Publications by authors named "Alan Bates"

Background: Patients with cancer often have unmet psychosocial needs. Early detection of who requires referral to a counsellor or psychiatrist may improve their care. This work used natural language processing to predict which patients will see a counsellor or psychiatrist from a patient's initial oncology consultation document.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Objectives: Older adults have unique needs and may benefit from additional supportive services through their cancer journey. It can be challenging for older adults to navigate the siloed systems within cancer centres and the community. We aimed to document the use of supportive care services in older adults with a new cancer diagnosis in a public healthcare system.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Introduction Street soccer makes the sport accessible to people affected by homelessness or precarious housing. There is overwhelming evidence that exercise improves physical and mental health. In addition, sport facilitates positive peer pressure that leads to beneficial life changes.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Introduction: In order to reduce transmission of COVID-19, in March 2020 the UK national and devolved governments imposed restrictions including spatial distancing, stay-at-home orders, and travel restrictions. The aim of this study is to compare the characteristics of cases referred to the Coronial system for autopsy in the months before and during the lockdown period.

Methods: In all, 580 autopsy cases, performed in the London area between January and June 2020 were included in the study.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Importance: Predicting short- and long-term survival of patients with cancer may improve their care. Prior predictive models either use data with limited availability or predict the outcome of only 1 type of cancer.

Objective: To investigate whether natural language processing can predict survival of patients with general cancer from a patient's initial oncologist consultation document.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Individuals with psychiatric disorders (PD) have a high prevalence of tobacco use. Patients with PD also potentially receive substandard care in comparison to the general population. Previous research has shown that individuals with PD have a decreased risk of receiving a tobacco related (TR) cancer diagnosis.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Objectives: Despite calls for better supportive care, patients and families still commonly bear significant responsibility for managing the physical and mental health and social challenges of being diagnosed with and treated for cancer. As such, there is increased advocacy for integrated supportive care to ease the burden of this responsibility. The purpose of this study was to understand patient and caregiver experiences with supportive care to advance its delivery at a large provincial cancer care organization in Canada.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Objectives: Little is known about how psychosocial factors and distress affect older patients with cancer and their survival. The study goals were to: 1) observe the prevalence of anxiety (ANX) and depression (DEP) symptoms at diagnosis in patients aged ≥65 years, 2) observe the association between social isolation (isolation) and distress, and 3) evaluate the impact on overall survival (OS).

Materials And Methods: A retrospective cohort study was completed for all patients ≥65 years (N = 25,382) referred to the provincial cancer care program in British Columbia, Canada from 2011 to 2016.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Adolescents and young adults (AYA) (18-40) are a population of patients with cancer, who have distinctive developmental and psychosocial pressures. Using validated distress screening tools, we investigated psychosocial needs of AYA compared to older adults with cancer at diagnosis. AYA and older adult patients from British Columbia, Canada, between 2011 and 2016, who completed the Canadian Problem Checklist (CPC) and the PsychoSocial Screen for Cancer-Revised (PSSCAN-R) within 6 months of their cancer diagnosis were included in the study.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Purpose: This study evaluates the prevalence of emotional distress and psychosocial needs in young adult (YA, age 18-39) patients at the time of their breast cancer diagnosis compared to older patients.

Methods: Through a province-wide program, BC Cancer patients complete the PsychoSocial Scan for CANcer-Revised (PSSCAN-R) questionnaire, which screens for the presence of symptoms of anxiety and depression and assesses psychosocial needs using the Canadian Problem Checklist (CPC). The study population comprised all breast cancer patients who completed the questionnaire within 6 months of their cancer diagnosis between 2011 and 2016.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Purpose: We describe the planning and outcomes of the first 'Blepharospasm Day' in the UK. Blepharospasm is a distressing condition for patients and carers. Our 'patient and public involvement' event aimed to: cultivate a more informed patient group via active dialogue, help clinicians more effectively prioritise research and to facilitate peer-to-peer support for affected patients and public.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Introduction: Information on the psychosocial distress and needs of sarcoma patients at diagnosis is sparse. The Canadian Problem Checklist (CPC) and Psychosocial Screen for Cancer-Revised (PSSCAN-R) are validated tools to identify cancer patients' distress and are administered to all new patients referred to BC Cancer prior to their consultation. We used the CPC and PSSCAN-R to understand sarcoma patients' needs at the initial oncology consultation in British Columbia, Canada.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Objective: The Psychosocial Screen for Cancer (PSSCAN-R) questionnaire is a validated screening tool used to identify the psychosocial needs of patients with cancer. It assesses patients' perceived social supports and psychosocial needs, and the presence of symptoms of depression and anxiety. The study goals were to assess the prevalence and factors associated with distress in patients with newly diagnosed nonsmall cell lung cancer (NSCLC).

