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Koori Quit Pack mailout smoking cessation support for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people who smoke: A feasibility study protocol
Get PDFIntroduction Smoking remains the leading preventable cause of death for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in Australia. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people who smoke are more likely to make a quit attempt than their non-Aboriginal counterparts but less likely to sustain the quit attempt. There is little available evidence specifically for and by Indigenous peoples to inform best practice smoking cessation care.
The provision of a free Koori Quit Pack with optional nicotine replacement therapy sent by mail may be a feasible, acceptable and effective way to access stop smoking support for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.
Methods and analysis An Aboriginal-led, multisite non-randomised single-group, pre–post feasibility study across three states in Australia will be conducted. Participants will be recruited via service-targeted social media advertising and during usual care at their Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Services. Through a process of self-referral, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people who smoke daily will complete a survey and receive mailout smoking cessation support. Data will be collected over the phone by an Aboriginal Research Assistant. This pilot study will inform the development of a larger, powered trial.
Ethics and dissemination Ethics approval has been obtained from the Aboriginal Health & Medical Research Council Ethics Committee of New South Wales (NSW) (#1894/21) and the University of Newcastle (#H-2022-0174). Findings will be reported through peer-reviewed journals and presentations at relevant local, national and international conferences. The findings will be shared with the NSW and Victoria Quitline, Aboriginal Health and Medical Research Council and Victorian Aboriginal Community Controlled Organisation and the National Heart Foundation
The creation and pilot testing of a method to identify strong and instantaneous responders to spinal manipulation therapy
Get PDFIntroduction: Spinal manipulative therapy (SMT) can provide pain relief for individuals with non-specific low back pain (NSLBP). Clinical prediction rules can be used to identify patients who are likely to respond positively to a particular treatment approach. A list of 18 signs and symptoms across 5 domains have previously been developed by expert manual therapists, and are suggested to be predictors of instantaneous relief in people with NSLBP after SMT. However, these items have yet to be developed into a workable format and tested in a clinical setting.
Objectives: To develop a workable questionnaire and subsequently run a pilot study which tests the feasibility of the study in chiropractic patients with NSLBP, and the preliminary relationships between the 18 signs and symptoms (predictors) and those who have a strong and instantaneous response to SMT.
Methods: Practitioner and patient questionnaires were designed based on the previously identified 18 predictors of instantaneous relief following SMT. Ten chiropractors were recruited and were each asked to recruit 10 NSLBP patients from among their normal patients. Each practitioner and patient answered the questionnaires, and feedback from practitioners was sought on the study and questionnaires. Predictors of immediate improvement after SMT were investigated using linear regression.
Results: Three validated outcome measures were used in designing the questionnaires and a further nine questions were designed to cover gaps in the literature. Of the 10 chiropractors who agreed to participate, two withdrew and two were lost to follow up. In total there were 63 out of a planned 100 practitioner/patient responses. Three of the five domains had predictors showing statistically significant results for predictive outcomes. These included the patient’s prior response to SMT, the patient’s expected response, Dr’s rating of patient’s health status, Dr’s rating of how well they felt they understood the patient’s goals, and decreased range of motion identified on physical examination.
