Publications by authors named "Pekka Vartiainen"

Article Synopsis
  • Low drug adherence significantly hampers the effectiveness of prescribed medications, making it crucial to understand the factors that lead to poor adherence and discontinuation of treatments.
  • Analysis of data from over 1.8 million individuals reveals that socio-demographic factors, such as needing social assistance and immigration status, negatively impact medication adherence and persistence, while demographic and health factors show less consistent effects.
  • Genetic factors show limited association with adherence, with some pharmacogenes linked to persistence; the study suggests that interventions targeting socio-economically disadvantaged populations could enhance medication uptake and overall health outcomes.
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Short-term mortality risk, which is indicative of individual frailty, serves as a marker for aging. Previous age clocks focused on predicting either chronological age or longer-term mortality. Aging clocks predicting short-term mortality are lacking and their algorithmic fairness remains unexamined.

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The percentage of people without children over their lifetime is approximately 25% in men and 20% in women. Individual diseases have been linked to childlessness, mostly in women, yet we lack a comprehensive picture of the effect of early-life diseases on lifetime childlessness. We examined all individuals born in 1956-1968 (men) and 1956-1973 (women) in Finland (n = 1,035,928) and Sweden (n = 1,509,092) to the completion of their reproductive lifespan in 2018.

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Background: Novel immunisation methods against respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) are emerging, but knowledge of risk factors for severe RSV disease is insufficient for optimal targeting of interventions against them. Our aims were to identify predictors for RSV hospital admission from registry-based data and to develop and validate a clinical prediction model to guide RSV immunoprophylaxis for infants younger than 1 year.

Methods: In this model development and validation study, we studied all infants born in Finland between June 1, 1997, and May 31, 2020, and in Sweden between June 1, 2006, and May 31, 2020, along with the data for their parents and siblings.

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Article Synopsis
  • The study examined the factors influencing COVID-19 vaccination in the Finnish population using machine learning, considering various health, socio-economic, and demographic factors.
  • The strongest predictors for vaccination were found to be labour income and medication purchase history, while mental health issues and unvaccinated first-degree relatives decreased vaccination likelihood.
  • A predictive model showed good accuracy, revealing that those at highest risk for not vaccinating had a significantly lower vaccination rate, indicating disparities in vaccination among vulnerable groups.
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Introduction: The current manuscript presents a protocol for a systematic review and meta-analysis of the evidence regarding the determinants of responsiveness to multidisciplinary management of chronic pain, with pain intensity, pain-related interference, physical functioning and health-related quality of life as the main outcomes, with consideration to multiple secondary outcomes.

Methods And Analysis: To identify relevant studies, the Ovid MEDLINE, PubMed, Ovid PsycINFO, EBSCO CINAHL and Scopus databases will be searched for all studies exploring factors associated with responsiveness to multidisciplinary pain management from study inception to the present. Cohorts, case-control studies and randomised controlled trials will be included.

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Background: Health-related quality of life (HRQoL) of orofacial pain patients is lower than that of the general population and impaired in multiple dimensions. The aim of the present study was to investigate HRQoL of orofacial pain patients in comparison with patients suffering from other chronic pain disorders.

Materials And Methods: One hundred and fifty-one tertiary care facial pain patients (mean age, 50 years; standard deviation [SD], 15; 119 females), were compared with 312 other non-cancer chronic pain patients (mean age, 46 years; SD, 13; 204 women), recruited from three multidisciplinary pain clinics in Finland.

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Article Synopsis
  • A study evaluated the mortality rates of chronic pain patients compared to the general population, revealing a higher risk of death, especially among younger individuals (ages 18-49), with males and females facing mortality rates 2.6 and 2.9 times higher, respectively.
  • The analysis involved 1,498 patients over an average follow-up of 10.4 years, during which 296 deaths were recorded; low health-related quality of life (HRQoL) and particularly poor psychosocial health were linked to higher mortality risks.
  • The findings emphasize the importance of assessing HRQoL using validated tools like the 15D, as both physical and psychological health issues contribute significantly to increased mortality in chronic
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Background and aims Health-related quality of life (HRQoL) assessments have been widely used in pain medicine as they are able to reflect the subjective and multidimensional nature of chronic pain. Studies have shown a consistent impairment in HRQoL in different chronic pain conditions. However, it is not known whether HRQoL is impaired in chronic orofacial pain (OFP).

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Background: Multidisciplinary pain management (MPM) is a generally accepted method for treating chronic pain, but heterogeneous outcome measures provide only limited conclusions concerning its effectiveness. Therefore, further studies on the effectiveness of MPM are needed to identify subgroups of patients who benefit, or do not benefit, from these interventions. Our aim was to analyse health-related quality of life (HRQoL) changes after MPM and to identify factors associated with treatment outcomes.

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Chronic pain has a significant impact on quality of life. Measurement of health-related quality of life (HRQoL) is essential in the assessment of pain management outcomes, but different instruments have produced varying results. We assessed the validity of 2 HRQoL instruments, EuroQol 5 dimensions questionnaire (EQ-5D) and 15-dimensional health-related quality of life measure (15D), in patients with challenging chronic pain.

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Health-related quality of life (HRQoL) measurement aims to capture the complete, subjective health state of the patients and to comprehensively evaluate treatment outcomes. The aim of this study was to assess, using the 15D HRQoL instrument, HRQoL in a sample of 1528 chronic pain patients, referred to the multidisciplinary pain clinic of the Helsinki University Hospital during 2004 to 2012. The 15D results of the chronic pain patients were compared with those of a matched general population.

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