Does adherence to exacerbation action plans matter? Insights from two COPD self-management studies.

Introduction: Patients' adherence is essential for COPD self-management, as beneficial effects can only be expected in adherent patients. We explored associations between patients' adherence to COPD exacerbation action plans and health outcomes.

Materials And Methods: Pooled COPD self-treatment intervention group data from two RCTs were analysed, only including patients who had ≥1 COPD exacerbation or started ≥1 course of oral corticosteroids over one-year follow-up.

Evaluation of Exacerbation and Symptom-Free Time in Patients with COPD.

In clinical practice, clinicians mainly focus on Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) exacerbations and symptoms, while patients may prefer to evaluate periods free of COPD exacerbations and deteriorated symptoms. The latter would suit the positive health approach that centralizes people and their beliefs. We aimed to identify patient characteristics and health outcomes relating to: 1) COPD exacerbation-free days; 2) days with no more symptoms than usual; and 3) combined COPD exacerbation and comorbid flare-up-free days (i.

Gastrointestinal and eating problems in SCN1A-related seizure disorders.

Objective: Our study aimed to describe the prevalence and characteristics of gastrointestinal and eating problems in Dravet syndrome (DS) and other SCN1A-related seizure disorders and to determine the association between the occurrence of gastrointestinal and eating problems and core features of DS.

Methods: Gastrointestinal and eating problems were assessed with a questionnaire in a Dutch cohort of participants with an SCN1A-related seizure disorder. Associations between the number of gastrointestinal and eating problems and core features of DS, seizure severity, level of intellectual disability, impaired mobility, behavioral problems, and use of anti-seizure medication, were explored by multivariate ordinal regression analyses.

Facilitators and Barriers of Adherence to Multi-Disease Exacerbation Action Plans in COPD Patients - A Qualitative Study.

Whereas exacerbation action plans to self-manage Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) significantly improve health outcomes, patients' adherence to those action plans is often poor. This study aimed to identify facilitators and barriers of adherence to tailored multi-disease exacerbation action plans. We also explored patients' perspectives toward disease management roles.

Navigating Voice, Vocabulary and Silence: Developing Critical Consciousness in a Photovoice Project with (Un)Paid Care Workers in Long-Term Care.

Photovoice is a widely used approach for community participation in health promotion and health promotion research. However, its popularity has a flip-side. Scholars raise concerns that photovoice drifts away from its emancipatory roots, neglecting photovoice's aim to develop critical consciousness together with communities.

Self-management interventions for people with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.

Background: Self-management interventions help people with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) to acquire and practise the skills they need to carry out disease-specific medical regimens, guide changes in health behaviour and provide emotional support to enable them to control their disease. Since the 2014 update of this review, several studies have been published.

Objectives: Primary objectives To evaluate the effectiveness of COPD self-management interventions compared to usual care in terms of health-related quality of life (HRQoL) and respiratory-related hospital admissions.

The Value of Active Arts Engagement on Health and Well-Being of Older Adults: A Nation-Wide Participatory Study.

An emerging body of research indicates that active arts engagement can enhance older adults' health and experienced well-being, but scientific evidence is still fragmented. There is a research gap in understanding arts engagement grounded in a multidimensional conceptualization of the value of health and well-being from older participants' perspectives. This Dutch nation-wide study aimed to explore the broader value of arts engagement on older people's perceived health and well-being in 18 participatory arts-based projects (dance, music, singing, theater, visual arts, video, and spoken word) for community-dwelling older adults and those living in long term care facilities.

Predictors of patient adherence to COPD self-management exacerbation action plans.

Objective: Identifying patient characteristics predicting categories of patient adherence to Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) exacerbation action plans.

Methods: Data were obtained from self-treatment intervention groups of two COPD self-management trials. Patients with ≥1 exacerbation and/or ≥1 self-initiated prednisolone course during one-year follow-up were included.

Erratum: Abma, T., et al. Sowing Seeds to Harvest Healthier Adults: The Working Principles and Impact of Participatory Health Research with Children in a Primary School Context. 2020, , 451.