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Pulmonary hypertension is a serious condition with multiple underlying aetiologies which require different treatment strategies. We present a case of severe idiopathic pulmonary arterial hypertension in a 20-year-old patient with ongoing breathlessness. She was initially diagnosed with asthma and panic attacks in community care.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Fumarate hydratase (FH) deficiency is a rare autosomal recessive disorder which results in a major defect in cellular metabolism. It presents in infancy with progressive encephalopathy, hypotonia, seizures and failure to thrive and is often fatal in childhood. It is caused by mutations in the FH gene (1q42.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Low-frequency oscillations in the electroencephalogram (EEG) have been found to be abnormal in patients with schizophrenia. It is unclear, however, whether these abnormalities are related to severity of illness or are a marker for risk. This study investigated total and evoked theta and delta activity in schizophrenia patients, unaffected siblings, and healthy controls (HCs).

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

In 1855 the leading British transcendental anatomist Robert Knox proposed a theory of retrogressive development according to which the human embryo could give rise to ancestral types or races and the animal embryo to other species within the same family. Unlike monsters attributed to the older theory of arrested development, new forms produced by retrogression were neither imperfect nor equivalent to a stage in the embryo's development. Instead, Knox postulated that embryos contained all possible specific forms in potentia.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Purpose Of Review: An up-to-date summary of the literature on children's and adolescents' understanding of their own terminal illness and death.

Recent Findings: Clinicians still find it difficult to speak with pediatric patients about death even though guidelines for facilitating communication on the topic exist. As a result, pediatric patients are less likely to develop a clear understanding of their illness and there is a disconnect between clinicians and parents about prognosis, even when clinicians have concluded there is no longer possibility for cure.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Introduction: Inflammatory myofibroblastic tumour arising in the adrenal gland is exceptional. As far as we are aware, there have been only three previous reports in the literature. We report a fourth case.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Paneth cell metaplasia (PCM) is well described in adults but little is known about the distribution of colonic Paneth cells and the occurrence of PCM in a paediatric population. The aim of this study is to determine whether Paneth cell hyperplasia or metaplasia characteristically occurs in the colons of children with newly diagnosed idiopathic inflammatory bowel disease (IBD).

Methods: We retrospectively reviewed colonic series from 28 new diagnoses of paediatric IBD at a tertiary referral centre, and from a further 14 children with IBD-like symptoms whose colonic biopsies and ancillary investigations were normal.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Fibro-osteochondroma of the uterus.

Indian J Pathol Microbiol

November 2013

A case of a uterine fibro-osteochondroma in a 61-year-old woman with postmenopausal bleeding was presented. Ultrasound revealed a calcified lesion in the posterior wall of the uterus and a hysterectomy was performed. Histopathologic examination showed a well-circumscribed triphasic tumor composed of peripheral lobules of mature hyaline cartilage and foci of trabecular bone with a core of loosely arranged fibroblast-like, spindle cells.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

A reduction in the error-related negativity (ERN), a response-locked event-related potential (ERP) observed when participants commit errors during processing of stimuli, is a well-replicated cerebral abnormality in schizophrenia. However, the extent to which this abnormality reflects susceptibility to schizophrenia rather than overt change in behavioural state is unclear. As the unaffected siblings of individuals with schizophrenia are at an increased genetic risk, this study examines whether they display abnormality of the ERN similar to that observed in individuals with schizophrenia.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Reports of  "eosinophilic colitis"-raised colonic mucosal eosinophil density in patients with lower gastrointestinal symptoms-have increased markedly over the last fifteen years, though it remains a rarity. There is no consensus over its diagnosis and management, and uncertainty is compounded by the use of the same term to describe an idiopathic increase in colonic eosinophils and an eosinophilic inflammatory reaction to known aetiological agents such as parasites or drugs. In patients with histologically proven colonic eosinophilia, it is important to seek out underlying causes and careful clinicopathological correlation is advised.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF