Objective: To study the demographic characteristics, risk factors, management details and clinical outcomes to 12 months corrected age in indigenous and non-indigenous infants with chronic neonatal lung disease in North Queensland.
Design: Retrospective cohort study of infants with chronic neonatal lung disease admitted to a tertiary neonatal intensive care unit in regional Queensland from January 2015 to December 2019.
Results: There were 139 infants with chronic neonatal lung disease and 425 controls.
Multiple myeloma (MM) is an incurable plasma cell malignancy that, despite an unprecedented increase in overall survival, lacks truly risk-adapted or targeted treatments. A proportion of patients with MM depend on BCL-2 for survival, and, recently, the BCL-2 antagonist venetoclax has shown clinical efficacy and safety in t(11;14) and BCL-2 overexpressing MM. However, only a small proportion of MM patients rely on BCL-2 (approx.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFProblem And Background: There is growing evidence in First Nations doula care as a strategy to address perinatal inequities and improve maternal care experiences. However, there is no evidence around the approach and principals required to successfully deliver First Nations doula (childbirth) training.
Question/aim: To explore and describe the approach and principles used in piloting the training of First Nations doulas in remote, multilingual Northern Australian community settings.
Background: Inequitable maternity care provision in high-income countries contributes to ongoing poor outcomes for women of refugee backgrounds. To address barriers to quality maternity care and improve health equity, a co-designed maternity service incorporating community-based group antenatal care, onsite social worker and interpreters, continuity of midwifery carer through a caseload design with 24/7 phone access was implemented for women of refugee background.
Objective: To explore and describe women's experiences and perceptions of care from a dedicated Refugee Midwifery Group Practice service.
Problem: Establishment of Birthing on Country services owned and governed by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Community Controlled Health Services has been slow.
Background: Birthing on Country services have demonstrated health and cost benefits and require redesign of maternity care. During the Building On Our Strengths feasibility study, use of endorsed midwives and licensing of birth centres has proven difficult.
In this follow-up at 2.5 years of children from the STRIDER NZAus Trial (N = 112), in which women with singleton pregnancies affected by severe early fetal growth restriction were randomized to sildenafil citrate 75 mg daily or placebo until 32 weeks, there was no difference between groups in survival without neurosensory impairment, defined as any of cerebral palsy, deafness, blindness, cognitive delay (Bayley III cognition or language score >1 SD below mean) or motor delay: 30/56[54%] vs. 34/56[61%]; aOR = 0.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFInt J Environ Res Public Health
December 2022
The music-based attention assessment (MAA) is a melody contour identification task that evaluates different types of attention. Previous studies have examined the psychometric and physiological validity of the MAA across various age groups in clinical and typical populations. The purpose of this study was to confirm the MAA's criterion validity in individuals with traumatic brain injury (TBI) and to correlate this with standardized neuropsychological measurements.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFProblem And Background: First Nations doulas offer an innovative approach for strengthening capacity and increasing the Australian First Nations maternity workforce to improve access to services that produce optimal outcomes. Currently, there is no published evidence on the training needs and health sector industry support for developing a First Nations doula workforce.
Question/aim: In the context of the 'Top End,' Northern Territory, Australia, the aim of this article is to document Industry feedback on the training needs and support for developing a First Nations doula workforce.
Background: Women from a refugee background who resettle in high-income countries experience poorer perinatal outcomes in comparison to women from host countries. There is a paucity of research on how best to improve these outcomes.
Aim: To report on the effectiveness of an Australian Refugee Midwifery Group Practice service on perinatal outcomes.
