Tag: statistics

Braz J Cardiovasc Surg. 2023 Jul 4;38(4):e20220355. doi: 10.21470/1678-9741-2022-0355.

ABSTRACT

INTRODUCTION: The European System for Cardiac Operative Risk Evaluation (EuroSCORE) II and the Society of Thoracic Surgeons (STS) are validated scoring systems for short-term risk estimation after coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG). The Meta-Analysis Global Group in Chronic Heart Failure (MAGGIC) risk score is originally aimed to estimate mortality in heart failure patients; however, it has showed a similar power to predict mortality after heart valve surgery. In this study, we sought to evaluate whether MAGGIC score may predict short and long-term mortality after CABG and to compare its power with EuroSCORE II and STS scoring systems.

METHODS: Patients who underwent CABG due to chronic coronary syndrome at our institution were included in this retrospective study. Follow-up data were used to define the predictive ability of MAGGIC and to compare it with STS and EuroSCORE-II for early, one-year, and up to 10-year mortality.

RESULTS: MAGGIC, STS, and EuroSCORE-II scores had good prognostic power, moreover MAGGIC was better for predicting 30-day (area under the curve [AUC]: 0.903; 95% confidence interval [CI]: 0.871-0.935), one-year (AUC: 0.931; 95% CI: 0.907-0.955), and 10-year (AUC: 0.923; 95% CI: 0.893-0.954) mortality. MAGGIC was found to be an independent predictor to sustain statistically significant association with mortality in follow-up.

CONCLUSION: MAGGIC scoring system had a good predictive accuracy for early and long-term mortality in patients undergoing CABG when compared to EuroSCORE-II and STS scores. It requires limited variables for calculation and still yields better prognostic power in determining 30-day, one-year, and up to 10-year mortality.

PMID:37402290 | DOI:10.21470/1678-9741-2022-0355

Braz J Cardiovasc Surg. 2023 Jul 4;38(4):e20220305. doi: 10.21470/1678-9741-2022-0305.

ABSTRACT

INTRODUCTION: Postoperative bleeding is one of the main causes of complications in cardiovascular surgery, which highlights the importance of ensuring adequate intraoperative hemostasis, providing a better patient outcome. This study aimed to improve the prevention of postoperative bleeding in the Cardiovascular Surgery Department of the Hospital Estadual Mário Covas (Santo André, Brazil) using an adapted version of the Papworth Haemostasis Checklist to assess the impact of this standardization on bleeding rate, postoperative complications, reoperation, and mortality.

METHODS: This is a non-randomized controlled clinical trial, whose non-probabilistic sample consisted of patients undergoing cardiac surgery in the abovementioned service within a two-year interval. The Papworth Haemostasis Checklist was adapted to the Brazilian laboratory parameters and the questions were translated into Portuguese. This checklist was used before the surgeon started the chest wall closure. Patients were followed up until 30 days after surgery. A P-value < 0.05 was considered statistically relevant.

RESULTS: This study included 200 patients. After the checklist, a reduction in 24-hour drain output, postoperative complications, and reoperation was observed, although statistical significance was not reached. Finally, there was a significant reduction in the number of deaths (8 vs. 2; P=0.05).

CONCLUSION: The use of the adapted checklist in our hospital proved to be an effective intervention to improve the prevention of postoperative bleeding, with a direct impact in the number of deaths in the study period. The reduction in deaths was possible thanks to the reduction in the bleeding rate, postoperative complications, and reoperations for bleeding.

PMID:37402279 | DOI:10.21470/1678-9741-2022-0305

Braz J Cardiovasc Surg. 2023 Jul 4;38(4):e20220251. doi: 10.21470/1678-9741-2022-0251.

ABSTRACT

INTRODUCTION: Fuziline is one of the many antioxidants currently being tested to treat cardiac damage. In our study, histopathological and biochemical effects of fuziline were investigated in mice with dobutamine-induced heart damage in vitro.

