MEPFeatX-automated feature extraction of motor-evoked potentials in transcranial magnetic stimulation.

Motor evoked potentials (MEPs) are an important measure in transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) when assessing neuronal excitability in clinical diagnostics related to motor function, as well as in neuroscience research. However, manual feature extraction from large datasets can be time-consuming and prone to human error, and valuable features, such as MEP polyphasia and duration, are often neglected. Several packages have been developed to simplify the process; however, they are often tailored to specific studies or are not accessible.

Neonatal outcomes in twin pregnancies in Finland from 2008 to 2023.

Unlabelled: Twin pregnancies are associated with higher risks of adverse maternal and neonatal outcomes compared to singleton pregnancies. This retrospective nationwide cohort study analyzed trends in twin pregnancy outcomes in Finland from 2008 to 2023 using data from the Finnish Medical Birth Register. Outcomes assessed included perinatal mortality, stillbirths, neonatal mortality, neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) admissions, and hospitalization rates at one week of age.

fMRI data acquisition and analysis for task-free, anesthetized rats.

Templates for the acquisition of large datasets such as the Human Connectome Project guide the neuroimaging community to reproducible data acquisition and scientific rigor. By contrast, small animal neuroimaging often relies on laboratory-specific protocols, which limit cross-study comparisons. The establishment of broadly validated protocols may facilitate the acquisition of large datasets, which are essential for uncovering potentially small effects often seen in functional MRI (fMRI) studies.

Surveillance of primary sclerosing cholangitis - a comparison of scheduled or on-demand ERCP with annual MRI surveillance: a multicenter study.

Primary sclerosing cholangitis (PSC) is associated with a high risk of hepatobiliary malignancy, especially cholangiocarcinoma (CCA). There are no good tumor markers to screen for CCA, and current recommendations for PSC monitoring are mainly based on expert opinions. The optimal strategy to assess disease progression and screen for CCA - the main cause of death of PSC patients - remains unclear.

Earlier pregnancies in nulliparous women with current father and lower risks for preeclampsia and low-birth weight newborns.

New paternity has been related to placenta-associated complications in pregnancy. We evaluated whether a lack of earlier pregnancies or deliveries with a current father are associated with the pregnancy, prenatal, and early neonatal outcomes after controlling for the most common maternal confounders in prospective birth cohort study. An online questionnaire was used to survey 4459 pregnant women from the Kuopio Birth Cohort in their third trimester.

The usage of the paris classification system in urine cytology in the diagnosis of non-muscle-invasive bladder cancer: a retrospective single-center study.

Purpose: This retrospective single-center study aimed to determine the correlation between The Paris System (TPS) urine cytology classification, cystoscopy findings, and non-muscle-invasive bladder cancer diagnosis. In addition, we sought to identify factors that might explain the abnormal cytology classification in cases in which no malignancy was detected.

Methods: A Total of 855 patients evaluated with urine cytology between 2017 and 2020 at Kuopio University Hospital were included.

Metabolic profiles of meconium in preeclamptic and normotensive pregnancies.

Introduction: Preeclampsia (PE) is a common vascular pregnancy disorder affecting maternal and fetal metabolism with severe immediate and long-term consequences in mothers and infants. During pregnancy, metabolites in the maternal circulation pass through the placenta to the fetus. Meconium, a first stool of the neonate, offers a view to maternal and fetoplacental unit metabolism and could add to knowledge on the effects of PE on the fetus and newborn.

Targeting Cytokine-Mediated Inflammation in Brain Disorders: Developing New Treatment Strategies.

Cytokine-mediated inflammation is increasingly recognized for playing a vital role in the pathophysiology of a wide range of brain disorders, including neurodegenerative, psychiatric, and neurodevelopmental problems. Pro-inflammatory cytokines such as interleukin-1 (IL-1), tumor necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-α), and interleukin-6 (IL-6) cause neuroinflammation, alter brain function, and accelerate disease development. Despite progress in understanding these pathways, effective medicines targeting brain inflammation are still limited.

