Zimmermanalexander5853
Sites with high refugial capacity, the super-refugia sites, have on average 30% less frequent extremely warm summers, 20% less frequent fire events, 10% less exposure to altered channels and riparian areas, and 50% fewer trails than the surrounding landscape. Our results suggest that super-refugia sites (∼ 8,200 km2 ) for some natural communities are under-represented in the existing protected area network, a finding that can inform efforts to expand protected areas. Our case study highlights how considering exposure to multiple stressors can inform planning and practice to conserve biodiversity in a changing world. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.
To evaluate the association of masticatory function with prosthetic rehabilitation status and dental prosthesis functionality in nursing home residents.
Prosthetic rehabilitation status and dental prosthesis functionality may adversely affect mastication of older people, and this relationship is underestimated in nursing home residents.
This cross-sectional study included 179 nursing home residents who used dental prostheses [mean (SD) age 78.9 (9.0) years]. Masticatory function data were determined by assessing (a) masticatory performance using two-colour chewing gum, and (b) swallowing thresholds by counting the number of peanut chewing cycles. Older adults were categorised as (1) using dental prostheses in both jaws (n=100) and (2) partially dentate using removable partial dental prostheses (RPDPs) or complete dentures (CDs) in only one jaw (n=41), or (3) edentulous using CD in only one jaw (n=38). Stability, retention, occlusion, vertical dimension and defects were considered in assessing dental prosthesis functionality.
Greater variance of hue (VOH) of the chewing gum and lower swallowing thresholds (worse masticatory function) was associated with edentulous using CD in only one jaw. Older adults wearing dental prostheses with poor occlusion and vertical dimensions presented worse masticatory function. Dental prosthesis stability was associated with lower VOH values. Higher number of chewing cycles while eating peanuts was associated with non-broken dental prosthesis use.
Edentulous participants using CD in only one jaw and non-functional dental prosthesis use negatively affect the masticatory function of nursing home residents.
Edentulous participants using CD in only one jaw and non-functional dental prosthesis use negatively affect the masticatory function of nursing home residents.
Parkinson's disease (PD) manifests in motor dysfunction, non-motor symptoms, and eventual dementia (PDD). Neuropathological hallmarks include nigrostriatal neurodegeneration, Lewy body (LB) pathology, and neuroinflammation. Palbociclib Alpha-synuclein (α-syn), a primary component of LBs, is implicated in PD pathogenesis, accumulating, and aggregating in both familial and sporadic PD. However, as α-syn pathology is often comorbid with amyloid-beta (Aβ) plaques and phosphorylated tau (pTau) tangles in PDD, it is still unclear whether α-syn is the primary cause of neurodegeneration in sporadic PDD. We aimed to determine how the absence of α-syn would affect PDD manifestation.
IFN-β knockout (Ifnb
) mice spontaneously develop progressive behavior abnormalities and neuropathology resembling PDD, notably with α-syn
LBs. We generated Ifnb/Snca double knockout (DKO) mice and evaluated their behavior and neuropathology compared with wild-type (Wt), Ifnb
, and Snca
mice using immunohistochemistry, electron microscopy, t to mitigate disease. Targeting specific aspects of neuroinflammation, such as aberrant neuronal TNF-α/TNFR1 or IFN-β/IFNAR signaling, may attenuate disease. ANN NEUROL 2021.Wildlife and conservation journals must do more to ensure qualitative research contributions are reviewed appropriately and fairly. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.
Patient safety and safety culture are critical for quality healthcare delivery in general and in Emergency Departments (EDs) in particular. The aim of this study is to identify strategies that may contribute to the improvement and maintenance of patient safety culture and which are considered most feasible in the ED environment.
A two-step modified Delphi method with 11 experts' panel was performed to establish consensus. A list of potential expert participants with a background in patient safety culture in EDs was compiled through the professional networks of the supervisory team. Snowball sampling was used to identify additional possible participants. The expert panel included key leaders in the emergency medicine community in Queensland, Australia patient safety experts and researchers, patient safety directors, and healthcare providers in an Australian ED The study ran from September 2018 to December 2018. The tool used in Round 1 in this study was developed through triangulating the outcomes of a revn the ED context. Six key strategies were seen as both important and feasible and these grouped into three main themes; leadership through agenda setting, operational management approaches to reinforce the agenda and commitment, and systems and structures to reinforce the agenda and monitor progress.
This study offers practical solutions for safety culture improvement in the ED context. Six key strategies were seen as both important and feasible and these grouped into three main themes; leadership through agenda setting, operational management approaches to reinforce the agenda and commitment, and systems and structures to reinforce the agenda and monitor progress.Species distribution data are an essential biodiversity variable requiring robust monitoring to inform wildlife conservation. Yet, such data remain inherently sparse because of the logistical challenges of monitoring biodiversity across broad geographic extents. Surveys of knowledgeable members of the public (e.g., people from forest-dwelling communities) provide an opportunity to evaluate species distributions and the ecology of wildlife communities across large spatial scales. However, such data can be prone to both false negative (non-detection) and false positive (misidentification) errors, which may bias assessments of species distributions if uncorrected. Here we analyse detection histories from a large-scale interview survey for 30 vertebrate species across the Western Ghats biodiversity hotspot in India with a multispecies occupancy model that simultaneously corrects for non-detection and misidentification errors. Using this model, we integrate data across species for composite analyses on the responst densely populated biodiversity hotspots. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.
