Κύπρος 1882: Κέντρο υποδοχής προσφύγων μετά την επανάσταση του Άραμπι στην Αίγυπτο

Please note: this article is in Greek. Cyprus 1882: a “safe haven” for refugees after the Arabi revolt in Egypt: Four years after the British takeover of Cyprus, a crisis in Egypt tested the island. This article aims to present the use of Cyprus by the British during the 1882 Arabi revolt and “Egyptian campaign”, as a place of refuge for European and Ottoman refugees from Egypt. This role Cyprus played has been so far neglected in the relevant literature; here it will be shown how the island was used to accommodate refugees. Using material from the British and Cypriot archives and from the Greek and British newspapers of the island (the latter providing information that was not found in any other account) the paper highlights how the British and Cyprus funds were used for the relief of the refugees and the way the people of the island reacted when faced with such a humanitarian crisis

Harbours, harbour works and commerce in Cyprus, 1878-1910

The lack of harbour facilities was always a setback in the financial development of Cyprus. The paper aims to describe the harbour facilities of the island in 1878–1879, and to analyse how the harbour works in Limasol, Larnaca and Kyrenia in 1881, 1882 and 1890 respectively and in Famagusta harbour in 1905, affected the shipping and commercial activity of the coastal towns. At the same time it will outline how much was spent on the harbour works and its authorisation. All of these factors will highlight to what extent the harbour works contributed to the economic development of Cyprus

Foodstuffs imports and diet change in Cyprus, 1881–1946/7

Using information from the import statistics found in the Cyprus Blue Books, this paper aims to examine the trends of diet change in Cyprus, in the period 1881–1948. Data on imported foodstuffs as reported in the Blue Books published in the Census Years (1881, 1891, 1901, 1911, 1921, 1931, 1946) is collected; the special focus is on (a) “new” foodstuff categories (e.g. “fine cheeses”, imported liquor, beer) and (b) on the bulk import of foodstuffs either not produced at all in Cyprus, or produced in quantities not sufficient for the needs of the population. Some of these are sugar, flour, pasta, rice et al. Quantitative data is processed to produce a per capita consumption in the census years. The result will indicate the general trend in diet change, as “new” food categories were made available and incorporated in the local diet. Information from sources such as advertisements as well as information on new manufacturing plants (e.g. pasta factories and breweries) will be used to complement and partially validate the trends on diet change in the years of colonial rule in Cyprus

Cervical masses as manifestation of papillary thyroid carcinomas ≤10 mm in diameter, in patients with unknown thyroid disease

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Papillary thyroid microcarcinomas are tumors often found accidentally after thyroidectomy for other thyroid disorders.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Patients with enlarged lateral cervical masses, with unknown thyroid disease, found to have metastases from papillary thyroid carcinoma ≤10 mm in diameter, were compared to patients operated on for nodular or multinodular goiter, who were incidentally found to have papillary thyroid microcarcinomas.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Group A included 24 patients with an enlarged lateral cervical mass whereas group B included 30 patients presenting with nodular or multinodular goiter. Patients in both groups underwent surgery. After thyroidectomy and lymph node dissection, pathology revealed multifocal papillary carcinomas of 1–10 mm, with invasion of the thyroid capsule and surrounding soft tissue in most of the cases in group A. Two patients presented with distant metastases at diagnosis which were surgically removed. During follow up, 3 patients (12.5%) presented with new cervical metastases which were surgically removed or treated with additional radioactive iodine. At last follow-up, all patients were alive. In contrast, all patients in group B had unifocal papillary thyroid carcinoma 1–10 mm in maximum diameter, with no infiltration or extension into the adjacent tissue, or cervical lymph node metastases.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Two groups of papillary thyroid microcarcinomas characterized by different clinical and biological behaviours are identified. Significant differences were found between these groups concerning the age, tumor size, number of tumor foci, lymph nodes metastases and extrathyroidal extension of the tumor. Papillary thyroid carcinomas of small (≤10 mm) size may have aggressive behaviour or be metastatic, and this subgroup should be treated and followed up as are other large, differentiated thyroid cancers.</p

