Georgeburgess0630

To determine if transdermal scopolamine is associated with decreased postoperative nausea and vomiting and shorter length of stay in the postoperative care unit among patients undergoing uterine aspiration for abortion or early pregnancy loss.

We conducted a retrospective cohort study at an integrated medical center that initiated a protocol to prescribe transdermal scopolamine to patients undergoing uterine aspiration under moderate sedation. We compared outcomes among patients who underwent uterine aspiration in 2017, before the institution enacted the protocol, with their counterparts in 2018, immediately after the institution instated the protocol. We reviewed patient charts for data on the postoperative length of stay, use of additional antiemetics, and a standardized clinician designated postoperative nausea and vomiting score. We analyzed outcomes by relevant demographic and clinical characteristics using chi-square or Fisher's exact tests for categorical variables and t tests for continuous variabration and could be an unnecessary cost.

Among patients who underwent uterine aspiration under moderate sedation, use of prophylactic transdermal scopolamine was not associated with shorter postoperative length of stay or lesser use of antiemetics. Prophylactic transdermal scopolamine is not likely to be useful for patients undergoing uterine aspiration and could be an unnecessary cost.

To document the change in contraceptive visits in the United States during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Using a nationwide sample of claims we analyzed the immediate and sustained changes in contraceptive visits during the pandemic by calculating the percentage change in number of visits between May 2019 and April 2020 and between December 2019 and December 2020, respectively. We examined these changes by contraceptive method, region, age, and use of telehealth, and separately for postpartum individuals.

Relative to May 2019, in April 2020, visits for tubal ligation declined by 65% (95% CI, -65.5, -64.1), LARCs by 46% (95% CI, -47.0, -45.6), pill, patch, or ring by 45% (95% CI, -45.8, -44.5), and injectables by 16% (95% CI -17.2, -15.4). The sustained change in visits in December 2020 was larger for tubal ligation (-18%, 95% CI, -19.1, -16.8) and injectable (-11%, 95% CI, -11.4, -9.6) visits than for LARC (-6%, 95% CI, -6.6, -4.4) and pill, patch, and ring (-5%, 95% CI, -5.7, -3.7) visits. The immediate decline was highest in the Northeast and Midwest regions. Declines among postpartum individuals were smaller but still substantial.

There were large declines in contraceptive visits at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic and visit numbers remained below pre-pandemic levels through the end of 2020.

Declines in contraceptive visits during the pandemic suggest that many people faced difficulties accessing this essential health service during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Declines in contraceptive visits during the pandemic suggest that many people faced difficulties accessing this essential health service during the COVID-19 pandemic.Cryopreservation of adherent cells is crucial for commercial cell therapy technology, including effective distribution and storage. Fast thawing has been shown to increase cell recovery in vitrified samples. Previously, radiofrequency (RF) has been investigated as a heating source on large samples, either with or without magnetic particles. Also, laser heating with the aid of dye or nanoparticles has been utilized on sub-millimeter samples successfully. For slow freezing cryopreservation methods, the influence of rate of thawing on viability is less clear. Cryopreservation of surface adhered cells result in many cases in detachment from the surface. We illustrate how intense infrared radiation from a focused halogen illuminator accelerates thawing. We show that two epithelial cell lines, retinal pigment epithelium cells and heterogeneous human epithelial colorectal adenocarcinoma cells, can be effectively cryopreserved and recovered using a combination of slow freezing and fast thawing under infrared illumination. We were able to successfully thaw samples, of 2-4 mm thick, including the media, on the order of a second, providing a heating rate of thousands of Kelvin per minute. Under optimal conditions, we observed higher post-thawing cell viability rates and higher cell adhesion with infrared thawing than with water bath thawing. We suggest that bulk warming with infrared radiation has an advantage over surface warming of surface-attached cells, as it alleviates cell stress during the process of thawing. These findings will pave the way for novel approaches to treating substrate-adhered cells and 3D scaffolds with cells and organoids. This technology may serve as a crucial component in lab-on-chip systems for medical testing and therapeutic use.

Aortic stenosis (AS) patients with eccentric hypertrophy (Ecc-LVH) have increased left ventricular (LV) size and possibly reduced ejection fraction (EF). However, previous studies suggest worse outcomes with concentric remodeling and hypertrophy. We hypothesized that Ecc-LVH pattern in AS patients will also be associated with greater heart failure (HF) and all-cause mortality (ACM).

We queried the electronic medical record from a community-based university practice for all AS patients. We included patients with >60 days follow-up and interpretable Doppler echocardiograms. We recorded demographics, Doppler-echo parameters, laboratories, HF readmission and ACM with follow-up to 2083 days. There were 329 patients divided into 4 groups based on the presence of LV hypertrophy (LVH) and relative wall thickness (RWT) by echocardiography. Ecc-LVH had RWT<0.43 and LVH.

