Tag: nevin manimala

Eur J Psychotraumatol. 2025 Dec;16(1):2490329. doi: 10.1080/20008066.2025.2490329. Epub 2025 May 6.

ABSTRACT

Background: Psychological safety plays a vital role in rest, recovery, and fostering social connections. However, a history of trauma can predispose individuals to perceive heightened levels of threat and danger. Research suggests that a lack of psychological safety may be a defining biopsychosocial characteristic of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Persistent feelings of threat and danger are associated with a lack of psychological safety and may be predictive of PTSD. Our pioneering work reported on the development of the neuroception of psychological safety (NPSS), rooted in polyvagal theory, and consists of social engagement, compassion, and body sensations dimensions. Understanding more about the dimensionality of the NPSS and further establishing its psychometric properties was our priority.Objective: Our current research aimed to validate and test the reliability and dimensionality of the NPSS, using a large community sample (n = 2035) of adult residents in the UKMethod: We examined the internal and test-retest reliability, convergent, discriminant, and concurrent validity as well as dimensionality of the NPSS.Results: The 3-factor structure of the NPSS was replicated with regard to the absolute fit indices. Internal consistencies ranged from acceptable to excellent across the NPSS’s subscales. Providing support for the validity of the NPSS, scores were predictably related to team psychological safety, wellbeing, post-traumatic stress, burnout, body awareness, and personality, with effect sizes typically in the high to medium range. Scores on the NPSS were found to show good test-retest reliability.Conclusions: This study demonstrates the validity, reliability and dimensionality of the NPSS with an adult sample. Further work is underway to support and enhance understandings of psychological safety with diverse clinical populations impacted by trauma. The NPSS has applicability across a range of health and social care contexts, such as shaping new approaches to evaluating trauma treatments and enhancing trauma informed care.

PMID:40326393 | DOI:10.1080/20008066.2025.2490329

Int Health. 2025 May 6:ihaf051. doi: 10.1093/inthealth/ihaf051. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: The aim of this study was to assess the population and health system factors affecting the transferability of health kiosks in markets in Kenya.

METHODS: A cross-sectional study with a partially mixed concurrent dominant status design was conducted among 843 households, policy actors, market chairpersons and champions, community health promoters and health workers. A χ2 test was used to test for independence with variables with a statistical significance (p<0.05) subjected to logistic regression. Qualitative data were transcribed verbatim to form nodes and themes.

RESULTS: Level of income, knowledge, awareness and perception of cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk factors were associated with 27.5% of Nyeri respondents earning ≥Ksh 10 000 monthly compared with Vihiga respondents (17.3%). Vihiga respondents were likely to identify excessive alcohol consumption as a cause of CVD. Vihiga had fair (40%) and good (26.6%) awareness levels towards CVDs compared with Nyeri respondents (36.3% and 19.7%, respectively). Vihiga respondents had a higher positive perception towards health services at the local facility compared with Nyeri respondents.

CONCLUSIONS: CVD burden, low awareness levels, low health insurance cover and the poor attitude of health workers have the potential to affect the transferability of a health intervention such as a health market kiosk.

PMID:40326387 | DOI:10.1093/inthealth/ihaf051

Neurorehabil Neural Repair. 2025 May 6:15459683251335316. doi: 10.1177/15459683251335316. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: Falls are a common challenge for people with Parkinson’s disease (PwPD), driven by balance impairments and misaligned perceptions of balance abilities.

OBJECTIVE: This study investigated the replicability and generalizability of the relationship between balance ability and perception discordance and fall risk.

METHODS: Using baseline data from 2 clinical trials involving 171 PwPD, discordance was calculated using the Activities Specific Balance Confidence Scale and Timed Up and Go (TUG) or the Mini Balance Evaluation System’s Test (MiniBEST).

RESULTS: Findings supported the replicability of discordance as a predictor of fall risk, with results consistent across measures. While TUG-derived discordance was statistically significant, MiniBEST-derived discordance showed generalizability without statistical inferiority.

CONCLUSION: These results emphasize the relevance of balance perception and its misalignment with ability as fall risk predictors.

