Does the use of store-and-forward telehealth systems improve outcomes for clinicians managing diabetic foot ulcers? A pilot study

Diabetic foot ulcers are one of the most hospitalised diabetes complications and contribute to many leg amputations.\ud Trained diabetic foot teams and specialists managing diabetic foot ulcers have demonstrated reductions in amputations and hospitalisation by up to 90%. Few such teams exist in Australia. Thus, access is limited for all geographical populations and may somewhat explain the high rates of hospitalisation.\ud Aim: This pilot study aims to analyse if local clinicians managing diabetic foot complications report improved access to diabetic foot specialists and outcomes with the introduction of a telehealth store-and-forward system.\ud Method: A store-and-forward telehealth system was implemented in six different Queensland locations between August 2009 and February 2010. Sites were offered ad hoc and/or fortnightly telehealth access to a diabetic foot speciality service. A survey was sent six months following commencement of the trial to the 14 eligible clinicians involved in the trial to gauge clinical perception of the telehealth system.\ud Results: Eight participants returned the surveys. The majority of responding clinicians reported that the telehealth system was easy to use (100%), improved their access to diabetic foot speciality services (75%), improved upskilling of local diabetes service staff (100%), and improved patient outcomes (100%).\ud Conclusion: This pilot study suggests that clinicians found the use of a telehealth store-and-forward system very useful in improving access to speciality services, clinical skills and patient outcomes. This study supports the recommendation that telehealth systems should be made available for diabetic foot ulcer management

Semiclassical quantization with bifurcating orbits

Bifurcations of classical orbits introduce divergences into semiclassical spectra which have to be smoothed with the help of uniform approximations. We develop a technique to extract individual energy levels from semiclassical spectra involving uniform approximations. As a prototype example, the method is shown to yield excellent results for photo-absorption spectra for the hydrogen atom in an electric field in a spectral range where the abundance of bifurcations would render the standard closed-orbit formula without uniform approximations useless. Our method immediately applies to semiclassical trace formulae as well as closed-orbit theory and offers a general technique for the semiclassical quantization of arbitrary systems

Open questions in the social lives of viruses

Social interactions among viruses occur whenever multiple viral genomes infect the same cells, hosts, or populations of hosts. Viral social interactions range from cooperation to conflict, occur throughout the viral world, and affect every stage of the viral lifecycle. The ubiquity of these social interactions means that they can determine the population dynamics, evolutionary trajectory, and clinical progression of viral infections. At the same time, social interactions in viruses raise new questions for evolutionary theory, providing opportunities to test and extend existing frameworks within social evolution. Many opportunities exist at this interface: Insights into the evolution of viral social interactions have immediate implications for our understanding of the fundamental biology and clinical manifestation of viral diseases. However, these opportunities are currently limited because evolutionary biologists only rarely study social evolution in viruses. Here, we bridge this gap by (1) summarizing the ways in which viruses can interact socially, including consequences for social evolution and evolvability; (2) outlining some open questions raised by viruses that could challenge concepts within social evolution theory; and (3) providing some illustrative examples, data sources, and conceptual questions, for studying the natural history of social viruses

Age at First Concussion Influences Number of Subsequent Concussions

Background: Individuals that sustain their first concussion during childhood may be at greater risk for sustaining multiple concussions throughout their lifetime, due to a longer window of vulnerability. Purpose: To estimate the association between age at first concussion with number of subsequent concussions. Methods: A total of 23,582 collegiate athletes from 26 universities and military cadets from three military academies completed a concussion history questionnaire (65% males, age: 19.9±1.4years). Participants self-reported concussions and age at time of each injury. Participants with a history of concussion (n=3,647, 15.5%) were categorized as having sustained their first concussion during childhood (<10 years old - yo) or adolescence (≥10yo & ≤18yo). Poisson regression was used to model age group (childhood, adolescence) predicting number of subsequent concussions (0, 1, 2+). A second Poisson regression was developed to determine whether age at first concussion predicted number of subsequent concussions. Results: Participants self-reporting their first concussion during childhood had an increased risk of sustaining subsequent concussions (RR=2.19, 95% CI: 1.82, 2.64) compared to participants self-reporting their first concussion during adolescence. For every one-year increase in age at first concussion, we observed a 16% reduction in the risk of subsequent concussion (RR=0.84, 95% CI:0.82,0.86). Conclusion(s): Individuals self-reporting a concussion at a young age sustained a higher number of concussions prior to the age of 18. Concussion prevention, recognition, and reporting strategies are of particular need at the youth level

