Tag: nevin manimala

Hepatology. 2022 Mar 29. doi: 10.1002/hep.32494. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND AND AIMS: The diagnostic accuracy of Liver Imaging Reporting and Data System (LI-RADS) v.2018 and European Association for the Study of the Liver (EASL) criteria for the diagnosis of hepatocellular carcinoma has been widely evaluated, but their reliability has not. We aimed to assess and compare the reliability of LI-RADS v.2018 and EASL criteria for the diagnosis of hepatocellular carcinoma using MRI with extracellular contrast agents (ECA) and gadoxetic acid (GA) and to determine the effect of ancillary features on LI-RADS reliability. Approach and Results Ten readers reviewed MRI studies of 92 focal liver lesions measuring <3 cm acquired with ECA and GA less than 1 month apart from two prospective trials, assessing EASL criteria, LI-RADS major and ancillary features, and LI-RADS categorization with and without including ancillary features. Inter-reader agreement for definite HCC diagnosis were substantial and similar for the two contrasts for both EASL and LI-RADS criteria. For ECA-MRI and GA-MRI, respectively, inter-reader agreement was k=0.72 (95%CI:0.63-0.81) and k=0.72 (95%CI:0.63-0.8) for nonrim hyperenhancement, k=0.63 (95%CI:0.54-0.72) and 0.57 (95%CI:0.48-0.66) for nonperipheral washout, and k=0.49 (95%CI:0.4-0.59) and k=0.48 (95%CI:0.37-0.58) for enhancing capsule. The inter-reader agreement for LI-RADS after applying ancillary features remained in the same range of agreement.

CONCLUSION: Agreement for definite hepatocellular carcinoma was substantial and similar for both scoring systems and the two contrast agents in small focal liver lesions. The agreement for LI-RADS categorization was lower for both contrast agents, and including LI-RADS ancillary features did not improve the agreement.

PMID:35349760 | DOI:10.1002/hep.32494

J Cosmet Dermatol. 2022 Mar 29. doi: 10.1111/jocd.14948. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

This study aimed to evaluate the safety and efficacy of a novel therapeutic strategy, a microneedle fractional radiofrequency system, for hand rejuvenation. Sixteen subjects were enrolled in a self-controlled evaluator-blind prospective trial. All subjects received three microneedle fractional radiofrequency treatments at 4-week intervals. Hand volume was evaluated through subjective (Hand Volume Rating Scale) and quantitative measurements. Patients were also assessed on the Global Aesthetic Improvement Scale using digital photographs. Patients were followed up at 1, 3, and 6 months after the last radiofrequency treatment. Statistically significant improvements on the Global Aesthetic Improvement Scale and Hand Rating Volume Scale were noted (p<0.05). Compared with the control side, the treated hand showed a 44% improvement in dorsal skin surface roughness (p<0.05). Quantitative measurements of hand volume showed a trend toward increased volume for the treated hand, but the difference was not statistically significant. We conclude that microneedle fractional radiofrequency is a safe therapeutic option for hand rejuvenation.

PMID:35349759 | DOI:10.1111/jocd.14948

Immun Inflamm Dis. 2022 Apr;10(4):e597. doi: 10.1002/iid3.597.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: Systemic reactivation of Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) may occur in novel coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2). However, the clinical consequences of EBV reactivation remain uncertain.

METHODS: In this retrospective study, we screened 1314 patients with confirmed COVID-19 who died or were discharged between January 1, 2020 and March 12, 2020, in Wuhan Infectious Disease Hospital, Wuhan, China. Patients who had complete data for EBV serology and cytomegalovirus (CMV) serology were eligible. Serum levels of viral capsid antigen (VCA)-immunoglobulin G (IgG), Epstein-Barr nuclear antigen-IgG, VCA-IgM, early antigen (EA)-IgG, CMV-IgG, and CMV-IgM were compared between survivors and nonsurvivors. Dynamic changes of laboratory tests and outcomes were compared in patients with and without ganciclovir treatment. We used 1:1 matching based on age, gender, and illness severity to balance baseline characteristics.

