A unified deep-learning framework for enhanced patient-specific quality assurance of intensity-modulated radiation therapy plans.

Background: Modern radiation therapy techniques, such as intensity-modulated radiation therapy (IMRT) and volumetric-modulated arc therapy (VMAT), use complex fluence modulation strategies to achieve optimal patient dose distribution. Ensuring their accuracy necessitates rigorous patient-specific quality assurance (PSQA), traditionally done through pretreatment measurements with detector arrays. While effective, these methods are labor-intensive and time-consuming.

The dithiol mechanism of class I glutaredoxins promotes specificity for glutathione as a reducing agent.

Class I glutaredoxins reversibly reduce glutathione- and nonglutathione disulfides with the help of reduced glutathione (GSH) using either a monothiol mechanism or a dithiol mechanism. The monothiol mechanism exclusively involves a single glutathionylated active-site cysteinyl residue, whereas the dithiol mechanism requires the additional formation of an intramolecular disulfide bond between the active-site cysteinyl residue and a resolving cysteinyl residue. While the oxidation of glutaredoxins by glutathione disulfide substrates has been extensively characterized, the enzyme-substrate interactions for the reduction of S-glutathionylated glutaredoxins or intramolecular glutaredoxin disulfides are still poorly characterized.

The Importance of Written Feedback on the Individual and Team Performance of Student Pharmacists.

To analyze the impact of written feedback provided using an online peer and self-evaluation tool on the individual and team performance of student pharmacists. Student pharmacists enrolled in two sections (section A=29 students; section B=32 students) of a required first-year pharmacy course were assigned to teams of six and given a project-based assignment in which they worked together to solve an authentic health care-related problem. Students used the Comprehensive Assessment of Team-Member Effectiveness (CATME) online peer and self-evaluation system to evaluate their peers at several points during the project.

Precision Determination of Pion-Nucleon Coupling Constants Using Effective Field Theory.

The pion-nucleon coupling constants determine the strength of the long-range nuclear forces and play a fundamental part in our understanding of nuclear physics. While the charged- and neutral-pion couplings to protons and neutrons are expected to be very similar, owing to the approximate isospin symmetry of the strong interaction, the different masses of the up and down quarks and electromagnetic effects may result in their slightly different values. Despite previous attempts to extract these coupling constants from different systems, our knowledge of their values is still deficient.

Extraction of the Neutron Charge Radius from a Precision Calculation of the Deuteron Structure Radius.

We present a high-accuracy calculation of the deuteron structure radius in chiral effective field theory. Our analysis employs the state-of-the-art semilocal two-nucleon potentials and takes into account two-body contributions to the charge density operators up to fifth order in the chiral expansion. The strength of the fifth-order short-range two-body contribution to the charge density operator is adjusted to the experimental data on the deuteron charge form factor.

Identifying a hunter responsible for killing a hunting dog by individual-specific genetic profiling of wild boar DNA transferred to the canine during the accidental shooting.

While genetic profiling can be a powerful tool to solve wildlife crime, comparably few examples of individual identification in wildlife forensics are available in the literature. Here, we report a case of an accidental shooting of a hunting dog during a wild boar drive hunt. The market value of trained hunting dogs can reach several thousand euro.

[Vitamin D status in 6- to 10-year-old children: a French multicenter study in 326 children].

Objective: To assess the vitamin D status of children aged 6-10years in the French general population for whom no guidelines have yet been defined due to insufficient data.

Method: The study was conducted during two winters with very different sunshine levels: 5 March to 17 April 2012 and 8 January to 16 April 2013 in 20 then 22 centers. Three hundred children (60 children for each year of age) attending an ambulatory care unit or outpatient department for a reason unrelated to vitamin D status were included at the end of winter in 20 hospital centers (ten centers in the northern half of France above latitude 46-47°N/Lille: 50°N and ten centers in the southern half of France below latitude 46-47°N/Marseille: 43°N).

[Catch-up vaccination of worldwide newcoming (adopted, refugee or migrant) children in France].

In France, international adoption includes around to 90,000 children since 1980 and near 300,000 immigrant children were counted in 2008. This population is heterogeneous, according to age and country of origin, and its large number. It is not easy to completely and surely assess the vaccine status of the child.

[Prophylactic prescription of vitamin D in France: national multicenter epidemiological study of 3240 children under 6 years of age].

Aims: The aim of the study was to assess compliance with the current recommendations of prophylactic prescription of vitamin D via a multicentric cross-sectional epidemiological survey of 3240 children under 6 years of age.

Method: Parent questionnaires and data from the health records of children presenting to the emergency departments of 25 teaching hospitals and hospital centers provided information on the children's characteristics, their prescriptions, and other vitamin D intake. Based on the currently applicable recommendations, intakes of 600-1,200 IU/day - 900-1500 IU/day for children with pigmented skin and/or premature and/or hypotrophic children - are considered adequate.

Assessment of post-excitatory long-interval cortical inhibition in adult attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder.

