1,721,081 research outputs found
Opinions regarding outcome differences in European and US haemodialysis patients
No full textStudy goal and design. The aim of this evaluation was to understand why outcomes seem to be different in different parts of the world. Ln an attempt to look at this question from a point of view other than that necessarily adopted by epidemiological studies, we decided to explore the personal opinion of a selected group of American (US and European (EU) experts by means of a simple questionnaire. A 13-item questionnaire was sent to 14 internationally recognized opinion leaders in the field of haemodialysis: all seven Europeans and five of the seven Americans responded. The answers to each question were stratified in order to highlight the key differences between the experts in the different continents. Results. Ten of the 12 respondents (six EU and four US) said that dialysis outcomes are better in Europe; nine (six EU and three US) confirmed their opinion after taking patient characteristics into account. When asked to suggest reasons for this difference, the highest score was given to the quality of procedures and medical training with no differences between EU and US physicians. This was followed by three other factors that received the same overall score (financial issues, doctor bedside time and quality of pre-dialysis care), but it is interesting to note that the Europeans attributed considerably greater importance to bedside time than their US counterparts. Conclusion. It seems that the reported difference in dialysis outcomes between Europe and the US is a widely accepted fact. Although directed towards few respondents, our questionnaire does suggest some differences in the approach towards dialysis and endstage renal disease patients
Pregnancy in women with pre-existing lupus nephritis: predictors of fetal and maternal outcome
Full text linkBackground. Only few data are available on pregnancy in patients with lupus nephritis (LN) diagnosed before conception. The aim of this study was to identify the risk factors for complicated pregnancy in women with pre-existing LN. Methods. In a multicentre study, we collected data on 113 pregnancies occurring in 81 women with pre-existing biopsy-proven LN. Primary outcomes were fetal loss including perinatal death and renal flares during and 12 months after pregnancy. Univariate and logistic regression analyses were used to identify predictors of outcomes. Results. Renal biopsy performed 7.2 ± 4.9 years before pregnancy showed the following WHO classes: 6 patients in II, 8 in III, 48 in IV and 19 in V. At conception, most patients were in complete (49%) or partial (27%) remission. There were nine spontaneous abortions, one stillbirth and five neonatal deaths. Thirty-one deliveries were preterm. Birth weight was <2500 g in 34 newborns. During pregnancy or after delivery, there were 34 renal flares, most of which (20) were reversible. Three patients had a progressive decline of glomerular filtration rate (one on dialysis). At logistic regression analysis, the pregnancy outcome was predicted by hypocomplementaemia at conception (RR 19.02; 90% CI 4.58-78.96) and aspirin during pregnancy (RR 0.11; 90% CI 0.03-0.38). Renal flare was predicted by renal status (partial remission RR 3.0; 90% CI 1.23-7.34, nonremission RR 9.0; 90% CI 3.59-22.57). Conclusions. Pregnancy can be successful in most women with pre-existing LN, even for those with a severe renal involvement at onset. Renal flares during and after pregnancy are not uncommon and can be predicted by renal status assessed before pregnancy. Normocomplementaemia and low-dose aspirin therapy during pregnancy are independent predictors of a favourable fetal outcome
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
- …
