Exploring the Experiences of Visiting Veterinary Service Providers in Indigenous Communities in Canada: Proposing Strategies to Support Pre-Clinical Preparation.

Many Indigenous communities in Canada lack access to veterinary services due to geography, affordability, and acceptability. These barriers negatively affect the health of animals, communities, and human-animal relationships. Canadian veterinary colleges offer veterinary services to Indigenous communities through fourth-year veterinary student rotations.

Interactions between blood lead (Pb) concentration, oxidative stress, cellular immune response and reproductive status in livestock from a mining area.

Chronic exposure to lead (Pb) in livestock grazing in abandoned mining areas affects animal welfare and productivity, as well as represents a significant food safety risk. Here, we evaluate the physiological effects of Pb exposure in goats maintained under extensive farming conditions in a non-remediated mining area. We monitored blood, fecal, and milk Pb levels in two groups of goats, pregnant (n = 17) and lactating (n = 24), kept in different enclosures with high soil Pb concentrations (geometric means of 270 and 143 μg/g, respectively) in Sierra Madrona mining district (Spain).

Supporting Positive Learning Experiences for Veterinary Students on Rotations in Remote Indigenous Communities in Canada.

Many health care programs in medicine, nursing, social work, and physiotherapy include practicum rotations near the end of students' studies. Increasingly, veterinary education programs also offer community-based rotations in underserved or remote communities. While these opportunities in veterinary medicine provide many learning benefits, they can also be stressful if the students do not feel adequately supported.

Student and Clinical Educator Perceptions of the Impacts of COVID-19 on Final-Year Veterinary Clinical Training in a Distributed Learning Model.

Delivery of the fourth year clinical program at the University of Calgary Veterinary Medicine (UCVM) is facilitated through the Distributed Veterinary Learning Community (DVLC) which has underwent major revisions in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. To determine the perceptions of how COVID-19 impacted fourth-year clinical rotations, students ( = 24) and DVLC practice rotation coordinators (PRCs, = 23) completed two questionnaires over a 7-month period. The survey consisted of demographic questions, statements ranked on an agreement scale, and open-ended questions.

A retrospective study of perianesthetic and sedation deaths in dogs and cats submitted to Canadian veterinary diagnostic laboratories.

Background: Perianesthetic death or sedation death in companion animals is an infrequent but devastating complication. Few studies have investigated the pathology associated with these deaths.

Objective: To determine clinical features and postmortem findings for submissions to multiple Canadian diagnostic laboratories from perianesthetic/sedation deaths in dogs and cats.

Off to a good start: The importance of the placental exchange surface - Lessons from the mouse.

The role of the chorio-allantoic placenta as the critical nutrient- and oxygen-supplying organ to nourish the demands of the fetus has been well recognized. This function relies on the successful establishment of the placental feto-maternal exchange unit, or interhaemal barrier, across which all nutrients as well as waste products must pass to cross from the maternal to the fetal blood circulation, or vice versa, respectively. As a consequence, defects in the establishment of this elaborate interface lead to fetal growth retardation or even embryonic lethality, depending on the severity of the defect.

Case Identification of Depression in Inpatient Electronic Medical Records: Scoping Review.

Background: Electronic medical records (EMRs) contain large amounts of detailed clinical information. Using medical record review to identify conditions within large quantities of EMRs can be time-consuming and inefficient. EMR-based phenotyping using machine learning and natural language processing algorithms is a continually developing area of study that holds potential for numerous mental health disorders.

A historical perspective of Kupffer cells in the context of infection.

The Kupffer cell was first discovered by Karl Wilhelm von Kupffer in 1876, labeling them as "Sternzellen." Since their discovery as the primary macrophages of the liver, researchers have gradually gained an in-depth understanding of the identity, functions, and influential role of Kupffer cells, particularly in infection. It is becoming clear that Kupffer cells perform important tissue-specific functions in homeostasis and disease.

Impact of blood volume, air exposure duration, transport duration, and testing delay on plasma total carbon dioxide in simulated open collections using microtainers.

Background: Exposing blood specimens to air reduces plasma total carbon dioxide (TCO). We evaluated the degree of TCO reduction attributed to open collection of neonatal blood in BD microtainers® (microtainers), microtainer transport duration and delayed testing of open plasma aliquots.

Methods: Venous blood was aliquoted into open microtainers in a 3x4 factorial design to simulate combined effects of blood volume (0.

Exploring How Values of Colorectal Cancer Patients and their Caregivers Influence Treatment Decision-Making.

Background: As we adopt value models to inform drug reimbursement, coverage, clinical trials, and treatment choices, aligning these models to reflect patient values and preferences becomes increasingly relevant. In this study, we focus on colorectal cancer (CRC), which is highly prevalent and a leading cause of death in Canada, and new drug treatment options are costly.