RESULTS: EBV reactivation was present in 55 of 217 patients. EBV reactivation was associated with age (57.91 [13.19] vs. 50.28 [12.66] years, p < .001), female gender (31 [56%] vs. 60 [37%], p = .02). Patients with EBV reactivation have statistically nonsignificant higher mortality rate (12 [22%] vs. 18 [11%], p = .08). EA-IgG levels were significantly higher in nonsurvivors than in survivors (median difference: -0.00005, 95% confidence interval, CI [-3.10, 0.00], p = .05). As compared to patients with COVID-19 who did not receive ganciclovir therapy, ganciclovir-treated patients had improved survival rate (0.98, 95% CI [0.95, 1.00] vs. 0.88, 95% CI [0.81, 0.95], p = .01). Hemoglobin (p < .001) and prealbumin (p = .02) levels were significantly higher in ganciclovir-treated patients.

CONCLUSION: A high proportion of COVID-19 patients had EBV reactivation that may be associated with an increased risk of death. Whether treatment with ganciclovir may decrease the mortality of COVID-19 patients complicated with EBV reactivation warrants to be addressed in a placebo-controlled randomized trial in the future.

PMID:35349757 | DOI:10.1002/iid3.597

Immun Inflamm Dis. 2022 Apr;10(4):e607. doi: 10.1002/iid3.607.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: Oral immunotherapy (OIT) is a promising therapeutic approach for children with persistent IgE-mediated cow’s milk allergy (CMA) but data are still limited.

OBJECTIVE: To analyze the prevalence of life-threatening anaphylaxis in children with persistent CMA undergoing OIT and to evaluate potential risk factors.

METHODS: This is a retrospective cohort study among children with persistent CMA undergoing OIT over a 20-year period, following a specific Oral Tolerance Induction protocol. Adverse reactions during the whole period and data on long-term outcome were registered. Descriptive and nondescriptive statistics were used to describe data.

RESULTS: Three hundred forty-two children were evaluated. During OIT, 12 children (3.5%) presented severe anaphylactic reactions that needed an adrenaline injection. None required intubation, intensive care unit (ICU) admission, or showed a fatal outcome. Five of them abandoned OIT, five reached unrestricted diet and the others are still undergoing OIT. As far as outcome is concerned, 51.2% reached an unrestricted diet; 13.5% are at the build-up stage; and 28.0% (97 patients) stopped the OIT. Among these 96 children, 6.3% experienced a severe reaction induced by accidental ingestion of milk with two fatal outcomes.

CONCLUSIONS: The risk of life-threatening reactions was nearly two times lower (3.5% vs. 6.3%) among patients assuming milk during OIT than in those who stopped the protocol. A trend in favor of more severe reactions, requiring ICU admission, or fatal, was shown in patients who stopped OIT.

PMID:35349753 | DOI:10.1002/iid3.607

Clin Exp Dent Res. 2022 Mar 29. doi: 10.1002/cre2.555. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

OBJECTIVE: The objective of this study was to evaluate the effect of finishing protocol and exposure to staining solutions on color stability of dental resin composites.

MATERIALS AND METHODS: A nanofill and microhybrid composite, three finishing protocols (mylar, Soflex disc, and white polishing stone) and four staining solutions (tea, red wine, khat extract-two concentrations, control-distilled water) were evaluated. A digital spectrophotometer was used for color change (ΔE) measurements employing the CIE-Lab-color system. Paired/independent-sample t test and two-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) followed by Tukey’s honestly significant difference posthoc test were used for inferential statistics at α = .05.

RESULTS: Soflex finish was associated with least staining and comparable color stability for the two materials in tea and red wine. In Khat 2, microhybrid composite had statistically significant better color stability than nanofill for Soflex finish (14 days t = 3.270, p = .011). For microhybrid composite, mylar resulted in highest mean ΔE, whereas Soflex recorded the least in all staining solutions. For nanofill composite, white stone resulted in highest mean ΔE, whereas Soflex demonstrated the least mean ΔE in all staining solutions, except red wine where mylar demonstrated the least mean ΔE. For mylar finish, nanofill demonstrated statistically significant better color stability than microhybrid in both red wine (14 days t = 4.902, p = .001) and Khat 1 (14 days t = 3.252, p = .012). For stone finish, microhybrid demonstrated statistically significant better color stability than nanofill in all staining solutions (14 days t ≥ 4.785, p ≤ .001). Two-way ANOVA showed a statistically significant difference in mean ΔE between and within specimens (F = 42.658, p < .001). All staining solutions caused clinically unacceptable discoloration for mylar and white stone finish. For Soflex finish, red wine produced clinically unacceptable color difference beyond 48 h.

