Evaluation of the Parentline Plus helpline: key findings

This report describes an evaluation of the Parentline helpline, carried out in 2006. It builds on the findings of an earlier evaluation, conducted by the authors between August 2002 and March 2003. The current evalaution focused on callers' perceptions of the helpline service, in order to determine whether the characteristics of callers using the service, and their reported perceptions of using the helpline, differed from callers interviewed in the original evaluation four years ago. More broadly, the evaluation aimed to inform the future development of Parentline services, by gathering detailed information on the extend to which callers' perceived needs were met by the universal helpline service

BMJ Open

ObjectivesApproximately 10% (40\u2005000) of US quitline enrollees who smoke cigarettes report current use of electronic nicotine delivery systems (ENDS); however, little is known about callers' ENDS use. Our aim was to describe why and how quitline callers use ENDS, their beliefs about ENDS and the impact of ENDS use on callers' quit processes and use of FDA-approved cessation medications.DesignQualitative interviews conducted 1-month postregistration. Interviews were recorded, transcribed, double-coded and analysed to identify themes.SettingOklahoma Tobacco Helpline.Participants40 callers aged 6518 who were seeking help to quit smoking were using ENDS at registration and completed 651 programme calls.ResultsAt 1-month postregistration interview, 80% of callers had smoked cigarettes in the last 7\u2005days, almost two-thirds were using ENDS, and half were using cessation medications. Nearly all believed ENDS helped them quit or cut down on smoking; however, participants were split on whether they would recommend cessation medications, ENDS or both together for quitting. Confusion and misinformation about potential harms of ENDS and cessation medications were reported. Participants reported using ENDS in potentially adaptive ways (eg, using ENDS to cut down and nicotine replacement therapy to quit, and stepping down nicotine in ENDS to wean off ENDS after quitting) and maladaptive ways (eg, frequent automatic ENDS use, using ENDS in situations they did not previously smoke, cutting down on smoking using ENDS without a schedule or plan to quit), which could impact the likelihood of quitting smoking or continuing ENDS use.ConclusionsThese qualitative findings suggest quitline callers who use ENDS experience confusion and misinformation about ENDS and FDA-approved cessation medications. Callers also use ENDS in ways that may not facilitate quitting smoking. Opportunities exist for quitlines to educate ENDS users and help them create a coordinated plan most likely to result in completely quitting combustible tobacco.201728365587PMC577547

VarDict: a novel and versatile variant caller for next-generation sequencing in cancer research

Accurate variant calling in next generation sequencing (NGS) is critical to understand cancer genomes better. Here we present VarDict, a novel and versatile variant caller for both DNA- and RNA-sequencing data. VarDict simultaneously calls SNV, MNV, InDels, complex and structural variants, expanding the detected genetic driver landscape of tumors. It performs local realignments on the fly for more accurate allele frequency estimation. VarDict performance scales linearly to sequencing depth, enabling ultra-deep sequencing used to explore tumor evolution or detect tumor DNA circulating in blood. In addition, VarDict performs amplicon aware variant calling for polymerase chain reaction (PCR)-based targeted sequencing often used in diagnostic settings, and is able to detect PCR artifacts. Finally, VarDict also detects differences in somatic and loss of heterozygosity variants between paired samples. VarDict reprocessing of The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) Lung Adenocarcinoma dataset called known driver mutations in KRAS, EGFR, BRAF, PIK3CA and MET in 16% more patients than previously published variant calls. We believe VarDict will greatly facilitate application of NGS in clinical cancer research

When the words are not everything: the use of laughter, fillers, back-channel, silence, and overlapping speech in phone calls

This article presents an observational study on how some common conversational cues – laughter, fillers, back-channel, silence, and overlapping speech – are used during mobile phone conversations. The observations are performed over the SSPNet Mobile Corpus, a collection of 60 calls between pairs of unacquainted individuals (120 subjects for roughly 12 h of material in total). The results show that the temporal distribution of the social signals above is not uniform, but it rather reflects the social meaning they carry and convey. In particular, the results show significant use differences depending on factors such as gender, role (caller or receiver), topic, mode of interaction (agreement or disagreement), personality traits, and conflict handling style

Barriers to Care: Hmong Experiences With the Sacramento Health Care System

Examines language barriers and computer system errors experienced by Hmong refugees when navigating the healthcare system, primarily through Medi-Cal. Provides recommendations for improving access to care, plan enrollment, and consumer education