. Pairs of multidisciplinary reviewers appraised each guideline.Results.  A prevalidated generic appraisal instrument was not found to be appropriate for intrapartum fetal monitoring guidelines. When using our own specifically‐developed appraisal tool for assessing the quality of fetal monitoring guidelines, only 11 reviewer pairs showed ‘good’ or ‘moderate’ agreement in their scores.Conclusions.  Generically‐validated guidelines may not be sufficiently discriminatory for specialized areas of practice such as intrapartum fetal monitoring.
A Bayesian belief network for quality assessment: application to employment officer support
Authors: Wooff D. A. , Schneider J. M. 
Published: September 2005

AbstractBackground  ‘Supported’ employment stipulates that disabled people should have real jobs for real pay. This paper models kinds of supported employment, assesses how the support and placement features affect its outcomes and its quality from the perspective of the employees, and provides a dynamic model to help explore what types of interventions might promote greater social inclusion for people with learning and other disabilities.Method  Bayesian belief networks (BBNs) provide the general framework for modelling the relationships between the variables and features of interest. The structure, probabilistic specification and quality indicators were elicited from project advisory groups, including people with learning disability, and took into account a pilot survey of 30 individuals. A subsequent survey of 1461 supported employees was used to update the model and to provide actual assessments of quality of placement.Results  We present the BBN methodology in some detail, as novel to this discipline. We show how the model was constructed, and its implications for supported employment. We derive indices for quality of placement, taking into account the views of clients. We show how survey and individual results can be used to update the model. Use of the model suggests that quality of placement is, on average, relatively high, with small differences between groups with differing primary disability.Conclusions  The BBN is the appropriate methodology to model complex relationships and interventions for problems such as these. The model developed in this study can be used to assess and improve the fit between people and jobs, both at the individual level and for groups of employees, and can take into account different kinds of quality for different stakeholders.
Genetic Differences in Hypothalamic‐Pituitary‐Adrenal Axis Activity and Food Restriction‐induced Hyperactivity in Three Inbred Strains of Rats
Authors: Duclos M. , Bouchet M. , Vettier A. , Richard D. 
Published: September 2005

AbstractWe used three inbred rat strains known for significant differences in the activity and reactivity of their hypothalamic‐pituitary‐adrenal (HPA) axis to stress [Fischer 344 (F344), Brown Norway (BN) and Lewis (Lew) rats] to search for a strain difference in the paradoxical increase in running activity induced by food restriction and to explore the role of the HPA axis in this behaviour. Rats were randomly assigned to either an ad lib sedentary group (AL), a control wheel activity group (ACT), a food restriction‐induced hyperactivity group (FR‐ACT) group (1.5 h/day ad lib food, 22.5 h/day ad lib wheel access) or a pair‐fed group (FR). The BN and Lew rats reached the 25% body weight‐loss criterion of FR‐ACT (strain effect: F2,132 = 45.58, P < 10–6) faster than the F344 strain due to higher food restriction‐induced running activity (strain effect: F2,65 = 17.43, P = 0.00001). FR and FR‐ACT decreased thymus weight (marker of integrated HPA axis activation) in all strains. In Lew and BN strains, FR‐ACT induced a further decrement on thymus weight compared to their FR group. Prefeeding corticosterone levels (15.00 h) increased during the study in BN and Lew FR‐ACT rats, but not in F344. Total wheel turns were correlated to both final adipose weight (r = −0.49, P = 0.002) and thymus weight decrement (r = 0.59, P = 0.0001), emphasizing the relationship between fat mass and HPA axis activation in excessive running activity. Increased running in conditions of food restriction and HPA axis activation may be linked at the level of the central nervous system. However, the involvement of corticotrophin‐releasing hormone, agouti‐related peptide or cocaine‐ and amphetamine‐regulated transcript in behavioural disturbances of FR‐ACT rats was excluded (in situ hybridization). We propose that corticosterone may be the link between initial low levels of fat mass and/or rate of fat mass loss (peripheral energy stores) and increased wheel activity, favouring fueling through lipolysis and proteolysis and reinforcing the self starvation via reward mechanisms, thus establishing a deleterious vicious cycle.
Overexpression of Mycobacterium tuberculosis manB, a phosphomannomutase that increases phosphatidylinositol mannoside biosynthesis in Mycobacterium smegmatis and mycobacterial association with human macrophages
Authors: McCarthy Travis R. , Torrelles Jordi B. , MacFarlane Amanda Shearer , Katawczik Melanie , Kutzbach Beth , DesJardin Lucy E. , Clegg Steven , Goldberg Joanna B. , Schlesinger Larry S. 
Published: September 2005

