1,720,968 research outputs found
The role of “closed abdomen” hyperthermic intraperitoneal chemotherapy (HIPEC) in the palliative treatment of neoplastic ascites from peritoneal carcinomatosis: report of a single-center experience
No full textPurpose: The purpose of this study was to review the results of a single-center experience in the management of “closed abdomen” hyperthermic intraperitoneal chemotherapy (HIPEC) using a sophisticated technical device (EXIPER®) in the palliative setting of neoplastic ascites from peritoneal carcinomatosis in patients with advanced cancer of different primary sites. Patients and methods: The study was an open, prospective, single-center, non-randomized study conducted at the Department of Medical Oncology 1, University of Cagliari, Italy, from May 2006 to October 2012. Fifteen patients with peritoneal carcinomatosis were treated with HIPEC: 5 males and 10 females (age range 51–82, median 62 years), for a total of 30 procedures (5 patients were treated more than once). Malignant ascites were from ovarian, uterine cervical, colorectal, gastric, malignant pleural mesothelioma, and unknown primary cancer. Main endpoints were increase of free interval between two consecutive procedures, progressive reduction of ascites volumes and improvement of quality of life assessed with ECOG performance status and EORTC QLQ-C30 questionnaire, and improvement of immunologic function. Results: Twelve patients were completely evaluable while three patients were “lost” to follow-up. The treatment was well tolerated. The mean free interval between two consecutive drainages increased from 11.2 to 39.5 days. The mean ascites volume drained decreased from 7.8 to 1.8 l. ECOG PS improved in the majority of patients and EORTC QLQ-C30 scores in all patients as well as immunologic function. In September 2015, only one patient was still alive. Conclusions: Our study shows that good results may be achieved in terms of symptom palliation and improvement of quality of life in very advanced cancer patients with MA from PC. The treatment was generally well tolerated considering the limited treatment options available for these patients
Trastuzumab-based adjuvant chemotherapy for breast cancer: Early myocardial dysfunction detected by "speckle tracking" echocardiography (STE).
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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
ANALYSIS AND EVALUATION OF CLINICAL AND PREDICTIVE BIOMARKERS OF RESPONSE TO IMMUNOTHERAPY IN THE ONCOLOGICAL FIELD
Full text linkBackground: Ipilimumab, Nivolumab and Pembrolizumab are the new immunotherapies today available, FDA approved both as first and second line treatment in different metastatic solid cancer. Despite their efficacy reported in literature is very promising, they still remain a therapy with a considerable outlay, both from an economic and safety point of view: the aim of our study is validate predictive biomarkers of treatment efficacy among hematological and faecal parameters normally used in clinical practice, in order to identify in advance which patients could really benefit from treatment.
Methods: This is a three phase study which enrolled patients suffering from different metastatic solid cancer treated with immunotherapy. At the beginning our study was focused on Ipilimumab and, after the CARAMEL study we decided to explore also the new checkpoint inhibitors, Nivolumab and Pembrolizumab (CREAM and COFFEE study). We assessed before and regularly every 3 weeks a faecal sample and the full blood count with absolute WBC (aWBC), neutrophil count, eosinophil count, neutrophil/lymphocyte ratio (NLR), Platelets/lymphocyte ratio (PLR) and LDH serum levels. We evaluated the mutational BRAF status (among melanoma patients) and the number of metastatic sites involved before treatment (more or less than 3 sites). The cut-off values for our parameters were determined with time-dependent receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis. To identify prognostic and predictive biomarkers the above parameters have been correlated with Progression Free Survival (PFS) and Overall Survival (OS). As regards the CREAM study, we also evaluated the correlation between use of antibiotics within 30 days before the beginning of immunotherapy and our patients clinical outcome.
Results: we found interesting correlation between clinical and pathological parameters and
Conclusions: we well know our study presents many limits and, above all, we surey need a larger sample size to confirm our findings, but these data are very promising and, if confirmed, they really could help us to better manage the correct therapeutic sequence for treatment of metastatic patients
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