Publications by authors named "Amy Miles"

Implementing competency based medical education (CBME) has generated enormous amounts of assessment data. To help residents synthesize and use these data, some programs have appointed academic advisors (AA) to 'coach over time'. This study explored how resident and faculty AA dyads perceived their relationship developing and evolving, and the extent to which it aligned with 'coaching over time'.

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  • Geriatric Emergency Department Guidelines aim to improve care transitions for older patients, highlighting the need for coordinated interprofessional services such as occupational therapy and social work.
  • The study involved assessing older adults in 10 EDs across Canada to determine their referral patterns, focusing on those with high-risk characteristics, and utilized rigorous assessment tools to identify complex needs.
  • Results showed that while a majority of high-needs patients received referrals to various services, factors like hospital location and the extent of their healthcare needs influenced referral decisions, indicating that risk-based referrals may not be consistently applied.
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Disentangling the molecular underpinnings of major depressive disorder (MDD) is necessary for identifying new treatment and prevention targets. The functional impact of depression-related transcriptomic changes on the brain remains relatively unexplored. We recently developed a novel transcriptome-based polygenic risk score (tPRS) composed of genes transcriptionally altered in MDD.

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Objective: The concentration of drugs in a driver's system can change between an impaired driving arrest or crash and the collection of a biological specimen for drug testing. Accordingly, delays in specimen collection can result in the loss of critical information that has the potential to affect impaired driving prosecution. The objectives of the study were: (1) to identify factors that influence the time between impaired-driving violations and specimen collections (time-to-collection) among crash-involved drivers, and (2) to consider how such delays affect measured concentrations of drugs, particularly with respect to common drug per se limits.

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Introduction: As the population skews toward older age, elucidating mechanisms underlying human brain aging becomes imperative. Structural MRI has facilitated non-invasive investigation of lifespan brain morphology changes, yet this domain remains uncharacterized in rodents despite increasing use as models of disordered human brain aging.

Methods: Young (2m, = 10), middle-age (10m, = 10) and old (22m, = 9) mice were utilized for maturational (young vs.

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Methamphetamine exists as two stereoisomers: -(+)-methamphetamine ((+)-MAMP) and -(-)-methamphetamine ((-)-MAMP). The (+)-MAMP stereoisomer is a well-known central nervous system stimulant, available as a pharmaceutical and clandestine drug of abuse. However, the (-)-MAMP stereoisomer is less well understood despite commercial availability for over 30 years as an over-the-counter (OTC) nasal decongestant in the Vicks Vapor Inhaler (a product of Procter & Gamble).

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Objective: Frailty and late-life depression (LLD) often coexist and share several structural brain changes. We aimed to study the joint effect LLD and frailty have on brain structure.

Design: Cross-sectional study.

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  • This manuscript introduces the concepts of reserve and resilience in chronic kidney disease (CKD) research and shares initial findings from a study aimed at understanding recovery from functional decline after health events.
  • The PREPARED study involved a cohort of Veterans aged 70 or older with severe kidney issues, collecting data through electronic health records and surveys to evaluate their physical, psychological, and cognitive reserves.
  • Findings revealed that while participants had similar kidney function levels, they exhibited a wide variability in other health reserves, suggesting that these non-kidney factors could be crucial for understanding recovery potential in CKD patients.
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Background: The pattern of structural brain abnormalities in anorexia nervosa (AN) is still not well understood. While several studies report substantial deficits in gray matter volume and cortical thickness in acutely underweight patients, others find no differences, or even increases in patients compared with healthy control subjects. Recent weight regain before scanning may explain some of this heterogeneity.

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Drug-impaired driver detection is a critical element of traffic safety. However, shifting drug use patterns over time and geography may limit the long-term reliability of assay-based screening tools. In this work, we compare qualitative results from the Abbott SoToxa® oral fluid (OF) screening device to Quantisal™ OF and whole blood.

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Background: Prenatal stress influences brain development and mood disorder vulnerability. Brain structural covariance network (SCN) properties based on inter-regional volumetric correlations may reflect developmentally-mediated shared plasticity among regions. Childhood trauma is associated with amygdala-centric SCN reorganization patterns, however, the impact of prenatal stress on SCN properties remains unknown.