Conclusion: The design of the questionnaire was based on best available evidence-based literature at the time of development. A fully powered study appears to be feasible; however, suggested changes to the questionnaire and data collection process were made. Pilot testing identified multiple possible predictors for instantaneous relief after SMT in chiropractic patients with NSLBP. These results support the need for a fully powered study to further explore the 18 possible predictors of instantaneous relief after SMT
Eimeria spp. and Tyzzeria perniciosa Allen, 1936 (Apicomplexa: Eimeriidae) from a Pacific black duck, Anas superciliosa Gmelin (Aves: Anseriformes), in western Australia
Get PDFFour species of the Eimeriidae, Eimeria anatis Scholtyseck, 1955, Eimeria aythyae Farr, 1965, Eimeria krylovi Svanbaev & Rakhmatullina, 1967 and Tyzzeria perniciosa Allen, 1936, were morphologically identified from oöcysts recovered from a Pacific black duck, Anas superciliosa Gmelin. Additionally, genotypic characterization of E. anatis is provided via sequencing of the mitochondrial cytochrome c oxidase subunit 1 (cox1) and the small subunit ribosomal RNA (18S) genes. The four species are redescribed, providing additional morphological details. The validity of genera and coccidian species parasitizing birds of the order Anseriformes such as Wenyonella Hoare, 1933 and some Tyzzeria spp. are discussed. Molecular phylogenetic analyses for the cox1 and 18S rRNA genes resulted in monophylies of Eimeria spp. from Anseriformes which included the sequences obtained from E. anatis oöcysts
Medium-chain fatty acids for the prevention or treatment of Alzheimer's disease: A systematic review and meta-analysis
No full textIn preclinical AD, the brain gradually becomes insulin resistant causing a cellular energy deficit, which leads to the accumulation of free radicals increasing inflammation and damaging neurons, thus ketone bodies offer an alternative energy source having the potential to supply the insulin-resistant brain with energy and may improve cognition
Effect of additional water supply during grain filling on protein composition and epitope characteristics of winter oats
Get PDFPure oats in gluten-free diets (GFD) represent important nutritional benefits for people suffering from celiac disease (CD). However, oat cultivars do not contain the typical CD-related wheat gliadin analog polypeptides. Emerging evidence suggests that oat cultivars containing gluten-like epitopes in avenin sequences may pose potential health risks for celiac patients in rare cases, depending on the individual’s susceptibility. Consequently, it is necessary to screen oats in terms of protein and epitope composition, to be able to select safe varieties for gluten-free applications. The overall aim of our study is to investigate the variation of oat protein composition directly related to health-related and techno-functional properties and to examine how the protein compositional parameters change due to irrigation during the grain-filling period as compared to the natural rain-fed grown, in a large winter oat population of different geographic origin.
Elements of an oat sample population representing 164 winter oat varieties from 8 countries and the protein composition of resulting samples have been characterized. Size distribution of the total protein extracts has been analyzed by SE-HPLC, while the 70% ethanol extracted proteins were analyzed by RP-HPLC. Protein extracts are separated into 3 main groups of fractions on the SE-HPLC column; polymeric, avenin, and non-avenin monomeric protein groups, representing 59.17–80.87%, 12.89–31.03%, and 3.40–9.41% of total protein content, respectively. The ratio of polymeric to monomeric proteins varied between 1.71 and 6.07. 91 RP-HPLC-separated peaks have been differentiated from the ethanol extractable proteins of the entire population.
The various parameters identified a lot of variation, confirming the significance of genotypic variation. In addition, it was also established that the additional water supply during grain filling significantly affected the various quantitative parameters of protein content, but not its qualitative structure. This environmental effect, however, was strongly genotype-dependent. Winter oat genotypes with low levels of epitope content were identified and it was proven that these characteristics were independent of the environmental factor of water availability. These genotypes are appropriate for initiating a specific breeding program to yield oat cultivars suitable for CD patients
Prevalence and risk factors of gestational diabetes mellitus in Bangladesh: Findings from demographic health survey 2017–2018
Get PDFGestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) has serious consequences for both maternal and neonatal health. The growing number of noncommunicable diseases and related risk factors as well as the introduction of new World Health Organization (WHO) diagnostic criteria for GDM are likely to impact the GDM prevalence in Bangladesh. Our study aimed to assess the national prevalence and identify the risk factors using the most recent WHO criteria. We used the secondary data of 272 pregnant women (weighted for sampling strategy) from the Bangladesh Demographic and Health Survey 2017–2018. Multivariate logistic regression was performed to determine the risk factors of GDM. The overall prevalence of GDM in Bangladesh was 35% (95/272). Increased odds of GDM were observed among women living in the urban areas (adjusted odds ratio (aOR) 2.74, 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.43–5.27) compared to rural areas and those aged ≥25 years (aOR 2.03, 95% CI 1.13–3.65). GDM rates were less prevalent in the later weeks of pregnancy compared to early weeks. Our study demonstrates that the national prevalence of GDM in Bangladesh is very high, which warrants immediate attention of policy makers, health practitioners, public health researchers, and the community. Context-specific and properly tailored interventions are needed for the prevention and early diagnosis of GDM
How have COVID-19 stringency measures changed scholarly activity?
