Developing a practical guide for teaching histology: an evaluation of the didactic components

The Didactic Guide is a valuable tool complementing and making learning more dynamic. It is done using creative didactic strategies that simulate the presence of the tutor and generate a dialogue in order to offer students different possibilities to improve their understanding and self-discovery learning.This way the student is the protagonist of his own learning process. In this context, is highly important to consider the self discovery learning as a goal facilitating significant learning. The use of practical guides enables students to manage their own time, goals, techniques, contents and evaluation. In medical histology teaching several models of didactic guides could be use, and they normally include numerous activities, text, questionnaires, pictures, and drawings that may enhance the effectiveness of this tool in the learning process. In this work we have evaluated the usefulnes of different sections of a histology didactic guide in order to determine the key sections that enhance the learning process in human histology. For this purpose, a practical histology guide was designed with different sections: message text, theoretical text, objectives, drawings, pictures, clinical cases, games, blank spaces for self notes and drawing and final self evaluation questions. First, a simple questionnaire was applied in 90 students enrolled in histology practical seccions to analyze the student´s perceptions and preferences related to the histology guide. Finally, for all questionnaires average results and standard deviations were calculated for each option and all participants, as well for each gender, separately. Comparisons were done for drawings vs drawing blank spaces, teoric content vs notes blank space, drawings vs pictures and for each gender separately using Mann-Whitney non-parametrical test. Our findings revealed that visual strategies such as images and pictures were considered to be more useful for learning histology in the practical session. Similary, the students rated the self evaluation questions and blank spaces for self notes and drawing to be more attractive to the students. However, texts with theoretical information, messages, objectives, and clinical cases revealed to be less useful for the students in the learning process of medical histology. Moreover, statistically significant differences between theoretical content vs notes blank space was observed. All these results point out the importance of including pictures and drawings in the practical guide accompained of blank spaces that allow the development of creativity and autonomy that lead the students into a self discovery learning. Interestingly the students do not appreciate the presence of theoretical background in the practical guide as relevant information for their academic formation in the practical session

Nanostructured fibrin agarose hydrogel as a novel haemostatic agent

Blood loss remains a major concern during surgery and can increase the morbidity of the intervention. The use of topical haemostatic agents to overcome this issue therefore becomes necessary. Fibrin sealants are promising haemostatic agents due to their capacity to promote coagulation, but their effectiveness and applicability need to be improved. We have compared the haemostatic efficacy of a novel nanostructured fibrin‐agarose hydrogel patch, with (c‐NFAH) or without cells (a‐NFAH), against two commercially available haemostatic agents in a rat model of hepatic resection. Hepatic resections were performed by making short or long incisions (mild or severe model, respectively), and haemostatic agents were applied to evaluate time to haemostasis, presence of haematoma, post‐operative adhesions to adjacent tissues, and inflammation factors. We found a significantly higher haemostatic success rate (time to haemostasis) with a‐NFAH than with other commercial haemostatic agents. Furthermore, other relevant outcomes investigated were also improved in the a‐NFAH group, including no presence of haematoma, lower adhesions, and lower grades of haemorrhage, inflammation, and necrosis in histological analysis. Overall, these findings identify a‐NFAH as a promising haemostatic agent in liver resection and likely in a range of surgical procedures.This work was supported by preclinical research funds from the Regional Government of Andalusia through the Andalusian Initiative for Advanced Therapie

Evaluation of the cell viability of human Wharton's jelly stem cells for use in cell therapy

Human umbilical cord Wharton's jelly stem cells (HWJSCs) are gaining attention as a possible clinical source of mesenchymal stem cells for cell therapy and tissue engineering due to their high accessibility, expansion potential, and plasticity. We employed a combination of highly sensitive techniques to determine the average cell viability levels and proliferation capabilities of 10 consecutive cell passages of cultured HWJSCs and then used RNA microarrays to identify genes associated with changes in cell viability levels. We found an initial decrease in cell viability from the first to the third cell passage followed by an increase until the sixth passage and a final decrease from the sixth to tenth cell passages. The highest cell viability levels corresponded to the fifth and sixth passages. The intracellular ionic contents of potassium, sodium, and chlorine suggest that the lower cell viability levels at passages 2, 3, and 8-10 may be associated with apoptotic cell death. In fact, gene expression analysis revealed that the average cell viability was significantly associated with genes with a function in apoptotic cell death, especially pro-apoptotic FASTKD2, BNIP3L genes and anti-apoptotic TNFAIP8 and BCL2L2 genes. This correlation with both pro-apoptotic and anti-apoptotic genes suggests that there may be a complex live-death equilibrium in cultured HWJSCs kept in culture for multiple cell passages. In this study, the highest cell viability levels corresponded to the fifth and sixth HWJSC passages, suggesting that these passages should be preferentially employed in cell therapy or tissue engineering protocols using this cell type

New teaching era for histology: from glass slides to virtual microscope as an alternative for selfdiscovery learning

