Pharmaceuticals in the blubber of live free-swimming common bottlenose dolphins ().

Pharmaceuticals prevent and treat diseases, yet inappropriate intake can result in harmful effects including mortality. Contaminants have become recurrent public and wildlife health concerns. Bioaccumulation of contaminants can occur throughout trophic levels of the food web.

The Prevalence of Local Symptoms in Benign Thyroid Disease: A Systematic Review with Meta-analysis.

Objective: This systematic review seeks to evaluate the prevalence of local symptoms in patients with benign thyroid disease as described in the literature.

Data Sources: A literature search was conducted across PubMed, Embase, Medline, and Cochrane databases.

Review Methods: Crude symptom prevalence was obtained by addition of data across studies that reported local symptoms, and adjusted symptom frequency was calculated using a random effects model.

Strategies to improve research participation by older people with cognitive impairment: a systematic review.

Background And Objectives: Older people with cognitive impairment are unrepresented in clinical research. Our objective was to review evidence for strategies to support their research inclusion and participation.

Research Design And Methods: Systematic review of published reports of inclusion and participation strategies for older people with cognitive impairment in clinical research (PROSPERO CRD42020212092).

Stress and Reproductive Hormones of Free-Ranging Dolphins Across a Natural Salinity Gradient.

Bottlenose dolphins () inhabit environments with variable natural salinities and experience physiological imbalances from extreme salinity fluctuations. Low salinity exposure (≤10) disrupts osmoregulation and increases the production of steroid hormones aldosterone (electrolyte balance) and cortisol (stress response). The effect(s) of high salinity exposure (>35) on steroid hormone production in bottlenose dolphins has not previously been assessed.

Associations Between Immunological Biomarkers, Voice Use Patterns, and Phonotraumatic Vocal Fold Lesions: A Scoping Review.

Objectives: This review aims to explore potential associations between immunological biomarkers and phonotraumatic vocal fold lesions.

Study Design: Scoping review.

Methods: Ovid MEDLINE, CINAHL, PubMed, Proquest Theses and Dissertations, Scopus, and Web of Science were searched using the terms "vocal fold" and "inflammatory marker" initially, and later "development" and "phonotraumatic lesion.

Getting it Right from the Start (GIRFTS): protocol for a stepped-wedge cluster randomised controlled trial of a school-based framework to improve children's oral language and reading outcomes.

Introduction: Strong oral language and reading skills are important for child development. The response to intervention (RTI) framework supports schools to apply evidence-based practices and interventions to proactively meet the learning needs of all students and identify and support students at risk of learning difficulties. Getting it Right from the Start (GIRFTS) aims to implement a codesigned RTI framework in the first 2 years of formal schooling (foundation and grade 1) to improve oral language and reading skills.

The Western Australian medical schools mindfulness project: a randomised controlled trial.

Background: Evidence for the longer-term benefits of online mindfulness training for medical students, including in the reduction of stress and improved wellbeing, is limited. This study aimed to evaluate the impact of a novel online mindfulness training program on trait mindfulness, wellbeing and study engagement of medical students at program completion and 6-month follow-up.

Methods: This was a randomised waitlist control study of an 8-week, online, mindfulness-based intervention versus normal curriculum alone for medical students (N = 114).

A Meta-Analysis of Mercury Biomagnification in Freshwater Predatory Invertebrates: Community Diversity and Dietary Exposure Drive Variability.

Accurate estimates of methylmercury (MeHg) exposure are valuable to actionably assess risk and protect wildlife and human health. MeHg trophic transfer is a critical driver of risk: MeHg is generally biomagnified by a factor of 8.3 ± 7.

Factors Associated with Advance Care Planning Engagement Among Community-Dwelling Older Adults: A Cross-Sectional Study.

Aim: To explore the associations between depression, anxiety, decisional conflict and advance care planning engagement and the potential mediating role of decisional conflict in the associations between depression, anxiety and advance care planning among community-dwelling older adults.

Design: A cross-sectional study was conducted with 262 community-dwelling older Australians across metropolitan, regional and rural communities between August and October 2022.

Methods: Validated self-reported questions were used to collect data on anxiety, depression (Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale), decisional conflict (Decisional Conflict Scale), advance care planning engagement (Advance Care Planning Engagement Survey) and covariates (demographic characteristics, health literacy [Health Literacy Screening Questions]), overall health status (Short form 36).

A linear ontogeny accounts for the development of naive, memory and tumour-infiltrating regulatory T cells in mice.

