Clinics
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Observational Study
Frailty prevalence and related factors in older adults from southern Brazil: A cross-sectional observational study.
To determine the prevalence of frailty and the association of sociodemographic characteristics, clinical aspects, and functional capacity with the frailty status of community-dwelling older adults from Curitiba, Southern Brazil. ⋯ The prevalence of frailty was more pronounced in female than in male individuals, mainly because of a decline in force. Prefrailty was 4 times more prevalent than frailty, and the presence of health problems and reduced functional capacity increased the chances of being prefrail and frail.
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Progressive renal disease is characterized by histological changes in the kidney and fibrosis is a common outcome. Renal biopsy is the only diagnostic tool to evaluate these histopathological changes. Pentraxin-2 (PTX-2) is an anti-inflammatory constitutive plasma protein associated with the innate immune system. Recently, as a biomarker, the circulating level of PTX-2 is shown to be decreased in chronic fibrotic diseases. In this study, we aimed to investigate the relationship between renal fibrosis severity and serum PTX-2 levels in patients undergoing renal biopsy. ⋯ The results indicated that PTX-2 levels are significantly lower in patients with renal fibrosis than HIs, and declining further in patients with severe fibrosis.
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This study aims to analyze the construct and content validity of the Iconographical Falls Efficacy Scale (Icon-FES) in order to measure the fear of falling in community-dwelling older adults. ⋯ The 13-item Icon-FES has excellent psychometric properties for measuring fear of falling in community-dwelling older adults. It can be recommended as a screening tool for fear of falling for both research and clinical purposes.
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This study aimed to analyze clinical and laboratory parameters and their association with long-term outcomes in patients who underwent liver transplantation for hepatocellular carcinoma treatment, according to the etiology of the underlying chronic liver disease, in order to identify predictors of response to this therapeutic modality. ⋯ Clinical and laboratory characteristics according to etiologic groups were not different, which might have led to comparable long-term outcomes among these patient groups and failure to identify predictors that could aid in better selection of subjects for liver transplantation in the management of this cancer.