J Alzheimers Dis
October 2024
Alzheimer's disease is a devastating neurodegenerative condition that exerts a significant global burden. Despite recent efforts, disease modifying therapies remain extremely limited, with a tremendous proportion of patients having to rely on symptomatic treatment only. Epidemiological and pathological overlaps exist between Alzheimer's disease and diabetes mellitus type 2, with people with diabetes mellitus type 2 at a significantly increased risk of developing Alzheimer's disease in the future.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFNeuronal differentiation requires building a complex intracellular architecture, and therefore the coordinated regulation of defined sets of genes. RNA-binding proteins (RBPs) play a key role in this regulation. However, while their action on individual mRNAs has been explored in depth, the mechanisms used to coordinate gene expression programs shaping neuronal morphology are poorly understood.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: To quantify the degree to which health care service area (HCSA) definitions captured hospitalizations and heterogeneity in social determinants of health (SDOH).
Data Sources And Study Setting: Geospatial data from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, the Census Bureau, and the Dartmouth Institute. Drive-time isochrones from MapBox.
As of 25 January 2022, over 349 million individuals have received a confirmed diagnosis of covid-19, with over 5.59 million confirmed deaths associated with the SARS-CoV-2 virus. The covid-19 pandemic has prompted an extensive global effort to study the molecular evolution of the virus and develop vaccines to prevent its spread.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe emergence of COVID-19 was rapidly followed by infection and the deaths of millions of people across the globe. With much of the research and scientific advancement rightly focused on reducing the burden of severe and critical acute COVID-19 infection, the long-term effects endured by those who survived the acute infection has been previously overlooked. Now, an appreciation for the post-COVID-19 condition, including its neurological manifestations, is growing, although there remain many unknowns regarding the etiology and risk factors of the condition, as well as how to effectively diagnose and treat it.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Optic neuropathy is a near ubiquitous feature of Friedreich's ataxia (FRDA). Previous studies have examined varying aspects of the anterior and posterior visual pathways but none so far have comprehensively evaluated the heterogeneity of degeneration across different areas of the retina, changes to the macula layers and combined these with volumetric MRI studies of the visual cortex and frataxin level.
Methods: We investigated 62 genetically confirmed FRDA patients using an integrated approach as part of an observational cohort study.
Since its emergence in Wuhan, China, covid-19 has spread and had a profound effect on the lives and health of people around the globe. As of 4 July 2021, more than 183 million confirmed cases of covid-19 had been recorded worldwide, and 3.97 million deaths.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThis cross-sectional study examines the uptake of several newly allowable Medicare Advantage benefits in 2021 as well as geographic differences in benefit offerings between rural and urban areas, plan penetration, and social vulnerability.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe Affordable Care Act played a major role in transitioning American health care away from fee-for-service payment. We explore the spread of payment reforms since the implementation of the ACA, both nationally and in North Carolina; the corresponding effects on health care costs and quality; and further steps needed to achieve greater transformation.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFA classical experiment of auditory stream segregation is revisited, reconceptualising perceptual ambiguity in terms of affordances and musical engagement. Specifically, three experiments are reported that investigate how listeners' perception of auditory sequences change dynamically depending on emotional context. The experiments show that listeners adapt their attention to higher or lower pitched streams (Experiments 1 and 2) and the degree of auditory stream integration or segregation (Experiment 3) in accordance with the presented emotional context.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe pipeline of new cardiovascular drugs is relatively limited compared with many other clinical areas. Challenges causing lagging drug innovation include the duration and expense of cardiovascular clinical trials needed for regulatory evaluation and approvals, which generally must demonstrate noninferiority to existing standards of care and measure longer-term outcomes. By comparison, there has been substantial progress in cardiovascular device innovation.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFTwo studies explored hearing-aid user and audiologist experiences of hearing-aid use and fitting for music in the UK. One-hundred-seventy-six hearing-aid users (age range: 21-93 years; mean: 60.56 years) answered a 4-item questionnaire on music listening difficulties and discussions about music in clinic.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFHeart failure (HF) is a leading cause of hospitalizations and readmissions in the United States. Particularly among the elderly, its prevalence and costs continue to rise, making it a significant population health issue. Despite tremendous progress in improving HF care and examples of innovation in care redesign, the quality of HF care varies greatly across the country.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFNorth Carolina has received national attention for its approach to health care payment and delivery reform. Importantly, payment reform alone is not enough to drive systematic changes in care delivery. We highlight the importance of progress in four complementary areas to achieve system-wide payment and care reform.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFTraining software to facilitate participation in conversations where overlapping talk is common was to be developed with the involvement of Cochlear implant (CI) users. Examples of common types of overlap were extracted from a recorded corpus of 3.5 hours of British English conversation.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFCare for people living with serious illness is suboptimal for many reasons, including underpayment for key services (such as care coordination and social supports) in fee-for-service reimbursement. Accountable care organizations (ACOs) have potential to improve serious illness care because of their widespread dissemination, strong financial incentives for care coordination in downside-risk models, and flexibility in shared savings spending. Through a national survey we found that 94 percent of ACOs at least partially identify their seriously ill beneficiaries, yet only 8-21 percent have widely implemented serious illness initiatives such as advance care planning or home-based palliative care.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFEffects of anthropogenic nitrogen (N) deposition and the ability of terrestrial ecosystems to store carbon (C) depend in part on the amount of N retained in the system and its partitioning among plant and soil pools. We conducted a meta-analysis of studies at 48 sites across four continents that used enriched 15N isotope tracers in order to synthesize information about total ecosystem N retention (i.e.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFFor more than 150 years, the only urinary space that has been recognized in the glomerulus conducting primary filtrate to the proximal convoluted tubule has been Bowman's space (BS) (1). Here it is shown that ultrastructural reconstructions of the podocyte and the glomerulus reveal BS to be formed from three distinct urinary spaces through which filtrate must pass before reaching the proximal convoluted tubule. The most restricted region, the subpodocyte space (SPS; first described by Gautier in 1950), was found to cover 58 to 65% of the glomerular filtration barrier.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: There is anecdotal evidence that ACEM Fellows are reducing or planning to reduce their clinical workload. We investigated the extent of, and reasons for, these reductions.
Methods: An anonymous, cross-sectional postal survey utilizing a study-specific questionnaire.
Objective: To evaluate the psychological health of ACEM Fellows and the important factors that impact on this health.
Methods: A cross-sectional, mail survey utilizing validated psychological instruments.
Results: Three hundred and twenty-three (63.
The use of heat in wound healing has been demonstrated to aid oxygen flow and hence healing in acute wounds. However, the situation in chronic wounds is less clear. This study was designed to investigate the benefits of using a radiant heat therapy system in the treatment of Stage 3 and 4 pressure ulcers.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFFew studies have investigated the use of dressings on patients with diabetic foot ulceration. This paper reports the results of a non-comparative, two-centre study investigating the performance characteristics of SeaSorb dressing in patients with this condition. This was an exploratory study to determine the potential use of this dressing, and not a large randomised control trial.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIn introducing a new mattress into practice it is important to evaluate its performance from both the patient's and nurse's perspective. A total of 20 patients admitted to the integrated medical unit were recruited and nursed on a new pressure-relieving mattress offering two modes of pressure relief (Duo). All patients had been recently admitted to hospital and were considered to be 'at very high risk' of developing a pressure ulcer, with an initial Waterlow score > 20.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF