Sources of PM exposure misclassification in three Finnish register-based study populations and the impact on attenuation of health effect estimates.

Air pollution is a leading environmental health risk factor. The risk estimates, primarily based on air pollution epidemiology, are sensitive to exposure misclassification, which can result in underestimation. To address some of these challenges, our aim is to investigate how the length of the period over which the exposure is averaged, trends in long-term PM concentrations, and the seasonal variability are associated with each other.

Text mining for contexts and relationships in cancer genomics literature.

Motivation: Scientific advances build on the findings of existing research. The 2001 publication of the human genome has led to the production of huge volumes of literature exploring the context-specific functions and interactions of genes. Technology is needed to perform large-scale text mining of research papers to extract the reported actions of genes in specific experimental contexts and cell states, such as cancer, thereby facilitating the design of new therapeutic strategies.

How Much Speech Data Is Needed for Tracking Language Change in Alzheimer's Disease? A Comparison of Random Length, 5-Min, and 1-Min Spontaneous Speech Samples.

Introduction: Changes in speech can act as biomarkers of cognitive decline in Alzheimer's disease (AD). While shorter speech samples would promote data collection and analysis, the minimum length of informative speech samples remains debated. This study aims to provide insight into the effect of sample length in analyzing longitudinal recordings of spontaneous speech in AD by comparing the original random length, 5- and 1-minute-long samples.

Development of diabetic macular oedema shows associations with systemic medication - An epidemiological study.

Purpose: To identify associations between systemic drugs and the incidence of diabetic macular oedema (DME). Of interest was to find beneficial and/or deleterious associations of used drugs.

Methods: A historic cohort design based on administrative data.

Etiology of intracerebral hemorrhage during pregnancy or puerperium: A nationwide study.

Background And Purpose: Intracerebral hemorrhage during pregnancy or puerperium (pICH) is one of the leading causes of maternal death worldwide. However, limited epidemiological data exist on the etiology and outcomes of pICH, which is required to guide prevention and treatment.

Methods: A retrospective nationwide cohort study and a nested case-control study was performed in Finland 1987-2016.

Synthetic computed tomography based dose calculation in prostate cancer patients with hip prostheses for magnetic resonance imaging-only radiotherapy.

Background And Purpose: Metallic hip prostheses cause substantial artefacts in both computed tomography (CT) and magnetic resonance (MR) images used in radiotherapy treatment planning (RTP) for prostate cancer patients. The aim of this study was to evaluate the dose calculation accuracy of a synthetic CT (sCT) generation workflow and the improvement in implant visibility using metal artefact reduction sequences.

Materials And Methods: The study included 23 patients with prostate cancer who had hip prostheses, of which 10 patients had bilateral hip implants.

Etiology and risk factors of ischemic stroke during pregnancy and puerperium: A population-based study.

Introduction: Ischemic stroke (IS) is an uncommon, but potentially life-changing, complication of pregnancy. The aim of this study was to analyze the etiology and risk factors of pregnancy-associated IS.

Patients And Methods: We collected a population-based retrospective cohort of patients diagnosed with IS during pregnancy or puerperium in Finland from 1987 to 2016.

Pregnancy-associated stroke and the recurrence of stroke and other complications in subsequent pregnancies: Population-based retrospective cohort study.

Objective: To examine the outcomes of the subsequent pregnancies from women with a previous pregnancy-associated stroke (PAS) in comparison to matched controls.

Design: Population-based retrospective cohort study.

Setting And Population: All women with a PAS in Finland 1987-2016 (n = 235) and controls (n = 694).

Long-term exposure to low-level particulate air pollution and Parkinson's disease diagnosis - A Finnish register-based study.

Background: There is mixed evidence for an association between particulate matter air pollution and Parkinson's disease despite biological plausibility.

Objectives: We studied the association between particulate air pollution, its components and Parkinson's disease (PD) risk.

Methods: We conducted a nested case-control study within the population of Finland using national registers.

The Generalizability of Longitudinal Changes in Speech Before Alzheimer's Disease Diagnosis.

Background: Language impairment in Alzheimer's disease (AD) has been widely studied but due to limited data availability, relatively few studies have focused on the longitudinal change in language in the individuals who later develop AD. Significant differences in speech have previously been found by comparing the press conference transcripts of President Bush and President Reagan, who was later diagnosed with AD.

Objective: In the current study, we explored whether the patterns previously established in the single AD-healthy control (HC) participant pair apply to a larger group of individuals who later receive AD diagnosis.

Subarachnoid Hemorrhage During Pregnancy and Puerperium: A Population-Based Study.

Background: Pregnancy-related subarachnoid hemorrhage (pSAH) is rare, but it causes high mortality and morbidity. Nevertheless, data on pSAH are limited. The objectives here were to examine the incidence trends, causes, risk factors, and outcomes of pSAH in a nationwide population-based cohort study in Finland covering 30 years.

