STUDYING VASCULAR MORPHOLOGIES IN THE AGED HUMAN BRAIN USING LARGE AUTOPSY DATASETS

Cerebrovascular disease is a major cause of dementia in elderly individuals, especially Black/African Americans. Within my dissertation, we focused on two vascular morphologies that affect small vessels: brain arteriolosclerosis (B-ASC) and multi-vascular profiles (MVPs). B-ASC is characterized by degenerative thickening of the wall of brain arterioles. The risk factors, cognitive sequelae, and co-pathologies of B-ASC are not fully understood. To address this, we used multimodal data from the National Alzheimer’s Coordinating Center, Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative, and brain-banked tissue samples from the University of Kentucky Alzheimer’s Disease Center (UK-ADC) brain repository. We analyzed two age at death groups separately: \u3c 80 years and ≥ 80 years. Hypertension was a risk factor in the \u3c 80 years at death group. In addition, an ABCC9 gene variant (rs704180), previously associated with aging-related hippocampal sclerosis, was associated with B-ASC in the ≥ 80 years at death group. With respect to cognition as determined by test scores, severe B-ASC was associated with worse global cognition in both age groups. With brain-banked tissue samples, we described B-ASC’s relationship to hippocampal sclerosis of aging (HS-Aging), a pathology characterized by neuronal cell loss in the hippocampal region not due to Alzheimer’s disease. We also studied MVPs, which are characterized by multiple small vessel lumens within a single vascular (Virchow-Robin) space. Little information exists on the frequency, risk factors, and co-pathologies of MVPs. Therefore, we used samples and data from the UK-ADC, University of Kentucky pathology department, and University of Pittsburgh pathology department to address this information. We only found MVPs to be correlated with age. Lastly, given the high prevalence of cerebrovascular disease and dementia in Black/African Americans, we discussed the challenges and considerations for studying Blacks/African Americans in these contexts

Strategies Technology Development Marketing Leaders Used to Commercialize a New Product Innovation

Strategies for commercialization of a new product innovation are critical for gaining a sustainable level of customer acceptance and financial performance. The purpose of this single case study was to explore the commercialization strategies used by 5 technology development marketing leaders from a healthcare company in Washington state. The conceptual framework for this study was commercialization of innovation theory (CoI). The data were collected through semistructured interviews and company documentation, and analyzed using Yin\u27s 5-step data analysis process for case studies to identify and code themes. Analysis of data generated 3 major themes: strategies implemented during the prelaunch phase, strategies implemented during the pilot customer phase, and strategies implemented in the broader market launch phase of the CoI process. The results of this study revealed the set of commercialization decisions made by technology development marketing leaders in the case, the phase in which the CoI process-specific strategies were implemented, and some of the pitfalls of commercializing an innovation, especially a radical innovation. Results indicated the challenges with being a first-mover and having unclear positioning, branding, and messaging strategies. It is essential for technology development marketing leaders to gain a deeper understanding of the strategies that might influence commercial success and failure. Findings may contribute to social change by maximizing commercial success and the diffusion of new product innovations in healthcare, which might lead to better patient outcomes and enhanced ways of practicing medicine

Designing Incentives Enabled Decentralized User Data Sharing Framework

Data sharing practices are much needed to strike a balance between user privacy, user experience, and profit. Different parties collect user data, for example, companies offering apps, social networking sites, and others, whose primary motive is an enhanced business model while giving optimal services to the end-users. However, the collection of user data is associated with serious privacy and security issues. The sharing platform also needs an effective incentive mechanism to realize transparent access to the user data while distributing fair incentives. The emerging literature on the topic includes decentralized data sharing approaches. However, there has been no universal method to track who shared what, to whom, when, for what purpose and under what condition in a verifiable manner until recently, when the distributed ledger technologies emerged to become the most effective means for designing a decentralized peer-to-peer network. This Ph.D. research includes an engineering approach for specifying the operations for designing incentives and user-controlled data-sharing platforms. The thesis presents a series of empirical studies and proposes novel blockchains- and smart contracts-based DUDS (Decentralized User Data Sharing) framework conceptualizing user-controlled data sharing practices. The DUDS framework supports immutability, authenticity, enhanced security, trusted records and is a promising means to share user data in various domains, including among researchers, customer data in e-commerce, tourism applications, etc. The DUDS framework is evaluated via performance analyses and user studies. The extended Technology Acceptance Model and a Trust-Privacy-Security Model are used to evaluate the usability of the DUDS framework. The evaluation allows uncovering the role of different factors affecting user intention to adopt data-sharing platforms. The results of the evaluation point to guidelines and methods for embedding privacy, user transparency, control, and incentives from the start in the design of a data-sharing framework to provide a platform that users can trust to protect their data while allowing them to control it and share it in the ways they want

Adviser\u27s Guide to Health Care, Volume 1: An Era of Reform—The Four Pillars

https://egrove.olemiss.edu/aicpa_guides/2720/thumbnail.jp