La figura del protagonista en la novela Guatimozín, último emperador de México de Gertudis Gómez de Avellaneda

Το ρομαντικό ιστορικό μυθιστόρημα Guatimozín, último emperador de México (1846) είναι ένα από τα σημαντικότερα έργα της συγγραφέως Gertrudis Gómez de Avellaneda (Κούβα, 1814 – Ισπανία, 1873). Η συγγραφέας ανασυνθέτει μέσα από μια λογοτεχνική προοπτική τα ιστορικά γεγονότα της κατάκτησης της αυτοκρατορίας των Αζτέκων από τον Hernán Cortés, τις τελευταίες ημέρες του Moctezuma και την τελευταία εξέγερση των Αζτέκων υπό τον Guatimozín, διάδοχό του και πρωταγωνιστή του μυθιστορήματος. Στόχος αυτής της μελέτης είναι να αναδείξει την προσωπικότητα του ήρωα του μυθιστορήματος, της ιστορικής μορφής Guatimozín, μέσα από μια λογοτεχνική και ιστορική ανάλυση του έργου. Ακολουθώντας τις ρομαντικές αρχές, η Gómez de Avellaneda παρουσιάζει τον αγώνα και τη θυσία του ιθαγενούς πρωταγωνιστή προκειμένου να υπερασπιστεί όχι μόνο τον λαό του, αλλά και τα ιδανικά και τον τρόπο ζωής του. Ως εκ τούτου, ο Γκουατιμοζίν υψώνεται σε ένα πανισπανικό σύμβολο του αγώνα για τα ανθρώπινα δικαιώματα και την ελευθερία.La novela romántica histórica Guatimozín, último emperador de México (1846) constituye una de las obras más importantes de la escritora Gertrudis Gómez de Avellaneda (Cuba, 1814 – España, 1873). La autora reconstruye desde una perspectiva literaria los hechos históricos de la conquista del imperio azteca por Hernán Cortés, los últimos días de Moctezuma y el último levantamiento del pueblo azteca bajo Guatimozín, su sucesor y protagonista de la novela. El objetivo del presente estudio es destacar la personalidad del personaje principal de la novela, la figura histórica del héroe Guatimozín, a través de un análisis literario e histórico de la obra. Siguiendo los principios románticos, Gómez de Avellaneda presenta la lucha y el sacrificio del protagonista indígena para defender no solo a su pueblo, sino a sus ideales y su modo de vida. Por lo tanto, Guatimozín se eleva a símbolo panhispánico de la lucha por los derechos humanos y la libertad

Histological subtype is the most important determinant of survival in metastatic papillary thyroid cancer

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Papillary thyroid cancer (PTC) comprises the commonest type of thyroid cancer and carries the highest rate of survival. However, when metastatic disease occurs, survival is significantly affected.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>We aimed to identify prognostic histopathological and clinical factors that modify survival in metastatic PTC. All cases of metastatic PTC treated at our department in the last 20 years were reviewed and analyzed.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Histological subtype was the most important determinant of survival, as classic PTC demonstrated clearly improved survival compared to follicular subtype of PTC and other less frequently seen histological subtypes. The instant risk of death for the other histological subtypes was 4.56 times higher than the risk for the classic papillary type. Overall, a 10-year survival of 76.6% in our patients was seen.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Patients with aggressive variants of PTC are more at risk for the development of metastatic disease. In these patients, established treatment modalities (surgery, radioiodine therapy) should be offered promptly, as well as close follow-up.</p

A statistical method for retrospective cardiac and respiratory motion gating of interventional cardiac x-ray images

