Revolutionaries, wanderers, converts, and compliants: Life histories of extreme right activists

Life-history interviews were conducted with thirty-six extreme right activists in the Netherlands (1996-1998). Becoming an activist was a matter of continuity, of conversion, or of compliance. Continuity denotes life histories wherein movement membership and participation are a natural consequence of prior political socialization; conversion to trajectories wherein movement membership and participation are a break with the past; and compliance to when people enter activism, not owing to personal desires but because of circumstances they deemed were beyond their control. Stories of continuity in our interviews were either testimonies of lifetimes of commitment to extreme right politics (labeled revolutionaries) or lifelong journeys from one political shelter to the other by political wanderers (labeled converts). Activists who told us conversion stories, we labeled converts and those who told compliance stories, compliants. The article presents a prototypical example of each type of career and suggests each prototype to hold for different motivational dynamics. © 2007 Sage Publications

Psychiatry in the Digital Age: A Blessing or a Curse?

Social distancing and the shortage of healthcare professionals during the COVID-19 pandemic, the impact of population aging on the healthcare system, as well as the rapid pace of digital innovation are catalyzing the development and implementation of new technologies and digital services in psychiatry. Is this transformation a blessing or a curse for psychiatry? To answer this question, we conducted a literature review covering a broad range of new technologies and eHealth services, including telepsychiatry; computer-, internet-, and app-based cognitive behavioral therapy; virtual reality; digital applied games; a digital medicine system; omics; neuroimaging; machine learning; precision psychiatry; clinical decision support; electronic health records; physician charting; digital language translators; and online mental health resources for patients. We found that eHealth services provide effective, scalable, and cost-efficient options for the treatment of people with limited or no access to mental health care. This review highlights innovative technologies spearheading the way to more effective and safer treatments. We identified artificially intelligent tools that relieve physicians from routine tasks, allowing them to focus on collaborative doctor-patient relationships. The transformation of traditional clinics into digital ones is outlined, and the challenges associated with the successful deployment of digitalization in psychiatry are highlighted

Occurrence and Clinical Relevance of Mycobacterium chimaera sp. nov., Germany

Retrospective molecular genetic analysis of 166 Mycobacterium intracellulare isolates showed that 143 (86%) strains could be assigned to Mycobacterium chimaera sp. nov. Of 97 patients from whom M. chimaera sp. nov. was isolated, only 3.3% exhibited mycobacterial lung disease, whereas all M. intracellulare isolates caused severe pulmonary infections

A 2-year longitudinal study of neuropsychological functioning, psychosocial adjustment and rehospitalisation in schizophrenia and major depression

Neuropsychological functioning turns out to be a rate-limiting factor in psychiatry. However, little is known when comparing neuropsychological and psychosocial functioning in inpatients with schizophrenia or severe depression in their treatment pathways including add-on psychoeducation or the latter combined with cognitive behavioral therapy up to 2-year follow-up. To evaluate this question, we investigated these variables in two randomised controlled trials including 196 patients with DSM-IV schizophrenia and 177 patients with major depression. Outcome measures were assessed in the hospital at pre- and posttreatment and following discharge until 2-year follow-up. We focused on neuropsychological and psychosocial functioning regarding its differences and changes over time in data of two pooled trials. There were significant time effects indicating gains in knowledge about the illness, short and medium-term memory (VLMT) and psychosocial functioning (GAF), however, the latter was the only variable showing a time x study/diagnosis interaction effect at 2-year follow-up, showing significant better outcome in depression compared to schizophrenia. Moderator analysis showed no changes in psychosocial and neuropsychological functioning in schizophrenia and in affective disorders due to age, duration of illness or sex. Looking at the rehospitalisation rates there were no significant differences between both disorders. Both groups treated with psychoeducation or a combination of psychoeducation and CBT improved in neuropsychological and psychosocial functioning as well as knowledge about the illness at 2-year follow-up, however, patients with major depression showed greater gains in psychosocial functioning compared to patients with schizophrenia. Possible implications of these findings were discussed

Bridging the age gap: a review of molecularly informed treatments for glioma in adolescents and young adults

