Annals of medicine
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Objectives: A new method was introduced using a smartphone's integrated inclinometer for rapid measurement of sagittal cervical parameters. The present study aims to compare the validity and reliability of the proposed method. Methods: We retrospectively reviewed 120 patients with cervical spondylosis treated at our hospital. ⋯ For the validity of the representative parameters mentioned above, the Bland-Altman plot displayed a mean difference of 0.2, 0.1, 0.1, and 0.4°with a 95% CI of 4.3, 4.5, 3.4, and 4.1°, respectively. The measurement by smartphone's integrated inclinometer (46.31 ± 3.99 s) was significantly quicker than that by PACS (69.48 ± 3.25 s) according to independent-samples T test (p < 0.001). Conclusion: This novel smartphone measurement based on the integrated inclinometer is accurate and reliable for measuring cervical sagittal parameters rapidly and conveniently.
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To evaluate the incidence of ocular pathologies seen at the ophthalmological emergency department (OED) during the national lockdown in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic and compare it to the corresponding period in 2019. ⋯ Our evaluation showed a significant reduction in the number of OED consultations in all deferrable pathologies. Although the incidence of conditions that affect visual function was lower, these were more frequent in the lockdown period. The significant reduction in the number of deferrable consultations highlights the misuse of the OED.
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Background: Copy number variants of uncertain significance (VUS) has brought much distress for patients and great counselling challenges for clinicians. Of these, a special type of VUS (HT-VUS), harbouring one or both breakpoints within the established haploinsufficient or triplosensitive genes, were considered to be more likely to cause clinical effects compared with other types of VUS. Methods: We retrospectively evaluated the properties and clinical significance of those HT-VUS samples in clinical testing for chromosome microarray analysis (CMA). ⋯ However, the incidence of HT-VUS was not statistically different between different groups. Conclusions: HT-VUS (deletions or duplications) involving introns and HT-VUS (duplications) including terminal coding exons (either the first or last exons) might be clinically neutral. Our study will be helpful for both interpretation and genetic counselling in the future.
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Prediction models for identifying emergency department (ED) patients at high risk of poor outcome are often not externally validated. We aimed to perform a head-to-head comparison of the discriminatory performance of several prediction models in a large cohort of ED patients. ⋯ Head-to-head validation of 19 prediction models in medical ED patients showed that the RISE UP and COPE score outperformed other models regarding 31-day mortality.
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Plant-based diets reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease but also increase the risk of certain micronutrient deficiencies, particularly, of vitamin B12 (B12). The extent to which the unsupervised use of oral nutrient supplements is sufficient to prevent these deficiencies is not well established. We analyzed nutrient intake, laboratory biomarkers, supplementation behavior, and B12 status adequacy amongst young, healthy, physically active omnivores, lacto-ovo-vegetarians and vegans from Germany. ⋯ Even amongst homogeneously healthy Germans, each diet manifested with measurable differences in dietary intakes and biomarkers of health. Plant-based diets, in particular the vegan diet, exhibited the most favorable patterns of lipid metabolism and glycemic control, but the lowest food intake of B12. Supplementation of healthy vegans with B12 (median 250 µg B12/day, over 2 years) secured an adequate B12 status that was comparable to that of healthy omnivores.Clinical Trial Registry: German Clinical Trial register number: DRKS00027425.