Publications by authors named "Gale C"

Background: Closing the evidence-practice gap for the treatment of acute coronary syndrome (ACS) is central to improving quality of care. Under the European Society of Cardiology (ESC) framework, we aimed to develop updated quality indicators (QIs) for the evaluation of quality of care and outcomes for patients with ACS.

Methods: A Working Group of experts including members of the ESC Clinical Practice Guidelines Task Force for ACS, Acute CardioVascular Care Association and European Association of Percutaneous Cardiovascular Interventions followed the ESC methodology for QI development.

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Background: Detecting atrial fibrillation (AF) after stroke is a key component of secondary prevention, but indiscriminate prolonged cardiac monitoring is costly and burdensome. Multivariable prediction models could be used to inform patient selection.

Objective: To determine the performance of available models for predicting AF after a stroke.

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Importance: Intraventricular hemorrhage (IVH) has proven to be a challenging and enduring complication of prematurity. However, its association with neurodevelopment across the spectrum of IVH severity, independent of prematurity, and in the context of contemporary care remains uncertain.

Objective: To evaluate national trends in IVH diagnosis and the association with survival and neurodevelopmental outcomes at 2 years of age.

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Background: Breast milk has significant benefits for preterm babies, but 'very preterm' babies are unable to feed directly from the breast at birth. Their mothers have to initiate and sustain lactation through expressing milk for tube feeding until their babies are developmentally ready to feed orally. There are wide disparities between neonatal units in England in rates of breast milk feeding at discharge.

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Objective: Following very preterm birth, some children require ongoing intensive care after the neonatal period and transition directly from neonatal units (NNUs) to paediatric intensive care units (PICUs) around term-corrected age.We aimed to understand, at a national level, characteristics and outcomes of children born very preterm who transitioned directly from NNUs to PICUs.

Design: Retrospective cohort study, using data linkage of National Neonatal Research Database, Paediatric Intensive Care Audit Network and Office for National Statistics datasets.

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Article Synopsis
  • The EuroHeart project aims to establish standardized definitions for outcome measures in cardiovascular clinical studies to enhance the evaluation of medical interventions and care.
  • A group of 82 experts formed five Working Groups to identify key outcome measures for various cardiovascular conditions, using a systematic review and consensus methods to define these measures.
  • In total, 24 mandatory (Level 1) and 48 optional (Level 2) outcome measures were established across five cardiovascular disease areas, providing a foundation for improved research and patient care quality.
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Importance: Children born very preterm (<32 weeks) are at risk of ongoing morbidity and admission to pediatric intensive care units (PICUs) in childhood. However, the influence of the timing of neonatal discharge on unplanned PICU admission has not been established.

Objective: To examine whether the timing of neonatal discharge (postmenstrual age and season) is associated with subsequent unplanned PICU admission.

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Metformin is an antihyperglycemic used to treat type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). Patients with T2DM are at increased risk of cardiovascular disease. We explored the association between metformin use and cardiovascular magnetic resonance (CMR) derived stress myocardial blood flow (MBF), myocardial perfusion reserve (MPR) and major adverse cardiovascular events (MACE; all cause death, MI, stroke, heart failure hospitalisation and coronary revascularisation) in patients with T2DM.

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  • Mothers of very preterm babies face challenges in breastfeeding due to the need for early milk expression and transitioning from tube feeding to breastfeeding after birth.
  • The study interviewed 23 mothers from different neonatal units in England to understand how staff support and unit facilities influence breastfeeding behaviors, using the COM-B framework to analyze factors like capability, opportunity, and motivation.
  • Key findings highlighted that mothers' motivation was significantly impacted by information from staff on the benefits of breast milk, encouragement, and the availability of resources, indicating that tailored support is essential for improving breastfeeding success in preterm infants.
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Background: Neonates undergoing emergency abdominal surgery frequently require a stoma; closing this stoma with a second operation is an essential part of recovery. Timing of closure varies. Optimal timing is unclear and would be best resolved through a randomised controlled trial; such a trial is likely to be challenging.

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The ability to compare plays a key role in how humans learn, but words that describe relations between objects, like comparisons, are difficult to learn. We examined how children learn size comparison words, and how their interpretations of these change across development. One-hundred-and-forty children in England (36-107 months; 68 girls; majority White) were asked to build block structures that were bigger, longer, smaller, shorter, or taller than an experimenter's.

