Random Walk over Basins of Attraction to Construct Ising Energy Landscapes

An efficient algorithm is developed to construct disconnectivity graphs by a random walk over basins of attraction. This algorithm can detect a large number of local minima, find energy barriers between them, and estimate local thermal averages over each basin of attraction. It is applied to the SK spin glass Hamiltonian where existing methods have difficulties even for a moderate number of spins. Finite-size results are used to make predictions in the thermodynamic limit that match theoretical approximations and recent findings on the free energy landscapes of SK spin glasses.Comment: 2 Figures and 1 Table. To be published in Physical Review Letter

Comparative Study of Malaria Prevalence among Travellers in Nigeria (West Africa) Using Slide Microscopy and a Rapid Diagnosis Test

Malaria is a major disease in Africa and leads to various public health problems. A study was carried out at the Aviation Medical Clinic Laboratory, Murtala Mohammed Airport, Ikeja, Lagos State, Nigeria, in 2014. The work aimed to determine the prevalence of malaria among patients attending the laboratory. Blood samples were therefore collected from 51 patients and subjected to both blood smear microscopy and a rapid immunochromatographic diagnostic test (SD BIOLINE Malaria Ag) for detection of, respectively, malaria parasites and antigens. At the end of the study, 22% of the patients were detected positive by the microscopic examination while 9.8% were tested positive when using SD BIOLINE Malaria Ag. The outcomes of the study show a high prevalence of malaria at the airport. This represents a serious risk factor leading to a high likelihood of spread and occurrence of malaria in other countries including Western countries whereby the disease is nonendemic. It also pointed out that the blood smear microscopy seems to be better than Rapid Diagnosis Test (RDT) for malaria diagnosis

Epidemiology of intra-abdominal infection and sepsis in critically ill patients: “AbSeS”, a multinational observational cohort study and ESICM Trials Group Project

Purpose: To describe the epidemiology of intra-abdominal infection in an international cohort of ICU patients according to a new system that classifies cases according to setting of infection acquisition (community-acquired, early onset hospital-acquired, and late-onset hospital-acquired), anatomical disruption (absent or present with localized or diffuse peritonitis), and severity of disease expression (infection, sepsis, and septic shock). Methods: We performed a multicenter (n = 309), observational, epidemiological study including adult ICU patients diagnosed with intra-abdominal infection. Risk factors for mortality were assessed by logistic regression analysis. Results: The cohort included 2621 patients. Setting of infection acquisition was community-acquired in 31.6%, early onset hospital-acquired in 25%, and late-onset hospital-acquired in 43.4% of patients. Overall prevalence of antimicrobial resistance was 26.3% and difficult-to-treat resistant Gram-negative bacteria 4.3%, with great variation according to geographic region. No difference in prevalence of antimicrobial resistance was observed according to setting of infection acquisition. Overall mortality was 29.1%. Independent risk factors for mortality included late-onset hospital-acquired infection, diffuse peritonitis, sepsis, septic shock, older age, malnutrition, liver failure, congestive heart failure, antimicrobial resistance (either methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, vancomycin-resistant enterococci, extended-spectrum beta-lactamase-producing Gram-negative bacteria, or carbapenem-resistant Gram-negative bacteria) and source control failure evidenced by either the need for surgical revision or persistent inflammation. Conclusion: This multinational, heterogeneous cohort of ICU patients with intra-abdominal infection revealed that setting of infection acquisition, anatomical disruption, and severity of disease expression are disease-specific phenotypic characteristics associated with outcome, irrespective of the type of infection. Antimicrobial resistance is equally common in community-acquired as in hospital-acquired infection

A922 Sequential measurement of 1 hour creatinine clearance (1-CRCL) in critically ill patients at risk of acute kidney injury (AKI)

Meeting abstrac

EPIdemiology of Surgery-Associated Acute Kidney Injury (EPIS-AKI) : Study protocol for a multicentre, observational trial

More than 300 million surgical procedures are performed each year. Acute kidney injury (AKI) is a common complication after major surgery and is associated with adverse short-term and long-term outcomes. However, there is a large variation in the incidence of reported AKI rates. The establishment of an accurate epidemiology of surgery-associated AKI is important for healthcare policy, quality initiatives, clinical trials, as well as for improving guidelines. The objective of the Epidemiology of Surgery-associated Acute Kidney Injury (EPIS-AKI) trial is to prospectively evaluate the epidemiology of AKI after major surgery using the latest Kidney Disease: Improving Global Outcomes (KDIGO) consensus definition of AKI. EPIS-AKI is an international prospective, observational, multicentre cohort study including 10 000 patients undergoing major surgery who are subsequently admitted to the ICU or a similar high dependency unit. The primary endpoint is the incidence of AKI within 72 hours after surgery according to the KDIGO criteria. Secondary endpoints include use of renal replacement therapy (RRT), mortality during ICU and hospital stay, length of ICU and hospital stay and major adverse kidney events (combined endpoint consisting of persistent renal dysfunction, RRT and mortality) at day 90. Further, we will evaluate preoperative and intraoperative risk factors affecting the incidence of postoperative AKI. In an add-on analysis, we will assess urinary biomarkers for early detection of AKI. EPIS-AKI has been approved by the leading Ethics Committee of the Medical Council North Rhine-Westphalia, of the Westphalian Wilhelms-University Münster and the corresponding Ethics Committee at each participating site. Results will be disseminated widely and published in peer-reviewed journals, presented at conferences and used to design further AKI-related trials. Trial registration number NCT04165369

Randomized Evaluation of Institutions: Theory with Applications to Voting and Deliberation Experiments

We study causal inference in randomized experiments where the treatment is a decision making process or an institution such as voting, deliberation or decentralized governance. We provide a statistical framework for the estimation of the intrinsic e¤ect of the institution. The proposed framework builds on a standard set-up for estimating causal e¤ects in randomized experiments with noncompliance (Hirano-Imbens-Rubin-Zhou [2000]). We use the model to reanalyze the e¤ect of deliberation on voting for programmatic platforms in Benin (Wantchekon [2008]), and provide practical suggestions for estimating intrinsic causal e¤ects of institutions.

Antihypertensive effects of the aqueous extract leaves of celtis durandii engler (ulmaceae) on rat

Celtis durandii (Ulmaceae), one of the plants used in traditional medicine to cure migraine, epilepsy, and high blood pressure was evaluated for antihypertensive activity in normotensive rats (NTR) and hypertensive saline rats (HSR), by the invasive method. Results indicated that C. durandii induce a decreased blood pressure after administration of the extract. This sudden decrease is followed by a slight increase, and then by an antihypertensive late activity of the extract that lasts for one hour. At a dose of 35 mg /kg, the antihypertensive late activity of C. durandii extract was 40% in NTR and 36% in HSR. The urinary excretion of Na+ increased by 513 % and 913%, respectively, in NTR and HSR at dose of 300 mg/kg while that of K+ increased by 82 % and 212% in the same animals at same dose. The results suggest that C durandii possesses an antihypertensive activity that could result from its diuretic effects. This activity could be explained by decrease of surrounding resistances.Key words:   Celtis durandii, blood pressure, diuretic, rat