Plos One
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Comparative Study
Whole-body staging of female patients with recurrent pelvic malignancies: Ultra-fast 18F-FDG PET/MRI compared to 18F-FDG PET/CT and CT.
To evaluate the diagnostic feasibility of an ultra-fast 18F-FDG PET/MRI protocol, including T2-w and contrast-enhanced T1-w imaging as well as metabolic assessment (PET) in comparison to 18F-FDG PET/CT and CT for whole-body staging of female patients with suspected recurrence of pelvic malignancies. ⋯ Ultra-fast PET/MRI provides equivalent diagnostic performance and examination time when compared to PET/CT and superior diagnostic performance to CT in restaging female patients suspected to have recurrent pelvic cancer.
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This study examined predictors of the development of Wikipedia articles that deal with controversial issues. We chose a corpus of articles in the German-language version of Wikipedia about alternative medicine as a representative controversial issue. We extracted edits made until March 2013 and categorized them using a supervised machine learning setup as either being pro conventional medicine, pro alternative medicine, or neutral. ⋯ We also found a positive effect of the number of authors and of the authors' heterogeneity on articles' balance. However, while the effect of the number of authors was reserved to pro-conventional medicine articles, the authors' heterogenity effect was restricted to pro-alternative medicine articles. Finally, we found a negative effect of incongruity between authors' and articles' perspectives that was pronounced for the pro-alternative medicine articles.
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Riding a bicycle under the influence of alcohol is illegal in Japan. Nevertheless, intoxicated bicyclists are frequently treated at hospital emergency departments for bicycle-related injuries. This patient population usually requires more hospital resources, even for relatively minor injuries. ⋯ Seventy (32%) patients consumed alcohol, and the median medical cost was 253 USD (interquartile range [IQR], 164-330). Multivariable analysis showed that alcohol intoxication was independently associated with higher medical costs (p = 0.030, adjusted R-square value = 0.55). These findings support our hypothesis and should encourage authorities to implement comprehensive measures to prohibit bicycling under the influence of alcohol to prevent injuries and to reduce medical costs.
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A previous study reported that low baseline cerebral oxygen saturation (ScO2) (≤50%) measured with near-infrared spectroscopy was predictive of poor clinical outcomes after cardiac surgery. However, such findings have not been reconfirmed by others. We conducted the current study to evaluate whether the previous findings would be reproducible, and to explore mechanisms underlying the ScO2-based outcome prediction. ⋯ Baseline ScO2 was reflective of severity of systemic comorbidities and was predictive of clinical outcomes after major cardiovascular surgery. ScO2 correlated most significantly with BNP in an exponential manner, suggesting that BNP plays a major role in the ScO2-based outcome prediction.
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Interferences between pathogenic bacteria and specific commensals are known. We determined the interactions between nasopharyngeal microbial pathogens and commensals during viral upper respiratory tract infection (URI) and acute otitis media (AOM) in infants. ⋯ Otopathogen genera played the key roles in URI and AOM occurrences. Staphylococcus counteracts otopathogens thus Staphylococcal colonization may be beneficial, rather than harmful. While Sphingobium may play a role in preventing AOM complicating URI, the commonly used probiotic Bifidobacterium did not play a significant role during URI or AOM. The role of less common commensals in counteracting the deleterious effects of otopathogens requires further studies.