Risk of glaucoma after vitreoretinal surgery - Findings from a population-based cohort study.

Purpose: To investigate the association between different types of vitrectomy and risk of different types of glaucoma and to determine the effect of systemic medication and diabetes status on this risk.

Methods: A population-based nested case-control study included individuals of age ≥ 18 years who had undergone single vitrectomy, vitrectomy with retinal procedure, or combined phaco-vitrectomy between 2001 and 2010. End of follow-up was 2017.

Landscape context and substrate characteristics shape fungal communities of dead spruce in urban and semi-natural forests.

Urban green areas are becoming increasingly recognized for their biodiversity potential. However, little is known about how urbanization shapes cryptic species communities, such as those residing in deadwood. In this study, we investigated downed Norway spruce trunks at intermediate stages of decay, in urban and semi-natural forests in southern Finland.

Proliferative diabetic retinopathy transcriptomes reveal angiogenesis, anti-angiogenic therapy escape mechanisms, fibrosis and lymphatic involvement.

Proliferative diabetic retinopathy (PDR) is a sight-threatening diabetic complication in urgent need of new therapies. In this study we identify potential molecular mechanisms and target candidates in the pathogenesis of PDR fibrovascular tissue formation. We performed mRNA sequencing of RNA isolated from eleven excised fibrovascular membranes of type 1 diabetic PDR patients and two non-diabetic patients with rhegmatogenous retinal detachment with proliferative vitreoretinopathy.

BioVerbNet: a large semantic-syntactic classification of verbs in biomedicine.

Background: Recent advances in representation learning have enabled large strides in natural language understanding; However, verbal reasoning remains a challenge for state-of-the-art systems. External sources of structured, expert-curated verb-related knowledge have been shown to boost model performance in different Natural Language Processing (NLP) tasks where accurate handling of verb meaning and behaviour is critical. The costliness and time required for manual lexicon construction has been a major obstacle to porting the benefits of such resources to NLP in specialised domains, such as biomedicine.

Application of Text Mining in Risk Assessment of Chemical Mixtures: A Case Study of Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons (PAHs).

Background: Cancer risk assessment of complex exposures, such as exposure to mixtures of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), is challenging due to the diverse biological activities of these compounds. With the help of text mining (TM), we have developed TM tools-the latest iteration of the Cancer Risk Assessment using Biomedical literature tool (CRAB3) and a Cancer Hallmarks Analytics Tool (CHAT)-that could be useful for automatic literature analyses in cancer risk assessment and research. Although CRAB3 analyses are based on carcinogenic modes of action (MOAs) and cover almost all the key characteristics of carcinogens, CHAT evaluates literature according to the hallmarks of cancer referring to the alterations in cellular behavior that characterize the cancer cell.

Analysis of spatial factors, time-activity and infiltration on outdoor generated PM exposures of school children in five European cities.

Atmospheric particles are a major environmental health risk. Assessments of air pollution related health burden are often based on outdoor concentrations estimated at residential locations, ignoring spatial mobility, time-activity patterns, and indoor exposures. The aim of this work is to quantify impacts of these factors on outdoor-originated fine particle exposures of school children.

Prevalence and impact of hazardous alcohol use in intensive care cohort: A multicenter, register-based study.

Background: Reports of the prevalence and impact of hazardous alcohol use among intensive care unit (ICU) patients are contradictory. We aimed to study the prevalence of hazardous alcohol use among ICU patients and its association with ICU length of stay (LOS) and mortality.

Methods: Finnish ICUs have been using the Alcohol Use Disorder Identification Test-Consumption (AUDIT-C) to evaluate and record patients' alcohol use into the Finnish Intensive Care Consortium's Database (FICC).

Stroke in Pregnancy and Puerperium: Validated Incidence Trends With Risk Factor Analysis in Finland 1987-2016.

Objective: To investigate whether previously reported increasing incidence of pregnancy-associated stroke (PAS) is observed in chart-validated register data in Finland. In an exploratory analysis, we studied risk factors for PAS.

Methods: We performed a retrospective population-based cohort study and nested case-control study in Finland from 1987 to 2016.

The role of managers in promoting good hand hygiene in a Finnish tertiary care hospital.

Background: Hospital managers play an essential role in implementing strategies to promote good hand hygiene (HH) among health care workers. We investigated the managers' views on their roles, challenges and developmental ideas in promoting good HH practice.

Methods: A descriptive cross-sectional study with an online survey of both medical and nursing managers was conducted within a single tertiary care hospital in Finland.

A systematic literature review of automatic Alzheimer's disease detection from speech and language.

Objective: In recent years numerous studies have achieved promising results in Alzheimer's Disease (AD) detection using automatic language processing. We systematically review these articles to understand the effectiveness of this approach, identify any issues and report the main findings that can guide further research.

Materials And Methods: We searched PubMed, Ovid, and Web of Science for articles published in English between 2013 and 2019.