Valoración del riesgo nutricional en pacientes ingresados en hospitales públicos del sur de Galicia

[Resumen] Introducción: En los países desarrollados una de las principales bolsas de malnutrición la encontramos entre la población de hospitalizados. Entre las causas, la enfermedad de base, el estrés metabólico aumentado, deficiencias en la ingesta y otros problemas inherentes al funcionamiento de los hospitales están implicados. Objetivo: Conocer la prevalencia de malnutrición y validar un protocolo de cribado nutricional en pacientes adultos hospitalizados, representativos de los pacientes ingresados por enfermedades agudas en el sur de Galicia. Pacientes y Métodos: Estudio transversal multicéntrico de 184 pacientes aleatorizados (89 varones, 111 de 65 años o más) de 6 hospitales públicos que representan el 92% de camas hospitalarias y el 88% de la población atendida por los servicios públicos de salud de las provincias de Orense y Pontevedra, ingresados por enfermedades agudas médicas, quirúrgicas o traumatológicas. Los pacientes fueron evaluados mediante pruebas de cribado (PC) del riesgo de desnutrición (Cardona, Elmore, Ulíbarri, NRS-2002, Must) que incluyen variables relativas a cambios de peso recientes, Albúmina Sérica, Linfocitos, Ingesta, diagnostico al ingreso, y con dos pruebas de diagnóstico (PD) más complejas (Método de Chang y valoración global subjetiva [VGS]. Se tomó como método de referencia para las comparaciones la VGS. Todas las pruebas fueron aplicadas por personal entrenado en valoración nutricional. Se compararon los resultados de las PC y las PD, y se analizaron los principales factores relacionados con la presencia de malnutrición; se consideró significación estadística con un valor de P<0,05. Resultados: Se encontró más de un 40% de pacientes con dificultades en la ingesta dietética o síntomas gastrointestinales que interferían con la misma, así como un significado deterioro de la capacidad funcional en los ingresados respecto a su situación previa. De entre los pacientes estudiados, de acuerdo con los métodos cribados, el riesgo de malnutrición se situó en torno al 45% de los pacientes, con una adecuada correlación entre ellos. De acuerdo con la VGS, el 44,6% de los pacientes presentaban malnutrición leve o significativa (Clase B+C), y de acuerdo con el protocolo de Chang el 66,3%, siendo la mayoría de los casos afectaciones leves del compartimento proteico visceral. La correlación entre las dos PD fue significativa. La correlación y el índice kappa de las PC fue significativa respecto al método al método de referencia (VGS). Se encontró a través de regresión logística un modelo explicativo (R2=03,13) Para la presencia de malnutrición por VGS en el que las variables independientemente relacionadas fueron un menor recuento de lifoncitos y la observación de pérdida de masa muscular en el examen físico. Conclusiones: La prevalencia del riesgo de malnutrición en adultos hospitalizados en hospitales del sur de Galicia es alta y concordante con lo publicado en otros países de nuestro entorno. Disponemos de herramientas de cribado útil y factible para detectar precozmente este riesgo y aplicar protocolos de diagnóstico y tratamiento para los pacientes que lo necesiten. Este algoritmo de manejo nutricional clínica y dietética hospitalarias y apoyado por las autorizaciones sanitarias con el fin de paliar este importante problema sanitario en nuestro medio

Portable multispectral imaging system based on Raspberry Pi

Purpose In this work, the authors aim to present a compact low-cost and portable spectral imaging system for general purposes. The developed system provides information that can be used for a fast in situ identification and classification of samples based on the analysis of captured images. The connectivity of the instrument allows a deeper analysis of the images in an external computer. Design/methodology/approach The wavelength selection of the system is carried out by light multiplexing through a light-emitting diode panel where eight wavelengths covering the spectrum from ultraviolet (UV) to near-infrared region (NIR) have been included. The image sensor used is a red green blue – infrared (RGB-IR) micro-camera controlled by a Raspberry Pi board where a basic image processing algorithm has been programmed. It allows the visualization in an integrated display of the reflectance and the histogram of the images at each wavelength, including UV and NIRs. Findings The prototype has been tested by analyzing several samples in a variety of applications such as detection of damaged, over-ripe and sprayed fruit, classification of different type of plastic materials and determination of properties of water. Originality/value The designed system presents some advantages as being non-expensive and portable in comparison to other multispectral imaging systems. The low-cost and size of the camera module connected to the Raspberry Pi provides a compact instrument for general purposes.Project CTQ2013-44545-R from the Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (Spain)Junta de Andalucía (Proyecto de Excelencia P10-FQM-5974)European Regional Development Funds (ERDF

