Publications by authors named "Carroll F"

Purpose: Critically ill patients in the intensive care unit (ICU) are frequently prescribed antibiotics, with many reporting an antibiotic allergy label, predominantly to penicillin. Mislabeling contributes to suboptimal antibiotic use, increasing multidrug-resistant organisms and Clostridium difficile infections, and increased hospital length of stay. This prospective study implemented an antibiotic allergy assessment and testing program in the ICU, independently of clinical immunology/allergy services.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Preterm birth is a major cause of infant mortality and morbidity and accounts for 7-8% of births in the UK. It is more common in women from socially deprived areas and from minority ethnic groups, but the reasons for this disparity are poorly understood. To inform interventions to improve child survival and their quality of life, this study examined the socioeconomic and ethnic inequalities in preterm births (< 37 weeks of gestation at birth) within Health Trusts in England.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Despite the inclusion of both individual interventions and population-based measures in the Aotearoa New Zealand (Aotearoa NZ) Tobacco Control Programme, the gap between Māori, Pacific peoples and European/Asian/Other (EAO) populations in tobacco use has not decreased significantly. Tobacco control interventions that focus on individual behaviour change have produced little impact towards reducing tobacco smoking inequities for Māori and Pacific peoples in Aotearoa NZ. Using data from the New Zealand Health Survey (NZHS), this research investigates the impact of the wider determinants of health and individual-level factors on inequities in tobacco use between Māori, Pacific peoples and EAO.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • Cognitive impairments in patients with alcohol use disorder (AUD) lead to low treatment initiation and adherence, making brain acetylcholine receptors (AChRs) potential targets for remediation.
  • A study evaluated the cognitive-enhancing effects of two AChR agonists, xanomeline and varenicline, in monkeys with a history of heavy drinking, using a task to measure cognitive flexibility disrupted by the antagonist scopolamine.
  • Results showed that both xanomeline and varenicline effectively improved cognitive flexibility in subordinate monkeys (heavier drinkers) but not in dominant monkeys, indicating their potential for aiding cognitive function in those with AUD.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Ethnic and socioeconomic inequalities in obstetric outcomes are well established. However, the role of induction of labour (IOL) to reduce these inequalities is controversial, in part due to insufficient evidence. This national cohort study aimed to identify adverse perinatal outcomes associated with IOL with birth at 39 weeks of gestation ("IOL group") compared to expectant management ("expectant management group") according to maternal characteristics in women with low-risk pregnancies.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Introduction: Urodynamic studies are fundamental in the care of children with neurogenic bladder. Children with neurogenic bladder who perform clean intermittent catheterization (CIC) are considered a high-risk group for infection after urodynamic studies. Current guidelines are not uniform regarding the duration, type, the need of prophylactic antibiotic treatment or performance of urine culture before urodynamic studies.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Hybrid effectiveness-implementation studies allow researchers to combine study of a clinical intervention's effectiveness with study of its implementation with the aim of accelerating the translation of evidence into practice. However, there currently exists limited guidance on how to design and manage such hybrid studies. This is particularly true for studies that include a comparison/control arm that, by design, receives less implementation support than the intervention arm.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

The κ-opioid receptor (KOR) has emerged as an attractive drug target for pain management without addiction, and biased signaling through particular pathways of KOR may be key to maintaining this benefit while minimizing side-effect liabilities. As for most G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs), however, the molecular mechanisms of ligand-specific signaling at KOR have remained unclear. To better understand the molecular determinants of KOR signaling bias, we apply structure determination, atomic-level molecular dynamics (MD) simulations, and functional assays.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Drug self-administration and intracranial self-stimulation (ICSS) are two preclinical behavioral procedures used to predict abuse potential of drugs, and abuse-related drug effects in both procedures are thought to depend on increased mesolimbic dopamine (DA) signaling. Drug self-administration and ICSS yield concordant metrics of abuse potential across a diverse range of drug mechanisms of action. The "rate of onset," defined as the velocity with which a drug produces its effect once administered, has also been implicated as a determinant of abuse-related drug effects in self-administration procedures, but this variable has not been systematically examined in ICSS.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Under oxidative stress and iron starvation conditions, Escherichia coli uses the Suf pathway to assemble iron-sulfur clusters. The Suf pathway mobilizes sulfur via SufS, a type II cysteine desulfurase. SufS is a pyridoxal-5'-phosphate-dependent enzyme that uses cysteine to generate alanine and an active-site persulfide (C-S-S).

