Joint TITE-CRM: A Design for Dose Finding Studies for Therapies with Late-Onset Safety and Activity Outcomes.

In Phase I/II dose-finding trials, the objective is to find the Optimal Biological Dose (OBD), a dose that is both safe and shows sufficient activity that maximizes some optimality criterion based on safety and activity. In cancer, treatment is typically given over several cycles, complicating the identification of the OBD as both toxicity and activity outcomes may occur at any point throughout the follow up of multiple cycles. In this work we present and assess the Joint TITE-CRM, a model-based design for late onset toxicities and activity based on the well-known TITE-CRM.

Emotion recognition deficits in children and adolescents with autism spectrum disorder: a comprehensive meta-analysis of accuracy and response time.

Background: Autism spectrum disorder is a neurodevelopmental condition characterized by persistent challenges in social communication and restricted, repetitive behaviors. Emotion recognition deficits are a core feature of ASD, impairing social functioning and quality of life. This meta-analysis evaluates emotion recognition accuracy and response time in individuals with autism spectrum disorder compared to neurotypical individuals and those with other neurodevelopmental disorders.

Delirium and Cognitive Screening in National Hip Fracture Registries: Scoping Review Protocol.

Background: Delirium and cognitive impairment are common in hip fracture populations and are associated with significant adverse patient outcomes. National hip fracture registries facilitate improvements in patient outcomes and care quality, such as reduced mortality and the development of specialist multidisciplinary services. However, there is substantial variation in the data collected and reported in relation to delirium and cognition, which impedes international comparison and may reduce quality of care.

Naxos Disease and Related Cardio-Cutaneous Syndromes.

Naxos disease is a rare autosomal recessive condition combining arrhythmogenic right ventricular cardiomyopathy, woolly hair, and palmoplantar keratoderma. The first identified causative variant was in the gene encoding the desmosomal protein plakoglobin. Naxos disease exhibits fibro-fatty myocardial replacement with immunohistological abnormalities in cardiac protein and signaling pathways, highlighting the role of inflammation and potential anti-inflammatory treatments.

Long-term follow-up of intradetrusor botulinum toxin utilisation: A comparison of patients with multiple sclerosis and idiopathic overactive bladder.

Objectives: To assess long-term outcomes (up to 10 cycles) of repeated intradetrusor botulinum toxin (BoNT) utilisation in multiple sclerosis (MS) and idiopathic overactive bladder (OAB).

Materials And Methods: This is a retrospective, international, multi-centre, observational cohort study of patients diagnosed with MS and neurogenic OAB and treated with intradetrusor BoNT between January 2005 and January 2020 (just prior to COVID-19 interruption). Dose, efficacy, duration of effect, International Consultation on Incontinence Questionnaire Overactive Bladder (ICIQ-OAB) and International Consultation on Incontinence Questionnaire Urinary Incontinence (ICIQ-UI) measures and complication rates were recorded.

Systematic review and meta-analysis of the pelvic organ prolapse and vaginal prolapse among the global population.

Background: Pelvic organ prolapse (POP) occurs when one or more pelvic organs (uterus, bowel, bladder or top of the vagina) descend from their normal position and bulge into the vagina. Symptoms include pelvic discomfort, fullness, and changes in bladder or bowel function. Treatment ranges from conservative approaches to surgery, depending on symptom severity.

Guidelines for robotic credentialling in reconstructive and functional urology. Consensus study.

Objectives: This study aims to define criteria for robotic reconstructive and functional urology credentialing using expert consensus. A recent narrative review identified a lack of standardised minimal requirements for performing robotic-assisted surgery procedures. The substantial variability or absence of a standardised curriculum and credentialing process within a highly specialised surgical field is often insufficient to guarantee surgeon proficiency and could potentially jeopardise patient safety.

The learning curve for hood-sparing robotic-assisted radical prostatectomy: A single-surgeon experience.

Objectives: This study aimed to assess the impact of anterior hood-sparing robot-assisted radical prostatectomy (RARP) with posterior-anterior reconstruction in a single-surgeon series by analysing oncological and functional continence outcomes.

Patients And Methods: We carried out a cohort comparison study of a prospectively collected single-surgeon series. The surgeon was an 'in-training' fellowship trained surgeon in their first 2 years of independent practice.

