Patient-Reported Side Effects of Intradetrusor Botulinum Toxin Type A for Idiopathic Overactive Bladder Syndrome

Objective: The aim of the study was a prospective assessment of patient-reported side effects in an open-label study after intradetrusor botulinum toxin injections for idiopathic overactive bladder (OAB). Patients and Methods: Botulinum toxin A injection was performed in 56 patients with idiopathic OAB. Patients were followed up for 6 months concerning side effects and patients' satisfaction. Results: Different types of side effects were assessed such as dry mouth (19.6%), arm weakness (8.9%), eyelid weakness (8.9%), leg weakness (7.1%), torso weakness (5.4%), impaired vision (5.4%) and dysphagia (5.4%). In all cases, symptoms were mild and transient. Urological complications such as gross hematuria (17.9%), acute urinary retention (8.9%) and acute urinary tract infection (7.1%) were noticed. In all cases, acute urinary retention was transient and treated with temporary intermittent self-catheterization. There was no statistically significant correlation between dosage and observed side effects. Patients' satisfaction rate was high (71.4%). Conclusion: Intradetrusor injection of botulinum toxin was associated with a high rate of neurourological side effects. In general, side effects were transient, mild and did not require special treatment. Copyright (C) 2010 S. Karger AG, Base

AA--Dependence of ΛΛ\Lambda\Lambda Bond Energies in Double---Λ\Lambda Hypernuclei

The $A$-dependence of the bond energy $\Delta B_{\Lambda\Lambda}$ of the ${\Lambda\Lambda}$ hypernuclear ground states is calculated in a three-body ${\Lambda + \Lambda + {^{A}Z}}$ model and in the Skyrme-Hartree-Fock approach. Various ${\Lambda\Lambda}$ and $\Lambda$-nucleus or ${\Lambda N}$ potentials are used and the sensitivity of $\Delta B_{\Lambda\Lambda}$ to the interactions is discussed. It is shown that in medium and heavy ${\Lambda\Lambda}$ hypernuclei, $\Delta B_{\Lambda\Lambda}$ is a linear function of $r_{\Lambda}^{-3}$, where $r_\Lambda$ is rms radius of the hyperon orbital. It looks unlikely that it will be possible to extract ${\Lambda\Lambda}$ interaction from the double-$\Lambda$ hypernuclear energies only, the additional information about the $\Lambda$-core interaction, in particular, on $r_{\Lambda}$ is needed.Comment: 11 pages, LaTex, 3 figure

Dorsolateral medullary ischemic infarction causing autonomic dysfunction and headache: a case report

Stroke can present, among other signs, with headache. Here, we describe the case of a man suffering from severe orbitary pain and autonomic dysfunction secondary to dorsolateral medullary ischemia. The anatomical relationship between lesion and symptomatology could be an indirect sign of hypothalamospinal tract involvement in the genesis of autonomic dysfunction and headache resembling a trigeminal autonomic cephalalgia

The relationship between livestock ownership and child stunting in three countries in eastern Africa using national survey data

Livestock ownership has the potential to improve child nutrition through various mechanisms, although direct evaluations of household livestock and child stunting status are uncommon. We conducted an analysis of Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) datasets from Ethiopia (2011), Kenya (2008-2009), and Uganda (2010) among rural children under 5 years of age to compare stunting status across levels of livestock ownership. We classified livestock ownership by summing reported household numbers of goats, sheep, cattle and chickens, as well as calculating a weighted score to combine multiple species. The primary association was assessed separately by country using a log-binomial model adjusted for wealth and region, which was then stratified by child diarrheal illness, animal-source foods intake, sub-region, and wealth index. This analysis included n = 8079 children from Ethiopia, n = 3903 children from Kenya, and n = 1645 from Uganda. A ten-fold increase in household livestock ownership had significant association with lower stunting prevalence in Ethiopia (Prevalence Ratio [PR] 0.95, 95% CI 0.92-0.98) and Uganda (PR 0.87, 95% CI 0.79-0.97), but not Kenya (PR 1.01, 95% CI 0.96-1.07). The weighted livestock score was only marginally associated with stunting status. The findings varied slightly by region, but not by wealth, diarrheal disease, or animal-source food intake. This analysis suggested a slightly beneficial effect of household livestock ownership on child stunting prevalence. The small effect size observed may be related to limitations of the DHS dataset or the potentially complicated relationship between malnutrition and livestock ownership, including livestock health and productivity

