Involving participants in the design of clinical trials should improve the overall success of a study. For this to occur, streamlined mechanisms are needed to connect the populations potentially impacted by a given study or health topic with research teams in order to inform trial design in a meaningful and timely manner. To address this need, we developed an innovative mechanism called the "ResearchMatch Expert Advice Tool" that quickly obtains volunteer perspectives from populations with specific health conditions or lived experiences using the national recruitment registry, ResearchMatch.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPurpose: This meta-analysis sought to compare knot tying against other methods of haemostasis in terms of post-operative haemorrhage, intraoperative blood loss and tonsillectomy time.
Methods: Two independent reviewers performed a literature search according to PRISMA guidelines. Three databases were consulted, Pubmed, Google Scholar and Embase.
Most people with a psychotic illness will never be violent; however, it is widely known that violence is more prevalent in this group compared to the general community, particularly during first-episode psychosis (FEP). Despite this, there is limited research into what contributes to this increased risk during FEP. The present systematic review aimed to identify whether certain risk factors are differentially associated with severity and timing of violence perpetration during FEP.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFActa Neuropathol Commun
December 2024
Mammalian central nervous system (CNS) axons cannot spontaneously regenerate after injury, creating an unmet need to identify molecular regulators to promote axon regeneration and reduce the lasting impact of CNS injuries. While tubulin polymerization promoting protein family member 3 (Tppp3) is known to promote axon outgrowth in amphibians, its role in mammalian axon regeneration remains unknown. Here we investigated Tppp3 in retinal ganglion cells (RGCs) neuroprotection and axonal regeneration using an optic nerve crush (ONC) model in the rodent.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Enhancing working memory performance in cognitively and physically healthy individuals is a popular area of research. The results from a large number of studies have now been summarized in multiple meta-analyses. In these reviews, various training methods have been examined, including mindfulness training, adaptive working memory training, physical activity training, and video game training, to examine whether working memory capacity can be improved.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPurpose: Falls are the commonest cause of accidental death in older people and the most frequent reason for their presentation to hospital. The Screening Tool of Older Persons Prescriptions in older adults with high falls risk (STOPPFall) facilitates deprescribing by providing a clear consensus on which medications are considered fall-risk-increasing drugs (FRIDs). This study aimed to determine the prevalence of STOPPFall FRIDs in inpatients referred to a falls and syncope service (FASS).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Amidst a national surge in overdose deaths among racial and ethnic minoritized people and people who use stimulants (cocaine or methamphetamines), our objective was to understand how these groups are adapting to a rapidly changing illicit drug supply.
Methods: We conducted semi-structured interviews with 64 people who use drugs and who self-identified as Black, Hispanic, Multiracial, or other Non-White race in three states (Michigan, New Jersey, and Wisconsin). Transcribed interviews were coded thematically.
Adm Policy Ment Health
November 2024
Peer roles have increased within mental health and alcohol and other drug services. However, there is a lack of understanding about the 'lived experience' necessary for success in these roles and how to recruit effectively. This study explores participants' views on the essential knowledge and skills derived from lived experience to inform the design of peer roles and support effective recruitment.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: There is a rising effort for hospital emergency departments (EDs) to offer and expand substance use disorder (SUD) services. This state-wide evaluation studies SUD services offered along the continuum of implementation across Kentucky's EDs to inform future state efforts to build ED bridge programs.
Methods: We conducted a mixed-methods study using an online survey of all Kentucky Emergency Department Directors between January and May of 2023.
The ED is increasingly the first point of contact for people who have no alternative when they are in a mental health crisis. However, there is mounting evidence of inadequate and negative responses to mental health crises in the ED, which has been identified as a 'human rights flashpoint'. This paper presents the desired crisis support from people who have accessed the ED in a mental health crisis and offers significant opportunities to use lived experience knowledge to reshape crisis care.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Most patients in specialty drug treatment programs that are not federally licensed Opioid Treatment Programs (OTPs) programs do not receive medications for opioid use disorder (MOUD).
