Critical Fluctuations as an Early Warning Signal of Sports Injuries? A Proof of Concept Using Football Monitoring Data.

Background: There has been an increasing interest in the development and prevention of sports injuries from a complex dynamic systems perspective. From this perspective, injuries may occur following critical fluctuations in the psychophysiological state of an athlete. Our objective was to quantify these so-called Early Warning Signals (EWS) as a proof of concept to determine their explanatory performance for injuries.

Monitoring the recovery-stress states of athletes: Psychometric properties of the acute recovery and stress scale and short recovery stress scale among Dutch and Flemish athletes.

The Acute Recovery and Stress Scale (ARSS) and the Short Recovery and Stress Scale (SRSS) are recently-introduced instruments to monitor recovery and stress processes in athletes. In this study, our aims were to replicate and extend previous psychometric assessments of the instruments, by incorporating recovery and stress dimensions into one model. Therefore, we conducted five confirmatory factor analyses (CFA) and determined structural validity, internal consistency, and construct validity.

Adherence to an injury prevention program in male amateur football players is affected by players' age, experience and perceptions.

Objectives: Adherence to injury prevention programmes in football remains low, which is thought to drastically reduce the effects of injury prevention programmes. Reasons why (medical) staff and players implement injury prevention programmes, have been investigated, but player's characteristics and perceptions about these programmes might influence their adherence. Therefore, this study investigated the relationships between player's characteristics and adherence and between player's perceptions and adherence following an implemented injury prevention programme.

Resilience in sports: a multidisciplinary, dynamic, and personalized perspective.

Athletes are exposed to various psychological and physiological stressors, such as losing matches and high training loads. Understanding and improving the resilience of athletes is therefore crucial to prevent performance decrements and psychological or physical problems. In this review, resilience is conceptualized as a dynamic process of bouncing back to normal functioning following stressors.

Nonergodicity in Load and Recovery: Group Results Do Not Generalize to Individuals.

Purpose: The study of load and recovery gained significant interest in the last decades, given its important value in decreasing the likelihood of injuries and improving performance. So far, findings are typically reported on the group level, whereas practitioners are most often interested in applications at the individual level. Hence, the aim of the present research is to examine to what extent group-level statistics can be generalized to individual athletes, which is referred to as the "ergodicity issue.

The Effects of Lower-Extremity Plyometric Training on Soccer-Specific Outcomes in Adult Male Soccer Players: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.

Background: Plyometric training is a specific form of strength training that is used to improve the physical performance of athletes. An overview of the effects of plyometric training on soccer-specific outcomes in adult male soccer players is not available yet.

Purpose: To systematically review and meta-analyze the effects of plyometric training on soccer-specific outcome measures in adult male soccer players and to identify which programs are most effective.

Geometric calibration of lens and filter distortions for multispectral filter-wheel cameras.

High-fidelity color image acquisition with a multispectral camera utilizes optical filters to separate the visible electromagnetic spectrum into several passbands. This is often realized with a computer-controlled filter wheel, where each position is equipped with an optical bandpass filter. For each filter wheel position, a grayscale image is acquired and the passbands are finally combined to a multispectral image.

Multispectral filter-wheel cameras: geometric distortion model and compensation algorithms.

Multispectral image acquisition considerably improves color accuracy in comparison to RGB technology. A common multispectral camera design concept features a filter-wheel consisting of six or more optical bandpass filters. By shifting the filters sequentially into the optical path, the electromagnetic spectrum is acquired through the channels, thus making an approximate reconstruction of the spectrum feasible.

Susceptibility of common aerobic pathogens to tigecycline: results of a surveillance study in Germany.

Tigecycline is a novel antimicrobial agent for parenteral use encompassing a broad spectrum of bacterial pathogens, including multi-resistant organisms. Here, we report the results of the first nationwide surveillance trial that was conducted in order to evaluate the susceptibility of bacterial isolates to tigecycline in a European country prior to its clinical use. A total of 2,610 Gram-positive and Gram-negative organisms recovered from hospitalized patients were tested.

Bactericidal activity of daptomycin, vancomycin, teicoplanin and linezolid against Staphylococcus aureus, Enterococcus faecalis and Enterococcus faecium using human peak free serum drug concentrations.

The bactericidal activities of daptomycin, vancomycin, teicoplanin and linezolid at human peak free serum concentrations (C(max,free)) were determined against Staphylococcus aureus (one methicillin-susceptible and two methicillin-resistant strains), Enterococcus faecalis and Enterococcus faecium (one vancomycin-susceptible and one vancomycin-resistant strain of each). Daptomycin was rapidly bactericidal against 7/7 strains at C(max,free) of 22.0 mg/L (corresponding to 63% protein binding) and against 3/7 strains at 4.

Surveillance of linezolid resistance in Germany, 2001-2002.

A surveillance study was performed throughout Germany from November 2001 to June 2002 to assess the prevalence of linezolid-resistant isolates among Gram-positive bacteria from routine susceptibility data and to compare the in-vitro activity of linezolid to that of other antibacterial agents. Each of 86 laboratories provided routine susceptibility data for 100 consecutive isolates. Most laboratories (c.

Activities of various beta-lactams and beta-lactam/beta-lactamase inhibitor combinations against Acinetobacter baumannii and Acinetobacter DNA group 3 strains.

Acinetobacter baumannii and Acinetobacter DNA group 3 are members of the so-called A. calcoaceticus-A. baumannii complex and are important nosocomial pathogens.

High prevalence of the ermB gene among erythromycin-resistant streptococcus pneumoniae isolates in Germany during the winter of 2000-2001 and in vitro activity of telithromycin.

Of 595 isolates of Streptococcus pneumoniae from outpatients with respiratory tract infections, collected from 17 microbiology laboratories, 14.1% were resistant to erythromycin. Eighty-three erythromycin-resistant isolates were genetically analyzed, 83.

[beta-lactam-antibiotics in the treatment of community-acquired respiratory tract infections with penicillin-resistant pneumococci].

Streptococcus pneumoniae is still the most important pathogen of community-acquired respiratory tract infections. During the last decades in many countries an increase in the spread of antibiotic resistant strains (e. g.

Nationwide German multicenter study on the prevalence of antibiotic resistance in streptococcal blood isolates from neutropenic patients and comparative in vitro activities of quinupristin-dalfopristin and eight other antimicrobials.

In a prospective multicenter study (1996 to 1999), 156 episodes of bacteremic streptococcal infections of neutropenic patients were evaluated. Streptococcus oralis (26.3%), S.

Nationwide German multicenter study on prevalence of antibiotic resistance in staphylococcal bloodstream isolates and comparative in vitro activities of quinupristin-dalfopristin.

Antibiotic-resistant gram-positive bacteria have become an increasing problem in the last two decades. In order to evaluate the prevalence of antibiotic resistance in staphylococcal bloodstream isolates in Germany, 2,042 staphylococci collected in 21 tertiary-care hospitals were investigated during a 3-year period (March 1996 to March 1999). Altogether, 1,448 S.

Efficacy and safety of 2% mupirocin ointment in the treatment of primary and secondary skin infections--an open multicentre trial.

Staphylococci and beta-haemolytic streptococci are usually responsible for causing common primary and secondary skin infections. Mupirocin (Bactroban, Eismycin; trademarks of Beecham Group plc), a new antibiotic unrelated to any other antibacterial agent and developed for topical use only, shows a high level of activity against these bacteria. In an open multicentre study the efficacy and safety of mupirocin (2% in a polyethylene glycol vehicle) was evaluated in 1,391 general practice patients with superficial skin infections.