Publications by authors named "Nam Tran"

Objective: Current guidelines recommend treatment of patients with asymptomatic carotid stenosis when stroke/death rates less than 3% can be achieved. However, in the Pacific Northwest region of the Vascular Quality Initiative (VQI) elevated stroke/death rates have been reported. This study aims to characterize regional and center-specific outcomes for transcarotid artery revascularization (TCAR) and transfemoral carotid artery stenting (TF-CAS) and investigate potential underlying drivers.

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  • - The study examined how nutrition-related symptoms affect the quality of life (QoL) for advanced non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients, using assessments like the PG-SGA and EORTC QLQ-LC13 tools.
  • - Data was collected from 170 patients undergoing chemotherapy, revealing that poor nutritional status is significantly linked to a decline in QoL.
  • - While some symptoms, like cough and shortness of breath, showed a moderate positive correlation with nutritional assessments, many other symptoms had weak correlations, indicating that focusing solely on nutrition may not sufficiently improve QoL for these patients.
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Background: Online child sexual victimization is increasingly facilitated by technology, but evidence of its prevalence and characteristics remains scarce. Reliable population-based data is critical to understand the magnitude and nature of the problem, and inform evidence-based prevention.

Objective: To determine the prevalence of nonconsensual sharing of sexual images of the child by any perpetrator, and of online sexual solicitation by any adult perpetrator; and to determine the characteristics of these experiences.

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Objective: To compare embryologic and clinical outcomes following oocyte cryopreservation (OC) and immediate fertilization for embryo cryopreservation (EC) in non-infertile patients.

Design: Retrospective cohort study SUBJECTS: Patients treated at a single fertility center from 2016 to 2023.

Exposure: OC MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Blastocyst development was compared between women undergoing OC and non-infertile women undergoing immediate fertilization for EC between 18 and 42 years of age.

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  • - Proteases play a crucial role in inflammation but are not well-studied in the immune response to biomedical implants, which is essential for their clinical success.
  • - The study analyzes the activity of neutrophil elastase, matrix metalloproteinases, and cysteine cathepsins in mice, showing that different materials affect protease activity levels, with biodegradable ones like poly(lactic-co-glycolic) acid triggering the most activity.
  • - Results indicate a connection between protease activity and the expression of inflammatory cytokines, suggesting that monitoring protease activity could be a valuable method for assessing the inflammatory response to biomaterials and guiding the development of better implants.
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The rapidly evolving landscape of artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) in medicine has prompted medical professionals to increasingly familiarize themselves with related topics. This also demands grasping the underlying statistical principles that govern their design, validation, and reproducibility. Uniquely, the practice of pathology and medicine produces vast amount of data that can be exploited by AI/ML.

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Empirical antibiotic prescription guidelines were developed at the University Medical Center Ho Chi Minh City in 2020, which included recommendations for the use of antibiotics to treat diabetic foot infections (DFIs). This study investigated the treatment outcomes when implementing empirical antibiotic guidelines. This retrospective study included 120 inpatients with DFIs at the Department of Endocrinology, University Medical Center Ho Chi Minh City.

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Metrics derived from continuous glucose monitoring (CGM) systems are often discordant between systems. A major cause is that CGM systems are not standardized; they use various algorithms and calibration methods, leading to discordant CGM readings across systems. This discordance can be addressed by standardizing CGM performance assessments: If manufacturers aim their CGM systems at the same target, then CGM readings will align across systems.

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Pharmacogenetics promises to optimize treatment-related outcomes by informing optimal drug selection and dosing based on an individual's genotype in conjunction with other important clinical factors. Despite significant evidence of genetic associations with drug response, pharmacogenetic testing has not been widely implemented into clinical practice. Among the barriers to broad implementation are limited guidance for how to successfully integrate testing into clinical workflows and limited data on outcomes with pharmacogenetic implementation in clinical practice.

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Continuous glucose monitoring (CGM) systems provide frequent glucose measurements in interstitial fluid and have been used widely in ambulatory settings for diabetes management. During the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, regulators in the U.S.

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In extreme environments people will have different needs for medicine(s), making it crucial to understand how such environments affect drug efficacy. Ibuprofen, commonly used in tablet formulation on Earth, could fail in space despite standard pharmaceutical packaging. We introduce the concept of 'space medicines', where solid-dosage forms protect the pharmaceutical from accelerated degradation in spaceflight.

