The Role of Pharmacists in LGBTQ Health

Pharmacists are one of the most accessible healthcare providers and often can serve as the first point of contact for patients with the healthcare system. This session explored the role of that pharmacist on the healthcare team related to LGBTQ health. The new Center for the Advancement of Pharmacy Education (CAPE) Educational Outcomes were discussed as well as current efforts within pharmacy education in LGBTQ health education. The speakers also addressed barriers to LGBTQ education and practice along with potential solutions

De pasiones y reglas : Sentidos que circulan entre los jóvenes sobre la policia

Esta investigación surgió en el marco de disputas físicas, territoriales y culturales que protagonizaron jóvenes con la policía en la ciudad de La Plata. A raíz de estos enfrentamientos, que se tornaron repetitivos al momento de la elección de un tema de tesis, nos inquietó conocer cuál era el motor de esas disputas. En esta instancia surgió el interrogante que dio lugar al objetivo de este trabajo: conocer las construcciones de sentido que tienen los jóvenes hinchas de clase media, de 16 a 21 años, que asisten a la cancha des dos clubes platenses Estudiantes y Gimnasia y Esgrima, acerca de la policía de la Provincia de Buenos Aires. Es pertinente aclarar que el recorte del objeto surgió a partir de nuestro interés por adentrarnos en el universo de la juventud y, a fin de abordarlo de una manera más acotada, elegimos la mencionada franja etaria. Al momento de seleccionar un escenario para pensar las construcciones que los jóvenes tienen sobre la policía, surgieron varios espacios posibles: la escuela, el centro comercial de la ciudad (con sus respectivos puntos de encuentro) y los boliches nocturnos. Finalmente optamos por trabajar en un lugar, que si bien no estaba en los planes iniciales, es un contexto donde se produce una interacción visible y continua entre jóvenes y uniformados. Esta producción tiene además un enfoque regional, ya que se enmarca en La Plata, ciudad de la que somos oriundas y en la que el fútbol ocupa un lugar central en la vida social de los habitantes. Con respecto a la delimitación de la clase, nos abocamos a los jóvenes de los sectores medios, pues no hemos encontrado demasiadas investigaciones al respecto, y además nos vemos incluidas en ese recorte social. En este sentido, la presente tesis podría pensarse como un antecedente para futuros trabajos en los que se aborde la temática.Facultad de Periodismo y Comunicación Socia

SPECIAL ARTICLES Best Practices for Survey Research Reports Revisited: Implications of Target Population, Probability Sampling, and Response Rate

Several papers have been published recently in the Journal addressing ''best practices'' for survey research manuscripts. This paper explores in more detail the effects of the target population size on sample size determination, probability sampling versus census approaches, and response rates and the relationship to potential nonresponse bias. Survey research is a complex methodology requiring expertise in the planning, execution, and analytic stages

Curricular Evaluation Using Self-Efficacy Measurements

Self-efficacy measurements have been used in other health-related professions such as nursing and occupational therapy to assess proficiency in disciplinary areas but have not been used extensively in pharmacy education as a method of curricular evaluation. Self-efficacy is a measurement of an individual's confidence in his or her ability to perform a specific task to successful completion. The purpose of this study was to propose a methodology using self-efficacy measurements in curricular evaluation and assessment as well as to provide specific recommendations for potential uses in pharmacy education. The suggested methodology includes item generation, validation, administration, and correlation with behavior. A specific example is provided demonstrating the suggested methodology. Self-efficacy measurement could provide a potentially valuable methodologic framework for assessment and evaluation within pharmacy curricula. Self-efficacy measurements could be used in a wide range of applications

Report of the 2016-17 Academic Affairs Standing Committee: Entrustable Professional Activities Implementation Roadmap

The purpose of this report is to: 1) Identify linkages across the EPA statements, Center for the Advancement of Pharmacy Education 2013 Educational Outcomes (CAPE 2013) and the Joint Commission of Pharmacy Practitioners’ Pharmacist Patient Care Process (PPCP); 2) Provide ways EPA statements can be used to communicate core skills that are part of the entry-level pharmacist identity; 3) Suggest a potential roadmap for AACP members on how to implement EPA statements

Reversible Functional Changes Evoked by Anodal Epidural Direct Current Electrical Stimulation of the Rat Auditory Cortex