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Studies in post-mortem human brain tissue have associated major depressive disorder (MDD) with cortical transcriptomic changes, whose potential in vivo impact remains unexplored. To address this translational gap, we recently developed a transcriptome-based polygenic risk score (T-PRS) based on common functional variants capturing 'depression-like' shifts in cortical gene expression. Here, we used a non-clinical sample of young adults (n = 482, Duke Neurogenetics Study: 53% women; aged 19.

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In this work, 114 volunteers were dosed with 80-proof liquor to produce peak blood-alcohol concentration (BAC) or breath-alcohol concentration (BrAC) of 0.040-0.080 g/100 mL blood or g/210 L breath.

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This report describes updates to the National Safety Council's Alcohol, Drugs and Impairment Division's recommendations for drug testing in driving under the influence of drug (DUID) cases and motor vehicle fatalities. The updates are based on a survey of drug testing practices in laboratories in the USA and Canada, a comprehensive review of the prior recommendations and data and research on drugs most frequently detected in DUID cases. A consensus meeting was held with representative forensic science practitioners and the authors of this report to update recommendations.

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  • Chronic stress (CRS) leads to behavioral and synaptic changes in brain areas like the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC), amygdala (AMY), and nucleus accumbens (NAc), showing increased emotional issues like anxiety and anhedonia.
  • The study found that CRS decreased the volume of the ACC significantly, correlating with increased behavioral emotionality, while other regions like the AMY and NAc showed negative correlations with emotionality but were not significantly altered.
  • At a cellular level, the reduction in ACC volume was linked to decreased synaptic density, suggesting that alterations in synaptic strength contribute to the behavioral effects of chronic stress, highlighting the ACC's importance in stress-related disorders.
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Introduction: Capitalising on direct workplace observations of residents by interprofessional team members might be an effective strategy to promote formative feedback in postgraduate medical education. To better understand how interprofessional feedback is conceived, delivered, received and used, we explored both feedback provider and receiver perceptions of workplace feedback.

Methods: We conducted 17 individual interviews with residents and eight focus groups with health professionals (HPs) (two nurses, two rehabilitation therapists, two pharmacists and two social workers), for a total of 61 participants.

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Convergent data from imaging and postmortem brain transcriptome studies implicate corticolimbic circuit (CLC) dysregulation in the pathophysiology of depression. To more directly bridge these lines of work, we generated a novel transcriptome-based polygenic risk score (T-PRS), capturing subtle shifts toward depression-like gene expression patterns in key CLC regions, and mapped this T-PRS onto brain function and related depressive symptoms in a nonclinical sample of 478 young adults (225 men; age 19.79 +/- 1.

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Maternal stress during pregnancy and shortly thereafter is associated with altered offspring brain development that may increase risk of mood and anxiety disorders. Cortical gyrification is established during the prenatal period and the first 2 years of life and is altered in psychiatric disorders. Here, we sought to characterize the effects of perinatal stress exposure on offspring gyrification patterns and mood dysregulation in young adulthood.

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Purpose: To describe the clinical features of COVID-19 in older adults, and relate these to outcomes.

Methods: A cohort study of 217 individuals (median age 80, IQR 74-85 years; 62% men) hospitalised with COVID-19, followed up for all-cause mortality, was conducted. Secondary outcomes included cognitive and physical function at discharge.

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Purpose: Our aim was to quantify the mortality from COVID-19 and identify any interactions with frailty and other demographic factors.

Methods: Hospitalised patients aged ≥ 70 were included, comparing COVID-19 cases with non-COVID-19 controls admitted over the same period. Frailty was prospectively measured and mortality ascertained through linkage with national and local statutory reports.

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Purpose: To ascertain delirium prevalence and outcomes in COVID-19.

Methods: We conducted a point-prevalence study in a cohort of COVID-19 inpatients at University College Hospital. Delirium was defined by DSM-IV criteria.

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Purpose: As key participants in the assessment dyad, residents must be engaged with the process. However, residents' experiences with competency-based medical education (CBME), and specifically with entrustable professional activity (EPA)-based assessments, have not been well studied. The authors explored junior residents' perceptions regarding the implementation of EPA assessment and feedback initiatives in an internal medicine program.

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