Global action for training in malaria elimination

The Rethinking Malaria Leadership Forum, held at Harvard Business School in February 2017 with collaboration of the Barcelona Institute for Global Health and the Swiss Tropical and Public Health Institute, identified this training gap as a high priority for both analysis and action. The gap in human resource training for malaria elimination needs to be addressed in order to assure continued progress. This paper identifies major gaps in skills and human resources, suggests institutions that can assist in filling the training gaps, and proposes global actions to implement expanded training for malaria elimination in endemic countries

NeAT: a Nonlinear Analysis Toolbox for Neuroimaging

NeAT is a modular, flexible and user-friendly neuroimaging analysis toolbox for modeling linear and nonlinear effects overcoming the limitations of the standard neuroimaging methods which are solely based on linear models. NeAT provides a wide range of statistical and machine learning non-linear methods for model estimation, several metrics based on curve fitting and complexity for model inference and a graphical user interface (GUI) for visualization of results. We illustrate its usefulness on two study cases where non-linear effects have been previously established. Firstly, we study the nonlinear effects of Alzheimer’s disease on brain morphology (volume and cortical thickness). Secondly, we analyze the effect of the apolipoprotein APOE-ε4 genotype on brain aging and its interaction with age. NeAT is fully documented and publicly distributed at https://imatge-upc.github.io/neat-tool/

ENVEJECIMIENTO Y SOLEDAD

Objective: The aim of this study is to analyze whether elderly people in a state of fragility, visited by the Emergency Domiciliary Care service, have received a follow-up program by the nursing staff and whether they were labeled as “Elderly people in state of fragility.” Material and method: A two-phase observational study. Firstly, in phase I, a population comprising people older than 64 and visited by the emergency domiciliary service from the Raval Nord Primary Care Centre was selected. Whether they had received nursing follow-up and whether they had been diagnosed as elderly people in a frail state was analyzed. In phase II, a simple random sample from this population was chosen. Here, it was analyzed whether there had been changes in the nursing diagnosis and follow-up. Results: Of a total was seen that of 776 medical emergency domiciliary visits, 568 (73.19%) were people belonging to the over 64 group. Out of the total, 57 cases (10%) belonged to the age group between 75 and 85 years old (80%). Out of this group, 77.26% were women; 94% were diagnosed with a chronic condition (diabetes, hypertension, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, etc); and 77.2% were polymedicated. In addition, 66.7% were not included in the Domiciliary Care Program and were not diagnosed as frail elderly people. In phase II, an increase in nursing care, as well as in the “frail elderly people” diagnosis were found. Conclusions: The use of nursing diagnosis for elderly people in a frail state is an indispensable tool for the monitoring and follow-up of that population.Objetivo: Analizar si en las personas mayores en situación de fragilidad que han sido atendidas por el servicio de urgencias domiciliarias, constaba el seguimiento por el personal de enfermería del centro y  si constaba  el diagnóstico de “Personas mayores en situación de fragilidad”. Material y método: Se realizó un estudio observacional en dos fases: 1ª se analizaron todas las personas mayores de 64 años que fueron atendidas en el servicio de urgencias domiciliarias del centro de Atención Primaría de Raval Nord, se analizó si en dicha población constaba el seguimiento de enfermería y el diagnóstico de personas mayores en situación de fragilidad ; 2ª fase, se realizó un muestreo simple  de la población analizada y se evaluó si se produjeron cambios en  los diagnósticos de enfermería y seguimiento de dicha población. Resultados: De un total de 776 visitas domiciliarias de urgencias médicas, se observó que 568 (73,19%) eran mayores de 64 años. Del total, se estudiaron 57 (10%) casos y se observó que el 80% pertenecían al grupo de edad comprendido entre 75 y 85 años; el 77,26% eran mujeres; el 94% con diagnóstico crónico (Diabetes, Hipertensión Epoc...); el 77,2% eran personas polimedicadas y el 66,7% del total no estaban incluidas en el programa de Atención Domiciliaria y no constaba ningún diagnóstico de “personas mayores frágiles”. En la segunda fase se observa un incremento  en la atención por parte de los profesionales de enfermería y un aumento en el diagnóstico de “Personas mayores frágiles”. Conclusiones: La utilización del diagnóstico de enfermería en las personas en situación de fragilidad es una herramienta imprescindible para el seguimiento y control de dicha población.  

DeepReg: a deep learning toolkit for medical image registration

Image fusion is a fundamental task in medical image analysis and computer-assisted intervention. Medical image registration, computational algorithms that align different images together (Hill et al., 2001), has in recent years turned the research attention towards deep learning. Indeed, the representation ability to learn from population data with deep neural networks has opened new possibilities for improving registration generalisability by mitigating difficulties in designing hand-engineered image features and similarity measures for many realworld clinical applications (Fu et al., 2020; Haskins et al., 2020). In addition, its fast inference can substantially accelerate registration execution for time-critical tasks. DeepReg is a Python package using TensorFlow (Abadi et al., 2015) that implements multiple registration algorithms and a set of predefined dataset loaders, supporting both labelledand unlabelled data. DeepReg also provides command-line tool options that enable basic and advanced functionalities for model training, prediction and image warping. These implementations, together with their documentation, tutorials and demos, aim to simplify workflows for prototyping and developing novel methodology, utilising latest development and accessing quality research advances. DeepReg is unit tested and a set of customised contributor guidelines are provided to facilitate community contributions. A submission to the MICCAI Educational Challenge has utilised the DeepReg code and demos to explore the link between classical algorithms and deep-learning-based methods (Montana Brown et al., 2020), while a recently published research work investigated temporal changes in prostate cancer imaging, by using a longitudinal registration adapted from the DeepReg code (Yang et al., 2020)

