Medical and Biomedical Researches

Interpretation of genomic data: questions and answers.

June 29th, 2008
Interpretation of genomic data: questions and answers. Using a question and answer format we describe important aspects of using genomic technologies in cancer research. The main challenges are not managing the mass of data, but rather the design, analysis, and accurate reporting of studies that result ...

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Interpreting diagnostic test accuracy studies.

June 29th, 2008
Interpreting diagnostic test accuracy studies. A central phase in the evaluation of a medical test is the assessment of its diagnostic accuracy: the degree to which the test results correspond to those of the clinical reference standard. There are several methods by which the results of ...

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Interpretation of associations in pharmacoepidemiology.

June 29th, 2008
Interpretation of associations in pharmacoepidemiology. Pharmacoepidemiology is an important tool for understanding and documenting the relationships between the use of drugs and adverse events. Side effects are an important consideration for clinicians making treatment decisions, and they also figure prominently in action by regulatory agencies. Unlike ...

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Interpreting the results of systematic reviews.

June 29th, 2008
Interpreting the results of systematic reviews. Systematic reviews are increasingly common and often provide the most robust research approach to informed decisions about health care. The successful interpretation of systematic reviews for decisions about health care requires consideration of their quality and judgement on whether the ...

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Misconceptions, challenges, uncertainty, and progress in guideline recommendations.

June 29th, 2008
Misconceptions, challenges, uncertainty, and progress in guideline recommendations. Although the quality of clinical practice guidelines has improved over the last decade, current guideline systems have limitations that reduce their validity and limit their acceptance. The Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development and Evaluation (GRADE) working group, a ...

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Perfect Study, Poor Evidence: Interpretation of Biases Preceding Study Design.

June 29th, 2008
Perfect Study, Poor Evidence: Interpretation of Biases Preceding Study Design. In the interpretation of research evidence, data that have been accumulated in a specific isolated study are typically examined. However, important biases may precede the study design. A study may be misleading, useless, or even harmful, ...

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Decision-making when data and inferences are not conclusive: risk-benefit and acceptable regret appr

June 29th, 2008
Decision-making when data and inferences are not conclusive: risk-benefit and acceptable regret approach. The absolute truth in research is unobtainable, as no evidence or research hypothesis is ever 100% conclusive. Therefore, all data and inferences can in principle be considered as \"inconclusive.\" Scientific inference and decision-making ...

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Bayesian interpretation and analysis of research results.

June 29th, 2008
Bayesian interpretation and analysis of research results. From a computational perspective, Bayesian methods can be viewed as a natural extension of familiar confidence intervals and significance tests, which sheds light on their meaning. This viewpoint shows that no special software is required to compute Bayesian results, ...

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A dirty dozen: twelve p-value misconceptions.

June 29th, 2008
A dirty dozen: twelve p-value misconceptions. The P value is a measure of statistical evidence that appears in virtually all medical research papers. Its interpretation is made extraordinarily difficult because it is not part of any formal system of statistical inference. As a result, the P ...

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Are individuals with an eating disorder less sensitive to aesthetic flaws than healthy controls?

June 29th, 2008
Are individuals with an eating disorder less sensitive to aesthetic flaws than healthy controls? OBJECTIVE: This study aimed to investigate whether the positive evaluation of other people\'s bodies is due to difficulties in the recognition of flaws in attractive features of others. METHOD: Thirty female individuals ...

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Is anxiety sensitivity a predictor of PTSD in children and adolescents?

June 29th, 2008
Is anxiety sensitivity a predictor of PTSD in children and adolescents? OBJECTIVE: Anxiety sensitivity (AS) is the fear of the physical symptoms of anxiety and related symptoms. Longitudinal studies support AS as a vulnerability factor for development of anxiety disorders. This study aimed to investigate AS ...

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Coping and quality of life in patients awaiting lung transplantation.

June 29th, 2008
Coping and quality of life in patients awaiting lung transplantation. OBJECTIVE: Patients with end-stage lung disease (ESLD) experience significant decrements in quality of life (QOL). Although coping strategies are related to QOL in patients with ESLD, the extent to which specific native lung disease moderates this ...

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Physicians’ prognostic estimates of survival for patients undergoing allogeneic hematopoietic stem

June 29th, 2008
Physicians\' prognostic estimates of survival for patients undergoing allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation. OBJECTIVE: Patients undergoing allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT) often demand a single estimate of their prognosis from their treating physician. Little is known about the validity of and the factors influencing these ...

