Publications by authors named "Kogan A"

Introduction: The World Health Organization global standard for representing drug data is the Anatomical Therapeutic Chemical (ATC) classification. However, it does not represent ingredients and other drug properties required by clinical decision support systems. A mapping to a terminology system that contains this information, like RxNorm, may help fill this gap.

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  • Nutcracker syndrome is a condition where the left renal vein is compressed by the superior mesenteric artery and aorta, potentially causing symptoms like abdominal pain and hematuria.
  • A case study describes a 10-year-old girl who experienced chronic left flank pain for over two years and was diagnosed with Nutcracker syndrome.
  • Her treatment involved surgically moving the left ovarian vein to relieve pressure on the left renal vein, and she has been symptom-free one year post-surgery, highlighting the procedure's effectiveness and low complication rate.
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Immunodetection of cardiac isoforms of troponin I (cTnI) and troponin T (cTnT) in blood samples is widely used for the diagnosis of acute myocardial infarction. The cardiac troponin complex (ITC-complex), comprising cTnI, cTnT, and troponin C (TnC), makes up a large portion of troponins released into the bloodstream after the necrosis of cardiomyocytes. However, the stability of the ITC-complex has not been fully investigated.

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  • The war that started on October 7, 2023, has led to an unexpected rise in open-heart surgeries at Israel's largest cardiac surgery department, despite half of the surgeons being in military service.
  • A study analyzed data from 275 patients who had cardiac surgeries or ECMO during the first two months of the war, comparing it to a similar period in 2022.
  • Results showed a 33% increase in open-heart procedures and a significant rise in transplants in 2023, but patient outcomes, including complications and mortality rates, remained consistent with those from 2022.
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  • Atrial fibrillation (AF) is a common heart rhythm disorder, and this study explores the effectiveness of surgical ablation as a treatment option, especially for patients also undergoing other cardiac surgeries.
  • The research involved 668 patients who underwent this procedure between 2006 and 2022, assessing their outcomes over multiple years, including recurrence of AF and mortality rates.
  • Results showed high success rates for maintaining freedom from AF, with success decreasing slightly over 7 years, while factors like age, female sex, and diabetes were linked to higher risks of recurrence and mortality.
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Objectives: Heparin is a highly charged polysaccharide used as an anticoagulant to prevent blood coagulation in patients with presumed myocardial infarction and to prepare heparin plasma samples for laboratory tests. There are conflicting data regarding the effects of heparin on the measurement of cardiac isoforms of troponin I (cTnI) and troponin T (cTnT), which are used for the immunodiagnosis of acute myocardial infarction. In this study, we investigated the influence of heparin on the immunodetection of human cardiac troponins.

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Codon optimization has evolved to enhance protein expression efficiency by exploiting the genetic code's redundancy, allowing for multiple codon options for a single amino acid. Initially observed in , optimal codon usage correlates with high gene expression, which has propelled applications expanding from basic research to biopharmaceuticals and vaccine development. The method is especially valuable for adjusting immune responses in gene therapies and has the potenial to create tissue-specific therapies.

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Introduction: People experiencing unsheltered homelessness (PEUH) have higher disease burden yet limited access to healthcare. COVID-19 introduced even greater risk for PEUH aged 65+ years with an underlying chronic health condition and were temporarily housed in hotels/motels for Project RoomKey (PRK). This study aimed to characterize a PRK cohort who received primary care from a street medicine program.

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  • The study analyzed the use of extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) in pregnant women experiencing severe respiratory or circulatory failure across 10 hospitals in Israel over three years.
  • Out of 540,234 live births, only 28 obstetric patients (5.2 per 100,000 births) were treated with ECMO, primarily for hypoxic respiratory failure due to conditions like ARDS, with COVID-19 being a significant factor.
  • Despite the low incidence, ECMO resulted in high survival rates for both mothers (89.3%) and babies (100%), with complications being rare.
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Background: Since treatment with immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs) is becoming standard therapy for patients with high-risk and advanced melanoma, an increasing number of patients experience treatment-related adverse events such as fatigue. Until now, studies have demonstrated the benefits of using eHealth tools to provide either symptom monitoring or interventions to reduce treatment-related symptoms such as fatigue. However, an eHealth tool that facilitates the combination of both symptom monitoring and symptom management in patients with melanoma treated with ICIs is still needed.

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Introduction: Open science initiatives have enabled sharing of large amounts of already collected data. However, significant gaps remain regarding how to find appropriate data, including underutilized data that exist in the long tail of science. We demonstrate the NeuroBridge prototype and its ability to search PubMed Central full-text papers for information relevant to neuroimaging data collected from schizophrenia and addiction studies.