In order to further examine cortical impairment in adult ADHD patients and to test the hypothesis of a disturbed neuronal inhibition in adults with ADHD, late auditory evoked potentials were measured. By using paired-chirp auditory late responses, we compared 15 adults with ADHD with 15 control subjects, focusing on the inhibition elicited by the stimuli. Besides amplitude measurements, a time-frequency phase coherence study using the wavelet phase synchronization stability (WPSS) was performed.

[Current events in vaccination].

The annual meeting of the Infectious Disease Society of America (IDSA) ; which brought together nearly 5000 participants from over 80 countries in Vancouver, Canada, October 21 to 24, 2010 ; provided a review of the influenza (H1N1) 2009 pandemic, evaluated vaccination programmes and presented new vaccines under development. With 12,500 deaths in the United States in 2009-2010, the influenza (H1N1) 2009 pandemic was actually less deadly than the seasonal flu. But it essentially hit the young, and the toll calculated in years of life lost is high.

[Current events in vaccination].

The annual meeting of the Infectious Disease Society of America (IDSA); which brought together nearly 5000 participants from over 80 countries in Vancouver, Canada, October 21 to 24, 2010; provided a review of the influenza (H1N1) 2009 pandemic, evaluated vaccination programmes and presented new vaccines under development. With 12,500 deaths in the United States in 2009-2010, the influenza (H1N1) 2009 pandemic was actually less deadly than the seasonal flu. But it essentially hit the young, and the toll calculated in years of life lost is high.

Impact of early transcranial Doppler screening and intensive therapy on cerebral vasculopathy outcome in a newborn sickle cell anemia cohort.

Transcranial Doppler (TCD) is used to detect children with sickle cell anemia (SCA) who are at risk for stroke, and transfusion programs significantly reduce stroke risk in patients with abnormal TCD. We describe the predictive factors and outcomes of cerebral vasculopathy in the Créteil newborn SCA cohort (n = 217 SS/Sβ(0)), who were early and yearly screened with TCD since 1992. Magnetic resonance imaging/magnetic resonance angiography was performed every 2 years after age 5 (or earlier in case of abnormal TCD).

Challenge with hepatitis B vaccine in children previously vaccinated with a hepatitis B-containing combination vaccine.

Introduction: The World Health Organization (WHO) recommends universal infant hepatitis B virus (HBV) vaccination as the most effective preventive measure against HBV-induced disease in endemic areas. More than 160 countries have followed the WHO recommendations to incorporate HBV vaccination in their national infant immunization programs. While antibodies to hepatitis B surface antigen (anti-HBs) concentrations progressively decrease following vaccination in infancy, protection persists, probably due to lasting immune memory.

[Serotype 19F pneumococcal meningitis in an imunocompetent infant immunized with heptavalent pneumococcal conjugated vaccine Prevenar].

Introduction: Seven cases of pneumococcal meningitis caused by serotypes covered by the available vaccine occurred in France in vaccinated children, 4 of which were caused by serotype 19F.

Case Report: A 3-year-old child, who had received 3 doses of the 7-valent pneumococcal conjugate vaccine Prevenar but not the 4th injection, presented with bacterial meningitis after acute media otitis. The identified bacterium was a 19F serotype of Streptococcus pneumoniae.

[Inaugural trunk dystonia revealing Langerhans cell histiocytosis].

Langerhans cell histiocytosis (LCH) is a multisystemic disease, which may present with neurological involvement. We report the case of a 20-month-old girl with initial liver and skin involvement. Initial symptoms were recurrent episodes of trunk dystonia, lasting approximately 2 months prior to the diagnosis of LCH.

Prevalence of anti-varicella-zoster virus antibodies in French infants under 15 months of age.

Varicella is a widespread disease of childhood resulting from primary infection with varicella-zoster virus (VZV). The objective of this study was to determine the kinetics of the decline of maternal anti-VZV antibodies in French infants between birth and the age of 15 months in order to estimate the duration of passively acquired maternal anti-VZV immunoglobulin G (IgG). This prospective multicenter study was conducted between October 2005 and January 2007 in the pediatric wards and/or pediatric emergency units of seven French hospitals scattered throughout the country.

Kinetics of decline of maternal measles virus-neutralizing antibodies in sera of infants in France in 2006.

The optimal age for measles vaccination is an important health issue, since maternal antibodies may neutralize the vaccine antigen before a specific immune response develops, while delaying vaccination may increase the risk of complicated diseases in infants. However, measles vaccination impacts the duration of protection afforded by transplacental transfer of maternal antibodies: vaccination-induced maternal antibodies disappear faster than disease-induced antibodies. In order to maintain protection against measles in infants, it is important to monitor the dynamics of this phenomenon in vaccinated populations.

[Distribution of neutralizing measles serum antibodies according to age in women of childbearing age in France in 2005-2006].

Unlabelled: Measles-vaccine coverage (MVC) increased significantly only beginning in 1983 based on the official recommendations. The majority of women born after 1983 should have vaccine-acquired rather than naturally derived immunity. Passively transferred measles antibodies (Mab) are expected to provide protection to offsprings during their 1st few months of life.