Age at First Concussion Influences Number of Subsequent Concussions

Background: Individuals that sustain their first concussion during childhood may be at greater risk for sustaining multiple concussions throughout their lifetime, due to a longer window of vulnerability. Purpose: To estimate the association between age at first concussion with number of subsequent concussions. Methods: A total of 23,582 collegiate athletes from 26 universities and military cadets from three military academies completed a concussion history questionnaire (65% males, age: 19.9±1.4years). Participants self-reported concussions and age at time of each injury. Participants with a history of concussion (n=3,647, 15.5%) were categorized as having sustained their first concussion during childhood (<10 years old - yo) or adolescence (≥10yo & ≤18yo). Poisson regression was used to model age group (childhood, adolescence) predicting number of subsequent concussions (0, 1, 2+). A second Poisson regression was developed to determine whether age at first concussion predicted number of subsequent concussions. Results: Participants self-reporting their first concussion during childhood had an increased risk of sustaining subsequent concussions (RR=2.19, 95% CI: 1.82, 2.64) compared to participants self-reporting their first concussion during adolescence. For every one-year increase in age at first concussion, we observed a 16% reduction in the risk of subsequent concussion (RR=0.84, 95% CI:0.82,0.86). Conclusion(s): Individuals self-reporting a concussion at a young age sustained a higher number of concussions prior to the age of 18. Concussion prevention, recognition, and reporting strategies are of particular need at the youth level

The Grizzly, April 20, 2017

Record Store Day Comes to Collegeville • Seismic Step Shares History and Tradition • Q&A with Incoming Music Professor • Jazzfest to Swing into Action Next Weekend • At the Intersection of Art and Meaning, Student Musicians Find Their Sound • Inside a Campus Tradition: The Story of the Heefner Organ • Opinions: Let More Life Carry You Through the Summer; Get it Together and Listen to Kendrick Lamar\u27s Album • UC Athletes Share the Best Pump-Up Music Before Competition • UC Baseball Captain Also Hitting the High Notes in a Capella Clubhttps://digitalcommons.ursinus.edu/grizzlynews/1667/thumbnail.jp

The Grizzly, October 27, 2016

How UC Students Get the News • International Students Sound Off on Election • Attorney General Candidate Discusses Platform • UC Alumni on the Campaign Trail • Local Volunteers Get Out the Vote • Opinions: The Difficulties of Voting from Past to Present; The Future of the Supreme Court is on the Ballot • UC Students Weigh in on Pro-Athlete Protests • Rein Wrestles Political Issueshttps://digitalcommons.ursinus.edu/grizzlynews/1653/thumbnail.jp

The Grizzly, September 15, 2016

Board Chair Marcon Resigns Amid Controversy • Meet the Interim Board Chair • Black Girl Dangerous Comes to Speak at Ursinus • Student Work Hits the Stage • A Creative Approach to Raising Awareness • Opinions: Choose the America You Wish to be a Part of ; Students\u27 Guide to Weekends at Reimert • Field Hockey Off to a Hot Start, Looking for Redemption • You Bend \u27Em, We Mend \u27Em: The Life of an Athletic Trainerhttps://digitalcommons.ursinus.edu/grizzlynews/1648/thumbnail.jp

A Pilot Search for Gravitational Self-Lensing Binaries with the Zwicky Transient Facility

Binary systems containing a compact object may exhibit periodic brightening episodes due to gravitational lensing as the compact object transits the companion star. Such "self-lensing" signatures have been detected before for white dwarf binaries. We attempt to use these signatures to identify detached stellar-mass neutron star and black hole binaries using data from the Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF). We present a systematic search for self-lensing signals in Galactic binaries from a subset of high-cadence ZTF data taken in 2018. We identify 19 plausible candidates from the search, although because each candidate is observed to only brighten once, other origins such as stellar flares are more likely. We discuss prospects for more comprehensive future searches of the ZTF data.Comment: 12 pages. Submitted to the Open Journal of Astrophysic