1,720,980 research outputs found
Short-term quality of life changes after surgery in elderly (>65 years) patients with breast cancer using the medical outcomes study short form (MOS-SF-36) questionnaire
No full textBackground: Elderly patients with breast cancer (BC) usually present a reduction of their quality of life (QoL) both before and after surgery compared to younger patients. The short-form (SF-36) of the Medical Outcomes Study (MOS) questionnaire has long been used in clinical practice for patient population survey and healthy policy evaluation. It is a 36-item questionnaire with eight scaled sections: a lower score corresponds to a more disease-related disability. The aim of this study was to evaluate the postoperative health-related QoL between elderly and younger patients after breast-conserving surgery in patients with early (N0) BC using the MOS-SF-36 questionnaire.
Methods: Sixty-two consecutive patients (60.8±9.9 years) with confirmed pT1-2 N0 M0 BC requiring conservative surgery were prospectively enrolled in the study. There were 36 (58.1%) elderly (>65 years of age) and 26 (41.9%) nonelderly patients. Informed consent was obtained from each participant. The day before discharge after surgery, all patients were asked to report their functional limitations and health-related status by filling the following sections of the MOS-SF-36 (No. of items): bodily pain (2), emotional role functioning (3), general health perceptions (5), mental health (5), physical functioning (10), physical role functioning (4), social role functioning (2), vitality (4). The Mann-Whitney U-test was used to compare results. A p-value <0.05 was considered statistically significant.
Results: The results are reported in the Table. In general, the health-related QoF after surgery was similar in both groups. However, the scores related to bodily pain (64.3±21.2 vs. 53.1±16.3, p=0.03), physical functioning (66.3±18.2 vs. 56.3±11.7, p=0.02) and vitality (56.7±13.6 vs. 50.1±8.7, p=0.03) reported by younger patients were higher than that reported by the elderly
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
Quality of life in elderly patients with breast cancer after mastectomy evaluated using the short form of the Medical Outcomes Study questionnaire (MOS-SF-36)
No full textBackground: Breast cancer (BC) is a common malignancy among women and the second or third leading cause of cancer-related death in Western countries. BC is common in the elderly, because the risk of getting cancer increases with the age. BC and its treatment can impact the quality of life (QoL) of women in several ways, including potential psychological and physical dysfunctions, because in the mind of each the patient, breast surgery remains a destroying surgery. The first effort of physicians to assess the consequences of cancer treatment was performed by Karnofsky in 1948. Since then, many other assessment tools have been proposed, including the Medical Outcomes Study (MOS) questionnaire. The aim of this study was to evaluate the sort-term postoperative health-related QoL of elderly (>65 years) and younger patients (≤65 years) who underwent mastectomy for BC using the MOS questionnaire.
Patients and methods: We reviewed the medical records of 117 women with advanced BC who required mastectomy. Unfortunately, only 31 (26.5%) patients accepted the short-form (36 items) of the MOS questionnaire (SF-MOS-36) administration (the day before discharge after surgery) and completely asked to the items related to their temporary psychosocial distress and functional limitation after mastectomy. There were 12 (38.7%) elderly and 19 (61.3%) younger patients, with an overall median age of 61 years (range 46-86 years). In the SF-MOS-36 questionnaire, 8 groups of items are designed to obtain information about bodily pain, emotional role functioning, general health perceptions, mental health, physical functioning, physical role functioning, social role functioning, and vitality. Because the data obtained had a non-Gaussian distribution, the non-parametric Mann-Whitney U test was used to evaluate the statistical significance between groups. A p-value<0.05 was considered significant.
Results: The results are reported in the Table. In general, the healthy-related QoL perceived by young and elderly patients assessed by analyzing the results of the SF-MOS-36 questionnaire was similar. However, the scores related to social role functioning and vitality were significantly different between groups. Conclusion: Older patients with BC who underwent mastectomy seem to be more susceptible than younger against social problems and their vitality after surgery. However, these preliminary results need to be confirmed by studies on a larger sample of patients
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 of risk factors for development of skeletal-related events in women with bone metastases from NSCLC and breast cancer
No full textBackground: Bone metastasis (BM) are common (up to 50% of cases) in patients with advanced non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) and other malignancies, including prostate cancer and breast cancer (BC). In patients with BMs, the onset of skeletal-related events (SREs), such as pathological fracture, malignant hypercalcemia, or spinal cord compression requiring surgery or radiation therapy, seriously affects the quality of life of patients and overall survival. The purpose of this study was to analyze the risk factors (RFs) for development of SREs in women with advanced NSCLC and BC, with the aim of highlighting the differences (if any) between the two groups of patients.
Material and Methods: The medical records of 16 women with BMs from NSCLC (Group A) and 15 women with BMs from luminal-type BC (Group B) were reviewed. The following RFs have been considered: age >65 years, ECOG performance status (PS) 2.65 mmol/L), and number of BMs >1. Odds ratio (OR) estimates and the relative 95% confidence interval (CI) were calculated. A p-value level <0.05 was considered statistically significant.
Results: During follow-up, 5 (33.3%) Group A and 11 (68.7%) Group B patients developed SREs (OR=4.40, p=0.04), respectively. The results are reported in the Table. No significant difference (p=NS) was found between groups in relation to ECOG-PS, ESM or hypercalcemia, and number of BMs. Only the age >65 years (OR=0.22, p=0.04) represented a weak significant risk factor.
Conclusion: Women with BMs from NSCLC has a reduced risk for development of SREs compared to those with BC, but elderly (>65 years) patients require a closer surveillance, and a precocious bisphosphonate treatment could be suggested
Analysis of factors affecting survival in patients with lung metastases from colorectal cancer who underwent video-assisted thoracoscopic (VAT) surgical resection
No full textBackground: Colorectal cancer (CRC) is one of the most common malignancy in both sexes, and the onset of liver or lung metastases (LMs) significantly affects overall survival (OS) of patients. The main reported prognostic factors related to OS are the age, preoperative carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA) serum levels, lymph node involvement, neoadjuvant chemotherapy, disease-free survival, and number and size of LMs. We have previously reported that the primary tumor site should not be considered a major criterion in selecting patients for pulmonary metastasectomy (Anticancer Res 36: 13-22, 2016). The aim of this retrospective study was to analyze whether the age of the patients and the number and size of LMs could affect survival of patients who underwent curative surgery for CRC and developed metachronous LMs during follow-up.
Patients and methods: We reviewed the medical reports of 36 patients who underwent video-assisted thoracoscopic (VAT) lung metastasectomy for LMs from CRC. There were 21 (58.3%) men (57.9±14.9 years) and 15 (41.7%) women (63.3±11.1 years). Because the data were not normally distributed, the Mann-Whitney U-test was used to evaluate the differences between groups. The Pearson correlation coefficient (r) and the linear regression equation calculation was obtained to evaluate the relationship between survival and the main risk factors, including age of the patients, size and number of the LMs. A p-value <0.05 was considered statistically significant.
Results: The age between men and women did not differ significantly (Z=0.35, p=0.71). The overall survival was 30.6±25.1 months (median 24.5 months, range 1-92 months). The mean number of the excised LMs was 2.1±1.6 (median 1.5, range 1-9) and the mean size of the greatest LM was 17±8 mm (median 15 mm, range 5-32 mm). No correlation was found between survival and age (r=0.099, p=0.56), mean size of LM (r=-0.209, p=0.22) or number of the LMs (r=-0.196, p=0.25). The Table reports the relative regression line equation.
Conclusion: In patients with LMs from CRC, the OS is independent of the number and size of LM and the age of the patients. Further studies will eventually confirm our results
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