Psychosocial Evaluation of Living Kidney Donors: A Survey of Current Practices in the United States.

Background: Best practices in psychosocial evaluation and care of living donor candidates and donors are not well established.

Methods: We surveyed 195 living kidney donor (LKD) transplant centers in United States from October 2021 to April 2022 querying (1) composition of psychosocial teams, (2) evaluation processes including clinical tools and domains assessed, (3) selection criteria, and (4) psychosocial follow-up post-donation.

Results: We received 161 responses from 104 programs, representing 53% of active LKD programs and 67% of LKD transplant volume in 2019.

Psychosocial evaluation of living liver donors-State of current practices in the United States.

We surveyed living donor liver transplant programs in the United States to describe practices in the psychosocial evaluation of living donors focused on (1) composition of psychosocial team; (2) domains, workflow, and tools of the psychosocial assessment; (3) absolute and relative mental health-related contraindications to donation; and (4) postdonation psychosocial follow-up. We received 52 unique responses, representing 33 of 50 (66%) of active living donor liver transplant programs. Thirty-one (93.

Information theoretic evaluation of a noiseband-based cochlear implant simulator.

Noise-band vocoders are often used to simulate the signal processing algorithms used in cochlear implants (CIs), producing acoustic stimuli that may be presented to normal hearing (NH) subjects. Such evaluations may obviate the heterogeneity of CI user populations, achieving greater experimental control than when testing on CI subjects. However, it remains an open question whether advancements in algorithms developed on NH subjects using a simulator will necessarily improve performance in CI users.

Pitch deviation analysis of pathological voice in connected speech.

Objectives: This study compares normal and pathologic voices using a novel voice analysis algorithm that examines pitch deviation during connected speech. The study evaluates the clinical potential of the algorithm as a mechanism to distinguish between normal and pathologic voices using connected speech.

Methods: Adult vocalizations from normal subjects and patients with known benign free-edge vocal fold lesions were analyzed.

Using windowed relative deviation to detect possible voice pathology.

A diagnostic method is presented that provides for analyzing pitch "jitter" in running speech. "Jitter" is typically measured with explicit voice tasks, namely sustained vowel phonation. However, some voice pathologies cannot be detected with sustained phonation.