Application of ISO 9001 quality management standards

Siirretty Doriast

Hoivayrittäjyys ikääntyvien palveluissa - nyt ja tulevaisuudessa

Raportissa kuvataan ikääntyvien palveluihin keskittyvää hoivayrittäjyyttä. Tietojen kerääminen tehtiin osana EU-rahoitteista CarePrise-projektia vuosien 2011–2013 aikana. Tavoitteena oli löytää ja kuvata erilaisia hyviä käytäntöjä eri maista – niin hoivayrittäjyyden kuin sosiaali- ja terveysalan yrittäjyyskasvatuksen alalta. Käytäntöjä etsittiin kumppaneiden, saatujen vihjeiden, tiedotusvälineissä esiin tulleen tiedon sekä internetin avustuksella. Hyvien käytäntöjen toimintaympäristöä kartoitettiin jotta saatiin tietoa käytännöt mahdollistavista erityispiirteistä, jotka mahdollistavat kyseisen toiminnan. Raportoidut hyvät käytännöt toimivat erilaisissa hyvinvointiyhteiskunnissa, joissa julkisella, yksityisellä, kolmannella ja epävirallisella sektorilla on erilaiset roolit. Toimintaympäristön kartoittamista tehtiin myös tulevaisuuden näkökulmasta. Tulevaisuuskuvia rakennettiin yhdistämällä delfoi-tekniikkaa hyödyntävää kyselyä sekä aikaisempia jo olemassa olevia tutkimuksia. Hyvien käytäntöjen ja tulevaisuuskuvien valossa ideoitiin uudenlaisia palveluita, joille ehkä vielä ei ole markkinoita, mutta jotka tulevaisuudessa voisivat olla haluttuja palveluja. Tällä hetkellä hoivapalveluiden markkinat ovat murrosvaiheessa. Siellä missä liikkuu suurimmat volyymit ja rahat, liikkuvat myös suuret yritykset, jotka valtaavat parhaillaan markkinoita. Osa hoivapalveluiden markkinoista on kilpailtuja, mutta monet yritykset ovat löytäneet oman tilansa markkinoilta tarkoituksenmukaisen konseptin tai hyvin kohdennetun tarjonnan avulla. Markkinarakoja tulee olemaan myös tulevaisuudessa. Pienet yritykset voivat rajata ja kohdistaa palveluita entistä enemmän joko alueellisesti tai kohderyhmänsä puolesta.The report describes the market-based care of the elderly. Data collection was done during the years 2011 –2013 as part of an EU co-funded project called CarePrise. The goal was to find good practices in Finland, Germany, Austria, Poland, and the Netherlands. Such practices were sought with the help of international partners, received clues, and media, including the Internet. The good practices found in the field of social and health care were described. In addition, the operational environment was charted, in order to find out if there were special features that made a particular activity possible and good. The good practices were found in countries with different kinds of welfare models. The countries put different emphasis on the public, private, non-governmental and informal sectors. Changes in society also make the need for entrepreneurship education visible. Future professionals will work in an environment where cooperation between different actors is part of everyday work. The future perspectives were also analyzed. Future scenarios were developed utilizing the Delphi technique in an enquiry, and on the basis of the existing research. In the light of good practices and future scenarios, new service ideas were developed. The authors thought of such service concepts for which there may be no market at the moment but which might be desired services in the future. At the moment, the private market of elderly care services is under transformation. Where the largest volumes and money are, there are also the big companies, which are trying to take over the market. There are market segments with much competition, but, on the other hand, many firms have found their space on the market thanks to a well-designed business concept or well-targeted supply. Niches will also exist in the future. Services provided by small and mediumsized enterprises may become more targeted than before, either locally or by target group

Selective Plating Underestimates Abundance and Shows Differential Recovery of Bifidobacterial Species from Human Feces

The aim of the present work was to compare the efficacies and levels of selectivity of different culture-dependent and -independent methods for analyzing bifidobacteria in human stool samples. The three different culture media used here significantly differed from each other, particularly with regard to the recovery of Bifidobacterium adolescentis. Bifidobacterium medium failed to recover B. adolescentis; Beerens medium recovered some B. adolescentis organisms (17% of total bifidobacteria), whereas tomato-Eugon medium recovered mainly B. adolescentis organisms (58% of total bifidobacteria). A culture-independent method that combines GC fractionation of bacterial community DNA and 16S rRNA sequencing indicated that B. adolescentis organisms accounted for 85% of all bifidobacteria. Methodological biases, such as those described in this paper, should be taken into account in interpreting earlier studies and designing future experiments