Edentulism or Poor Oral Hygiene: Which Is the Stronger Predictor for All-Cause Mortality?

: All-cause mortality consisting of several heterogeneous subgroups does not have a well-defined set of risk factors. Despite the well-described role of oral hygiene on mortality, the association between the condition of the existing dentition and mortality remains unclear. Therefore, we embarked on the current study to assess the association of oral hygiene self-care (OHS) with all-cause mortality.

One hundred thirty-four germ line PU.1 variants and the agammaglobulinemic patients carrying them.

Leukopoiesis is lethally arrested in mice lacking the master transcriptional regulator PU.1. Depending on the animal model, subtotal PU.

Factors Associated With Social-Pragmatic Understanding in Deaf and Hard of Hearing and Typically Hearing 6-Year-Old Children.

Purpose: Children develop social-pragmatic understanding with the help of sensory, cognitive, and linguistic functions by interacting with other people. This study aimed to explore (a) associations between auditory, demographic, cognitive, and linguistic factors and social-pragmatic understanding in children who use bilateral hearing aids (BiHAs) or bilateral cochlear implants (BiCIs) and in typically hearing (TH) children and (b) the effect of the group (BiHA, BiCI, TH) on social-pragmatic understanding when the effects of demographic, cognitive, and linguistic factors are controlled for.

Method: The Pragma test was used to assess social-pragmatic understanding in 119 six-year-old children: 25 children who use BiHAs, 29 who use BiCIs, and 65 TH children.

Comparative effectiveness of antipsychotic treatment strategies for relapse prevention in first-episode schizophrenia in Finland: a population-based cohort study.

Background: The best pharmacological treatment practices for relapse prevention in patients with first-episode schizophrenia are unclear. We aimed to assess different treatment strategies used before and after the first relapse, and their associations with subsequent relapse risk.

Methods: In this population-based cohort study, we enrolled individuals (aged ≤45 years) with first-episode schizophrenia who were hospitalised and subsequently relapsed between 1996 and 2014 from the nationwide Finnish Hospital Discharge Register.

Correlation of zero echo time functional MRI with neuronal activity in rats.

Zero echo time (zero-TE) pulse sequences provide a quiet and artifact-free alternative to conventional functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) pulse sequences. The fast readouts (<1 ms) utilized in zero-TE fMRI produce an image contrast with negligible contributions from blood oxygenation level-dependent (BOLD) mechanisms, yet the zero-TE contrast is highly sensitive to brain function. However, the precise relationship between the zero-TE contrast and neuronal activity has not been determined.

Increased PD-1 expression in livers associated with PD-1-antibody-induced hepatotoxicity.

Vanishing bile duct syndrome (VBDS) is a serious drug induced liver injury characterized by chronic cholestasis and loss of intrahepatic bile ducts. VBDS has been reported also following checkpoint inhibitor treatment. We compared CD3 + , CD4 + , CD8 + , CD20 + , CD57 + , PD-1 + and PD-L1 + lymphocyte infiltrates in liver biopsies of patients that encountered VBDS (n = 2) or hepatotoxicity (n = 3) after pembrolizumab (n = 4) or nivolumab (n = 1) treatment with samples from normal liver (n = 10), non-alcohol steatohepatitis (NASH, n = 10), primary biliary cholangitis (PBC, n = 10) or pembrolizumab-treated patients without adverse events (n = 2).

Comparisons of Physicians', Nurses', and Social Welfare Professionals' Experiences With Participation in Information System Development: Cross-Sectional Survey Study.

Background: The integration of health care and social welfare services together with the consolidation of health care information systems (HISs) and client information systems (CISs) has become a timely topic. Despite this development, there is a scarcity of systematic research on physicians', registered nurses' (RNs) and social welfare professionals' (SWPs) experiences of participating in the development of HISs and CISs.

Objective: This study aimed to examine how physicians, RNs and SWPs experience collaboration with HIS or CIS vendors, and what kinds of end users have participated in HIS or CIS development.

