6,180 research outputs found
Instrumental swallowing assessment in adults in residential aged care homes : Practice patterns and opportunities
Objective
To describe practice patterns in the use of instrumental swallowing assessment (ISA) for older adults in residential aged care homes (RACHs).
Methods
A retrospective audit of medical records of residents living in RACHs in Melbourne, Australia to extract data on speech-language pathologist (SLP) involvement, indications for ISA and ISA practice patterns.
Results
Medical files of 323 residents across four Melbourne facilities were reviewed. 36% (n = 115) of residents were referred to SLP for swallowing assessment. Referral to SLP was related to length of stay (U = 7393.00, p < 0.001), dementia status (χ2[1] = 7.06, p = 0.008), texture modification (χ2[1] = 93.34, p < 0.001) and an existing dysphagia diagnosis (χ2[1] = 112.89, p < 0.001). There were no referrals for ISA and no instances of ISA being used. Among 115 residents who were referred to SLP for swallowing assessment, there were 33 instances where ISA might be clinically relevant according to ISA indicators.
Conclusions
Instrumental swallowing assessment is not being used for the management of swallowing in RACHs in Australia despite a clinical need for ISA and a potential role for ISA to improve swallowing care quality. Lack of timely ISA may fail to meet the complex health-care needs of older adults living with dysphagia in RACHs, increasing their vulnerability to complications of dysphagia and its management
Quantifying ultrasonic mouse vocalizations using acoustic analysis in a supervised statistical machine learning framework
Examination of rodent vocalizations in experimental conditions can yield valuable insights into how disease manifests and progresses over time. It can also be used as an index of social interest, motivation, emotional development or motor function depending on the animal model under investigation. Most mouse communication is produced in ultrasonic frequencies beyond human hearing. These ultrasonic vocalizations (USV) are typically described and evaluated using expert defined classification of the spectrographic appearance or simplistic acoustic metrics resulting in nine call types. In this study, we aimed to replicate the standard expert-defined call types of communicative vocal behavior in mice by using acoustic analysis to characterize USVs and a principled supervised learning setup. We used four feature selection algorithms to select parsimonious subsets with maximum predictive accuracy, which are then presented into support vector machines (SVM) and random forests (RF). We assessed the resulting models using 10-fold cross-validation with 100 repetitions for statistical confidence and found that a parsimonious subset of 8 acoustic measures presented to RF led to 85% correct out-of-sample classification, replicating the experts' labels. Acoustic measures can be used by labs to describe USVs and compare data between groups, and provide insight into vocal-behavioral patterns of mice by automating the process on matching the experts' call types
Conformational and Structural Relaxations of Poly(ethylene oxide) and Poly(propylene oxide) Melts: Molecular Dynamics Study of Spatial Heterogeneity, Cooperativity, and Correlated Forward-Backward Motion
Performing molecular dynamics simulations for all-atom models, we
characterize the conformational and structural relaxations of poly(ethylene
oxide) and poly(propylene oxide) melts. The temperature dependence of these
relaxation processes deviates from an Arrhenius law for both polymers. We
demonstrate that mode-coupling theory captures some aspects of the glassy
slowdown, but it does not enable a complete explanation of the dynamical
behavior. When the temperature is decreased, spatially heterogeneous and
cooperative translational dynamics are found to become more important for the
structural relaxation. Moreover, the transitions between the conformational
states cease to obey Poisson statistics. In particular, we show that, at
sufficiently low temperatures, correlated forward-backward motion is an
important aspect of the conformational relaxation, leading to strongly
nonexponential distributions for the waiting times of the dihedrals in the
various conformational statesComment: 13 pages, 13 figure
Logopenic and nonfluent variants of primary progressive aphasia are differentiated by acoustic measures of speech production
Differentiation of logopenic (lvPPA) and nonfluent/agrammatic (nfvPPA) variants of Primary Progressive Aphasia is important yet remains challenging since it hinges on expert based evaluation of speech and language production. In this study acoustic measures of speech in conjunction with voxel-based morphometry were used to determine the success of the measures as an adjunct to diagnosis and to explore the neural basis of apraxia of speech in nfvPPA. Forty-one patients (21 lvPPA, 20 nfvPPA) were recruited from a consecutive sample with suspected frontotemporal dementia. Patients were diagnosed using the current gold-standard of expert perceptual judgment, based on presence/absence of particular speech features during speaking tasks. Seventeen healthy age-matched adults served as controls. MRI scans were available for 11 control and 37 PPA cases; 23 of the PPA cases underwent amyloid ligand PET imaging. Measures, corresponding to perceptual features of apraxia of speech, were periods of silence during reading and relative vowel duration and intensity in polysyllable word repetition. Discriminant function analyses revealed that a measure of relative vowel duration