Rat auditory cortex was subjected to 0.1 mA anodal direct current in seven 10-min sessions on alternate days. Based on the well-known auditory cortex control of olivocochlear regulation through corticofugal projections, auditory brainstem responses (ABRs) were recorded as an indirect test of the effectiveness and reversibility of the multisession protocol of epidural stimulation. Increases of 20–30 dB ABR auditory thresholds shown after epidural stimulation reverted back to control levels 10 min after a single session. However, increases in thresholds revert 4 days after multisession stimulation. Less changes in wave amplitudes and threshold shifts were shown in ABR recorded contralaterally to the electrically stimulated side of the brain. To assess tissue effects of epidural electric stimulation on the brain cortex, well characterized functional anatomical markers of glial cells (GFAP/astrocytes and Iba1/microglial cells) and neurons (c-Fos) were analyzed in alternate serial sections by quantitative immunocytochemistry. Restricted astroglial and microglial reactivity was observed within the cytoarchitectural limits of the auditory cortex. However, interstitial GFAP overstaining was also observed in the ventricular surface and around blood vessels, thus supporting a potential global electrolytic stimulation of the brain. These results correlate with extensive changes in the distribution of c-Fos immunoreactive neurons among layers along sensory cortices after multisession stimulation. Quantitative immunocytochemical analysis supported this idea by showing a significant increase in the number of positive neurons in supragranular layers and a decrease in layer 6 with no quantitative changes detected in layer 5. Our data indicate that epidural stimulation of the auditory cortex induces a reversible decrease in hearing sensitivity due to local, restricted epidural stimulation. A global plastic response of the sensory cortices, also reported here, may be related to electrolytic effects of electric currents

Large expert-curated database for benchmarking document similarity detection in biomedical literature search

Document recommendation systems for locating relevant literature have mostly relied on methods developed a decade ago. This is largely due to the lack of a large offline gold-standard benchmark of relevant documents that cover a variety of research fields such that newly developed literature search techniques can be compared, improved and translated into practice. To overcome this bottleneck, we have established the RElevant LIterature SearcH consortium consisting of more than 1500 scientists from 84 countries, who have collectively annotated the relevance of over 180 000 PubMed-listed articles with regard to their respective seed (input) article/s. The majority of annotations were contributed by highly experienced, original authors of the seed articles. The collected data cover 76% of all unique PubMed Medical Subject Headings descriptors. No systematic biases were observed across different experience levels, research fields or time spent on annotations. More importantly, annotations of the same document pairs contributed by different scientists were highly concordant. We further show that the three representative baseline methods used to generate recommended articles for evaluation (Okapi Best Matching 25, Term Frequency-Inverse Document Frequency and PubMed Related Articles) had similar overall performances. Additionally, we found that these methods each tend to produce distinct collections of recommended articles, suggesting that a hybrid method may be required to completely capture all relevant articles. The established database server located at https://relishdb.ict.griffith.edu.au is freely available for the downloading of annotation data and the blind testing of new methods. We expect that this benchmark will be useful for stimulating the development of new powerful techniques for title and title/abstract-based search engines for relevant articles in biomedical research.Peer reviewe

Canagliflozin and renal outcomes in type 2 diabetes and nephropathy

BACKGROUND Type 2 diabetes mellitus is the leading cause of kidney failure worldwide, but few effective long-term treatments are available. In cardiovascular trials of inhibitors of sodium–glucose cotransporter 2 (SGLT2), exploratory results have suggested that such drugs may improve renal outcomes in patients with type 2 diabetes. METHODS In this double-blind, randomized trial, we assigned patients with type 2 diabetes and albuminuric chronic kidney disease to receive canagliflozin, an oral SGLT2 inhibitor, at a dose of 100 mg daily or placebo. All the patients had an estimated glomerular filtration rate (GFR) of 30 to <90 ml per minute per 1.73 m2 of body-surface area and albuminuria (ratio of albumin [mg] to creatinine [g], >300 to 5000) and were treated with renin–angiotensin system blockade. The primary outcome was a composite of end-stage kidney disease (dialysis, transplantation, or a sustained estimated GFR of <15 ml per minute per 1.73 m2), a doubling of the serum creatinine level, or death from renal or cardiovascular causes. Prespecified secondary outcomes were tested hierarchically. RESULTS The trial was stopped early after a planned interim analysis on the recommendation of the data and safety monitoring committee. At that time, 4401 patients had undergone randomization, with a median follow-up of 2.62 years. The relative risk of the primary outcome was 30% lower in the canagliflozin group than in the placebo group, with event rates of 43.2 and 61.2 per 1000 patient-years, respectively (hazard ratio, 0.70; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.59 to 0.82; P=0.00001). The relative risk of the renal-specific composite of end-stage kidney disease, a doubling of the creatinine level, or death from renal causes was lower by 34% (hazard ratio, 0.66; 95% CI, 0.53 to 0.81; P<0.001), and the relative risk of end-stage kidney disease was lower by 32% (hazard ratio, 0.68; 95% CI, 0.54 to 0.86; P=0.002). The canagliflozin group also had a lower risk of cardiovascular death, myocardial infarction, or stroke (hazard ratio, 0.80; 95% CI, 0.67 to 0.95; P=0.01) and hospitalization for heart failure (hazard ratio, 0.61; 95% CI, 0.47 to 0.80; P<0.001). There were no significant differences in rates of amputation or fracture. CONCLUSIONS In patients with type 2 diabetes and kidney disease, the risk of kidney failure and cardiovascular events was lower in the canagliflozin group than in the placebo group at a median follow-up of 2.62 years