Current attitudes to testicular prosthesis insertion during radical orchidectomy-An international perspective.

Objectives: This study aimed to assess current international clinician practices, attitudes and barriers related to testicular prosthesis implantation in patients with testicular cancer at the time of radical inguinal orchidectomy.

Methods: An international online survey of urologists who perform radical orchidectomy for testicular cancer was developed. The recruitment process used social media and the emailing lists of national urological societies.

The impact of preoperative venous thromboembolism on patients undergoing TURBT: Perioperative outcomes and healthcare costs from US insurance claims data.

Objectives: To assess the impact of a positive history of venous thromboembolism (VTE) on perioperative outcomes, including length of in-hospital stay, readmission rates, 90-day postoperative complications, and healthcare costs in bladder cancer (BCa) patients undergoing transurethral resection of bladder tumour (TURBT) in the United States.

Patients And Methods: Patients aged ≥18 years with a BCa diagnosis undergoing TURBT were identified in the Merative® Marketscan® Research de-identified databases between 2007 and 2021. Multivariable logistic regression adjusted by relevant perioperative confounders was used to investigate the association between diagnosis of VTE before TURBT and 90-day complication rates, new postoperative VTE events, re-hospitalization, and total hospital expenditures (2021 US dollars).

Does bladder outflow obstruction obfuscate the traditional clinical factors that are used to assess the risk of prostate cancer at rapid-access diagnostic clinics?

Objectives: To understand whether bladder outflow obstruction influences the association between traditional clinical predictive factors, particularly prostate-specific antigen (PSA) density and clinically significant prostate cancer (csPCa). This will help facilitate effective and evidence-based triaging of patients in rapid-access clinics.

Materials And Methods: We retrospectively analysed prospectively collected data from 307 suspected prostate cancer patients who underwent diagnostic biopsy from 2019 to 2023 at a single, high-volume, specialist cancer centre.

SPIRIT-DEFINE explanation and elaboration: recommendations for enhancing quality and impact of early phase dose-finding clinical trials protocols.

Unlabelled: Transparent and accurate reporting in early phase dose-finding (EPDF) clinical trials is crucial for informing subsequent larger trials. The SPIRIT statement, designed for trial protocol content, does not adequately cover the distinctive features of EPDF trials. Recent findings indicate that the protocol contents in past EPDF trials frequently lacked completeness and clarity.

CONSORT-DEFINE explanation and elaboration: recommendations for enhancing reporting quality and impact of early phase dose-finding clinical trials.

Unlabelled: Early phase dose-finding (EPDF) trials are key in the development of novel therapies, with their findings directly informing subsequent clinical development phases and providing valuable insights for reverse translation. Comprehensive and transparent reporting of these studies is critical for their accurate and critical interpretation, which may improve and expedite therapeutic development. However, quality of reporting of design characteristics and results from EPDF trials is often variable and incomplete.

Efficacy and safety of post-discharge oral nutritional supplements for patients with gastric cancer undergoing gastrectomy: a meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials.

Objectives: To report the first and largest systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials (RCT) to evaluated the efficacy and safety of post-discharge oral nutritional supplements (ONS) for patients with gastric cancer undergoing gastrectomy.

Design: Systematic review and meta-analysis.

Eligibility Criteria For Selecting Studies: RCT which evaluated the efficacy and/or safety of post-discharge ONS for patients with gastric cancer undergoing gastrectomy.

Risk prediction models for feeding intolerance in patients with enteral nutrition: a systematic review and meta-analysis.

Background: Although more risk prediction models are available for feeding intolerance in enteral-nourishment patients, it is still unclear how well these models will work in clinical settings. Future research faces challenges in validating model accuracy across populations, enhancing interpretability for clinical use, and overcoming dataset limitations.

Objective: To thoroughly examine studies that have been published on feeding intolerance risk prediction models for enteral nutrition patients.

Depression in pregnant non-diabetic women and women with gestational diabetes in Bangladesh-a comparative study based on multiple logistic regression.

Background: Depression and gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) pose significant challenges during pregnancy. Limited literature exists on depression in women with GDM, with most studies focusing on pre-pregnancy diabetes or postpartum depression. This study fills a crucial gap by specifically investigating and comparing antenatal depression among subjects with and without GDM in Bangladesh, utilizing data from the gestational period.