No full textGovernment restrictions to the movement of people due to the COVID-19 pandemic have resulted in a reduction in the number of registered non COVID-19 clinical trials which was in turn negatively correlated with the stringency index of a country. This could have serious consequences for the discovery of treatments that are required to reduce the global burden of disease (GBD)
Probability-based framework to fuse temporal consistency and semantic information for background segmentation
No full textThe fusion of temporal consistency and semantic information with limited foreground information for background segmentation using deep learning is an underinvestigated problem. In this paper, we explore the relation between temporal consistency and semantic information based on the law of total probability. A highly concise framework is proposed to fuse these two types of information. A theoretical proof is given to show that the proposed framework is more accurate than either the temporal consistency-based model or the semantic information-based model and that each model is a special case of the proposed framework. The proposed framework is a white-box framework that can easily be embedded into a deep neural network as a merging layer. In the proposed model, only a few parameters must be learned, which substantially reduces the need for a large dataset. In addition, these interpretable parameters reflect our understanding of the background and can be applied to a wide range of environments. Extensive evaluations indicate the promising performance of the proposed method. Our code and trained weights for the experiments are available at GitHub
The effects of Lutein and Zeaxanthin supplementation on cognitive function in Adults with Self-Reported mild cognitive complaints: A randomized, Double-Blind, Placebo-Controlled Study
Get PDFBackground: Lutein and zeaxanthin are fat-soluble, dietary carotenoids with high concentrations in human brain tissue. There have been a number studies confirming an association between lutein and zeaxanthin and cognitive function.
Purpose: Examine the effects of lutein and zeaxanthin supplementation on cognitive function in adults with self-reported cognitive complaints.
Study Design: Two-arm, parallel-group, 6-month, randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial.
Methods: Ninety volunteers aged 40–75 years received either 10 mg of lutein and 2 mg of zeaxanthin, once daily or a placebo. Outcome measures included computer-based cognitive tasks, the Cognitive Failures Questionnaire, Behavior Rating Inventory of Executive Function, Profile of Mood States, and the Patient-Reported Outcomes Measurement Information System-29.
Results: Compared to the placebo, lutein and zeaxanthin supplementation was associated with greater improvements in visual episodic memory (p = 0.005) and visual learning (p = 0.001). However, there were no other statistically-significant differences in performance on the other assessed cognitive tests or self-report questionnaires. Lutein and zeaxanthin supplementation was well-tolerated with no reports of significant adverse effects.
Conclusion: The results from this trial suggest that 6-months of supplementation with lutein and zeaxanthin may improve visual memory and learning in community-dwelling adults with self-reported cognitive complaints. However, it had no other effect on other computer-based measures of cognitive performance or self-report measures of cognition, memory, mood, or physical function
Breeding more crops in less time: A perspective on speed breeding
Get PDFBreeding crops in a conventional way demands considerable time, space, inputs for selection, and the subsequent crossing of desirable plants. The duration of the seed-to-seed cycle is one of the crucial bottlenecks in the progress of plant research and breeding. In this context, speed breeding (SB), relying mainly on photoperiod extension, temperature control, and early seed harvest, has the potential to accelerate the rate of plant improvement. Well demonstrated in the case of long-day plants, the SB protocols are being extended to short-day plants to reduce the generation interval time. Flexibility in SB protocols allows them to align and integrate with diverse research purposes including population development, genomic selection, phenotyping, and genomic editing. In this review, we discuss the different SB methodologies and their application to hasten future plant improvement. Though SB has been extensively used in plant phenotyping and the pyramiding of multiple traits for the development of new crop varieties, certain challenges and limitations hamper its widespread application across diverse crops. However, the existing constraints can be resolved by further optimization of the SB protocols for critical food crops and their efficient integration in plant breeding pipelines