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Improving neuroendocrine tumor treatments with mathematical modeling : lessons from other endocrine cancers
Get PDFNeuroendocrine tumors (NETs) occur sporadically or as part of rare endocrine tumor syndromes (RETS) such as Multiple Endocrine Neoplasia 1 and Von-Hippel Landau syndromes. Due to their relative rarity and lack of model systems, NETs and RETs are difficult to study, hindering advancements in therapeutic development. Causal, or mechanistic mathematical modeling, is widely deployed in disease areas such as breast and prostate cancers, aiding understanding of observations as well as streamlining in vitro and in vivo modeling efforts. Mathematical modeling, while not yet widely utilized in NETs research, offers an opportunity to accelerate NET research and therapy development. To illustrate this, we highlight examples of how mathematical modeling associated with more common endocrine cancers has been successfully used in the preclinical, translational, and clinical settings. We also provide a scope of the limited work that has been done in NETs and map how these techniques can be utilized in NET research to address specific outstanding challenges in the field. Finally, we include practical details such as hardware and data requirements, present advantages and disadvantages of various mathematical modeling approaches, and discuss challenges of using mathematical modeling. Through a crossdisciplinary approach, we believe that many currently difficult problems can be made more tractable by applying mathematical modeling and that the field of rare diseases in endocrine oncology is well-poised to take advantage of these techniques.
Uncovering hidden histories of community-led planning
No full textThere has been a long tradition of political organising around planning that has taken place outside or in opposition to the state in the UK. However, what can loosely be termed ‘community-led planning’ (CLP) has often not been fully recorded. This chapter seeks to redress this absence. Drawing on insights from a three-year project investigating ‘Hidden Histories of Community-Led Planning’ since the 1960s, we consider how and why this rich history has been overlooked within mainstream planning history. In doing so, however, we also reflect that the notion of what is hidden from history is itself multilayered. Paying attention to the challenges our project faced in moving beyond an identifiable ‘canon’ of projects, places and people, we also consider what may be hidden within existing accounts of CLP, including the voices and experiences of women and racialised communities. We conclude by arguing that whilst these insurgent spaces offer an important counter-tradition capable of expanding the political horizons of planning in the UK, they are not immune from the privileging of certain forms of knowledge and expertise at the expense of other voices. We therefore argue for ongoing work to expand planning’s archive and build a critical planning historiography
When grand societal challenges stimulate the creation of public value : a study of nurses in a non-western public healthcare sector
No full textA unified evaluation framework for epistemic predictions
Get PDFPredictions of uncertainty-aware models are diverse, ranging from single point estimates (often averaged over prediction samples) to predictive distributions, to set-valued or credal-set representations. We propose a novel unified evaluation framework for uncertaintyaware classifiers, applicable to a wide range of model classes, which allows users to tailor the trade-off between accuracy and precision of predictions via a suitably designed performance metric. This makes possible the selection of the most suitable model for a particular real-world application as a function of the desired trade-off. Our experiments, concerning Bayesian, ensemble, evidential, deterministic,
credal and belief function classifiers on the CIFAR-10, MNIST and CIFAR-100 datasets, show that the metric behaves as desired
Emotions at work : the emotional labour of professional diplomats in the early modern Venetian republic
Get PDFThis article furthers the dialogue between business history and the history of diplomacy in the early modern period. The focus is early modern Venice, an idiosyncratic state, where individuals who comprised the ruling class, determining Venice’s political and diplomatic fate, were also professional businessmen, engaging in banking, investments, and international trade. The article discusses the emotional labour of professional diplomats representing Venice’s commercial and political interests. It does so by focusing on the emotional ramifications involved in the protection and preservation of official secrecy, as inherent to professional diplomacy. By emphasising the business background of Venetian diplomats, the article shows that in the early modern era, business and diplomacy intersected and interacted a lot more than hitherto understood. Ultimately, the article introduces an emotional turn to a significant aspect of early modern business and diplomatic history, using secrecy as the link for a much needed dialogue between the two disciplines
Evaluating the impact of educational resources on household food waste generation
Get PDFFood waste is a major global problem resulting in financial, environmental and social consequences, with household food waste contributing to 70% of all food waste in the UK(1, 2). Although long-term personalised interventions have been recommended to target it, these are generally impractical when dealing with differing complex demands and dynamics of everyday lives (3). This study aimed to develop a range of short, clear and succinct educational resources combining a variety of motivational, informative and practical tools and assessing their effect on changes in attitudes, abilities and behaviour towards reducing household food waste.
