Real-life assessment of chronic rhinosinusitis patients using mobile technology: the mySinusitisCoach project by EUFOREA

Background: Chronic rhinosinusitis (CRS) is a chronic inflammatory disease associated with a substantial personal and socioeconomic burden. Monitoring of patient‐reported outcomes by mobile technology offers the possibility to better understand real‐life burden of CRS. Methods: This study reports on the cross‐sectional evaluation of data of 626 users of mySinusitisCoach (mSC), a mobile application for CRS patients. Patient characteristics of mSC users were analysed as well as the level of disease control based on VAS global rhinosinusitis symptom score and adapted EPOS criteria. Results: The mSC cohort represents a heterogeneous group of CRS patients with a diverse pattern of major symptoms. Approximately half of patients reported nasal polyps. 47.3% of all CRS patients were uncontrolled based on evaluation of VAS global rhinosinusitis symptom score compared to 40.9% based on adapted EPOS criteria. The impact of CRS on sleep quality and daily life activities was significantly higher in uncontrolled versus well‐controlled patients. Half of patients had a history of FESS (functional endoscopic sinus surgery) and reported lower symptom severity compared to patients without a history of FESS, except for patients with a history of more than 3 procedures. Patients with a history of FESS reported higher VAS levels for impaired smell. Conclusion: Real‐life data confirm the high disease burden in uncontrolled CRS patients, clearly impacting quality of life. Sinus surgery improves patient‐reported outcomes, but not in patients with a history of more than 3 procedures. Mobile technology opens a new era of real‐life monitoring, supporting the evolution of care towards precision medicine

Real-life assessment of chronic rhinosinusitis patients using mobile technology : The mySinusitisCoach project by EUFOREA

Background Chronic rhinosinusitis (CRS) is a chronic inflammatory disease associated with a substantial personal and socioeconomic burden. Monitoring of patient-reported outcomes by mobile technology offers the possibility to better understand real-life burden of CRS. Methods This study reports on the cross-sectional evaluation of data of 626 users of mySinusitisCoach (mSC), a mobile application for CRS patients. Patient characteristics of mSC users were analysed as well as the level of disease control based on VAS global rhinosinusitis symptom score and adapted EPOS criteria. Results The mSC cohort represents a heterogeneous group of CRS patients with a diverse pattern of major symptoms. Approximately half of patients reported nasal polyps. 47.3% of all CRS patients were uncontrolled based on evaluation of VAS global rhinosinusitis symptom score compared to 40.9% based on adapted EPOS criteria. The impact of CRS on sleep quality and daily life activities was significantly higher in uncontrolled versus well-controlled patients. Half of patients had a history of FESS (functional endoscopic sinus surgery) and reported lower symptom severity compared to patients without a history of FESS, except for patients with a history of more than 3 procedures. Patients with a history of FESS reported higher VAS levels for impaired smell. Conclusion Real-life data confirm the high disease burden in uncontrolled CRS patients, clearly impacting quality of life. Sinus surgery improves patient-reported outcomes, but not in patients with a history of more than 3 procedures. Mobile technology opens a new era of real-life monitoring, supporting the evolution of care towards precision medicine.Peer reviewe

Het psychologische contract als dynamisch proces in complexe technologische contexten: inzichten uit de sociomaterialiteitstheorie

Het psychologische contract is een managementconcept dat verklaart hoe veranderingen in en het al dan niet naleven van wederzijdse verplichtingen tussen werkgever en werknemer samenhangen met attitudes en gedragingen. Onderzoekers gaan veelal uit van causale, lineaire verbanden tussen een psychologisch contractbreuk en werknemersattituden en -gedragingen en maken gebruik van de sociale uitwisselingstheorie om reacties op psychologisch contractbreuk te verklaren. Steeds vaker wordt erkend dat dit perspectief moet worden aangevuld met andere theorieën en onderzoeksmethoden om zo de complexiteit en de dynamieken van het psychologische contract beter te begrijpen. Gezien het grotendeels uitblijven van onderzoek naar de rol van technologie, is er ook steeds meer vraag naar theorieën die het begrip van technologie in het psychologisch contractraamwerk vergroten. Dit is voornamelijk van belang in vluchtige, onzekere, complexe en ambigue arbeidscontexten. In deze conceptuele paper stellen we voor om de sociomaterialiteitstheorie als een aanvullende lens te gebruiken om meer inzicht te krijgen in de rol van technologie in de dynamiek van het psychologische contract. We vergelijken de traditionele en recentere psychologisch contractperspectieven met het sociomaterialiteitsperspectief en leggen uit waar deze lens een waardevolle bijdrage aan de literatuur kan leveren. We sluiten af met een kritische reflectie op dit perspectief en praktische aanbevelingen

Primary myxoid mesenchymal tumor with intracranial location: report of a case with a EWSR1-ATF1 fusion

About a third of soft tissue tumors are recognized by gene fusions. Some of these fusions are not histotype specific and occur in entities with totally different clinicopathological features. A good example is the fusion between EWSR1 and genes of the CREB transcription factor gene family (CREB1 or ATF1). This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.status: publishe

Neurogranin and tau in cerebrospinal fluid and plasma of patients with acute ischemic stroke

Abstract Background While neurogranin has no value as plasma biomarker for Alzheimer’s disease, it may be a potential blood biomarker for traumatic brain injury. This evokes the question whether there are changes in neurogranin levels in blood in other conditions of brain injury, such as acute ischemic stroke (AIS). Methods We therefore explored neurogranin in paired cerebrospinal fluid (CSF)/plasma samples of AIS patients (n = 50) from a well-described prospective study. In parallel, we investigated another neuronal protein, i.e. tau, which has already been suggested as potential AIS biomarker in CSF and blood. ELISA as well as Single Molecule Array (Simoa) technology were used for the biochemical analyses. Statistical analyses included Shapiro-Wilk testing, Mann-Whitney analyses and Pearson’s correlation analysis. Results In contrast to tau, of which high levels in both CSF and plasma were related to stroke characteristics like severity and long-term outcome, plasma neurogranin levels were only correlated with infarct volume. Likewise, CSF neurogranin levels were significantly higher in patients with an infarct volume > 5 mL than in patients with smaller infarct volumes. Finally, neurogranin and tau were significantly correlated in CSF, whereas a weaker relationship was observed in plasma. Conclusions These findings indicate that although plasma and CSF neurogranin may reflect the volume of acute cerebral ischemia, this synaptic protein is less likely to be a potential AIS biomarker. Levels of tau correlated with severity and outcome of stroke in both plasma and CSF, in the present study as well as previous reports, confirming the potential of tau as an AIS biomarker

Additional file 2: of Neurogranin and tau in cerebrospinal fluid and plasma of patients with acute ischemic stroke

Plasma AIS biomarker tau.xls. Value of tau as plasma AIS biomarker reflecting stroke severity and long-term outcome. Severity (NIHSS) or outcome at 12 months (mRS 12 m) were first dichotomized: patients with NIHSS scores ≤7 were pooled versus NIHSS >7, or with mRS scores 0–3 versus scores 4–6. ROC analysis was performed at all time points on both groups for tau, quantified by Simoa. Statistical significant AUC-values are depicted in bold font and underlined. (XLSX 11 kb