Reimagining and rebranding advance care planning.

Advance care planning (ACP) has traditionally aimed at ensuring that patients' end-of-life (EOL) wishes are understood and respected. However, recent literature raises concerns about its effectiveness, with many trials indicating that ACP does not significantly improve goal-concordant care, enhance quality of life or reduce healthcare costs. This is because patients' future decisions are influenced by their transient preferences due to projection bias.

Healthcare professionals' perspectives on facilitators of and barriers to CKD management in primary care: a qualitative study in Singapore clinics.

Introduction: The burden of chronic kidney disease (CKD) is rising globally including in Singapore. Primary care is the first point of contact for most patients with early stages of CKD. However, several barriers to optimal CKD management exist.

Semaphorin3E-PlexinD1 signaling in coronary artery and lymphatic vessel development with clinical implications in myocardial recovery.

Blood and lymphatic vessels surrounding the heart develop through orchestrated processes from cells of different origins. In particular, cells around the outflow tract which constitute a primordial transient vasculature, referred to as aortic subepicardial vessels, are crucial for the establishment of coronary artery stems and cardiac lymphatic vessels. Here, we revealed that the epicardium and pericardium-derived Semaphorin 3E (Sema3E) and its receptor, PlexinD1, play a role in the development of the coronary stem, as well as cardiac lymphatic vessels.

A slow, efficient and safe nanoplatform of tailored ZnS QD-mycophenolic acid conjugates for drug delivery against dengue virus 2 genome replication.

Dengue is a major health concern causing significant mortality, morbidity and economic loss. The development of anti-dengue viral drugs is challenging due to high toxicity, as well as off-target/side effects. We engineered size tuned ZnS QDs as a platform for the efficient delivery of mycophenolic acid (MPA) against dengue virus serotype 2 (DENV2) to evaluate the drug efficacy and toxicity using the DENV2 sub-genomic replicon system in BHK21 cells.

Plasma alpha-synuclein detected by single molecule array is increased in PD.

We utilized ultrasensitive single molecule technology to measure plasma alpha-synuclein in 221 subjects (51 controls, 170 PD). Plasma alpha-synuclein levels were significantly higher in PD than controls (15506.3 vs.

Three-dimensional diastolic blood flow in the left ventricle.

Three-dimensional blood flow in a human left ventricle is studied via a computational analysis with magnetic resonance imaging of the cardiac motion. Formation, growth and decay of vortices during the myocardial dilation are analyzed with flow patterns on various diametric planes. They are dominated by momentum transfer during flow acceleration and deceleration through the mitral orifice.

Minimal clinically important difference (MCID) for the functional assessment of cancer therapy: cognitive function (FACT-Cog) in breast cancer patients.

Objectives: This is the first reported study to determine the minimal clinically important difference (MCID) of Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy-Cognitive Function (FACT-Cog), a validated subjective neuropsychological instrument designed to evaluate cancer patients' perceived cognitive deterioration.

Study Design And Setting: Breast cancer patients (n = 220) completed FACT-Cog and European Organization for Research and Treatment of Cancer Quality of Life Questionnaire Core 30 (EORTC-QLQ-C30) at baseline and at least 3 months later. Anchor-based approach used the validated EORTC-QLQ-C30-Cognitive Functioning scale (EORTC-CF) as the anchor for patients who showed minimal deterioration and a receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve to identify the optimal MCID cutoff for deterioration.