Trending Articles
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The ability to habituate to pain may be adaptive, and it may enable us to pursue valuable goals despite the pain. In this study, we experimentally investigated this idea using the primary task paradigm in which participants had to identify the color of a circle (blue or yellow) as quickly as possible while ignoring painful or tactile distractors that are presented on some of the trials. In the first experiment, we were interested whether the attentional interference effect because of the presentation of the distractors and its habituation would differ between painful and tactile distractor stimuli. ⋯ Moreover, we did not find evidence for dishabituation. These are the first studies of their kind. Implications and guidelines for future research are formulated.
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Multicenter Study
Targeted Embolization of Aneurysms Associated With Brain Arteriovenous Malformations at High Risk for Surgical Resection: A Case-Control Study.
High-risk components of brain arteriovenous malformations (BAVMs) can be targeted to reduce the risk of lesion rupture. ⋯ For BAVMs at high risk for surgical resection, TAE can be performed safely and effectively. Patients treated with TAE had better outcomes than matched patients undergoing other combinations of treatment. TAE can be considered for BAVMs with high operative risk prior to radiosurgery or when no other treatment options are available.
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The concept of futility has been a source of discussion for many years. Even though it is tempting to propose that an action or clinical intervention should be deemed futile if it does not achieve the goals of that action, further clarification is needed in terms of the nature of the likely outcomes of an intervention and the probabilities of various outcomes being achieved. ⋯ This is especially the case when considering outcome following decompressive craniectomy for severe traumatic brain injury, in which certain outcomes are likely to be severely impaired states that the patient would consider unacceptable. In this article, we use some key ethical concepts such as substantial benefit and the risk of unbearable badness to explore the concept of futility in severe traumatic brain injury and, by linking that to recent advances in neurosurgical science, propose a pragmatic patient-centered approach to deal with the concept of futility.
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Delirium occurs frequently in acute internal medicine wards and may worsen the patient's prognosis; it deserves a fast, systematic screening tool. ⋯ A simple, 1-min screening test (AL-O-A score), even administered by an untrained professional, can identify delirium in internal medicine patients.