Search results for "Specificity."
showing 10 items of 2232 documents
Imaging of the lungs using 3he MRI: Preliminary clinical experience in 18 patients with and without lung disease
1997
The purpose of this study was to describe the 3He MRI findings of normal pulmonary ventilation in healthy volunteers and to evaluate abnormalities in patients with different lung diseases. Hyperpolarized 3He gas (300 ml, 3 x 10(5) Pa, polarized to 35-45% by optical pumping, provided in special glass cells) was inhaled by 8 healthy volunteers and 10 patients with different lung diseases. Imaging was performed with a three-dimensional fast low-angle shot (FLASH) sequence (TR = 11.8 msec; TE = 5 msec; transmitter amplitude, 5-8 V; corresponding flip angle, < 5 degrees) in a single breath-hold (22-42 seconds). Clinical and radiological examinations were available for correlation. The studies we…
Performance characteristics of the new Abbott Real Time MTB assay for detection of Mycobacterium tuberculosis complex in respiratory specimens
2015
The performance of the Abbott Real Time MTB assay for detection of Mycobacterium tuberculosis complex in respiratory specimens was evaluated using a standard culture as the reference. The overall concordance between both methods was 0.95. The assay displayed an excellent sensitivity (100% for smear-positive/92.3% for smear-negative specimens) and specificity (100%).
Biomarker discovery study of inflammatory proteins for colorectal cancer early detection demonstrated importance of screening setting validation
2018
Abstract Objectives Most studies identifying inflammatory markers for early detection of colorectal cancer (CRC) were conducted using clinically manifest cases. We aimed to identify circulating inflammatory biomarkers for early detection of CRC and validate them in both a clinical setting and a true screening setting. Study Design and Setting A total of 92 inflammatory proteins were quantified in baseline plasma samples from individuals clinically diagnosed with CRC and neoplasm-free controls matched on age and sex (training set). A multimarker panel was selected and evaluated in samples from another clinical setting (validation set C) and a screening setting (validation set S). Results In …
Breakdown of Thalamo-Cortical Connectivity Precedes Spike Generation in Focal Epilepsies
2017
Electroencephalography (EEG) spikes and focal epileptic seizures are generated in circumscribed cerebral networks that have been insufficiently described. For precise time and spatial domain network characterization, we applied in patients with focal epilepsy dense array 256-channel EEG recordings with causal connectivity estimation by using time-resolved partial directed coherence and 3T-magnetic resonance imaging-derived cortical and thalamus integrity reconstruction. Before spike generation, significant theta and alpha bands driven information flows alterations were noted from both temporal and frontal lobes to the thalamus and from the thalamus to the frontal lobe. Medial dorsal and ven…
Establishment of standardised SLA/LP immunoassays: specificity for autoimmune hepatitis, worldwide occurrence, and clinical characteristics
2002
Background: Antibodies to soluble liver antigen/liver pancreas (SLA/LP) are specific markers of autoimmune hepatitis. Their target antigen has recently been cloned. Aims: To establish standardised immunoassays using the recombinant antigen, and to assess the frequency and significance of seropositivity in patients from different countries. Methods: An enzyme linked immunoassay was developed using purified recombinant antigen and validated by testing sera from 200 healthy blood donors and 1026 patients with various liver and non-liver diseases. The assay was then applied to 454 sera from 419 patients with autoimmune hepatitis from different countries. All sera were also tested by inhibition …
Autoimmune associations and autoantibody screening show focused recognition in patient subgroups with generalized myasthenia gravis
2013
Autoimmune associations in myasthenia gravis (MG)-patients and their relatives have not been re-assessed since their separation into early- or late-onset MG (EOMG, LOMG), or thymoma-associated MG. Here, we analysed 226 EOMG-, 97 LOMG-, and 150 thymoma-patients for autoimmune disorders in themselves and their relatives. From 283 of them sera were tested for different organ- and non-organ-specific autoantibodies (autoAbs) by immunofluorescence test (IFT) and ELISA; genotyping was performed in 213 patients. Relatives with autoimmune disorders were reported by more patients with EOMG (40% of 210) than LOMG (20% of 89; p0.01) than thymomas (8% of 150; p0.001). In 150 genotyped EOMG-females, the …
Optical noninvasive monitoring of skin blood pulsations
2005
Time-resolved detection and analysis of skin backscattered optical signals (remission photoplethysmography or PPG) provide rich information on skin blood volume pulsations and can serve for reliable cardiovascular assessment. Single- and multiple-channel PPG concepts are discussed. Simultaneous data flow from several locations on the human body allows us to study heartbeat pulse-wave propagation in real time and to evaluate vascular resistance. Portable single-, dual-, and four-channel PPG monitoring devices with special software have been designed for real-time data acquisition and processing. The prototype devices have been clinically studied, and their potential for monitoring heart arrh…
Prediction of the hemoglobin level in hemodialysis patients using machine learning techniques
2013
HighlightsDifferent prediction algorithms were used to predict Hb levels in CRF patients.Prediction errors in the validation cohorts of patients were around 0.6g/dl.Difficulty to obtain lower errors due to the measuring machine precision (0.2g/dl).Relevance analysis of features have been applied for each predictor. Patients who suffer from chronic renal failure (CRF) tend to suffer from an associated anemia as well. Therefore, it is essential to know the hemoglobin (Hb) levels in these patients. The aim of this paper is to predict the hemoglobin (Hb) value using a database of European hemodialysis patients provided by Fresenius Medical Care (FMC) for improving the treatment of this kind of …
Virtual reality treatment of flying phobia.
2002
Flying phobia (FP) might become a very incapacitating and disturbing problem in a person's social, working, and private areas. Psychological interventions based on exposure therapy have proved to be effective, but given the particular nature of this disorder they bear important limitations. Exposure therapy for FP might be excessively costly in terms of time, money, and efforts. Virtual reality (VR) overcomes these difficulties as different significant environments might be created, where the patient can interact with what he or she fears while in a totally safe and protected environment, the therapist's consulting room. This paper intends, on one hand, to show the different scenarios desig…
Application of headspace solid phase dynamic extraction gas chromatography/mass spectrometry (HS-SPDE-GC/MS) for biomonitoring of n-heptane and its m…
2011
Abstract Solid phase dynamic extraction (SPDE) is an innovative sample preparation and enrichment technique in connection with gas chromatography (GC). Using SPDE, we developed a method for simultaneous determination of n-heptane and its mono-oxygenated metabolites heptane-4-one, 3-one, 2-one, 4-ol, 3-ol, 2-ol, and 1-ol in blood. After adjustment of various extraction and desorption parameters, method validation resulted in limits of detection (LOD) between 0.006 (heptane-4-one) and 0.021 mg/L (heptane-1-ol). Intra-assay coefficients of variation ranged between 4.8% and 20.8% while relative recovery ranged between 100% and 117% (spiked concentration 0.128 mg/L, n = 8). The method was appli…