Patients with severe AS were older, had greater coronary disease prevalence, lower hemoglobin, greater LV mass index, more abnormal diastolic function, greater HF and ACM. Multivariate Cox proportional analysis revealed that valvulo-arterial impedance (p=0.017) and Ecc-LVH (p=0.033) were HF predictors. Brain natriuretic peptide>100 pg/ml (p<0.001) and Ecc-LVH (p=0.019) were ACM predictors. ACM was increased in Ecc-LVH patients with both moderate (HR=3.67-8.18 vs other geometries, p=0.007-0.0007) and severe AS (HR=3.94-9.48 vs normal and concentric remodeling, p=0.0002). Sodium L-ascorbyl-2-phosphate In patients with HF, Ecc-LVH was associated with greater HF in moderate AS vs normal geometry (HR=3.28, p=0.0135) and concentric remodeling (HR=2.66, p=0.0472).

Patients with AS and Ecc-LVH have greater ACM than other LV geometries with both moderate and severe AS and greater HF in moderate AS.

Patients with AS and Ecc-LVH have greater ACM than other LV geometries with both moderate and severe AS and greater HF in moderate AS.An important function of microRNAs in gene regulation is to repress the protein synthesis in a multi-step process with implications in timing efficiency of the regulatory network. We propose a stochastic description of translation-initiation mechanism and solve for the steady state distribution of protein number in the linear regime. The time-dependent moments have been approximately calculated and the role of miRNAs in determining the First Passage Time (FPT) properties of protein dynamics has been established. We analytically show that the modulation of slow rates of the translation process will result in efficient and robust timing mechanism. For a general nonlinear model our numerical simulation results are in qualitative agreement with the linear model.Myocilin, a modular multidomain protein, is expressed broadly in the human body but is best known for its presence in the trabecular meshwork extracellular matrix, and myocilin misfolding is associated with glaucoma. Despite progress in comprehending the structure and misfolding of the myocilin olfactomedin domain, the structure and function of full-length myocilin, and contextual changes in glaucoma, remain unknown. Here we expressed and purified milligram-scale quantities of full-length myocilin from suspension mammalian cell culture (Expi293F), enabling molecular characterization in detail not previously accessible. We systematically characterized disulfide-dependent and -independent oligomerization as well as confirmed glycosylation and susceptibility to proteolysis. We identified oligomeric states with glycosylation sites that are inaccessible to enzymatic removal. Low-resolution single particle 2D class averaging from conventional transmission electron microscopy imaging confirms an extended arrangement of tetramers, truncated products consistent with dimers, and a higher-ordered state consistent with octamer. Taken together, our study reveals new myocilin misfolded states and layers of intrinsic heterogeneity, expands our knowledge of olfactomedin-family proteins and lays the foundation for a better molecular understanding of myocilin structure and its still enigmatic biological function.MicroRNAs (miRNAs) play a significant role in tumorigenesis and tumor development. Exosomal microRNA-141 (miRNA-141, miR-141) has been reported to be overexpressed in prostate cancer (PCa) and has become a potential biomarker for the diagnosis of PCa. Herein, a novel fluorescent biosensor based on toehold-aided cyclic amplification combined with horseradish peroxidase (HRP) enzyme catalysis and magnetic nanoparticles (MNPs) was designed for determination of the exosomes-derived microRNA-141 (miRNA-141, miR-141). The synergy of HRP enzyme catalysis and toehold mediated strand display reaction (TSDR) increase the sensitivity of the method, and the good separation ability of MNPs ensures the specificity of the method. Therefore, under the optimized experimental conditions, the highly sensitive and specific detection of miRNA-141 can be realized, and the detection limit is as low as 10 fM. More importantly, the biosensor successfully determinates the exosomal miR-141 in the plasma of patients with PCa.Peptides with recognition, assembly, various activities exhibit strong power and application prospects in sensing, material science, biomedicine. However, peptide-based sensing and expanding application is still at an early stage. Herein, a peptide-based sensing and logic system was developed for highly sensitive and selective detection of Pb2+ and implementation of logic operations. Our Pb2+ assay method was ultra-rapid (less than 1 min), direct, simple with detection limit of 0.75 nM. Flexibility and scalability of peptide-based solution system facilitated the execution of sensing and logic operations from simple to complex. This research will not only inspire discovery and comprehensive applications (such as sensing and assembly) of more functional peptides, but also provide more opportunities for development and design of peptide-based systems and molecular information technologies.Pituitary tumor-transforming gene 1 (PTTG1) has been found to be associated with the process of cell proliferation and invasion, and is highly expressed in aortic dissection (AD). However, its potential role and underlying mechanism in AD remain uncertain. This study aims at elucidating the roles of specificity protein 1 (SP1) and PTTG1 in the migration and phenotypic switching of aortic vascular smooth muscle cells (VSMCs) in AD. Aortic samples were collected from 35 patients with AD for examination of PTTG1 expression in the tissues by qPCR, western blot and immunofluorescence. Human aortic vascular smooth muscle cells (HAVSMCs) were stimulated with platelet-derived growth factor-BB (PDGF-BB) to establish the cellular model of AD. PTTG1 expression in VSMCs was also examined by qPCR and western blot. Cell viability was detected by CCK-8, cell proliferation by EdU staining and cell migration by wound healing and transwell. Western blot was then performed to assay migration-related proteins. After interference with PTTG1, the levels of smooth muscle pthenotypic switch markers smooth muscle protein 22 alpha (SM22-α) and osteopontin (OPN) were detected by qPCR, western blot and immunofluorescence.