31 research outputs found
A Literature Review of GP Knowledge and Understanding of ME/CFS: A Report from the Socioeconomics Working Group of the European Network on ME/CFS (EUROMENE)
No full text Background and Objectives: The socioeconomic working group of the European myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS) Research Network (EUROMENE) has conducted a review of the literature pertaining to GPs' knowledge and understanding of ME/CFS; Materials and Methods: A MEDLINE search was carried out. The papers identified were reviewed following the synthesis without meta-analysis (SWiM) methodology, and were classified according to the focus of the enquiry (patients, GPs, database and medical record studies, evaluation of a training programme, and overview papers), and whether they were quantitative or qualitative in nature; Results: Thirty-three papers were identified in the MEDLINE search. The quantitative surveys of GPs demonstrated that a third to a half of all GPs did not accept ME/CFS as a genuine clinical entity and, even when they did, they lacked confidence in diagnosing or managing it. It should be noted, though, that these papers were mostly from the United Kingdom. Patient surveys indicated that a similar proportion of patients was dissatisfied with the primary medical care they had received. These findings were consistent with the findings of the qualitative studies that were examined, and have changed little over several decades; Conclusions: Disbelief and lack of knowledge and understanding of ME/CFS among GPs is widespread, and the resultant diagnostic delays constitute a risk factor for severe and prolonged disease. Failure to diagnose ME/CFS renders problematic attempts to determine its prevalence, and hence its economic impact. </p
[Prognosis of colorectal cancer and socio-economic inequalities].
No full textIt is well established that socio-economic status is a major prognostic factor for many cancers, including colorectal cancer. The aims of this review are (i) to report epidemiological data showing how socio-economic status influences colorectal cancer survival, (ii) to attempt to describe the mechanisms underlying these survival inequalities, and (iii) to assess their impact on survival of colorectal cancer
Changes in the Allostatic Response to Whole-Body Cryotherapy and Static-Stretching Exercises in Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Patients vs. Healthy Individuals
No full textThis study represents a comparison of the functional interrelation of fatigue and cognitive, cardiovascular and autonomic nervous systems in a group of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS) patients compared with those in healthy individuals at different stages of analysis: at baseline and after changes induced by whole-body cryotherapy (WBC) combined with a static-stretching (SS) program. The study included 32 patients (Fukuda criteria) and 18 healthy controls. Fatigue, cognitive, cardiovascular and autonomic function and arterial stiffness were measured before and after 10 sessions of WBC with SS. In the patients, a disturbance in homeostasis was observed. The network relationship based on differences before and after intervention showed comparatively higher stress and eccentricity in the CFS group: 50.9 ± 56.1 vs. 6.35 ± 8.72, p = 0.002, r = 0.28; and 4.8 ± 0.7 vs. 2.4 ± 1, p 0.001, r = 0.46, respectively. Before and after intervention, in the CFS group increased fatigue was related to baroreceptor function, and baroreceptor function was in turn related to aortic stiffness, but no such relationships were observed in the control group. Differences in the network structure underlying the interrelation among the four measured criteria were observed in both groups, before the intervention and after ten sessions of whole cryotherapy with a static stretching exercise
Novel Techniques for Improved Performance of Dynamic Differential Frequency Hopping Under Partial Band Jamming
No full textDifferential Frequency Hopping (DFH) is a spread-spectrum communication technique in which the current hop frequency is determined by a Frequency Transfer Function (FTF) that relies only upon the current data symbol and previous hop frequency. This dissertation proposes two methods invented by the author which will increase DFH system resiliency to noise or deliberate jamming and improve system error performance. The first method provides a DFH transmitter enhancement for hop frequency assignment randomization which improves over earlier efforts of other authors by dynamically expanding the signal space for a single user for improved jammer resiliency without increasing encoder complexity, scales easily while maintaining its randomization characteristics, dynamically assigns random hop frequencies to encoder states every hop period, retains an underlying Error Correction Code (ECC) encoder structure for improved error performance, is easy to understand, and provided in sufficient detail so as to be reproducible by others.The second method provides a DFH receiver enhancement for missed hop error correction which improves over earlier efforts of other authors in that it operates off of the received sequence only, tracks piece-wise solution convergence as a means to remain computationally efficient over the length of a received message, can work in cascade with other error correction techniques (e.g., Viterbi decoding) for improved overall information error performance in an end-end system, it is simple to implement, easy to follow, and described in sufficient detail so as to be reproduceable by others.These improvement methods are combined and presented in an end-end system which will be evaluated under the presence of partial band jamming. Overall hop error rate and bit error rate performance will be evaluated for several different DFH encoder models and jamming conditions. It will be shown that with the selection of an appropriate Error Correcting Code (ECC) with sufficiently large free distance for encoder state generation, improved error performance can be realized through the cooperative effects of random hopping, hop error correction, and bit error correction