Yolŋu (First Nations Australians from North-East Arnhem Land, Northern Territory) and Balanda (non-Indigenous people) often encounter communication challenges at a cultural interface during the provision of health and education services. To address these challenges, our project co-created an educational process and resources to inform and facilitate intercultural communication. During interactive workshops, participants and researchers from different cultural backgrounds reflected on their communication practice together in small groups.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBioinform Adv
September 2021
Background: Communication difficulties, including hypokinetic dysarthria and swallowing difficulties (dysphagia), affect a large percentage of people diagnosed with Parkinson's disease. Onset of these symptoms has been identified in up to 78% of people with early-stage Parkinson's disease. Communication difficulties are frequently disregarded until they have a significant impact on quality of life, while the person may often be unaware of indicators of dysphagia and the associated risk of aspiration pneumonia.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFNeurol Neuroimmunol Neuroinflamm
January 2022
Background And Objectives: Patients with Alzheimer dementia display evidence of amyloid-related neurodegeneration. Our focus was to determine whether such patients also display evidence of a disease-targeting adaptive immune response mediated by CD4 T cells. To test this hypothesis, we evaluated the CSF immune profiles of patients with Alzheimer clinical syndrome (ACS), who display clinically defined dementia.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Over half a million individuals are diagnosed with head and neck cancer each year globally. Radiotherapy is an important curative treatment for this disease, but it requires manual time to delineate radiosensitive organs at risk. This planning process can delay treatment while also introducing interoperator variability, resulting in downstream radiation dose differences.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIn this call to action, a coalition of Indigenous and non-Indigenous researchers from Australia, Aotearoa New Zealand, United States and Canada argue for the urgent need for adequately funded Indigenous-led solutions to perinatal health inequities for Indigenous families in well-resourced settler-colonial countries. Authors describe examples of successful community-driven programs making a difference and call on all peoples to support and resource Indigenous-led perinatal health services by providing practical actions for individuals and different groups.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFZinc binding proteins make up a significant proportion of the proteomes of most organisms and, within those proteins, zinc performs rôles in catalysis and structure stabilisation. Identifying the ability to bind zinc in a novel protein can offer insights into its functions and the mechanism by which it carries out those functions. Computational means of doing so are faster than spectroscopic means, allowing for searching at much greater speeds and scales, and thereby guiding complimentary experimental approaches.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMicrofibrillated cellulose (MFC) is widely used as a reinforcement filler for biocomposites due to its unique properties. However, the challenge of drying MFC and the incompatibility between nanocellulose and polymer matrix still limits the mechanical performance of MFC-reinforced biocomposites. In this study, we used a water-based transesterification reaction to functionalize MFC and explored the capability of oven-dried MFC as a reinforcement filler for polylactic acid (PLA).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: A study was done to explore the attitudes of relevant health care professionals (HCP) towards the provision of intensive care for periviable and extremely premature babies.
Methods/design: Applying a constructivist grounded theory methodology, HCP were interviewed about their attitudes towards the provision of resuscitation and intensive care for extremely premature babies. These babies are at increased risk of death and neurodisability when compared to babies of older gestations.
Introduction: Increased left ventricular mass index (LVMI) is associated with mortality in end-stage renal disease. LVMI regression may improve outcomes. Allopurinol has reduced LVMI in randomized controlled trials in chronic kidney disease, diabetes, and ischemic heart disease.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFDiversity of neural crest derivatives has been studied with a variety of approaches during embryonic development. In mammals Cre-LoxP lineage tracing is a robust means to fate map neural crest relying on cre driven from regulatory elements of early neural crest genes. Sox10 is an essential transcription factor for normal neural crest development.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIssue Addressed: Indigenous women continue to experience reproductive health inequities. While enhancing health literacy is suggested as an approach for reducing disparities and increasing equity, there is a paucity of literature exploring Indigenous women's conceptualisation of reproductive health literacy. This paper demonstrates one approach to developing a reproductive health literacy framework for Yolŋu (Indigenous) women in a remote Northern Australian setting.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground & Problem: Birthing On Country (BOC) is an international movement for returning childbirth to First Nations peoples and their communities. The RISE Framework was developed to guide evidence-based BOC implementation but has not yet been tested in a remote Australian community setting.
Aim: To test the transferability and acceptability of the RISE Framework in a remote multilingual setting in a Yolŋu (First Nations) community in Northern Australia.