Category: Statistics

Eye (Lond). 2026 Jul 9. doi: 10.1038/s41433-026-04713-9. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND/OBJECTIVES: To compare the subjective treatment burden of intravitreal anti-VEGF therapy (IVT) among patients with neovascular age-related macular degeneration (nAMD), diabetic macular oedema (DME), and macular oedema secondary to retinal vein occlusion (CME).

SUBJECTS/METHODS: This single-centre, cross-sectional study surveyed 393 patients at the Department of Ophthalmology, Hietzing Hospital, Vienna. All participants had received at least five anti-VEGF intravitreal injections and had been in treatment for at least six months. Data were collected via a structured questionnaire, assessing perceived treatment burden, sociodemographics, and treatment-related experiences. Statistical analysis was performed using SPSS, with nonparametric tests applied due to ordinal data.

RESULTS: Of the 393 participants (nAMD: 305; CME: 55; DME: 33), 64% reported no or only slight burden from treatment frequency or injections. There was no statistically significant difference in overall treatment burden between disease groups (p > 0.4). However, the nature of the burden differed: nAMD patients most often cited fear of progressive vision loss, while CME and DME patients more frequently named the injection itself as the greatest burden. Better patient education significantly correlated with a lower perceived burden (p < 0.001). Nearly half of the patients required assistance with clinic visits.

CONCLUSIONS: Although the overall perceived burden of anti-VEGF treatment was similar across retinal diseases, patients’ specific concerns varied. Addressing these differences through personalised education and communication may help alleviate treatment-related anxiety and improve adherence. These findings highlight the importance of tailoring support strategies to individual patient experiences within long-term intravitreal treatment regimens.

PMID:42426273 | DOI:10.1038/s41433-026-04713-9

Eur Radiol. 2026 Jul 9. doi: 10.1007/s00330-026-12729-8. Online ahead of print.

NO ABSTRACT

PMID:42426246 | DOI:10.1007/s00330-026-12729-8

Eur J Obstet Gynecol Reprod Biol. 2026 Jul 6;325:115288. doi: 10.1016/j.ejogrb.2026.115288. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

OBJECTIVE: To compare cystectomy and ablative surgical techniques for the treatment of ovarian endometrioma, focusing on recurrence, ovarian reserve, and fertility outcomes.

METHODS: This systematic review and meta-analysis was conducted according to PRISMA 2020 guidelines and prospectively registered in PROSPERO (CRD420261342497). PubMed and Scopus were searched from January 2000 to September 2025. Studies comparing cystectomy with ablative techniques (CO₂ laser, argon plasma coagulation, PlasmaJet, bipolar energy, or hybrid approaches) in women with ovarian endometrioma ≥3 cm were included. Random-effects models were used to calculate pooled risk ratios (RRs) for dichotomous outcomes and mean differences (MDs) for continuous outcomes.

RESULTS: Twelve studies were included, with 4-6 studies contributing to each meta-analysis depending on outcome availability. Cystectomy showed a trend toward lower recurrence compared with ablative techniques (RR 0.61, 95% CI 0.37-1.01; p = 0.054), although this did not reach statistical significance. Ablative techniques were associated with better preservation of ovarian reserve, with a significantly smaller decline in antral follicle count (MD – 1.96, 95% CI – 3.04 to – 0.88; p < 0.001), while no significant difference was observed in anti-Müllerian hormone levels (MD – 0.24, 95% CI – 0.69 to 0.21; p = 0.30). No significant differences were found in overall pregnancy (RR 1.02), spontaneous conception (RR 1.02), or ART/IVF pregnancy rates (RR 0.83).

CONCLUSION: Cystectomy may reduce recurrence risk, whereas ablative techniques better preserve ovarian reserve. However, neither approach appears to confer a significant advantage in fertility outcomes. Surgical management of ovarian endometrioma should be individualized based on patient characteristics and reproductive goals.

PMID:42424709 | DOI:10.1016/j.ejogrb.2026.115288

Public Health. 2026 Jul 9;258:106320. doi: 10.1016/j.puhe.2026.106320. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

OBJECTIVES: To examine the association between moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA) and global cognitive function among older Chinese adults, and to assess the mediating role of depressive symptoms and moderating role of age in this association.

STUDY DESIGN: Cross-sectional, survey-weighted analysis of CHARLS 2020.