CONCLUSION: There was a difference in color stability of resin composites depending on filler type, further influenced by finishing protocol. Soflex disc finish results in better color stability than mylar and white stone in both microhybrid and nanofill composites.

CLINICAL SIGNIFICANCE: Esthetic dental restorations such as resin composites are routine in contemporary restorative practice. Color stability of composites may be influenced by surface finish, dependent on the filler type, and consumption of chromogenic substances such as khat. To prolong their service, selection of suitable finishing protocols is an important consideration.

PMID:35349747 | DOI:10.1002/cre2.555

J Community Psychol. 2022 Mar 29. doi: 10.1002/jcop.22850. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

There exists a significant need of screening, measuring, and assessing phobic reactions to the negative effects and consequences of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) across the world. For this purpose, the C19P-S has been developed and adapted to several languages and cultures including Turkish, Russian, Arabic, English, Korean, and soforth. This study aimed to adapt the scale into Japanese. Convenience sampling was used in the recruitment of the participants. The sample involved 310 Japanese-speaking natives from different prefectures of the country (Mean_AGE = 49.97; SD = 13.07). The scale is a self-report instrument, which includes 20, 5-point Likert-type items. The scale assesses the levels of COVID-19 phobia in four areas: Psychological, Somatic, Economic, and Social. The validity (content, construct, convergent, and discriminant) and reliability (internal consistency) analyses were conducted. Multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) was used for group comparisons. MANOVA results show that women scored statistically higher in the psychological area. Furthermore, the participants with a lower educational level scored higher than those with a higher level in the somatic area. Among other scales measuring fear and anxiety, the C19P-S Japanese (C19P-SJ) is the first measurement tool specifically designed and adapted for evaluating coronaphobia. It is suggested that the individuals with psychiatric diagnoses be included to measure and support the construct validity of the scale.

PMID:35349737 | DOI:10.1002/jcop.22850

Nucleic Acids Res. 2022 Mar 29:gkac219. doi: 10.1093/nar/gkac219. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

Dimension reduction and (spatial) clustering is usually performed sequentially; however, the low-dimensional embeddings estimated in the dimension-reduction step may not be relevant to the class labels inferred in the clustering step. We therefore developed a computation method, Dimension-Reduction Spatial-Clustering (DR-SC), that can simultaneously perform dimension reduction and (spatial) clustering within a unified framework. Joint analysis by DR-SC produces accurate (spatial) clustering results and ensures the effective extraction of biologically informative low-dimensional features. DR-SC is applicable to spatial clustering in spatial transcriptomics that characterizes the spatial organization of the tissue by segregating it into multiple tissue structures. Here, DR-SC relies on a latent hidden Markov random field model to encourage the spatial smoothness of the detected spatial cluster boundaries. Underlying DR-SC is an efficient expectation-maximization algorithm based on an iterative conditional mode. As such, DR-SC is scalable to large sample sizes and can optimize the spatial smoothness parameter in a data-driven manner. With comprehensive simulations and real data applications, we show that DR-SC outperforms existing clustering and spatial clustering methods: it extracts more biologically relevant features than conventional dimension reduction methods, improves clustering performance, and offers improved trajectory inference and visualization for downstream trajectory inference analyses.

PMID:35349708 | DOI:10.1093/nar/gkac219

J Nutr. 2022 Mar 29:nxac077. doi: 10.1093/jn/nxac077. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: It is not feasible to determine the true ileal amino acid (AA) digestibility of protein sources in humans on a routine basis and the growing pig has been recommended as an animal model for this purpose but requires further validation.

OBJECTIVES: To determine and compare true ileal AA digestibility between adult human ileostomates and growing cannulated pigs for a range of food proteins.

METHODS: Seven protein sources (black beans, bread, collagen, pigeon peas, wheat bran, whey protein isolate and zein) that spanned the range of digestibilities typically seen in foods were evaluated. Six female growing pigs received each of the protein sources, as well as a protein-free diet, and digesta were collected via ileal T-cannula. Adult human ileostomates consumed the same protein sources (5 to 8 ileostomates, depending on the protein source), as well as a protein-free diet and digesta were collected. Titanium dioxide and celite were included in the diets as indigestible markers. True ileal AA digestibility coefficients were determined.