Uniting biobank resources reveals novel genetic pathways modulating susceptibility for atopic dermatitis

Publisher Copyright: © 2021 The AuthorsBackground: Atopic dermatitis (AD) is a common chronic inflammatory skin disease with high heritability. Previous genome-wide association studies have identified several loci predisposing to AD. These findings explain approximately 30% of the variance in AD susceptibility, suggesting that further work is required to fully understand the genetic underpinnings. Objective: We sought to gain additional understanding of the genetic contribution to AD risk by using biobank resources. Methods: We completed a genome-wide meta-analysis of AD in 796,661 individuals (Ncases = 22,474) from the FinnGen study, the Estonian Biobank, and the UK Biobank. We further performed downstream in silico analyses to characterize the risk variants at the novel loci. Results: We report 30 loci associating with AD (P < 5 × 10−8), 5 of which are novel. In 2 of the novel loci, we identified missense mutations with deleterious predictions in desmocollin 1 and serpin family B member 7, genes encoding proteins crucial to epidermal strength and integrity. Conclusions: These findings elucidate novel genetic pathways involved in AD pathophysiology. The likely involvement of desmocollin 1 and serpin family B member 7 in AD pathogenesis may offer opportunities for the development of novel treatment strategies for AD in the future.Peer reviewe

Uniting biobank resources reveals novel genetic pathways modulating susceptibility for atopic dermatitis

Publisher Copyright: © 2021 The AuthorsBackground: Atopic dermatitis (AD) is a common chronic inflammatory skin disease with high heritability. Previous genome-wide association studies have identified several loci predisposing to AD. These findings explain approximately 30% of the variance in AD susceptibility, suggesting that further work is required to fully understand the genetic underpinnings. Objective: We sought to gain additional understanding of the genetic contribution to AD risk by using biobank resources. Methods: We completed a genome-wide meta-analysis of AD in 796,661 individuals (Ncases = 22,474) from the FinnGen study, the Estonian Biobank, and the UK Biobank. We further performed downstream in silico analyses to characterize the risk variants at the novel loci. Results: We report 30 loci associating with AD (P < 5 × 10−8), 5 of which are novel. In 2 of the novel loci, we identified missense mutations with deleterious predictions in desmocollin 1 and serpin family B member 7, genes encoding proteins crucial to epidermal strength and integrity. Conclusions: These findings elucidate novel genetic pathways involved in AD pathophysiology. The likely involvement of desmocollin 1 and serpin family B member 7 in AD pathogenesis may offer opportunities for the development of novel treatment strategies for AD in the future.Peer reviewe

The Finnish genetic heritage in 2022 - from diagnosis to translational research

Publisher Copyright: © 2022. Published by The Company of Biologists Ltd.Isolated populations have been valuable for the discovery of rare monogenic diseases and their causative genetic variants. Finnish disease heritage (FDH) is an example of a group of hereditary monogenic disorders caused by single major, usually autosomal-recessive, variants enriched in the population due to several past genetic drift events. Interestingly, distinct subpopulations have remained in Finland and have maintained their unique genetic repertoire. Thus, FDH diseases have persisted, facilitating vigorous research on the underlying molecular mechanisms and development of treatment options. This Review summarizes the current status of FDH, including the most recently discovered FDH disorders, and introduces a set of other recently identified diseases that share common features with the traditional FDH diseases. The Review also discusses a new era for population-based studies, which combine various forms of big data to identify novel genotype-phenotype associations behind more complex conditions, as exemplified here by the FinnGen project. In addition to the pathogenic variants with an unequivocal causative role in the disease phenotype, several risk alleles that correlate with certain phenotypic features have been identified among the Finns, further emphasizing the broad value of studying genetically isolated populations.Peer reviewe

Genetic Variability Overrides the Impact of Parental Cell Type and Determines iPSC Differentiation Potential

Reports on the retention of somatic cell memory in induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) have complicated the selection of the optimal cell type for the generation of iPSC biobanks. To address this issue we compared transcriptomic, epigenetic, and differentiation propensities of genetically matched human iPSCs derived from fibroblasts and blood, two tissues of the most practical relevance for biobanking. Our results show that iPSC lines derived from the same donor are highly similar to each other. However, genetic variation imparts a donor-specific expression and methylation profile in reprogrammed cells that leads to variable functional capacities of iPSC lines. Our results suggest that integration-free, bona fide iPSC lines from fibroblasts and blood can be combined in repositories to form biobanks. Due to the impact of genetic variation on iPSC differentiation, biobanks should contain cells from large numbers of donors.Peer reviewe