Gliomas are the most common primary central nervous system (CNS) tumors and a major cause of cancer-related mortality in children (age 39 years). Molecular pathology has helped enhance the characterization of these tumors, revealing a heterogeneous and ever more complex group of malignancies. Recent molecular analyses have led to an increased appreciation of common genomic alterations prevalent across all ages. The 2021 World Health Organization (WHO) CNS tumor classification, 5th edition (WHO CNS5) brings forward a nomenclature distinguishing "pediatric-type" and "adult-type" gliomas. The spectrum of gliomas in AYA comprises both "pediatric-like" and "adult-like" tumor entities but remains ill-defined. With fragmentation of clinical management between pediatric and adult centers, AYAs face challenges related to gaps in medical care, lower rates of enrollment in clinical trials and additional psychosocial and economic challenges. This calls for a rethinking of diagnostic and therapeutic approaches, to improve access to appropriate testing and potentially beneficial treatments to patients of all ages

Altered emotion processing circuits during the anticipation of emotional stimuli in women with borderline personality disorder

Borderline personality disorder (BPD) is associated with disturbed emotion processing, typically encompassing intense and fast emotional reactions toward affective stimuli. In this study, we were interested in whether emotional dysregulation in BPD occurs not only during the perception of emotional stimuli, but also during the anticipation of upcoming emotional pictures in the absence of concrete stimuli. Eighteen female patients with a diagnosis of BPD and 18 healthy control subjects anticipated cued visual stimuli with prior known emotional valence or prior unknown emotional content during functional magnetic resonance imaging. Brain activity during the anticipation of emotional stimuli was compared between both groups. When anticipating negative pictures, BPD patients demonstrated less signal change in the left dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC) and left middle cingulate cortex (MCC), and enhanced activations in the left pregenual ACC, left posterior cingulate cortex (PCC) as well as in left visual cortical areas including the lingual gyrus. During the anticipation of ambiguously announced stimuli, brain activity in BPD was also reduced in the left MCC extending into the medial and bilateral dorsolateral prefrontal cortex. Results point out that deficient recruitment of brain areas related to cognitive-emotional interaction already during the anticipation phase may add to emotional dysregulation in BPD. Stronger activation of the PCC could correspond to an increased autobiographical reference in BPD. Moreover, increased preparatory visual activity during negative anticipation may contribute to hypersensitivity toward emotional cues in this disorder

Expression of hedgehog signalling pathway in anaplastic thyroid cancer

Abstract The purpose of this work is to study the activation of the hedgehog signalling pathway is associated with tumour progression in various types of cancer, hence the development of specific antagonists raises hope for new therapeutic strategies. Therefore, the expression of hedgehog pathway components in anaplastic thyroid cancer (ATC) and effects of the hedgehog inhibitor Cyclopamine on ATC cells were investigated in this study. Expression of the ligand Sonic Hedgehog (SHh), the transmembrane protein Smoothened (Smo), the receptor Patched (Ptc) and the target gene Gli-1 was evaluated in two ATC cell lines (Hth 74, C643) by RT-PCR and in tumour specimens by immunohistochemistry. The corresponding gene products were examined by western blotting analysis. After treatment with different concentrations of Cyclopamine the time-dependent course of cell viability in ATC cell lines was evaluated by MTT assay. SHh, Smo, Ptc and Gli were clearly expressed on mRNA and protein levels in both cell lines and in tumour samples (41 %SHh, 65 %Smo, 65 %Ptc and 65 %Gli). Treatment with Cyclopamine showed a time-and dose-dependent inhibition of cell numbers with IC50 values between 1 and 4 lM in both cell lines, comparable to other types of cancer. In conclusion, we believe that the hedgehog pathway is expressed in anaplastic thyroid carcinoma specimens and proliferation of ATC cell lines can be influenced by the Hh inhibitor Cyclopamine. Aberrant activation of this pathway might be involved in the aggressive biology of anaplastic cancer and further evaluation regarding a possible clinical impact of pathway inhibition is warranted