METHODS: We analysed data from 5318 community-dwelling adults aged ≥60 years participating in the 2020 wave of the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study (CHARLS). MVPA was derived from the International Physical Activity Questionnaire-Short Form, and global cognition was assessed using education-adjusted z-scores constructed from episodic memory, figure drawing, and mental status items. Depressive symptoms were measured with the 10-item Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale (CES-D-10). Survey-weighted linear regression models estimated associations between MVPA and cognition, progressively adjusting for sociodemographic, health, and behavioral covariates. Bias-corrected bootstrapped mediation analyses quantified the indirect association via depressive symptoms, and interaction terms with age tested moderation. All analyses incorporated survey weights, clustering, and stratification.

RESULTS: Weighted mean age was 69.8 years, and 50.1% of participants were women; 32.6% met education-adjusted criteria for cognitive impairment. Higher MVPA was positively associated with better cognitive performance in models adjusting for sociodemographic, health, and behavioral factors (standardized β = 0.38, 95% CI 0.34-0.42), with the direct association attenuating but remaining significant after further adjustment for depressive symptoms (β = 0.30, 95% CI 0.26-0.34). Depressive symptoms partially mediated the MVPA-cognition association (indirect effect = 0.08, 95% CI 0.06-0.10), accounting for 21.1% of the total association. Age strengthened the positive MVPA-cognition association (interaction β = 0.025, 95% CI 0.015-0.035), with conditional slopes ranging from β = 0.25 at ∼63 years to β = 0.45 at ∼77 years.

CONCLUSIONS: Among community-dwelling older Chinese adults, higher MVPA was associated with better global cognitive function, with a meaningful portion of this association statistically attributed to lower depressive symptom burden and stronger effects observed at older ages. Although the cross-sectional design precludes causal inference, these findings support age-attuned MVPA promotion combined with routine mood assessment and support as a pragmatic strategy to help preserve late-life cognitive health.

PMID:42424706 | DOI:10.1016/j.puhe.2026.106320

Curr Opin Psychol. 2026 Jun 27;73:102351. doi: 10.1016/j.copsyc.2026.102351. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

Aesthetic pleasure is shaped by many visual attributes, including prototypicality, fluency, complexity, symmetry, and self-relevance, but it is unclear why such diverse factors all influence liking. I propose that a major component of visual aesthetic pleasure is an epiphenomenon of categorization in the visual system, constrained by the metabolic cost of neural activity. In this view, successfully recognizing a stimulus as a member of a category is intrinsically rewarding because it supports perception, generalization, and planning, and aesthetic pleasure partly reflects the summed effect of many local rewards for successful categorization across the visual hierarchy. At the same time, neural activity costs energy, so that strongly driven, cluttered, or statistically extreme displays incur costs that can make them aversive even when they are easily interpretable. The “sweet spot of seeing” (3S) model formalizes visual pleasure as a compromise between categorization-based reward and metabolic expense. It offers a unifying explanation for prototype effects, fluency and mere exposure, mid-level regularities such as symmetry and good continuation, and visual discomfort. The model links classic inverted-U relations between complexity and liking to a concrete trade-off between information and cost, and it makes specific predictions for how aesthetic preferences change due to expertise or fatigue. While integrating recent evidence that lower-cost representations in categorization-trained neural networks and human visual cortex predict higher aesthetic ratings, the 3S model leaves room for later, reflective, self-relevant, and culturally informed forms of aesthetic experience that recruit broader neural systems.

PMID:42424690 | DOI:10.1016/j.copsyc.2026.102351

Int J Pediatr Otorhinolaryngol. 2026 Jul 8;207:112928. doi: 10.1016/j.ijporl.2026.112928. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: Theory of mind refers to the ability to attribute mental states to oneself and others and is foundational for effective social interaction. Children with hearing impairments often experience delays in theory of mind development, potentially due to limited access to language-based communication. While cochlear implants (CIs) and hearing aids (HAs) improve auditory access, the extent to which theory of mind skills can be enhanced through targeted intervention remains underexplored-particularly in Persian-speaking populations.

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the effectiveness of a structured theory of mind intervention in improving theory of mind skills, comprehension of mental verbs, and mean length of utterance in Persian-speaking children aged 5-7 years with hearing impairments using CIs or HAs.

METHODS: A randomized controlled trial was conducted with 60 children (n = 15 per group), stratified into four groups: CI-Intervention, CI-Control, HA-Intervention, and HA-Control. The 8-week intervention (16 sessions) was adapted from existing theory of mind training programs and delivered by trained facilitators in rehabilitation centers across Kerman, Iran. Primary outcomes were theory of mind skills assessed using a validated Persian version of the theory of mind. Secondary outcomes included comprehension of mental verbs and mean length of utterance. Assessments were conducted at baseline, mid-intervention, post-intervention, and one-month follow-up. Repeated-measures ANOVA and post hoc tests were used for data analysis.