METHODS: Thirty-two adult male BALB/c mice, average weight of 18-20 g, were randomly divided into four groups – Group 1 (sham, n=8), Group 2 (control, dobutamine, n=8), Group 3 (treatment 1, dobutamine + fuziline, n=8), and Group 4 (treatment 2, fuziline, n=8). Biochemical parameters and total antioxidant status (TAS), total oxidant status (TOS), and oxidative stress index (OSI) values were measured. Interleukin 1 beta (IL-1β), NLR family, pyrin domain containing protein 3 (NLRP3), 8-hydroxy-deoxyguanosine (8-OHDG), gasdermin D (GSDMD), and galectin 3 (GAL-3) levels were analyzed by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay method, and histopathological examination of heart tissues was performed.

RESULTS: When dobutamine + fuziline and fuziline groups were compared, troponin-I (P<0.05), NLRP3 (P<0.001), GSDMD (P<0.001), 8-OHDG (P<0.001), IL-1β (P<0.001), and GAL-3 (P<0.05) were found to be statistically significant. TOS level was the highest in the dobutamine group (P<0.001) and TAS level was the highest in the fuziline group (P<0.001). OSI level was statistically significant between the groups (P<0.001). In histopathological examination, focal necrosis areas were smaller in the dobutamine + fuziline group than in the dobutamine group, and cardiac myocytes were better preserved.

CONCLUSION: Fuziline markedly reduced cardiac damage and pyroptosis in mice with dobutamine-induced heart damage by lowering the levels of GSDMD, 8-OHDG, IL-1β, and GAL-3. It also prevented necrosis of cardiac myocytes in histopathological evaluation.

PMID:37402273 | DOI:10.21470/1678-9741-2022-0251

Braz J Cardiovasc Surg. 2023 Jul 4;28(4):e20220230. doi: 10.21470/1678-9741-2022-0230.

ABSTRACT

INTRODUCTION: Given the incipience of domestic studies on hope and spirituality in cardiology, this study evaluated adult cardiac patients’ hope in the preoperative period of cardiac surgery and its potential association with spirituality.

METHODS: This is a cross-sectional study carried out at a university hospital in the State of São Paulo (Brazil). A total of 70 patients answered the Herth Hope Scale and a sociodemographic questionnaire before undergoing surgical procedure between January and October 2018. Descriptive and inferential analyses were performed using the Spearman’s rank correlation coefficient and the Mann-Whitney U test. The R-3.4.1 software and SAS System for Windows 9.2 were also used. P-value < 0.05 was considered statistically significant.

RESULTS: Patients had a high prevalence of modifiable risk factors. Having a religion (37.53±4.57) and practicing it (38.79±4.25), regardless of its denomination and time dedicated to that religion, was associated with hope (P<0.01) in the immediate preoperative period of cardiac surgery. However, hope did not exhibit a significant correlation with factors such as age (P=0.09) and time dedicated to religious practice (P=0.07).

CONCLUSION: Regardless of the religious strand and time dedicated to religious practices as an expression of spirituality, hope was associated with the participants’ religion and religiosity. Considering the importance of this construct on the processes of health and disease, the whole health team should consider in their praxis a setting of conditions to make the patient’s spirituality process feasible during hospitalization.

PMID:37402272 | DOI:10.21470/1678-9741-2022-0230

Int J Cosmet Sci. 2023 Jul 4. doi: 10.1111/ics.12882. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

OBJECTIVE: The excessive use of plastic packaging, even though it is possible to recycle it, is one of the main causes of global warming. In this study, dissolvable shower gel tablets for multiple uses have been developed in order to reduce the use of fresh plastic packaging.

METHODS: The appropriate ratio of two surfactants, cocoyl glutamic acid (CGA) and sodium coco sulfate (SCS), was optimized using design of experiments. Additionally, skin hydration of the emollient either omega oil or glycerin was taken into account when determining its concentration. After that, powdered shower gel formulations were made and tested for their properties, including cleaning power, and foamability. On 30 volunteers, the effects of reconstituted shower gel on skin redness, cleaning effectiveness, and overall satisfaction were evaluated in human volunteers.

RESULTS: The study found that, when cleaning power and foam height were taken into account, the proper surfactant ratio was 7.5:0 (SCS:CGA). The 5% glycerin shower gel formula demonstrated significantly greater skin hydration than other formulas. The in vivo study’s findings demonstrated that there was no statistically significant difference between selected formulas (5% glycerin and 2.5% omega oil) in terms of cleaning ability. Comparing both formulas to the control, neither showed any skin redness. Additionally, it was discovered that the developed products were much more effective at cleaning and easier to use when washing for the volunteers than regular liquid soap. Overall satisfaction and the moisturizing feel were not significantly different among all products.