A compact dosimetric system for MOSFETs based on passive NFC tag and smartphone

The authors acknowledge the Servicio de Radiofísica (Radio-physics Service) of the Hospital Universitario San Cecilio (Granada, Spain) for permitting us to use their installations. This work was funded by the Spanish Government under project FPA2015-67694-P (Spanish Ministry of Economy, Industry and Competitiveness) and a R&D predoctoral grant (FPU13/05032, Spanish Ministry of Education, Culture and Sport). This project is partially supported by European Regional Development Funds (ERDF).In this work we describe and evaluate a dosimetric system based on an NFC (Near Field Communication) tag and a smartphone that uses commercial MOSFETs as radiation sensors. The tag is designed with commercial integrated circuits and the smartphone is the power source of the tag configured as a readout unit, user interface and storage unit. The NFC tag is supplied wirelessly by the smartphone via NFC, using a home-made structure to align the tag coil and smartphone coil in order to achieve a good inductive coupling. In this case, the commercial DMOS transistor ZVP3306 is used as dosimeter in unbiased mode, connected to the tag before and after each irradiation session to perform the sensor reading. An evaluation of the dosimetric system has been carried out irradiating three transistors with photon beam of 6 MV up to 20 Gy. The average sensitivity found is (4.75 ± 0.15) mV/Gy, which is in good agreement with the results found with our previously developed dosimetric system. Therefore, this miniaturised dosimetric system can be considered as a promising and low cost electronic architecture to be used for dosimetry control in radio-therapy treatments.Servicio de Radiofísica (Radio-physics Service) of the Hospital Universitario San Cecilio (Granada, Spain)Spanish Government under project FPA2015-67694-P (Spanish Ministry of Economy, Industry and Competitiveness) and a R&D predoctoral grant (FPU13/05032, Spanish Ministry of Education, Culture and Sport)European Regional Development Funds (ERDF

Non-Invasive Oxygen Determination in Intelligent Packaging Using a Smartphone

Here, we present a technique for the determination of the gaseous oxygen concentration 2 inside packed food. It is based on the use of a luminescent membrane sensitive to O2 that is optically excited and read by a smartphone. The flash of the smartphone along with an optical filter is used as the light source for the optical stimulation of the membrane. The luminescence generated, which is quenched by the surrounding gaseous oxygen, is registered by the rear camera of the same device. The response parameter is defined by combining the registered intensities at two different wavelength ranges corresponding to the emission and the absorption peaks of the sensitive membrane. Thanks to this novel response parameter, the sensitivity is increased and, more importantly, the thermal dependence of the membrane is significantly reduced. This approach allows the use of a luminescent O2-sensitive membrane for intelligent packaging with no need of any associated electronics for its excitation and reading. This means that an oxygen sensor is developed, where a luminescent compound acts as an indicator, therefore combining the advantages of both schemes, that is, the simplicity and reduced cost of indicators with the high sensitivity and accuracy of selective sensors.This work was supported by the Spanish Ministry of Economics and Competivity through the Project CTQ2016-78754-C2-1-R. The work P. Escobedo Araque was supported by the Spanish Ministry of Education, Culture and Sport under Grant FPU13/05032. The work of I. Pérez de Vargas-Sansalvador was supported in part by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Program (Multisens) under Grant 706303, in part by the Talentia Postdoc Program launched by the Andalusian Knowledge Agency, in part by the European Union’s Seventh Framework Program, in part by the Marie Skłodowska-Curie actions (COFUND) under Grant 267226, and in part by the Ministry of Economy, Innovation, Science and Employment of the Junta de Andalucía

Digital Optical Ballistocardiographic System for Activity, Heart Rate, and Breath Rate Determination during Sleep