Methods: We linked results from a survey of non-OTP treatment program directors in New Jersey (n = 81) to statewide administrative records of admissions for opioid use to those programs between July 2021-June 2022. Using multi-level regression, we examined the association of three types of factors with planned MOUD use: program survey responses, client-level factors, and program-level client characteristic mix.
This phenomenological study deeply explores the individual and collective lived experience of a mental health crisis. A Lifeworld approach provided the entry point to deeper insights into the as the embodied emotional, physical, cognitive, and spiritual nature of crisis. Findings uncovered rich descriptions of mental health crises and how the crisis was encountered in a shattered sense of self and relational challenges in the context of receiving crisis care.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFA postmenopausal woman presented with recurrent takotsubo syndrome on 3 different occasions. The first and second episodes presented as broken heart syndrome and the third as happy heart syndrome. After literature review, the authors believe this is the first recorded case of a patient having broken and happy heart syndrome on separate occasions.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFProc Natl Acad Sci U S A
October 2024
The production of Adeno-associated virus (AAV) vectors in the lab setting has typically involved expression in adherent cells followed by purification through ultracentrifugation in density gradients. This production method is, however, not easily scalable, presents high levels of cellular impurities that co-purify with the virus, and results in a mixture of empty and full capsids. Here we describe a detailed AAV production protocol that overcomes these limitations through AAV expression in suspension cells followed by AAV affinity purification and AAV polishing to separate empty and full capsids, resulting in high yields of ultra-pure AAV that is highly enriched in full capsids.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFHigh-quality imaging of the retina is crucial to the diagnosis and monitoring of disease, as well as for evaluating the success of therapeutics in human patients and in preclinical animal models. Here, we describe the basic principles and methods for in vivo retinal imaging in rodents, including fundus imaging, fluorescein angiography, optical coherence tomography, fundus autofluorescence, and infrared imaging. After providing a concise overview of each method and detailing the retinal diseases and conditions that can be visualized through them, we will proceed to discuss the advantages and disadvantages of each approach.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFImportance: Rates of overdose deaths involving synthetic opioids remain high, increasingly involve stimulants combined with opioids, and are increasing rapidly in racially and ethnically minoritized communities, yet little is known about access to harm reduction and treatment services in these groups.
Objective: To characterize access and barriers to harm reduction and treatment in a racially and ethnically diverse population of people who use drugs.
Design, Setting, And Participants: A cross-sectional telephone survey of people recruited from 39 treatment, harm reduction, and social service organizations in Milwaukee County, Wisconsin; Flint and Detroit, Michigan; and statewide in New Jersey was conducted from January 30 to July 28, 2023.
Purpose: This study investigates a real-world multicenter cohort of patients with urinary tract cancer (UTC), with primary disease sites including the bladder, urethra, and upper tract, who enrolled for research molecular testing of their germline and tumor. The purpose of this study was to evaluate factors that could affect the likelihood of identifying a clinically actionable germline pathogenic variant (PV).
Methods: Patients with UTC were identified from 10 cancer institutes of the Oncology Research Information Exchange Network consortium.
Objectives: This study examined the factorial invariance of the factor structure of the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children, Fifth Edition (WISC-V) across the UK, US and Australia & New Zealand (A&NZ). The factorial equivalence of cognitive assessments should be demonstrated before assuming cross-culture generalizability and interpretations of score comparisons.
Methods: Data were obtained from the UK, US and A&NZ normative standardizations of the WISC-V.
Background: Medical interventions have a place in crisis support; however, narrow biomedical and risk-driven responses negatively impact people seeking crisis care. With increasing shifts towards involving people with lived experience (service users) in designing services, foregrounding people's desired responses is critical. Accordingly, the aim of the study was to explore the wished-for crisis responses from the perspective of people who have experienced crisis and accessed crisis care.
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