Uniting biobank resources reveals novel genetic pathways modulating susceptibility for atopic dermatitis

Background: Atopic dermatitis (AD) is a common chronic inflammatory skin disease with high heritability. Previous genome-wide association studies have identified several loci predisposing to AD. These findings explain approximately 30% of the variance in AD susceptibility, suggesting that further work is required to fully understand the genetic underpinnings.Objective: We sought to gain additional understanding of the genetic contribution to AD risk by using biobank resources.Methods: We completed a genome-wide meta-analysis of AD in 796,661 individuals (Ncases = 22,474) from the FinnGen study, the Estonian Biobank, and the UK Biobank. We further performed downstream in silico analyses to characterize the risk variants at the novel loci.Results: We report 30 loci associating with AD (P -8), 5 of which are novel. In 2 of the novel loci, we identified missense mutations with deleterious predictions in desmocollin 1 and serpin family B member 7, genes encoding proteins crucial to epidermal strength and integrity.Conclusions: These findings elucidate novel genetic pathways involved in AD pathophysiology. The likely involvement of desmocollin 1 and serpin family B member 7 in AD pathogenesis may offer opportunities for the development of novel treatment strategies for AD in the future.Keywords: Atopic dermatitis; DSC1; FinnGen; SERPINB7; genome-wide association.Copyright © 2021 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.</p

Impact of diets with a high content of greaves-meal protein or carbohydrates on faecal characteristics, volatile fatty acids and faecal calprotectin concentrations in healthy dogs

BACKGROUND: Research suggests that dietary composition influences gastrointestinal function and bacteria-derived metabolic products in the dog colon. We previously reported that dietary composition impacts upon the faecal microbiota of healthy dogs. This study aims at evaluating the dietary influences on bacteria-derived metabolic products associated with the changes in faecal microbiota that we had previously reported. We fed high-carbohydrate starch based (HCS), [crude protein: 194 g/kg, starch: 438 g/kg], high-protein greaves-meal (HPGM), [crude protein: 609 g/kg, starch: 54 g/kg] and dry commercial (DC), [crude protein: 264 g/kg, starch: 277 g/kg] diets, and studied their effects on the metabolism of the colonic microbiota and faecal calprotectin concentrations in five Beagle dogs, allocated according to the Graeco-Latin square design. Each dietary period lasted for three weeks and was crossed-over with washout periods. Food intake, body weight, and faecal consistency scores, dry matter, pH, ammonia, volatile fatty acids (VFAs), and faecal canine calprotectin concentrations were determined. RESULTS: Faecal ammonia concentrations decreased with the HCS diet. All dogs fed the HPGM diet developed diarrhoea, which led to differences in faecal consistency scores between the diets. Faecal pH was higher with the HPGM diet. Moreover, decreases in propionic and acetic acids coupled with increases in branched-chain fatty acids and valeric acid caused changes in faecal total VFAs in dogs on the HPGM diet. Faecal canine calprotectin concentration was higher with the HPGM diet and correlated positively with valeric acid concentration. CONCLUSIONS: The HPGM diet led to diarrhoea in all dogs, and there were differences in faecal VFA profiles and faecal canine calprotectin concentrations

The Finnish genetic heritage in 2022 - from diagnosis to translational research

Isolated populations have been valuable for the discovery of rare monogenic diseases and their causative genetic variants. Finnish disease heritage (FDH) is an example of a group of hereditary monogenic disorders caused by single major, usually autosomal-recessive, variants enriched in the population due to several past genetic drift events. Interestingly, distinct subpopulations have remained in Finland and have maintained their unique genetic repertoire. Thus, FDH diseases have persisted, facilitating vigorous research on the underlying molecular mechanisms and development of treatment options. This Review summarizes the current status of FDH, including the most recently discovered FDH disorders, and introduces a set of other recently identified diseases that share common features with the traditional FDH diseases. The Review also discusses a new era for population-based studies, which combine various forms of big data to identify novel genotype-phenotype associations behind more complex conditions, as exemplified here by the FinnGen project. In addition to the pathogenic variants with an unequivocal causative role in the disease phenotype, several risk alleles that correlate with certain phenotypic features have been identified among the Finns, further emphasizing the broad value of studying genetically isolated populations