Cardiac Effects of Modern Breast Radiation Therapy in Patients Receiving Systemic Cancer Therapy.

Background: Radiation therapy (RT) improves breast cancer outcomes, but cardiac morbidity remains a concern.

Objectives: This study sought to evaluate changes in cardiac function after RT and the relationship between cardiac dose metrics and echocardiography-derived measures of function.

Methods: In a longitudinal cohort study of women with breast cancer, radiation cardiac dose metrics and core lab quantitated echocardiographic measures of cardiac function were evaluated.

Algorithm-Based Palliative Care in Patients With Cancer: A Cluster Randomized Clinical Trial.

Importance: Among patients with advanced solid malignant tumors, early specialty palliative care (PC) is guideline recommended, but strategies to increase PC access and effectiveness in community oncology are lacking.

Objective: To test whether algorithm-based defaults with opting out and accountable justification embedded in the electronic health record (EHR) increase completed PC visits.

Design, Setting, And Participants: This 2-arm cluster randomized clinical trial was conducted from November 1, 2022, to December 31, 2023.

Assessing Algorithm Fairness Requires Adjustment for Risk Distribution Differences: Re-Considering the Equal Opportunity Criterion.

The proliferation of algorithm-assisted decision making has prompted calls for careful assessment of algorithm fairness. One popular fairness metric, equal opportunity, demands parity in true positive rates (TPRs) across different population subgroups. However, we highlight a critical but overlooked weakness in this measure: at a given decision threshold, TPRs vary when the underlying risk distribution varies across subgroups, even if the model equally captures the underlying risks.

Senescence-specific molecular subtypes stratify the hallmarks of the tumor microenvironment and guide precision medicine in bladder cancer.

Background: Bladder cancer (BLCA) is notably associated with advanced age, characterized by its high incidence and mortality among the elderly. Despite promising advancements in models that amalgamate molecular subtypes with treatment and prognostic outcomes, the considerable heterogeneity in BLCA poses challenges to their universal applicability. Consequently, there is an urgent need to develop a new molecular subtyping system focusing on a critical clinical feature of BLCA: senescence.

A new indirect method for the quantification of total organic iodine (TOI) in environmental waters by inductively coupled plasma with mass spectrometry and liquid chromatography with tandem mass spectrometry.

The formation of emerging iodinated disinfection by-products (I-DBPs) is associated with iodine sources including organic compounds. Total organic iodine (TOI) was used as a bulk index of organic iodinated compounds because of the difficulty in identifying and quantifying individual organic iodinated compounds in environmental waters. Conventional methods for the direct quantification of TOI require complicated pretreatments, which has promoted many studies to attempt to simplify the quantification of TOI by an indirect measurement.

TBX3 shapes an immunosuppressive microenvironment and induces immunotherapy resistance.

Identifying biomarkers that predict immunotherapy efficacy and discovering new targets for combination therapies are critical elements for improving the prognosis of bladder cancer (BLCA) patients. Firstly, we explored the expression patterns of TBX3 in normal and pan-cancer tissues and the correlation between TBX3 and the immune microenvironment using data from multiple public databases. Then, we combined various techniques, including bulk RNA sequencing, single-cell RNA sequencing, high-throughput cytokine arrays, functional experiments, ProcartaPlex multiplex immunoassays and TissueFAXS panoramic tissue quantification assays, to demonstrate that TBX3 shapes an immunosuppressive tumor microenvironment (TME) in BLCA.

Blue light promotes conjunctival epithelial-mesenchymal transition and collagen deposition through ITGB4.

The increasing prevalence of LED technology heightened blue light (BL) exposure, raising concerns about its long-term effects on ocular health. This study investigated the transcriptomic response of conjunctiva to BL exposure, highlighting potential biomarkers for conjunctival injury. We exposed human conjunctival epithelial cells and C57BL/6 mice to BL to establish in vitro and in vivo models and identified the responsive genes in mice's conjunctiva to BL exposure by RNA sequencing transcriptome analysis.

Polygenic risk scores for cardiometabolic traits demonstrate importance of ancestry for predictive precision medicine.

Polygenic risk scores (PRS) have predominantly been derived from genome-wide association studies (GWAS) conducted in European ancestry (EUR) individuals. In this study, we present an in-depth evaluation of PRS based on multi-ancestry GWAS for five cardiometabolic phenotypes in the Penn Medicine BioBank (PMBB) followed by a phenome-wide association study (PheWAS). We examine the PRS performance across all individuals and separately in African ancestry (AFR) and EUR ancestry groups.

Monitoring long-term cardiac activity with contactless radio frequency signals.

Cardiovascular diseases claim over 10 million lives annually, highlighting the critical need for long-term monitoring and early detection of cardiac abnormalities. Existing techniques like electrocardiograms (ECG) and Holter are accurate but suffer from discomfort caused by body-attached electrodes. While wearable devices using photoplethysmography offer more convenience, they sacrifice accuracy and are susceptible to environmental interference.

A qualitative study of perceptions of the care pathway for familial hypercholesterolemia: screening, diagnosis, treatment, and family cascade screening.

Background: Familial hypercholesterolemia (FH) is an autosomal dominant genetic condition that carries increased risk for premature atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease, cardiovascular events, and death. Due to low uptake of evidence-based practices, up to 80% of FH patients remain undiagnosed and most are undertreated. This project aimed to understand patient and clinician perceptions across the care pathway of evidence-based diagnosis and treatment of FH, to inform implementation strategy design for two clinical trials seeking to increase evidence-based care.

Evasion of immunosurveillance by the upregulation of Siglec15 in bladder cancer.

Immunotherapy resistance in bladder cancer (BLCA) is associated with elevated levels of sialic acid-binding immunoglobulin-like lectin (Siglec15). This protein plays a crucial role in fostering a noninflammatory tumor microenvironment (TME), which is conducive to cancer progression. Our study confirmed that the overexpression of Siglec15 led to a reduction in CD8 T cell infiltration.

Nationwide Prevalence and Geographic Variation of Idiopathic Intracranial Hypertension among Women in the United States.

Purpose: To determine the nationwide prevalence and geographic distribution of idiopathic intracranial hypertension (IIH) among women in the United States.

Design: Retrospective cross-sectional study using Medicaid claims and electronic health record data from the IRIS® Registry (Intelligent Research in Sight) and Sight Outcomes Research Collaborative (SOURCE).

Participants: Female Medicaid beneficiaries 18 to 55 years of age with IIH diagnoses and prescriptions for acetazolamide or methazolamide in 2018 were identified, excluding those with other causes of intracranial hypertension.

Hsa_circ_0000520 suppresses vasculogenic mimicry formation and metastasis in bladder cancer through Lin28a/PTEN/PI3K signaling.

Background: Vasculogenic mimicry (VM) is a potential cause of resistance to antiangiogenic therapy and is closely related to the malignant progression of tumors. It has been shown that noncoding RNAs play an important role in the formation of VM in malignant tumors. However, the role of circRNAs in VM of bladder cancer and the regulatory mechanisms are unclear.

Osteogenic-Like Microenvironment of Renal Interstitium Induced by Osteomodulin Contributes to Randall's Plaque Formation.

Calcium oxalate (CaOx) kidney stones are common and recurrent, lacking pharmacological prevention. Randall's plaques (RPs), calcium deposits in renal papillae, serve as niduses for some CaOx stones. This study explores the role of osteogenic-like cells in RP formation resembling ossification.