428 research outputs found
Factors That Could Impact on Liver Fibrosis Staging by Transient Elastography.
PublishedReviewTransient elastography (TE) based on liver stiffness measurement (LSM) is one of the most validated noninvasive methods for liver fibrosis staging in patients with chronic liver diseases. This method is painless, has no potential complications, is rapid (100 exams), in a 3-hour fasting status, and its results should be handled by specialist clinicians that are aware of the limitations of this method.This work was supported by funding from Newton Fund
RCUK-CONFAP Research Partnerships Call, Fundac¸ao Car- ˜
los Chagas Filho de Amparo a Pesquisa do Estado do Rio `
de Janeiro (FAPERJ) under Grant E-26/170.021/2015 (Brazil),
and Medical Research Council (MRC) Grant reference MR/
M026515/1 (UK); from Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento
Cient´ıfico e Tecnologico (CNPq)/Bolsa Jovem Talento ´
(BJT) under Grant 301520/2014-3; from FAPERJ under Grant
E-26/110.268/2014; and from Fundac¸ao para Desenvolvi- ˜
mento Cientifico e Tecnologico em Sa ´ ude (FioTec), Rio de ´
Janeiro, Brazil
Micro-costing analysis of guideline-based treatment by direct-acting agents: the real-life case of hepatitis C management in Brazil
Background
Eradication of hepatitis C virus (HCV) using direct-acting agents (DAA) has been associated with a financial burden to health authorities worldwide. We aimed to evaluate the guideline-based treatment costs by DAAs from the perspective of the Brazilian Ministry of Health (BMoH).
Methods
The activity based costing method was used to estimate the cost for monitoring/treatment of genotype-1 (GT1) HCV patients by the following strategies: peg-interferon (PEG-IFN)/ribavirin (RBV) for 48 weeks, PEG-IFN/RBV plus boceprevir (BOC) or telaprevir (TEL) for 48 weeks, and sofosbuvir (SOF) plus daclastavir (DCV) or simeprevir (SIM) for 12 weeks. Costs were reported in United States Dollars without (US). Drug costs were collected at the National Database of Health Prices and an overview of the literature was performed to assess effectiveness of SOF/DCV and SOF/SIM regimens in real-world cohorts.
Results
Treatment costs of GT1-HCV patients were PPP 24,020.16) for PEG-IFN/RBV, PPP 39,578.23) for PEG-IFN/RBV/BOC and PPP 47,946.92) for PEG-IFN/RBV/TEL. Treatment by all-oral interferon-free regimens were the less expensive approach: PPP 10,985.90) for SOF/DCV and PPP 12,002.75) for SOF/SIM. The overview reported HCV eradication in up to 98% for SOF/DCV and 96% for SOF/SIM.
Conclusion
Strategies with all oral interferon-free might lead to lower costs for management of GT1-HCV patients compared to IFN-based regimens in Brazil. This occurred mainly because of high discounts over international DAA prices due to negotiation between BMoH and pharmaceutical industries
Optimal Scheduling of Multiproduct Pipeline System Using MILP Continuous Approach
Part 5: Planning and Scheduling; International audience; To date, the multiproduct pipeline transportation mode has nationally and internationally considerably evolved thanks to his efficiently and effectively of transporting several products. In this paper, we focus our study on the scheduling of a multiproduct pipeline system that receives a number of petroleum products (fuels) from a single refinery source in order to be distributed to several storage and distribution centers (depots). Mixed Integer Linear Programming (MILP) continuous mathematical approach is presented to solve this problem. The sequence of injected products in the same pipeline should be carefully studied, in order to meet market demands and ensure storage autonomy of the marketable pure products in the fuels depots on the one hand and to minimize the number of interfaces; Birth zone of mixture between two products in contact and in sequential flow, which may hinder the continuous operation of the pipeline system, by the necessity of additional storage capacity for this last mixture, that is in no way marketable and requires special processing operations. This work is applied on a real case of a multiproduct pipeline that feeds the western and southwestern region of Algeria with fuels. The obtained results based on the MILP continuous approach give an optimal scheduling of the multiproduct transport system with a minimized number of interfaces.