RESULTS: Both intervention groups demonstrated significant improvements in theory of mind performance across all three levels (p < 0.001), with moderate to large effect sizes (0.58-0.75). Comprehension of mental verbs significantly improved in the CI-intervention group post-intervention (p = 0.03). While mean length of utterance increased over time in both intervention groups, no statistically significant difference was observed between groups post-intervention. Children with cochlear implants consistently outperformed those using hearing aids across multiple outcome measures. Gains in theory of mind and mental verb comprehension were maintained at one-month follow-up, though some attenuation was observed.

CONCLUSION: Structured theory of mind intervention is effective in enhancing theory of mind skills and mental verb comprehension in Persian-speaking children with hearing impairments, particularly those using cochlear implants. However, the limited impact on MLU and the partial maintenance of gains at follow-up suggest that sustained and linguistically enriched interventions may be necessary to consolidate and generalize improvements.

TRIAL REGISTRATION: IRCT20230827059274N1.

PMID:42424679 | DOI:10.1016/j.ijporl.2026.112928

Clinics (Sao Paulo). 2026 Jul 9;81:101034. doi: 10.1016/j.clinsp.2026.101034. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

CONTEXT: Stroke causes upper limb disability. The literature shows the effectiveness of radial Extracorporeal Shock Wave Therapy (rESWT) in reducing spasticity and promoting functional recovery of the upper limb of patients with stroke.

OBJECTIVE: Demonstrate the effect of rESWT on functional recovery of the upper extremity after ischemic stroke in the middle cerebral artery territory.

METHODS: Randomized, doubleblind, sham-controlled trial.

INTERVENTIONS: Weekly sessions of 5,000 rESWs (3.5 to 4.0 bar, 15 Hz), diffusely over the elbow and wrist flexors in the forearm and hand interosseous muscles for four weeks, delivered with a 36 mm device. A control treatment was conducted by a sham handpiece that did not emit the rESWs.

OUTCOMES: Changes in Fugl-Meyer Assessment for upper limb function (FMA-UE) at four weeks after the end of the treatment was the primary outcome. Spasticity, strength, and cortical integrity by transcranial magnetic stimulation were also assessed before and four weeks after the end of the treatment .

RESULTS: 23 patients were randomized, and 16 were included in the per-protocol analysis. Baseline measures were were balanced. FMA-UE was significantly different between the groups for proximal muscles (p = 0.004) and overall score (p = 0.038). Muscle strength by the Medical Research Council (MRC) score was also significantly different between both groups (p = 0.012). Three patients of the rESWT group and four patients of the sham rESWT group were excluded due to the use of Botulinum toxin, declined participation soon after they were randomized, or did not return four weeks after the end of treatment to follow-up. A limitation of this study is its small sample size, which limits the statistical power and the generalizability of our findings.

CONCLUSION: Four weekly sessions of rESWT improved the functional recovery of patients with chronic ischemic stroke and absent MEPs at baseline. This suggests rESWT may act via peripheral mechanisms to improve proximal muscle function, reflected in the overall improvement of the global measure of FMA-UE.

PMID:42424664 | DOI:10.1016/j.clinsp.2026.101034

JMIR Med Inform. 2026 Jul 9;14:e80377. doi: 10.2196/80377.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: Cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) and type 2 diabetes (DM2) are influenced not only by biomedical risk factors but also by social determinants of health (SDOH). While the inclusion of SDOH in predictive models is increasingly advocated, few studies have quantified their specific contribution in a high-risk clinical cohort using robust statistical and machine-learning approaches.

OBJECTIVE: This study aims to quantify the added predictive value of SDOH in predicting CVD or DM2 disease onset within 5 years, within 10 years, and at any time during follow-up among individuals already at elevated risk and to compare this added value across multiple modeling setups and frameworks.

METHODS: We used a large, linked dataset of over 58,000 inclusion events from the Extramural Leiden University Medical Center Academic Network data warehouse in the Netherlands, combining structured coded diagnosis and medication records from general practitioners with individual-level socioeconomic data from Statistics Netherlands. Individuals aged 30 years and older without prior DM2 or CVD were followed to assess disease progression. We trained Cox proportional hazards (CPH) and Extreme Gradient Boosting (XGBoost) models to predict progression to DM2 or CVD within 5 and 10 years and overall. All analyses were performed using the R programming language. Experiments included comparisons of Systematic Coronary Risk Evaluation 2, CPH, and XGBoost models; evaluation of time-bound and survival-based formulations; and quantification of SDOH impact using feature subset XGBoost models and Shapley additive explanations (SHAP)-based importance.