Metacognitions about desire thinking predict the severity of binge eating in a sample of Italian women

In this study, our principal aim was to investigate whether metacognitions about desire thinking predict the severity of binge eating in women and, if so, whether this relationship is independent of age, self-reported body mass index (BMI), negative affect, irrational food beliefs and craving. One hundred and four women, consisting of 32 consecutive patients with binge eating disorder undergoing initial assessment for cognitive therapy for eating disorders, 39 moderate binge eaters, and 33 non-binge eaters (both from the general population), completed the following measures: Self-reported BMI, Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale, Irrational Food Beliefs Scale, General Craving Scale, Metacognitions about Desire Thinking Questionnaire, and Binge Eating Scale. A series of Spearman's rho correlation analyses revealed that self-reported BMI, anxiety, depression, irrational food beliefs, craving, and all three factors of the metacognitions about desire thinking questionnaire were significantly associated with the severity of binge eating. A stepwise regression analysis identified self-reported BMI, craving, and negative metacognitions about desire thinking as significant predictors of the severity of binge eating. These results, taken together, highlight the possible role of metacognitions about desire thinking in predicting the severity of binge eating. The clinical implications of these findings are discussed

What traits are carried on mobile genetic elements, and why?

Although similar to any other organism, prokaryotes can transfer genes vertically from mother cell to daughter cell, they can also exchange certain genes horizontally. Genes can move within and between genomes at fast rates because of mobile genetic elements (MGEs). Although mobile elements are fundamentally self-interested entities, and thus replicate for their own gain, they frequently carry genes beneficial for their hosts and/or the neighbours of their hosts. Many genes that are carried by mobile elements code for traits that are expressed outside of the cell. Such traits are involved in bacterial sociality, such as the production of public goods, which benefit a cell's neighbours, or the production of bacteriocins, which harm a cell's neighbours. In this study we review the patterns that are emerging in the types of genes carried by mobile elements, and discuss the evolutionary and ecological conditions under which mobile elements evolve to carry their peculiar mix of parasitic, beneficial and cooperative genes

No advantage for remembering horizontal over vertical spatial locations learned from a single viewpoint

Previous behavioral and neurophysiological research has shown better memory for horizontal than for vertical locations. In these studies, participants navigated toward these locations. In the present study we investigated whether the orientation of the spatial plane per se was responsible for this difference. We thus had participants learn locations visually from a single perspective and retrieve them from multiple viewpoints. In three experiments, participants studied colored tags on a horizontally or vertically oriented board within a virtual room and recalled these locations with different layout orientations (Exp. 1) or from different room-based perspectives (Exps. 2 and 3). All experiments revealed evidence for equal recall performance in horizontal and vertical memory. In addition, the patterns for recall from different test orientations were rather similar. Consequently, our results suggest that memory is qualitatively similar for both vertical and horizontal two-dimensional locations, given that these locations are learned from a single viewpoint. Thus, prior differences in spatial memory may have originated from the structure of the space or the fact that participants navigated through it. Additionally, the strong performance advantages for perspective shifts (Exps. 2 and 3) relative to layout rotations (Exp. 1) suggest that configurational judgments are not only based on memory of the relations between target objects, but also encompass the relations between target objects and the surrounding room—for example, in the form of a memorized view

Smith-Waterman peak alignment for comprehensive two-dimensional gas chromatography-mass spectrometry