Serum phosphorylated neurofilament-heavy chain (pNF-H) has not been longitudinally evaluated in dogs that develop progressive myelomalacia (PMM) after Type I intervertebral disc herniation (IVDH).
To determine if serum pNF-H concentrations would predict outcome of neuroligical disease in dogs with acute, severe thoracolumbar myelopathy secondary to Type I IVDH.
Thirty-nine client-owned dogs with thoracolumbar myelopathy secondary to IVDH.
Prospective controlled cohort study. Serum was collected from dogs undergoing hemilaminectomy at multiple timepoints. Final neurological status was established at 12 months and groups were stratified accordingly. Comparisons between outcome and pNF-H concentration at each timepoint was examined using Kruskal-Wallis analysis of variance on ranks and receiver operator characteristics curve analysis.
Median serum pNF-H concentrations were not significantly different between deep pain negative dogs that did or did not recover at any timepoint (baseline 0.37 ng/mL [0-0.9 ng/mL] vs 0 ng/mL [0-0.9 ng/mL], P > 1; 24 hours 1.25 ng/mL [0.35-7.23 ng/mL] vs 1.53 ng/mL [0-11.94 ng/mL], P > 1; 48 hours 1.22 ng/mL [0.63-6.62 ng/mL] vs 2.12 ng/mL [0-20.72 ng/mL], P > 1; 72 hours 2.77 ng/mL [1.33-6.62 ng/mL] vs 16.69 ng/mL [4.02-40.12 ng/mL], P > 1). Dogs that developed PMM had significantly higher serum pNF-H concentrations after surgery compared to all other cohorts at 24 hours 39.88 ng/mL (25.74-50.68 ng/mL); P < .05 and 72 hours 223.9ng/mL (155.4-263.7ng/mL); P < .05. A serum pNF-H concentration ≥31.39 ng/mL was 83.33% sensitive and 100% specific for identifying PMM in this cohort.
Serum pNF-H is a promising biomarker for antemortem diagnosis of PMM in dogs with acute, severe thoracolumbar myelopathy secondary to Type I IVDH.
Serum pNF-H is a promising biomarker for antemortem diagnosis of PMM in dogs with acute, severe thoracolumbar myelopathy secondary to Type I IVDH.As a developing country, Pakistan reports a high burden of fungal diseases, of which cutaneous mucormycosis remains a prominent infection, presenting as a highly invasive disease with significant mortality. Apart from a high population of at-risk individuals, multiple factors have precipitated an increment in mucormycosis cases in the country following the COVID-19 pandemic. These include increased use of corticosteroids, immunosuppression following the viral infection, prolonged stays in the intensive care unit and sub-optimal laboratory testing available in the country. This article aims to assess the potential implications of a mucormycosis epidemic on a healthcare system already strained under the COVID-19 pandemic, and provides subsequent recommendations to weather the dual challenge of two deadly pathogens.Many clinical endpoint measures, such as the number of standard drinks consumed per week or the number of days that patients stayed in the hospital, are count data with excessive zeros. However, the zero-inflated nature of such outcomes is sometimes ignored in analyses of clinical trials. This leads to biased estimates of study-level intervention effect and, consequently, a biased estimate of the overall intervention effect in a meta-analysis. The current study proposes a novel statistical approach, the Zero-inflation Bias Correction (ZIBC) method, that can account for the bias introduced when using the Poisson regression model, despite a high rate of inflated zeros in the outcome distribution of a randomized clinical trial. This correction method only requires summary information from individual studies to correct intervention effect estimates as if they were appropriately estimated using the zero-inflated Poisson regression model, thus it is attractive for meta-analysis when individual participant-level data are not available in some studies. Simulation studies and real data analyses showed that the ZIBC method performed well in correcting zero-inflation bias in most situations.
Inaccuracy in estimating reference intervals (RIs) is a problem with small sample sizes.
This study aimed to identify the most accurate statistical methods to estimate RIs based on sample size and population distribution shape. We also studied the accuracy of sample frequency distribution histograms to retrieve the original population distribution and compared strategies based on the histogram and goodness-of-fit test.
The statistical methods that best enhanced accuracy were determined for various sample sizes (n=20-60) and population distributions (Gaussian, log-normal, and left-skewed) were determined by repeated-measures ANOVA and posthoc analyses. Frequency distribution histograms were built from 900 samples of five different sizes randomly extracted from six simulated populations. Three reviewers classified the population distributions from visual assessments of a sample histogram, and the classification error rate was calculated. RI accuracy was compared among the strategies based on the histograms and goodness-of-fit tests.
