Anticoagulation Therapy for the Elderly with Atrial Fibrillation

• Atrial fibrillation increases in occurrence as we age with about 9% of patients developing it by age 90. When a patient is diagnosed with atrial fibrillation, one of the drugs that they are prescribed is an anticoagulant. The purpose of this drug is to prevent thrombus formation in addition to preventing an ischemic stroke. Today, there are many options available for anticoagulation therapy. The options include aspirin, vitamin K antagonists like warfarin, factor Xa inhibitors like rivaroxaban and apixaban, direct thrombin inhibitors like dabigatran, and antiplatelet agents such as clopidogrel. • A review of the literature was done of peer reviewed journal articles using the databases PubMed, Dynamed, CINAHL and Clinical Key. A total of 14 articles were used in this paper with the inclusion criteria of being published within the past five years, the patients all have atrial fibrillation, over 65 years old, and are on some form of anticoagulation therapy. • Previously, warfarin has been one of the few anticoagulation drugs on the market until the newer novel anticoagulants were released. Bell et al. (2016) found that warfarin is still used in 53.6% of the patients, even though the prevalence has decreased by 3.9% between the years of 2011 and 2013. (p • It was found that patients who were diagnosed with atrial fibrillation needed some form of anticoagulation as compared to no anticoagulation to reduce stroke. Most of the studies compared warfarin versus no anticoagulation treatment. There were not many studies that looked at the newer novel anticoagulants. It was mentioned that there has been a decrease in warfarin use since the newer novel anticoagulants have been released. There are considerations that a prescriber needs to be conscious of before prescribing a specific anticoagulant. Some of these considerations are renal function, other medication usage to avoid drug-drug interactions and age.https://commons.und.edu/pas-grad-posters/1040/thumbnail.jp

Teacher Perceptions of the Connections Between Social and Emotional Learning and Student Success

This qualitative study was about teacher perceptions of how incorporating social and emotional learning addresses the social-emotional needs of students and relates to student success. Teacher perceptions help inform educational leaders and policy makers about the impact social and emotional learning can have on students and their success. The findings of this study led to three emerging themes. Those themes were teachers believe (a) there needs to be direct instruction in social and emotional skills; (b) social and emotional learning helps students academically by becoming self-driven, taking ownership of their learning and actions, building confidence, and persevering through challenging work; and (c) incorporating social and emotional learning into their daily classroom routines helps students develop essential social competencies, as shown through their interactions with adults and other students, showing kindness and empathy, handling their feelings and emotions, and making responsible choices. These themes helped to conclude that teachers perceive a connection between social and emotional learning and student success. This conclusion adds to the existing literature regarding the need for and benefits of social and emotional learning

Observation of abundant heat production from a reactor device and of isotopic changes in the fuel

New results are presented from an extended experimental investigation of anomalous heat production in a special type of reactor tube operating at high temperatures. The reactor, named E-Cat, is charged with a small amount of hydrogen-loaded nickel powder plus some additives, mainly Lithium. The reaction is primarily initiated by heat from resistor coils around the reactor tube. Measurements of the radiated power from the reactor were performed with high-resolution thermal imaging cameras. The measurements of electrical power input were performed with a large bandwidth three-phase power analyzer. Data were collected during 32 days of running in March 2014. The reactor operating point was set to about 1260 ºC in the first half of the run, and at about 1400 °C in the second half. The measured energy balance between input and output heat yielded a COP factor of about 3.2 and 3.6 for the 1260 ºC and 1400 ºC runs, respectively . The total net energy obtained during the 32 days run was about 1.5 MWh. This amount of energy is far more than can be obtained from any known chemical sources in the small reactor volume. A sample of the fuel was carefully examined with respect to its isotopic composition before the run and after the run, using several standard methods: XPS, EDS, SIMS, ICP-MS and ICP-AES. The isotope composition in Lithium and Nickel was found to agree with the natural composition before the run, while after the run it was found to have changed substantially . Nuclear reactions are therefore indicated to be present in the run process, which however is hard to reconcile with the fact that no radioactivity was detected outside the reactor during the run

Exclusive Measurements of pp -> dpi+pi0: Double-Pionic Fusion without ABC Effect

Exclusive measurements of the reaction pp -> dpi+pi0 have been carried out at T_p = 1.1 GeV at the CELSIUS storage ring using the WASA detector. The isovector pi+pi0 channel exhibits no enhancement at low invariant pipi masses, i. e. no ABC effect. The differential distributions are in agreement with the conventional t-channel Delta-Delta excitation process, which also accounts for the observed energy dependence of the total cross section. This is an update of a previously published version -- see important note at the end of the article