Retrospective cross-sectional study on bronchiectasis in adult Aboriginal Australians: disease characteristics and comparison with ethnically diverse global bronchiectasis registry cohorts.

Background: Globally, adult Indigenous people, including Aboriginal Australians, have a high burden of chronic respiratory disorders, and bronchiectasis is no exception. However, literature detailing bronchiectasis disease characteristics among adult Indigenous people is sparse. This study assessed the clinical profile of bronchiectasis among adult Aboriginal Australians and compared against previously published international bronchiectasis registry reports.

Depressive Symptoms and Amyloid Pathology.

Importance: Depressive symptoms are associated with cognitive decline in older individuals. Uncertainty about underlying mechanisms hampers diagnostic and therapeutic efforts. This large-scale study aimed to elucidate the association between depressive symptoms and amyloid pathology.

Ambiguous Genitalia Due to 3β-Hydroxysteroid Dehydrogenase Type 2 Deficiency: Clinical, Genetic, and Functional Characterization of Two Novel Variants.

3β-Hydroxysteroid dehydrogenase 2 deficiency (3βHSD2D) is a rare form of congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH) with variable clinical presentation. We describe a 46, XY child with ambiguous genitalia and CAH without apparent adrenal insufficiency due to 2 novel heterozygous variants in the gene (c.779C > T/p.

Predictive value of myositis antibodies: role of semiquantitative classification and positivity for more than one autoantibody.

Objectives: We assessed the positive predictive value (PPV) of 17 myositis antibodies for having a diagnosis of myositis and other myositis-spectrum conditions (interstitial lung disease (ILD), connective tissue diseases (CTD), malignancy) and evaluated the impact of semiquantitative classification and antibody overlap on the PPVs.

Materials And Methods: We retrospectively identified 1068 individuals ≥18 years who tested positive for ≥1 antibody in the EUROLINE myositis line blot assay or positive for anti-3-hydroxy-3-methylglutaryl-CoA reductase (HMGCR) in an ELISA-based test between 2015 and 2020 in 15 out of the 20 hospital districts in Finland. We extracted clinical diagnoses from the Care Register for Health Care between January 2013 and June 2022.

Hospitalizations of the older adults with and without dementia during the last two years of life: the impact of comorbidity and changes from 2002 to 2017.

Background: Multimorbidity creates challenges for care and increases health care utilization and costs. People with dementia often have multiple comorbidities, but little is known about the role of these comorbidities in hospitalizations.

Aims: This study examines the frequency of hospitalizations during the last two years of life in older adults with and without dementia, the impact of comorbidities on hospitalizations, and their time trends.

Increasing incidence and prevalence of Hodgkin's lymphoma in Finland: a population-based registry study.

Hodgkin's lymphoma (HL) is a lymphoid malignancy with an emphasized incidence in developed countries. This study aimed to assess the changes in the epidemiology of HL in Finland at the population level by utilizing data from six nationwide healthcare registries. A total of 2912 patients with HL, diagnosed and treated between 2000 and 2019 were matched by controls and divided into younger (<50 years) and older cohorts (≥50 years) for analysis.

Neovascular age-related macular degeneration on three nationwide survey and register data in Finland during 2000-2017.

Purpose: To evaluate time trends in the incidence and prevalence of neovascular age-related macular degeneration (nAMD) and its treatments, associated factors, and effects on vision in Finland during 2000-2017.

Methods: We used three nationwide health examination surveys representing the Finnish population aged 30 years or older. All three surveys were linked to the national care register covering nAMD diagnoses and intravitreal injections between 2000 and 2017.

Respiratory Syncytial Virus Vaccination Is Associated With Increased Odds of Preterm Birth.

Aim: To analyse whether respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) vaccination during pregnancy increases the odds of preterm birth.

Methods: A rapid review and meta-analysis was performed. The main outcome was the risk of preterm (gestational week less than 37) birth.