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Because of their implications in several pathological conditions, α4β2* nicotinic acetylcholine receptors (nAChRs) are potential targets for the treatment of nicotine dependence, pain, and many psychiatric and neurodegenerative diseases. However, they exist in various subtypes, and finding selective tools to investigate them has proved challenging. The nicotinic receptor agonist, 5-iodo-A-85380 (5IA), has helped in delineating the function of β2-containing subtypes in vitro; however, much is still unknown about its behavioral effects.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Layered manufacturing, the underlying technology of 3-D printing, has made rapid strides over the last 30 years. We discuss layered manufacturing from the artist's perspective, especially for intricate ceramic pottery. We contend that opportunities exist for applying visualization to the foremost problems plaguing layered manufacturing.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Exposure to stress triggers biological changes throughout the body. Accumulating evidence indicates that alterations in immune system function are associated with the development of stress-associated illnesses such as major depressive disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder, increasing interest in identifying immune markers that provide insight into mental health. Recombination events during T-cell receptor rearrangement and T-cell maturation in the thymus produce circular DNA fragments called T-cell receptor excision circles (TRECs) that can be utilized as indicators of thymic function and numbers of newly emigrating T-cells.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Handcrafting ceramic pottery in the traditional method or virtual reality (VR) with intricate surface details is still challenging for the ceramic and graphic artist. Free-form pottery modeling can be efficiently geometrically modeled with the right tools with detailed 3D print outputs, yet challenging to be manufactured using traditional art. The new advanced pottery VR simulation is a promising method to recreate the traditional pottery simulation for a better experience with some barriers.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Objectives: To assess the association between hospital-level rates of induction of labour and emergency caesarean section, as measures of "practice style", and rates of adverse perinatal outcomes.

Design: National study using electronic maternity records.

Setting: English National Health Service.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Low-nanomolar binding constants were recorded for a series of six 2'-fluoro-(carbamoylpyridinyl)deschloroepibatidine analogues with acetylcholine-binding protein (AChBP). The crystal structures of three complexes with AChBP reveal details of molecular recognition in the orthosteric binding site and imply how the other three ligands bind. Comparisons exploiting AChBP as a surrogate for α4β2 and α7 nicotinic acetylcholine receptors (nAChRs) suggest that the key interactions are conserved.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Phishing attacks are on the increase. The fact that our ways of living, studying and working have drastically changed as a result of the COVID pandemic (i.e.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Human senses have evolved to recognise sensory cues. Beyond our perception, they play an integral role in our emotional processing, learning, and interpretation. They are what help us to sculpt our everyday experiences and can be triggered by aesthetics to form the foundations of our interactions with each other and our surroundings.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted maternity services worldwide and imposed restrictions on societal behaviours. This national study aimed to compare obstetric intervention and pregnancy outcome rates in England during the pandemic and corresponding pre-pandemic calendar periods, and to assess whether differences in these rates varied according to ethnic and socioeconomic background.

Methods And Findings: We conducted a national study of singleton births in English National Health Service hospitals.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Brain kappa-opioid receptors (KORs) are implicated in the pathophysiology of depressive and anxiety disorders, stimulating interest in the therapeutic potential of KOR antagonists. Research on KOR function has tended to focus on KOR-expressing neurons and pathways such as the mesocorticolimbic dopamine system. However, KORs are also expressed on non-neuronal cells including microglia, the resident immune cells in the brain.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Introduction: Visceral artery injuries are rare but lethal entities that pose significant management challenges in a patient who presents with blunt trauma. There is a paucity of specific guidelines both in the trauma and vascular literature regarding the management of blunt intra-abdominal vascular injuries. The midterm outcomes of two cases of blunt traumatic visceral artery injuries managed successfully with endovascular interventions are presented.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Study Design: A retrospective cohort study.

Objectives: To document the prevalence of asymptomatic bacteriuria and to characterize the resistance patterns to antibiotics among children with neurogenic bladder who require clean intermittent catheterization, with an emphasis on multidrug resistance.

Setting: A national referral pediatric and adolescent rehabilitation facility in Jerusalem, Israel.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Inconsistent results have been reported for the effects of the mitogen-activating extracellular kinase (MEK) inhibitor α-[amino(4-aminophenyl)thio]methylene-2-(trifluoromethyl)benzeneacetonitrile (SL 327) on ethanol-induced conditioned place preference (EtOH-CPP). Since such inconsistencies may be due to the configurational composition of administered SL 327, the interconvertibility of the geometric isomers of this class of compounds has been investigated. This study provides conditions for determination of configurational composition of this class of compounds by HPLC and by H NMR and reports details of configurational equilibria as a function of medium and time in solution along with solubility data for SL 327 in aqueous DMSO.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Some studies have suggested that women with SARS-CoV-2 infection during pregnancy are at increased risk of adverse pregnancy and neonatal outcomes, but these associations are still not clear.

Objective: This study aimed to determine the association between SARS-CoV-2 infection at the time of birth and maternal and perinatal outcomes.

Study Design: This is a population-based cohort study in England.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF