Publications by authors named "Enrique Ramalle Gomara"

Introduction: Stroke mortality has declined in recent decades, but there appears to be a slowdown in the decline in recent years. We analyze the trends in stroke mortality in La Rioja (Spain) for the period 1999-2022.

Methods: We evaluated stroke mortality using statistical data from the mortality registry of La Rioja (Spain).

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Introduction: The state of alarm was declared in Spain due to the COVID-19 epidemic on March 14, 2020, and established population confinement measures. The objective is to describe the process of lifting these mitigation measures.

Methods: The Plan for the Transition to a New Normality, approved on April 28, contained four sequential phases with progressive increase in socio-economic activities and population mobility.

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Introduction: The state of alarm was declared in Spain due to the COVID-19 epidemic on March 14, 2020, and established population confinement measures. The objective is to describe the process of lifting these mitigation measures.

Methods: The Plan for the Transition to a New Normality, approved on April 28, contained four sequential phases with progressive increase in socio-economic activities and population mobility.

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Neoadjuvant chemoradiotherapy (CRT) is one of the standards of care in locally advanced rectal cancer (LARC). This retrospective study examines clinical, analytical, and pathological parameters collected from 77 patients with locally advanced (cT3-4 or cN+) rectal carcinoma diagnosed between 2007 and 2017 at our institution that were treated with preoperative CRT and surgery. In the prognosis analysis, lower hemoglobin levels ( = 0.

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Stroke remains an important health challenge. Here, we study whether circulating chemokine (C-C motif) ligand 5 (CCL5) levels may predict clinical outcomes for stroke patients. A total of 100 consecutive stroke patients (36 acute ischemic and 64 hemorrhagic) were admitted to the stroke unit.

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The assessment of cancer survival at the population level is essential for monitoring progress in cancer control. We aimed to assess cancer survival and its trends in adults in Spain. Individual records of 601,250 adults with primary cancer diagnosed during 2002-2013 and followed up to 2015 were included from 13 population-based cancer registries.

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Traditionally, epidemiological surveillance has focused on infectious diseases, but the concept of Public Health surveillance, introduced in Spain with the Law 33/2011, is broader and includes chronic diseases. Health strategies for these diseases need epidemiological information to improve understanding of socio-health needs and to facilitate the efficient management of resources. The European Union defines rare diseases (RD) as those that, being life-threatening or chronically debilitating, have a prevalence of less than 5 cases per 10,000 inhabitants.

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Article Synopsis
  • Spain declared a state of alarm on March 14, 2020, due to COVID-19, implementing confinement measures and later launching a phased plan to lift them, beginning May 4, 2020.
  • The transition involved a careful strategy for monitoring and controlling the virus, with decision-making shared between the national government and regional authorities, using specific indicators to assess the situation.
  • By June 21, 2020, significant improvements were made, including a decrease in infection rates, increased testing capacity, and better contact tracing, highlighting the importance of data and communication in managing the public health response.
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Background: Rare diseases are a priority objective for public health systems. Given its complexity, late and misdiagnoses occur very often which causes mental and physical burden for patients and family. This would be caused, in part, for unprepared clinicians in this field.

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Aim: To analyze the effects of subcutaneous or intravenous rituximab + lymphokine-activated killer cells, obinutuzumab or ibrutinib on natural killer (NK) cell levels in chronic lymphocytic leukemia and follicular lymphoma patients.

Patients & Methods: The distribution of peripheral blood NK cells of 31 patients was analyzed by flow cytometry.

Results: We detected a decrease of NK cells in peripheral blood below normal range after obinutuzumab treatment.

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Background: Patients with HIV infection suffer from accelerated aging. In this context, frailty could be a relevant problem that aggravates the quality of life (QoL) and morbi-mortality of these patients. Our objective was to determine the prevalence of frailty and pre-frailty in HIV-infected patients in our cohort as well as their risk factors and QoL.

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Objective: The aim of this study was to determine the impact of orthostatic hypotension (OH) and orthostatic hypertension (OHT) on all-cause mortality.

Patients And Methods: A total of, 1176 adults from the community over 18 years of age were included in this ambispective study. The mean follow-up was 9.

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Background: Guillain-Barré syndrome (GBS) is a rare disease that consists of a group of neuropathic conditions. Very few epidemiological studies of GBS have been carried out in Spain. The aim of this study was to determine the trends in GBS mortality in the total population of Spain for the period 1999 to 2013.

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Article Synopsis
  • PCT (Procalcitonin) is an important diagnostic tool for bacterial infections, but its effectiveness in elderly patients had not been extensively studied prior to this research.* -
  • The study involved 161 elderly patients (75 years and older) split into two groups: one with probable bacterial infections and another with noninfectious diseases, to assess the validity of PCT levels in diagnosis.* -
  • Results showed that PCT had a sensitivity of 72% and specificity of 92% for diagnosing bacterial infections in the elderly, indicating it can effectively help identify infections in this population.*
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Rationale, Aims And Objectives: The debate about whether to dedicate funds to rare diseases (RD) may hinge on the existence of a societal preference for prioritizing rarity. There are scarce studies about the interest of doctors and general society in RD.

Method: Four groups of future health and non-health professionals were surveyed in a region of Spain to evaluate their opinion on RD.

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Objective: To analyse the validity of diagnosis of aplastic anaemia (AA) by International Classification of Diseases codes in hospital discharge data (MBDS) and the mortality registry (MR) of La Rioja to detect cases to be included in the Spanish National Rare Diseases Registry.

Methods: International Classification of Diseases (ICD) codes were used to detect AA cases during the period 2007-2012 from two administrative databases: the MBDS and the MR of La Rioja (Spain). Medical records of population selected by merging both databases were used to confirm true AA cases.

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Our objective was to analyse the coverage of hospital discharge data and the mortality registry (MR) of La Rioja to ascertain motor neuron disease (MND) cases to be included in the Spanish National Rare Diseases Registry. MND cases that occurred in La Rioja during the period 1996-2011 were selected from hospital discharge data and the MR by means of the International Classification of Diseases. Review of the medical histories was carried out to confirm the causes of death reported.

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Introduction: HIV-associated lipodystrophy syndrome causes systemic metabolic alterations and psychological distress that worsen the quality of life of these patients. An early detection should be considered to efficiently treat it. Objective criteria or reference indices are needed for an early diagnosis.

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Background: Hospital administrative data have been suggested as a valuable cost-effective tool for providing information about the stroke burden. Nevertheless, the choice of the diagnosis codes has been a critical issue in the development of case ascertainment algorithms.

Methods: In this study, the Minimum Basic Data Set administrative database was used to analyze the accuracy of different ICD-9-CM algorithms based on the neurologist's clinical judgement as the 'gold standard'.

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Background: Stroke is a public health concern and the availability of a stroke registry would provide valuable information. Administrative hospital data and mortality registries have been previously suggested as suitable sources of information. The aim of this study was to evaluate the utility of merging data from a hospital discharge database and the mortality registry (MR) to estimate the incidence of stroke in La Rioja, Spain.

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Objective: To produce a comprehensive anatomical and hemodynamic ultrasound scan mapping of the whole limb in patients with primary varicose veins (VVs).

Design: An analysis of venous duplex scans performed on patients referred for treatment of primary VVs.

Methods: A total of 2036 limbs were evaluated, looking for the origin of VVs in the saphenous systems and in the perforating vein (PV) systems, as well as for the presence of non-saphenous reflux.

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