Swordfish bill injury involving abdomen and vertebral column: case report and review

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Penetrating injuries of the abdomen and spinal canal that involve organic material of animal origin are extremely rare and derive from domestic and wild animal attacks or fish attacks.</p> <p>Case presentation</p> <p>In this case report we present the unique, as far as the literature is concerned, unprovoked woman's injury to the abdomen by a swordfish. There are only four cases of swordfish attacks on humans in the literature - one resulted to thoracic trauma, two to head trauma and one to knee trauma, one of which was fatal - none of which were unprovoked. Three victims were professional or amateur fishermen whereas in the last reported case the victim was a bather as in our case. Our case is the only case where organic debris of animal's origin remained in the spinal canal after penetrating trauma.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Although much has been written about the management of penetrating abdominal and spinal cord trauma, controversy remains about the optimal management. Moreover, there is little experience in the management of patients with such spinal injuries, due to the fact that such cases are extremely rare. In this report we focus on the patient's treatment with regard to abdominal and spinal trauma and present a review of the literature.</p

Tracking the serial advantage in the naming rate of multiple over isolated stimulus displays

The serial advantage, defined as the gain in naming rate in the serial over the discrete task of the same content, was examined between grades and types of content in English and Greek. 720 English- and Greek-speaking children from Grades 1, 3, and 5 were tested in rapid naming and reading tasks of different content, including digits, objects, dice, number words, and words. Each type of content was presented in two presentation formats: multiple stimulus displays (i.e., serial naming) and isolated stimulus displays (i.e., discrete naming). Serial tasks yielded faster naming rates―irrespective of task content―in both languages. However, content-specific characteristics influenced the trajectory of the serial advantage between grades. Improvement in the serial advantage between grades was found to be greatest for word reading, which started off similar to object naming in Grade 1, but ended up similar to digit or dice naming by Grade 5. In addition, growth in serial advantage was found to be associated with growth in discrete naming rate only in grade level analysis. For individuals, greater serial advantage was found to rely on processing skills specific to serial naming rather than on differences in the rate of naming isolated items. Our findings suggest that group level findings may not generalize to individuals, and although practice and familiarity with the content on the naming/reading task may impact the development of serial advantage, isolated item identification processes contribute little to individual differences in the gain in serial naming rates

From Individual Word Recognition to Word List and Text Reading Fluency

This study aimed to examine (a) the developing interrelations between the efficiency of reading individually presented words (i.e., isolated word recognition speed) and the efficiency of reading multiword sequences (i.e., word list and text reading fluency); (b) whether serial digit naming, indexing the ability to process multi-item sequences, accounts for variance in word list and text reading fluency beyond isolated word recognition speed; and (c) if these patterns of relations/effects differ between two alphabetic languages varying in orthographic consistency (English and Greek). In total, 710 Greek- and English-speaking children from Grades 1, 3, and 5 completed a serial digit naming task and a set of reading tasks, including unconnected words presented individually, unconnected words presented in lists, and sentences forming a meaningful passage. Our results showed that the relation between isolated word recognition speed and both word list and text reading fluency gradually decreased across grades, irrespective of contextual processing requirements. Moreover, serial digit naming uniquely predicted both word-list and text reading fluency in Grades 3 and 5, beyond isolated word recognition speed. The same pattern of results was observed across languages. These findings challenge the notion that individual word recognition and reading fluency differ only in text-level processing requirements. Instead, an additional component of processing multi-item sequences appears to emerge by Grade 3, after a basic level of both accuracy and speed in word recognition has been achieved, offering a potential mechanism underlying the transition from dealing with words one at a time to efficient processing of word sequences

Word Reading Fluency as a Serial Naming Task

Word list reading fluency is theoretically expected to depend on single word reading speed. Yet the correlation between the two diminishes with increasing fluency, while fluency remains strongly correlated to serial digit naming. We hypothesized that multielement sequence processing is an important component of fluency. We used confirmatory factor analyses with serial and discrete naming tasks with matched items, including digits, dice, objects, number words, and words, performed by about one hundred Greek children in each of Grades 1, 3, and 5. Separable serial and discrete factors emerged across grades, consistent with distinct skill dimensions. Loadings were greater for serial than discrete, suggesting that discrete processing does not fully determine serial processing. Average serial performance differed more than discrete between grades, consistent with improvement beyond single-item speed. Serial word reading aligned increasingly with the serial factor at higher grades. Thus, word reading fluency is gradually dominated by skill in simultaneously processing multiple successive items through different stages (termed “cascading”), beyond automatization of individual words. The final version of this research has been published in Scientific Studies of Reading. © 2018 Taylor & Franci

From Individual Word Recognition to Word List and Text Reading Fluency

This study aimed to examine (a) the developing interrelations between the efficiency of reading individually presented words (i.e., isolated word recognition speed) and the efficiency of reading multiword sequences (i.e., word list and text reading fluency), (b) whether serial digit naming, indexing the ability to process multi-item sequences, accounts for variance in word list and text reading fluency beyond isolated word recognition speed, and (c) if these patterns of relations/effects differ between two alphabetic languages varying in orthographic consistency (English and Greek). In total, 710 Greek- and English-speaking children from Grades 1, 3, and 5 completed a serial digit naming task and a set of reading tasks, including unconnected words presented individually, unconnected words presented in lists, and sentences forming a meaningful passage. Our results showed that the relation between isolated word recognition speed and both word list and text reading fluency gradually decreased across grades, irrespective of contextual processing requirements. Moreover, serial digit naming uniquely predicted both word-list and text reading fluency in Grades 3 and 5, beyond isolated word recognition speed. The same pattern of results was observed across languages. These findings challenge the notion that individual word recognition and reading fluency differ only in text-level processing requirements. Instead, an additional component of processing multi-item sequences appears to emerge by Grade 3, after a basic level of both accuracy and speed in word recognition has been achieved, offering a potential mechanism underlying the transition from dealing with words one at a time to efficient processing of word sequences