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  • - Less invasive surfactant administration (LISA) is gaining traction for treating respiratory distress syndrome in preterm infants who are breathing on their own.
  • - The best ways to manage pain and discomfort during LISA, whether through medication or other methods, are still uncertain, leading to inconsistent practices among healthcare providers.
  • - This article aims to highlight the current understanding of LISA and identify where more research is needed regarding premedication options before the procedure.
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  • Early life gut microbiomes significantly impact brain and immune system development, with probiotics suggested as a way to enhance health through microbiome modification.
  • This study investigates the effects of maternal probiotic exposure during pregnancy and breastfeeding on inflammation in breastmilk, variations in maternal and infant microbiomes, and infant neurodevelopment.
  • Results indicate that maternal probiotics are linked to lower breastmilk inflammation markers and changes in infant gut microbiome, as well as improved recognition memory responses in infants at 6 months old.
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  • Heart failure is a critical health issue that can lead to high patient mortality and hospital readmissions, emphasizing the need for better medicines management during hospital discharge to improve patient outcomes.
  • The Medicines at Transitions Intervention (MaTI), part of the ISCOMAT program, was developed to enhance the transition of heart failure patients from hospital to community care by providing a toolkit for patients and improving communication with community pharmacies.
  • The study revealed challenges in implementing the MaTI due to poor communication between hospital staff and pharmacies, leading to incomplete delivery of certain program components, despite some positive feedback on the patient toolkit for education.
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Article Synopsis
  • * A working group, including experts from the European Society of Cardiology, conducted a systematic review and reached consensus on mandatory (Level 1) and optional (Level 2) measures through a Delphi process.
  • * The final catalogue includes five Level 1 and two Level 2 outcome measures, along with five additional monitoring outcomes, which will enhance research quality and improve heart failure care.
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  • This study looks at how well doctors can predict sudden cardiac death after someone has a heart attack using a measurement called left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF).
  • They combined information from over 140,000 heart attack patients to see if LVEF alone is good enough for deciding who should get a heart device called a defibrillator.
  • The results showed that LVEF didn't do a great job at predicting sudden cardiac death, which means doctors need better ways to tell who is at risk.
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  • * The study will recruit approximately 1955 participants for home-based ECG monitoring, and will conduct comprehensive assessments, including physical exams and advanced imaging techniques.
  • * The research aims to identify how other health issues affect AF development, find prevention strategies, and establish a foundation for future clinical trials on AF detection and prevention.
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Although all hexose sugars share the same chemical formula, CHO, subtle differences in their stereochemical structures lead to their various biological roles. Due to their prominent role in metabolism, hexose sugars are commonly found in nanoconfined environments. The complexity of authentic nanoconfined biological environments makes it challenging to study how confinement affects their behavior.

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  • Human milk is essential for infant nourishment, but there's limited understanding of how its composition affects infant health.
  • A study examined the relationships between maternal genetics, milk gene expression, and the infant microbiome in 310 breastfeeding mother-infant pairs, identifying 482 genetic loci linked to milk characteristics.
  • Findings revealed connections between milk components, like interleukin-6, and the gut bacteria of infants, highlighting the importance of genetics in lactation and its impact on maternal and infant health.
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Introduction: Very preterm babies are at risk of poor neurodevelopmental outcomes and death. Intraventricular haemorrhage (IVH) after birth is the most prevalent cause of this. Birth by caesarean section may protect against IVH in very preterm babies, but the evidence is limited.

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  • Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) increases the risk of cardiovascular issues, and the ETHOS trial showed that triple therapy with budesonide/glycopyrrolate/formoterol fumarate (BGF) lowered the rates of exacerbations and all-cause mortality compared to dual therapies.
  • The study aimed to evaluate the effects of BGF on cardiovascular events and the time to first severe exacerbation, finding that BGF 320 significantly reduced the occurrence of major adverse cardiac events and other serious cardiopulmonary issues when compared to dual therapy with glycopyrrolate/formoterol fumarate (GFF).
  • Overall, BGF demonstrated a notable benefit in reducing
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