Publications by authors named "W J Burns"

Unlabelled: Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) carries an extremely poor prognosis, in part resulting from cellular heterogeneity that supports overall tumorigenicity. Cancer associated fibroblasts (CAF) are key determinants of PDAC biology and response to systemic therapy. While CAF subtypes have been defined, the effects of patient-specific CAF heterogeneity and plasticity on tumor cell behavior remain unclear.

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Objective: Effective communication is essential in delivering high-quality patient care, and in recent years, resident education has expanded to focus on nontechnical skills and communication training. The "Everything DiSC" model is a communication inventory tool used to help employers and employees gain insight into how an individual may communicate within a team and how others may perceive similarities and differences in communication styles, comprising of Dominance (D), Influence (i), Steadiness (S), and Conscientiousness (C). In this report, we describe our experience mapping the DiSC model to the Kern 6-step framework for curriculum development and summarize residents' feedback several years following its implementation.

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Article Synopsis
  • The study focuses on pancreatic acinar cell carcinoma (pACC), a rare type of pancreatic cancer, highlighting its clinical characteristics, genetic mutations, and patient survival outcomes.
  • A total of 61 patients who underwent surgery between 1999 and 2022 were analyzed, showing a median overall survival of 73 months and a recurrence-free survival of 22 months; those with oligometastatic disease had even better outcomes.
  • Significant genetic findings included mutations in core genes related to DNA repair pathways in 26% of patients, indicating potential avenues for targeted treatment.
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Purpose: Dynamics of carbohydrate antigen 19-9 (CA19-9) often inform treatment decisions during and after neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NAT) of patients with pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC). However, considerable dispute persists regarding the clinical relevance of specific CA19-9 thresholds and dynamics. Therefore, we aimed to define optimal thresholds for CA19-9 values and create a biochemically driven composite score to predict survival in CA19-9-producing patients with PDAC after NAT.

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Introduction: Emergency providers risk encountering firearms in the emergency department, but a minority report familiarity with handling firearms. It may be unsafe if unfamiliar, untrained providers attempt to remove a firearm from the clinical care space. This study assessed the efficacy of an educational intervention training resident physicians in this task.

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