Background: Testicular seminoma is the most common malignant tumor of the testis. It occurs at a rate of 5 per 100 000 men, primarily between the ages of 15 to 34. While seminomas typically occur in the testis, other primary sites include the mediastinum, the retroperitoneum, or other extra-gonadal sites.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPurpose: Desmoid tumors are bland fibroblastic tumors that do not metastasize but have a high rate of local recurrence. Previously published studies proposed two different transcriptomic signatures to predict relapse. Molecular heterogeneity has been well established in high-grade sarcomas, but little is known about molecular variability within locally aggressive tumors such as desmoids.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFHeterostructured scintillators offer a promising solution to balance the sensitivity and timing in TOF-PET detectors. These scintillators utilize alternating layers of materials with complementary properties to optimize performance. However, the layering compromises time resolution due to light transport issues.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFExpert Rev Vaccines
September 2024
Introduction: Rotavirus vaccines may provide indirect protection by reducing transmission in the population and thus reducing disease burden.
Methods: This systematic review summarizes estimates of indirect protection from rotavirus vaccines and the methods used to obtain these estimates.
Results: We identified 71 studies published between 2009 and 2022 that provided 399 estimates of indirect protection from rotavirus vaccine.
Background: Quantitative molecular assays are increasingly used for detection of enteric viruses.
Methods: We compared the clinical severity using the modified Vesikari score (mVS) of enteric viruses detected by conventional assays (enzyme immunoassays [EIAs] for rotavirus and adenovirus 40/41 and conventional polymerase chain reaction for astrovirus, sapovirus, and norovirus) and a quantitative molecular assay (TaqMan Array Card [TAC]) among children aged 0-59 months in the Global Enteric Multicenter Study. For rotavirus and adenovirus 40/41, we compared severity between EIA-positive and TAC-positive cases assigned etiologies using different cycle threshold (Ct) cutoffs.
Background: Norovirus-associated acute gastroenteritis (AGE) exacts a substantial disease burden, yet the health care utilization for and clinical management of norovirus-associated AGE are not well characterized.
Methods: We describe the health care encounters and therapeutics used for patients with all-cause and norovirus-associated AGE in the Kaiser Permanente Northwest health system from 1 April 2014 through 30 September 2016. Medical encounters for patients with AGE were extracted from electronic health records, and encounters within 30 days of one another were grouped into single episodes.
Radiation mapping has attracted widespread research attention and increased public concerns on environmental monitoring. Regarding materials and their configurations, radiation detectors have been developed to identify the position and strength of the radioactive sources. However, due to the complex mechanisms of radiation-matter interaction and data limitation, high-performance and low-cost radiation mapping is still challenging.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBiliary-pattern injury in the liver (eg, duct injury, ductular reaction, cholestasis) can occur in several conditions, including primary biliary cholangitis (PBC), primary sclerosing cholangitis (PSC), large duct obstruction (LDO), and drug-induced liver injury (DILI). While the histologic changes in these conditions have been individually well described, distinguishing among them remains often challenging, particularly when biopsy samples are limited in size, robust clinical information is unavailable, and/or the pathologist does not feel confident in evaluating liver disease. This study evaluated histologic features that could aid the diagnosis of biliary-pattern injury on biopsy.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF» Negative margin resection of musculoskeletal sarcomas is associated with reduced risk of local recurrence.» There is limited evidence to support an absolute margin width of soft tissue or bone that correlates with reduced risk of local recurrence.» Factors intrinsic to the tumor, including histologic subtype, grade, growth pattern and neurovascular involvement impact margin status and local recurrence, and should be considered when evaluating a patient's individual risk after positive margins.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFStandard signal processing approaches for scintillation detectors in positron emission tomography (PET) derive accurate estimates for 511 keV photon time of interaction and energy imparted to the detection media from aggregate characteristics of electronic pulse shapes. The ultimate realization of a scintillation detector for PET is one that provides a unique timestamp and position for each detected scintillation photon. Detectors with these capabilities enable advanced concepts for three-dimensional (3D) position and time of interaction estimation with methods that exploit the spatiotemporal arrival time kinetics of individual scintillation photons.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: The medical therapy of prostatic symptoms (MTOPS) trial randomized men with symptoms of benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH) and followed response of treatment with a 5α-reductase inhibitor (5ARI), an alpha-adrenergic receptor antagonist (α-blocker), the combination of 5ARI and α-blocker or no medical therapy (none). Medical therapy reduced risk of clinical progression by 66% but the reasons for nonresponse or loss of therapeutic response in some patients remains unresolved. Our previous work showed that prostatic glucocorticoid levels are increased in 5ARI-treated patients and that glucocorticoids can increased branching of prostate epithelia in vitro.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: While prior studies have suggested a role for norovirus gastroenteritis in contributing to severe morbidity and mortality, the importance of norovirus as a causal pathogen for hospitalization and mortality remains poorly understood. We estimated the effect of laboratory-confirmed norovirus infection on hospitalization and mortality among a national cohort of veterans who sought care within the Veterans Affairs health care system.
