Search results for "ELECTION"

Analysis of cardiac and pulmonary complication probabilities after radiation therapy for patients with early-stage breast cancer

2009

Objective. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the radiobiological implications of clinical use of respiratory-gated techniques for postoperative radiation therapy of early-stage left-sided breast cancer after breast-conserving surgery. Material and methods. Radiation therapy treatment plans of 80 patients with early-stage breast cancer (stage I–II), receiving whole breast irradiation after breast-conserving therapy, were analyzed. The control group consisting of 47 patients received standard radiation therapy, and the respiratory-gated group consisting of 33 patients received deep inspiration-gated radiation therapy. Normal tissue complication probabilities (NTCP) for cardiac mortali…

Methodology for high-quality studies on course and prognosis of inflammatory bowel disease.

2012

Inflammatory bowel diseases (IBDs) are characterized by a chronic course with an alternation of relapses and remissions. Questions about prognosis are important for the patient who wants to know how the disease will affect his/her life and also for clinicians to make management decisions. Correct selection of the patients is the basis for good methodological studies on the course of IBD. A great proportion of data on the course of IBD is derived from a limited number of cohort studies. Studies help to define the endpoints for clinical trials and to identify subsets of patients in whom the prognosis of the disease can be stratified according to clinical features. Specific scientific requirem…

Renal artery denervation for treating resistant hypertension: Definition of the disease, patient selection and description of the procedure

2012

Arterial hypertension is responsible for a significant burden of cardiovascular morbidity and mortality, worldwide. Although several rational and integrated pharmacological strategies are available, the control of high blood pressure still remains largely unsatisfactory. Failure to achieve effective blood pressure control in treated hypertensive patients may have a substantial impact on individual global cardiovascular risk, since it significantly increases the risk of developing hypertension-related macrovascular and microvascular complications. Arterial hypertension is arbitrarily defined as 'resistant' or 'refractory' when the recommended blood pressure goals (clinic blood pressure below…

Interventional and surgical modalities of treatment for pulmonary arterial hypertension

2004

AbstractBeyond medical therapy, different interventional and surgical approaches exist for treatment of pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH). Atrial septostomy has been applied in patients with lack of response to medical therapy in the absence of other surgical treatment options. With growing experience, procedure-related death rates have been reduced to 5.4%, and the most suitable patient group has been identified among patients with a mean right atrial pressure between 10 and 20 mm Hg. Pulmonary endarterectomy is the accepted form of treatment for patients with chronic thromboembolic pulmonary hypertension. Establishing the diagnosis and the classification of the type of lesions by pulm…

Critical Appraisal of Scientific Articles

2009

Despite the increasing number of scientific publications, many physicians find themselves with less and less time to read what others have written. Selection, reading, and critical appraisal of publications is, however, necessary to stay up to date in one’s field. This is also demanded by the precepts of evidence-based medicine (1, 2). Besides the medical content of a publication, its interpretation and evaluation also require understanding of the statistical methodology. Sadly, not even in science are all terms always used correctly. The word "significance," for example, has been overused because significant (or positive) results are easier to get published (3, 4). The aim of this article …

185Effect of gender on patient selection for cardiac resynchronisation therapy

2017

Mapping of the human visual cortex using image-guided transcranial magnetic stimulation

2002

We describe a protocol using transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) to systematically map the visual sensations induced by focal and non-invasive stimulation of the human occipital cortex. TMS is applied with a figure of eight coil to 28 positions arranged in a 2x2-cm grid over the occipital area. A digitizing tablet connected to a PC computer running customized software, and audio and video recording are used for detailed and accurate data collection and analysis of evoked phosphenes. A frameless image-guided neuronavigational device is used to describe the position of the actual sites of the stimulation coils relative to the cortical surface. Our results show that TMS is able to elicit p…

Rationale and design of the EMBRACE STEMI Study: A phase 2a, randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial to evaluate the safety, tolerability …

2012

Background Although significant efforts have been made to improve ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) outcomes by reducing symptom-onset-to-reperfusion times, strategies to decrease the clinical impact of ischemic reperfusion injury have demonstrated limited success. Bendavia, an intravenously administered mitochondrial targeting peptide, has been shown to reduce myocardial infarct size and attenuate coronary no-reflow in experimental modelswhen given before reperfusion. Design The EMBRACE STEMI study is a phase 2a, randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial enrolling 300 patients with a first-time anterior STEMI and an occluded proximal or mid–left anterior descendin…

Absence of the lactase-persistence-associated allele in early Neolithic Europeans.

2007

Lactase persistence (LP), the dominant Mendelian trait conferring the ability to digest the milk sugar lactose in adults, has risen to high frequency in central and northern Europeans in the last 20,000 years. This trait is likely to have conferred a selective advantage in individuals who consume appreciable amounts of unfermented milk. Some have argued for the “culture-historical hypothesis,” whereby LP alleles were rare until the advent of dairying early in the Neolithic but then rose rapidly in frequency under natural selection. Others favor the “reverse cause hypothesis,” whereby dairying was adopted in populations with preadaptive high LP allele frequencies. Analysis based on the cons…

Sex-specific effects of natural and sexual selection on the evolution of life span and ageing in Drosophila simulans

2014

Summary Variation in the strength of age-dependent natural selection shapes differences in ageing rates across species and populations. Likewise, sexual selection can promote divergent patterns of senescence across the sexes. However, the effects of these processes on the evolution of ageing have largely been considered independently, and interactions between them are poorly understood. We use experimental evolution to investigate how natural and sexual selection affect life span and ageing in Drosophila simulans. Replicate populations were evolved under lifetime monogamy (relaxed sexual selection) or lifetime polyandry (elevated sexual selection) and at one of two temperatures, 25 °C (rela…