Objective: It remains unclear whether general hospitals without psychiatric wards can provide sufficient services for both physical and mental health needs, as they often lack adequate psychiatrists, primarily due to cost constraints. This article explores the relationship between the number of full-time psychiatrists and functionality for integrating physical and mental health services in these settings.
Methods: The Medical Policy Committee of the Japanese Society of General Hospital Psychiatry conducted a nationwide survey in 2022 to evaluate the detailed scope and volume of service of psychiatric departments in general hospitals without a psychiatric ward.
Millijoule-scale pulses of multicycle terahertz radiation (MC-THz) are increasingly being pursued as drivers for applications requiring high-fields and high spectral brightness. An attractive approach for generating high peak-power MC-THz pulses is nonlinear optical down-conversion of laser pulses in periodically-poled crystals. A principal limitation to the yield, however, is the small (sub-centimeter) apertures of commercially-available crystals which restrict the amount of laser energy that can be used.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: No clinical trials have been reported on the use of focused ultrasound (FUS) for treating cervical dystonia.
Objective: We aimed to confirm the efficacy and safety of FUS pallidothalamic tractotomy for cervical dystonia.
Methods: This was a prospective, open-label, non-controlled pilot study.
The cultivation of sunflower ( L.) as a cut flower stands out in floriculture due to its aesthetic beauty and commercial value. Understanding how cut sunflower genotypes adapt to different edaphoclimatic regions and management practices is essential to optimize flower quality and productivity.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIntroduction: Delineating subthalamic nucleus (STN) boundaries using microelectrode recordings (MER) and trajectory history is a valuable resource for neurosurgeons, aiding in the accurate and efficient positioning of deep brain stimulation (DBS) electrodes within the STN. Here, we aimed to assess the application of artificial intelligence, specifically Hidden Markov Models (HMM), in the context of STN localization.
Methods: A comprehensive search strategy was employed, encompassing electronic databases, including PubMed, EuroPMC, and MEDLINE.
We report a case with paretic focal hand dystonia, which at first glance was diagnosed as writer's cramp, with poor performance only when playing the guitar and writing but with increased muscle tension around the elbow rather than in the fingers and hands. The muscle tension was around the elbow and the pallidothalamic tract (PTT) was selected as the proximal muscle target with less permanent complications. During the operation, the PTT test electrical stimulation was impaired only for guitar playing, but not for other hand movements.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground Meige syndrome is a segmental dystonia affecting the head and neck, with bilateral blepharospasm as the primary symptom. First-line treatment typically involves Botox injections. For cases resistant to this treatment, bilateral deep brain stimulation of the globus pallidus internus (GPi) is considered.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFImportance: Delirium is common among older hospitalized adults. In addition to presenting immediate management issues, delirium can increase the long-term risk of dementia, institutionalization, and mortality. Delirium is associated with disrupted sleep, and prior studies suggest that some specific sleep-promoting agents may reduce delirium.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThrombocytopenia frequently occurs in patients with sepsis. Disseminated intravascular coagulation (DIC) may be a possible cause of thrombocytopenia owing to its high prevalence and association with poor outcomes; however, it is important to keep the presence of other diseases in mind in sepsis practice. Thrombotic microangiopathy (TMA), which is characterized by thrombotic thrombocytopenic purpura, Shiga toxin-producing Escherichia coli hemolytic uremic syndrome (HUS), and complement-mediated HUS, is characterized by thrombocytopenia, microangiopathic hemolytic anemia, and organ damage.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThis case report presents a 77-year-old woman who developed subacute thyroiditis following COVID-19. The patient exhibited atypical symptoms, including fever, fatigue, anorexia, significant weight loss, headaches, and palpitations, without the typical neck pain or tenderness associated with thyroiditis. One week later, a follow-up examination showed mild enlargement and tenderness of the thyroid.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: The efficacy and safety of zolpidem for treating musician's dystonia are not well understood. We aimed to retrospectively investigate the efficacy and safety of zolpidem for treating musician's dystonia.
Methods: We retrospectively reviewed medical records between January 2021 and December 2023 to identify patients with musician's dystonia who had been prescribed zolpidem.
A Joule-class room-temperature diode-pumped solid-state laser was developed. The energy scaling of the 100 mJ 1064 nm seed pulse was realized by a series of two diode-pumped amplifiers. The gain medium consists in free combinations of Nd:YAG ceramics bonded to sapphire transparent heat sinks, to relax the thermal load induced by the 34 kW pump power.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFImmune checkpoint inhibitors have significantly transformed the landscape of cancer therapy. Nevertheless, while these inhibitors are highly effective for certain patient groups, many do not benefit due to primary or acquired resistance. Specifically, these treatments often lack sufficient therapeutic efficacy against cancers with low antigenicity.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: The association between fluid balance and outcomes in patients who underwent out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA) and received extracorporeal cardiopulmonary resuscitation (ECPR) remains unknown. We aimed to examine the above relationship during the first 24 h following intensive care unit (ICU) admission.
Methods: We performed a secondary analysis of the SAVE-J II study, a retrospective multicenter study involving OHCA patients aged ≥ 18 years treated with ECPR between 2013 and 2018 and who received fluid therapy following ICU admission.
Fat embolism syndrome (FES) is a rare complication of long bone fractures, with fulminant FES developing within 12 h of injury and often proving fatal (Shaikh, 2009 [1]). Here, we present a case of fulminant FES in a patient who developed sudden right heart failure after undergoing external fixation of a lower leg fracture and required veno-arterial extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (VA-ECMO). A 79-year-old woman injured in a traffic accident was transferred to our emergency department.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFis a prevalent fungal pathogen that displays antibiotic resistance. The polyene antifungal amphotericin B (AmB) has been the gold standard because of its broad antifungal spectra, and its liposomal formulation, AmBisome, has been used widely and clinically in treating fungal infections. Herein, we explored enhancing the antifungal activity of AmBisome by integrating a small chitin-binding domain (LysM) of chitinase A derived from .
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPatients with unresectable pancreatic cancer often present with duodenal bleeding, a potentially life-threatening complication. In our case series of six unresectable pancreatic cancer patients with tumor bleeding, we explored the efficacy and safety of placement of a covered self-expandable metallic stent in the duodenum as a treatment option; we achieved a hemostasis rate of 67% (4/6), with a rebleeding rate of 50% (2/4). No complications occurred with stent placement, except for food impaction in one patient.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Gemcitabine plus nab-paclitaxel (GnP) therapy has been shown to improve the prognosis in patients with metastatic pancreatic cancer (PC); however, the efficacy and safety of GnP in PC patients with malignant ascites (MA) remains unknown.
Methods: We retrospectively investigated PC patients with peritoneal dissemination who had received GnP as first-line chemotherapy at our institution between March 2015 and August 2021. The following patient data were reviewed: patient characteristics, overall survival (OS), progression-free survival (PFS), objective response rate (ORR), adverse events (AEs), and relative dose intensity (RDI).