1,720,969 research outputs found
Pulse inversion harmonic gray scale imaging with contrast agent (Levovist) in detection of liver metastases
Nuclear medicine imaging of inflammatory/infective disorders of the abdomen
Different nuclear medicine modalities are currently used to study inflammatory and infective disorders of the abdomen. They are usually complementary to radiology and endoscopy, but they play a pivotal role in particular clinical situations. Several radiopharmaceuticals (e.g., In-111 or Tc-99m labelled white blood cells, monoclonal antibodies, human polyclonal immunoglobulins, Ga-67 citrate) are commercially available, but they can not be used indifferently to study abdominal inflammatory disorders. The lack of comparative studies showing the accuracy of each radiopharmaceutical for the study of inflammatory/infective abdominal diseases does not allow the best nuclear medicine technique(s) to be chosen in an evidence-based manner. To this end we performed a meta-analysis of peer reviewed articles published between 1984 and 2004 describing the use of nuclear medicine imaging for the study of inflammatory bowel disorders, appendicitis and vascular graft infections. A guideline for the optimal radiopharmaceutical(s) to be used in each clinical condition and for different aims is provided
The Mindfulness-Based Gaia Program Reduces Internalizing Problems in High-School Adolescents: a Cluster Randomized Controlled Trial
Objectives The Gaia program is a 12-week mindfulness intervention based on cultivating body, emotional, and ecological self-awareness, which has been shown so far to be effective in reducing children's internalizing and externalizing problems at school. This paper presents the results of a CRCT aimed at investigating the effectiveness of this program on improving internalizing, externalizing, and total problems in a different population group (i.e., high-school adolescents).Methods The study compared outcomes for adolescents assigned to the experimental group, who received the intervention delivered by instructors within the school curriculum, with those of the control group using a multilevel regression model. Emotional/behavioral problems were assessed with the Achenbach Youth Self-Report. Two hundred thirty-four participants (mean age 14 years) were recruited from seven schools.Results The experimental group showed a significant decrease in internalizing and total problems scales, as well as a stable pattern of externalizing problems over time, whereas the control group showed an increasing trend in internalizing, externalizing, and total problems. Moreover, the treatment group showed a decreasing trend in social and thought problems as compared to that in the control group. Finally, adolescents in the control group who scored below the clinical cut-off score at pre-test, at the end of the study scored above the clinical cut-off score in total and externalizing problems.Conclusions Findings from this study provide evidence that the Gaia program for adolescents may significantly decrease internalizing problems and maintain similar levels of externalizing problems from pre-test to post-test that, conversely, increase in the control group
Internal consistency, convergent validity and reliability of a brief Questionnare on Disordered Eating (DEQ)
Clinical interviews are considered the gold standard for the evaluation of the specific psychopathology associated with eating disorders. However, there are situations in which brief but valid and reliable self-report questionnaires can be helpful. For this reason, we have developed a new questionnaire, called the DEQ (Disordered Eating Questionnaire), brief enough to be used in epidemiological screenings, that evaluates the frequency and intensity of disordered eating attitudes and behaviours within a time frame of three months and addresses face valid questions to the general population. The aim of this study was to evaluate the dimensionality, reliability and convergent validity of this questionnaire. The DEQ was filled in by Italian secondary school girls and boys, together with the Contour Drawing Rating Scale (CDRS) and with the Eating Attitudes Test (EAT-26). The results showed a single component that explain a portion of variance of around 36%. The reliability of the scale is highly satisfactory. The scale is also valid, since scores on the DEQ scale are significantly and highly correlated with body dissatisfaction, measured by the CDRS, with body mass inex (BMI) and with all the subscales of the EAT-26. As expected, there were gender differences, given that DEQ scores were higher in females than in males
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
The 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
“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
We 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
We 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
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