What factors influence pain scores following Corticosteroid injection in patients with Greater Trochanteric Pain Syndrome? A systematic Review

YesBackground: Cortico-steroid Injections (CSI) are commonly used to treat patients with Greater Trochanteric Pain Syndrome (GTPS) but it is unclear which patients will experience improvements in pain Objectives: To identify factors that influence improvements in pain for patients with GTPS treated with CSI Design: Systematic review Methods: A search was undertaken of AMED, CINAHL, Cochrane Library, EMBASE, Medline and PEDro databases. Studies were eligible for inclusion of they investigated factors that influenced changes in pain experienced by patients who received a CSI. Studies needed to include relevant summary statistics and tests of clinical significance. Risk Of Bias in Non-randomised Trials Of Interventions (ROBINS-I) and Risk of Bias 2 (ROB2) tools were used to assess bias. Results: The search identified 466 studies, 8 were included in the final review with a total of 643 participants. There was no association between demographic variables such as age, sex, symptom duration or obesity and pain outcomes post-CSI. Having a co-existing musculoskeletal (MSK) condition such as knee osteoarthritis or sacroiliac/lumbar spine pain was associated with less pain reduction post-CSI. Injections into the Trochanteric Bursa were associated with longer lasting pain reduction than Gluteus Medius Bursa or extra-bursal injections. Image guidance of CSI maintained lower pain scores at six months but did not increase the duration of the therapeutic effect past six months. The presence of specific ultrasound scan features was not associated with differences in pain scores. Conclusions: Patients with co-existing MSK conditions may not respond to CSI as well as those without. Injections into the Greater Trochanteric Bursa may have longer lasting benefit. Further research is needed on the use of USS imaging findings and image guidance.This work was completed as part of a pre-doctoral fellowship funded by the National Institute of Health Research [NIHR301938, 2021]

Addressing Behavioral Barriers to COVID-19 Testing With Health Literacy-Sensitive eHealth Interventions: Results From 2 National Surveys and 2 Randomized Experiments.

BACKGROUND: Polymerase chain reaction (PCR) testing for COVID-19 was crucial in Australia's prevention strategy in the first 2 years of the pandemic, including required testing for symptoms, contact with cases, travel, and certain professions. However, several months into the pandemic, half of Australians were still not getting tested for respiratory symptoms, and little was known about the drivers of and barriers to COVID-19 PCR testing as a novel behavior at that time. OBJECTIVE: We aimed to identify and address COVID-19 testing barriers, and test the effectiveness of multiple eHealth interventions on knowledge for people with varying health literacy levels. METHODS: The intervention was developed in 4 phases. Phase 1 was a national survey conducted in June 2020 (n=1369), in which testing barriers were coded using the capability-opportunity-motivation-behavior framework. Phase 2 was a national survey conducted in November 2020 (n=2034) to estimate the prevalence of testing barriers and health literacy disparities. Phase 3 was a randomized experiment testing health literacy-sensitive written information for a wide range of barriers between February and March 2021 (n=1314), in which participants chose their top 3 barriers to testing to view a tailored intervention. Phase 4 was a randomized experiment testing 2 audio-visual interventions addressing common testing barriers for people with lower health literacy in November 2021, targeting young adults as a key group endorsing misinformation (n=1527). RESULTS: In phase 1, barriers were identified in all 3 categories: capability (eg, understanding which symptoms to test for), opportunity (eg, not being able to access a PCR test), and motivation (eg, not believing the symptoms are those of COVID-19). Phase 2 identified knowledge gaps for people with lower versus higher health literacy. Phase 3 found no differences between the intervention (health literacy-sensitive text for top 3 barriers) and control groups. Phase 4 showed that a fact-based animation or a TikTok-style video presenting the same facts in a humorous style increased knowledge about COVID-19 testing compared with government information. However, no differences were found for COVID-19 testing intentions. CONCLUSIONS: This study identified a wide range of barriers to a novel testing behavior, PCR testing for COVID-19. These barriers were prevalent even in a health system where COVID-19 testing was free and widely available. We showed that key capability barriers, such as knowledge gaps, can be improved with simple videos targeting people with lower health literacy. Additional behavior change strategies are required to address motivational issues to support testing uptake. Future research will explore health literacy strategies in the current context of self-administered rapid antigen tests. The findings may inform planning for future COVID-19 variant outbreaks and new public health emergencies where novel testing behaviors are required. TRIAL REGISTRATION: Australian New Zealand Clinical Trials Registry ACTRN12621000876897, https://www.anzctr.org.au/Trial/Registration/TrialReview.aspx?id=382318 ; Australian New Zealand Clinical Trials Registry ACTRN12620001355965, https://www.anzctr.org.au/Trial/Registration/TrialReview.aspx?id=380916&isReview=true

