An engineered interleukin-11 decoy cytokine inhibits receptor signaling and proliferation in lung adenocarcinoma.

The cytokine interleukin (IL)-11 has been shown to play a role in promoting fibrosis and cancer, including lung adenocarcinoma, garnering interest as an attractive target for therapeutic intervention. We used combinatorial methods to engineer an IL-11 variant that binds with higher affinity to the IL-11 receptor and stimulates enhanced receptor-mediated cell signaling. Introduction of two additional point mutations ablates IL-11 ligand/receptor association with the gp130 coreceptor signaling complex, resulting in a high-affinity receptor antagonist.

Using selection models to assess sensitivity to publication bias: A tutorial and call for more routine use.

In meta-analyses, it is critical to assess the extent to which publication bias might have compromised the results. Classical methods based on the funnel plot, including Egger's test and Trim-and-Fill, have become the de facto default methods to do so, with a large majority of recent meta-analyses in top medical journals (85%) assessing for publication bias exclusively using these methods. However, these classical funnel plot methods have important limitations when used as the sole means of assessing publication bias: they essentially assume that the publication process favors large point estimates for small studies and does not affect the largest studies, and they can perform poorly when effects are heterogeneous.

A review of racial, socioeconomic, and geographic disparities in pediatric liver transplantation.

Equity is a core principle in both pediatrics and solid organ transplantation. Health inequities, specifically across race, socioeconomic position, or geography, reflect a moral failure. Ethical principles of prudential life span, maximin principle, and fair innings argue for allocation priority to children related to the number of life years gained, equal access to transplant, and equal opportunity for ideal posttransplant outcomes.

Development and implementation of a novel Web-based gaming application to enhance emergency medical technician knowledge in low- and middle-income countries.

Background: Increasing access to high-quality emergency and prehospital care is an important priority in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). However, ensuring that emergency medical technicians (EMTs) maintain their clinical knowledge and proficiency with procedural skills is challenging, as continuing education requirements are still being introduced, and clinical instructional efforts need strengthening. We describe the development and implementation of an innovative asynchronous learning tool for EMTs in the form of a Web-based trivia game.