Cardiovascular events in patients with gout initiating urate-lowering therapy with or without colchicine for flare prophylaxis: a retrospective new-user cohort study using linked primary care, hospitalisation, and mortality data.

Background: Initiating urate-lowering therapy can trigger gout flares. Gout flares have been associated with a temporally increased risk of cardiovascular events. Therefore, we aimed to estimate the risk of cardiovascular events in patients with gout initiating urate-lowering therapy with flare prophylaxis using colchicine (the drug recommended for gout flare prohphylaxis by many international societies) compared with no prophylaxis.

EMSIG: Uncovering Factors Influencing COVID-19 Vaccination Across Different Subgroups Characterized by Embedding-Based Spatial Information Gain.

COVID-19 and its variants continue to pose significant threats to public health, with considerable uncertainty surrounding their impact. As of September 2024, the total number of deaths reached 8.8 million worldwide.

Assessing barriers to COVID-19 diagnostic testing in community pharmacies: Insights from Alabama.

Background: The COVID-19 pandemic stressed the critical role of diagnostic testing in controlling the spread of infectious diseases. Due to their accessibility and presence in underserved areas, community pharmacies have become vital in decentralizing COVID-19 testing. Despite their potential, pharmacies face significant barriers in integrating testing services.

Comparative effectiveness of sodium-glucose cotransporter-2 inhibitors for recurrent nephrolithiasis among patients with pre-existing nephrolithiasis or gout: target trial emulation studies.

Objective: To emulate target trials comparing recurrence of nephrolithiasis among patients with pre-existing nephrolithiasis (overall and stratified by concomitant gout) initiating sodium-glucose cotransporter-2 (SGLT-2) inhibitors versus an active comparator.

Design: Target trial emulation studies.

Setting: Canadian population database, January 2014 to June 2022.

Prediagnostic Amino Acid Metabolites and Risk of Gout, Accounting for Serum Urate: Prospective Cohort Study and Mendelian Randomization.

Objective: Our objective was to prospectively investigate prediagnostic population-based metabolome for risk of hospitalized gout (ie, most accurate, severe, and costly cases), accounting for serum urate.

Methods: We conducted prediagnostic metabolome-wide analyses among 249,677 UK Biobank participants with nuclear magnetic resonance metabolomic profiling (N = 168 metabolites, including eight amino acids) from baseline blood samples (2006-2010) without a history of gout. We calculated multivariable hazard ratios (HRs) for hospitalized incident gout, before and after adjusting for serum urate levels; we included patients with nonhospitalized incident gout in a sensitivity analysis.

Association of personalized and tumor-informed ctDNA with patient survival outcomes in pancreatic adenocarcinoma.

Introduction: Personalized and tumor-informed circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) testing is feasible and allows for molecular residual disease (MRD) identification in patients with pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC).

Methods: In this retrospective analysis of commercial cases from multiple US institutions, personalized, tumor-informed, whole-exome sequenced, and germline-controlled ctDNA levels were quantified and analyzed in patients with PDAC. Plasma samples (n = 1329) from 298 clinically validated patients were collected at diagnosis, perioperatively (MRD-window; within 2-12 weeks after surgery, before therapy), and during surveillance (>12 weeks post-surgery if no ACT or starting 4 weeks post-ACT) from November 2019 to March 2023.

Serum urate change among gout patients treated with sodium-glucose cotransporter type 2 inhibitors vs. sulfonylurea: A comparative effectiveness analysis.

Objective: To investigate the serum urate (SU) change among gout patients initiating SGLT2i, and to compare with sulfonylurea, the second-most widely used glucose-lowering medication after metformin.

Methods: We conducted a cohort study of patients with gout and baseline SU >6 mg/dL who had SU measured within 90 days before and after SGLT2i or sulfonylurea initiation. Using multivariable linear regression, we compared SU change among SGLT2i initiators between those with and without diabetes and then compared SU change between SGLT2i and sulfonylurea.

Sodium-Glucose Cotransporter-2 Inhibitors vs Sulfonylureas for Gout Prevention Among Patients With Type 2 Diabetes Receiving Metformin.

Importance: Sodium-glucose cotransporter type 2 inhibitors (SGLT2i) are a revolutionary treatment for type 2 diabetes (T2D) with cardiovascular, kidney, and serum urate-lowering benefits.

Objective: To compare risk of incident gout and rate of recurrent flares between patients with T2D initiating SGLT2i vs sulfonylurea, most common second-line glucose-lowering therapy, when added to metformin monotherapy.

Design, Setting, And Participants: This sequential, propensity score-matched, new-user comparative effectiveness study using target trial emulation framework included adults with T2D receiving metformin monotherapy in a Canadian general population database from January 1, 2014, to June 30, 2022.

Serum Urate and Recurrent Gout.

Importance: Approximately 12 million adults in the US have a history of gout, but whether serum urate levels can help predict recurrence is unclear.

Objective: To assess associations of a single serum urate measurement with subsequent risk of acute gout flares and subsequent risk of hospitalizations for gout among patients in the UK with a history of gout.

Design, Setting, And Participants: This retrospective study included patients with a history of gout identified from the UK between 2006 and 2010 who were followed up through Primary Care Linked Data medical record linkage until 2017 and through the Hospital Episode Statistics database until 2020.

Factors Associated with the Implementation of Pediatric Immunization Services: A Survey of Community Pharmacies.

