1,720,954 research outputs found
Impact of obesity on left ventricular mass and function in subjects with chronic volume overload
No full textAbstract
OBJECTIVE: Previous studies evaluated the effect of obesity on left ventricular (LV) mass and systolic function in healthy subjects and in patients with coexistent chronic LV pressure overload due to hypertension, but no data exist regarding subjects with underlying volume overload. This study assessed the impact of overweight-obesity on LV mass and systolic function in patients with coexistent chronic LV volume overload.
RESEARCH METHODS AND PROCEDURES: In 885 subjects with degenerative aortic regurgitation, a common cause of LV volume overload, LV mass, ejection fraction, and myocardial contractility were determined by echocardiography.
RESULTS: LV mass was greater in overweight (193.5 +/- 54.2 g) and further increased in obese subjects (208.4 +/- 63.6 g) in comparison with normal-weight patients (177.7 +/- 54.9 g) (p < 0.0001), and these differences were still evident after adjustment for LV workload, gender, and body size. Despite no differences in ejection fraction, LV myocardial contractility was lower in overweight (92.6 +/- 14.8%) and obese subjects (91.7 +/- 14.4%) than normal-weight individuals (95.6 +/- 16.0%) (p = 0.0058). The magnitudes of these effects were not different from those found in age-, gender-, and body size-matched controls, suggesting additive interaction, rather than synergistic, between overweight-obesity and the underlying condition of volume overload. Multivariate analysis showed that BMI independently predicted LV mass and that the negative effect on LV myocardial contractility was mediated by LV hypertrophy.
DISCUSSION: Overweight and obesity are associated with LV hypertrophy and contractile impairment in patients with underlying chronic LV volume overload
Left ventricular midwall mechanics in subjects with aortic stenosis and normal systolic chamber function.
No full textBACKGROUND AND AIM OF THE STUDY: Endocardial indices of left ventricular (LV) systolic function overestimate myocardial performance in hypertrophic left ventricles. Midwall fractional shortening (mFS) is a more reliable index of systolic performance. Aortic stenosis (AS) is a common cause of LV hypertrophy (LVH), but midwall mechanics in this condition have not been analyzed. Also, a tendency towards hyperdynamic LV chamber function has been reported in women with AS in comparison with men, but whether there exist gender-related discrepancies in midwall performance is not known.
METHODS: The study group included 147 patients with AS and normal chamber systolic function. LV diameters and thicknesses, LV mass, relative wall thickness (RWT), endocardial fractional shortening, stroke volume, ejection fraction (EF), mFS and stress-corrected mFS were determined.
RESULTS: Patients with AS showed depressed mFS (16.2 +/- 2.5% versus 18.8 +/- 2.4%, p <0.0001) and stress-corrected mFS (84.3 +/- 13.8% versus 100.0 +/- 12.6%, p <0.0001) when compared to controls. The subset with moderate AS had lower mFS (15.9 +/- 2.0%) than those with mild AS (16.9 +/- 2.4%), and further depression was present in subjects with severe AS (13.8 +/- 2.2%, p <0.0001). A similar trend was observed for stress-corrected mFS (mild AS, 88.5 +/- 13.3%; moderate AS, 82.0 +/- 11.5%; severe AS, 71.2 +/- 12.0%, p <0.0001). Multivariate analysis identified RWT as the best predictor of mFS and stress-corrected mFS. Logistic regression showed that depressed stress-corrected mFS was independently associated with the presence of symptoms. Endocardial fractional shortening and EF were increased in women compared to men, but there were no gender-related differences in mFS (16.2 +/- 2.5% versus 16.1 +/- 2.4%, p = 0.84) and stress-corrected mFS (84.0 +/- 14.1% versus 84.5 +/- 13.5%, p 0.82).
CONCLUSION: Aortic stenosis is associated with depression in LV midwall mechanics. Systolic midwall performance reduces as the severity of valve disease increases, and this relationship is mediated by parallel changes in LV geometry
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Full text linkWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Full text linkWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
koamabayili/VECTRON-author-checklist: VECTRON author checklist
No full textWe have done our best to complete the author checklist relating to the use of animals in the hut study. Note that the objective for the hut study was to evaluate the IRS treatment applications for residual efficacy against Anopheles mosquitoes, including the local An. coluzzii mosquito population. Cows were only used to attract mosquitoes into the huts and no tests were carried out directly on the cows. The author checklist is intended for use with studies where experiments are carried out on animals, which is why we have had such difficulty in completing this for the hut study, as many of the questions do not relate to how the cows were used
Author-wise bibliometric analysis based on entropy.
No full textAuthor-wise bibliometric analysis based on entropy.</p
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