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Comprehensive two-dimensional gas chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry (GC × GC-MS) is a powerful technique which has gained increasing attention over the last two decades. The GC × GC-MS provides much increased separation capacity, chemical selectivity and sensitivity for complex sample analysis and brings more accurate information about compound retention times and mass spectra. Despite these advantages, the retention times of the resolved peaks on the two-dimensional gas chromatographic columns are always shifted due to experimental variations, introducing difficulty in the data processing for metabolomics analysis. Therefore, the retention time variation must be adjusted in order to compare multiple metabolic profiles obtained from different conditions.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>We developed novel peak alignment algorithms for both homogeneous (acquired under the identical experimental conditions) and heterogeneous (acquired under the different experimental conditions) GC × GC-MS data using modified Smith-Waterman local alignment algorithms along with mass spectral similarity. Compared with literature reported algorithms, the proposed algorithms eliminated the detection of landmark peaks and the usage of retention time transformation. Furthermore, an automated peak alignment software package was established by implementing a likelihood function for optimal peak alignment.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>The proposed Smith-Waterman local alignment-based algorithms are capable of aligning both the homogeneous and heterogeneous data of multiple GC × GC-MS experiments without the transformation of retention times and the selection of landmark peaks. An optimal version of the SW-based algorithms was also established based on the associated likelihood function for the automatic peak alignment. The proposed alignment algorithms outperform the literature reported alignment method by analyzing the experiment data of a mixture of compound standards and a metabolite extract of mouse plasma with spiked-in compound standards.</p

Scapinin, the Protein Phosphatase 1 Binding Protein, Enhances Cell Spreading and Motility by Interacting with the Actin Cytoskeleton

Copyright (c) 2009 Sagara et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.Scapinin, also named phactr3, is an actin and protein phosphatase 1 (PP1) binding protein, which is expressed in the adult brain and some tumor cells. At present, the role(s) of scapinin in the brain and tumors are poorly understood. We show that the RPEL-repeat domain of scapinin, which is responsible for its direct interaction with actin, inhibits actin polymerization in vitro. Next, we established a Hela cell line, where scapinin expression was induced by tetracycline. In these cells, expression of scapinin stimulated cell spreading and motility. Scapinin was colocalized with actin at the edge of spreading cells. To explore the roles of the RPEL-repeat and PP1-binding domains, we expressed wild-type and mutant scapinins as fusion proteins with green fluorescence protein (GFP) in Cos7 cells. Expression of GFP-scapinin (wild type) also stimulated cell spreading, but mutation in the RPEL-repeat domain abolished both the actin binding and the cell spreading activity. PP1-binding deficient mutants strongly induced cell retraction. Long and branched cytoplasmic processes were developed during the cell retraction. These results suggest that scapinin enhances cell spreading and motility through direct interaction with actin and that PP1 plays a regulatory role in scapinin-induced morphological changes.ArticlePLOS ONE. 4(1):e4247 (2009)journal articl

Integrating ecology and evolutionary theory. A game changer for biodiversity conservation?

Currently, one of the central arguments in favour of biodiversity conservation is that it is essential for the maintenance of ecosystem services, that is, the benefits that people receive from ecosystems. However, the relationship between ecosystem services and biodiversity is contested and needs clarification. The goal of this chapter is to spell out the interaction and reciprocal influences between conservation science, evolutionary biology, and ecology, in order to understand whether a stronger integration of evolutionary and ecological studies might help clarify the interaction between biodiversity and ecosystem functioning as well as influence biodiversity conservation practices. To this end, the eco-evolutionary feedback theory proposed by David Post and Eric Palkovacs is analysed, arguing that it helps operationalise niche construction theory and develop a more sophisticated understanding of the relationship between ecosystem functioning and biodiversity. Finally, it is proposed that by deepening the integration of ecological and evolutionary factors in our understanding of ecosystem functioning, the eco-evolutionary feedback theory is supportive of an “evolutionary-enlightened management” of biodiversity within the ecosystem services approach.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio