Matrix porosity is associated with biofilm survival during prosthetic joint infection.

Biofilms are a cause of chronic, non-healing infections. is a proficient biofilm forming pathogen commonly isolated from prosthetic joint infections that develop following primary arthroplasty. Extracellular adhesion protein (Eap), previously characterized in planktonic or non-biofilm populations as being an adhesin and immune evasion factor, was recently identified in the exoproteome of biofilms.

A systematic review and mapping exercise to assess the content validity of patient-reported outcome measures for adults having reconstructive surgery of the lower limb.

Aims: Lower limb reconstruction (LLR) has a profound impact on patients, affecting multiple areas of their lives. Many patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs) are employed to assess these impacts; however, there are concerns that they do not adequately capture all outcomes important to patients, and may lack content validity in this context. This review explored whether PROMs used with adults requiring, undergoing, or after undergoing LLR exhibited content validity and adequately captured outcomes considered relevant and important to patients.

The Rutgers Integrated Care Evaluation (RICE) Research Framework: An Innovative and Rigorous Set of Methods to Evaluate Integrated Care Programs.

Introduction: Integrated care programs that prioritize comprehensive service delivery for behavioural health and medical conditions have the potential to improve patient outcomes. Few programs, however, use data-driven methods to guide program evaluation and implementation, limiting their effectiveness, as well as the scope of findings in the research literature.

Purpose: To address these gaps, we describe an innovative and rigorous evaluative research framework: the Rutgers Integrated Care Evaluation (RICE) Research Framework, designed to be tailorable across conditions and care settings.

Empirical Testing of Alternative Search Methods to Retrieve Utility Values for Health Economic Modelling.

Objectives: The objective of this study is to compare different information retrieval methods that can be used to identify utility inputs for health economic models.

Methods: The usual practice of using systematic review methods was compared with two alternatives (iterative searching and rapid review), using a health technology assessment (HTA) case study in ulcerative colitis (UC). We analysed whether there were differences in the utility values identified when using the alternative search methods.