Analysis of speech and silent intervals in naming tasks

Protopapas, Katopodi, Altani, Kolotoura, Sagris, Ziaka, &amp; Georgiou. A process-oriented analysis of speech and silent intervals in responses to serial naming tasks

A Process-Oriented Analysis of Speech and Silent Intervals in Responses to Serial Naming Tasks

In this study we present a framework for conceptualizing and analyzing responses to serial naming (RAN) tasks, in which participants sequentially name a set of stimuli that are simultaneously presented in an array format. Our aim is to better understand how these tasks are processed and why they are associated with reading skills, particularly word reading fluency. We analyzed responses by 298 Greek children in Grades 1, 3, and 5 to serial and discrete naming of digits, dice, objects, number words, and words. We measured the durations of silent and speech intervals per item in each task and grade, and tested predictions about their relations based on a hypothesis of two overlapping processing stages. We found that articulation times were longer in the serial tasks, further modulated by task demands. Total times were faster for serial than for discrete tasks, and the differences between the two (termed serial advantage) were increasingly associated with the duration of speech intervals, consistent with efficient scheduling. Serial naming rate approached or exceeded the limits imposed by processing time (operationalized as discrete onset latency), consistent with increasing processing overlap. These patterns were primarily observed for digits, number words, and—to some extent—dice, after Grade 1. Object naming seemed to pose different cognitive demands, stably across grades. Word reading exhibited the greatest differences between grades, consistent with rapid development of automaticity. We interpret this pattern of findings within a cascaded processing framework, in which performance is determined by the efficiency of cognitive scheduling of successive operations, constrained by susceptibility to interference from adjacent items. We propose that reading fluency is predicted by serial naming because it is also largely governed by the same scheduling constraints

Is processing of symbols and words influenced by writing system? Evidence from Chinese, Korean, English, and Greek

We examined cross-linguistic effects in the relationship between serial and discrete versions of digit naming and word reading. In total, 113 Mandarin-speaking Chinese children, 100 Korean children, 112 English-speaking Canadian children, and 108 Greek children in Grade 3 were administered tasks of serial and discrete naming of words and digits. Interrelations among tasks indicated that the link between rapid naming and reading is largely determined by the format of the tasks across orthographies. Multigroup path analyses with discrete and serial word reading as dependent variables revealed commonalities as well as significant differences between writing systems. The path coefficient from discrete digits to discrete words was greater for the more transparent orthographies, consistent with more efficient sight-word processing. The effect of discrete word reading on serial word reading was stronger in alphabetic languages, where there was also a suppressive effect of discrete digit naming. However, the effect of serial digit naming on serial word reading did not differ among the four language groups. This pattern of relationships challenges a universal account of reading fluency acquisition while upholding a universal role of rapid serial naming, further distinguishing between multi-element interword and intraword processing. Altani, Angeliki; Georgiou, George; Deng, Ciping; Cho, Jeung-Ryeul; Katopodi, Katerina; Wei, Wei; Protopapas, Athanassios "Is processing of symbols and words influenced by writing system? Evidence from Chinese, Korean, English, and Greek." Journal of Experimental Child Psychology. 2017, 164, 117-135 © 2017. This manuscript version is made available under the CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 licens

Association of LOXL1 polymorphisms with pseudoexfoliation, glaucoma, intraocular pressure, and systemic diseases in a Greek population. The Thessaloniki eye study.

PurposeTo investigate the association of the two single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in the lysyl oxidase-like 1 (LOXL1) gene with pseudoexfoliation syndrome (PEX), pseudoexfoliative glaucoma (PEXG), and primary open-angle glaucoma (POAG) in a Greek population-based setting, from the Thessaloniki Eye study.MethodsA total of 233 subjects with successful DNA extraction, PCR amplification, and genotyping were included in the genetic analysis of G153D and R141L SNPs of LOXL1 gene and classified into four groups: controls (n = 93); subjects with PEX (n = 40); POAG (n = 66); and PEXG (n = 34). Multinomial logistic regression was used to test their association with LOXL1 SNPs with adjustment for covariates. The association of LOXL1 with IOP (in untreated subjects) and with systemic diseases was explored.ResultsBoth LOXL1 SNPs were present in high frequencies in controls and cases. The G153D was strongly associated with both PEX (odds ratio [OR] = 23.2, P = 0.003 for allele G) and PEXG (OR = 24.75, P = 0.003 for allele G) and was not associated with POAG (P = 0.451). In contrast, the R141L was not associated with PEX (P = 0.81), PEXG (P = 0.063), or POAG (P = 0.113). No association of the G153D with either intraocular pressure (IOP) or systemic diseases was found.ConclusionsIn the Thessaloniki Eye Study, the G153D SNP of LOXL1 gene was strongly associated with both PEX and PEXG, whereas the R141L was not associated. No association of the LOXL1 with IOP or with systemic diseases was found. These findings further support the hypothesis that the LOXL1 gene contributes to onset of PEXG through PEX. Gene variants of LOXL1 do not help to identify those with PEX at increased risk for glaucoma development