Tag: nevin manimala

J Oral Implantol. 2024 Mar 26. doi: 10.1563/aaid-joi-D-23-00168. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

The aim of this study was to assess the effects of serum vitamin D levels and its relationship to early dental implant failures. A total of 174 implants in 109 patients were placed and serum vitamin D levels of those patients were noted the day of implant placement. Implants were followed up until restoration, approximately 3-6 months later, and any implant failure was noted based on 50% or more bone loss or implant mobility. Eight individuals had an implant fail early and their vitamin D levels had a mean of 42.54 ng/ml compared to the successful patients’ levels of 31.92 ng/ml. Although not statistically significant, there was no correlation with low serum vitamin D levels of patients and early implant failure. Keywords: dental implant, implant failure, vitamin D.

PMID:38530826 | DOI:10.1563/aaid-joi-D-23-00168

PLoS One. 2024 Mar 26;19(3):e0298181. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0298181. eCollection 2024.

ABSTRACT

INTRODUCTION: Worldwide, demographic ageing is a major social, economic and health challenge. Despite the increase in life expectancy, elderly often live with multiple chronic conditions, exposing them to multiple medications. Concerns have been raised about the growing issue of inappropriate long-term usage of proton-pump inhibitors (PPI), which have been associated with adverse outcomes and increased healthcare costs. Deprescribing is a recommended intervention to reduce or withdraw medicines that might be causing harm or might no longer be of benefit. This protocol details a trial to assess the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of a collaborative deprescribing intervention of PPI among community-dwelling elderly, involving community pharmacists and general practitioners.

METHODS AND ANALYSIS: A pragmatic, multicentre, two-arm, non-randomised controlled trial of a structured PPI collaborative deprescribing intervention in the primary care setting with a 6-month follow-up will be conducted. Patients must be 65 years old or older, live in the community and have been using PPI for more than 8 weeks. We hypothesize that the intervention will reduce the PPI usage in the intervention group compared to the control group. The primary outcome is the successful discontinuation or dose decrease of any PPI, defined as a statistically significant absolute 20% reduction in medication use between the intervention and control groups at 3- and 6-month follow-ups. An economic evaluation will be conducted alongside the trial. This study was approved by the Ethics Research Committee of Nova Medical School, NOVA University of Lisbon and by the Ethics Committee from the Local Health Unit Alto Minho, Portugal.

DISCUSSION: This pragmatic trial will provide evidence on the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of a patient-centred collaborative deprescribing intervention in the community setting in Portugal. It will also inform improvements for the development of future multi-faceted interventions that aim to optimise medication for the community-dwelling elderly.

CLINICAL TRIAL REGISTRATION: ISRCTN 49637686.

PMID:38530823 | DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0298181

Am Surg. 2024 Mar 26:31348241241683. doi: 10.1177/00031348241241683. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: Prolonged postoperative ileus (PPOI) contributes to morbidity and prolonged hospitalization. Prucalopride, a selective 5-hydroxytryptamine receptor agonist, may enhance bowel motility. This review assesses whether the perioperative use of prucalopride compared to placebo is associated with accelerated return of bowel function post gastrointestinal (GI) surgery.

METHODS: OVID, CENTRAL, and EMBASE were searched as of January 2024 to identify randomized controlled trials (RCTs) comparing prucalopride and placebo for prevention of PPOI in adult patients undergoing GI surgery. The primary outcomes were time to stool, time to flatus, and time to oral tolerance. The secondary outcomes were incidence of PPOI, length of stay (LOS), postoperative complications, adverse events, and overall costs. The Cochrane risk of bias tool for randomized trials and the Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development, and Evaluations framework were used. An inverse variance random effects model was used.

