Evaluating the Impact of a Clinical Pharmacist in Patients Receiving New Chemotherapy for Breast Cancer: Analysis of a Pilot Study.

Purpose: Breast cancer treatment may include chemotherapy, which is associated with significant toxicities. At the Sidney Kimmel Cancer Center at Jefferson Health, a pilot program was developed to add an oncology clinical pharmacist to the breast cancer clinic. The purpose of this study is to identify the impact of the clinical pharmacist in supportive care management, add to existing literature discussing the impact of the clinical pharmacist in ambulatory oncology settings, and justify future, permanent ambulatory oncology pharmacist positions within the institution.

Taming the terminological tempest in invasion science.

Standardised terminology in science is important for clarity of interpretation and communication. In invasion science - a dynamic and rapidly evolving discipline - the proliferation of technical terminology has lacked a standardised framework for its development. The result is a convoluted and inconsistent usage of terminology, with various discrepancies in descriptions of damage and interventions.

Economic costs of invasive non-native species in urban areas: An underexplored financial drain.

Urbanization is an important driver of global change associated with a set of environmental modifications that affect the introduction and distribution of invasive non-native species (species with populations transported by humans beyond their natural biogeographic range that established and are spreading in their introduced range; hereafter, invasive species). These species are recognized as a cause of large ecological and economic losses. Nevertheless, the economic impacts of these species in urban areas are still poorly understood.

Uncovering and Addressing Implicit Bias in Oncology.

Implicit bias affects patient care every day, and not just in oncology. It impacts decision-making in already vulnerable populations such as the historically marginalized racial and ethnic groups, the LGBTQI+ population, patients with disabilities, and patients with low socioeconomic status or low health literacy. At JADPRO Live 2022 in Aurora, Colorado, panelists took a deep look at implicit bias and its impact on health inequities.

Race, Social Determinants of Health, and Cancer: How Can APs Address and Improve Patient Outcomes?

The data show that racial and ethnic minority groups throughout the United States experience higher rates of illness and death across a wide range of health conditions when compared to their White counterparts. This session at JADPRO Live Virtual 2021 explained race, social determinants of health, and the impact of health disparities on oncology patients, highlighting concrete ways advanced practitioners can reduce health disparities and improve patient outcomes.

Sheep feeding preference as a tool to control pine invasion in Patagonia: influence of foliar toughness, terpenoids and resin content.

Herbivores modulate the structure and composition of plant communities, including plant invasions. This is conditioned by plant palatability which can be reduced by its chemical or physical traits. The effects that ungulates browsing has on pine invasions are variable and the empirical evidence on the causes of this variability is scarce.

SoilTemp: A global database of near-surface temperature.

Current analyses and predictions of spatially explicit patterns and processes in ecology most often rely on climate data interpolated from standardized weather stations. This interpolated climate data represents long-term average thermal conditions at coarse spatial resolutions only. Hence, many climate-forcing factors that operate at fine spatiotemporal resolutions are overlooked.

Improvement of paracellular transport in the Caco-2 drug screening model using protein-engineered substrates.

The Caco-2 assay has achieved wide popularity among pharmaceutical companies in the past two decades as an in vitro method for estimation of in vivo oral bioavailability of pharmaceutical compounds during preclinical characterization. Despite its popularity, this assay suffers from a severe underprediction of the transport of drugs which are absorbed paracellularly, that is, which pass through the cell-cell tight junctions of the absorptive cells of the small intestine. Here, we propose that simply replacing the collagen I matrix employed in the standard Caco-2 assay with an engineered matrix, we can control cell morphology and hence regulate the cell-cell junctions that dictate paracellular transport.

An artificial niche preserves the quiescence of muscle stem cells and enhances their therapeutic efficacy.

A promising therapeutic strategy for diverse genetic disorders involves transplantation of autologous stem cells that have been genetically corrected ex vivo. A major challenge in such approaches is a loss of stem cell potency during culture. Here we describe an artificial niche for maintaining muscle stem cells (MuSCs) in vitro in a potent, quiescent state.

Protein-engineered scaffolds for in vitro 3D culture of primary adult intestinal organoids.

Though in vitro culture of primary intestinal organoids has gained significant momentum in recent years, little has been done to investigate the impact of microenvironmental cues provided by the encapsulating matrix on the growth and development of these fragile cultures. In this work, the impact of various in vitro culture parameters on primary adult murine organoid formation and growth are analyzed with a focus on matrix properties and geometric culture configuration. The air-liquid interface culture configuration was found to result in enhanced organoid formation relative to a traditional submerged configuration.

Global Invader Impact Network (GIIN): toward standardized evaluation of the ecological impacts of invasive plants.