Towards a Framework for Open Data Publishers:A Comparison Study between Sweden and Belgium

Public organizations in the role of publishers publish datafor anyone to reuse, which can lead to benets. However, the processdescriptions for this publishing work focus on one or a few issues, whichleaves out important areas and decisions. Little seems to be known aboutvariations between publishers based on one common point of comparison.Therefore, this paper presents a comparison between two publishers:Namur (Belgium) and Linkoping (Sweden). The comparison is based ona process framework, seven in-depth interviews, document studies, anda verication meeting with one respondent. We learned that the OGD manager is an agent of change who need to balance implementation andguidance, the orthodox method of e-mail registration can be used toengage users and monitor impact, the organizational unit for OGD iscross-organizational, and the publisher process framework could be usedas ex-ante strategic guidelines and context-specic recommendations

Overexpression of Fatty Acid Amide Hydrolase Induces Early Flowering in Arabidopsis thaliana

N-Acylethanolamines (NAEs) are bioactive lipids derived from the hydrolysis of the membrane phospholipid N-acylphosphatidylethanolamine (NAPE). In animal systems this reaction is part of the “endocannabinoid” signaling pathway, which regulates a variety of physiological processes. The signaling function of NAE is terminated by fatty acid amide hydrolase (FAAH), which hydrolyzes NAE to ethanolamine and free fatty acid. Our previous work in Arabidopsis thaliana showed that overexpression of AtFAAH (At5g64440) lowered endogenous levels of NAEs in seeds, consistent with its role in NAE signal termination. Reduced NAE levels were accompanied by an accelerated growth phenotype, increased sensitivity to abscisic acid (ABA), enhanced susceptibility to bacterial pathogens, and early flowering. Here we investigated the nature of the early flowering phenotype of AtFAAH overexpression. AtFAAH overexpressors flowered several days earlier than wild type and AtFAAH knockouts under both non-inductive short day (SD) and inductive long day (LD) conditions. Microarray analysis revealed that the FLOWERING LOCUS T (FT) gene, which plays a major role in regulating flowering time, and one target MADS box transcription factor, SEPATALLA3 (SEP3), were elevated in AtFAAH overexpressors. Furthermore, AtFAAH overexpressors, with the early flowering phenotype had lower endogenous NAE levels in leaves compared to wild type prior to flowering. Exogenous application of NAE 12:0, which was reduced by up to 30% in AtFAAH overexpressors, delayed the onset of flowering in wild type plants. We conclude that the early flowering phenotype of AtFAAH overexpressors is, in part, explained by elevated FT gene expression resulting from the enhanced NAE hydrolase activity of AtFAAH, suggesting that NAE metabolism may participate in floral signaling pathways

COVID-19 Misinformation Trends in Australia: Prospective Longitudinal National Survey.