RESULTS: From 174 citations, 3 RCTs with 139 patients in each treatment group were included. Patients underwent a variety of GI surgeries. Patients treated with prucalopride had a decreased time to stool (mean difference 36.82 hours, 95% CI 59.4 to 14.24 hours lower, I² = 62%, low certainty evidence). Other outcomes were not statistically significantly different (very low certainty evidence). Postoperative complications and adverse events could not be meta-analyzed due to heterogeneity; yet individual studies suggested no significant differences (very low certainty evidence).

DISCUSSION: Current RCT evidence suggests that prucalopride may enhance postoperative return of bowel function. Larger RCTs assessing patient important outcomes and associated costs are needed before routine use of this agent.

PMID:38530772 | DOI:10.1177/00031348241241683

AIDS Rev. 2024;26(1):1-14. doi: 10.24875/AIDSRev.23000017.

ABSTRACT

This study was performed to reveal the risk factors associated with mortality in people living with HIV (PLHIV) who were diagnosed with COVID-19. Studies reporting deaths among PLHIV and infected with SARS-CoV-2 were investigated. After protocol setup and registration, the extracted sources were categorized and assessed for quality. This study examined ten articles with a total of 46,136 patients. Patients aged ≥ 60 years (hazard ratio [HR] = 2.22; 95% CI: 1.617, 3.050; p < 0.001), male (HR = 1.668; 95% CI: 1.179, 2.361; p = 0.004), and people with diabetes (risk ratio [RR] = 3.34; 95% CI: 1.45, 7.68; p = 0.005) were at higher risk of death. Adherence to antiretroviral therapy (ART) reduced mortality risk (RR = 0.90; 95% CI: 0.83, 0.98; p = 0.02). Patients in the survival groups showed a statistically significant lower mean of C-reactive protein (mean difference = 114.08; 95% -74.05, 154.10; p < 0.001). Deceased patients showed higher mean levels of interleukin-6 (IL-6). Chronic respiratory disorders, hypertension, oxygen requirement, admission to an intensive care unit, D-dimer levels, and HIV viral load < 50 copies RNA/mL before admission did not show statistically significant differences between the deceased and survival groups. ART therapy reduced mortality risk (RR = 0.90; 95% 0.83, 0.98; p = 0.02). Identifying PLHIV at higher mortality risk could improve the outcomes of COVID-19 by stratifying these patients to the most effective treatment in a timely fashion.

PMID:38530743 | DOI:10.24875/AIDSRev.23000017

Eur J Psychotraumatol. 2024;15(1):2330880. doi: 10.1080/20008066.2024.2330880. Epub 2024 Mar 26.

ABSTRACT

Background: Childhood adversity can have lasting negative effects on physical and mental health. This study contributes to the existing literature by describing the prevalence rates and mental health outcomes related to adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) among adolescents registered for mental health care.Methods: Participants in this cross-sectional study were youths (aged 12-18 years) who were referred to outpatient psychiatric departments in the Netherlands. Demographic information was collected from the medical records. The Child Trauma Screening Questionnaire (CTSQ) was used to examine the presence of ACEs and posttraumatic stress symptoms (PTSS). To assess mental health problems, we used the Dutch translation of the Youth Self Report. Descriptive statistics and frequencies were used to calculate prevalence rates across the various ACEs domains. ANOVA and chi-square tests were used to explore the relationship between ACEs and mental health.Results: Of the 1373 participants, 69.1% reported having experienced at least one ACE and 17.1% indicated exposure to four or more ACEs in their lives. Although there was substantial overlap among all ACE categories, the most frequently reported were bullying (49.2%), emotional abuse (17.8%), physical abuse (12.2%), and sexual abuse (10.1%). Female adolescents (72.7%) reported significantly more ACEs than their male counterparts (27.0%). Furthermore, a higher number of ACEs was associated with significantly more self-reported general mental health problems, an elevated prevalence of both mood and post-traumatic stress disorders, and a greater presence of two or more co-existing psychiatric diagnoses (comorbid psychiatric classification).Conclusions: This cross-sectional study on childhood adversity and its association with mental health showed that ACEs are highly prevalent in youth registered for mental health care. This study provides support for a graded and cumulative relationship between childhood adversity and mental health problems.