Objective: The aim of this study was to understand how the values and experiences of people with CRC and their caregivers inform their perspectives about new and emerging colorectal cancer drug treatments.

Sexual Activity, Function, and Satisfaction in Reproductive-Aged Females Living with Chronic Kidney Disease.

Up to 80% of women living with chronic kidney disease (CKD) experience sexual dysfunction, though its link with sexual activity and sexual satisfaction is not well understood. Among older women with CKD treated with hemodialysis, the majority report sexual inactivity, though few describe sexual difficulty and most report high sexual satisfaction. Whether this applies to reproductive-aged females living with CKD is yet unknown.

Screening for depression in patients with epilepsy: same questions but different meaning to different patients.

Purpose: Patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs) such as the Neurological Disorders Depression Inventory in Epilepsy (NDDI-E), a 6-item epilepsy-specific PROM, is used to screen for major depressive disorder symptoms for patients with epilepsy (PWE). The validity and interpretation of PROMs can be affected by differential item functioning (DIF), which occurs when subgroups of patients with the same underlying health status respond to and interpret questions about their health status differently. This study aims to determine whether NDDI-E items exhibit DIF and to identify subgroups of PWE that exhibit DIF in NDDI-E items.

Running-induced neurogenesis reduces CA1 perineuronal net density without substantial temporal delay.

Aerobic exercise has many effects on brain function, particularly at the hippocampus. Exercise has been shown to increase the rate of adult neurogenesis within the dentate gyrus and decrease the density of perineuronal nets in area CA1. The relationship between the rate of neurogenesis and the density of perineuronal nets in CA1 is robust; however, these studies only ever examined these effects across longer time scales, with running manipulations of 4 weeks or longer.

Confidence level of Australian veterinarians with point-of-care ultrasound before and after a training course.

Objective: To determine if a short, hands-on, point-of-care course improves confidence of veterinary practitioners (VPs) in performing basic point-of-care ultrasound (POCUS) applications and diagnosing specific POCUS pathologies.

Procedure: A 2-day POCUS course was offered, including 6 h of lectures and 4 h of hands-on training. A self-assessment survey, using a 4-point Likert scale, was administered before and after the course, to study VPs' confidence in attaining ultrasound skills and diagnosing pathologies.

When veterinarians treat plus-sized pets: Insights for veterinary practice.

Background: Obesity of companion animals in Canada is becoming a problem in veterinary practice. Cats and dogs, in particular, are increasingly overweight. However, prevention and treatment present challenges.

Understanding the mental health and intention to leave of the public health workforce in Canada during the COVID-19 pandemic: A cross-sectional study.

Background: There is limited evidence about the mental health and intention to leave of the public health workforce in Canada during the COVID-19 pandemic. The objectives of this study were to determine the prevalence of burnout, symptoms of anxiety and depression, and intention to leave among the Canadian public health workforce, and associations with individual and workplace factors.

Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted using data collected by a Canada-wide survey from November 2022 to January 2023, where participants reported sociodemographic and workplace factors.

APPROACH e-PROM system: a user-centered development and evaluation of an electronic patient-reported outcomes measurement system for management of coronary artery disease.

Background: Coronary artery disease (CAD) confers increased risks of premature mortality, non-fatal morbidity, and significant impairment in functional status and health-related quality of life. Routine administration of electronic patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs) and its real time delivery to care providers is known to have the potential to inform routine cardiac care and to improve quality of care and patient outcomes. This study describes a user-centered development and evaluation of the Alberta Provincial Project for Outcomes Assessment (APPROACH) electronic Patient Reported Outcomes Measurement (e-PROM) system.

A Systematic Review of Uremic Toxin Concentrations and Cardiovascular Risk Markers in Pediatric Chronic Kidney Disease.

Chronic kidney disease (CKD) can lead to cardiac dysfunction in a condition known as cardiorenal syndrome (CRS). It is postulated that the accumulation of uremic toxins in the bloodstream, as a consequence of declining kidney function, may contribute to these adverse cardiac effects. While CRS in adults has been extensively studied, there is a significant knowledge gap with pediatric patients.

Candidacy 2.0 (CC) - an enhanced theory of access to healthcare for chronic conditions: lessons from a critical interpretive synthesis on access to rheumatoid arthritis care.

Background: The Dixon-Woods et al. Candidacy Framework, a valuable tool since its 2006 introduction, has been widely utilized to analyze access to various services in diverse contexts, including healthcare. This social constructionist approach examines micro, meso, and macro influences on access, offering concrete explanations for access challenges rooted in socially patterned influences.

Edge effects in spatial infectious disease models.

Epidemic models serve as a useful analytical tool to study how a disease behaves in a given population. Individual-level models (ILMs) can incorporate individual-level covariate information including spatial information, accounting for heterogeneity within the population. However, the high-level data required to parameterize an ILM may often be available only for a sub-population of a larger population (e.