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Transcriptional memory is characterized by a primed cellular state, induced by an external stimulus that results in an altered expression of primed genes upon re-exposure to the inducing signal. Intriguingly, the primed state is heritably maintained across somatic cell divisions even after the initial stimulus and target gene transcription cease. This phenomenon is widely observed across various organisms and appears to enable cells to retain a memory of external signals, thereby adapting to environmental changes.

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  • - Severe respiratory failure from COVID-19 often necessitates mechanical ventilation and can involve ECMO; lung transplantation is a rare last resort with unclear patient selection and timing.
  • - A study of 20 patients supported by ECMO found that 16 remained for analysis, revealing that nine recovered while seven died while waiting for lung transplantation.
  • - Younger patients showed a better recovery chance without lung transplantation after about 59 days on ECMO compared to a median of 99 days for those who died, suggesting a delay of 8-10 weeks for referral to transplantation for potentially recoverable patients.
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  • - The CAPABLE project developed a multi-agent system to assist cancer patients and their clinicians by providing coaching advice and decision support based on clinical guidelines.
  • - A Case Manager (CM) orchestrates the agents' activities by monitoring patient data on a shared blackboard and using a special syntax inspired by HL7-FHIR for effective communication.
  • - The CM has been validated through simulations and is essential for coordinating the agents, with potential applications for integrating various healthcare services into a seamless telemedicine system.
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  • Postoperative atrial fibrillation (POAF) is a common complication after cardiac surgery, linked to higher mortality and complications, but the long-term recurrence rate is not well-understood.
  • The study followed 22 patients with POAF, using either an implanted loop recorder or ECG monitoring to track AF recurrence over two years, finding about 35.7% experienced recurrence.
  • Results showed no significant difference between monitoring methods, with patients receiving anticoagulation treatment, and no major adverse events like mortality or strokes reported, indicating a need for further research on monitoring methods in this patient group.*
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Objective: The study has dual objectives. Our first objective (1) is to develop a community-of-practice-based evaluation methodology for knowledge-intensive computational methods. We target a whitebox analysis of the computational methods to gain insight on their functional features and inner workings.

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TACROLIMUS, a mainstay of immunosuppression after orthotopic heart transplantation (OHT), is associated with a broad range of side effects. Vasoconstriction caused by tacrolimus has been proposed as a mechanism underlying common side effects such as hypertension and renal injury. Neurologic side effects attributed to tacrolimus include headaches, posterior reversible encephalopathy syndrome (PRES), or reversible cerebral vasospasm syndrome (RCVS).

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  • Diabetes type 2 is associated with higher health risks and complications in patients undergoing surgical ablation for atrial fibrillation (AF), particularly older age and higher rates of conditions like hypertension and stroke.
  • A study involving 606 patients compared outcomes between non-diabetic and diabetic patients after AF ablation, revealing similar short-term AF recurrence and mortality rates within the first 3 years, but a notably higher 5-year mortality rate in diabetic patients.
  • The findings suggest that while surgical ablation is effective for both groups, long-term outcomes may be less favorable for patients with diabetes type 2.
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Background: Blood measurement of cardiac troponin T (cTnT) is one of the most widespread methods of acute myocardial infarction (MI) diagnosis. cTnT degradation may have a significant influence on the precision of cTnT immunodetection; however, there are no consistent data describing the level and sites of cTnT proteolysis in the blood of MI patients. In this study, we bordered major cTnT fragments and quantified their relative abundance in the blood at different times after MI.

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  • This study looked at how the timing of a procedure called tracheostomy (a way to help people breathe after heart surgery) affects how long patients live after surgery.
  • It found that having this procedure done early (within 4-10 days) is linked to better survival compared to those who had it done later.
  • The study also kept track of infections in patients' wounds, but the main finding was that getting the tracheostomy sooner helps patients live longer after their surgery.
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Recently, the mRNA platform has become the method of choice in vaccine development to find new ways to fight infectious diseases. However, this approach has shortcomings, namely that mRNA vaccines require special storage conditions, which makes them less accessible. This instability is due to the fact that the five-prime and three-prime ends of the mRNA are a substrate for the ubiquitous exoribonucleases.

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Cancer is the second leading cause of death worldwide after heart disease. The current treatment options to fight cancer are limited, and there is a critical need for better treatment strategies. During the last several decades, several electric field (EF)-based approaches for anti-cancer therapies have been introduced, such as electroporation and tumor-treating fields; still, they are far from optimal due to their invasive nature, limited efficacy and significant side effects.

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Introduction: Primary care research is an important field of study within medicine, but little research has characterized medical students' projects on this topic. Second-year medical students at the Keck School of Medicine (KSOM) of University of Southern California are required to complete a research project on a topic of their choice. This study seeks to describe the scope of primary care medical student research conducted by KSOM medical students and specifically Primary Care Program (PCP) pipeline students.

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