The development and validation of a scoring tool to predict the operative duration of elective laparoscopic cholecystectomy

Background: The ability to accurately predict operative duration has the potential to optimise theatre efficiency and utilisation, thus reducing costs and increasing staff and patient satisfaction. With laparoscopic cholecystectomy being one of the most commonly performed procedures worldwide, a tool to predict operative duration could be extremely beneficial to healthcare organisations. Methods: Data collected from the CholeS study on patients undergoing cholecystectomy in UK and Irish hospitals between 04/2014 and 05/2014 were used to study operative duration. A multivariable binary logistic regression model was produced in order to identify significant independent predictors of long (> 90 min) operations. The resulting model was converted to a risk score, which was subsequently validated on second cohort of patients using ROC curves. Results: After exclusions, data were available for 7227 patients in the derivation (CholeS) cohort. The median operative duration was 60 min (interquartile range 45–85), with 17.7% of operations lasting longer than 90 min. Ten factors were found to be significant independent predictors of operative durations > 90 min, including ASA, age, previous surgical admissions, BMI, gallbladder wall thickness and CBD diameter. A risk score was then produced from these factors, and applied to a cohort of 2405 patients from a tertiary centre for external validation. This returned an area under the ROC curve of 0.708 (SE = 0.013, p  90 min increasing more than eightfold from 5.1 to 41.8% in the extremes of the score. Conclusion: The scoring tool produced in this study was found to be significantly predictive of long operative durations on validation in an external cohort. As such, the tool may have the potential to enable organisations to better organise theatre lists and deliver greater efficiencies in care

Surface Organometallic Chemistry on Zeolites: Synthesis of Group IV Metal Alkyls and Metal Hydrides on Hierarchical Mesoporous H‑ZSM‑5

Surface organometallic chemistry (SOMC) has mainly been devoted to the reaction of organometallics with surfaces comprising highly divided and dehydroxylated oxides. The field has been extended to SOMC on metal nanoparticles. However, to the best of our knowledge, SOMC has not been extended to hierarchical fibrous zeolites, although zeolitic materials are a particular class of oxides. Zeolite catalysis is important in hydrocarbon industrial chemistry. However, having an optimum balance between the activity and selectivity of the zeolitic catalysts remains a major challenge in the field. The main difficultly is the plethora of surface sites, only some of which are catalytically active. Given that the acido–basic properties and porosity of zeolites are especially important to the refining and petrochemical industries, we decided to explore this rather unexplored area. Here, three novel well-defined single-site materials [(Np)3M@ZSM-5, M = Ti, Zr, and Hf] supported on a hierarchical mesoporous H-ZSM-5 material (1) are reported. They are prepared using the concepts and tools of SOMC. They are further converted to their corresponding metal hydride [(H)nM@ZSM-5, M = Ti, Zr, and Hf, (n = 1–2)] materials (5–7) through controlled hydrogenolysis of [(Si–O−)M(Np)3, M = Ti, Zr, and Hf] materials (2–4) under H2 (1 atm) at 150 °C for 16 h. All these surface catalysts are characterized by various spectroscopic techniques including Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, elemental analysis, solid-state NMR spectroscopy, powder X-ray diffraction, Brunauer–Emmett–Teller surface area measurements, and scanning electron microscopy and high-resolution transmission electron microscopy analyses and are supported by density functional theory calculations. The catalytic activity of these well-defined single-site novel materials will be tested for the catalytic applications in petrochemistry for refinery processes such as hydrocracking of distillates from crude oil or intermediate refinery process streams to useful petroleum value-added products for the society

Enseigner et apprendre à l'ère de l'intelligence artificielle

International audienceAs part of the Digital Working Group (GTnum) #Scol_IA “Renewal of digital practices and creative uses of digital and AI” we are pleased to present the white paper “Teaching and learning in the era of Artificial Intelligence, Acculturation , integration and creative uses of AI in education”. The white paper edited by Margarida Romero, Laurent Heiser and Alexandre Lepage aims to provide the various educational actors with a diversified perspective both on the issues of acculturation and training in AI and on the resources and feedback from the various research teams and organisations. of scientific culture in the French-speaking countries. A multidisciplinary approach makes it possible to consider the perspectives of researchers in computer science as well as those of education and training sciences, information and communication sciences and the expertise of teaching professionals. and scientific mediation.Dans le cadre du Groupe de Travail numérique (GTnum) #Scol_IA “Renouvellement des pratiques numériques et usages créatifs du numérique et IA” nous sommes heureux de vous présenter le livre blanc “Enseigner et apprendre à l’ère de l’Intelligence Artificielle, Acculturation, intégration et usages créatifs de l’IA en éducation”. Le livre blanc édité par Margarida Romero, Laurent Heiser et Alexandre Lepage vise apporter aux différents acteurs éducatifs un éclairage diversifié tant des enjeux de l’acculturation et formation à l’IA que des ressources et retours d’expérience des différentes équipes de recherche et organismes de culture scientifique de la francophonie. Une approche pluridisciplinaire permet de considérer tant les perspectives des chercheurs en sciences de l’informatique, que celles des sciences de l’éducation et de la formation, les sciences de l’information et la communication et l’expertise des professionnels de l’enseignement et de la médiation scientifique