Thirty four participants from the Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire area were recruited to complete a food waste diary for three days including two week days and a weekend day. Following this, they were provided with daily educational resources to reduce food waste, for 10 days before completing a second food waste diary for three days. Participants completed a questionnaire evaluating the usefulness of the intervention using educational resources. Total amount and nutritional value of the wasted foods were calculated using Nutritics software. A Wilcoxon signed rank test was used to detect differences between the food waste records before and after the educational intervention as well as the difference in environmental awareness pre- and post-intervention.
Results from the second food waste diary showed that average daily household food waste significantly reduced from 1406 ± 1201 g to 763 ± 611 g (Z=2.847, p=0.004). The energy content of the food wasted pre-intervention was 1831 ± 1752 kcal compared to 958 ± 840 kcal post intervention (Z=2.932, p=0.003). The greatest reduction in food waste was achieved by the 45-54 year age category (-73%), households with children (-50%), those who shopped daily (-67%) and those who ate 4-7 meals outside (-70%). Participants’ awareness of environmental impact of food waste significantly increased (Z=-2.707, p=0.007) alongside improvements in self-reported attitudes, abilities and behaviour towards household food waste. The educational resource on ‘storing foods properly’ was rated by the participants as most useful. The study has demonstrated the use of educational resources designed to target knowledge, attitudes and motivation alongside practical solutions to result in a reduction in household food waste generation. Future research should focus on the resources that were most useful and assess the long-term success of these types of interventions
Effect of combined aerobic exercise and resistance training on postmenopausal women with type 2 diabetes : a systematic review and meta-analysis
Get PDFBackground.
There is no strong evidence demonstrating whether or not aerobic exercise in conjunction with resistance exercise improves metabolic diabetes markers in postmenopausal women.
Objective.
To evaluate the effect of aerobic exercise and resistance training on metabolic markers in postmenopausal women with type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) by means of a systematic review and meta-analysis.
Methods.
The searches were completed using EMBASE, MEDLINE/PubMed, Scopus and Web of Science databases. This study included non-blinded, single or double-blinded randomized control trials and postmenopausal women diagnosed with T2DM. The imposed intervention was aerobic exercise plus any training protocol to strengthen muscle groups for resistance intervention. The outcomes of interest were the blood glucose levels, insulin secretion, homeostasis model assessment-insulin resistance index (HOMA-IR) and glycated hemoglobin (HbA1c). Risk of Bias tools and GRADE were obligatory.
Results.
Three studies were included (83 participants). Exercise intervention ranged between two to four days per week. Compared to the control group, in the group submitted to aerobic exercise + resistance training, no significant change was noted for HbA1c (subtotal = mean difference − 0.35 [95% CI: −0.85, 0.15], p = .17, and heterogeneity = 0%) (GRADE: very low), nevertheless, HOMA-IR index was significantly improved (subtotal = mean difference −0.52 [95% CI: −0.99, −0.05], p = .03, and heterogeneity = 0%) (GRADE: very low).
Conclusion.
Despite the very low certainty found in the quality of evidences, our analysis showed that aerobic exercise along with strength exercise seems to improve some metabolic diabetes markers in postmenopausal women with T2DM. There is a need for further studies to support our preliminary findings
Introducing SPARK: A pilot study of a sport-specific, pragmatic, and athlete-centred values-based anti-doping education workshop
No full textThe provision of values-based education (VbE) for elite athletes, as required by WADA's International Standard for Education, presents challenges which are related to the developmental stage of learners, delivery methods, content design, and resource availability. To address these challenges, we developed and piloted SPARK, a 90-minute, evidence-based, in-person workshop for elite athletes. SPARK combines value-education and values-based education to enhance athletes' awareness of personal values, sensemaking, and decision-making autonomy, complementing anti-doping education. This pilot study included two international groups of young elite biathletes (54 in 2023 and 51 in 2024). Standardized evaluations were conducted pre- and post-intervention (n = 19 and n = 10, respectively), with feedback collected from 48 athletes. Paired pre- and post-workshop assessments demonstrated effect sizes ranging from small (i.e., noticeable) to medium (i.e., practically meaningful) in self-awareness of value priorities (d=0.37, p=0.06), efficacy in processing and managing personal and societal values (d=0.39, p=0.04), handling value conflicts (d=0.37, p=0.06), and using personal values to guide decision-making about sport and performance enhancement (d=0.42, p=0.03). Results suggest SPARK is feasible, effective, and well-received by athletes