The After Diagnosis Head and Neck cancer specific Patient Concerns Inventory (HaNC-AD) as a pre-treatment preparation aid during the COVID-19 pandemic

The coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic has resulted in new challenges for clinicians, head and neck cancer (HNC) patients and carers. There is evidence that the current crisis is afecting the management of HNC patients. Most healthcare systems have introduced remote consultations to decrease the risk of coronavirus infection to patients, carers and clinicians. At present, HNC patients may be anxious and due to logistical issues, may not be adequately prepared for their treatment. To ensure that patients have a thorough understanding of their treatment and expected outcome during the current COVID-19 crisis there may be merit in the use of the HaNC-AD PCI

Genomic mutations and proof of causation between dysplasia and squamous cell carcinoma in medicolegal cases: a useful approach or a waste of resources?

It has been suggested that oral stratified squamous epithelium may be implicated in field cancerisation.1,2 Several other studies have examined the clonal relations between dysplasia and oral squamous cell carcinoma (SCC),3,4 and it is now obvious that the relation between dysplasia at a specific site in the oral cavity, and a subsequent SCC that has arisen at the same site several years later, is a complex rather than a simple progression.5 Those of us who see patients with mucosal abnormalities often treat lesions with low-grade or high-grade dysplasi

Structured review of the patient-reported outcome instruments used in clinical trials in head and neck surgery

The number of clinical trials that relate to patients with cancer of the head and neck is growing. Patient-reported outcomes, which are rarely the primary outcome, are now an important component, and in this structured review to identify and report the characteristics of the questionnaires that have been used in these trials, we summarise the findings reported. We searched several online databases using the key terms: head and neck oncology, head and neck surgery, reconstruction, clinical trials patient-reported outcomes, questionnaires, quality of life (QoL), validated instruments, and patients’ satisfaction. We screened 1342 papers to collect information about the topic of the paper, sample size, selection criteria, main advantages and disadvantages of the patient-reported outcome used, and if it was used in conjunction with another measure. A total of 54 were eligible, and from them we identified 22 questionnaires. The primary reason for using a questionnaire was its relevance to the focus of the paper, such as xerostomia, pain, or swallowing. To allow the experience of patients to be the focus of the primary outcome in a clinical trial, we recommend that the measures used should be appropriate, reliable, valid, responsive, precise, interpretable, acceptable, and feasible. The trials used validated questionnaires, but the patient-reported outcome measures tended not to be the focus. There is merit in such measures being the primary outcomes in future trials and these should be designed around an explicit hypothesis

A Library of Integrated Spectra of Galactic Globular Clusters

We present a new library of integrated spectra of 40 Galactic globular clusters, obtained with the Blanco 4-m telescope and the R-C spectrograph at the Cerro Tololo Interamerican Observatory. The spectra cover the range ~ 3350 -- 6430 A with ~ 3.1 A (FWHM) resolution. The spectroscopic observations and data reduction were designed to integrate the full projected area within the cluster core radii in order to properly sample the light from stars in all relevant evolutionary stages. The S/N values of the flux-calibrated spectra range from 50 to 240/A at 4000 A and from 125 to 500/A at 5000 A. The selected targets span a wide range of cluster parameters, including metallicity, horizontal-branch morphology, Galactic coordinates, Galactocentric distance, and concentration. The total sample is thus fairly representative of the entire Galactic globular cluster population and should be valuable for comparison with similar integrated spectra of unresolved stellar populations in remote systems. For most of the library clusters, our spectra can be coupled with deep color-magnitude diagrams and reliable metal abundances from the literature to enable the calibration of stellar population synthesis models. In this paper we present a detailed account of the observations and data reduction. The spectral library is publicly available in electronic format from the National Optical Astronomical Observatory website.Comment: 39 Pages, including 2 tables and 15 Figures. To appear in the Astrophysical Journal, Supplement Serie

Weed management in soybean with a special focus on the control of purple nutsedge (Cyperus rotundus)

Purple nutsedge (Cyperus rotundus L.) is globally an important perennial weed. Infestations from this species lead to significant losses in yield and quality of crop production. A field study was conducted at Kopaida region in Greece, to evaluate the efficacy of different herbicides for the weed management in soybean. The evaluation of the herbicides was based on the efficacy against purple nutsedge and the effect on soybean biomass production and crop seed yield. Treatments included an untreated control, two pre-emergence applications (with S-metolachlor and pendimethalin), as well as three post-emergence applications (with trifloxysulfuron, bentazone and pyrithiobac sodium). A single application of S-metolachlor maintained the density of purple nutsedge at 15 plants per m2 in soybean and allowed the crop to compete adequately with the weed. S-metolachlor also resulted in a seed yield of 3.26 tn ha-1 , a value 52% higher than the untreated control and 38–45% higher than the other herbicides. The results from this study demonstrated that a combination of high seed density in soybean and effective application of herbicides like S-metolachlor can lead to economically acceptable yields