Multimodal classification of Alzheimer's disease and mild cognitive impairment using custom MKSCDDL kernel over CNN with transparent decision-making for explainable diagnosis.

The study presents an innovative diagnostic framework that synergises Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs) with a Multi-feature Kernel Supervised within-class-similar Discriminative Dictionary Learning (MKSCDDL). This integrative methodology is designed to facilitate the precise classification of individuals into categories of Alzheimer's Disease, Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI), and Cognitively Normal (CN) statuses while also discerning the nuanced phases within the MCI spectrum. Our approach is distinguished by its robustness and interpretability, offering clinicians an exceptionally transparent tool for diagnosis and therapeutic strategy formulation.

Effects of Dog-Assisted Therapy on Communication and Basic Social Skills of Adults With Intellectual Disabilities: A Pilot Study.

Thirty-nine adults with severe to profound intellectual disability (ID) were randomly assigned to either an experimental group (n = 21) or a control group (n = 18). Assessment was blinded and included selected items from the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF), the Behavioral Assessment Battery (BAB), and the Learning Accomplishment Profile (LAP). The experimental group, who attended a dog-assisted treatment intervention over a 20-week period, showed significant improvements in several cognitive domains, including attention to movement (BAB-AM), visuomotor coordination (BAB-VM), exploratory play (BAB-EP), and motor imitation (BAB-CO-MI), as well as in some social skills, as measured by LAP items.

"Open" repair of ruptured thoracoabdominal aortic aneurysm (experience of 51 cases).

Introduction: Surgical treatment of toracoabdominal aortic aneurysms (TAAA) represents a difficult problem for the vascular surgeon and may become a formidable challenge in an emergency procedure. In patient with hemodynamic instability, protective measures as cerebral spinal fluid drainage and bio-pump against spinal cord, visceral and renal ischemia, may be ineffective or impracticable.

Material And Methods: We report our experience of 51 emergency-operated patients with TAAA out of 660 treated between 1994 and 2014; 48 patients (94%) were hemodynamically unstable, 3 (6%) were hemodynamically stable.

Exposure of the proximal descending thoracic aorta in the first stage of the elephant trunk procedure.

My colleagues and I propose a simple and reproducible technique to achieve optimal exposure and mobilization of the distal aortic arch and proximal descending thoracic aorta in the first stage of the elephant trunk procedure. The technique uses division of the ligamentum arteriosum and a series of circumferential pledgeted traction stitches on the segment of aorta selected for the distal anastomosis.