An International Study of the Ability and Cost-Effectiveness of Advertising Methods to Facilitate Study Participant Self-Enrolment Into a Pilot Pharmacovigilance Study During Early Pregnancy

Knowledge of the fetal effects of maternal medication use in pregnancy is often inadequate and current pregnancy pharmacovigilance (PV) surveillance methods have important limitations. Patient self-reporting may be able to mitigate some of these limitations, providing an adequately sized study sample can be recruited.To compare the ability and cost-effectiveness of several direct-to-participant advertising methods for the recruitment of pregnant participants into a study of self-reported gestational exposures and pregnancy outcomes.The Pharmacoepidemiological Research on Outcomes of Therapeutics by a European Consortium (PROTECT) pregnancy study is a non-interventional, prospective pilot study of self-reported medication use and obstetric outcomes provided by a cohort of pregnant women that was conducted in Denmark, the Netherlands, Poland, and the United Kingdom. Direct-to-participant advertisements were provided via websites, emails, leaflets, television, and social media platforms.Over a 70-week recruitment period direct-to-participant advertisements engaged 43,234 individuals with the study website or telephone system; 4.78% (2065/43,234) of which were successfully enrolled and provided study data. Of these 90.4% (1867/2065) were recruited via paid advertising methods, 23.0% (475/2065) of whom were in the first trimester of pregnancy. The overall costs per active recruited participant were lowest for email (€23.24) and website (€24.41) advertisements and highest for leaflet (€83.14) and television (€100.89). Website adverts were substantially superior in their ability to recruit participants during their first trimester of pregnancy (317/668, 47.5%) in comparison with other advertising methods (P<.001). However, we identified international variations in both the cost-effectiveness of the various advertisement methods used and in their ability to recruit participants in early pregnancy.Recruitment of a pregnant cohort using direct-to-participant advertisement methods is feasible, but the total costs incurred are not insubstantial. Future research is needed to identify advertising strategies capable of recruiting large numbers of demographically representative pregnant women, preferentially in early pregnancy

Giant Resonance Excitation with 115 MeV Protons

This work was supported by National Science Foundation Grants PHY 76-84033A01, PHY 78-22774, and Indiana Universit

Inelastic Proton Scattering at Intermediate Energies to Giant Resonances

Supported by the National Science Foundation and Indiana Universit

Screening Instrument for Dysphagia in People with an Intellectual Disability (SD-ID):Quick and Reliable Screening by Caregivers

Background and Aim: Timely diagnosis of dysphagia is important for people with an intellectual disability. Periodic screening of each individual by speech-language therapists is barely feasible with respect to limited resources. Therefore, preselection of individuals with an increased dysphagia risk through screening by caregivers is crucial.Objective: This study aimed to develop the novel Screening instrument for Dysphagia for people with an Intellectual Disability (SD-ID).Methods: The SD-ID was developed, validated and optimised in two rounds. Version 3, consisting of nine risk factors and 20 items concerning eating/drinking behaviour, was thoroughly studied for feasibility, concurrent validity and reliability, and then optimised.Outcomes and Results: The SD-ID (version 3) was filled out in an average of four minutes (feasibility). A strong positive association was found between scores on SD-ID and Dysphagia Disorder Survey (concurrent validity). Test-retest and interrater reliability were very good. Two additional risk factors were added and two items removed to yield the final version 4. The most optimal cut-off score appeared to be either 4 or 5.Conclusions and Implications: The SD-ID is a reliable instrument to screen for an increased risk of dysphagia in people with an intellectual disability. Ideally it is part of a cyclic work process: Screening with SD-ID (step 1), diagnostic work-up if necessary (step 2), recommendations (step 3), and evaluation (step 4).</p

An attempt to explore the production routes of Astatine radionuclides: Theoretical approach

In order to fulfil the recent thrust of Astatine radionuclides in the field of nuclear medicine various production routes have been explored in the present work. The possible production routes of $^{209-211}$At comprise both light and heavy ion induced reactions at the bombarding energy range starting from threshold to maximum 100 MeV energy. For this purpose, we have used the nuclear reaction model codes TALYS, ALICE91 and PACE-II. Excitation functions of those radionuclides, produced through various production routes, have been calculated using nuclear reaction model codes and compared with the available measured data. Contribution of various reaction mechanisms, like, direct, preequilibrium and equilibrium reactions, to the total reaction cross section has been studied using the codes. Result shows that equilibrium reaction mechanism dominates in all cases over other reaction mechanisms

Feasibility and reliability of fetal two dimensional speckle tracking echocardiography at 16 weeks gestational age:A pilot study

BACKGROUND: Fetal two-dimensional speckle tracking echocardiography (2D-STE) is an emerging technique for assessing fetal cardiac function by measuring global longitudinal strain. Alterations in global longitudinal strain may serve as early indicator of pregnancy complications, making 2D-STE a potentially valuable tool for early detection. Early detection can facilitate timely interventions to reduce fetal and maternal morbidity and mortality. Therefore, the aim of this study was to investigate the feasibility of performing 2D-STE at 16 weeks gestational age.METHODS: This pilot study utilized 50 ultrasound clips of the fetal four-chamber view recorded between 15+5 and 16+2 weeks gestational age from a prospective cohort study. A strict protocol assessed three parameters essential for 2D-STE analysis: fetal four-chamber view ultrasound clip quality, region of interest, and frame rates. Two independent researchers measured global longitudinal strain in all adequate fetal four-chamber view ultrasound clips to determine inter- and intra-operator reliability.RESULTS: Out of the 50 ultrasound clips, 37 (74%) were feasible for 2D-STE analysis. The inter-operator reliability for global longitudinal strain measurements of the left and right ventricles was moderate (ICC of 0.64 and 0.74, respectively), while the intra-operator reliability was good (ICC of 0.76 and 0.79, respectively).CONCLUSIONS: Our findings demonstrate that fetal 2D-STE analysis at 16 weeks gestational age is feasible when adhering to a strict protocol. However, further improvements are necessary to enhance the inter- and intra-operator reliability of 2D-STE at this gestational age.</p

Experimental determination of monopole strength in 40Ca between 10 and 20 MeV excitation energy

The distribution of isoscalar monopole strength in 40Ca was determined from singles 40Ca(α, α′) and from coincident 40Ca(α,α′α0) data at Eα =120 MeV and scattering angles from 0° to 3°. Between 10.5 and 15.7 MeV excitation energy (23±5)% of the EO EWSR was located from the singles and from the coincidence measurements independently, while (30 ±6)% of the EO EWSR was found in the interval 10.5–20 MeV from the singles data only

Separabelized Skyrme Interactions and Quasiparticle RPA

A finite rank separable approximation for the quasiparticle RPA with Skyrme interactions is applied to study the low lying quadrupole and octupole states in some S isotopes and giant resonances in some spherical nuclei. It is shown that characteristics calculated within the suggested approach are in a good agreement with available experimental data.Comment: 12 pages, 2 figures, proceedings of the Seventh School-Seminar on Heavy Ion Physics, Dubna, Russia, May 27-June 1, 2002; to appear in Physics of Atomic Nucle