Foxp3 Regulatory T cells (Treg) are a subset of CD4 T cells that play critical functions in maintaining tolerance to self antigens and suppressing autoimmunity, regulating immune responses to pathogens and have a role in the pathophysiology of anti-tumoural immunity. Treg ontogeny is complex since they are generated following recognition of self antigens in the thymus during normal T cell development (thymic Treg), but are also induced from mature conventional T cells when activated by foreign antigen with appropriate additional cues (inducible Treg). How these distinct ontogenic pathways contribute to the maintenance and function of the mature Treg compartment in health and disease remains unclear.

Oral glucose tolerance test-The imperfect gold standard for gestational diabetes screening: A qualitative study involving clinicians in regional, rural and remote areas of Western Australia.

Issue Addressed: The oral glucose tolerance test is the 'gold standard' for detecting gestational diabetes in Australian and International guidelines. Test completion in regional, rural and remote regions may be as low as 50%. We explored challenges and enablers for regional, rural and remote antenatal clinicians providing gestational diabetes screening to better understand low oral glucose tolerance test completion.

Barriers Experienced by Community-Dwelling Older Adults Navigating Formal Care: Evidence From an Australian Population-Based National Survey.

Objectives: This study aims to identify the relationship between psychosocial factors and unmet needs among community-dwelling older adults who have received or who expect to receive formal home-based aged care services.

Methods: A subsample of the national Survey of Disability, Ageing and Carers was used to examine the prevalence of having any unmet needs among older adults navigating care. We also examined associations between older adults' psychosocial factors and their unmet needs using logistic regression.

The Cost-Effectiveness of Primary Prevention Interventions for Skin Cancer: An Updated Systematic Review.

Objective: Preventing the onset of skin malignancies is feasible by reducing exposure to ultraviolet radiation. We reviewed published economic evaluations of primary prevention initiatives in the past decade, to support investment decisions for skin cancer prevention.

Methods: We assessed cost-effectiveness, cost-utility and benefit-cost analyses published from 1 September 2013.

Applications of Flow Cytometry in Drug Discovery and Translational Research.

Flow cytometry is a mainstay technique in cell biology research, where it is used for phenotypic analysis of mixed cell populations. Quantitative approaches have unlocked a deeper value of flow cytometry in drug discovery research. As the number of drug modalities and druggable mechanisms increases, there is an increasing drive to identify meaningful biomarkers, evaluate the relationship between pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics (PK/PD), and translate these insights into the evaluation of patients enrolled in early clinical trials.

Dispersal stabilizes coupled ecological and evolutionary dynamics in a host-parasitoid system.

When ecological and evolutionary dynamics occur on comparable timescales, persistence of the ensuing eco-evolutionary dynamics requires both ecological and evolutionary stability. This unites key questions in ecology and evolution: How do species coexist, and what maintains genetic variation in a population? In this work, we investigated a host-parasitoid system in which pea aphid hosts rapidly evolve resistance to parasitoids. Field data and mathematical simulations showed that heterogeneity in parasitoid dispersal can generate variation in parasitism-mediated selection on hosts through time and space.

Validating care and treatment scenarios for measuring decisional conflict regarding future care preferences among older adults.

Objective: Decisional conflict is used increasingly as an outcome measure in advance care planning (ACP) studies. When the Decisional Conflict Scale (DCS) is used in anticipatory decision-making contexts, the scale is typically tethered to hypothetical scenarios. This study reports preliminary validation data for hypothetical scenarios relating to life-sustaining treatments and care utilisation to inform their broader use in ACP studies.

Balancing the risks and benefits of sun exposure: A revised position statement for Australian adults.

Objective: To describe the development of a new position statement regarding balancing the risks and benefits of sun exposure for Australian adults.

Methods: We conducted a Sun Exposure Summit in March 2021, with presentations from invited experts and a workshop including representation from academic, clinical, policy, and patient stakeholder organisations. The group considered advice about balancing the risks and benefits of sun exposure for Australian adults and developed a revised consensus position statement.

Estimating cancers attributable to physical inactivity in Australia.

Objectives: It was previously estimated that 1814 (1.6 % of incident cancers) were attributable to physical inactivity in Australia in 2010, when only three sites were considered. We estimated the burden of cancer due to physical inactivity in Australia for 13 sites.

Demystifying Prognosis : Understanding the Science and Art of Prognostication.

The science of prognostication is emerging as a vital part of providing goal concordant patient care. Historically, modern medicine has tended to shy away from approaching prognostication as a core clinical skill, and prognosis as something to be shared directly with the patient. In recent years however, the medical field's shift towards a focus on patient autonomy and more openness in matters regarding end of life has propelled the study of prognostication into a more essential component of patient centered care.