1,720,961 research outputs found
Personalized Treatment Response in Progressive MS: Can the Patient's Profile Influence the Outcome?
No full textBackground: Evidence from clinical trials providing average effects in populations is often used to forecast individualized patient outcomes similar to the trial patients. Multiple sclerosis (MS), known for notable heterogeneity in outcomes, makes the evaluation of potential heterogeneity of treatment effect (HTE) significant. Identifying factors that predict individual treatment response is crucial for optimizing patient care, and this study aimed to demonstrate the feasibility (proof of concept) of applying a statistical method to predict individual treatment response in MS trials. Methods: We developed an individualized response score (RS) to predict treatment response in patients with active secondary progressive MS (SPMS). The RS was a continuous combination of baseline clinical characteristics, including age, sex, previous relapses, EDSS, and disease duration. We used data from the EXPAND trial to train and validate the RS. A training dataset (70% of the data) was used to identify optimal response thresholds for four key outcomes: Expanded Disability Status Scale (EDSS), Timed 25 Foot Walk (T25FW), 9-Hole Peg Test (9HP), and the Symbol Digit Modalities Test (SDMT). The remaining 30% of the data served as a validation set to assess the RS's predictive performance. The continuous RS was binarized (into responder and non-responder) based on the threshold representing the top 25% versus the bottom 75% of the continuous score distribution. Results: Using baseline profiles, SPMS patients exhibiting varying benefits from Siponimod across different outcomes were successfully categorized as responders or non-responders. The overall effect of Siponimod on the EDSS was HR = 0.79 (95% CI: 0.65-0.95), while responders’ demonstrated a HR = 0.64 (95% CI: 0.49-0.84) versus a HR = 0.97 (95% CI: 0.74-1.27) for non-responders’, interaction p = 0.027. Siponimod's overall effect on SDMT progression was HR = 0.75 (95% CI: 0.63-0.88). Responders' demonstrated a HR = 0.59 (95% CI: 0.43-0.80) vs a HR = 1.00 (95% CI: 0.69-1.44) for non-responders, interaction p = 0.031. On the entire dataset, Siponimod exhibited a non-significant effect on 9HPT (HR = 0.86, 95% CI: 0.66-1.10) and on T25FW (HR = 0.95, 95% CI: 0.81-1.12), whereas responders’ demonstrated a HR = 0.68 (95% CI: 0.47-0.97) on 9HPT and a HR = 0.77 (95% CI: 0.60-0.98) for T25FW. Conclusions: This analysis demonstrated the ability to define responders to a therapy based on their baseline profile and evaluate the treatment effect on multiple endpoints, showing that the benefit on different outcomes can vary across patients
Relapse Rate and MRI Activity in Young Adult Patients With Multiple Sclerosis: A Post Hoc Analysis of Phase 3 Fingolimod Trials
No full textBackground Disease activity differs in young patients with multiple sclerosis (MS) compared with the overall adult MS population. Objective The objective of this paper is to evaluate the effect of fingolimod 0.5 mg on disease activity in young adults with MS from three randomized, double-blind Phase 3 trials. Methods Annualized relapse rate (ARR), number of new/newly enlarging T2 lesions (neT2), and no evidence of disease activity (NEDA-3) were estimated in the intent-to-treat population at age 20 (youngest) and 30 (young) and compared to the overall population. Models used included a negative binomial regression (ARR/neT2) and a logistic regression (NEDA), with age at baseline as a continuous covariate. Results ARRs were higher in younger patients (all p < 0.05), and significantly reduced with fingolimod versus placebo or interferon beta-1a (IFN β-1a), with the percentage reduction inversely proportional to age. Fingolimod was significantly associated with a lower number of neT2 lesions versus placebo/IFN in all age groups except versus IFN in the youngest patients. Regardless of age, fingolimod-treated patients were more likely to achieve NEDA-3 versus placebo/IFN β-1a, with strongest benefits in the youngest patients (all p < 0.05). Conclusions Young adults show higher levels of MS disease activity, and may particularly benefit from fingolimod treatment compared with the overall study population. </jats:sec
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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