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Association between burnout and circulating levels of pro- and anti-inflammatory cytokines in school

June 29th, 2008
Association between burnout and circulating levels of pro- and anti-inflammatory cytokines in schoolteachers. OBJECTIVE: The burnout syndrome has been associated with an increased risk of cardiovascular disease. The physiological mechanisms potentially involved in this link are underexplored. Knowing that a chronic low-grade systemic inflammatory state contributes ...

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Attentional bias towards health-threat information in chronic fatigue syndrome.

June 29th, 2008
Attentional bias towards health-threat information in chronic fatigue syndrome. OBJECTIVE: To investigate whether individuals with chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) show an attentional bias towards health-threat information. METHODS: Attentional bias (AB) was assessed in individuals with CFS and healthy controls using a visual probe task which presented ...

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Determinants of health care use in chronic fatigue syndrome patients: A cross-sectional study.

June 29th, 2008
Determinants of health care use in chronic fatigue syndrome patients: A cross-sectional study. BACKGROUND: Chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) is associated with a high use of health care services. To reduce the related costs for patients and society, it will be useful to know which factors determine ...

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A comparison of the course of burnout and prolonged fatigue: A 4-year prospective cohort study.

June 29th, 2008
A comparison of the course of burnout and prolonged fatigue: A 4-year prospective cohort study. OBJECTIVE: Outcomes in burnout and prolonged fatigue have hardly been compared in longitudinal research, despite several similarities such as the importance of fatigue symptoms in both conditions. This study aims to ...

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Heart rate variability and daytime functioning in insomniacs and normal sleepers: Preliminary result

June 29th, 2008
Heart rate variability and daytime functioning in insomniacs and normal sleepers: Preliminary results. OBJECTIVES: This study examined the differences in heart rate variability (HRV) and daytime functioning between insomniacs and normal sleepers. METHODS: All participants underwent an interview, a medical examination, and a sleep measurement protocol ...

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Reduced parasympathetic activity during sleep in the symptomatic phase of severe premenstrual syndro

June 29th, 2008
Reduced parasympathetic activity during sleep in the symptomatic phase of severe premenstrual syndrome. OBJECTIVE: Severe premenstrual syndrome (PMS) is a common distressing disorder in women that manifests during the premenstrual (late-luteal) phase of the ovulatory menstrual cycle. There is some evidence that altered autonomic function may ...

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On the nature of burnout-insomnia relationships: A prospective study of employed adults.

June 29th, 2008
On the nature of burnout-insomnia relationships: A prospective study of employed adults. OBJECTIVE: This prospective study was designed to test the hypothesis that burnout and insomnia predict each other\'s incidence and intensification across time. Burnout is conceptualized as representing individuals\' unique affective response to their exposure ...

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Bolus or weekly zoledronic acid administration does not delay endochondral fracture repair but weekl

June 29th, 2008
Bolus or weekly zoledronic acid administration does not delay endochondral fracture repair but weekly dosing enhances delays in hard callus remodeling. INTRODUCTION: It has been widely assumed that osteoclasts play a pivotal role during the entire process of fracture healing. Bisphosphonates (BPs) are anti-catabolic agents commonly ...

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Polyglutamine gene function and dysfunction in the ageing brain.

June 29th, 2008
Polyglutamine gene function and dysfunction in the ageing brain. The coordinated regulation of gene expression and protein interactions determines how mammalian nervous systems develop and retain function and plasticity over extended periods of time such as a human life span. By studying mutations that occur in ...

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Evolution of four BK virus subtypes.

June 29th, 2008
Evolution of four BK virus subtypes. BK viruses (BKV) comprise four subtypes that are distinguishable by serological and molecular methods with the latter indicating up to four subgroups within subtype I. In this study, the phylogeny of all BKV subtypes was analyzed. Phylogenetic analyses of the ...

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Nonlinear model-based estimates of IC(50) for studies involving continuous therapeutic dose-response

June 29th, 2008
Nonlinear model-based estimates of IC(50) for studies involving continuous therapeutic dose-response data. We present statistical details for estimating an in vitro 50% inhibitory concentration (IC(50)), based on several models for continuous response data fit to bone-marrow endothelial cell lines replicated in vehicle and at several dose ...

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Metallothionein-2 gene from the mandarin fish Siniperca chuatsi: cDNA cloning, tissue expression, an

June 29th, 2008
Metallothionein-2 gene from the mandarin fish Siniperca chuatsi: cDNA cloning, tissue expression, and immunohistochemical localization. The metallothionein-2 (MT-2) gene was isolated from the mandarin fish, one of the most important industrial aquatic animals in China, by using rapid amplification of cDNA ends (RACE). The deduced amino ...

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