The design space of E(3)-equivariant atom-centred interatomic potentials.

Molecular dynamics simulation is an important tool in computational materials science and chemistry, and in the past decade it has been revolutionized by machine learning. This rapid progress in machine learning interatomic potentials has produced a number of new architectures in just the past few years. Particularly notable among these are the atomic cluster expansion, which unified many of the earlier ideas around atom-density-based descriptors, and Neural Equivariant Interatomic Potentials (NequIP), a message-passing neural network with equivariant features that exhibited state-of-the-art accuracy at the time.

Optical Properties of Phenylthiolate-Capped CdS Nanoparticles.

Using many-body perturbation theory, we study the optical properties of phenylthiolate-capped cadmium sulfide nanoparticles to understand the origin of the experimentally observed blue shift in those properties with decreasing particle size. We show that the absorption spectra predicted by many-body perturbation theory agree well with the experimentally measured spectra. The results of our calculations demonstrate that all low-energy excited states correspond to a mixture of two fundamental types of excitations: intraligand and ligand-to-metal charge-transfer excitations.

Plasmonic Nanoparticles for Photothermal Therapy: Benchmarking of Photothermal Properties and Modeling of Heating at Depth in Human Tissues.

Many different types of nanoparticles have been developed for photothermal therapy (PTT), but directly comparing their efficacy as heaters and determining how they will perform when localized at depth in tissue remains complex. To choose the optimal nanoparticle for a desired hyperthermic therapy, it is vital to understand how efficiently different nanoparticles extinguish laser light and convert that energy to heat. In this paper, we apply photothermal mass conversion efficiency (η ) as a metric to compare nanoparticles of different shapes, sizes, and conversion efficiencies.

Advantages and challenges of using arterial spin labelling MRI to monitor cerebral blood flow in multi-centre clinical trials of neurodegenerative disease: Experience from the RADAR study.

Arterial spin labelling (ASL) enables non-invasive quantification of regional brain perfusion using MRI. ASL was used in the Reducing Pathology in Alzheimer's Disease through Angiotensin TaRgeting (RADAR) multi-centre trial to pilot the assessment of the effects of the anti-hypertension drug losartan on cerebral blood flow (CBF). In the multi-centre setting, disparities in ASL implementation on scanners from different manufacturers lead to inherent differences in measured CBF and its associated parameters (e.

Evaluating mobile apps for sun protection: content analysis and user preferences in a two-part study.

Background: Sunburn and intermittent sun exposure elevate melanoma skin cancer risk. Sun protection behaviours, including limiting sun exposure, seeking shade, wearing protective gear, and using sunscreen, help mitigate excessive sun exposure. Smartphone apps present a promising platform to enhance these behaviours.

Efficacy and safety of hemoporfin photodynamic therapy in treating port-wine stains in Chinese children: a systematic review and meta-analysis.

Objective: The purpose of this study is to explore the efficacy and safety of hematoporphyrin monomethyl ether mediated photodynamic therapy (HMME-PDT) in treating children with port-wine stains (PWS).

Method: Literature related to the topic was searched in PubMed, Embase, Cochrane Library, Web of Science, China National Knowledge Infrastructure, Wanfang, and China Science Technology Journal Database online databases. The quality of the literature was evaluated using the Effective Public Health Practice Project.

Clustering Sequence Data with Mixture Markov Chains with Covariates Using Multiple Simplex Constrained Optimization Routine (MSiCOR).

Mixture Markov Model (MMM) is a widely used tool to cluster sequences of events coming from a finite state-space. However, the MMM likelihood being multi-modal, the challenge remains in its maximization. Although Expectation-Maximization (EM) algorithm remains one of the most popular ways to estimate the MMM parameters, however, convergence of EM algorithm is not always guaranteed.

Diagnostic inequalities relating to physical healthcare among people with mental health conditions: a systematic review.

Background: Inaccurate diagnosis of physical health problems in people with mental health conditions may contribute to poorer health outcomes. We review the evidence on whether individuals with mental health conditions are at risk of diagnostic inequalities related to their physical health.

Methods: We searched MEDLINE, PsycINFO, Embase, and CINAHL, 1 September 2002-18 Septemebr 2024 (PROSPERO 2022: CRD42022375892).