The authors wish to make the following corrections to the above-mentioned published paper [1]: During production, an error occurred in the layout of Figure 1 'Learning impact of KLIK, as self-assessed by the children' on page 6 [...

Sowing Seeds to Harvest Healthier Adults: The Working Principles and Impact of Participatory Health Research with Children in a Primary School Context.

Participatory research on health-related topics with children is promising but current literature offers limited guidance on how to involve children and falls short on the reporting impact. The purpose of this article is to heighten our understanding of the working principles and impact of participatory health research (PHR) with children. We completed a PHR project in two primary schools, which included children from a multiethnic, deprived neighborhood in the second largest city in The Netherlands over a period of three school years (2016-2019).

Plasma donor-derived cell-free DNA kinetics after kidney transplantation using a single tube multiplex PCR assay.

Background: After transplantation, cell-free DNA derived from the donor organ (ddcfDNA) can be detected in the recipient's circulation. We aimed to quantify ddcfDNA levels in plasma of kidney transplant recipients thereby investigating the kinetics of this biomarker after transplantation and determining biological variables that influence ddcfDNA kinetics in stable and non-stable patients.

Materials And Methods: From 107 kidney transplant recipients, plasma samples were collected longitudinally after transplantation (day 1-3 months) within a multicenter set-up.

Illumina sequencing of 15 deafness genes using fragmented amplicons.

Background: Resequencing of deafness related genes using GS FLX massive parallel sequencing of PCR amplicons spanning selected genes has previously been reported as a successful strategy to discover causal variants. The amplicon lengths were designed to be smaller than the sequencing read length of GS FLX technology, but are longer than Illumina sequencing technology read lengths. Fragmentation is thus required to sequence these amplicons using high throughput Illumina technology.

Locust bean gum safety in neonates and young infants: an integrated review of the toxicological database and clinical evidence.

Locust bean gum (LBG) is a galactomannan polysaccharide used as thickener in infant formulas with the therapeutic aim to treat uncomplicated gastroesophageal reflux (GER). Since its use in young infants below 12weeks of age is not explicitly covered by the current scientific concept of the derivation of health based guidance values, the present integrated safety review aimed to compile all the relevant preclinical toxicological studies and to combine them with substantial evidence gathered from the clinical paediatric use as part of the weight of evidence supporting the safety in young infants below 12weeks of age. LBG was demonstrated to have very low toxicity in preclinical studies mainly resulting from its indigestible nature leading to negligible systemic bioavailability and only possibly influencing tolerance.

Development of an oral mucosa model to study host-microbiome interactions during wound healing.

Crosstalk between the human host and its microbiota is reported to influence various diseases such as mucositis. Fundamental research in this area is however complicated by the time frame restrictions during which host-microbe interactions can be studied in vitro. The model proposed in this paper, consisting of an oral epithelium and biofilm, can be used to study microbe-host crosstalk in vitro in non-infectious conditions up to 72 h.

The CpG island methylator phenotype: what's in a name?

Although the CpG island methylator phenotype (CIMP) was first identified and has been most extensively studied in colorectal cancer, the term "CIMP" has been repeatedly used over the past decade to describe CpG island promoter methylation in other tumor types, including bladder, breast, endometrial, gastric, glioblastoma (gliomas), hepatocellular, lung, ovarian, pancreatic, renal cell, and prostate cancers, as well as for leukemia, melanoma, duodenal adenocarninomas, adrenocortical carcinomas, and neuroblastomas. CIMP has been reported to be useful for predicting prognosis and response to treatment in a variety of tumor types, but it remains unclear whether or not CIMP is a universal phenomenon across human neoplasia or if there should be cancer-specific definitions of the phenotype. Recently, it was shown that somatic isocitrate dehydrogenase-1 (IDH1) mutations, frequently observed in gliomas, establish CIMP in primary human astrocytes by remodeling the methylome.