Document type: Conference objec
Quantizing higher-spin gravity in free-field variables
We study the formulation of massless higher-spin gravity on AdS in a
gauge in which the fundamental variables satisfy free field Poisson brackets.
This gauge choice leaves a small portion of the gauge freedom unfixed, which
should be further quotiented out. We show that doing so leads to a bulk version
of the Coulomb gas formalism for CFT's: the generators of the residual
gauge symmetries are the classical limits of screening charges, while the
gauge-invariant observables are classical charges. Quantization in these
variables can be carried out using standard techniques and makes manifest a
remnant of the triality symmetry of . This symmetry can be
used to argue that the theory should be supplemented with additional matter
content which is precisely that of the Prokushkin-Vasiliev theory. As a further
application, we use our formulation to quantize a class of conical surplus
solutions and confirm the conjecture that these are dual to specific degenerate
primaries, to all orders in the large central charge expansion.Comment: 31 pages + appendices. V2: typos corrected, reference adde
Graphene plasmonics
Two rich and vibrant fields of investigation, graphene physics and
plasmonics, strongly overlap. Not only does graphene possess intrinsic plasmons
that are tunable and adjustable, but a combination of graphene with noble-metal
nanostructures promises a variety of exciting applications for conventional
plasmonics. The versatility of graphene means that graphene-based plasmonics
may enable the manufacture of novel optical devices working in different
frequency ranges, from terahertz to the visible, with extremely high speed, low
driving voltage, low power consumption and compact sizes. Here we review the
field emerging at the intersection of graphene physics and plasmonics.Comment: Review article; 12 pages, 6 figures, 99 references (final version
available only at publisher's web site
Polymorphism of the pedictive antigenic sites on the V3 loop of Brazilian HIV-1 subtype B strains
Patterns of subnet usage reveal distinct scales of regulation in the transcriptional regulatory network of Escherichia coli
The set of regulatory interactions between genes, mediated by transcription
factors, forms a species' transcriptional regulatory network (TRN). By
comparing this network with measured gene expression data one can identify
functional properties of the TRN and gain general insight into transcriptional
control. We define the subnet of a node as the subgraph consisting of all nodes
topologically downstream of the node, including itself. Using a large set of
microarray expression data of the bacterium Escherichia coli, we find that the
gene expression in different subnets exhibits a structured pattern in response
to environmental changes and genotypic mutation. Subnets with less changes in
their expression pattern have a higher fraction of feed-forward loop motifs and
a lower fraction of small RNA targets within them. Our study implies that the
TRN consists of several scales of regulatory organization: 1) subnets with more
varying gene expression controlled by both transcription factors and
post-transcriptional RNA regulation, and 2) subnets with less varying gene
expression having more feed-forward loops and less post-transcriptional RNA
regulation.Comment: 14 pages, 8 figures, to be published in PLoS Computational Biolog
g-Functions and gluon scattering amplitudes at strong coupling
We study gluon scattering amplitudes/Wilson loops in N=4 super Yang-Mills
theory at strong coupling by calculating the area of the minimal surfaces in
AdS_3 based on the associated thermodynamic Bethe ansatz system. The remainder
function of the amplitudes is computed by evaluating the free energy, the T-
and Y-functions of the homogeneous sine-Gordon model. Using conformal field
theory (CFT) perturbation, we examine the mass corrections to the free energy
around the CFT point corresponding to the regular polygonal Wilson loop. Based
on the equivalence between the T-functions and the g-functions, which measure
the boundary entropy, we calculate corrections to the T- and Y-functions as
well as express them at the CFT point by the modular S-matrix. We evaluate the
remainder function around the CFT point for 8 and 10-point amplitudes
explicitly and compare these analytic expressions with the 2-loop formulas. The
two rescaled remainder functions show very similar power series structures.Comment: 51 pages, 4 figures, v2: some comments and references added, based on
the published version, v3: minor change
First records of Falco deiroleucus nest temminck, 1825 (Falconiformes: Falconidae) tree for Brazil and the first description of food storage in hollow tree
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