In this work, we present a ballistocardiographic (BCG) system for the determination of heart and breath rates and activity of a user lying in bed. Our primary goal was to simplify the analog and digital processing usually required in these kinds of systems while retaining high performance. A novel sensing approach is proposed consisting of a white LED facing a digital light detector. This detector provides precise measurements of the variations of the light intensity of the incident light due to the vibrations of the bed produced by the subject’s breathing, heartbeat, or activity. Four small springs, acting as a bandpass filter, connect the boards where the LED and the detector are mounted. Owing to the mechanical bandpass filtering caused by the compressed springs, the proposed system generates a BCG signal that reflects the main frequencies of the heartbeat, breathing, and movement of the lying subject. Without requiring any analog signal processing, this device continuously transmits the measurements to a microcontroller through a twowire communication protocol, where they are processed to provide an estimation of the parameters of interest in configurable time intervals. The final information of interest is wirelessly sent to the user’s smartphone by means of a Bluetooth connection. For evaluation purposes, the proposed system has been compared with typical BCG systems showing excellent performance for different subject positions. Moreover, applied postprocessing methods have shown good behavior for information separation from a single-channel signal. Therefore, the determination of the heart rate, breathing rate, and activity of the patient is achieved through a highly simplified signal processing without any need for analog signal conditioning.Junta de Andalucia European Commission PYC20-RE-040 UGR MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033/with PID2019-103938RB-I00European Commissio

Comparative Study of Inkjet-Printed Silver Conductive Traces With Thermal and Electrical Sintering

Thermal sintering has traditionally been the most popular sintering method to enhance conductivity after the printing process in the manufacturing of printed electronics. Nevertheless, in recent years, there has been a growing interest in electrical sintering as an alternative method to overcome some of the limitations of thermal curing. This paper makes a comparative study of both sintering methods in terms of surface morphology, electrical dc conductance, and radiofrequency performance for different applied voltage waveforms. To this end, microstrip transmission lines have been inkjet-printed using nanoparticle-based silver ink on flexible polyimide substrate. The traces have been tested under different sintering conditions, achieving electrical sintering resistivity values only 2.3 times higher than that of bulk silver. This implies a 62% reduction in comparison with the best resistivity value achieved using thermal sintering in our samples. The main novelty of this contribution lies in the analysis of RF behavior as a function of electrical sintering conditions. Lower resistivities have been achieved with slower voltage ramps or allowing higher density current during sintering. It has also been proved that electrically sintered lines have similar RF performance than high-temperature thermally sintered lines in terms of insertion losses, regardless of their very different surface topology. Therefore, we can take advantage of the benefits that electrical sintering offers over thermal sintering regarding significant shorter sintering times maintaining suitable RF performance.This work was supported in part by the Spanish Ministry of Economics and Competitiveness under Grant CTQ2016-78754-C2-1-R

Non-syndromic craniosynostosis in children : scoping review

Craniosynostosis (CS) is a complex condition consisting of the early fusion of one or more cranial sutures in the intrauterine stage. The affected infant exhibits abnormal head shape at time of birth or shortly thereafter. It can be observed in normal individuals (non-syndromic CS or NSCS) or as a part of a multisystem syndrome. The purposes of the present article were to carry out a scoping review on Non-Syndromic CS and to discuss the most important findings retrieved. The steps of this scoping review were as follows: first, to pose a research question; second, to identify relevant studies to answer the research question; third, to select and retrieve the studies; fourth, to chart the critical data, and finally, to collate, summarize, and report the results from the most important articles. Relevant articles published over a 20-year period were identified and retrieved from five Internet databases: PubMed; EMBASE; Cochrane Library; Google Scholar, and EBSCO. Fourteen articles were finally included in the present scoping review. The following four most important clinical issues are discussed: (i) normal cranial development, clinical manifestations, and pathogenesis of NCSC; (ii) clinical evaluation of NCSC; (iii) treatment and post-surgical follow-up; and (iv) additional considerations. NSCS may be present with associated head shapes. Multiple early surgical reconstructive options are currently available for the disorder. Pediatric Dentistry practitioners must be familiarized with this condition and form part of a multi-approach health team as those responsible for the opportune oral health care of the affected child

