The HLA class II allele DRB1*1501 is over-represented in patients with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis

Background: Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) is a progressive and medically refractory lung disease with a grim prognosis. Although the etiology of IPF remains perplexing, abnormal adaptive immune responses are evident in many afflicted patients. We hypothesized that perturbations of human leukocyte antigen (HLA) allele frequencies, which are often seen among patients with immunologic diseases, may also be present in IPF patients. Methods/Principal Findings: HLA alleles were determined in subpopulations of IPF and normal subjects using molecular typing methods. HLA-DRB1*15 was over-represented in a discovery cohort of 79 Caucasian IPF subjects who had lung transplantations at the University of Pittsburgh (36.7%) compared to normal reference populations. These findings were prospectively replicated in a validation cohort of 196 additional IPF subjects from four other U.S. medical centers that included both ambulatory patients and lung transplantation recipients. High-resolution typing was used to further define specific HLA-DRB1*15 alleles. DRB1*1501 prevalence in IPF subjects was similar among the 143 ambulatory patients and 132 transplant recipients (31.5% and 34.8%, respectively, p = 0.55). The aggregate prevalence of DRB1*1501 in IPF patients was significantly greater than among 285 healthy controls (33.1% vs. 20.0%, respectively, OR 2.0; 95%CI 1.3-2.9, p = 0.0004). IPF patients with DRB1*1501 (n = 91) tended to have decreased diffusing capacities for carbon monoxide (DLCO) compared to the 184 disease subjects who lacked this allele (37.8±1.7% vs. 42.8±1.4%, p = 0.036). Conclusions/Significance: DRB1*1501 is more prevalent among IPF patients than normal subjects, and may be associated with greater impairment of gas exchange. These data are novel evidence that immunogenetic processes can play a role in the susceptibility to and/or manifestations of IPF. Findings here of a disease association at the HLA-DR locus have broad pathogenic implications, illustrate a specific chromosomal area for incremental, targeted genomic study, and may identify a distinct clinical phenotype among patients with this enigmatic, morbid lung disease

Examining assumptions regarding valid electronic monitoring of medication therapy: development of a validation framework and its application on a European sample of kidney transplant patients

BACKGROUND: Electronic monitoring (EM) is used increasingly to measure medication non-adherence. Unbiased EM assessment requires fulfillment of assumptions. The purpose of this study was to determine assumptions needed for internal and external validity of EM measurement. To test internal validity, we examined if (1) EM equipment functioned correctly, (2) if all EM bottle openings corresponded to actual drug intake, and (3) if EM did not influence a patient's normal adherence behavior. To assess external validity, we examined if there were indications that using EM affected the sample representativeness. METHODS: We used data from the Supporting Medication Adherence in Renal Transplantation (SMART) study, which included 250 adult renal transplant patients whose adherence to immunosuppressive drugs was measured during 3 months with the Medication Event Monitoring System (MEMS). Internal validity was determined by assessing the prevalence of nonfunctioning EM systems, the prevalence of patient-reported discrepancies between cap openings and actual intakes (using contemporaneous notes and interview at the end of the study), and by exploring whether adherence was initially uncharacteristically high and decreased over time (an indication of a possible EM intervention effect). Sample representativeness was examined by screening for differences between participants and non-participants or drop outs on non-adherence. RESULTS: Our analysis revealed that some assumptions were not fulfilled: 1) one cap malfunctioned (0.4%), 2) self-reported mismatches between bottle openings and actual drug intake occurred in 62% of the patients (n = 155), and 3) adherence decreased over the first 5 weeks of the monitoring, indicating that EM had a waning intervention effect. CONCLUSION: The validity assumptions presented in this article should be checked in future studies using EM as a measure of medication non-adherence

Well-being as a Function of Person-Country Fit in Human Values

It is often assumed that incongruence between individuals’ values and those of their country is distressing, but the evidence has been mixed. Across 29 countries, the present research investigated whether well-being is higher if people’s values match with those of people living in the same country or region. Using representative samples, we find that person-country and person-region value congruence predict six well-being measures (e.g., emotional well-being, relationship support; N = 54,673). Crucially, however, value type moderates whether person-country fit is positively or negatively associated with well-being. People who value self-direction, stimulation, and hedonism more and live in countries and regions where people on average share these values report lower well-being. In contrast, people who value achievement, power, and security more and live in countries and regions where people on average share these values, report higher well-being. Additionally, we find that people who moderately value stimulation report the highest well-being

Investigating the Effect of Conflicting Goals and Transparency on Trust and Collaboration in Multi-Team Systems

In Air Traffic Management (ATM) multiple teams have to collaborate to achieve efficient and safe operation. Multiple-team operations rely on communication and information sharing between the team members. In this field, multi-team systems (MTSs) are the most common form of organization. The interface between the organizations involved (e.g. air traffic control, cockpit crews, airports) is of central importance. Apart from a common goal, different stakeholders may pursue individual goals governed by their own company culture or policies. Therefore, simply sharing all available information may not be enough to ensure safe and efficient operation. As part of the project ITC (Inter-Team Collaboration), an experimental study with 48 teams of three (n=144) has just started to investigate the impact that conflicting goals have on communication and collaboration. Additionally, it examines whether and how transparency in roles, processes, and goals can affect performance, communication, and trust in multi-team systems. In the synthetic task environment (STE) ConCenT (Control Center Task Environment), teams of three have to collaborate to detect system failures in time, determine their causes, and decide on a solution in order to ensure successful production processes. Measurements of performance, perceived trust, communication, and gaze data will be analyzed to examine and compare different coordination and communication patterns on a group level. Results of the study will identify factors that may facilitate or hinder collaborative work processes in an MTS, thus enabling the validation of an approach to improve collaboration through transparency and mutual trust

Normal parameter reduction algorithm in soft set based on hybrid binary particle swarm and biogeography optimizer

© 2019, Springer-Verlag London Ltd., part of Springer Nature. Existing classification techniques that are proposed previously for eliminating data inconsistency could not achieve an efficient parameter reduction in soft set theory, which effects on the obtained decisions. Meanwhile, the computational cost made during combination generation process of soft sets could cause machine infinite state, which is known as nondeterministic polynomial time. The contributions of this study are mainly focused on minimizing choices costs through adjusting the original classifications by decision partition order and enhancing the probability of searching domain space using a developed Markov chain model. Furthermore, this study introduces an efficient soft set reduction-based binary particle swarm optimized by biogeography-based optimizer (SSR-BPSO-BBO) algorithm that generates an accurate decision for optimal and sub-optimal choices. The results show that the decision partition order technique is performing better in parameter reduction up to 50%, while other algorithms could not obtain high reduction rates in some scenarios. In terms of accuracy, the proposed SSR-BPSO-BBO algorithm outperforms the other optimization algorithms in achieving high accuracy percentage of a given soft dataset. On the other hand, the proposed Markov chain model could significantly represent the robustness of our parameter reduction technique in obtaining the optimal decision and minimizing the search domain.Published versio

Taking stock of accounting ethics scholarship: a review of the journal literature

The proportion of business ethics literature devoted to accounting and the proportion of academic accounting literature devoted to ethical issues are both small, yet over the past two decades there has been a steady accumulation of research devoted to ethical issues in accounting. Based on a database of more than 500 articles gathered from a wide range of accounting and business ethics academic journals, this paper describes and analyses the characteristics of what has been published in the past twenty years or so. It identifies and explores patterns and trends in publication outlets and the type of research conducted. Furthermore, through a comparison with issues that have been raised in the general business ethics literature, it offers guidance to researchers who intend to take the field of accounting ethics forward using empirical methods