Approaches to Resolve False Reporting in Neutralizing Antibody Assays Caused by Reagent Leaching from Affinity Capture Elution Solid Phase.

Insufficient drug tolerance presents a major challenge in the development of neutralizing antibody (NAb) assays for biotherapeutics. Sample pre-treatment using solid-phase extraction with acid dissociation (SPEAD) is widely reported to improve drug tolerance. In this paper, a case study is presented in which SPEAD was used in conjunction with a competitive ligand binding NAb assay format.

Levelling bed occupancy: reconfiguring surgery schedules via simulation.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to present simulation modelling to reconfigure a 700-bed Hong Kong hospital's master surgery schedule (MSS), aiming to improve patient flow, capacity management and resource allocation through levelling bed occupancy within the hospital.

Design/methodology/approach: A discrete-event simulation model was developed to understand how changes to the MSS would affect bed occupancy, thereby providing business intelligence for short- and long-term hospital planning. A decision tool was subsequently developed for hospital managers to test different scenarios.

Long-term treatment-free remission of chronic myeloid leukemia with falling levels of residual leukemic cells.

Following the achievement of deep molecular response on tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKIs), approximately half of patients with chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) can discontinue TKI and remain in treatment-free remission (TFR). The ALLG CML8 study enrolled 40 imatinib-treated patients with undetectable BCR-ABL1 mRNA (approximately MR). Molecular relapse was defined as detectable BCR-ABL1 on two consecutive tests or any single value >0.

Adjustment to retirement: effects of resource change on physical and psychological well-being.

A 1-year longitudinal study was conducted to examine the effects of retirement resources on the physical and psychological well-being of Hong Kong Chinese retirees during the transition to retirement. This study consisted of two assessments: Time 1 was conducted 6 months before retirement, while Time 2 was implemented 6 months after retirement. Personal resources and physical and psychological well-being were measured in the two assessments.

Age-related differences in levels and dynamics of workplace affect.

Affective experiences at work are a key contributing factor to long-term job-related well-being and effectiveness, yet may systematically change as workers get older. Given the central role of affect in work settings, it is important to obtain a thorough understanding of older workers' strengths and vulnerabilities in affective functioning. This paper's goal was to comprehensively study age differences in mean levels and dynamics of affect (affect stability, occurrence of positive and negative daily work events, and affective reactivity) and to link these with perceptions of global occupational well-being and effectiveness.

Validation of water-fat MRI and proton MRS in assessment of hepatic fat and the heterogeneous distribution of hepatic fat and iron in subjects with non-alcoholic fatty liver disease.

Background: Research studies demonstrated pathologic lesions were unevenly distributed in patients with non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) and non-alcoholic steatohepatitis. As hepatic steatosis occurs prior to steatohepatitis and other late stage liver conditions, the distribution pattern of hepatic fat and iron concentration should be investigated to prevent sampling variability. The first purpose of this study was to perform comparison and validation of in-house hepatic fat measurements using water-fat MRI and MRS.

Observed changes in brown, white, hepatic and pancreatic fat after bariatric surgery: Evaluation with MRI.

Objectives: To study the change in brown and white adipose tissue (BAT and WAT), as well as fat content in the liver and pancreas, in patients with morbid obesity before and after bariatric surgery.

Methods: Twelve patients with morbid obesity (F=8, M=4, age: 45.4 years (38.

Evaluating the broad-spectrum efficacy of the acetylcholinesterase oximes reactivators MMB4 DMS, HLö-7 DMS, and 2-PAM Cl against phorate oxon, sarin, and VX in the Hartley guinea pig.

Organophosphorus (OP) compounds, including pesticides and chemical warfare nerve agents (CWNA), are threats to the general population as possible weapons of terrorism or by accidental exposure whether through inadvertent release from manufacturing facilities or during transport. To mitigate the toxicities posed by these threats, a therapeutic regimen that is quick-acting and efficacious against a broad spectrum of OPs is highly desired. The work described herein sought to assess the protective ratio (PR), median effective doses (ED), and therapeutic index (TI = oxime 24-h LD/oxime ED) of MMB4 DMS, HLö-7 DMS, and 2-PAM Cl against the OPs sarin (GB), VX, and phorate-oxon (PHO).

