An interaction-based mixing model for predicting porosity and tensile strength of directly compressed ternary blends of pharmaceutical powders.

Predicting the mechanical properties of powder mixtures without extensive experimentation is important for model driven design in solid dosage form manufacture. Here, a new binary interaction-based model is proposed for predicting the compressibility and compactability of directly compressed pharmaceutical powder mixtures based on the mixture composition. The model is validated using blends of MCC, lactose and paracetamol or ibuprofen.

Confocal laser microscopy for assessment of surgical margins during radical prostatectomy.

Objective: To evaluate the feasibility of confocal laser microscopy (CLM) for intraoperative margin assessment as faster alternative to neurovascular structure-adjacent frozen-section examination (NeuroSAFE) during robot-assisted radical prostatectomy (RARP).

Patients And Methods: Surgical margins were assessed during 50 RARP procedures in patients scheduled for NeuroSAFE. Posterolateral sections were cut and imaged with CLM and further processed to conform with the NeuroSAFE protocol.

Streamlining tablet lubrication design via model-based design of experiments.

In oral solid dosage production through direct compression powder lubrication must be carefully selected to facilitate the manufacturing of tablets without degrading product manufacturability and quality (e.g. dissolution).

Measuring the depth of invasion in vulvar squamous cell carcinoma: interobserver agreement and pitfalls.

Aims: The depth of invasion is an important prognostic factor for patients with vulvar squamous cell carcinoma (SCC). The threshold of 1 mm distinguishes between FIGO stages IA and ≥IB disease and guides the need for groin surgery. Therefore, high interobserver agreement is crucial.

Data analytics on raw material properties to accelerate pharmaceutical drug development.

Manufacturability of active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) is often evaluated by an empirical approach during development due to limited material availability. This brings challenges in designing flexible yet robust manufacturing processes under highly accelerated timelines. Hence, good utilisation of a limited material dataset is key to accelerate the delivery of high quality final drug product into the market at minimum cost and maximum process capacity.

Experiences of adult cancer survivors in transitions.

Purpose: To understand the experiences of adult cancer survivors as they transition from the end of cancer treatment to follow-up care as a basis for developing actionable recommendations to integrate cancer care delivery and survivorship care.

Methods: A national survey was conducted in collaboration with ten Canadian provinces to identify unmet needs and experiences with follow-up for cancer survivors between 1 and 3 years post-treatment. Surveys were available in English and French and completed either on paper or on-line.

Multivariate monitoring for the industrialisation of a continuous wet granulation tableting process.

The pharmaceutical industry is undergoing a significant change in product development and manufacturing strategies with the progressive shift from batch to continuous processes. These typically feature vast volumes of data generated by the numerous sensors connected to several unit operations running over the period of several hours or even days and that demand the application of increasingly efficient tools for process understanding, monitoring and control. This paper describes the use of multivariate statistical process modeling by means of chemometric methods to monitor the continuous wet granulation tableting process for a drug product currently under development.

Measuring patient-reported outcomes to improve cancer care in Canada: an analysis of provincial survey data.

Patient-reported outcomes measures (proms) are an important component of the shift from disease-centred to person-centred care. In oncology, proms describe the effects of cancer and its treatment from the patient perspective and ideally enable patients to communicate to their providers the physical symptoms and psychosocial concerns that are most relevant to them. The Edmonton Symptom Assessment System-revised (esas-r) is a commonly used and validated tool in Canada to assess symptoms related to cancer.

Dutch Consumers' Willingness to Pay for Broiler Welfare.

This article analyzes Dutch consumers' willingness to pay (WTP) for the welfare of broiler chickens and the consequences for nonhuman animal welfare policies. Using data from a discrete-choice experiment and a random parameter logit model, this study showed that consumers particularly value opportunities for outdoor access and the method used for anesthesia before slaughter. The WTP was also positively related to the number of consumers buying the same product, indicating that they experience the public-good dilemma.

Knowledge management in secondary pharmaceutical manufacturing by mining of data historians-A proof-of-concept study.

In this proof-of-concept study, a methodology is proposed to systematically analyze large data historians of secondary pharmaceutical manufacturing systems using data mining techniques. The objective is to develop an approach enabling to automatically retrieve operation-relevant information that can assist the management in the periodic review of a manufactory system. The proposed methodology allows one to automatically perform three tasks: the identification of single batches within the entire data-sequence of the historical dataset, the identification of distinct operating phases within each batch, and the characterization of a batch with respect to an assigned multivariate set of operating characteristics.

Dare to date: age estimation of subdural hematomas, literature, and case analysis.

The age estimation of injuries, e.g., subdural hematomas (SDH), can play an important role in medicolegal cases.

Cervical cytology in serous and endometrioid endometrial cancer.

The aim of this study was to determine the frequency of abnormal cervical cytology in preoperative cervical cytology of patients diagnosed with uterine papillary serous carcinoma (UPSC) and endometrioid endometrial carcinoma (EEC). In addition, associations between abnormal cervical cytology and clinicopathologic factors were evaluated. In this multicentre study, EEC patients diagnosed at two hospitals from 1999 to 2009 and UPSC patients diagnosed at five hospitals from 1992 to 2009, were included.

