Publications by authors named "James Thomas"

Pulmonary artery (PA) flow analysis is crucial for understanding the progression of pulmonary hypertension (PH). We hypothesized that PA flow characteristics vary according to PH etiology. In this study, we used 4D flow cardiovascular magnetic resonance imaging (CMR) to compare PA flow velocity and wall shear stress (WSS) between patients with pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) and those with heart failure with preserved ejection fraction and pulmonary hypertension (PH-HFpEF).

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Defining qualitative grades of echocardiographic metrics of right heart chamber size and function is critical for screening, clinical assessment, and measurement of therapeutic response in individuals with pulmonary vascular disease (PVD). In a population enriched for PVD, we sought to establish qualitative grades and prognostic value of right heart chamber size and function.

Methods: We investigated 1053 study participants in the Redefining Pulmonary Hypertension through PVD Phenomics program (PVDOMICS) to determine clinical and echocardiographic differences associated with increasing pulmonary vascular resistance (PVR) severity.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Objectives: In public health, access to research literature is critical to informing decision-making and to identify knowledge gaps. However, identifying relevant research is not a straightforward task since public health interventions are often complex, can have positive and negative impacts on health inequalities and are applied in diverse and rapidly evolving settings. We developed a "living" database of public health research literature to facilitate access to this information using Natural Language Processing tools.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • Type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) can lead to problems with blood vessel function, increasing the risk of heart issues, and hot water immersion (HWI) might help improve this, though research is limited.
  • A study with 14 participants assessed the effects of 8-10 sessions of HWI, measuring various heart and blood vessel functions before and after the treatment.
  • Results showed significant reductions in cardiac index, stroke volume index, resting heart rate, and systolic blood pressure, suggesting HWI could benefit heart-related measures in T2DM, but it didn’t improve overall vascular function.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: On-scene improvised and interim decontamination protocols in the Initial Operational Response to chemical incidents aim for rapid intervention to minimise injury before specialist capabilities arrive. This study examines the effectiveness of UK improvised and interim protocols conducted in sequence.

Method: A simulant with methyl salicylate (MeS) in vegetable oil and a fluorophore was applied to participants' shoulders, arms and legs.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • - The Oxford Haemodynamic Adaptation to Reduce Pulsatility (OxHARP) trial studied the effects of sildenafil on cerebrovascular conditions, finding that it increased cerebrovascular reactivity but didn't reduce cerebral pulsatility, both linked to vascular aging.
  • - This study aimed to see how the severity of white matter hyperintensities (WMH) relates to both cerebral pulsatility and cerebrovascular reactivity in the same group of patients.
  • - Results showed that greater severity of WMH was independently linked to decreased cerebrovascular reactivity and increased cerebral pulsatility, suggesting a complex interaction that warrants further investigation.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Disturbances in the intricate processes that control craniofacial morphogenesis can result in birth defects, most common of which are orofacial clefts (OFCs). Nonsyndromic cleft lip (nsCL), one of the phenotypic forms amongst OFCs, has a non-random laterality presentation with the left side being affected twice as often compared to the right side. This study investigates the etiology of nsCL and the factors contributing to its laterality using a pair of monozygotic twins with mirror-image cleft lip.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

The eighth meeting of the International Collaboration for the Automation of Systematic Reviews (ICASR) was held on September 7 and 8, 2023, at the University College London, London, England. ICASR is an interdisciplinary group whose goal is to maximize the use of technology for conducting rapid, accurate, and efficient evidence synthesis, e.g.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

B-type natriuretic peptides (BNP) are produced and secreted by the myocardium to reduce blood pressure and cardiac load. They cause vasodilation, natriuresis, growth suppression, and inhibition of the sympathetic nervous system and the renin-angiotensin-aldosterone system. The measurement of plasma BNP levels provides clinically useful information concerning the diagnosis and management of left ventricular dysfunction and heart failure, complementing other diagnostic testing procedures.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

High-affinity islet autoantibodies predict type 1 diabetes in mice and humans and implicate germinal centers (GCs) in type 1 diabetes pathogenesis. T follicular helper (Tfh) cells are increased in type 1 diabetic individuals and alterations in Tfh-like cells in the peripheral blood predicted individual responses to abatacept. Tfh cells support GC responses and depend on the transcriptional repressor BCL6 for their maturation.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • Surgical weight loss (SWL) has been shown to improve heart function as measured by specific imaging techniques, but its effects compared to non-surgical methods in overweight Asian individuals were previously unstudied.
  • A study involved 66 patients who completed a 16-week lifestyle intervention program and revealed significant weight loss, but only a non-significant improvement in heart strain metrics.
  • In contrast, participants who underwent bariatric surgery exhibited notable improvements in heart function, confirming that surgical weight loss is a strong independent factor for enhancing heart strain parameters.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Local authorities have a crucial role in building community resilience to the health effects of a changing climate. Support in achieving local action can be provided through improving available public health intelligence to inform decision making. We aimed to co-develop with a local authority a tool mapping vulnerability to climate related hazards.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Alternative polyadenylation (APA) affects most human genes and is recurrently dysregulated in all studied cancers. However, the mechanistic origins of this dysregulation are incompletely understood.

