Tag: nevin manimala

Arq Bras Cardiol. 2022 Sep 2:S0066-782X2022005013402. doi: 10.36660/abc.20210681. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: The right ventricular hypertrophy and dilation observed in pulmonary artery hypertension (PAH) damages the left ventricle (LV) dynamics by flattening the interventricular septum.

OBJECTIVE: To investigate whether low- to moderate-intensity resistance exercise training (RT) is beneficial to LV and cardiomyocyte contractile functions in rats during the development of monocrotaline (MCT)-induced PAH.

METHODS: Male Wistar rats (Body weight: ~ 200 g) were used. To assess the time to potential heart failure onset (i.e., end point), rats were divided into sedentary hypertension until failure (SHF, n=6) and exercise hypertension until failure (EHF, n=6) groups. To test RT effects, rats were divided into sedentary control (SC, n = 7), sedentary hypertension (SH, n=7), and exercise hypertension (EH, n=7) groups. PAH was induced by two MCT injections (20 mg/kg, with 7 days interval). Exercise groups were submitted to an RT protocol (Ladder climbing; 55-65% of carrying maximal load), 5 times/week. Statistical significance was assumed at P < 0.05.

RESULTS: RT prolonged the end point (~25 %), enhanced the physical effort tolerance (~ 55%), and mitigated the LV and cardiomyocyte contractility dysfunctions promoted by MCT by preserving the ejection fraction and fractional shortening, the amplitude of shortening, and the velocities of contraction and relaxation in cardiomyocytes. RT also prevented increases in left ventricle fibrosis and type I collagen caused by MCT, and maintained the type III collagen and myocyte dimensions reduced by MCT.

CONCLUSION: Low- to moderate-intensity RT benefits LV and cardiomyocyte contractile functions in rats during the development of MCT-induced PAH.

PMID:36074480 | DOI:10.36660/abc.20210681

Microbiol Immunol. 2022 Sep 8. doi: 10.1111/1348-0421.13026. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

There are a limited number of studies regarding the involvement of viruses in the development and pathogenesis of renal cell carcinoma (RCC). In this study, we aimed to discover whether human herpesvirus 6A (HHV-6A) and 6B (HHV-6B) and human polyomavirus JC (JCV) and BK (BKV) are associated with RCC and the expression of p53, p16INK4a, Ki-67 and NF-κB in RCC patients. A total of 122 histologically confirmed RCC tissue specimens and 96 specimens of their corresponding peritumoral tissues were included in this prospective study. Nested polymerase chain reaction (nPCR) was performed in order to amplify viral DNA sequences. Restriction endonuclease analysis was carried out to discriminate between HHV-6A and HHV-6B. p53, p16INK4a, Ki-67, and NF-κB immunostaining data of the studied tissue specimens were available from our previous study. Statistical analysis was performed to demonstrate the potential associations. HHV-6B and JCV were detected in 10.7% and 13.9% of RCC patients, respectively. We did not detect HHV-6A and BKV in any of RCC tissue specimens. Moreover, no association was found between either of these viruses and RCC. Our study revealed a significant association between HHV-6B and p53 overexpression. No other associations were found between cellular biomarkers p53, p16INK4a, Ki-67, and NF-κB and the studied viruses. The data of the present study, though very limited, disprove the involvement of HHV-6A, HHV-6B, BKV, and JCV in the initiation or progression of RCC. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.

PMID:36073532 | DOI:10.1111/1348-0421.13026

Electromagn Biol Med. 2022 Sep 8:1-7. doi: 10.1080/15368378.2022.2117189. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