RESULTS: There was a significant effect of protein source (P ≤ 0.001) for all AAs. The effect of species was not significant (P > 0.05) except for total lysine (but not for available lysine). When analyzed within diets, the statistically significant species effect for true lysine digestibility was found for black beans only. Pig and human digestibility values were generally highly and significantly (P ≤ 0.05) correlated. A linear regression equation derived for true ileal AA digestibility (given as coefficients) determined in the human and pig for the overall mean of all AAs was (y = human, x = pig) y = 1.00x – 0.010, with the slope not statistically significant (P > 0.05) from unity and the intercept not different (P > 0.05) from zero.

CONCLUSIONS: True ileal AA digestibility values determined in the growing pig can be directly used for predicting digestibility in adult humans.

PMID:35349701 | DOI:10.1093/jn/nxac077

J Nutr. 2022 Mar 29:nxac075. doi: 10.1093/jn/nxac075. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: Specialized pro-resolving mediators (SPM), synthesized from polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA), resolve inflammation and return damaged tissue to homeostasis. Thus, increasing metabolites of the SPM biosynthetic pathway may have potential health benefits for select clinical populations such as those with obesity that display dysregulation of SPM metabolism. However, bioavailability of SPMs and their metabolic intermediates in humans with obesity remains unclear.

OBJECTIVES: The primary objective was to determine if a marine oil supplement increased specific metabolites of the SPM biosynthetic pathway in adults with obesity. The second objective was to determine if the supplement changed the relative abundance of key immune cell populations. Finally, given the critical role of antibodies in inflammation, we determined if ex vivo CD19 + B cell antibody production was modified by marine oil intervention.

METHODS: Twenty-three subjects, median age of 56y and BMI of 33.1, consumed 2 g/d of a marine oil supplement for 28-30 days. The supplement was particularly enriched with 18-hydroxyeicosapentaenoic, 14-hydroxydocosahexaenoic, and 17-hydroxydocosahexaenoic acids. Blood was collected pre/post supplementation for plasma mass spectrometry oxylipin and fatty acid analyses, flow cytometry, and B cell isolation. Paired T-tests/Wilcoxon tests were used for statistical analyses.

RESULTS: Relative to pre-intervention, the supplement increased six different hydroxyeicosapentaenoic and hydroxydocosahexaenoic acids accompanied by changes in plasma PUFAs. Resolvin E1 and docosapentaenoic acid-derived maresin 1 levels were respectively increased 3.5 and 4.7-fold upon intervention. The supplement did not increase the concentration of D-series resolvins and had no effect on the abundance of immune cells. Ex vivo B cell IgG but not IgM levels were lowered post-supplementation.

CONCLUSIONS: A marine oil supplement increased select SPMs and their metabolic intermediates in adults with obesity. Additional studies are needed to determine if increased levels of specific SPMs control the resolution of inflammation in humans with obesity. This trial was registered at clinicaltrials.gov (NCT04701138).

PMID:35349683 | DOI:10.1093/jn/nxac075

J Nutr. 2022 Mar 29:nxac072. doi: 10.1093/jn/nxac072. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: Monitoring countries’ progress towards the achievement of their nutrition targets is an important task, but data sparsity makes monitoring trends challenging. Childhood stunting and overweight data in the European region over the last thirty years had low coverage and frequency, with most data only covering a portion of the complete age interval of 0-59 months.

OBJECTIVES: We implemented a statistical method to extract useful information on child malnutrition trends from sparse longitudinal data for these indicators.

METHODS: Heteroscedastic penalised longitudinal mixed models were used to accommodate data sparsity and predict region-wide, country-level trends over time. We leveraged prevalence estimates stratified by sex and partial age intervals (i.e., intervals that do not cover the complete 0-59 months) which expanded the available data (for stunting: from 84 sources and 428 prevalence estimates to 99 sources and 1,786 estimates), improving the robustness of our analysis.

RESULTS: Results indicated a generally decreasing trend in stunting and a stable, slightly diminishing rate for overweight, with large differences in trends between low- and middle-income countries versus high-income countries. No differences were found between age groups and between sexes. Cross-validation results indicated that both stunting and overweight models were robust in estimating the indicators for our data (root mean squared error 0.061 and 0.056; median absolute deviation 0.045 and 0.042 for stunting and overweight respectively).

CONCLUSIONS: These statistical methods can provide useful and robust information on child malnutrition trends over time, even when data are sparse.

PMID:35349691 | DOI:10.1093/jn/nxac072