CONCLUSION: The formula with 7.5% SCS and 5% glycerin is said to be the best one for both cleaning ability and moisturizing effect. These findings suggest that dissolvable shower gel tablets with enhanced skin benefits could offer a promising innovation in the personal care industry.

PMID:37402220 | DOI:10.1111/ics.12882

IEEE Trans Neural Netw Learn Syst. 2023 Jul 4;PP. doi: 10.1109/TNNLS.2023.3289056. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

Although learning-based light field disparity estimation has achieved great progress in the most recent years, the performance of unsupervised light field learning is still hindered by occlusions and noises. By analyzing the overall strategy underlying the unsupervised methodology and the light field geometry implied in epipolar plane images (EPIs), we look beyond the photometric consistency assumption, and design an occlusion-aware unsupervised framework to deal with the situations of photometric consistency conflict. Specifically, we present a geometry-based light field occlusion modeling, which predicts a group of visibility masks and occlusion maps, respectively, by forward warping and backward EPI-line tracing. In order to learn better the noise-and occlusion-invariant representations of the light field, we propose two occlusion-aware unsupervised losses: occlusion-aware SSIM and statistics-based EPI loss. Experiment results demonstrate that our method can improve the estimation accuracy of light field depth over the occluded and noisy regions, and preserve the occlusion boundaries better.

PMID:37402202 | DOI:10.1109/TNNLS.2023.3289056

IEEE Trans Pattern Anal Mach Intell. 2023 Jul 4;PP. doi: 10.1109/TPAMI.2023.3292062. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

A recent paper claims that a newly proposed method classifies EEG data recorded from subjects viewing ImageNet stimuli better than two prior methods. However, the analysis used to support that claim is based on confounded data. We repeat the analysis on a large new dataset that is free from that confound. Training and testing on aggregated supertrials derived by summing trials demonstrates that the two prior methods achieve statistically significant above-chance accuracy while the newly proposed method does not.

PMID:37402186 | DOI:10.1109/TPAMI.2023.3292062

Physiol Int. 2023 Jul 4. doi: 10.1556/2060.2023.00188. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: Grip strength is a marker of future health conditions and is mainly generated by the extrinsic flexor muscles of the fingers. Therefore, whether or not there is a relationship between grip strength and forearm muscle size is vital in considering strategies for grip strength development during growth. Thus, this study aimed to examine the association between changes in grip strength and forearm muscle thickness in young children.

METHODS: Two hundred eighteen young children (104 boys and 114 girls) performed maximum voluntary grip strength and ultrasound-measured muscle thickness measurements in the right hand. Two muscle thicknesses were measured as the perpendicular distance between the adipose tissue-muscle interface and muscle-bone interface of the radius (MT-radius) and ulna (MT-ulna). All participants completed the first measurement and underwent a second measurement one year after the first one.

RESULTS: There were significant (P < 0.001) within-subject correlations between MT-ulna and grip strength [r = 0.50 (0.40, 0.60)] and MT-radius and grip strength [r = 0.59 (0.49, 0.67)]. There was no significant between-subject correlation between MT-ulna and grip strength [r = 0.07 (-0.05, 0.20)], but there was a statistically significant (P < 0.001) between-subject relationship between MT-radius and grip strength [r = 0.27 (0.14, 0.39)].

CONCLUSION: Although we cannot infer causation from the present study, our findings suggest that as muscle size increases within a child, so does muscle strength. Our between-subject analysis, however, suggests that those who observed the greatest change in muscle size did not necessarily get the strongest.

PMID:37402166 | DOI:10.1556/2060.2023.00188

JMIR Res Protoc. 2023 Jul 4;12:e39817. doi: 10.2196/39817.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: Stress-related mental disorders are highly prevalent and pose a substantial burden on individuals and society. Improving strategies for the prevention and treatment of mental disorders requires a better understanding of their risk and resilience factors. This multicenter study aims to contribute to this endeavor by investigating psychological resilience in healthy but susceptible young adults over 9 months. Resilience is conceptualized in this study as the maintenance of mental health or quick recovery from mental health perturbations upon exposure to stressors, assessed longitudinally via frequent monitoring of stressors and mental health.

