53 research outputs found
The science of clinical practice: disease diagnosis or patient prognosis? Evidence about "what is likely to happen" should shape clinical practice.
BACKGROUND: Diagnosis is the traditional basis for decision-making in clinical practice. Evidence is often lacking about future benefits and harms of these decisions for patients diagnosed with and without disease. We propose that a model of clinical practice focused on patient prognosis and predicting the likelihood of future outcomes may be more useful. DISCUSSION: Disease diagnosis can provide crucial information for clinical decisions that influence outcome in serious acute illness. However, the central role of diagnosis in clinical practice is challenged by evidence that it does not always benefit patients and that factors other than disease are important in determining patient outcome. The concept of disease as a dichotomous 'yes' or 'no' is challenged by the frequent use of diagnostic indicators with continuous distributions, such as blood sugar, which are better understood as contributing information about the probability of a patient's future outcome. Moreover, many illnesses, such as chronic fatigue, cannot usefully be labelled from a disease-diagnosis perspective. In such cases, a prognostic model provides an alternative framework for clinical practice that extends beyond disease and diagnosis and incorporates a wide range of information to predict future patient outcomes and to guide decisions to improve them. Such information embraces non-disease factors and genetic and other biomarkers which influence outcome. SUMMARY: Patient prognosis can provide the framework for modern clinical practice to integrate information from the expanding biological, social, and clinical database for more effective and efficient care
Effects of 28-days ingestion of a slow-release energy supplement versus placebo on hematological and cardiovascular measures of health
VI Le test F de Cattell est-il un test objectif de tempérament ?
Bénassy M., Chauffard C. VI Le test F de Cattell est-il un test objectif de tempérament ?. In: L'année psychologique. 1942 vol. 43-44. pp. 200-230
High fidelity simulation and ECMO in intensive care unit. A multi profesionnal training program to improve skills and self efficacy
International audienc
Magic Number Pt<sub>13</sub> and Misshapen Pt<sub>12</sub> Clusters: Which One is the Better Catalyst?
A relationship between the size of
metal particles and their catalytic
activity has been established over a nanometer scale (2–10
nm). However, application on a subnanometer scale (0.5–2 nm)
is difficult, a possible reason being that the activity no longer
relies on the size but rather the geometric structure as a cluster
(or superatomic) compound. We now report that the catalytic activity
for the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) significantly increased when
only one atom was removed from a magic number cluster composed of
13-platinum atoms (Pt<sub>13</sub>). The synthesis with an atomic-level
precision was successfully achieved by using a dendrimer ligand as
the macromolecular template strictly defining the number of metal
atoms. It was quite surprising that the Pt<sub>12</sub> cluster exhibited
more than 2-fold catalytic activity compared with that of the Pt<sub>13</sub> cluster. ESI-TOF-mass and EXAFS analyses provided information
about the structures. These analyses suggested that the Pt<sub>12</sub> has a deformed coordination, while the Pt<sub>13</sub> has a well-known
icosahedral atomic coordination as part of the stable cluster series.
Theoretical analyses based on density functional theory (DFT) also
supported this idea. The present results suggest potential activity
of the metastable clusters although they have been “missing”
species in conventional statistical synthesis
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Effects of probiotic or prebiotic supplemented milk formulas on fecal microbiota composition of infants
The aim of the study was to evaluate whether supplementation of milk-formulas with prebiotic fructooligosaccharides or a probiotic, Lactobacillus johnsonii La1 (La1), could modulate the composition of the fecal microbiota of formula-fed infants, compared to breastfed (BF) infants. Ninety infants close to 4 months of age were randomized into one of three groups to be blindly assigned to receive for 13 weeks: a) an infant formula (Control), b) the same formula with fructo-oligosaccharides (Prebio), or c) with La1 (Probio). At the end of this period, all infants received the control formula for 2 additional weeks. Twenty-six infants, breastfed throughout the study, were recruited to form group BF. Fecal samples were obtained upon enrolment and after 7 and 15 weeks. Bacterial populations were assessed with classical culture techniques and fluorescent in situ hybridisation (FISH). Seventy-six infants completed the study. On enrolment, higher counts of Bifidobacterium and Lactobacillus and lower counts of enterobacteria were observed in BF compared to the formula-fed infants; these differences tended to disappear at weeks 7 and 15. No major differences for Clostridium, Bacteroides or Enterococcus were observed between the groups or along the follow up. Probio increased fecal Lactobacillus counts (P<0.001); 88% of the infants in this group excreted live La1 in their stools at week 7 but only 17% at week 15. Increased Bifidobacterium counts were observed at week 7 in the 3 formula groups, similar to BF infants. These results confirm the presence of higher counts of bifidobacteria and lactobacilli in the microbiota of BF infants compared to formula-fed infants before dietary diversification, and that La1 survives in the infant digestive tract
Caffeine or melatonin effects on sleep and sleepiness after rapid eastward transmeridian travel
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