General procedure to aid the development of continuous pharmaceutical processes using multivariate statistical modeling - an industrial case study.

Streamlining the manufacturing process has been recognized as a key issue to reduce production costs and improve safety in pharmaceutical manufacturing. Although data available from earlier developmental stages are often sparse and unstructured, they can be very useful to improve the understanding about the process under development. In this paper, a general procedure is proposed for the application of latent variable statistical methods to support the development of new continuous processes in the presence of limited experimental data.

Pure compared with mixed serous endometrial carcinoma: two different entities?

Objective: To analyze whether mixed compared with pure uterine papillary serous carcinoma histology affects clinical outcome, and to assess uterine papillary serous carcinoma for its association with the precursor lesion endometrial intraepithelial carcinoma.

Methods: A multi-institution observational study of stage I-IV uterine papillary serous carcinoma patients was performed. Histopathologic slides were reviewed by four expert pathologists, with determination of the percentage serous histology within each tumor.

Consensus multivariate methods in gas chromatography mass spectrometry and denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis: MHC-congenic and other strains of mice can be classified according to the profiles of volatiles and microflora in their scent-marks.

House mice (Mus domesticus) communicate using scent-marks, and the chemical and microbial composition of these 'extended phenotypes' are both influenced by genetics. This study examined how the genes of the major histocompatibility complex (MHC) and background genes influence the volatile compounds (analysed with Gas Chromatography Mass Spectrometry or GC/MS) and microbial communities (analysed using Denaturating Gradient Gel Electrophoresis or DGGE) in scent-marks produced by congenic strains of mice. The use of Consensus Principal Components Analysis is described and shows relationships between the two types of fingerprints (GC/MS and DGGE profiles).

Detection and assessment of co-association in inhalable drug particles using aerosol time-of-flight mass spectrometry.

Aerosol Time-of-Flight Mass Spectrometry (AToFMS) was used to examine co-association between two inhaled drugs, fluticasone propionate (FP) and salmeterol xinofoate (SX), in fine aerosolised particles emitted from Seretide(R)/Advair(R) inhaled combination products. Principal Component Analysis (PCA) was used to identify fragmentation patterns indicative of either pure or co-associated particles (particles containing both drugs). A third component of the particles emitted from dry powder inhalers (DPIs), lactose, gave only a very weak mass spectral signal and no interpretable data was acquired for this compound; however, it was not found to interfere with the detection of the two drug substances.

Pattern recognition for the analysis of polymeric materials.

A new method of polymer classification is described involving dynamic mechanical analysis of polymer properties as temperature is changed. The method is based on the chemometric analysis of the damping factor (tan delta) as a function of temperature. In this study four polymer groups, namely, polypropylene, low density polyethylene, polystyrene and acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene, each characterised by different grades, were studied.

Component detection weighted index of analogy: similarity recognition on liquid chromatographic mass spectral data for the characterization of route/process specific impurities in pharmaceutical tablets.

Detection and identification of impurities in pharmaceuticals is an essential task for determining the possible infringement of a patent. This article reports a multivariate analysis method to distinguish between tablets of the same substance on the basis of their origin, by characterizing route/process specific impurities via diagnostic ion chromatograms, using liquid chromatography/mass spectrometry (LC/MS). The approach is based on the formulation of a novel index that quantifies the similarity between LC/MS samples, named the component detection weighted index of analogy.

Multivariate analysis and classification of two-dimensional angular optical scattering patterns from aggregates.

Two-dimensional light-scattering patterns from aggregates have undergone feature extraction followed by multivariate statistical analysis. The aggregates are comprised of primary particles of varying shape and size. Morphological descriptors (features) were extracted by a nonlinear filtering algorithm (spectrum enhancement) and then processed by principal component analysis and discriminant function analysis.

Toxicological classification of urine samples using pattern recognition techniques and capillary electrophoresis.

In toxicology, hazardous substances detected in organisms may often lead to different pathological conditions depending on the type of exposure and level of dosage; hence, further analysis on this can suggest the best cure. Urine profiling may serve the purpose because samples typically contain hundreds of compounds representing an effective metabolic fingerprint. This paper proposes a pattern recognition procedure for determining the type of cadmium dosage, acute or chronic, administrated to laboratory rats, where urinary profiles are detected using capillary electrophoresis.

Optical scattering (TAOS) by tire debris particles: preliminary results.

Tire debris particles from low severity laboratory wear tests have been investigated by the TAOS optical scattering facility at Yale University. The incident wavelength is 532 nm. After the TAOS event some particle samples have been imaged by a scanning electron microscope and microanalyzed.

Delusions of parasitosis. A psychiatric disorder to be treated by dermatologists? An analysis of 33 patients.

Delusions of parasitosis is a rare disorder in which patients have the false and fixed belief that they are infested by parasites. It is a psychiatric disorder, but patients usually present to a dermatologist and referral to a psychiatrist is almost always rejected. Treating a patient with delusions of parasitosis requires patience and tact.