Social Influence Given (Partially) Deliberate Matching: Career Imprints in the Creation of Academic Entrepreneurs

Actors often match with associates on a small set of dimensions that matter most for the particular relationship at hand. In so doing, they are exposed to unanticipated social influences because counterparts have more interests, attitudes, and preferences than would-be associates considered when they first chose to pair. This implies that some apparent social influences (those tied to the rationales for forming the relationship) are endogenous to the matching process, while others (those that are incidental to the formation of the relationship) may be conditionally exogenous, thus enabling causal estimation of peer effects. We illustrate this idea in a new dataset tracking the training and professional activities of academic biomedical scientists. In qualitative and quantitative analyses, we show that scientists match to their postdoctoral mentors based on two dominant factors, geography and scientific focus. They then adopt their advisers' orientations toward commercial science as evidenced by the transmission of patenting behavior, but they do not match on this dimension. We demonstrate this in two-stage models that adjust for the endogeneity of the matching process, using a modification of propensity score estimation and a sample selection correction with valid exclusion restrictions. Furthermore, we draw on qualitative accounts of the matching process recorded in oral histories of the career choices of the scientists in our data. All three methods-qualitative description, propensity score estimators, and those that tackle selection on unobservable factors-are potential approaches to establishing evidence of social influence in partially endogenous networks, and they may be especially persuasive in combination.

Retractions

To what extent does “false science” impact the rate and direction of scientific change? We examine the impact of over 1,100 scientific retractions on the citation trajectories of articles that are related to retracted papers in intellectual space but were published prior to the retraction event. Following retraction and relative to carefully selected controls, related articles experience a lasting five to ten percent decline in the rate of citations received. This penalty is more severe when the retracted article involves fraud or misconduct, rather than honest mistakes. In addition, we find that the arrival rate of new articles and funding ows into these fields decrease after a retraction.National Science Foundation (U.S.) (SciSIP Program Award SBE-0738142)National Science Foundation (U.S.) (SciSIP Program Award SBE-0738394

Characteristics and outcome of patients with newly diagnosed advanced or metastatic lung cancer admitted to intensive care units (ICUs)

BACKGROUND: Although patients with advanced or metastatic lung cancer have poor prognosis, admission to the ICU for management of life-threatening complications has increased over the years. Patients with newly diagnosed lung cancer appear as good candidates for ICU admission, but more robust information to assist decisions is lacking. The aim of our study was to evaluate the prognosis of newly diagnosed unresectable lung cancer patients. METHODS: A retrospective multicentric study analyzed the outcome of patients admitted to the ICU with a newly diagnosed lung cancer (diagnosis within the month) between 2010 and 2013. RESULTS: Out of the 100 patients, 30 had small cell lung cancer (SCLC) and 70 had non-small cell lung cancer. (Thirty patients had already been treated with oncologic treatments.) Mechanical ventilation (MV) was performed for 81 patients. Seventeen patients received emergency chemotherapy during their ICU stay. ICU, hospital, 3- and 6-month mortality were, respectively, 47, 60, 67 and 71%. Hospital mortality was 60% when invasive MV was used alone, 71% when MV and vasopressors were needed and 83% when MV, vasopressors and hemodialysis were required. In multivariate analysis, hospital mortality was associated with metastatic disease (OR 4.22 [1.4-12.4]; p = 0.008), need for invasive MV (OR 4.20 [1.11-16.2]; p = 0.030), while chemotherapy in ICU was associated with survival (OR 0.23, [0.07-0.81]; p = 0.020). CONCLUSION: This study shows that ICU management can be appropriate for selected newly diagnosed patients with advanced lung cancer, and chemotherapy might improve outcome for patients with SCLC admitted for cancer-related complications. Nevertheless, tumors' characteristics, numbers and types of organ dysfunction should be taken into account in the decisional process before admitting these patients in ICU.Peer reviewe

Admission of advanced lung cancer patients to intensive care unit: A retrospective study of 76 patients

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Criteria for admitting patients with incurable diseases to the medical intensive care unit (MICU) remain unclear and have ethical implications.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>We retrospectively evaluated MICU outcomes and identified risk factors for MICU mortality in consecutive patients with advanced lung cancer admitted to two university-hospital MICUs in France between 1996 and 2006.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Of 76 included patients, 49 had non-small cell lung cancer (stage IIIB n = 20; stage IV n = 29). In 60 patients, MICU admission was directly related to the lung cancer (complication of cancer management, n = 30; cancer progression, n = 14; and lung-cancer-induced diseases, n = 17). Mechanical ventilation was required during the MICU stay in 57 patients. Thirty-six (47.4%) patients died in the MICU. Three factors were independently associated with MICU mortality: use of vasoactive agents (odds ratio [OR] 6.81 95% confidence interval [95%CI] [1.77-26.26], p = 0.005), mechanical ventilation (OR 6.61 95%CI [1.44-30.5], p = 0.015) and thrombocytopenia (OR 5.13; 95%CI [1.17-22.5], p = 0.030). In contrast, mortality was lower in patients admitted for a complication of cancer management (OR 0.206; 95%CI [0.058-0.738], p = 0.015). Of the 27 patients who returned home, four received specific lung cancer treatment after the MICU stay.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Patients with acute complications of treatment for advanced lung cancer may benefit from MCIU admission. Further studies are necessary to assess outcomes such as quality of life after MICU discharge.</p