The presence of technological devices in our lives has increased exposure to environmental electromagnetic fields. As a result of this, especially Cancer and Diabetes are increasing.Rats were divided into 3 groups with 12 rats in each group. The 1st experimental group (n = 12) was exposed to a 50 Hz ELF magnetic field of 0.4 mT for 6 hours a day for 5 days, the 2nd experimental group (n = 12) was exposed for 10 days, and the control group (n = 12) was never exposed to a magnetic field. After completing the applications, blood collection from the rats was performed under appropriate conditions, measurements were made in the laboratory, and statistical analysis was performed between the groups. There was no significant difference between the groups in the results of transaminases and lipid profiles and C-Peptide. There was no significant difference in insulin, urea, creatinine, Na, K, Ca, and uric acid parameters between the groups. However, there was a significant increase in glucose, HbA1c, and Hba1 IFCC values between the control group and the experimental groups (p < .001). There was a significant increase in the level of Fetuin-A between the control group and the experimental groups (p < .05). There was an increase in the Fetuin-A, Glucose, HbA1c, and Hba1c IFCC values in both of the experimental groups compared to the control group. We believe that an increase in these values may cause Type 3 diabetes.

PMID:36073511 | DOI:10.1080/15368378.2022.2117189

Stud Health Technol Inform. 2022 Aug 17;296:98-106. doi: 10.3233/SHTI220809.

ABSTRACT

Data quality in health research encompasses a broad range of aspects and indicators. While some indicators are generic and can be calculated without domain knowledge, others require information about a specific data element. Even more complex are indicators addressing contradictions, that stem from implausible combinations of multiple data elements. In this paper, we investigate how contradictions within interdependent categorical data can be identified and if they give additional information about possible quality issues, their cause, and mitigation options. The 19 data elements that represent four biosample types including their pre-analytic states within the DZHK Biobanking basic set are exported to the CDISC Operational Data Model (ODM), transformed and loaded into a tranSMART instance. Through the implementation of a data quality assessment workflow as a SmartR plug-in, statistical information about the domain-specific consistency of interdependent values are retrieved, assessed, and visualized. Data quality indicators have been selected for the assessment according to common recommendations found in the literature. Different contradictions could be discovered in the dataset including mismatch of interdependent values in the pre-analytic states of blood and urine samples, as well as primary and aliquoted samples. The overall assessment rating shows that 99.61% of the interdependent values are free of contradictions. However, measures within the EDC design to avoid contradictions may result in overestimated missing rates in automatic, item-based quality assessment checks. Through consistency checks on interdependent categorical features, we demonstrated that consistency flaws can be found in the categorical data of biobanking metadata and that they can help to detect issues in the data entry process. Our approach underscores the importance of domain knowledge in the definition of the consistency rules but also knowledge about the EDC implementation of such consistency rules to consider the impact on item-based quality indicators.

PMID:36073494 | DOI:10.3233/SHTI220809

Stud Health Technol Inform. 2022 Aug 17;296:66-72. doi: 10.3233/SHTI220805.

ABSTRACT

We describe the creation of GRASCCO, a novel German-language corpus composed of some 60 clinical documents with more than.43,000 tokens. GRASCCO is a synthetic corpus resulting from a series of alienation steps to obfuscate privacy-sensitive information contained in real clinical documents, the true origin of all GRASCCO texts. Therefore, it is publicly shareable without any legal restrictions We also explore whether this corpus still represents common clinical language use by comparison with a real (non-shareable) clinical corpus we developed as a contribution to the Medical Informatics Initiative in Germany (MII) within the SMITH consortium. We find evidence that such a claim can indeed be made.

PMID:36073490 | DOI:10.3233/SHTI220805

Stud Health Technol Inform. 2022 Aug 17;296:17-24. doi: 10.3233/SHTI220799.

ABSTRACT

In Germany, the current COVID-19 cases are managed and reported by the local health authorities. The workload of their employees during the pandemic is high, especially in periods of high infection numbers. In this work a decision support toolkit for local health authorities is introduced. A demonstrator web application was developed with the R Shiny framework and is publicly accessible online. It contains five separate tools based on statistical models for specific use cases and corresponding questions of COVID-19 cases and their contacts. The underlying statistical methods have been implemented in a new open-source R package. The toolkit has the potential to support local health authorities’ employees in their daily work. A simulated-based validation of the statistical models and a usability evaluation of the demonstrator application in a user study will be carried out in the future.

PMID:36073484 | DOI:10.3233/SHTI220799

Stud Health Technol Inform. 2022 Aug 31;298:127-131. doi: 10.3233/SHTI220921.

