Patient-Related Barriers to the Prescription of Cannabinoid-Based Medicines in Palliative Care: A Qualitative Approach

Background: A minority of palliative care patients benefit from prescribed cannabinoid-based medicines (CBMs). Objective: The objective of this study was to explore the perceptions, expectations, and experiences of CBM usage among palliative care patients and to evaluate whether and how they may constitute an obstacle to prescription. Design: This is a qualitative study involving semistructured in-depth interviews with 10 patients hospitalized in a palliative care unit in Geneva, Switzerland. The data were analyzed using the interpretative phenomenological analysis method. Results: Semistructured interviews were conducted on 10 patients (average age of 73.3 years), mainly with advanced cancer. Most patients favored CBM use in palliative care and distinguished it from recreational use. Seven themes were identified from patients' perceptions, experiences, and expectations during the interviews: right time to begin CBMs, off-label use, information about side effects, lack of a safe medical framework, costs, relatives, and social acceptance of CBMs. Conclusion: The obstacles described by the patients seem to be surmountable with specific measures at the clinical level. We suggest training health professionals in a palliative care setting, especially in explaining the effects and side effects. CBMs will undoubtedly play a more significant role in palliative care medicine in the years to come.</p

Separation of Biological Particles in a Modular Platform of Cascaded Deterministic Lateral Displacement Modules

Abstract Deterministic lateral displacement (DLD) has been extensively implemented in the last decade for size-based sample preparation, owing to its high separation performances for a wide range of particle dimensions. However, separating particles from 1 μm to 10 μm in one single DLD device is challenging because of the required diversity of pillar dimensions and inherent fabrication issues. This paper presents an alternative approach to achieve the extraction of E. coli bacteria from blood samples spiked with prostate cancer cells. Our approach consists in cascading individual DLD devices in a single automated platform, using flexible chambers that successively collect and inject the sample between each DLD stage without any external sample manipulation. Operating DLD separations independently enables to maximize the sorting efficiency at each step, without any disturbance from downstream stages. The proposed two-step automated protocol is applied to the separation of three types of components (bacteria, blood particles and cancer cells), with a depletion yield of 100% for cancer cells and 93% for red blood cells. This cascaded approach is presented for the first time with two DLD modules and is upscalable to improve the dynamic range of currently available DLD devices

Legislative Documents

Also, variously referred to as: House bills; House documents; House legislative documents; legislative documents; General Court documents

Nested structure of intraspecific competition network in Carnobacterium maltaromaticum

International audienceWhile competition targeting food-borne pathogens is being widely documented, few studies have focused on competition among non-pathogenic food bacteria. Carnobacterium maltaromaticum is a genetically diverse lactic acid bacterium known for comprising several bacteriocinogenic strains with bioprotective potentialities against the food-borne pathogen Listeria monocytogenes. The aim of our study is to examine the network properties of competition among a collection of 73 strains of C. maltaromaticum and to characterize their individual interaction potential. The performed high-throughput competition assays, investigating 5 329 pairwise interactions, showed that intraspecific competition was major in C. maltaromaticum with approximately 56% of the sender strains antagonizing at least one receiver strain. A high diversity of inhibitory and sensitivity spectra was identified along with a majority of narrow inhibitory as well as sensitivity spectra. Through network analysis approach, we determined the highly nested architecture of C. maltaromaticum competition network, thus showing that competition in this species is determined by both the spectrum width of the inhibitory activity of sender strains and the spectrum width of the sensitivity of receiver strains. This study provides knowledge of the competition network in C. maltaromaticum that could be used in rational assembly of compatible microbial strains for the design of mixed starter cultures

Draft Genome Sequence of Carnobacterium divergens V41, a Bacteriocin-Producing Strain

International audienceIn this study, we present the draft genome sequence of Carnobacterium divergens V41. This strain was previously reported as producing divercin V41, a bacteriocin of interest for food biopreservation. Its genome revealed also the presence of a gene cluster putatively involved in polyketide production, which is unique in lactic acid bacteria

Musical and psychomotor interventions for cognitive, sensorimotor, and cerebral decline in patients with Mild Cognitive Impairment (COPE) ::a study protocol for a multicentric randomized controlled study

Background : Regular cognitive training can boost or maintain cognitive and brain functions known to decline with age. Most studies administered such cognitive training on a computer and in a lab setting. However, everyday life activities, like musical practice or physical exercise that are complex and variable, might be more successful at inducing transfer effects to different cognitive domains and maintaining motivation. "Body-mind exercises", like Tai Chi or psychomotor exercise, may also positively affect cognitive functioning in the elderly. We will compare the influence of active music practice and psychomotor training over 6 months in Mild Cognitive Impairment patients from university hospital memory clinics on cognitive and sensorimotor performance and brain plasticity. The acronym of the study is COPE (Countervail cOgnitive imPairmEnt), illustrating the aim of the study: learning to better "cope" with cognitive decline. Methods : We aim to conduct a randomized controlled multicenter intervention study on 32 Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI) patients (60–80 years), divided over 2 experimental groups: 1) Music practice; 2) Psychomotor treatment. Controls will consist of a passive test–retest group of 16 age, gender and education level matched healthy volunteers. The training regimens take place twice a week for 45 min over 6 months in small groups, provided by professionals, and patients should exercise daily at home. Data collection takes place at baseline (before the interventions), 3, and 6 months after training onset, on cognitive and sensorimotor capacities, subjective well-being, daily living activities, and via functional and structural neuroimaging. Considering the current constraints of the COVID-19 pandemic, recruitment and data collection takes place in 3 waves. Discussion : We will investigate whether musical practice contrasted to psychomotor exercise in small groups can improve cognitive, sensorimotor and brain functioning in MCI patients, and therefore provoke specific benefits for their daily life functioning and well-being

Schematic of the successive resolution steps.

<p>Schematic of the successive resolution steps.</p