Purpose: Image-guided cardiac interventions involve the use of fluoroscopic images to guide the insertion and movement of interventional devices. Cardiorespiratory gating can be useful for 3D reconstruction from multiple x-ray views and for reducing misalignments between 3D anatomical models overlaid onto fluoroscopy. Methods: The authors propose a novel and potentially clinically useful retrospective cardiorespiratory gating technique. The principal component analysis (PCA) statistical method is used in combination with other image processing operations to make our proposed masked-PCA technique suitable for cardiorespiratory gating. Unlike many previously proposed techniques, our technique is robust to varying image-content, thus it does not require specific catheters or any other optically opaque structures to be visible. Therefore, it works without any knowledge of catheter geometry. The authors demonstrate the application of our technique for the purposes of retrospective cardiorespiratory gating of normal and very low dose x-ray fluoroscopy images. Results: For normal dose x-ray images, the algorithm was validated using 28 clinical electrophysiology x-ray fluoroscopy sequences (2168 frames), from patients who underwent radiofrequency ablation (RFA) procedures for the treatment of atrial fibrillation and cardiac resynchronization therapy procedures for heart failure. The authors established end-systole, end-expiration, and end-inspiration success rates of 97.0%, 97.9%, and 97.0%, respectively. For very low dose applications, the technique was tested on ten x-ray sequences from the RFA procedures with added noise at signal to noise ratio (SNR) values of √50, √10, √8, √6, √5, √2 and √1 to simulate the image quality of increasingly lower dose x-ray images. Even at the low SNR value of √2, representing a dose reduction of more than 25 times, gating success rates of 89.1%, 88.8%, and 86.8% were established. Conclusions: The proposed technique can therefore extract useful information from interventional x-ray images while minimizing exposure to ionizing radiation. © 2014 American Association of Physicists in Medicine

Image-based view-angle independent cardiorespiratory motion gating and coronary sinus catheter tracking for x-ray-guided cardiac electrophysiology procedures

Determination of the cardiorespiratory phase of the heart has numerous applications during cardiac imaging. In this article we propose a novel view-angle independent near-real time cardiorespiratory motion gating and coronary sinus (CS) catheter tracking technique for x-ray fluoroscopy images that are used to guide cardiac electrophysiology procedures. The method is based on learning CS catheter motion using principal component analysis and then applying the derived motion model to unseen images taken at arbitrary projections, using the epipolar constraint. This method is also able to track the CS catheter throughout the x-ray images in any arbitrary subsequent view. We also demonstrate the clinical application of our model on rotational angiography sequences. We validated our technique in normal and very low dose phantom and clinical datasets. For the normal dose clinical images we established average systole, end-expiration and end-inspiration gating success rates of 100%, 85.7%, and 92.3%, respectively. For very low dose applications, the technique was able to track the CS catheter with median errors not exceeding 1 mm for all tracked electrodes. Average gating success rates of 80.3%, 71.4%, and 69.2% were established for the application of the technique on clinical datasets, even with a dose reduction of more than 10 times. In rotational sequences at normal dose, CS tracking median errors were within 1.2 mm for all electrodes, and the gating success rate was 100%, for view angles from RAO 90° to LAO 90°. This view-angle independent technique can extract clinically useful cardiorespiratory motion information using x-ray doses significantly lower than those currently used in clinical practice

3D/2D Registration with Superabundant Vessel Reconstruction for Cardiac Resynchronization Therapy

<p>Miscellaneous classes: consistent/single studies of pregnancy associated pharmacokinetic changes (percent calculated as pregnant/nonpregnant values).</p

Carotid Ultrasound Boundary Study (CUBS): An Open Multicenter Analysis of Computerized Intima–Media Thickness Measurement Systems and Their Clinical Impact

[Abstract] Common carotid intima–media thickness (CIMT) is a commonly used marker for atherosclerosis and is often computed in carotid ultrasound images. An analysis of different computerized techniques for CIMT measurement and their clinical impacts on the same patient data set is lacking. Here we compared and assessed five computerized CIMT algorithms against three expert analysts’ manual measurements on a data set of 1088 patients from two centers. Inter- and intra-observer variability was assessed, and the computerized CIMT values were compared with those manually obtained. The CIMT measurements were used to assess the correlation with clinical parameters, cardiovascular event prediction through a generalized linear model and the Kaplan–Meier hazard ratio. CIMT measurements obtained with a skilled analyst's segmentation and the computerized segmentation were comparable in statistical analyses, suggesting they can be used interchangeably for CIMT quantification and clinical outcome investigation. To facilitate future studies, the entire data set used is made publicly available for the community at http://dx.doi.org/10.17632/fpv535fss7.