47 research outputs found

    General practitioner workforce planning: assessment of four policy directions

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    <p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Estimating the supply of GPs into the future is important in forecasting shortages. The lengthy training process for medicine means that adjusting supply to meet demand in a timely fashion is problematic. This study uses Ireland as a case study to determine the future demand and supply of GPs and to assess the potential impact of several possible interventions to address future shortages.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Demand was estimated by applying GP visit rates by age and sex to national population projections. Supply was modelled using a range of parameters derived from two national surveys of GPs. A stochastic modelling approach was adopted to determine the probable future supply of GPs. Four policy interventions were tested: increasing vocational training places; recruiting GPs from abroad; incentivising later retirement; increasing nurse substitution to enable practice nurses to deliver more services.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Relative to most other European countries, Ireland has few GPs per capita. Ireland has an ageing population and demand is estimated to increase by 19% by 2021. Without intervention, the supply of GPs will be 5.7% less than required in 2021. Increasing training places will enable supply to meet demand but only after 2019. Recruiting GPs from overseas will enable supply to meet demand continuously if the number recruited is approximately 0.8 per cent of the current workforce per annum. Later retirement has only a short-term impact. Nurse substitution can enable supply to meet demand but only if large numbers of practice nurses are recruited and allowed to deliver a wide range of GP services.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>A significant shortfall in GP supply is predicted for Ireland unless recruitment is increased. The shortfall will have numerous knock-on effects including price increases, longer waiting lists and an increased burden on hospitals. Increasing training places will not provide an adequate response to future shortages. Foreign recruitment has ethical considerations but may provide a rapid and effective response. Increased nurse substitution appears to offer the best long-term prospects of addressing GP shortages and presents the opportunity to reshape general practice to meet the demands of the future.</p

    Functional analysis of missense variants in the TRESK (KCNK18) K+ channel

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    A loss of function mutation in the TRESK K2P potassium channel (KCNK18), has recently been linked with typical familial migraine with aura. We now report the functional characterisation of additional TRESK channel missense variants identified in unrelated patients. Several variants either had no apparent functional effect, or they caused a reduction in channel activity. However, the C110R variant was found to cause a complete loss of TRESK function, yet is present in both sporadic migraine and control cohorts, and no variation in KCNK18 copy number was found. Thus despite the previously identified association between loss of TRESK channel activity and migraine in a large multigenerational pedigree, this finding indicates that a single non-functional TRESK variant is not alone sufficient to cause typical migraine and highlights the genetic complexity of this disorder

    The reliability of side to side measurements of upper extremity activity levels in healthy subjects

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    <p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>In both clinical and occupational settings, ambulatory sensors are becoming common for assessing all day measurements of arm motion. In order for the motion of a healthy, contralateral side to be used as a control for the involved side, the inherent side to side differences in arm usage must be minimal. The goal of the present study was to determine the reliability of side to side measurements of upper extremity activity levels in healthy subjects.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Thirty two subjects with no upper extremity pathologies were studied. Each subject wore a triaxial accelerometer on both arms for three and a half hours. Motion was assessed using parameters previously reported in the literature. Side to side differences were compared with the intraclass correlation coefficient, standard error of the mean, minimal detectable change scores and a projected sample size analysis.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The variables were ranked based on their percentage of minimal detectable change scores and sample sizes needed for paired t-tests. The order of these rankings was found to be identical and the top ranked parameters were activity counts per hour (MDC% = 9.5, n = 5), jerk time (MDC% = 15.8, n = 8) and percent time above 30 degrees (MDC% = 34.7, n = 9).</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>In general, the mean activity levels during daily activities were very similar between dominant and non-dominant arms. Specifically, activity counts per hour, jerk time, and percent time above 30 degrees were found to be the variables most likely to reveal significant difference or changes in both individuals and groups of subjects. The use of ambulatory measurements of upper extremity activity has very broad uses for occupational assessments, musculoskeletal injuries of the shoulder, elbow, wrist and hand as well as neurological pathologies.</p

    Does physical activity change predict functional recovery in low back pain? Protocol for a prospective cohort study