PMID:40326378 | DOI:10.1177/15459683251335316

Nutr Hosp. 2025 Apr 30. doi: 10.20960/nh.05616. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: the FM/FFM ratio has been proposed as a new body composition variable. However, the association between FM/FFM ratio and physical function in older adults remains limited. Therefore, the aim of this study was to analyze the association between FM/FFM ratio and muscle strength, static balance, and exercise capacity in older adults.

METHODS: this was a cross-sectional study involving 392 older adults from Londrina, Brazil. Subjects underwent body composition analysis by bioelectrical impedance, and assessments for aerobic capacity, muscle strength and static balance including the 6-minutes walking test, handgrip strength and one-legged stance test. Statistical analysis was conducted using correlation tests and lineal regression models adjusted for age and gender. The statistical significance considered was p < 0.05.

RESULTS: a total of 392 older adults participated (mean age = 69.77 years; women: 74.7 %). The FM/FFM ratio was significantly associated with muscle strength (β = -22.779, 95 % CI: -26.741 to -18.818; p < 0.001), static balance (β = -14.335, 95 % CI: -19.980 to -8.690; p < 0.001), and exercise capacity (β =-98.937, 95 % CI: -152.286 to -45.588, p < 0.001). After adjusting for age and gender, FM/FFM ratio was an important predictor of muscle strength (β = -4.687, 95 % CI: -8.646 to -0.728; p = 0.020) and static balance (β = -18.361, 95 % CI: -24.943 to -11.778; p < 0.001).

CONCLUSIONS: the FM/FFM ratio is an important clinical measure of body composition that is significantly associated with key indicators of physical performance, including muscle strength, static balance, and exercise capacity in older adults.

PMID:40326320 | DOI:10.20960/nh.05616

Nutr Hosp. 2025 Apr 30. doi: 10.20960/nh.05569. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

INTRODUCTION: bariatric surgery is an effective treatment but weight loss does not occur only at the expense of fat mass and preserving muscle mass is a priority.

OBJECTIVE: to evaluate the improvement in nutritional parameters of patients undergoing bariatric surgery after supplementation with beta-hydroxy-β-methylbutyrate (HMB).

METHODOLOGY: intervention study comparing 2 types of protein supplementation (with and without HMB) in the 3 months after surgery. All patients underwent a baseline and 3-month anthropometric, body composition, dynamometry and analytical study with usual nutritional determination, inflammation markers (CRP and IL-6), muscle markers (irisin, CK) and MRO (CTX, P1NP, sclerostin). Adherence was assessed and physical activity was recorded.

RESULTS: a total of 24 patients (87.5 % women) with a mean age of 52 ± 8 years were included. There were no statistically significant differences (p > 0.05) between intervention vs control in weight loss (17.5 ± 1.3 vs 19.1 ± 1.7 kg), MME (3.07 ± 1.7 vs 3.06 ± 136 kg), MG (12.9 ± 0.8 vs 14.7 ± 1.4 kg) or in dynamometry. Prealbumin levels in the intervention group were significantly higher (21 ± 1 vs 18 ± 0.8 mg/dl, p = 0.04) but there were no significant differences in the rest of the analytical markers. Significant changes in weight and fat mass were observed depending on physical activity.

CONCLUSIONS: after bariatric surgery, a significant weight reduction has been seen both at the expense of fat mass and lean mass in all patients. HMB supplementation has not shown statistically significant differences compared to the other protein supplementation to preserve muscle mass or function.

PMID:40326309 | DOI:10.20960/nh.05569

Brain. 2025 May 6:awaf172. doi: 10.1093/brain/awaf172. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