Population genetic diversity and fitness in multiple environments

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>When a large number of alleles are lost from a population, increases in individual homozygosity may reduce individual fitness through inbreeding depression. Modest losses of allelic diversity may also negatively impact long-term population viability by reducing the capacity of populations to adapt to altered environments. However, it is not clear how much genetic diversity within populations may be lost before populations are put at significant risk. Development of tools to evaluate this relationship would be a valuable contribution to conservation biology. To address these issues, we have created an experimental system that uses laboratory populations of an estuarine crustacean, <it>Americamysis bahia </it>with experimentally manipulated levels of genetic diversity. We created replicate cultures with five distinct levels of genetic diversity and monitored them for 16 weeks in both permissive (ambient seawater) and stressful conditions (diluted seawater). The relationship between molecular genetic diversity at presumptive neutral loci and population vulnerability was assessed by AFLP analysis.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Populations with very low genetic diversity demonstrated reduced fitness relative to high diversity populations even under permissive conditions. Population performance decreased in the stressful environment for all levels of genetic diversity relative to performance in the permissive environment. Twenty percent of the lowest diversity populations went extinct before the end of the study in permissive conditions, whereas 73% of the low diversity lines went extinct in the stressful environment. All high genetic diversity populations persisted for the duration of the study, although population sizes and reproduction were reduced under stressful environmental conditions. Levels of fitness varied more among replicate low diversity populations than among replicate populations with high genetic diversity. There was a significant correlation between AFLP diversity and population fitness overall; however, AFLP markers performed poorly at detecting modest but consequential losses of genetic diversity. High diversity lines in the stressful environment showed some evidence of relative improvement as the experiment progressed while the low diversity lines did not.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>The combined effects of reduced average fitness and increased variability contributed to increased extinction rates for very low diversity populations. More modest losses of genetic diversity resulted in measurable decreases in population fitness; AFLP markers did not always detect these losses. However when AFLP markers indicated lost genetic diversity, these losses were associated with reduced population fitness.</p

Validation of a proxy‐reported SARC‐F questionnaire for current and retrospective screening of sarcopenia‐related functional impairments

BACKGROUND: The strength, assistance walking, rise from a chair, climb stairs, and falls (SARC‐F) questionnaire is a well‐established instrument for screening of sarcopenia and sarcopenia‐related functional impairments. As it is based on self‐reporting, its use precludes patients who are unable to answer the questionnaire as a consequence of severe acute diseases or cognitive impairment. Therefore, we aimed to validate a proxy‐reported version of the SARC‐F for both ad‐hoc as well as retrospective screening for severe sarcopenia‐related functional impairments. METHODS: Patients aged ≥60 years completed the SARC‐F and performed the short physical performance battery (SPPB) at baseline (T1). Proxies in Cohort A gave a simultaneous assessment of the patients' functional status with the proxy‐reported SARC‐F at T1 and again, retrospectively, after 3 months (T2). Proxies in Cohort B only completed the SARC‐F retrospectively at T2. The questionnaires' performances were assessed through sensitivity/specificity analyses and receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves. For non‐inferiority analyses, results of both the patient‐reported and proxy‐reported SARC‐F were correlated with the SPPB total score as well as the results of the chair‐rise test subcategory; the respective correlation coefficients were tested against each other. RESULTS: One hundred and four patients and 135 proxies participated. Using a SPPB score < 9 points as the reference standard, the proxy‐reported SARC‐F identified patients at high risk for sarcopenia‐related functional impairment with a sensitivity of 0.81 (ad‐hoc), 0.88 (retrospective Cohort A), and 0.87 (retrospective Cohort B) as well as a specificity of 0.89 (ad‐hoc), 0.78 (retrospective Cohort A), and 0.64 (retrospective Cohort B). Areas under the ROC curves were ≥ 0.9 for the ad‐hoc proxy‐reported SARC‐F and the retrospective proxy‐reported SARC‐F in both cohorts. The proxy‐reported SARC‐F showed a non‐inferior correlation with the SPPB compared with the patient‐reported SARC‐F for ad‐hoc (P = <0.001) as well as retrospective screening for severe sarcopenia‐related functional impairment in both Cohorts A (P = 0.007) and B (P = 0.026). CONCLUSIONS: Proxy‐reported SARC‐F is a valid instrument for both ad‐hoc as well as retrospective screening for sarcopenia‐related functional impairment and could become the standard tool for evaluating this risk in older adults with severe acute disease, for example, in patients with quickly evolving haematological conditions