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    Background: Activity advice and prescription are commonly used in the management of low back pain (LBP). Although there is evidence for advising patients with LBP to remain active, facilitating both recovery and return to work, to date no research has assessed whether objective measurements of free living physical activity (PA) can predict outcome, recovery and course of LBP. Methods: An observational longitudinal study will investigate PA levels in a cohort of community-dwelling working age adults with acute and sub-acute LBP. Each participant's PA level, functional status, mood, fear avoidance behaviours, and levels of pain, psychological distress and occupational activity will be measured on three occasions during for 1 week periods at baseline, 3 months, and 1 year. Physical activity levels will be measured by self report, RT3 triaxial accelerometer, and activity recall questionnaires. The primary outcome measure of functional recovery will be the Roland Morris Disability Questionnaire (RMDQ). Free living PA levels and changes in functional status will be quantified in order to look at predictive relationships between levels and changes in free living PA and functional recovery in a LBP population. Discussion: This research will investigate levels and changes in activity levels of an acute LBP cohort and the predictive relationship to LBP recovery. The results will assess whether occupational, psychological and behavioural factors affect the relationship between free living PA and LBP recovery. Results from this research will help to determine the strength of evidence supporting international guidelines that recommend restoration of normal activity in managing LBP. Trial registration. [Clinical Trial Registration Number, ACTRN12609000282280]. © 2009 Hendrick et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd

    Inhibition of G Protein-Activated Inwardly Rectifying K+ Channels by Different Classes of Antidepressants

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    Various antidepressants are commonly used for the treatment of depression and several other neuropsychiatric disorders. In addition to their primary effects on serotonergic or noradrenergic neurotransmitter systems, antidepressants have been shown to interact with several receptors and ion channels. However, the molecular mechanisms that underlie the effects of antidepressants have not yet been sufficiently clarified. G protein-activated inwardly rectifying K+ (GIRK, Kir3) channels play an important role in regulating neuronal excitability and heart rate, and GIRK channel modulation has been suggested to have therapeutic potential for several neuropsychiatric disorders and cardiac arrhythmias. In the present study, we investigated the effects of various classes of antidepressants on GIRK channels using the Xenopus oocyte expression assay. In oocytes injected with mRNA for GIRK1/GIRK2 or GIRK1/GIRK4 subunits, extracellular application of sertraline, duloxetine, and amoxapine effectively reduced GIRK currents, whereas nefazodone, venlafaxine, mianserin, and mirtazapine weakly inhibited GIRK currents even at toxic levels. The inhibitory effects were concentration-dependent, with various degrees of potency and effectiveness. Furthermore, the effects of sertraline were voltage-independent and time-independent during each voltage pulse, whereas the effects of duloxetine were voltage-dependent with weaker inhibition with negative membrane potentials and time-dependent with a gradual decrease in each voltage pulse. However, Kir2.1 channels were insensitive to all of the drugs. Moreover, the GIRK currents induced by ethanol were inhibited by sertraline but not by intracellularly applied sertraline. The present results suggest that GIRK channel inhibition may reveal a novel characteristic of the commonly used antidepressants, particularly sertraline, and contributes to some of the therapeutic effects and adverse effects

    Precise Measurement of the Neutrino Mixing Parameter theta(23) from Muon Neutrino Disappearance in an Off-Axis Beam

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    New data from the T2K neutrino oscillation experiment produce the most precise measurement of the neutrino mixing parameter theta_{23}. Using an off-axis neutrino beam with a peak energy of 0.6 GeV and a data set corresponding to 6.57 x 10^{20} protons on target, T2K has fit the energy-dependent nu_mu oscillation probability to determine oscillation parameters. Marginalizing over the values of other oscillation parameters yields sin^2 (theta_{23}) = 0.514 +0.055/-0.056 (0.511 +- 0.055), assuming normal (inverted) mass hierarchy. The best-fit mass-squared splitting for normal hierarchy is Delta m^2_{32} = (2.51 +- 0.10) x 10^{-3} eV^2/c^4 (inverted hierarchy: Delta m^2_{13} = (2.48 +- 0.10) x 10^{-3} eV^2/c^4). Adding a model of multinucleon interactions that affect neutrino energy reconstruction is found to produce only small biases in neutrino oscillation parameter extraction at current levels of statistical uncertainty

