A further use for the Harvest plot: a novel method for the presentation of data synthesis

2011 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 79-83 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Crowther ◽  
Alison Avenell ◽  
Graeme MacLennan ◽  
Graham Mowatt
Author(s):  
Eleanor M Rees ◽  
Emily S Nightingale ◽  
Yalda Jafari ◽  
Naomi Waterlow ◽  
Samuel Clifford ◽  
...  

Background The COVID-19 pandemic has placed an unprecedented strain on health systems, with rapidly increasing demand for healthcare in hospitals and intensive care units (ICUs) worldwide. As the pandemic escalates, determining the resulting needs for healthcare resources (beds, staff, equipment) has become a key priority for many countries. Projecting future demand requires estimates of how long patients with COVID-19 need different levels of hospital care. Methods We performed a systematic review to gather data on length of stay (LoS) of patients with COVID-19 in hospital and in ICU. We subsequently developed a method to generate LoS distributions which combines summary statistics reported in multiple studies, accounting for differences in sample sizes. Applying this approach we provide distributions for general hospital and ICU LoS from studies in China and elsewhere, for use by the community. Results We identified 52 studies, the majority from China (46/52). Median hospital LoS ranged from 4 to 53 days within China, and 4 to 21 days outside of China, across 45 studies. ICU LoS was reported by eight studies - four each within and outside China - with median values ranging from 6 to 12 and 4 to 19 days, respectively. Our summary distributions have a median hospital LoS of 14 (IQR: 10-19) days for China, compared with 5 (IQR: 3-9) days outside of China. For ICU, the summary distributions are more similar (median (IQR) of 8 (5-13) days for China and 7 (4-11) days outside of China). There was a visible difference by discharge status, with patients who were discharged alive having longer LoS than those who died during their admission, but no trend associated with study date. Conclusion Patients with COVID-19 in China appeared to remain in hospital for longer than elsewhere. This may be explained by differences in criteria for admission and discharge between countries, and different timing within the pandemic. In the absence of local data, the combined summary LoS distributions provided here can be used to model bed demands for contingency planning and then updated, with the novel method presented here, as more studies with aggregated statistics emerge outside China.


Author(s):  
M.A. Gregory ◽  
G.P. Hadley

The insertion of implanted venous access systems for children undergoing prolonged courses of chemotherapy has become a common procedure in pediatric surgical oncology. While not permanently implanted, the devices are expected to remain functional until cure of the primary disease is assured. Despite careful patient selection and standardised insertion and access techniques, some devices fail. The most commonly encountered problems are colonisation of the device with bacteria and catheter occlusion. Both of these difficulties relate to the development of a biofilm within the port and catheter. The morphology and evolution of biofilms in indwelling vascular catheters is the subject of ongoing investigation. To date, however, such investigations have been confined to the examination of fragments of biofilm scraped or sonicated from sections of catheter. This report describes a novel method for the extraction of intact biofilms from indwelling catheters.15 children with Wilm’s tumour and who had received venous implants were studied. Catheters were removed because of infection (n=6) or electively at the end of chemotherapy.


GeroPsych ◽  
2012 ◽  
Vol 25 (4) ◽  
pp. 235-245 ◽  
Author(s):  
Katja Franke ◽  
Christian Gaser

We recently proposed a novel method that aggregates the multidimensional aging pattern across the brain to a single value. This method proved to provide stable and reliable estimates of brain aging – even across different scanners. While investigating longitudinal changes in BrainAGE in about 400 elderly subjects, we discovered that patients with Alzheimer’s disease and subjects who had converted to AD within 3 years showed accelerated brain atrophy by +6 years at baseline. An additional increase in BrainAGE accumulated to a score of about +9 years during follow-up. Accelerated brain aging was related to prospective cognitive decline and disease severity. In conclusion, the BrainAGE framework indicates discrepancies in brain aging and could thus serve as an indicator for cognitive functioning in the future.


2018 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 276-295 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael A. Woodley of Menie ◽  
Mateo Peñaherrera-Aguirre ◽  
Heitor B. F. Fernandes ◽  
Aurelio-José Figueredo
Keyword(s):  

2014 ◽  
Vol 62 (S 02) ◽  
Author(s):  
J. Photiadis ◽  
M. Musci ◽  
O. Miera ◽  
S. Ovroutski ◽  
A. Mekkawy ◽  
...  

1979 ◽  
Author(s):  
W. Nieuwenhuizen ◽  
I. A. M. van Ruijven-Vermeer ◽  
F. Haverkate ◽  
G. Timan

A novel method will be described for the preparation and purification of fibrin(ogen) degradation products in high yields. The high yields are due to two factors. on the one hand an improved preparation method in which the size heterogeneity of the degradation products D is strongly reduced by plasmin digestion at well-controlled calcium concentrations. At calcium concentrations of 2mM exclusively D fragments, M.W.= 93-000 (Dcate) were formed; in the presence of 1OmM EGTA only fragments M.W.= 80.000 (D EGTA) were formed as described. on the other hand a new purification method, which includes Sephadex G-200 filtration to purify the D:E complexes and separation of the D and E fragments by a 16 hrs. preparative isoelectric focussing. The latter step gives a complete separation of D (fragments) (pH = 6.5) and E fragments (at pH = 4.5) without any overlap, thus allowing a nearly 100% recovery in this step. The overall recoveries are around 75% of the theoretical values. These recoveries are superior to those of existing procedures. Moreover the conditions of this purification procedure are very mild and probably do not affect the native configuration of the products. Amino-terminal amino acids of human Dcate, D EGTA and D-dimer are identical i.e. val, asx and ser. in the ratgly, asx and ser were found. E 1% for rat Dcate=17-8 for rat D EGTA=16.2 and for rat D- dimer=l8.3. for the corresponding human fragments, these values were all 20.0 ± 0.2.


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