Publications by authors named "DM Blankenship"

Article Synopsis
  • * Results showed that patients who started dialysis in TCUs were more likely to be on kidney transplant waiting lists, less likely to remain on in-center hemodialysis, and had better vascular access outcomes compared to those without TCU history.
  • * Overall, TCU patients experienced more positive clinical outcomes, suggesting that TCUs provide significant benefits beyond just increasing home dialysis rates.
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Background: Mycobacterium tuberculosis infection is a leading cause of infectious death worldwide. Gene-expression microarray studies profiling the blood transcriptional response of tuberculosis (TB) patients have been undertaken in order to better understand the host immune response as well as to identify potential biomarkers of disease. To date most of these studies have focused on pulmonary TB patients with gene-expression profiles of extra-pulmonary TB patients yet to be compared to those of patients with pulmonary TB or sarcoidosis.

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Background: Gene set analysis (GSA) of gene expression data can be highly powerful when the biological signal is weak compared to other sources of variability in the data. However, many gene set analysis approaches utilize permutation tests which are not appropriate for complex study designs. For example, the correlation of subjects is broken when comparing time points within a longitudinal study.

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Psychotic disorder diagnoses are common in the United States and internationally. However, racial disparities in rates of psychotic disorder diagnoses have been reported across time and mental health professions. This literature review provides an updated and comprehensive summary of empirical research on race and diagnosis of psychotic disorders spanning a 24-year period.

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Aim: To determine the rate of use and non-use of prophylactic percutaneous endoscopic gastrostomy (PEG) tubes among patients with head and neck cancer (HNC) patients.

Methods: All patients with HNC undergoing PEG between January 1, 2004 and June 30, 2006 were identified. Patients (or their next-of-kin) were surveyed by phone and all available medical records and cancer registry data were reviewed.

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Background: Melioidosis is a severe infectious disease caused by Burkholderia pseudomallei, a Gram-negative bacillus classified by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) as a category B priority agent. Septicemia is the most common presentation of the disease with a 40% mortality rate even with appropriate treatments. Better diagnostic tests are therefore needed to improve therapeutic efficacy and survival rates.

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Pruritus is a frequent and troublesome consequence of end-stage renal disease. We have surveyed 155 chronic dialysis patients and found pruritus to be a significant problem in approximately 70%. Seventeen patients reporting severe pruritus were treated thrice weekly with total body exposure to either UVA or UVB light.

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