PMID:38530708 | DOI:10.1080/20008066.2024.2330880

J Phys Chem A. 2024 Mar 26. doi: 10.1021/acs.jpca.3c08131. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

Using reactive force field (ReaxFF) and molecular dynamics simulation, we investigate the combustion process of hydrogen-oxygen systems in initial thermal nonequilibrium states with different translational and rovibrational temperatures for oxygen. The system studied in this work contains 300 oxygen molecules and 700 hydrogen molecules with a density of 7 times the air density. For this system, the characteristic relaxation times of oxygen and hydrogen vibrational energies are 0.173 and 0.249 ns, respectively. 0.6% of hydrogen undergoes a chemical reaction with oxygen during the thermal nonequilibrium relaxation stage. For the distribution of translational energy and vibrational energy of oxygen in the thermal nonequilibrium state, the maximum mean error of the statistical distribution in the simulation and the Boltzmann distribution at temperature calculated from the average kinetic energy of molecules is about 2.25 × 10^-5. At the same time, it was observed in the simulation that many-body interactions play a certain role in the combustion process. Furthermore, we compare the ignition time and temperature rise behavior of different combustion mechanisms and molecular dynamics simulations starting from the thermal equilibrium state. These results will provide meaningful references for the construction of thermal nonequilibrium combustion chemical reaction mechanisms.

PMID:38530707 | DOI:10.1021/acs.jpca.3c08131

JACC Heart Fail. 2024 Mar 23:S2213-1779(24)00180-X. doi: 10.1016/j.jchf.2024.02.016. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

Clinical trials are vital for assessing therapeutic interventions. The associated data monitoring committees (DMCs) safeguard patient interests and enhance trial integrity, thus promoting timely, reliable evaluations of those interventions. We face an urgent need to recruit and train new DMC members. The Heart Failure Collaboratory (HFC), a multidisciplinary public-private consortium of academics, trialists, patients, industry representatives, and government agencies, is working to improve the clinical trial ecosystem. The HFC aims to improve clinical trial efficiency and quality by standardizing concepts, and to help meet the demand for experienced individuals on DMCs by creating a standardized approach to training new members. This paper discusses the HFC’s training workshop, and an apprenticeship model for new DMC members. It describes opportunities and challenges DMCs face, along with common myths and best practices learned through previous experiences, with an emphasis on data confidentiality and need for quality independent statistical reporting groups.

PMID:38530701 | DOI:10.1016/j.jchf.2024.02.016

Elife. 2024 Mar 26;12:RP90156. doi: 10.7554/eLife.90156.

ABSTRACT

The understanding of eco-evolutionary dynamics, and in particular the mechanism of coexistence of species, is still fragmentary and in need of test bench model systems. To this aim we developed a variant of SELEX in vitro selection to study the evolution of a population of ∼10¹⁵ single-strand DNA oligonucleotide ‘individuals’. We begin with a seed of random sequences which we select via affinity capture from ∼10¹² DNA oligomers of fixed sequence (‘resources’) over which they compete. At each cycle (‘generation’), the ecosystem is replenished via PCR amplification of survivors. Massive parallel sequencing indicates that across generations the variety of sequences (‘species’) drastically decreases, while some of them become populous and dominate the ecosystem. The simplicity of our approach, in which survival is granted by hybridization, enables a quantitative investigation of fitness through a statistical analysis of binding energies. We find that the strength of individual resource binding dominates the selection in the first generations, while inter- and intra-individual interactions become important in later stages, in parallel with the emergence of prototypical forms of mutualism and parasitism.

