Rare diseases: matching wheelchair users with rare metabolic, neuromuscular or neurological disorders to electric powered indoor/outdoor wheelchairs (EPIOCs)

Purpose: To describe the clinical features of electric powered indoor/outdoor wheelchair (EPIOC) users with rare diseases (RD) impacting on EPIOC provision and seating. Method: Retrospective review by a consultant in rehabilitation medicine of electronic and case note records of EPIOC recipients with RDs attending a specialist wheelchair service between June 2007 and September 2008. Data were systematically extracted, entered into a database and analysed under three themes; demographic, diagnostic/clinical (including comorbidity and associated clinical features (ACFs) of the illness/disability) and wheelchair factors. Results: Fifty-four (27 male) EPIOC users, mean age 37.3 (SD 18.6, range 11–70) with RDs were identified and reviewed a mean of 64 (range 0–131) months after receiving their wheelchair. Diagnoses included 27 types of RDs including Friedreich’s ataxia, motor neurone disease, osteogenesis imperfecta, arthrogryposis, cerebellar syndromes and others. Nineteen users had between them 36 comorbidities and 30 users had 44 ACFs likely to influence the prescription. Tilt-in-space was provided to 34 (63%) users and specialised seating to 17 (31%). Four users had between them complex control or interfacing issues. Conclusions: The complex and diverse clinical problems of those with RDs present unique challenges to the multiprofessional wheelchair team to maintain successful independent mobility and community living

Energy-Based Models for Anomaly Detection: A Manifold Diffusion Recovery Approach

We present a new method of training energy-based models (EBMs) for anomaly detection that leverages low-dimensional structures within data. The proposed algorithm, Manifold Projection-Diffusion Recovery (MPDR), first perturbs a data point along a low-dimensional manifold that approximates the training dataset. Then, EBM is trained to maximize the probability of recovering the original data. The training involves the generation of negative samples via MCMC, as in conventional EBM training, but from a different distribution concentrated near the manifold. The resulting near-manifold negative samples are highly informative, reflecting relevant modes of variation in data. An energy function of MPDR effectively learns accurate boundaries of the training data distribution and excels at detecting out-of-distribution samples. Experimental results show that MPDR exhibits strong performance across various anomaly detection tasks involving diverse data types, such as images, vectors, and acoustic signals.Comment: NeurIPS 202

The Effect of Incremental Context on Conceptual Processing: Evidence from Visual World and Reading Experiments

Abstract The analysis of the internal structure of concepts reveals the presence of a substantial amount of contextual information. Even though this interaction is easily recognizable, it is not clear how contextual information is processed and included into concept representations. The aim of this paper is to shed light on this question by analyzing the effect that an increasing amount of context exerts on conceptual processing. We report a self-paced reading experiment and a visual world experiment to test two hypotheses about the integration of context information: the incremental activation hypothesis suggests that the degree of facilitation in concept processing increases with the amount of context available; and the immediate activation hypothesis states that once a sufficient amount of contextual support is reached, no more facilitation occurs. Our data are compatible with the latter account

Convective burn from use of hairdryer for heel warming prior to the heel prick test - a case report

Background Blood sampling through heel lancing is the most common invasive painful procedure performed on newborn infants. Case Presentation We report the case of a five day old infant who sustained burns to the left foot and leg after the mother's hairdryer was used by the midwife to warm the baby's heel prior to capillary blood sampling (CBS) with an automated device. Conclusion Heel warming is not recommended for routine CBS although it is often practiced. If pre-warming is to be practiced, standardised devices should be used rather than improvised techniques. This will reduce the risk of injury to these infants

Diabetic dyslipidaemia is associated with alterations in eNOS, caveolin-1 and endothelial dysfunction in streptozotocin treated rats

This is the peer reviewed version of the following article: Yousif A. Shamsaldeen, Rosemary Ugur, Christopher D. Benham, and Lisa A. Lione, ‘Diabetic dyslipidaemia is associated with alterations in eNOS, caveolin‐1, and endothelial dysfunction in streptozotocin treated rats’, Diabetes Metabolism Research and Reviews, e2995, March 2018, which has been published in final form at https://doi.org/10.1002/dmrr.2995. Under embargo until 22 February 2019. This article may be used for non-commercial purposes in accordance with Wiley Terms and Conditions for Self-Archiving.Background: Diabetes is a complex progressive disease characterised by chronic hyperglycaemia and dyslipidaemia associated with endothelial dysfunction. Oxidised LDL (Ox-LDL) is elevated in diabetes and may contribute to endothelial dysfunction. The aim of this study was to relate the serum levels of Ox-LDL with endothelial dysfunction in streptozotocin (STZ)-diabetic rats and to further explore the changes in endothelial nitric oxide synthase (eNOS) and caveolin-1 (CAV-1) expression in primary aortic endothelial cells (ECs). Methods: Diabetes was induced with a single intraperitoneal injection of STZ in male Wistar rats. During the hyperglycaemic diabetes state serum lipid markers, aortic relaxation and aortic ECs eNOS and CAV-1 protein expression was measured. Results: Elevated serum Ox-LDL (STZ 1486 ± 78.1 pg/ml vs control 732.6 ± 160.6pg/ml, p<0.05) was associated with hyperglycaemia (STZ 29 ± 0.9 mmol/L vs control: 7.2 ± 0.2 mmol/L, p<0.001) and hypertriglyceridemia (STZ 9.0 ± 1.5 mmol/L vs control: 3.0 ± 0.3 mmol/L, p<0.01) in diabetic rats. A significant reduction was observed in STZ-diabetic aortic endothelial cell eNOS and CAV-1 of 40% and 30% respectively, accompanied by a compromised STZ-diabetic carbachol-induced vasodilation (STZ 29.6 ± 9.3% vs control 77.2 ± 2.5%, p<0.001). Conclusions: The elevated serum Ox-LDL in hyperglycaemic STZ-diabetic rats may contribute to diabetic endothelial dysfunction, possibly through downregulation of endothelial CAV-1 and eNOS.Peer reviewe

The mental health disaster in conflict settings: Can scientific research help?

Neuner F, Elbert T. The mental health disaster in conflict settings: Can scientific research help? BMC Public Health. 2007;7(1): 275