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  • An error grid is a tool that helps compare glucose levels measured by devices to see if they are correct and to identify any risks.
  • Experts created a new error grid called the DTS Error Grid that works for both blood glucose monitors (BGMs) and continuous glucose monitors (CGMs), organizing accuracy into five risk zones.
  • The results showed that the DTS Error Grid provides a clearer picture of how accurate these devices are and includes a separate matrix to evaluate how well CGMs track glucose trends over time.
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Biogas digestive effluent (BDE) has been applied to rice fields in the Vietnamese Mekong Delta (VMD). However, limited information is available on the community composition and isolation of methanotrophs in these fields. Therefore, the present study aimed (i) to clarify the responses of the methanotrophic community in paddy fields fertilized with BDE or synthetic fertilizer (SF) and (ii) to isolate methanotrophs from these fields.

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Single-atom iron embedded in N-doped carbon (Fe-N-C) is among the most representative single-atomic catalysts (SACs) for electrochemical CO reduction reaction (CORR). Despite the simplicity of the active site, the CO-to-CO mechanism on Fe-N-C remains controversial. Firstly, there is a long debate regarding the rate-determining step (RDS) of the reactions.

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  • * Circulating extracellular vesicles (EVs) from patients are promising as sepsis biomarkers, as they are linked to bacterial activity and immune response.
  • * This study uses Raman spectroscopy on EVs from patient plasma, achieving high sensitivity (97.5%) and specificity (90.0%) in detecting sepsis, indicating their potential as effective diagnostic tools in burn care.
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Rice-shrimp rotation systems are one of the widespread farming practices in the Vietnamese Mekong Delta coastal areas. However, greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in the system have remained unclear. This study aimed to examine methane (CH) and nitrous oxide (NO) emissions from the system, including land-based versus high-density polyethylene-lined (HDPE) nursery ponds and conventional versus improved grow-out ponds inoculated with effective microorganisms (EM) bioproducts.

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Background: Metastases to the bone of aortic sarcoma include osteolytic and nonosteolytic lesions. This study aims to review the clinical symptoms, the sites, and diagnostic methods of bone metastases and to compare the osteolytic and nonosteolytic metastases of patients with aortic sarcoma.

Methods: A systematic search was conducted in PubMed and scientific journals published from 1972 to 2022.

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Introduction: The incidence of sexually transmitted infections (STI) increased in the United States between 2017-2021. There is limited data describing STI co-testing practices and the prevalence of STI co-infections in emergency departments (ED). In this study, we aimed to describe the prevalence of co-testing and co-infection of HIV, hepatitis C virus (HCV), syphilis, gonorrhea, and chlamydia, in a large, academic ED.

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Sepsis following burn trauma is a global complication with high mortality, with ~60% of burn patient deaths resulting from infectious complications. Sepsis diagnosis is complicated by confounding clinical manifestations of the burn injury, and current biomarkers markers lack the sensitivity and specificity required for prompt treatment. Circulating extracellular vesicles (EVs) from patient liquid biopsy as biomarkers of sepsis due to their release by pathogens from bacterial biofilms and roles in subsequent immune response.

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Urbanization and economic development cause water pollution in the inner-city canals and rivers globally. Bung Xang canal in Can Tho city of Vietnam is facing problems with water pollution due to the lack of centralized wastewater treatment plants and low public awareness on environmental protection. Perception of local residents was collected using structured questionnaires including both qualitative and quantitative information.

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Extracellular vesicles (EVs) are emerging as a promising drug delivery vehicle as they are biocompatible and capable of targeted delivery. However, clinical translation of EVs remains challenging due to the lack of standardized and scalable manufacturing protocols to consistently isolate small EVs (sEVs) with both high yield and high purity. The heterogenous nature of sEVs leading to unknown composition of biocargos causes further pushback due to safety concerns.

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Background: Intramedullary spinal cord abscesses (ISCA) can result in high morbidity and mortality if not treated in a timely manner. The incidence and outcomes of postsurgical ISCA are unknown. We present a case of a 52-year-old male patient with neurofibromatosis type 1 who developed an intramedullary spinal cord abscess after a previous resection of a cervical intradural, extramedullary neurofibroma.

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Study Objectives: Evidence from studies among non-Indigenous populations has established the association of poor sleep to mental health issues and supported how improving sleep could reduce the risk of mental ill health. In contrast, for Indigenous people, who experience disproportionate rates of mental ill health, the association between sleep and mental health and the potential of sleep health in reducing the risk and severity of mental health issues have never been fully reviewed. Considering the literature gap, this review assesses the association between sleep and mental health in Indigenous people.

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Introduction: Procalcitonin (PCT) is a useful biomarker in the initial evaluation of febrile infants for serious bacterial infections (SBIs). However, PCT is not always available locally and must at times be frozen and shipped to a reference laboratory for research studies. We sought to compare PCT measured locally versus centrally at a reference laboratory during a research study.

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