Breast cancer management pathways during the COVID-19 pandemic: outcomes from the UK ‘Alert Level 4’ phase of the B-MaP-C study

Abstract: Background: The B-MaP-C study aimed to determine alterations to breast cancer (BC) management during the peak transmission period of the UK COVID-19 pandemic and the potential impact of these treatment decisions. Methods: This was a national cohort study of patients with early BC undergoing multidisciplinary team (MDT)-guided treatment recommendations during the pandemic, designated ‘standard’ or ‘COVID-altered’, in the preoperative, operative and post-operative setting. Findings: Of 3776 patients (from 64 UK units) in the study, 2246 (59%) had ‘COVID-altered’ management. ‘Bridging’ endocrine therapy was used (n = 951) where theatre capacity was reduced. There was increasing access to COVID-19 low-risk theatres during the study period (59%). In line with national guidance, immediate breast reconstruction was avoided (n = 299). Where adjuvant chemotherapy was omitted (n = 81), the median benefit was only 3% (IQR 2–9%) using ‘NHS Predict’. There was the rapid adoption of new evidence-based hypofractionated radiotherapy (n = 781, from 46 units). Only 14 patients (1%) tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 during their treatment journey. Conclusions: The majority of ‘COVID-altered’ management decisions were largely in line with pre-COVID evidence-based guidelines, implying that breast cancer survival outcomes are unlikely to be negatively impacted by the pandemic. However, in this study, the potential impact of delays to BC presentation or diagnosis remains unknown

POSTAWY KOBIET WOBEC ŻYCIA I AKTYWNOŚCI ZAWODOWEJ NA OBSZARACH WIEJSKICH

The aim of the study was to present women’s attitudes towards living and working in rural areas. The literature on the subject, secondary data from the Polish Central Statistical Office and the results of research carried out in 2020 by Martin&Jacob on behalf of BNP Paribas bank and published in the report „Situation of women in rural areas” were used to achieve the research objective. The empirical material was collected using a survey method with the CAWI technique, and the research observation covered 300 women who were owners or co-owners of farms. The data in the report shows that the vast majority of women had educational aspirations, as one in five respondents planned to obtain secondary education, higher education or write a doctoral thesis, while in-service training in the form of courses and training was intended to be attended by 2/3 of the respondents. These women valued living in the rural areas, despite the many inconveniences, and the vast majority would not want to move to a city. The survey also showed that 2/5 of the female respondents planned to develop professionally in agriculture and almost as many planned to combine activities in agriculture with other professional activities. The willingness to become more active in agriculture was declared more often by women from younger age groups and those with a university degree in agriculture

POSTAWY KOBIET WOBEC ŻYCIA I AKTYWNOŚCI ZAWODOWEJ NA OBSZARACH WIEJSKICH

The aim of the study was to present women’s attitudes towards living and working in rural areas. The literature on the subject, secondary data from the Polish Central Statistical Office and the results of research carried out in 2020 by Martin&Jacob on behalf of BNP Paribas bank and published in the report „Situation of women in rural areas” were used to achieve the research objective. The empirical material was collected using a survey method with the CAWI technique, and the research observation covered 300 women who were owners or co-owners of farms. The data in the report shows that the vast majority of women had educational aspirations, as one in five respondents planned to obtain secondary education, higher education or write a doctoral thesis, while in-service training in the form of courses and training was intended to be attended by 2/3 of the respondents. These women valued living in the rural areas, despite the many inconveniences, and the vast majority would not want to move to a city. The survey also showed that 2/5 of the female respondents planned to develop professionally in agriculture and almost as many planned to combine activities in agriculture with other professional activities. The willingness to become more active in agriculture was declared more often by women from younger age groups and those with a university degree in agriculture

EXAFS and photoluminescence study on the Er-doped SiO2/nc−SiSiO_{2}/nc-Si multilayers

Electrically pumped Si light source at the standard telecommunication wavelength (1535 nm) can be made by using a unique properties of Si nanostructures doped with rare earth ions. However, despite intensive research, highly efficient light sources based on silicon structures have not yet been obtained. One of the most crucial and still unresolved problems is how to achieve the efficient energy transfer from Si nanostructures to Er ions. The solution can be a structure constructed from the layers consisting of Si and SiO2:Er. The Er doped SiO2 and nc-Si multilayers, unlike homogeneous films, allow to precisely control the distance between the Er ions and the Si nanocrystals, which is a critical parameter for energy transfer. In this work the visible and infra-red photoluminescence (PL) as well as time-resolved photoluminescence (TR PL) supported with X-ray absorption spectroscopy studies will be presented. Er doped SiO2/nc-Si multilayers prepared in three different configurations were studied. The SiO2:Er/Si layers were fabricated by rf magnetron sputtering with or without pure SiO2 buffer between the Si and SiO2:Er layers. Samples were subjected to furnace annealing at 1050oC. The total Er concentration measured by Secondary Ion Mass Spectrometry was estimated to be 2•1020 atoms/cm3 for all multilayers. X-ray absorption fine structure technique was applied in order to investigate local structure around the Er ions. X-ray absorption fine structure measurements were performed at the Er L3 edge (PETRA III, beamline P65). All samples were measured in a fluorescence mode with 7-element Ge detector. Reference Er2O3 powder sample was measured in a transmission configuration. The PL spectra were carried out at room temperature using the Ar+ laser line at 514.5 nm, which is off resonance with Er3+. The time correlated photon-counting technique (TimeHarp200, PicoQuant) was used to collect the time-resolved PL under 405 nm femtosecond laser excitation from a frequency-doubled Ti:sapphire laser system with a 200 Hz repetition rate. Comparison of the samples' and reference XANES spectra confirmed that in all samples Er ions are at 3+ state. EXAFS analysis revealed that the first coordination sphere around the Er ions consists of oxygen atoms. It was found out that for the as grown samples there is a difference in the oxygen quantity and distance depending on the layers' configuration. The differences were also visible after annealing. All samples exhibit both visible and infrared emission. The strongest PL signal is observed for Er+SiO2 buffered by SiO2 layers. The TR PL studies show differences in the decay spectra. The visible (at 750 nm) TR PL spectra reveal two decay times (“fast” (nanosecond) and “slow” (millisecond)) from the sample with the closest Si-Er proximity, contrary to the samples with longer Si-Er distance, that show only one decay time – the “slow” one. The different TR PL results arise from two different energy transfer mechanisms from nc-Si to Er, depending on the Si-Er distance and neighborhood. EXAFS analysis allowed to point out structural differences in the Er ion neighborhood between the sample with pure SiO2 buffer and the samples without one. This result is correlated with the TR PL studies that show “fast” and “slow” ways of Er excitation in SiO2 matrix. This fact is reflected in the PL intensity - the sample with strong both fast and slow components shows the most effective infrared emission