RESULTS: For the 5-year prediction of CVD or DM2, the combined XGBoost model using biomedical and SDOH predictors achieved an area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC) of 0.738, significantly outperforming the biomedical-only model (AUC=0.728; P=.01) and the SDOH-only model (AUC=0.691; P<.001). For 10-year CVD prediction, XGBoost achieved an AUC of 0.729, outperforming CPH (AUC=0.718; P=.02) and Systematic Coronary Risk Evaluation 2 (AUC=0.697; P<.001). For overall event prediction, XGBoost again performed best (AUC=0.719), significantly higher than CPH (AUC=0.704; P<.001). SHAP analyses showed that biomedical predictors contributed most strongly on a per-feature basis, while a subset of SDOH variables, particularly income- and benefit-related indicators, provided complementary predictive signal and ranked among the most influential predictors.

CONCLUSIONS: Incorporating SDOH improved the prediction of CVD and DM2 onset in a clinically defined high-risk cohort. Across hundreds of linked predictors, SDOH provided measurable incremental discrimination beyond biomedical risk factors, and income- and benefit-related variables ranked among the most influential features. SHAP analyses indicated that this added value was largely driven by a limited subset of highly informative social predictors. These findings support integrating structured SDOH into clinically actionable risk stratification models.

PMID:42424628 | DOI:10.2196/80377

Obstet Gynecol. 2026 Jul 9. doi: 10.1097/AOG.0000000000006364. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the risks of severe coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19)-related outcomes among pregnant and postpartum individuals and nonpregnant women during the Delta variant period and after the pandemic emergency ended in the United States.

METHODS: We conducted a retrospective cohort study of 18- to 49-year-old women identified in a national U.S. commercial insurance claims database during the Delta variant (July 1-December 20, 2021) and postemergency periods (May 11, 2023-September 10, 2024). Pregnant and postpartum individuals unvaccinated for COVID-19 during the year before follow-up were propensity score-matched to four nonpregnant women. Primary outcomes were laboratory-confirmed or clinically diagnosed COVID-19 with subsequent COVID-19 hospitalization, pneumonia hospitalization, or a severe composite COVID-19 hospitalization such as acute respiratory failure, intensive care unit admission, acute respiratory distress syndrome, or respiratory support.

RESULTS: Among the individuals followed during the Delta variant (1,109,384) and postemergency (878,003) periods, hospitalization rates with COVID-19 were substantially higher among pregnant individuals than among postpartum individuals or nonpregnant women. In propensity score-matched analyses, the risks of all primary outcomes were elevated for individuals who were pregnant during the Delta period, compared with matched nonpregnant women. Although absolute risks of severe COVID-19 outcomes were lower during the postemergency period, the relative risks (RRs) of COVID-19 hospitalization (RR 4.09; 95% CI, 3.65-4.59) and pneumonia hospitalization (RR 2.78; 95% CI, 1.38-4.81) during pregnancy remained elevated. The RR for severe composite COVID-19 hospitalization (RR 2.17; 95% CI, 0.35-6.67) was imprecise, reflecting substantial uncertainty. Risks for severe COVID-19-related outcomes were also elevated postpartum. Sensitivity analyses reinforced these findings.

CONCLUSION: Higher risks of severe COVID-19-related outcomes among pregnant and postpartum individuals have persisted since the resolution of the pandemic emergency.

PMID:42424625 | DOI:10.1097/AOG.0000000000006364

Syst Biol. 2026 Jul 9:syag045. doi: 10.1093/sysbio/syag045. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

Reticulate processes such as hybridization, introgression, and horizontal gene transfer cannot be fully represented by a bifurcating tree. Enter phylogenetic networks: first as split graphs to visualize tree discordance, then as explicit probabilistic models that capture biological phenomena. Here, we describe the broad taxonomy of network representations, distinguishing the principal classes of explicit networks, their biological interpretability and our ability to accurately estimate them from empirical data. We also trace the evolution of the main network inferential methods from hybrid detection tests, distance- and subgraph-based amalgamation methods, probabilistic approaches under the multispecies network coalescent, composite-likelihood and divide-and-conquer frameworks, while highlighting the selective pressures of statistical identifiability and computational scalability that have shaped this evolution. As we move towards a network thinking paradigm, previously isolated methodological lineages from population genetics, phylogenomics, and mathematical network theory are now introgressing, uniting diverse network models into a shared framework that can integrate sequence- and species-level reticulate processes, increase robustness to systematic errors, and refine algorithms for genome-scale data, expanding the tree of life into a richer, more entangled yet clearer picture of evolution.

PMID:42424608 | DOI:10.1093/sysbio/syag045