Pharmacists are well-positioned to help increase pediatric immunization rates. This study assessed the types of pediatric vaccines offered in community pharmacies, compared participant/pharmacy characteristics and participants' perceptions of barriers and pharmacists' role in providing pediatric immunizations between pharmacy-based providers and non-providers, and assessed factors associated with pharmacy-based pediatric immunization provision. A cross-sectional survey was sent to Alabama community pharmacies from February to April 2023, of which 240 responded (20.

Utilization of Immunization Information Systems (IIS) among independently owned community pharmacies: A national survey.

Background/objective: Immunization information systems (IIS) consolidate provider-submitted immunization information. We reassessed independently owned community pharmacies' IIS enrollment, verification of immunizations needs via IIS records retrieval, and immunization records reporting to IISs following post-pandemic shifts in community pharmacy operations.

Methods: A cross-sectional online survey of National Community Pharmacists Association pharmacist, pharmacy owner, and pharmacy technician members was conducted in Fall 2022.

Betaproteobacteria are a key component of surface water biofilters that maintain sustained manganese removal in response to fluctuations in influent water temperature.

The health risks associated with manganese (Mn) in drinking water, and an improved understanding of Mn accumulation within, and subsequent release from, distribution systems, have increased the need for robust, sustainable treatment options to minimize Mn concentrations in finished water. Biofiltration is an established and effective method to remove Mn in groundwater however, Mn removal in surface water biofilters is an emerging treatment process that has not been extensively studied. Seasonal variations in water temperature can present an operational challenge for surface water biofilters which may see reduced Mn removal under colder conditions.

Comparative Effectiveness of Sodium-Glucose Cotransporter-2 Inhibitors for Recurrent Gout Flares and Gout-Primary Emergency Department Visits and Hospitalizations : A General Population Cohort Study.

Background: Sodium-glucose cotransporter-2 inhibitors (SGLT2is) decrease serum urate levels, but whether this translates into prevention of recurrent flares among patients with gout and gout-primary emergency department (ED) visits or hospitalizations is unknown.

Objective: To compare gout flares and cardiovascular events among patients with gout initiating SGLT2is versus dipeptidyl peptidase 4 inhibitors (DPP-4is), another second-line glucose-lowering agent not associated with serum urate levels or cardiovascular risk.

Design: Propensity score-matched, new-user cohort study.

Qualitative analysis of community pharmacy-based COVID-19 immunization service operations.

Background: The unprecedented coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has generated worldwide impacts while positioning community pharmacies as easily accessible immunizers to rollout the COVID-19 vaccine.

Objectives: This study describes community pharmacists' experiences, success stories, and lessons learned from providing COVID-19 immunization services.

Methods: This study was conducted in February to March 2022 using semistructured interviews with licensed pharmacists practicing full-time in Alabama community pharmacies.

Current published evidence on barriers and proposed strategies for genetic testing implementation in health care settings: A scoping review.

Background: The slow uptake of genetic testing in routine clinical practice warrants the attention of researchers and practitioners to find effective strategies to facilitate implementation.

Objectives: This study aimed to identify the barriers to and strategies for pharmacogenetic testing implementation in a health care setting from published literature.

Methods: A scoping review was conducted in August 2021 with an expanded literature search using Ovid MEDLINE, Web of Science, International Pharmaceutical Abstract, and Google Scholar to identify studies reporting implementation of pharmacogenetic testing in a health care setting, from a health care system's perspective.

Prediagnostic Glycoprotein Acetyl Levels and Incident and Recurrent Flare Risk Accounting for Serum Urate Levels: A Population-Based, Prospective Study and Mendelian Randomization Analysis.

Objective: To prospectively investigate population-based metabolomics for incident gout and reproduce the findings for recurrent flares, accounting for serum urate.

Methods: We conducted a prediagnostic metabolome-wide analysis among 105,615 UK Biobank participants with nuclear magnetic resonance metabolomic profiling data (168 total metabolites) from baseline blood samples collected 2006-2010 in those without history of gout. We calculated hazard ratios (HRs) for incident gout, adjusted for gout risk factors, excluding and including serum urate levels, overall and according to fasting duration before sample collection.

Two-term scattering phase function for photon transport to model subdiffuse reflectance in superficial tissues.

For Monte Carlo simulations of light transport in a variety of diffuse scattering applications, a single-scattering two-term phase function with five adjustable parameters is sufficiently flexible to separately control the forward and backward components of scattering. The forward component dominates light penetration into a tissue and the resulting diffuse reflectance. The backward component controls early subdiffuse scatter from superficial tissues.

The current state of transplant advanced practice providers: results of the advanced practice provider practice survey.

Advanced practice providers (APPs) are trained, licensed health care providers. The American Society of Transplant APP community of practice developed an electronic survey to investigate transplant APP demographics, scope of practice, and academic activities. We defined the top of scope of practice as delivering health care to the fullest extent of APP education and training as allowed by state laws and regulations.

Hydroxychloroquine Dose and Risk for Incident Retinopathy : A Cohort Study.

Background: Hydroxychloroquine is recommended for all patients with systemic lupus erythematosus and is often used for other inflammatory conditions, but a critical long-term adverse effect is vision-threatening retinopathy.

Objective: To characterize the long-term risk for incident hydroxychloroquine retinopathy and examine the degree to which average hydroxychloroquine dose within the first 5 years of treatment predicts this risk.

Design: Cohort study.