Methods: We analyzed electronic health record data from a cohort study of adults who were tested for norovirus within the Veterans Affairs system between 1 January 2010 and 31 December 2018.
Background: Even moderate differences in rotavirus vaccine effectiveness against nonvaccine genotypes may exert selective pressures on circulating rotaviruses. Whether this vaccine effect or natural temporal fluctuations underlie observed changes in genotype distributions is unclear.
Methods: We systematically reviewed studies reporting rotavirus genotypes from children <5 years of age globally between 2005 and 2023.
In areas of moderate to intense Plasmodium falciparum transmission, malaria in pregnancy remains a significant cause of low birth weight, stillbirth, and severe anaemia. Previously, fetal sex has been identified to modify the risks of maternal asthma, pre-eclampsia, and gestational diabetes. One study demonstrated increased risk of placental malaria in women carrying a female fetus.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Assessment and feedback is a common implementation strategy to improve healthcare provider fidelity to clinical guidelines. For immunization guidelines, fidelity is often measured with doses administered during eligible visits. Adding a patient refusal measure captures provider fidelity more completely (i.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground And Objectives: Bone tumours are relatively rare and, as a consequence, treatment in a centre with expertise is required. Current treatment guidelines also recommend review by a specialised pathologist. Here we report on international consensus-based datasets for the pathology reporting of biopsy and resection specimens of bone sarcomas.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPrognostic factors for pleomorphic dermal sarcoma, a rare undifferentiated neoplasm of the skin, are poorly defined, and typical staging systems do not appear to be appropriate for these neoplasms. We; therefore, sought to identify prognostic factors for disease-specific survival and predictors of metastasis.Pleomorphic dermal sarcomas were identified in the Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results database (N=1911).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFWe have evaluated CTR performance of four different mixed-signal front-end electronic readout configurations with the goal to achieve 100 picoseconds (ps) coincidence time resolution (CTR). The proposed TOF-PET detector elements are based on two 3 × 3 × 10 mm "fast LGSO" crystal segments, side-coupled to linear arrays of 3 × 3 mm silicon photomultipliers (SiPMs), to form a total crystal length of 20 mm. We studied multiple configurations and components for the front-end readout: 1) high speed radio frequency (RF) amplifiers; 2) an ASIC-based discriminator; 3) combination of RF amplifier, balun transformer, and discriminator ASIC; and 4) combination of balun transformer, and discriminator ASIC.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Radiation after resection of an atypical lipomatous tumor (ALT) is controversial. This study evaluates local control and complications after the first resection of ALTs of the extremity with or without adjuvant radiation.
Methods: A dual institution, retrospective review of patients treated from 1995 to 2020 with first-time resection of an ALT in the extremity was performed.
State-of-the-art (SoA) electronic readout for silicon photomultiplier (SiPM)-based scintillation detectors that demonstrate experimental limits in achievable coincidence time resolution (CTR) leverage low noise, high frequency signal processing to facilitate a single photon time response that is near the limit of the SiPMs architecture. This readout strategy can optimally exploit fast luminescence and prompt photon populations, and promising measurements show detector concepts employing this readout can greatly advance PET detector CTR, relative to SoA in clinical systems. However, the technique employs power hungry components which make the electronics chain impractical for channel-dense time-of-flight (TOF)-PET detectors.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFGlobal catastrophes such as a supervolcanic eruption, asteroid impact, or nuclear winter could cause global agricultural collapse due to reduced sunlight reaching the Earth's surface. The human civilization's food production system is unprepared to respond to such events, but methane single cell protein (SCP) could be a key part of the solution. Current preparedness centers around food stockpiling, an excessively expensive solution given that an abrupt sunlight reduction scenario (ASRS) could hamper conventional agriculture for 5-10 years.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: In the United States, ∼179 million acute gastroenteritis (AGE) episodes occur annually. We aimed to identify risk factors for all-cause AGE, norovirus-associated vs non-norovirus AGE, and severe vs mild/moderate AGE among hospitalized adults.
Methods: We enrolled 1029 AGE cases and 624 non-AGE controls from December 1, 2016, to November 30, 2019, at 5 Veterans Affairs Medical Centers.
Background: The development of benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH) and medication-refractory lower urinary tract symptoms (LUTS) remain poorly understood. This study attempted to characterize the pathways associated with failure of medical therapy for BPH/LUTS.
Methods: Transitional zone tissue levels of cholesterol and steroids were measured in patients who failed medical therapy for BPH/LUTS and controls.
On April 21, 2022, CDC issued a health advisory encouraging U.S. clinicians to report all patients aged <10 years with hepatitis of unknown etiology to public health authorities, after identification of similar cases in both the United States (1) and Europe.
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