PMID:38530348 | DOI:10.7554/eLife.90156

JMIR Res Protoc. 2024 Mar 26;13:e53722. doi: 10.2196/53722.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: Vitamin D deficiency has been associated with hypertensive disorders in pregnancy (HDP). The risk of developing HDP was reported to be further augmented among individuals with a vitamin D receptor (VDR) genetic variant. However, the reported roles of VDR variants in hypertensive disorders are inconsistent among different populations. Given the relatively higher incidence of vitamin D deficiency among Malaysian pregnant women and the high incidence of HDP in this population, we hypothesize that there may be associations between the risk of vitamin D deficiency and HDP with VDR genetic variants.

OBJECTIVE: This paper outlines the protocol for a study to determine the association of vitamin D status and VDR sequence variants among Malaysian pregnant women with HDP.

METHODS: This prospective study consists of two phases. The first phase is a cross-sectional study that will entail gathering medical records, a questionnaire survey, and laboratory testing for vitamin D status, with a planned recruitment of 414 pregnant women. The questionnaire will be utilized to assess the risk factors for vitamin D deficiency. The vitamin D status will be obtained from measurement of the vitamin D (25-hydroxyvitamin D₃) level in the blood. The second phase is a case-control study involving a Malay ethnic cohort with vitamin D deficiency. Participants will be divided into two groups with and without HDP (n=150 per group). Genomic DNA will be extracted from the peripheral blood monocytes of participants using the Qiagen DNA blood kit, and VDR sequence variants will be determined using polymerase chain reaction-high-resolution melting (PCR-HRM) analysis. Sanger sequencing will then be used to sequence randomly selected samples corresponding to each identified variant to validate our PCR-HRM results. The VDR genotype and mutation frequencies of BsmI, ApaI, TaqI, and FokI will be statistically analyzed to evaluate their relationships with developing HDP.

RESULTS: As of December 2023, 340 subjects have been recruited for the phase 1 study, 63% of whom were determined to have vitamin D deficiency. In the phase 2 study, 50 and 22 subjects have been recruited from the control and case groups, respectively. Recruitment is expected to be completed by March 2024 and all analyses should be completed by August 2024.

CONCLUSIONS: The outcome of the study will identify the nonmodifiable genetic components contributing to developing vitamin D deficiency leading to HDP. This will in turn enable gaining a better understanding of the contribution of genetic variability to the development of HDP, thus providing more evidence for a need of customized vitamin D supplementation during pregnancy according to the individual variability in the response to vitamin D intake.

TRIAL REGISTRATION: ClinicalTrials.gov NCT05659173; https://clinicaltrials.gov/study/NCT05659173.

INTERNATIONAL REGISTERED REPORT IDENTIFIER (IRRID): DERR1-10.2196/53722.

PMID:38530345 | DOI:10.2196/53722

Physiol Meas. 2024 Mar 26. doi: 10.1088/1361-6579/ad37ee. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

Atrial fibrillation (AF) is a prevalent cardiac arrhythmia associated with significant health ramifications, including an elevated susceptibility to ischemic stroke, heart disease, and heightened mortality. Photoplethysmography (PPG) has emerged as a promising technology for continuous AF monitoring for its cost-effectiveness and widespread integration into wearable devices. Our team previously conducted an exhaustive review on PPG-based AF detection before June 2019. However, since then, more advanced technologies have emerged in this field. This paper offers a comprehensive review of the latest advancements in PPG-based AF detection, utilizing digital health and artificial intelligence (AI) solutions, within the timeframe spanning from July 2019 to December 2022. Through extensive exploration of scientific databases, we have identified 57 pertinent studies. Our comprehensive review encompasses an in-depth assessment of the statistical methodologies, traditional machine learning techniques, and deep learning approaches employed in these studies. In addition, we address the challenges encountered in the domain of PPG-based AF detection. Furthermore, we maintain a dedicated website to curate the latest research in this area, with regular updates on a regular basis.&#xD.

PMID:38530307 | DOI:10.1088/1361-6579/ad37ee