Single session, high-intensity aerobic exercise fails to affect plasticity-related protein expression in the rat sensorimotor cortex.

Typical responses in muscle following acute aerobic exercise have been well documented, but the responses in brain have remained relatively unexplored. Recent reports suggest that a single bout of aerobic exercise can prime motor regions of the human brain to experience use-dependent plasticity, however, the mechanisms underlying this priming phenomenon are unclear. As a result, we asked whether a graded test to exhaustion (GXT), the most widely employed test to examine relationships between exercise and integrated responses within the musculoskeletal, cardiopulmonary, and neuropsychological systems, would be able to upregulate the expression of plasticity-related proteins in sensorimotor cortex in rats.

A meta-analysis of narrow-band imaging for the diagnosis of primary nasopharyngeal carcinoma.

: Narrow band imaging (NBI), an endoscopic technique featuring an augmented definition of microvasculature and mucosal patterns. NBI is increasingly advocated as a tool to characterize neoplasia and intestinal metaplasia in endoscopic standards, such as for colorectal polyps and tumors. Recently NBI has also been studied in the detection of Nasopharyngeal Carcinoma (NPC).

Incremental Hash-Bit Learning for Semantic Image Retrieval in Nonstationary Environments.

Images are uploaded to the Internet over time which makes concept drifting and distribution change in semantic classes unavoidable. Current hashing methods being trained using a given static database may not be suitable for nonstationary semantic image retrieval problems. Moreover, directly retraining a whole hash table to update knowledge coming from new arriving image data may not be efficient.

genomic DNA PCR response kinetics during first-line imatinib treatment of chronic myeloid leukemia.

Accurate quantification of minimal residual disease (MRD) during treatment of chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) guides clinical decisions. The conventional MRD method, RQ-PCR for mRNA, reflects a composite of the number of circulating leukemic cells and the transcripts per cell. genomic DNA only reflects leukemic cell number.

Should job applicants be excited or calm? The role of culture and ideal affect in employment settings.

Do cultural differences in emotion play a role in employment settings? We predicted that cultural differences in ideal affect-the states that people value and ideally want to feel-are reflected in: (a) how individuals present themselves when applying for a job, and (b) what individuals look for when hiring someone for a job. In Studies 1-2 ( = 236, = 174), European Americans wanted to convey high arousal positive states (HAP; excitement) more and low arousal positive states (LAP; calm) less than did Hong Kong Chinese when applying for a job. European Americans also used more HAP words in their applications and showed more "high intensity" smiles in their video introductions than did Hong Kong Chinese.

Integrative genomic analysis reveals cancer-associated mutations at diagnosis of CML in patients with high-risk disease.

Genomic events associated with poor outcome in chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) are poorly understood. We performed whole-exome sequencing, copy-number variation, and/or RNA sequencing for 65 patients to discover mutations at diagnosis and blast crisis (BC). Forty-six patients with chronic-phase disease with the extremes of outcome were studied at diagnosis.

Cultural variation in social judgments of smiles: The role of ideal affect.

While significant research has demonstrated that people's beliefs about a group shape how they judge members of that group, few studies have examined whether people's beliefs and values regarding emotion (their "ideal affect") shape how they socially judge people's emotional facial expressions. We predicted that the more people valued and ideally wanted to feel excitement and other high arousal positive states (HAP), the more affiliative (extraverted, agreeable) they would judge excited (vs. calm) faces.

Precision medicine approaches may be the future for CRLF2 rearranged Down Syndrome Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia patients.

Breakthrough studies over the past decade have uncovered unique gene fusions implicated in acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (ALL). The critical gene, cytokine receptor-like factor 2 (CRLF2), is rearranged in 5-16% of B-ALL, comprising 50% of Philadelphia-like ALL and cooperates with genomic lesions in the Jak, Mapk and Ras signalling pathways. Children with Down Syndrome (DS) have a predisposition to developing CRLF2 rearranged-ALL which is observed in 60% of DS-ALL patients.