Surfactant Protein D, a Marker of Lung Innate Immunity, Is Positively Associated With Insulin Sensitivity

Impaired lung function and innate immunity have both attracted growing interest as a potentially novel risk factor for glucose intolerance, insulin resistance, and type 2 diabetes. We aimed to evaluate whether surfactant protein D (SP-D), a lung-derived innate immune protein, was behind these associations

Root hydrotropism is controlled via a cortex-specific growth mechanism

Plants can acclimate by using tropisms to link the direction of growth to environmental conditions. Hydrotropism allows roots to forage for water, a process known to depend on abscisic acid (ABA) but whose molecular and cellular basis remains unclear. Here, we show that hydrotropism still occurs in roots after laser ablation removed the meristem and root cap. Additionally, targeted expression studies reveal that hydrotropism depends on the ABA signalling kinase, SnRK2.2, and the hydrotropism-specific MIZ1, both acting specifically in elongation zone cortical cells. Conversely, hydrotropism, but not gravitropism, is inhibited by preventing differential cell-length increases in the cortex, but not in other cell types. We conclude that root tropic responses to gravity and water are driven by distinct tissue-based mechanisms. In addition, unlike its role in root gravitropism, the elongation zone performs a dual function during a hydrotropic response, both sensing a water potential gradient and subsequently undergoing differential growth

Prevalence of diabetes mellitus and impaired glucose regulation in Spain: the [email protected] Study

Introduction: atherosclerosis, blood vessel disease, is the main cause of cardiovascular disease associated with aging; comprising modifiable risk factors that increase because of this when it exists.Objective: to evaluate atherogenic markers and metabolic syndrome in older adults, with cardiovascular risk living in urban areas, Pinar del Río province. Methods: observational, descriptive and cross-sectional study, from the service of Clinical Laboratory at Abel Santamaría Cuadrado Teaching General Hospital  Pinar del Río with 60 years old and older patients from the urban areas, during the period 2013 - 2014. The target group included 588 patients. The sample comprised 100 patients who have at least two risk factors previously established for this study.Results: ample predominance of women (61.0 %), the risk factors of higher incidence were hypertension 67 %, and sedentary lifestyle 65 %, followed by obesity 48 %, diabetes mellitus 40 % along with smoking habit 32 %, obese with increased diameters of waist circumference 48 %, and dyslipidemia 49 %, those with high glycemic values in fasting 50 % of the sample. It was considered that 63 % of the patients studied suffer from metabolic syndrome.Conclusions: a high number of white-skin women, the predominant risk factors were hypertension followed by sedentary lifestyle, obesity, diabetes mellitus and smoking habit. Approximately half of the sample was obese with increased diameters of the waist circumference, a large part suffered from dyslipidemia and half of them showed high fasting blood glucose levels. The prevalence of metabolic syndrome was detected.IIntroducción: aterosclerosis, enfermedad de los vasos sanguíneos, principal causa de enfermedad cardiovascular vinculada al envejecimiento, con factores de riesgo modificables que se incrementan cuando esta existe.Objetivo: evaluar marcadores aterogénicos y síndrome metabólico en adultos mayores, con riesgo cardiovascular residentes en zonas urbanas de la provincia Pinar del Río.Métodos: estudio observacional, descriptivo, transversal, servicio de Laboratorio Clínico Hospital General Docente “Abel Santamaría Cuadrado” Pinar del Río, pacientes de 60 años y más de zonas urbanas, durante período 2013 - 2014. Universo de 588 pacientes. Muestra de 100 pacientes que posean mínimo de dos factores de riesgo establecidos con anterioridad para este estudio.Resultados: amplio predominio de las mujeres (61 %). Factores de riesgo de mayor incidencia hipertensión arterial 67 %, y sedentarismo 65 %, seguidos por obesidad 48 %, diabetes mellitus 40 % y hábito de fumar 32 %, obesos con diámetros aumentados de la circunferencia de la cintura 48 %, presentaban dislipidemia 49 % y tenían elevados valores de glucemia en ayunas el 50 % de la muestra. Se consideró que 63 % de los pacientes estudiados presentaron síndrome metabólico.Conclusiones: elevado número de mujeres de piel blanca, con factor de riesgo predominante de hipertensión arterial seguido por sedentarismo, obesidad, diabetes mellitus y hábito de fumar. Alrededor de la mitad de la muestra fueron obesos con diámetros aumentados de la circunferencia de la cintura, gran parte presentaban dislipidemia y la mitad altos valores de glucemia en ayunas. Se detecta prevalencia de síndrome metabólico