Mixed methods study protocol for combining stakeholder-led rapid evaluation with near real-time continuous registry data to facilitate evaluations of quality of care in intensive care units.

Background: Improved access to healthcare in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) has not equated to improved health outcomes. Absence or unsustained quality of care is partly to blame. Improving outcomes in intensive care units (ICUs) requires delivery of complex interventions by multiple specialties working in concert, and the simultaneous prevention of avoidable harms associated with the illness and the treatment interventions.

Adherence in rheumatoid arthritis patients assessed with a validated Italian version of the 5-item Compliance Questionnaire for Rheumatology.

Objectives: The 5-item Compliance Questionnaire for Rheumatology (CQR5) proved reliability and validity in respect of identification of patients likely to be high adherers (HAs) to anti-rheumatic treatment, or low adherers (LAs), i.e. taking<80% of their medications correctly.

Calculating census tract-based life expectancy in New York state: a generalizable approach.

Background: Life expectancy at birth (LE) has been calculated for states and counties. LE estimates at these levels mask health disparities in local communities. There are no nationwide estimates at the sub-county level.

Longitudinal Trends in Tobacco Availability, Tobacco Advertising, and Ownership Changes of Food Stores, Albany, New York, 2003-2015.

Introduction: Frequency of visiting convenience and corner grocery stores that sell tobacco is positively associated with the odds of ever smoking and the risk of smoking initiation among youth. We assessed 12-year trends of tobacco availability, tobacco advertising, and ownership changes in various food stores in Albany, New York.

Methods: Eligible stores were identified by multiple government lists and community canvassing in 2003 (n = 107), 2009 (n = 117), 2012 (n = 135), and 2015 (n = 137).

Environmental health hazards of e-cigarettes and their components: Oxidants and copper in e-cigarette aerosols.

To narrow the gap in our understanding of potential oxidative properties associated with Electronic Nicotine Delivery Systems (ENDS) i.e. e-cigarettes, we employed semi-quantitative methods to detect oxidant reactivity in disposable components of ENDS/e-cigarettes (batteries and cartomizers) using a fluorescein indicator.

Pragmatic use of language by children who develop schizophrenia in adult life.

At eleven years of age all children in a UK national birth cohort wrote short stories about the life they expected to be leading at age 25. Using a data linkage exercise, we identified those who later developed schizophrenia, affective psychosis, or other non-psychotic psychiatric disorders in later life based on the PSE CATEGO diagnostic system. The majority of these had completed the written essays.

Risk of adult schizophrenia and its relationship to childhood IQ in the 1958 British birth cohort.

Background: An inverse relationship between risk of schizophrenia and premorbid IQ is a robust empirical finding. Cognitive impairment may be a core feature of schizophrenia in addition to the clinical symptoms that have historically defined the disorder.

Aims: To evaluate whether risk of schizophrenia increases linearly or nonlinearly with the lowering of premorbid IQ after adjustment for a range of confounding factors.

Does religious belief enable positive interpretation of auditory hallucinations?: a comparison of religious voice hearers with and without psychosis.

Introduction. Hearing voices occurs in people without psychosis. Why hearing voices is such a key pathological feature of psychosis whilst remaining a manageable experience in nonpsychotic people is yet to be understood.

Is semantic memory impaired in schizophrenia? A systematic review and meta-analysis of 91 studies.

Introduction: Semantic memory impairments in schizophrenia have been reported across a wide range of neuropsychological tests. Set against a backdrop of fairly widespread cognitive impairments, it is difficult to know whether there is a primary, or secondary, impairment of semantic memory in schizophrenia. Also, whether there is a profile of differential impairment across the range of neuropsychological tests.

Beyond symptom dimensions: schizophrenia risk factors for patient groups derived by latent class analysis.

Introduction: Patients grouped by latent class analysis of symptoms show some consensus between studies, and may be less etiologically heterogeneous than current diagnoses. If so, the effect size of 'neurodevelopmental' risk factors may be greater than in equivalent DSMIV diagnostic groups.

Method: Two hundred fifty six individuals with neurodevelopmental risk factors recorded in the National Child Development Study (1958) UK birth cohort were grouped by data-driven illness subtypes, derived previously in over 1000 individuals.

Overinclusive thought and loosening of associations are not unique to schizophrenia and are produced in Alzheimer's dementia.

Introduction: Bleuler's concept of loosening of associations which he believed epitomised psychotic thinking can manifest as overinclusion (merging of semantic categories) on semantic categorisation tasks. Overinclusion is explained by excessive activation within the semantic memory network to subordinate features with low associative strength. Therefore patients with degradation of subordinate semantic knowledge (e.

Semantic memory impairment in schizophrenia--deficit in storage or access of knowledge?

This study evaluates whether patients with schizophrenia have a degraded memory store for semantic knowledge. 20 patients with a chronic history of schizophrenia and evidence of cognitive impairment were selected, since the literature indicates that this subgroup is most likely to manifest a degraded semantic knowledge store. Their profile of semantic memory impairments was compared to that of a group of Alzheimer's Dementia (AD) patients (n=22), who met neuropsychological criteria for degraded semantic store.

Body image, mood and quality of life in young burn survivors.