differentiated nfvPPA cases from both control and lvPPA cases (r2 = 0.47) with 88% agreement with expert judgment of presence of apraxia of speech in nfvPPA cases. VBM analysis showed that relative vowel duration covaried with grey matter intensity in areas critical for speech motor planning and programming: precentral gyrus, supplementary motor area and inferior frontal gyrus bilaterally, only affected in the nfvPPA group. This bilateral involvement of frontal speech networks in nfvPPA potentially affects access to compensatory mechanisms involving right hemisphere homologues. Measures of silences during reading also discriminated the PPA and control groups, but did not increase predictive accuracy. Findings suggest that a measure of relative vowel duration from of a polysyllable word repetition task may be sufficient for detecting most cases of apraxia of speech and distinguishing between nfvPPA and lvPPA
Slow dynamics near glass transitions in thin polymer films
The -process (segmental motion) of thin polystyrene films supported
on glass substrate has been investigated in a wider frequency range from
10 Hz to 10 Hz using dielectric relaxation spectroscopy and thermal
expansion spectroscopy. The relaxation rate of the -process increases
with decreasing film thickness at a given temperature above the glass
transition. This increase in the relaxation rate with decreasing film thickness
is much more enhanced near the glass transition temperature. The glass
transition temperature determined as the temperature at which the relaxation
time of the -process becomes a macroscopic time scale shows a distinct
molecular weight dependence. It is also found that the Vogel temperature has
the thickness dependence, i.e., the Vogel temperature decreases with decreasing
film thickness. The expansion coefficient of the free volume is
extracted from the temperature dependence of the relaxation time within the
free volume theory. The fragility index is also evaluated as a function of
thickness. Both and are found to decrease with decreasing film
thickness.Comment: 9 pages, 7 figures, and 2 table
Quantum-scissors device for optical state truncation: A proposal for practical realization
We propose a realizable experimental scheme to prepare superposition of the
vacuum and one-photon states by truncating an input coherent state. The scheme
is based on the quantum scissors device proposed by Pegg, Phillips, and Barnett
[Phys. Rev. Lett. 81, 1604 (1998)] and uses photon-counting detectors, a
single-photon source, and linear optical elements. Realistic features of the
photon counting and single-photon generation are taken into account and
possible error sources are discussed together with their effect on the fidelity
and efficiency of the truncation process. Wigner function and phase
distribution of the generated states are given and discussed for the evaluation
of the proposed scheme.Comment: 11 pages, 12 figures, the final version to appear in Phys. Rev. A64,
0638xx (2001
Bounds on the tau and muon neutrino vector and axial vector charge radius
A Majorana neutrino is characterized by just one flavor diagonal
electromagnetic form factor: the anapole moment, that in the static limit
corresponds to the axial vector charge radius . Experimental information
on this quantity is scarce, especially in the case of the tau neutrino. We
present a comprehensive analysis of the available data on the single photon
production process off Z-resonance, and we
discuss the constraints that these measurements can set on for the tau
neutrino. We also derive limits for the Dirac case, when the presence of a
vector charge radius is allowed. Finally, we comment on additional
experimental data on scattering from the NuTeV, E734, CCFR and
CHARM-II collaborations, and estimate the limits implied for and
for the muon neutrino.Comment: 20 pages, 2 eps figures. CCFR data included in the analysis.
Conclusion unchange
Reconstruction of quantum states of spin systems via the Jaynes principle of maximum entropy
We apply the Jaynes principle of maximum entropy for the partial
reconstruction of correlated spin states. We determine the minimum set of
observables which are necessary for the complete reconstruction of the most
correlated states of systems composed of spins-1/2 (e.g., the Bell and the
Greenberger-Horne-Zeilinger states). We investigate to what extent an
incomplete measurement can reveal nonclassical features of correlated spin
states.Comment: 14 pages + 3 tables, LaTeX with revtex, to appear in J. Mod. Op
Slow dynamics and aging in a non-randomly frustrated spin system
A simple, non-disordered spin model has been studied in an effort to
understand the origin of the precipitous slowing down of dynamics observed in
supercooled liquids approaching the glass transition. A combination of Monte
Carlo simulations and exact calculations indicates that this model exhibits an
entropy vanishing transition accompanied by a rapid divergence of time scales.
Measurements of various correlation functions show that the system displays a
hierarchy of time scales associated with different degrees of freedom. Extended
structures, arising from the frustration in the system, are identified as the
source of the slow dynamics. In the simulations, the system falls out of
equilibrium at a temperature higher than the entropy-vanishing
transition temperature and the dynamics below exhibits aging as
distinct from coarsening. The cooling rate dependence of the energy is also
consistent with the usual glass formation scenario.Comment: 41 pages, 16 figures. Bibliography file is correcte
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