    Measurement of the intrinsic electron neutrino component in the T2K neutrino beam with the ND280 detector

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    The T2K experiment has reported the first observation of the appearance of electron neutrinos in a muon neutrino beam. The main and irreducible background to the appearance signal comes from the presence in the neutrino beam of a small intrinsic component of electron neutrinos originating from muon and kaon decays. In T2K, this component is expected to represent 1.2% of the total neutrino flux. A measurement of this component using the near detector (ND280), located 280 m from the target, is presented. The charged current interactions of electron neutrinos are selected by combining the particle identification capabilities of both the time projection chambers and electromagnetic calorimeters of ND280. The measured ratio between the observed electron neutrino beam component and the prediction is 1.01 +/- 0.10 providing a direct confirmation of the neutrino fluxes and neutrino cross section modeling used for T2K neutrino oscillation analyses. Electron neutrinos coming from muons and kaons decay are also separately measured, resulting in a ratio with respect to the prediction of 0.68 +/- 0.30 and 1.10 +/- 0.14, respectively

    T2K neutrino flux prediction

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    cited By 15 art_number: 012001 affiliation: Centre for Particle Physics, Department of Physics, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB, Canada; Albert Einstein Center for Fundamental Physics, Laboratory for High Energy Physics (LHEP), University of Bern, Bern, Switzerland; Department of Physics, Boston University, Boston, MA, United States; Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada; Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of California Irvine, Irvine, CA, United States; IRFU, CEA Saclay, Gif-sur-Yvette, France; Institute for Universe and Elementary Particles, Chonnam National University, Gwangju, South Korea; Department of Physics, University of Colorado at Boulder, Boulder, CO, United States; Department of Physics, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, CO, United States; Department of Physics, Dongshin University, Naju, South Korea; Department of Physics, Duke University, Durham, NC, United States; IN2P3-CNRS, Laboratoire Leprince-Ringuet, Ecole Polytechnique, Palaiseau, France; Institute for Particle Physics, ETH Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland; Section de Physique, DPNC, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland; H. Niewodniczanski Institute of Nuclear Physics PAN, Cracow, Poland; High Energy Accelerator Research Organization (KEK), Tsukuba, Ibaraki, Japan; Institut de Fisica d’Altes Energies (IFAE), Bellaterra (Barcelona), Spain; IFIC (CSIC and University of Valencia), Valencia, Spain; Department of Physics, Imperial College London, London, United Kingdom; INFN Sezione di Bari, Dipartimento Interuniversitario di Fisica, UniversitĂ  e Politecnico di Bari, Bari, Italy; INFN Sezione di Napoli and Dipartimento di Fisica, UniversitĂ  di Napoli, Napoli, Italy; INFN Sezione di Padova, Dipartimento di Fisica, UniversitĂ  di Padova, Padova, Italy; INFN Sezione di Roma, UniversitĂ  di Roma la Sapienza, Roma, Italy; Institute for Nuclear Research, Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, Russian Federation; Kobe University, Kobe, Japan; Department of Physics, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan; Physics Department, Lancaster University, Lancaster, United Kingdom; Department of Physics, University of Liverpool, Liverpool, United Kingdom; Department of Physics and Astronomy, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA, United States; UniversitĂ© de Lyon, UniversitĂ© Claude Bernard Lyon 1, IPN Lyon (IN2P3), Villeurbanne, France; Department of Physics, Miyagi University of Education, Sendai, Japan; National Centre for Nuclear Research, Warsaw, Poland; State University of New York at Stony Brook, Stony Brook, NY, United States; Department of Physics and Astronomy, Osaka City University, Department of Physics, Osaka, Japan; Department of Physics, Oxford University, Oxford, United Kingdom; UPMC, UniversitĂ© Paris Diderot, Laboratoire de Physique NuclĂ©aire et de Hautes Energies (LPNHE), Paris, France; Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA, United States; School of Physics, Queen Mary University of London, London, United Kingdom; Department of Physics, University of Regina, Regina, SK, Canada; Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Rochester, Rochester, NY, United States; III. Physikalisches Institut, RWTH Aachen University, Aachen, Germany; Department of Physics and Astronomy, Seoul National University, Seoul, South Korea; Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, United Kingdom; University of Silesia, Institute of Physics, Katowice, Poland; STFC, Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, Harwell Oxford, Warrington, United Kingdom; Department of Physics, University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan; Institute for Cosmic Ray Research, Kamioka Observatory, University of Tokyo, Kamioka, Japan; Institute for Cosmic Ray Research, Research Center for Cosmic Neutrinos, University of Tokyo, Kashiwa, Japan; Department of Physics, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada; TRIUMF, Vancouver, BC, Canada; Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Victoria, Victoria, BC, Canada; Faculty of Physics, University of Warsaw, Warsaw, Poland; Institute of Radioelectronics, Warsaw University of Technology, Warsaw, Poland; Department of Physics, University of Warwick, Coventry, United Kingdom; Department of Physics, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, United States; Department of Physics, University of Winnipeg, Winnipeg, MB, Canada; Faculty of Physics and Astronomy, Wroclaw University, Wroclaw, Poland; Department of Physics and Astronomy, York University, Toronto, ON, Canada references: Astier, P., (2003) Nucl. 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    Measurement of the neutrino-oxygen neutral-current interaction cross section by observing nuclear deexcitation gamma rays

