1,720,959 research outputs found
Establishing Reliability and Objective Evaluation of 12 Weeks of Robotic Walking: Spasticity, Contracture and Muscle Strength
No full textBackground: Neurological conditions like Cerebral Palsy (CP) often lead to spasticity, contracture, and muscle weakness, affecting mobility. Current clinical measures for these impairments lack reliability and/or responsiveness to change and cannot differentiate between spasticity and contracture. Using objective tools like stationary dynamometers can provide more objective assessments and resolution to detect change. Robotic training provides ways to reduce sedentary time and experience walking in a safe and stable frame at home or in the community, potentially changing spasticity, contracture, and muscle weakness. Objective Aim 1 was to establish reliability for measuring knee flexor spasticity, contracture and knee extensor muscle strength in children who cannot walk due to neurological disorders using a stationary dynamometer. Aim 2 was to evaluate the impact of 12 weeks of robotic training on knee flexor spasticity, contracture and knee extensor muscle strength in the same population. Methods Project 1: Assessment of knee flexor spasticity, contracture and knee extensor muscle strength was conducted one month apart using a stationary dynamometer. Test-retest reliability was assessed using Intraclass Correlation Coefficients, Standard Error Measurement and Bland-Altman plots. Project 2: The impact of 12 weeks of robotic training on knee flexor spasticity, contracture and knee extensor muscle strength was evaluated using a stationary dynamometer. Wilcoxon signed-rank test was used to assess the significance of the change in spasticity, contracture and muscle strength following 12 weeks of robotic training. Results Project 1: Good relative reliability was observed for spasticity and contracture outcomes except at a higher speed. Absolute reliability was less than 15% of the mean baseline value for spasticity outcomes and more than 25% for outcomes influenced by contracture. Good relative reliability was observed for torque outcome of muscle strength and moderate relative reliability was observed for muscle activity outcome. Project 2: Twelve weeks of robotic training significantly reduced spasticity. 2 of 3 outcomes influenced by contracture were also reduced significantly with the remaining outcome unchanged. All five participants showed increased strength after 12 weeks of robotic training
Hypercapnic Hemotherapy to Stabilize Blood Flow in the Acute Phase of Spinal Cord Injury
No full textSpinal cord injury (SCI) results in disturbances to sensory, motor, and/or autonomic function and impairs quality of life. There is a lack of standardized management strategies after SCI due to the lack of consensus regarding the use of corticosteroids, optimal timing of surgical intervention, and the type and timing of rehabilitation, amongst other things. Secondary damage after the initial trauma involves ischemia, hypoxia, and vascular damage, amongst other effects. This secondary insult during the acute phase of SCI has been shown to underlie approximately half of the final injury severity. There are no current therapies targeting the acute phase of SCI that could help reduce the severity of final injury. My project is focused on addressing this gap in finding an effective intervention during the acute phase of SCI to mitigate the severity of the final injury. My thesis aimed to characterize how hemodynamic parameters are impaired during the acute phase of SCI and if inspired carbon dioxide (CO2) could increase these hemodynamic parameters. We aimed to develop a method to stabilize blood flow (BF) using closed-loop during the acute phase of SCI in mice. I showed that penumbral BF and related hemodynamic parameters are impaired during the acute phase of SCI and that hypercapnia can stabilize these parameters to pre-SCI levels. I then developed a closed-loop system that titrated CO2 to keep penumbral BF around a pre-determined setpoint during the acute phase of SCI. The methods established in this study are Laser Doppler Flowmetry, Near-Infrared Spectroscopy, and O2 MicroOptode technology which have never all been studied in a SCI mouse model. This novel methodology will lead the way for future studies that aim to investigate hemodynamic parameters in a SCI mouse model. This project is significant because a closed-loop system has the potential to be an early therapy targeting the acute phase of SCI
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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