Publications by authors named "Lum S"

Receptor Interacting Serine/Threonine Kinase 1 (RIPK1) is widely expressed and integral to inflammatory and cell death responses. Autosomal recessive RIPK1-deficiency, due to biallelic loss of function mutations in RIPK1, is a rare inborn error of immunity (IEI) resulting in uncontrolled necroptosis, apoptosis and inflammation. Although hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT) has been suggested as a potential curative therapy, the extent to which disease may be driven by extra-hematopoietic effects of RIPK1-deficiency, which are non-amenable to HSCT, is not clear.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: In the United States, often only tertiary centers offer cytoreductive surgery and heated intraperitoneal chemotherapy (CRS+HIPEC) for peritoneal metastases in advanced lower gastrointestinal malignancies. Growing evidence shows that Medicaid expansion under the Affordable Care Act (ACA) of 2010 enhanced healthcare access and outcomes.

Objective: We sought to determine whether Medicaid expansion was associated with decreased all-cause mortality of lower gastrointestinal cancer patients following CRS+HIPEC.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Qualitative research on child sexual abuse (CSA) in youth serving organizations (YSOs) indicates that powerful, high-status persons are better able to abuse children, because they have a superior capacity to obtain the acquiescence and overcome the resistance of children to their abusive advances, evade detection of their abusive behavior, and escape accountability for their detected abuse.

Objective: We conduct quantitative empirical analyses designed to confirm the presumption that powerful, high-status persons are better able to abuse children in YSOs.

Setting: We analyzed 85 episodes of CSA linked to Boys and Girls Clubs (BGCs) affiliated with the Boys and Girls Clubs of America, identified by a Hearst Connecticut reporting team.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Cytotoxic T-lymphocyte antigen 4 (CTLA-4) insufficiency causes a primary immune regulatory disorder characterized by lymphoproliferation, dysgammaglobulinemia, and multiorgan autoimmunity including cytopenias and colitis.

Objective: We examined the outcome of hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT) for CTLA-4 insufficiency and study the impact of pre-HSCT CTLA-4 fusion protein (CTLA-4-Ig) therapy and pre-HSCT immune dysregulation on survival and immunologic outcome.

Methods: This was a retrospective study of HSCT for CTLA-4 insufficiency and 2q33.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • A study compared outcomes of robotic, laparoscopic, and open surgery for gastric gastrointestinal stromal tumors (GIST) using data from over 15,000 patients from 2010 to 2020.
  • Results showed that minimally invasive surgery (MIS) led to shorter hospital stays and lower 30 and 90-day mortality rates compared to open surgery, but it did not significantly affect the chances of complete tumor removal.
  • Five-year survival rates were better for MIS approaches versus open surgery, while survival rates were similar between robotic and laparoscopic techniques.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Pandemic Breast Cancer Consortium (PBCC) published recommendations for triage of breast cancer patients. The recommendations included neoadjuvant treatment of early-stage breast cancer patients experiencing delays in surgery. This study evaluated national patterns of neoadjuvant treatment according to triage guidelines.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Introduction: Fragmentation of care (FC, the receipt of care at > 1 institution) has been shown to negatively impact cancer outcomes. Given the multimodal nature of breast cancer treatment, we sought to identify factors associated with FC and its effects on survival of breast cancer patients.

Methods: A retrospective analysis was performed of surgically treated, stage I-III breast cancer patients in the 2004-2020 National Cancer Database, excluding neoadjuvant therapy recipients.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Gender representation trends at the Society of American Gastrointestinal and Endoscopic Surgeons (SAGES) Annual Meetings and the effect of the 2018 'We R SAGES' initiatives are unknown. We assessed gender trends in oral presentations at the SAGES Annual Meeting between 2012 and 2022 with a focus on assessing the impact of the 2018 initiatives.

Methods: Abstracts selected for oral presentations from 2012 to 2022 were reviewed for presenter and first, second, and senior author gender.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT) is the only established curative option for Fanconi anemia (FA)-associated bone marrow failure (BMF)/aplastic anemia (AA) and acute myeloid leukemia (AML)/myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS). We performed a retrospective multicenter study on 813 children with FA undergoing first HSCT between 2010 and 2018. Median duration of follow-up was 3.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

HLA-mismatched transplants with either in vitro depletion of CD3+ T-cell receptor (TCR)αβ/CD19 (TCRαβ) cells or in vivo T-cell depletion using posttransplant cyclophosphamide (PTCY) have been increasingly used for patients with inborn errors of immunity (IEIs). We performed a retrospective multicenter study via the EBMT registry on 306 children with IEIs undergoing their first transplant between 2010 and 2019 from an HLA-mismatched donor using TCRαβ (n = 167) or PTCY (n = 139). The median age for hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT) was 1.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Traumatic hemorrhage is a prevalent cause of death nationally, with >50% of civilian deaths estimated to be preventable with more timely intervention. This study investigated the efficacy of training large and diverse audiences in bleeding control methods including tourniquets in community health fair settings.