This study looks at the body image, mood and quality of life of a group of 36 young people aged between 11 and 19 years who had burns as children, compared with an age-matched control group of 41 young people who had not had these injuries. Participants completed the Body Esteem Scale (BES), the Satisfaction With Appearance Scale (SWAP), the Beck Depression Inventory-II (BDI-II) and the Youth Quality of Life Questionnaire (YQOL). It was hypothesised that young burn survivors would report more dissatisfaction with their appearance, a lower mood and a lower quality of life compared with non-injured controls.

Do overinclusion and distorted semantic category boundaries in schizophrenia arise from executive dysfunction?

Semantic memory impairments have been reported extensively in people with schizophrenia. Inefficient search and retrieval strategies, due to an executive dysfunction, rather than a primary loss of semantic knowledge are a primary candidate for such impairments. In order to test this hypothesis we compared the performance of 20 patients meeting DSM-IV-TR criteria for schizophrenia with that of 20 healthy controls and 10 patients with acquired brain injury (ABI) with a dysexecutive syndrome.

Evidence for a dissociation of structural and semantic knowledge in dementia of the Alzheimer type (DAT).

Object recognition and naming deficits in dementia of the Alzheimer type (DAT) have typically been attributed to deficits in semantic processing, with only a few studies proposing loci of deficits other than semantic. One possible cause of DAT object recognition impairments could involve deficits in processing structural aspects of visually presented items. In this paper, we assess the performance of a group of mild DAT patients on two tasks of structural access, object decision, and the complete/incomplete task (based on part-whole matching task), as well as on a semantic probes task, designed to assess the patients' semantic knowledge of the same items for which structural knowledge had earlier been assessed.

Randomized controlled trial of assertive community treatment in intellectual disability: the TACTILD study.

Background: There has been a policy shift away from hospital to community in the services of all those with psychiatric disorders, including those with intellectual disability (ID), in the last 50 years. This has been accompanied recently by the growth of assertive outreach services, but these have not been evaluated in ID services.

Method: In a randomized controlled trial we compared assertive outreach with 'standard' community care, using global assessment of function (GAF) as the primary outcome measure, and burden and quality of life as secondary measures.

Loss of high-level perceptual knowledge of object structure in DAT.

Visual object recognition and naming deficits in patients with dementia of the Alzheimer type (DAT) have typically been attributed to deficits in semantic processing. On a visual object naming test, a group of 10 mild, early stage DAT patients (mean MMSE=23.8) were found to suffer from anomia, compared to a group of 10 age-matched control participants.

Analogical reasoning in schizophrenic delusions.

Purpose: Reasoning ability has often been argued to be impaired in people with schizophrenic delusions, although evidence for this is far from convincing. This experiment examined the analogical reasoning abilities of several groups of patients, including non-deluded and deluded schizophrenics, to test the hypothesis that performance by the deluded schizophrenic group would be impaired.

Subjects/materials: Eleven deluded schizophrenics, 10 depressed subjects, seven non-deluded schizophrenics and 16 matched non-psychiatric controls, who were matched on a number of key variables, were asked to solve an analogical reasoning task.

Can disorganisation of semantic memory account for the abnormalities of thought in schizophrenia-a controlled experimental study.

Background: Disorganisation of semantic memory could provide a cognitive explanation for the disturbances of thinking and reasoning in schizophrenia. In this study, we directly test this explanation by identifying patients with disorganised semantic categories and then examine how they use their knowledge about these same categories in an inductive reasoning task.

Method: Experiment 1 utilised a semantic category-sorting task to identify patients with disorganisation of semantic memory.

Adult psychosis, common childhood infections and neurological soft signs in a national birth cohort.

Background: Neurological soft signs preceding adult-onset schizophrenia suggest a neurodevelopmental origin and could reflect physical illness in childhood.

Aims: To investigate possible associations of adult-onset psychosis with neurological soft signs and common infectious illnesses in childhood.

Method: Using data from the UK National Child Development Study, a longitudinal general population sample, odds ratios were calculated for clinical diagnoses of common childhood viral illnesses and later adult psychotic illness, childhood epilepsy and a range of neurological soft signs.

Elasticity and confabulation in schizophrenic delusions.

Background: This experiment examines two aspects of delusional cognition that have been reported clinically but not investigated empirically. These are the incorporation of potentially conflicting information into the recall of delusion-related scripts and the type and amount of material produced additional to that presented for recall, referred to here as confabulation.

Methods: Three groups of patients--deluded schizophrenics, non-deluded schizophrenics and matched non-psychiatric controls--were asked to recall two 15-item scripts, which comprised 10 typical and five atypical components.

Training in communication skills for informal carers of people suffering from dementia: a cluster randomized clinical trial comparing a therapist led workshop and a booklet.

The objective of the study was to evaluate whether a short training workshop in communication techniques is more effective than an information booklet for improving communication skills in informal carers of people suffering from dementia. 30 informal carers were allocated to the workshop sessions and 15 to the booklet. Outcome measures included awareness of communication strategies; perceived frequency of communication breakdown at home, and the associated level of distress; general stress; and consumer satisfaction.

Visual crowding and category specific deficits for pictorial stimuli: A neural network model.

This paper describes a series of modular neural network simulations of visual object processing. In a departure from much previous work in this domain, the model described here comprises both supervised and unsupervised modules and processes real pictorial representations of items from different object categories. The unsupervised module carries out bottom-up encoding of visual stimuli, thereby developing a "perceptual" representation of each presented picture.