Terrestrial invasive plants are a global problem and are becoming ubiquitous components of most ecosystems. They are implicated in altering disturbance regimes, reducing biodiversity, and changing ecosystem function, sometimes in profound and irreversible ways. However, the ecological impacts of most invasive plants have not been studied experimentally, and most research to date focuses on few types of impacts, which can vary greatly among studies.

Protein-engineered hydrogel encapsulation for 3-D culture of murine cochlea.

Hypothesis: Elastin-like protein (ELP) hydrogel helps maintain the three-dimensional (3-D) cochlear structure in culture.

Background: Whole-organ culture of the cochlea is a useful model system facilitating manipulation and analysis of live sensory cells and surrounding nonsensory cells. The precisely organized 3-D cochlear structure demands a culture method that preserves this delicate architecture; however, current methods have not been optimized to serve such a purpose.

Engineering of three-dimensional microenvironments to promote contractile behavior in primary intestinal organoids.

Multiple culture techniques now exist for the long-term maintenance of neonatal primary murine intestinal organoids in vitro; however, the achievement of contractile behavior within cultured organoids has thus far been infrequent and unpredictable. Here we combine finite element simulation of oxygen transport and quantitative comparative analysis of cellular microenvironments to elucidate the critical variables that promote reproducible intestinal organoid contraction. Experimentally, oxygen distribution was manipulated by adjusting the ambient oxygen concentration along with the use of semi-permeable membranes to enhance transport.

Exotic mammals disperse exotic fungi that promote invasion by exotic trees.

Biological invasions are often complex phenomena because many factors influence their outcome. One key aspect is how non-natives interact with the local biota. Interaction with local species may be especially important for exotic species that require an obligatory mutualist, such as Pinaceae species that need ectomycorrhizal (EM) fungi.

Evaluation of coagulation factors and platelet function from an off-line modified ultrafiltration technique for post-cardiopulmonary bypass circuit blood recovery.

Modified ultrafiltration (MUF) is a technique that hemoconcentrates residual CPB circuit blood and the patient at the same time. Hemoconcentration and MUF are Class 1-A recommendations in the anesthesia and surgical blood conservation guidelines. This study evaluated the off-line MUF process of the Hemobag (HB, Global Blood Resources, Somers, CT, USA) to quantitate coagulation factor levels, platelet (PLT) count and function in one facility and cellular growth factor concentrations of the final product that were transfused to the patient in another facility In two cardiac surgery facilities, after decannulation, the extracorporeal circuit (ECC) blood from 22 patients undergoing cardiac surgery was processed with the HB device.

Changes in mechanical fragility and free hemoglobin levels after processing salvaged cardiopulmonary bypass circuit blood with a modified ultrafiltration device.

Modified ultrafiltration (MUF) is available for the salvage of post-cardiopulmonary bypass circuit blood. This study evaluated the extent of hemolysis, the mechanical fragility index (MFI), and the amount of plasma free hemoglobin (PFHb) created after processing with the MUF device. Several RBC parameters were measured on pre- and post-MUF device processed samples of blood from 12 patients undergoing cardiac surgery.

Multifunctional materials through modular protein engineering.

The diversity of potential applications for protein-engineered materials has undergone profound recent expansion through a rapid increase in the library of domains that have been utilized in these materials. Historically, protein-engineered biomaterials have been generated from a handful of peptides that were selected and exploited for their naturally evolved functionalities. In recent years, the scope of the field has drastically expanded to include peptide domains that were designed through computational modeling, identified through high-throughput screening, or repurposed from wild type domains to perform functions distinct from their primary native applications.

Family matters: effect of host plant variation in chemical and mechanical defenses on a sequestering specialist herbivore.

Insect herbivores contend with various plant traits that are presumed to function as feeding deterrents. Paradoxically, some specialist insect herbivores might benefit from some of these plant traits, for example by sequestering plant chemical defenses that herbivores then use as their own defense against natural enemies. Larvae of the butterfly species Battus philenor (L.

Reflective electronic portfolios: a design process for integrating liberal and professional studies and experiential education.

The purpose of this article is to describe the process used to create and pilot-test a customized reflective electronic portfolio (e-portfolio) that integrates learning across three distinct components of an entry-level 6.5 year Doctor of Physical Therapy (DPT) program. During the 2004-2005 academic year, a pilot test was conducted with 10 students, representative of all 6.

Pyrrolidinedithiocarbamate induces apoptosis in human acute myelogenous leukemic cells affecting NF-kappaB activity.

Pyrrolidindithiocarbamate (PDTC), is a metal chelator widely used to study the activation of redox sensitive transcription factors. Recently it has been demonstrated that it manifests pro-oxidant properties. The nuclear factor-Kappa B (NF-kappaB) transcription factor can both promote cell survival and induce apoptosis depending on cell type and context in response to genotoxic stress.