ABSTRACT

Interoperability and portability of healthcare data to enable research in the healthcare sector is an important factor towards precision medicine and a learning health system. With many safety-nets put in place like the European General Data Protection Regulation, and local standards like the broad consent set up by the German Medical Informatics Initiative, management and compliance to these standards across all systems and clinical data repositories becomes a daunting task. An appropriate process needs to be established especially when patient data is transferred to and from different systems and standards. On extraction and transforming, an appropriate method of loading the modified data to a destination where it can be read and accessed needs to be established besides functional compliance by the repository systems. This paper makes recommendations in relation to data load strategies while working with FHIR server-based data marts.

PMID:36073470 | DOI:10.3233/SHTI220921

Stud Health Technol Inform. 2022 Aug 31;298:51-55. doi: 10.3233/SHTI220906.

ABSTRACT

Health data science is an emerging discipline that bridges computer science, statistics and health domain knowledge. This consists of taking advantage of the large volume of data, often complex, to extract information to improve decision-making. We have created a Master’s degree in Health Data Science to meet the growing need for data scientists in companies and institutions. The training offers, over two years, courses covering computer science, mathematics and statistics, health and biology. With more than 60 professors and lecturers, a total of 835 hours of classes (not including the mandatory 5 months of internship per year), this curriculum has enrolled a total of 53 students today. The feedback from the students and alumni allowed us identifying new needs in terms of training, which may help us to adapt the program for the coming academic years. In particular, we will offer an additional module covering data management, from the edition of the clinical report form to the implementation of a data warehouse with an ETL process. Git and application lifecycle management will be included in programming courses or multidisciplinary projects.

PMID:36073455 | DOI:10.3233/SHTI220906

Stud Health Technol Inform. 2022 Sep 2;297:525-532. doi: 10.3233/SHTI220883.

ABSTRACT

The Norwegian building code give an apparently clear framework for the implementation of universal design (UD) in public buildings. However, it seems that neither increased awareness of UD, nor compliance with building regulations can so far guarantee equal use. Statistics and inspections reveal that there still are shortcomings as regards accessibility for many groups. Children with reduced mobility or impaired vision are better cared for than students whose needs are less documented. There is still a necessity for understanding the needs of other groups, such as children with hearing impairments, or other sensory challenges, children with social anxieties and those within the autism spectrum. A key part of achieving UD should be a design process where users’ needs are in focus. Based on recent research carried out by SINTEF Building and Infrastructure and funded by the Directorate for Children, Youth and Families, this paper presents 1) Examples of practices where primary and lower secondary schools have been designed within a framework of UD, and 2) Important drivers for universal design during the design process. Recommendations will be proposed for further development of standardized tools. Findings indicate that opportunities to challenge the minimum requirements for UD within a conventional design process are few without having a supportive and competent client. The regulations and standards do not necessarily ensure inclusion and equal use. Low understanding about what UD entails in terms of user knowledge and involvement may be one reason. Norwegian standards for UD do not appear to be in significant use. Tools for UD often appear as checklists, based on the building regulations. The examples show that effective collaboration between the client and the architect plays a central role in the UD of schools. Architects not only need tools to think about usability at all design levels, but the ability to collaborate with the client and users in every phase.

PMID:36073434 | DOI:10.3233/SHTI220883

Stud Health Technol Inform. 2022 Sep 2;297:135-142. doi: 10.3233/SHTI220831.

ABSTRACT

The Norwegian mapping authority has developed a standard method and an easy and flexible tool for mapping accessibility mostly for people with limited or no walking abilities in urban and recreational areas. We choose an object-orientated approach where points, lines and polygons represent objects in the environment. All data are stored in a geospatial database and are presented as web map and can be downloaded and analysed using GIS software. By the end of 2021, more than 250 out of 356 municipalities are mapped using that method. The aim of this project is to establish a national standard for mapping of accessibility and to provide a geodatabase that shows the status of accessibility throughout Norway. The data provide a useful tool for national statistics, local planning authorities and private users. The results show that accessibility is still low and Norway and faces many challenges to meet the goals for Universal Design.

PMID:36073388 | DOI:10.3233/SHTI220831