Facilitating integration of regulated pharmacy technicians into community pharmacy practice in Ontario: Results of an exploratory study.

Background: The integration of regulated pharmacy technicians (RPTs) into community pharmacy practice was intended to relieve pharmacists of certain technical duties to facilitate greater provision of direct patient care services, commensurate with expanded scope of practice. There is scant data available regarding the success, value and impact of RPT integration, either in Canada or in other jurisdictions.

Methods: Pharmacists and RPTs working in community practices were interviewed.

Prognostic factors of radiation dermatitis following passive-scattering proton therapy for breast cancer.

Background: To identify prognostic factors for grade 3 radiation dermatitis following passive-scattering proton therapy for breast cancer.

Methods: This retrospective study included data on 23 (11 post-mastectomy and 12 post-lumpectomy) breast cancer patients who underwent proton therapy with the passive scattering technique in our institute from 2012 to 2016. Each patient received 50-50.

Sequential mediating effects of provided and received social support on trait emotional intelligence and subjective happiness: A longitudinal examination in Hong Kong Chinese university students.

Past research has often focused on the effects of emotional intelligence and received social support on subjective well-being yet paid limited attention to the effects of provided social support. This study adopted a longitudinal design to examine the sequential mediating effects of provided and received social support on the relationship between trait emotional intelligence and subjective happiness. A total of 214 Hong Kong Chinese undergraduates were asked to complete two assessments with a 6-month interval in between.

Echocardiographic Assessment of Patients with Fabry Disease.

Fabry disease is an X-linked lysosomal storage disorder that results from a deficiency of α-galactosidase A. Increased left ventricular wall thickness has been the most commonly described cardiovascular manifestation of the disease. However, a variety of other structural and functional abnormalities have also been reported.

Social Media as a Catalyst for Policy Action and Social Change for Health and Well-Being: Viewpoint.

This viewpoint paper argues that policy interventions can benefit from the continued use of social media analytics, which can serve as an important complement to traditional social science data collection and analysis. Efforts to improve well-being should provide an opportunity to explore these areas more deeply, and encourage the efforts of those conducting national and local data collection on health to incorporate more of these emerging data sources. Social media remains a relatively untapped source of information to catalyze policy action and social change.

Pre-B acute lymphoblastic leukaemia recurrent fusion, EP300-ZNF384, is associated with a distinct gene expression.

Background: Zinc-finger protein 384 (ZNF384) fusions are an emerging subtype of precursor B-cell acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (pre-B-ALL) and here we further characterised their prevalence, survival outcomes and transcriptome.

Methods: Bone marrow mononuclear cells from 274 BCR-ABL1-negative pre-B-ALL patients were immunophenotyped and transcriptome molecularly characterised. Transcriptomic data was analysed by principal component analysis and gene-set enrichment analysis to identify gene and pathway expression changes.

Efficacy and safety of nilotinib 300 mg twice daily in patients with chronic myeloid leukemia in chronic phase who are intolerant to prior tyrosine kinase inhibitors: Results from the Phase IIIb ENESTswift study.

Background: Some patients receiving a tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI) for the first-line treatment of chronic phase chronic myeloid leukemia (CML-CP) experience intolerable adverse events. Management strategies include dose adjustments, interrupting or discontinuing therapy, or switching to an alternative TKI.

Methods: This multicenter, single-arm, Phase IIIb study included CML-CP patients intolerant of, but responsive to, first-line treatment with imatinib or dasatinib.

Kinetic analysis of oxime-assisted reactivation of human, Guinea pig, and rat acetylcholinesterase inhibited by the organophosphorus pesticide metabolite phorate oxon (PHO).

Unlabelled: Phorate is a highly toxic agricultural pesticide currently in use throughout the world. Like many other organophosphorus (OP) pesticides, the primary mechanism of the acute toxicity of phorate is acetylcholinesterase (AChE) inhibition mediated by its bioactivated oxon metabolite. AChE reactivation is a critical aspect in the treatment of acute OP intoxication.