Background: Misinformation about COVID-19 is common and has been spreading rapidly across the globe through social media platforms and other information systems. Understanding what the public knows about COVID-19 and identifying beliefs based on misinformation can help shape effective public health communications to ensure efforts to reduce viral transmission are not undermined. Objective: This study aimed to investigate the prevalence and factors associated with COVID-19 misinformation in Australia and their changes over time. Methods: This prospective, longitudinal national survey was completed by adults (18 years and above) across April (n=4362), May (n=1882), and June (n=1369) 2020. Results: Stronger agreement with misinformation was associated with younger age, male gender, lower education level, and language other than English spoken at home (P<.01 for all). After controlling for these variables, misinformation beliefs were significantly associated (P<.001) with lower levels of digital health literacy, perceived threat of COVID-19, confidence in government, and trust in scientific institutions. Analyses of specific government-identified misinformation revealed 3 clusters: prevention (associated with male gender and younger age), causation (associated with lower education level and greater social disadvantage), and cure (associated with younger age). Lower institutional trust and greater rejection of official government accounts were associated with stronger agreement with COVID-19 misinformation. Conclusions: The findings of this study highlight important gaps in communication effectiveness, which must be addressed to ensure effective COVID-19 prevention

Sustainability appraisal: Jack of all trades, master of none?

Sustainable development is a commonly quoted goal for decision making and supports a large number of other discourses. Sustainability appraisal has a stated goal of supporting decision making for sustainable development. We suggest that the inherent flexibility of sustainability appraisal facilitates outcomes that often do not adhere to the three goals enshrined in most definitions of sustainable development: economic growth, environmental protection and enhancement, and the wellbeing of the human population. Current practice is for sustainable development to be disenfranchised through the interpretation of sustainability, whereby the best alternative is good enough even when unsustainable. Practitioners must carefully and transparently review the frameworks applied during sustainability appraisal to ensure that outcomes will meet the three goals, rather than focusing on a discourse that emphasises one or more goals at the expense of the other(s)

Cirsium species show disparity in patterns of genetic variation at their range-edge, despite similar patterns of reproduction and isolation

Genetic variation was assessed across the UK geographical range of Cirsium acaule and Cirsium heterophyllum. A decline in genetic diversity and increase in population divergence approaching the range edge of these species was predicted based on parallel declines in population density and seed production reported seperately. Patterns were compared with UK populations of the widespread Cirsium arvense.Populations were sampled along a latitudinal transect in the UK and genetic variation assessed using microsatellite markers. Cirsium acaule shows strong isolation by distance, a significant decline in diversity and an increase in divergence among range-edge populations. Geographical structure is also evident in C. arvense, whereas no such patterns are seen in C.heterophyllum. There is a major disparity between patterns of genetic variation in C. acaule and C. heterophyllum despite very similar patterns in seed production and population isolation in these species. This suggests it may be misleading to make assumptions about the geographical structure of genetic variation within species based solely on the present-day reproduction and distribution of populations

Genetic Traces of Recent Long-Distance Dispersal in a Predominantly Self-Recruiting Coral

Understanding of the magnitude and direction of the exchange of individuals among geographically separated subpopulations that comprise a metapopulation (connectivity) can lead to an improved ability to forecast how fast coral reef organisms are likely to recover from disturbance events that cause extensive mortality. Reef corals that brood their larvae internally and release mature larvae are believed to show little exchange of larvae over ecological times scales and are therefore expected to recover extremely slowly from large-scale perturbations.Using analysis of ten DNA microsatellite loci, we show that although Great Barrier Reef (GBR) populations of the brooding coral, Seriatopora hystrix, are mostly self-seeded and some populations are highly isolated, a considerable amount of sexual larvae (up to approximately 4%) has been exchanged among several reefs 10 s to 100 s km apart over the past few generations. Our results further indicate that S. hystrix is capable of producing asexual propagules with similar long-distance dispersal abilities (approximately 1.4% of the sampled colonies had a multilocus genotype that also occurred at another sampling location), which may aid in recovery from environmental disturbances.Patterns of connectivity in this and probably other GBR corals are complex and need to be resolved in greater detail through genetic characterisation of different cohorts and linkage of genetic data with fine-scale hydrodynamic models