SummaryMycobacterium tuberculosis (M. tb) pathogenesis involves the interaction between the mycobacterial cell envelope and host macrophage, a process mediated, in part, by binding of the mannose caps of M. tb lipoarabinomannan (ManLAM) to the macrophage mannose receptor (MR). A presumed critical step in the biosynthesis of ManLAM, and other mannose‐containing glycoconjugates, is the conversion of mannose‐6‐phosphate to mannose‐1‐phosphate, by a phosphomannomutase (PMM), to produce GDP‐mannose, the primary mannose‐donor in mycobacteria. We have identified four M. tb H37Rv genes with similarity to known PMMs. Using in vivo complementation of PMM and phosphoglucomutase (PGM) deficient strains of Pseudomonas aeruginosa, and an in vitro enzyme assay, we have identified both PMM and PGM activity from one of these genes, Rv3257c (MtmanB). MtmanB overexpression in M. smegmatis produced increased levels of LAM, lipomannan, and phosphatidylinositol mannosides (PIMs) compared with control strains and led to a 13.3 ± 3.9‐fold greater association of mycobacteria with human macrophages, in a mannan‐inhibitable fashion. This increased association was mediated by the overproduction of higher order PIMs that possess mannose cap structures. We conclude that MtmanB encodes a functional PMM involved in the biosynthesis of mannosylated lipoglycans that participate in the association of mycobacteria with macrophage phagocytic receptors.
Identification of novel single amino acid changes that result in hyperactivation of the unique GTPase, Rheb, in fission yeast
Authors: Urano Jun , Comiso Melissa J. , Guo Lea , Aspuria Paul‐Joseph , Deniskin Roman , Tabancay Angel P. , Kato‐Stankiewicz Juran , Tamanoi Fuyuhiko 
Published: September 2005

SummaryRheb GTPase is a key player in the control of growth, cell cycle and nutrient uptake that is conserved from yeast to humans. To further our understanding of the Rheb pathway, we sought to identify hyperactivating mutations in theSchizosaccharomyces pombeRheb, Rhb1. Hyperactive forms of Rhb1 were found to result from single amino acid changes at valine‐17, serine‐21, lysine‐120 or asparagine‐153. Expression of these mutants confers resistance to canavanine and thialysine, phenotypes which are similar to phenotypes exhibited by cells lacking the Tsc1/Tsc2 complex that negatively regulates Rhb1. The thialysine‐resistant phenotype of the hyperactive Rhb1 mutants is suppressed by a second mutation in the effector domain. Purified mutant proteins exhibit dramatically decreased binding of GDP, while their GTP binding is not drastically affected. In addition, some of the mutant proteins show significantly decreased GTPase activities. Thus the hyperactivating mutations are expected to result in an increase in the GTP‐bound/GDP‐bound ratio of Rhb1. By using the hyperactive mutant, Rhb1K120R, we have been able to demonstrate that Rhb1 interacts with Tor2, one of the twoS. pombeTOR (Target of Rapamycin) proteins. These fission yeast results provide the first evidence for a GTP‐dependent association of Rheb with Tor.
Light‐dependent regulation of photosynthesis genes in Rhodobacter sphaeroides 2.4.1 is coordinately controlled by photosynthetic electron transport via the PrrBA two‐component system and the photoreceptor AppA
Authors: Happ Hendrik N. , Braatsch Stephan , Broschek Vera , Osterloh Lisa , Klug Gabriele 
Published: September 2005