Methods: A booth was utilized for bleeding control training at community health fairs via direct demonstrations of pressure, wound packing, and commercial and improvised tourniquet application followed by hands-on practice.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Importance: Nearly 75% of newly diagnosed cancer patients in the United States will receive care from a hospital that is accredited by the Commission on Cancer (CoC). To support hospitals in their quality assurance efforts, the CoC maintains a portfolio of quality measures to give hospitals compliance data with select best practices for cancer care. As the CoC quality measures have evolved over recent years, many clinicians may lack awareness of the intent and content of the measure portfolio, as well as the mechanism by which new measures originate.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Bird collisions with buildings are responsible for a large number of bird deaths in cities around the world, yet they remain poorly studied outside North America. We conducted one of the first citywide fine-scale and landscape-scale analyses of bird-building collisions in Asia and used maximum entropy modeling (as commonly applied to species distribution modeling) in a novel way to assess the drivers of bird-building collisions in the tropical city-state of Singapore. We combined 7 years of community science observations with publicly available building and remote sensing data.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Although firearms are implicated in the majority of law enforcement intervention (LEI)-related deaths, scientific research is lacking. The present study sought to characterize clinical and financial outcomes between injured suspects and other gunshot wound (GSW) patients.

Study Design: The 2016-2020 National Inpatient Sample was queried for patients ≥16 years old admitted following GSW.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Mycorrhizae, a form of plant-fungal symbioses, mediate vegetation impacts on ecosystem functioning. Climatic effects on decomposition and soil quality are suggested to drive mycorrhizal distributions, with arbuscular mycorrhizal plants prevailing in low-latitude/high-soil-quality areas and ectomycorrhizal (EcM) plants in high-latitude/low-soil-quality areas. However, these generalizations, based on coarse-resolution data, obscure finer-scale variations and result in high uncertainties in the predicted distributions of mycorrhizal types and their drivers.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • - This study investigated the effects of hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT) in children using either bone marrow (BM) or peripheral blood stem cells (PBSC) after conditioning with alemtuzumab, focusing on the risks of severe acute and chronic graft-versus-host disease (GVHD).
  • - In a multicenter analysis of 397 children, it was found that the PBSC group had a higher incidence of grade II-IV acute GVHD (31%) compared to the BM group (19%), but the incidence of severe (grade III-IV) GVHD was similar for both groups.
  • - The research suggested that using alemtuzumab for T cell depletion and specific prophylaxis strategies may reduce GVHD
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Introduction: We sought to compare medium-term outcomes between robotic-assisted cholecystectomy (RC) and laparoscopic cholecystectomy (LC) using validated quality of life (QoL) and pain assessments.

Materials And Methods: Patients who underwent RC or LC between 2012 and 2017 at a single academic institution were examined. Cases converted to open were excluded.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Introduction: The proportion of women surgeons is increasing, although women in surgical leadership and research has not kept pace. The Society for Surgery of the Alimentary Tract (SSAT) pledged its commitment to diversity and inclusion in 2016. Our study sought to evaluate the temporal trend of gender representation in leadership, speakership, and research at SSAT.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Collecting and reporting data on race and ethnicity is vital to understanding and addressing health disparities in the United States. These health disparities can include increased prevalence and severity of disease, poorer health outcomes, decreased access to healthcare, etc., in disadvantaged populations compared with advantaged groups.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Introduction: To complete a culturally appropriate translation of the European Organization for Research and Treatment of Cancer (EORTC) Quality of Life Questionnaire Cervical Cancer module (QLQ-CX24) from English to Chichewa (one of the official languages of Malawi) in preparation for postsurgical outcomes research in rural Malawian cervical cancer patients.

Methods: Following the EORTC translation procedure manual, two distinct forward translations from English were reconciled into a preliminary Chichewa translation, followed by two distinct back-translations to English. The English back-translation was reconciled and the translation report sent for discussion and proofreading by EORTC; this was followed by pilot testing.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Introduction: Because limited data exist, we sought to evaluate timeliness of multimodal treatments in a safety net breast cancer population.

Methods: Breast cancer patients treated at a safety net hospital from 2016 to 2020 were analyzed retrospectively. Time intervals were defined as primary time (PT) from diagnosis to initiation of primary intervention, secondary time (ST) from completion of primary to initiation of secondary intervention, and tertiary time (TT) from completion of secondary to initiation of tertiary intervention.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF