Initial assessment and treatment of refugees in the Mediterranean Sea (a secondary data analysis concerning the initial assessment and treatment of 2656 refugees rescued from distress at sea in support of the EUNAVFOR MED relief mission of the EU)

Excerpt of the underlying study variables with explanations and degree. (DOCX 100 kb

Stereotypes about poverty mean that policymakers aren’t fighting food insecurity

Despite the country’s vast food production and exports, millions of Americans go hungry every day. While many are quick to point the finger at poor spending choices, the reality of food insecurity is far more complex, write Kaitland M. Byrd, W. Carson Byrd, Leslie Hossfeld, E. Brook Kelly, and Julia Waity. They argue that as long as those in poverty are blamed for their own hunger, policy change is unlikely. In the meantime, local efforts such as food pantries and community gardens will continue to try to fill the hap and help the undernourished in America

An Ecological Approach to Understanding Program Management Practices for Food Pantries in Rural Communities

This qualitative study was conducted in Mississippi, a state comprised of 82 counties, many of which are rural and highly impoverished. To gain a greater understanding of the food needs of residents from across the state, a representative sample of food pantries from each region of the state was identified. For this project, researchers with the Mississippi Food Insecurity Project formed a partnership with the Mississippi Food Network to interview partner pantries across the state. Interviews were conducted with food pantry managers and volunteers to examine various issues, challenges, and successes related to their operations. All interviews were transcribed and coded using a systematic analysis of codes to generate major themes related to pantry management protocols. Using an ecological framework, our study yielded five major areas of consideration for optimal pantry management: volunteer recruitment, operating and control systems, patron needs, collaboration, and advocacy

Understanding Wales: Nationalism and Culture

In the spring of 2013 ten students from the University of North Carolina Wilmington participated in a study abroad program in Wales attending Swansea University for the semester. As a group, we began examining Welsh culture and identity. Living abroad provided many opportunities to collect data and make observations about Welsh life. Our initial observations pointed to a tension that seemed to exist between Welsh and English cultures. We found this tension noteworthy and decided to examine it more closely through an exploratory research project examining Welsh political and economic history, Welsh culture and Welsh nationalism through participant observation, field trips and face-to-face interviews

Mobilization of putative high-proliferative-potential endothelial colony-forming cells during antihypertensive treatment in patients with essential hypertension

Recent studies have shown that in response to vascular damage or ischemia, bone marrow-derived endothelial progenitor cells (EPCs) are recruited into the circulation. To investigate whether antihypertensive treatment has an influence on the number of circulating EPCs, patients with essential hypertension were treated either with the angiotensin receptor antagonist telmisartan, the calcium channel blocker nisoldipine, or their combination for 6 weeks. At baseline and after 3 and 6 weeks of treatment, EPCs were identified and quantified by fluorescence-activated cell sorting (FACS) analysis and by their capacity to generate colony-forming units of the endothelial lineage (CFU-EC) in a methylcellulose-based assay. During treatment, patients in the nisoldipine groups, but not in the telmisartan group, showed a significant mobilization of EPCs, which in part had the capacity to generate large-sized colonies comprising more than 1,000 cells. Moreover, a remarkable correlation between the number of CFU-EC and the number of circulating CD133(+)/CD34(+)/CD146(+) cells was observed, thereby providing strong evidence that cells with this phenotype represent functional EPCs. No correlation was found between the numbers of CFU-EC and the blood pressure levels at any time point during the treatment. Hence, nisoldipine-induced mobilization of EPCs might represent a novel mechanism by which this antihypertensive compound independently of its blood pressure-lowering effect contributes to vasoprotection in patients with essential hypertension

Impact of Tone-mapping Algorithms on Subjective and Objective Face Recognition in HDR Images

Crowdsourcing is a popular tool for conducting subjective evaluations in uncontrolled environments and at low cost. In this paper, a crowdsourcing study is conducted to investigate the impact of High Dynamic Range (HDR) imaging on subjective face recognition accuracy. For that purpose, a dataset of HDR images of people depicted in high-contrast lighting conditions was created and their faces were manually cropped to construct a probe set of faces. Crowdsourcing-based face recognition was conducted for five differently tone-mapped versions of HDR faces and were compared to face recognition in a typical Low Dynamic Range alternative. A similar experiment was also conducted using three automatic face recognition algorithms. The comparative analysis results of face recognition by human subjects through crowdsourcing and machine vision face recognition show that HDR imaging affects the recognition results of human and computer vision approaches differently

Does the Constitution Provide More Ballot Access Protection for Presidential Elections Than for U.S. House Elections?