Results: We describe an unbiased analysis of molecular regulators of poly(A) site selection across The Cancer Genome Atlas and identify that colorectal adenocarcinoma is an outlier relative to all other cancer subtypes.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Identifying the effects of pain catastrophizing on movement patterns in people with chronic low back pain (CLBP) has important clinical implications for treatment approaches. Prior research has shown people with CLBP have decreased lumbar-hip ratios during trunk flexion movements, indicating a decrease in the contribution of lumbar flexion relative to hip flexion during trunk flexion. In this study, we aim to explore the relationship between pain catastrophizing and movement patterns during trunk flexion in a CLBP population.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Various effective treatments for depression exist. We aimed to identify the most effective first-line treatments for new episodes of less and more severe depression (defined by depression scale cut-off scores), to update NICE guidance on the management of Depression in Adults in England.

Methods: Systematic review and network meta-analysis of randomised controlled trials (RCTs) published up to June 2020 (PROSPERO registration number CRD42019151328).

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: The aim of this study was to evaluate the performance of three disposable hearing aid battery brands available in Wales. Hearing-impaired individuals who utilise hearing aids rely on the functionality of their devices, which is often contingent upon the quality and longevity of disposable batteries.

Materials And Methods: A grey literature review foregrounded the battery standards.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Many of the most highly conserved elements in the human genome are "poison exons," alternatively spliced exons that contain premature termination codons and permit post-transcriptional regulation of mRNA abundance through induction of nonsense-mediated mRNA decay (NMD). Poison exons are widely assumed to be highly conserved due to their presumed importance for organismal fitness, but this functional importance has never been tested in the context of a whole organism. Here, we report that a poison exon in Smndc1 is conserved across mammals and plants and plays a molecular autoregulatory function in both kingdoms.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Protein aggregation in brainstem nuclei is thought to occur in the early stages of Alzheimer's disease (AD), but its specific role in driving prodromal symptoms and disease progression is largely unknown. The dorsal raphe nucleus (DRN) contains a large population of serotonin (5-hydroxytryptamine; 5-HT) neurons that regulate mood, reward-related behavior, and sleep, which are all disrupted in AD. We report here that tau pathology is present in the DRN of individuals 25-80 years old without a known history of dementia, and its prevalence was comparable to the locus coeruleus (LC).

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Objectives: Dentists' Medicaid participation is a critical factor affecting dental care access for Medicaid beneficiaries. An important gap in existing literature is the variation in participation across Medicaid dental Managed Care Organizations (MCOs) in states with more than one. This study examined the variation in participation overall and in predictors of dentist participation between two MCOs in Iowa's Dental Medicaid program.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Trace amine-associated receptor 1 (TAAR1) agonism shows promise for treating psychosis, prompting us to synthesise data from human and non-human studies.

Methods: We co-produced a living systematic review of controlled studies examining TAAR1 agonists in individuals (with or without psychosis/schizophrenia) and relevant animal models. Two independent reviewers identified studies in multiple electronic databases (until 17.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • Anhedonia, a significant symptom of depression, is being explored as a target for new personalized treatments, particularly through enhancing dopaminergic pathways.
  • The study will involve detailed searches for clinical and animal studies on pro-dopaminergic interventions affecting anhedonia, with independent reviewers managing data selection and extraction.
  • Outcomes will include overall symptoms of anhedonia and side effects, with plans to update the findings every six months and collaborate with various stakeholders for comprehensive input.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Objective: To synthesise qualitative evidence on clinicians' views and experiences of defensive practice.

Design: Systematic review of qualitative data.

Data Sources: MEDLINE, Embase, PsycINFO, AMED, Maternity and Infant Care, CINAHL, ASSIA, Sociological Abstracts, Proquest Dissertations & Theses and PROSPERO were searched from 2000 to October 2023.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Introduction Adenoid tissue is part of the first line of immunity of the upper aero-digestive tract. It is located in the postero-superior wall of the nasopharynx behind the choana. Adenoid hypertrophy, a common childhood disorder, significantly contributes to the pathogenesis of otitis media with effusion (OME), which is the leading cause of hearing impairment in young children.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

A PHP Error was encountered

Severity: Warning

Message: A non-numeric value encountered

Filename: controllers/Author.php

Line Number: 219

Backtrace:

File: /var/www/html/application/controllers/Author.php
Line: 219
Function: _error_handler

File: /var/www/html/index.php
Line: 316
Function: require_once

A PHP Error was encountered

Severity: Warning

Message: A non-numeric value encountered

Filename: libraries/Pagination.php

Line Number: 413

Backtrace:

File: /var/www/html/application/controllers/Author.php
Line: 274
Function: create_links

File: /var/www/html/index.php
Line: 316
Function: require_once