Migraine has an assumed polygenic basis, but the genetic risk variants identified in genome-wide association studies only explain a proportion of the heritability. We aimed to develop machine learning models, capturing non-additive and interactive effects, to address the missing heritability. This was a cross-sectional population-based study of participants in the second and third Trøndelag Health Study. Individuals underwent genome-wide genotyping and were phenotyped based on validated modified criteria of the International Classification of Headache Disorders. Four datasets of increasing number of genetic variants were created using different thresholds of linkage disequilibrium and univariate genome-wide associated p-values. A series of machine learning and deep learning methods were optimized and evaluated. The genotype tools PLINK and LDPred2 were used for polygenic risk scoring. Models were trained on a partition of the dataset and tested in a hold-out set. The area under the receiver operating characteristics curve was used as the primary scoring metric. Classification by machine learning was statistically compared to that of polygenic risk scoring. Finally, we explored the biological functions of the variants unique to the machine learning approach. 43,197 individuals (51% women), with a mean age of 54.6 years, were included in the modelling. A light gradient boosting machine performed best for the three smallest datasets (108, 7,771 and 7,840 variants), all with hold-out test set area under curve at 0.63. A multinomial naïve Bayes model performed best in the largest dataset (140,467 variants) with a hold-out test set area under curve of 0.62. The models were statistically significantly superior to polygenic risk scoring (area under curve 0.52 to 0.59) for all the datasets (p<0.001 to p=0.02). Machine learning identified many of the same genes and pathways identified in genome-wide association studies, but also several unique pathways, mainly related to signal transduction and neurological function. Interestingly, pathways related to botulinum toxins, and pathways related to the calcitonin gene-related peptide receptor also emerged. This study suggests that migraine may follow a non-additive and interactive genetic causal structure, potentially best captured by complex machine learning models. Such structure may be concealed where the data dimensionality (high number of genetic variants) is insufficiently supported by the scale of available data, leaving a misleading impression of purely additive effects. Future machine learning models using substantially larger sample sizes could harness both the additive and the interactive effects, enhancing precision and offering deeper understanding of genetic interactions underlying migraine.

PMID:40326299 | DOI:10.1093/brain/awaf172

J Clin Hypertens (Greenwich). 2025 May;27(5):e70053. doi: 10.1111/jch.70053.

ABSTRACT

Screenings for hypertension, diabetes, and high cholesterol are widely conducted in routine clinical practice for cardiovascular disease (CVD) prevention. However, few studies have investigated whether these screenings could eventually lead to lower risks of hard outcomes such as mortality. This cohort study aimed to examine directly the association of screenings for hypertension, diabetes, and high cholesterol with all-cause and cardiovascular mortality and whether the association, if existent, varied with important characteristics. A nationally representative sample of 86 587 US adults without the three conditions and CVD at baseline were recruited. The history of screenings for the three conditions was elicited by a series of questions in the surveys. All-cause and cardiovascular mortality were ascertained by linkage to National Death Index records through December 31, 2019. The association of screenings with mortality was investigated by multivariable Cox regression analysis and expressed as hazard ratio (HR) with 95% confidence interval (CI), adjusting for major risk factors of CVD and mortality. The “1 screening,” “2 screenings,” “3 screenings,” and “any screening” (combining the above three) groups were compared with the “no screening” group separately. During a median follow-up of 51 months (4.3 years), 1783 participants died and 366 of them were attributed to CVD. After adjusting for all covariates, no statistically significant association was found between “any screening” and all-cause mortality (HR = 1.08, 95% CI 0.92-1.26) or cardiovascular mortality (HR = 1.06, 95% CI 0.76-1.47). The results were consistent across various subgroups. The associations of “1 screening,” “2 screenings,” and “3 screenings” respectively with all-cause and cardiovascular mortality were not statistically significant either (HRs ranging from 0.65 to 1.40). Overall, in this population of US general adults, there was no evidence that screening for hypertension, diabetes, and high cholesterol could lead to lower all-cause or cardiovascular mortality.

PMID:40326297 | DOI:10.1111/jch.70053

Genome Biol Evol. 2025 May 6:evaf080. doi: 10.1093/gbe/evaf080. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

Population branch statistics, which estimate the degree of genetic differentiation along a focal population’s lineage, have been used as an alternative to FST-based genome-wide scans for identifying loci associated with local selective sweeps. Beyond the population branch statistic (PBS), the normalized PBSn1 adjusts focal branch length with respect to outgroup branch lengths at the same locus, whereas population branch excess (PBE) incorporates median branch lengths at other loci. PBSn1 and PBE were proposed to be more specific to local selective sweeps as opposed to geographically ubiquitous selection. However, the accuracy and statistical power of branch statistics have not been systematically assessed. To do so, we simulate genomes in representative large and small populations with varying proportions of sites evolving under genetic drift or (approximated) background selection, with local selective sweeps or geographically parallel selective sweeps. We then assess the probability that local selective sweep loci are correctly identified as outliers by FST and by each of the branch statistics. We find that branch statistics consistently outperform FST at identifying local sweeps. Particularly when parallel sweeps are introduced, PBSn1 and PBE correctly identify local sweeps among their top outliers more frequently than PBS. Additionally, we evaluate versions of these statistics based on maximal site differentiation within a window, finding that site-based PBE and PBSn1 are particularly effective at identifying local soft sweeps. These results validate the greater specificity of the rescaled branch statistics PBE and PBSn1 to detect population-specific positive selection, supporting their use in genomic studies focused on local adaptation.