Medical histology is a basic science that deals with concepts and facts regarding the microscopic structure of the human body. Histology has traditionally been taught as a lecture and microscopybased practical course using glass slides and microscopes and it is based on reception learning. However, a new era has been implemented using virtual microscope in order to improve the selfdiscovery learning process. Self-discovery learning is a constructive learning method that takes place without systematic external guidance and differs from tutorization and continuous instructions of reception learning method. The use of virtual microscope implies autonomous exploration of the histological images by simply dragging the mouse and changing the file of interest accompanied by the observation at different magnifications with a click. This method increases discussion and collaboration while increasing the speed and efficiency of learning without the need of light microscope. Virtual microscope encourages active learning environment and also places the students at the forefront of their own learning process being an useful tool for self- discovery learning. The knowledge about the students’ perceptions and their preferences is necessary for better design of self-discovery strategies in medical histology. In this study we have investigated male and female student´s preferences for optical (OM) and virtual microscope (VM) in a medical histology practical course. To achieve this, 90 first year medical students enrolled in medical histology course were evaluated. All students received 10 practical histology units (20 hours) where 5 (10 hours) units were taught using OM and 5 units (10 hours) with VM. Each student received both methods during the practical course. Each student completed a questionnaire after the whole practical units were performed in order to evaluate the student´s perceptions and preferences. The questionnaire consisted on four questions regarding OM and four questions related to VM the students have to answer to each question using a Likert scale from 1 to 5. Finally, a statistical test was use to analyze the results on the students perception´s and preferences for OM vs VM. Our results showed that both, OM and VM are adequate for histology learning as revealed by the high scores obtained for both types of methods. OM and VM tools were easy to manage and facilite the localization of histological structures during the visualization for all the students. However, most of the students significantly prefer to use VM to study the histological components of human tissues. The gender analysis revealed differences being statistically significant for men vs women for VM. These results suggest that VM should be included as an important tool for teaching human histology due to promote the self-discovery learning by the students

Estimating Optimal Military Spending Policy in DSGE Model: Empirical vs Theoretical Approach

193-196Public spending on defense has become one of the most recent and complex research topics in macroeconomic policy analysis, which affects both economic growth and the welfare of society. Literature demands works that address the optimal calculation of military spending. This paper tries to respond to the estimation approach used to calculate military spending. Both a DSGE model (theoretical approach), a VAR model (empirical approach) and a DSGE-VAR model (combined approach) are developed. Our results indicate that the DSGE-VAR model offers the most robust estimates with minor deviations, closely followed by the DSGE model

Successful restoration of corneal surface integrity with a tissue-engineered allogeneic implant in severe keratitis patients

Objectives: Corneal diseases are among the main causes of blindness, with approximately 4.6 and 23 million patients worldwide suffering from bilateral and unilateral corneal blindness, respectively. The standard treatment for severe corneal diseases is corneal transplantation. However, relevant disadvantages, particularly in high-risk conditions, have focused the attention on the search for alternatives. Methods: We report interim findings of a phase I-II clinical study evaluating the safety and preliminary efficacy of a tissue-engineered corneal substitute composed of a nanostructured fibrin-agarose biocompatible scaffold combined with allogeneic corneal epithelial and stromal cells (NANOULCOR). 5 subjects (5 eyes) suffering from trophic corneal ulcers refractory to conventional treatments, who combined stromal degradation or fibrosis and limbal stem cell deficiency, were included and treated with this allogeneic anterior corneal substitute. Results: The implant completely covered the corneal surface, and ocular surface inflammation decreased following surgery. Only four adverse reactions were registered, and none of them were severe. No detachment, ulcer relapse nor surgical re-interventions were registered after 2 years of follow-up. No signs of graft rejection, local infection or corneal neovascularization were observed either. Efficacy was measured as a significant postoperative improvement in terms of the eye complication grading scales. Anterior segment optical coherence tomography images revealed a more homogeneous and stable ocular surface, with complete scaffold degradation occurring within 3–12 weeks after surgery. Conclusions: Our findings suggest that the surgical application of this allogeneic anterior human corneal substitute is feasible and safe, showing partial efficacy in the restoration of the corneal surface.Biobank of the Andalusian Public Health Syste

Movilidad urbana, cambios en las preferencias de los usuarios en España después del COVID-19

La movilidad urbana puede considerarse una cuestión de especial relevancia para un gran número de ciudades europeas debido a los altos niveles de contaminación que presentan alguna de ellas. Una situación anómala, se observó con la llegada de la Pandemia puesto que se observó una reducción de la movilidad urbana y como resultado de ello se registraron grandes reducciones de contaminación. Con la vuelta a la normalidad, los atascos y el vertido de partículas contaminantes ha vuelto a la normalidad y ello nos lleva a destacar la relevancia de la elección de la opción de movilidad que toman los usuarios, así como poder observar los posibles cambios que han resultado con la irrupción de la tecnología en el sector del transporte de las grandes ciudades. En este artículo, investigamos cómo evolucionan sus preferencias en la elección del medio de transporte mediante el modelo logit. Los datos estudiados se recogieron mediante encuestas a nivel nacional. Los resultados generados nos muestran información relevante para que el taxi y el VTC adapten sus estrategias en un entorno altamente competitivo e incierto como el que se enfrentan en la actualidad