Flexible Passive NFC Tag for Multi-Gas Sensing

In this work we present a full-passive flexible multigas sensing tag for the determination of oxygen, carbon dioxide, ammonia, and relative humidity readable by a smartphone. This tag is based on near field communication (NFC) technology for energy harvesting and data transmission to a smartphone. The gas sensors show an optic response that is read through high-resolution digital color detectors. A white LED is used as the common optical excitation source for all the sensors. Only a reduced electronics with very low power consumption is required for the reading of the optical responses and data transmission to a remote user. An application for the Android operating system has been developed for the power supplying and data reception from the tag. The responses of the sensors have been calibrated and fitted to simple functions, allowing a fast prediction of the gases concentration. Cross-sensitivity has also been evaluated, finding that in most of the cases it is negligible or easily correctable using the rest of the readings. The election of the target gases has been due to their importance in the monitoring of modified atmosphere packaging. The resolutions and limits of detection measured are suitable for such kinds of applications.This work was supported by project CTQ2013-44545-R from the Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (Spain) and Junta de Andalucía (Proyecto de Excelencia P10- FQM-5974). These projects were partially supported by European Regional Development Funds (ERDF). P. Escobedo wants to thank the Spanish Ministry of Education, Culture and Sport (MECD) for a pre-doctoral grant (FPU13/05032)

Compact readout system for chipless passive LC tags and its application for humidity monitoring

The development of a contactless readout system for High Frequency (HF) tags and its application to relative humidity monitoring is presented. The system consists of a Colpitts oscillator circuit whose frequency response is determined by a built-in logic counter of a microcontroller unit. The novel readout strategy is based on the frequency response change due to the inductive coupling between the coil of the Colpitts oscillator and the load impedance of a parallel LC resonator tag, as a result of the variation of the humidity sensing capacitor. The frequency is monitored with a low cost microcontroller, resulting in a simple readout circuit. This passive LC tag has been directly screen-printed on a humidity-sensitive flexible substrate. The readout circuit experimental uncertainty as frequency meter was 4 kHz in the HF band. A linear temperature drift of (-1.52 ± 0.17) kHz/⁰C was obtained, which can be used to apply thermal compensation if required. The readout system has been validated as a proof of concept for humidity measurement, obtaining a significant change of about 260 kHz in the resonance frequency of the Colpitts oscillator when relative humidity varies from 10% to 90%, with a maximum uncertainty of ±3% (±2 SD). Therefore, the proposed readout system stands as a compact, low-cost, contactless solution for chipless HF tags that avoids the use of bulky and costly equipment for the analog reading of wireless passive LC sensors.This work was supported by project CTQ2016-78754-C2-1-R from the Spanish Ministry of Economics and Competitivity. P. Escobedo wants to thank the Spanish Ministry of Education, Culture and Sport (MECD) for a pre-doctoral grant (FPU13/05032)

Cognitive status and nutritional markers in a sample of institutionalized elderly people

Background: Since many of the risk factors for cognitive decline can be modified by diet, the study of nutrition and its relationships with cognitive status in aging has increased considerably in recent years. However, there are hardly any studies that have assessed cognitive status using a comprehensive set of neuropsychological tests along with measures of functional capacity and mood and that have related it to nutritional status measured from several nutritional parameters that have shown its relationships with cognitive function. Objective: To test the differences in depressive symptomatology and in several measures of nutritional status between three groups classified according to their cognitive status (CS hereafter). Method: One hundred thirteen participants from nursing homes in Galicia, Spain, underwent a comprehensive neuropsychological examination, including a general screening test (MMSE) and tests for different cognitive domains along with measures of activities of daily living (ADL) and assessment of depressive symptomatology (GDSSF). According to established clinical criteria, participants were divided into three CS groups, Cognitively Intact (CI), Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI), and All-Cause Dementia (ACD). Nutritional status was also examined using blood-derived measures, body mass index (BMI) and a nutritional screening test (MNA-SF). Differences between CS groups in all nutritional variables were studied by one-way ANOVAs with post-hoc Bonferroni correction or Kruskal-Wallis with Games-Howell post-hoc correction when appropriate. Multinomial logistic regression was also applied to test the association between nutritional variables and CS. Results: Differences between CS groups were statistically significant for depressive symptomatology, vitamin A and D, albumin, selenium (Se), uric acid (UA), and BMI. The results of multinomial logistic regression found positive associations between groups with better CS and higher concentrations of vitamins A and D, transthyretin (TTR), albumin, Se, and UA, while negative associations were found for BMI. Conclusion: Higher serum levels of vitamin A, vitamin D, TTR, albumin, Se, and UA could act as protective factors against cognitive decline, whereas higher BMI could act as a risk factorNUTRIAGE (0359_NUTRIAGE_1_E) was a research project 75% co-financed by the Interreg V-A Spain-Portugal Program (POCTEP) 2014–2020 through the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) of the European UnionS