Background: Fully automatic skull-stripping and tumor segmentation are crucial for monitoring pediatric brain tumors (PBT). Current methods, however, often lack generalizability, particularly for rare tumors in the sellar/suprasellar regions and when applied to real-world clinical data in limited data scenarios. To address these challenges, we propose AI-driven techniques for skull-stripping and tumor segmentation.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAims: Sudden arrhythmic death syndrome (SADS) refers to a sudden death, which remains unexplained despite comprehensive post-mortem examination and a toxicological screen. We aimed to investigate the impact of age and sex on the overall diagnostic yield and underlying aetiology in decedents with SADS using a combined approach of familial evaluation (FE) and molecular autopsy (MA).
Methods And Results: Consecutive referrals to a single centre for FE only, MA only or both, following a SADS death were included.
Nat Cardiovasc Res
December 2024
Circ Cardiovasc Qual Outcomes
December 2024
Background: An improved understanding of the natural history in NYHA functional class I patients with obstructive hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (oHCM) is needed.
Objectives: Using a multicenter registry (SHaRe [Sarcomeric Human Cardiomyopathy Registry]), this study described the natural history in patients with oHCM who were classified as NYHA functional class I at the initial visit compared with patients classified as NYHA functional class II and reported baseline characteristics associated with incident clinical events.
Methods: Incident events assessed included a composite of NYHA functional class III to IV symptoms, left ventricular ejection fraction <50%, atrial fibrillation, stroke, ventricular arrhythmias, septal reduction therapy, ventricular assist device or transplantation, or death.
Background: Hypereosinophilic syndromes (HES) are defined as hypereosinophilia with eosinophil-related clinical manifestations, some of which overlap in presentation with asthma, atopic dermatitis, eosinophilic esophagitis, and/or chronic rhinosinusitis with nasal polyps. Dupilumab is approved to treat these conditions but can induce a transient rise in the absolute eosinophil count and rare eosinophil-related complications.
Objective: To determine whether eosinophil-related complications of dupilumab are increased in HES.
Background: Neonatal Intensive Care Units utilize incubators to sustain core temperatures associated with transepidermal water loss. High relative humidity in incubators provides an environment for fungi to grow. In August 2022, mold was identified growing in 11 (85%) Neonatal Intensive Care Unit incubators.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Cardiomyopathies are clinically important conditions, with a strong genetic component. National genomic initiatives such as 100,000 Genome Project (100KGP) provide opportunity to study these rare conditions at scale beyond conventional research studies.
Methods: We present the clinical and molecular characteristics of the 100KGP cohort, comparing paediatric and adult probands with diverse cardiomyopathies.
Bacterial membrane vesicle (BMV) nanoparticles are secreted naturally by bacteria throughout their lifecycle and are a rich source of biomarkers from the parent bacteria, but they are currently underutilized for clinical diagnostic applications, such as pathogen identification, due to the time-consuming and low-yield nature of traditional recovery methods required for analysis. The recovery of BMVs is particularly difficult from complex biological fluids. Here, we demonstrate a recovery method that uses dielectrophoretic (DEP) forces generated on electrokinetic microfluidic chips to isolate and analyze BMVs from human plasma.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFInsect coloration has evolved in response to multiple pressures, and in Odonata (dragonflies and damselflies) a body of work supports a role of wing color in a variety of visual signals and potentially in thermoregulation. Previous efforts have focused primarily on melanistic coloration even though wings are often multicolored, and there has yet to be comprehensive comparative analyses of wing color across broad geographic regions and phylogenetic groups. Percher vs.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Aerobic exercise capacity is an independent predictor of mortality in dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM), but the central mechanisms contributing to exercise intolerance in DCM are unknown. The aim of this study was to characterize coronary microvascular function in DCM and determine if cardiovascular magnetic resonance (CMR) measures are associated with aerobic exercise capacity.
Methods: Prospective case-control comparison of adults with DCM and matched controls.
Precision medicine, which among other aspects includes an individual's genomic data in diagnosis and management, has become the standard-of-care for Mendelian cardiovascular disease (CVD). However, early identification and management of asymptomatic patients with potentially lethal and manageable Mendelian CVD through screening, which is the promise of precision health, remains an unsolved challenge. The reduced costs of genomic sequencing have enabled the creation of biobanks containing in-depth genetic and health information, which have facilitated the understanding of genetic variation, penetrance, and expressivity, moving us closer to the genotype-first screening of asymptomatic individuals for Mendelian CVD.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: The objective was to evaluate the safety and efficacy of ultra-rapid-acting insulin with the Boost and Ease-off features of the Cambridge hybrid closed-loop system.
Methods: A secondary analysis of Boost and Ease-off from two double-blind, randomized, crossover hybrid closed-loop studies comparing (1) Fiasp to insulin aspart (n = 25), and (2) Lyumjev to insulin lispro (n = 26) was carried out. Mean glucose on initialization of Boost and Ease-off, change in glucose 60 and 120 minutes after initialization, duration and frequency of use, mean glucose, and time in, above, and below target glucose range were calculated for periods of Boost use, Ease-off use, or neither.
Objective: We aimed to evaluate the longer-term safety and efficacy of hybrid closed-loop (CL) therapy in very young children with type 1 diabetes (T1D).
Research Design And Methods: Following a 16-week multinational, randomized crossover trial comparing hybrid CL with sensor-augmented pump (SAP) therapy in 74 very young children aged 1-7 years with T1D, participants were invited to an extension phase using CL for a further 18 months. Outcomes were compared with the primary-phase SAP period and primary-phase CL period.
Background: A diagnosis of type 1 diabetes in a young person can create vulnerability for sleep. Historically it has been rare for young people to be offered a closed-loop system soon after diagnosis meaning that studies examining sleep under these circumstances in comparison with standard treatment have not been possible. In this study, we examine sleep in young people (and their parents) who were provided with hybrid closed-loop therapy at diagnosis of type 1 diabetes versus those who receive standard treatment over a 2-year period.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAims: In TRED-HF, 40% of patients with recovered dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM) relapsed in the short term after therapy withdrawal. This follow-up investigates the longer-term effects of therapy withdrawal.
Methods And Results: TRED-HF was a randomized trial investigating heart failure therapy withdrawal in patients with recovered DCM over 6 months.
Deep learning models can predict uptake of emerging contaminants in plants with improved accuracy because they leverage advanced data-driven approaches to capture non-linear relationships that traditional models struggle to address. Traditional models suffer from low accuracy in predicting transpiration stream concentration factor (TSCF) and root concentration factor (RCF). This study applied deep neural networks (DNN), recurrent neural networks (RNN), and long short-term memory (LSTM) to enhance the accuracy of predictive models for TSCF and RCF.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIn the past decade, genetic testing for cardiac disease has become part of routine clinical care. A genetic diagnosis provides the possibility to clarify risk for relatives. For family planning, a genetic diagnosis provides reproductive options, including prenatal diagnosis and preimplantation genetic testing, that can prevent an affected parent from having a child with the genetic predisposition.
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