GLUCAN SYNTHASE-LIKE8 and STEROL METHYLTRANSFERASE2 are required for ploidy consistency of the sexual reproduction system in Arabidopsis.

In sexually reproducing plants, the meiocyte-producing archesporal cell lineage is maintained at the diploid state to consolidate the formation of haploid gametes. In search of molecular factors that regulate this ploidy consistency, we isolated an Arabidopsis thaliana mutant, called enlarged tetrad2 (et2), which produces tetraploid meiocytes through the stochastic occurrence of premeiotic endomitosis. Endomitotic polyploidization events were induced by alterations in cell wall formation, and similar cytokinetic defects were sporadically observed in other tissues, including cotyledons and leaves.

Improved base-calling and quality scores for 454 sequencing based on a Hurdle Poisson model.

Background: 454 pyrosequencing is a commonly used massively parallel DNA sequencing technology with a wide variety of application fields such as epigenetics, metagenomics and transcriptomics. A well-known problem of this platform is its sensitivity to base-calling insertion and deletion errors, particularly in the presence of long homopolymers. In addition, the base-call quality scores are not informative with respect to whether an insertion or a deletion error is more likely.

Molecular diagnostics for congenital hearing loss including 15 deafness genes using a next generation sequencing platform.

Background: Hereditary hearing loss (HL) can originate from mutations in one of many genes involved in the complex process of hearing. Identification of the genetic defects in patients is currently labor intensive and expensive. While screening with Sanger sequencing for GJB2 mutations is common, this is not the case for the other known deafness genes (> 60).

Practical tools to implement massive parallel pyrosequencing of PCR products in next generation molecular diagnostics.

Despite improvements in terms of sequence quality and price per basepair, Sanger sequencing remains restricted to screening of individual disease genes. The development of massively parallel sequencing (MPS) technologies heralded an era in which molecular diagnostics for multigenic disorders becomes reality. Here, we outline different PCR amplification based strategies for the screening of a multitude of genes in a patient cohort.

Applying massive parallel sequencing to molecular diagnosis of Marfan and Loeys-Dietz syndromes.

The Marfan (MFS) and Loeys-Dietz (LDS) syndromes are caused by mutations in the fibrillin-1 (FBN1) and Transforming Growth Factor Beta Receptor 1 and 2 (TGFBR1 and TGFBR2) genes, respectively. With the current conventional mutation screening technologies, analysis of this set of genes is time consuming and expensive. We have tailored a cost-effective and reliable mutation discovery strategy using multiplex PCR followed by Next Generation Sequencing (NGS).

Massive parallel amplicon sequencing of the breast cancer genes BRCA1 and BRCA2: opportunities, challenges, and limitations.

This study describes how the new massive parallel sequencing technology can be implemented in a diagnostic setting for the breast cancer susceptibility genes (BRCA1 and BRCA2). The throughput was maximized by increasing uniformity in coverage, obtained by a multiplex approach, which outperformed pooling of singleplex PCRs. We evaluated the sensitivity by analysis of 133 distinct sequence variants; three (2%) deletions or duplications in homopolymers of greater than or equal to seven nucleotides remained undetected, illustrating a limitation of pyrosequencing.

Crossover study of three methods for low-level white blood cell counting on two types of flow cytometer.

Background: Flow cytometric methods were previously shown to be preferable to microscopic and volumetric methods for counting residual white blood cells (WBCs). In this study, three flow cytometric, low-level WBC counting methods were cross compared using two flow cytometers.

Methods: Double-filtered red cell and platelet concentrates were spiked with different amounts of WBC to obtain panels of unspiked and 0.

[Nutrition and health--vitamins and vitamin supplements].

A balanced diet based on the Guidelines of the Netherlands Nutrition Centre provides a suitable basis for the maintenance of good health. However, there are a number of situations where supplementation with vitamins is clearly indicated. These include infants (vitamin A, D and K), young children, and pregnant and lactating women (vitamin D), future expectant mothers (folic acid) and the elderly (vitamin D).