SummaryFormation of the photosynthetic apparatus in Rhodobacter is regulated by oxygen tension and light intensity. Here we show that in anaerobically grown Rhodobacter cells a light‐dependent increase in expression of the puc and puf operons encoding structural proteins of the photosynthetic complexes requires an active photosynthetic electron transport. The redox‐sensitive CrtJ/PpsR repressor of photosynthesis genes, which was suggested to mediate electron transport‐dependent signals, is not involved in this light‐dependent signal chain. Our data reveal that the signal initiated in the photosynthetic reaction centre is transmitted via components of the electron transport chain and the PrrB/PrrA two‐component system in Rhodobacter sphaeroides. Under blue light illumination in the absence of oxygen this signal leads to activation of photosynthesis genes and interferes with a blue‐light repression mediated by the AppA photoreceptor and the PpsR transcriptional repressor in R. sphaeroides. Thus, light either sensed by a photoreceptor or initiating photosynthetic electron transport has opposite effects on the transcription of photosynthesis genes. Both signalling pathways involve redox‐dependent steps that finally determine the effect of light on gene expression.
The ExPortal: an organelle dedicated to the biogenesis of secreted proteins in Streptococcus pyogenes
Authors: Rosch Jason W. , Caparon Michael G. 
Published: September 2005

SummaryThe Gram‐positive pathogen Streptococcus pyogenes secretes proteins through the ExPortal, a unique single microdomain of the cellular membrane specialized to contain the Sec translocons. It has been proposed that the ExPortal functions as an organelle to promote the biogenesis of secreted proteins by coordinating interactions between nascent unfolded secretory proteins and membrane‐associated chaperones. In this study we provide evidence to support this model. It was found that HtrA (DegP), a surface anchored accessory factor required for maturation of the secreted SpeB cysteine protease, was localized exclusively to the ExPortal. Furthermore, the ATP synthase β subunit was not localized to the ExPortal, suggesting that retention is likely restricted to a specific subset of exported proteins. Mutations that disrupted the anchoring, but not the protease activity, of HtrA, also altered the maturation kinetics of SpeB demonstrating that localization to the ExPortal was important for HtrA function. These data indicate that the ExPortal provides a mechanism by which Gram‐positive bacteria can coordinate protein secretion and subsequent biogenesis in the absence of a specialized protein‐folding compartment.
Nuclear magnetic resonance solution structure of the periplasmic signalling domain of the TonB‐dependent outer membrane transporter FecA from Escherichia coli
Authors: Garcia‐Herrero Alicia , Vogel Hans J. 
Published: September 2005

SummaryGram‐negative bacteria possess outer membrane receptors that utilize energy provided by the TonB system to take up iron. Several of these receptors participate in extracytoplasmic factor (ECF) signalling through an N‐terminal signalling domain that interacts with a periplasmic transmembrane anti‐sigma factor protein and a cytoplasmic sigma factor protein. The structures of the intact TonB‐dependent outer membrane receptor FecA from Escherichia coli and FpvA from Pseudomonas aeruginosa have recently been solved by protein crystallography; however, no electron density was detected for their periplasmic signalling domains, suggesting that it was either unfolded or flexible with respect to the remainder of the protein. Here we describe the well‐defined solution structure of this domain solved by multidimensional nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy. The monomeric protein construct contains the 79‐residue N‐terminal domain as well as the next 17 residues that are part of the receptor's plug domain. These form two clearly distinct regions: a highly structured domain at the N‐terminal end followed by an extended flexible tail at the C‐terminal end, which includes the ‘TonB‐box’ region, and connects it to the plug domain of the receptor. The structured region consists of two alpha‐helices that are positioned side by side and are sandwiched in between two small beta‐sheets. This is a novel protein fold which appears to be preserved in all the periplasmic signalling domains of bacterial TonB‐dependent outer membrane receptors that are involved in ECF signalling, because the hydrophobic residues that make up the core of the protein domain are highly conserved.