OBJECTIVE: This study aims to investigate the factors predicting mental resilience and adaptive processes and mechanisms contributing to mental resilience and to provide a methodological and evidence-based framework for later intervention studies.

METHODS: In a multicenter setting, across 5 research sites, a sample with a total target size of 250 young male and female adults was assessed longitudinally over 9 months. Participants were included if they reported at least 3 past stressful life events and an elevated level of (internalizing) mental health problems but were not presently affected by any mental disorder other than mild depression. At baseline, sociodemographic, psychological, neuropsychological, structural, and functional brain imaging; salivary cortisol and α-amylase levels; and cardiovascular data were acquired. In a 6-month longitudinal phase 1, stressor exposure, mental health problems, and perceived positive appraisal were monitored biweekly in a web-based environment, while ecological momentary assessments and ecological physiological assessments took place once per month for 1 week, using mobile phones and wristbands. In a subsequent 3-month longitudinal phase 2, web-based monitoring was reduced to once a month, and psychological resilience and risk factors were assessed again at the end of the 9-month period. In addition, samples for genetic, epigenetic, and microbiome analyses were collected at baseline and at months 3 and 6. As an approximation of resilience, an individual stressor reactivity score will be calculated. Using regularized regression methods, network modeling, ordinary differential equations, landmarking methods, and neural net-based methods for imputation and dimension reduction, we will identify the predictors and mechanisms of stressor reactivity and thus be able to identify resilience factors and mechanisms that facilitate adaptation to stressors.

RESULTS: Participant inclusion began in October 2020, and data acquisition was completed in June 2022. A total of 249 participants were assessed at baseline, 209 finished longitudinal phase 1, and 153 finished longitudinal phase 2.

CONCLUSIONS: The Dynamic Modelling of Resilience-Observational Study provides a methodological framework and data set to identify predictors and mechanisms of mental resilience, which are intended to serve as an empirical foundation for future intervention studies.

INTERNATIONAL REGISTERED REPORT IDENTIFIER (IRRID): DERR1-10.2196/39817.

PMID:37402143 | DOI:10.2196/39817

JMIR Public Health Surveill. 2023 Jul 4;9:e45324. doi: 10.2196/45324.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: The causal relationship between blood pressure variability (BPV) and arterial stiffness remains debated.

OBJECTIVE: This study aimed to explore the temporal and bidirectional associations between long-term BPV and arterial stiffness using a cohort design with multiple surveys.

METHODS: Participants from the Beijing Health Management Cohort who underwent health examinations from visit 1 (2010-2011) to visit 5 (2018-2019) were enrolled in this study. Long-term BPV was defined as intraindividual variation using the coefficient of variation (CV) and SD. Arterial stiffness was measured by brachial-ankle pulse wave velocity (baPWV). The bidirectional relationship between BPV and arterial stiffness was explored using cross-lagged analysis and linear regression models, with records before and after visit 3 categorized as phase 1 and phase 2, respectively.

RESULTS: Of the 1506 participants, who were a mean of 56.11 (SD 8.57) years old, 1148 (76.2%) were male. The cross-lagged analysis indicated that the standardized coefficients of BPV at phase 1 directing to the baPWV level at phase 2 were statistically significant but not vice-versa. The adjusted regression coefficients of the CV were 4.708 (95% CI 0.946-8.470) for systolic blood pressure, 3.119 (95% 0.166-6.073) for diastolic pressure, and 2.205 (95% CI 0.300-4.110) for pulse pressure. The coefficients of the SD were 4.208 (95% CI 0.177-8.239) for diastolic pressure and 4.247 (95% CI 0.448-8.046) for pulse pressure. The associations were predominant in the subgroup with hypertension, but we did not observe any significant association of baPWV level with subsequent BPV indices.

CONCLUSIONS: The findings supported a temporal relationship between long-term BPV and arterial stiffness level, especially among people with hypertension.

PMID:37402142 | DOI:10.2196/45324