Both the U.S. Constitution and The Federalist Papers suggest that voters ought to have more freedom to vote for the candidate of their choice for the U.S. House of Representatives than they do for the President or the U.S. Senate. Yet, strangely, for the last thirty-three years, the U.S. Supreme Court and lower courts have ruled that the Constitution gives voters more freedom to vote for the candidate of their choice in presidential elections than in congressional elections. Also, state legislatures, which have been writing ballot access laws since 1888, have passed laws that make it easier for minor-party and independent candidates to get on the ballot for President than for the U.S. House. As a result, voters in virtually every state invariably have far more choices on their general election ballots for the President than they do for the House. This Article argues that the right of a voter to vote for someone other than a Democrat or a Republican for the House is just as important as a voter’s right to do so for President, and that courts should grant more ballot access protection to minor-party and independent candidates for the House

Primary diffuse large B-cell lymphoma of the breast: prognostic factors and outcomes of a study by the International Extranodal Lymphoma Study Group

Background: Primary diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL) of breast is rare. We aimed to define clinical features, prognostic factors, patterns of failure, and treatment outcomes. Patients and methods: A retrospective international study of 204 eligible patients presenting to the International Extranodal Lymphoma Study Group-affiliated institutions from 1980 to 2003. Results: Median age was 64 years, with 95% of patients presenting with unilateral disease. Median overall survival (OS) was 8.0 years, and median progression-free survival 5.5 years. In multifactor analysis, favourable International Prognostic Index score, anthracycline-containing chemotherapy, and radiotherapy (RT) were significantly associated with longer OS (each P ≤ 0.03). There was no benefit from mastectomy, as opposed to biopsy or lumpectomy only. At a median follow-up time of 5.5 years, 37% of patients had progressed—16% in the same or contralateral breast, 5% in the central nervous system, and 14% in other extranodal sites. Conclusions: The combination of limited surgery, anthracycline-containing chemotherapy, and involved-field RT produced the best outcome in the pre-rituximab era. A prospective trial on the basis of these results should be pursued to confirm these observations and to determine whether the impact of rituximab on the patterns of relapse and outcome parallels that of DLBCL presenting at other site

Design and testing of hydrophobic core/hydrophilic shell nano/micro particles for drug-eluting stent coating

In this study, we designed a novel drug-eluting coating for vascular implants consisting of a core coating of the anti-proliferative drug docetaxel (DTX) and a shell coating of the platelet glycoprotein IIb/IIIa receptor monoclonal antibody SZ-21. The core/shell structure was sprayed onto the surface of 316L stainless steel stents using a coaxial electrospray process with the aim of creating a coating that exhibited a differential release of the two drugs. The prepared stents displayed a uniform coating consisting of nano/micro particles. In vitro drug release experiments were performed, and we demonstrated that a biphasic mathematical model was capable of capturing the data, indicating that the release of the two drugs conformed to a diffusion-controlled release system. We demonstrated that our coating was capable of inhibiting the adhesion and activation of platelets, as well as the proliferation and migration of smooth muscle cells (SMCs), indicating its good biocompatibility and anti-proliferation qualities. In an in vivo porcine coronary artery model, the SZ-21/DTX drug-loaded hydrophobic core/hydrophilic shell particle coating stents were observed to promote re-endothelialization and inhibit neointimal hyperplasia. This core/shell particle-coated stent may serve as part of a new strategy for the differential release of different functional drugs to sequentially target thrombosis and in-stent restenosis during the vascular repair process and ensure rapid re-endothelialization in the field of cardiovascular disease