PMID:40326284 | DOI:10.1093/gbe/evaf080

Int J Soc Psychiatry. 2025 May 6:207640251336725. doi: 10.1177/00207640251336725. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: Although environmental factors have been studied for their impact on mental health, the link between ambient temperature and mental disorders remains insufficiently explored.

AIM: This study aimed to explore the relationship between ambient temperature and the frequency of emergency psychiatric consultations at the sole university hospital in Paraguay from 2021 to 2023.

METHODS: This investigation adopted a quantitative, observational, cross-sectional design, using a case-crossover approach. Data collection entailed reviewing patient records and meteorological data, focusing on the daily mean temperatures and other meteorological variables. Statistical analysis was conducted using RStudio and SPSS, applying a distributed lag non-linear model (DLNM) for a seven-day lag period. Multinomial logistic regression was used to estimate odds ratios (ORs) for the likelihood of specific diagnoses resulting in emergency consultations in relation to temperature exposure.

RESULTS: The analysis covered 2,186 first-time emergency psychiatric consultations, with anxiety disorders being the most frequent diagnosis (24.3%), followed by depressive disorders (23.4%) and personality disorders (15.8%). Women accounted for 70.6% of all patients. The findings indicated that higher temperatures were associated with a greater frequency of consultations for certain disorders, including bipolar (OR up to 27.12 at Lag 1) and eating disorders (OR up to 100 at Lag 1). Conversely, a negative association was observed for schizophrenia, dissociative disorders, and trauma- and stressor-related disorders as temperature increased. Additionally, a linear relationship was found between lower relative humidity and increased number of consultations.

CONCLUSIONS: The findings underscore the impact of ambient temperature on psychiatric emergency consultations, revealing that the frequency of consultations for different conditions varies with temperature. These insights could inform public health strategies to mitigate the effects of climatic variation on mental health. These findings suggest the need for targeted mental health interventions to address vulnerabilities during periods of climatic stress, particularly in resource-limited settings.

PMID:40326281 | DOI:10.1177/00207640251336725

Pharm Biol. 2025 Apr 29;63(1):357-363. doi: 10.1080/13880209.2025.2499075. Epub 2025 May 6.

ABSTRACT

CONTEXT: As a naturally occurring terpenoid found in Cannabis sativa L. (Cannabaceae), cannabidiol (CBD) has gained public and industry interest for the purposes of personal well-being as a foodstuff and pharmaceutical. Despite a number of publications on CBD toxicology, many have significant limitations, especially those relating to genotoxicity. These include poor characterization of the CBD extract and/or lack rigor in conforming to accepted regulatory guidelines and best practice. A number of regulatory agencies have highlighted these issues and requested additional genotoxicity data to help ensure the safe use of CBD.

OBJECTIVE: To provide insights into the genotoxicity of a CBD isolate and its lipid carrier.

MATERIALS AND METHODS: We have conducted an in vitro mammalian cell micronucleus (OECD 487) and a bacterial reverse mutagenicity assay (Ames test) (OECD 471) in a CBD isolate (97% > CBD) with its carrier.

RESULTS: The samples tested were non-mutagenic, as determined in the Ames test. The in vitro micronucleus assay conducted was negative for genotoxicity, with no statistically significant increases in the incidences of micronucleated cells observed at any dose compared to negative controls.

CONCLUSIONS: These studies confirm that this CBD rich isolate in combination with its carrier, are unlikely to post any genotoxic hazard at exposure levels expected in foods.

PMID:40326262 | DOI:10.1080/13880209.2025.2499075