Amaranth Oil Increases Total and LDL Cholesterol Levels without Influencing Early Markers of Atherosclerosis in an Overweight and Obese Population: A Randomized Double-Blind Cross-Over Study in Comparison with Rapeseed Oil Supplementation

Background: Atherosclerosis (AT) is a chronic inflammatory process in which oxidative stress is the key event. Amaranth oil (AmO) has potential hypolipidemic and antiatherogenic effects. The aim of the study was to compare the effects of AmO and rapeseed oil (RaO) supplementation on expression of early markers of AT and lipid profile in obese or overweight subjects. Methods: A randomized, double-blinded cross-over study was conducted, in which participants took 20 mL of AmO in the first arm and 20 mL RaO in the second arm, switching after the washout period. Serum concentrations of adhesion molecules (sP-selectin, sVCAM-1), high-sensitivity C-reactive protein (hsCRP), asymmetric dimethylarginine (ADMA), and lipid profile were assessed before and after nutritional interventions. In addition, anthropometric parameters were measured. Results: The total (TC) and low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol concentrations increased significantly in the AmO group in comparison with RaO (ΔTC 5.52 ± 35 vs. −8.43 ± 17.65 mg/dL; p = 0.002 and 4.43 ± 34.96 vs. −7.55 ± 16.41 mg/dL; p = 0.002, respectively). There were no significant differences in other parameters analyzed between the groups. Conclusion: The use of AmO instead of RaO may increase cardiovascular risk in obese and overweight subjects

Automatic Gleason grading of H&E stained microscopic prostate images using deep convolutional neural networks

Prostate cancer is the most diagnosed cancer in men. The diagnosis is confirmed by pathologists based on ocular inspection of prostate biopsies in order to classify them according to Gleason score. The main goal of this paper is to automate the classification using convolutional neural networks (CNNs). The introduction of CNNs has broadened the field of pattern recognition. It replaces the classical way of designing and extracting hand-made features used for classification with the substantially different strategy of letting the computer itself decide which features are of importance. For automated prostate cancer classification into the classes: Benign, Gleason grade 3, 4 and 5 we propose a CNN with small convolutional filters that has been trained from scratch using stochastic gradient descent with momentum. The input consists of microscopic images of haematoxylin and eosin stained tissue, the output is a coarse segmentation into regions of the four different classes. The dataset used consists of 213 images, each considered to be of one class only. Using four-fold cross-validation we obtained an error rate of 7.3%, which is significantly better than previous state of the art using the same dataset. Although the dataset was rather small, good results were obtained. From this we conclude that CNN is a promising method for this problem. Future work includes obtaining a larger dataset, which potentially could diminish the error margin

The ultra-performance liquid chromatography (UPLC) analysis of phenolics in four plant species

For the evaluation of the efficiency of in vitro systems and for standardization of commercial products the reliable fast analytical procedures are required. These are usually based on HPLC analysis. Regular HPLC separations are usually time and solvent consuming. The new achievements in analytical equipment allows to apply much faster technique UPLC for plant phytochemical analysis. The technology is quite new (developed in 2004) and in this respect there is no literature available. It was applied for separation of phenolics in the extracts of four plant species: basil (Ocimium basilicum), dandelion (Taraxacum officinale), soybean (Glycine max), mint (Mentha piperica) considered as a source of nutraceuticals researched under the project NUTRASNACK (E.C. F.P.6 contract No FOOD-CT-2005-023044). The Acquinity Ultra Performance Liquid Chromatograph (Waters) consisting of Binary Solvent Manager, Sample Manager, PDA detector and Empower Pro 2.0 software was used. The analyses were performed on an UPLC BEH C18 column (1.7mm, 50mm ´ 2.1mm) utilizing a gradient elution profile and a mobile phase consisting of 0,1% acetic acid in water and 40% AcN. The column was maintained at 50oC and at a flow rate was kept constant at 0.35 mL/min. The separation profiles obtained for four analysed species were of similar quality as the profiles obtained with HPLC. However, optimization of the separation conditions (water-acetonitrile gradient shape, column temperature) in UPLC allowed us to reduce separation time down to 5 min (basil, dandelion) and 6 min (mint and soybean); regular HPLC separation time was 50 min. The developed method simplified the analytical protocol and shortened the time of analysis just to few minutes. This an important achievement when big number of samples e.g. in vitro culture efficiency evaluation is necessary