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    We report the first measurement of the neutrino-oxygen neutral-current quasielastic (NCQE) cross section gamma It is obtained by observing nuclear deexcitation. rays which follow neutrino-oxygen interactions at the Super-Kamiokande water Cherenkov detector. We use T2K data corresponding to 3.01 x 10(20) protons on target. By selecting only events during the T2K beam window and with well-reconstructed vertices in the fiducial volume, the large background rate from natural radioactivity is dramatically reduced. We observe 43 events in the 4-30 MeV reconstructed energy window, compared with an expectation of 51.0, which includes an estimated 16.2 background events. The background is primarily nonquasielastic neutral-current interactions and has only 1.2 events from natural radioactivity. The flux-averaged NCQE cross section we measure is 1.55 x 10(-38) cm(2) with a 68% confidence interval of (1.22, 2.20) x 10(-38) cm(2) at a median neutrino energy of 630 MeV, compared with the theoretical prediction of 2.01 x 10(-38) cm(2)

    Protective Effects of Adenosine Receptor Agonist in a Cirrhotic Liver Resection Model

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    Objectives: To investigate the role of CGS21680, a selective adenosine A2A receptor agonist, on a bile-duct-ligated cirrhotic liver resection model in rats. Methods: Male Wistar rats were allotted into 3 groups (n = 7 per time-point): the control group, the bile duct ligation + CGS21680 group (BDL + CGS), and the bile duct ligation group (BDL). Biliary cirrhosis had been previously induced by ligature of the common bile duct in the BDL + CGS and BDL groups. After 2 weeks, the animals underwent partial hepatectomy (50%). The BDL + CGS group received a single dose of CGS21680 15 minutes prior to hepatectomy. Blood samples were collected and analyzed. Results: Aspartate transaminase levels were found to be lower in the control vs BDL groups (1, 3, and 24 h) (P < 0.01) and the BDL + CGS (1 and 3 hours) (P < 0.01) and BDL + CGS vs BDL (24 hours) (P < 0.05) groups. Hepatic flow was measured and BDL showed significantly lower values at the 3, 24, and 168 h time-points compared to the control (P < 0.01) and BDL + CGS groups (P < 0.05 at 3 and 168 hours; P < 0.01 at 24 h). O2C velocity was reduced in the BDL compared to the control group (P < 0.001 at 3 hours; P < 0.01 at 24 and 168 hours) and the BDL + CGS group (P < 0.01 at 24 hours). Interleukin-6 levels were abrogated in the BDL + CGS (P < 0.05) and control (P < 0.01) groups versus BDL. Histone-bound low-molecular-weight DNA fragments in the BDL + CGS (P < 0.01) and control (P < 0.05) groups were low compared to the BDL group. Conclusions: Administration of CGS21680, an adenosine receptor agonist, after the resection of bile-duct-ligated cirrhotic livers led to improved liver function, regeneration, and microcirculation
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