Heather M Green

This study aimed to evaluate psychometric properties of Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy Cognitive Version 3 (FACT-Cog3). Scoring was compared when including then excluding four multitasking items that the scale authors added after validating the scale. This was intended to improve guidance about use of FACT-Cog3 in both clinical and non-clinical samples. Data from previous studies in people with and without cancer were supplemented with a new sample, for a total of 205 participants with and 110 participants without a history of cancer. Factors, reliability, and validity were examined in conjunction with other relevant measures. Exploratory factor analysis results supported a four-factor solution (i.e., perceived cognitive impairment [PCI], comments from others, perceived cognitive ability [PCA], and quality of life) for both versions of the scale in a clinical sample. In the non-clinical sample, factor analysis results suggested a four-factor solution for the 37-item scale but not the 33-item version, suggesting that the scale may perform differently in a non-clinical sample. High reliability and validity were found for both samples in the 33-item and 37-item versions of the scale. To gain a comprehensive understanding of perceived cognitive functioning it is recommended that the 37-item FACT-Cog3 scoring should be used in research and clinical practice. Most importantly, regardless of which scoring is used, it is essential that users clearly disclose which scoring method for the FACT-Cog3 has been selected and it is recommended that subscales are labelled accordingly (e.g., PCI18, PCA20, PCA7, PCA9).

Associations between age, resting-state (RS) peak-alpha-frequency (PAF = frequency showing largest amplitude alpha activity), and thalamic volume (thalamus thought to modulate alpha activity) were examined to understand differences in RS alpha activity between children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and typically-developing children (TDC) noted in prior studies. RS MEG and structural-MRI data were obtained from 51 ASD and 70 TDC 6- to 18-year-old males. PAF and thalamic volume maturation were observed in TDC but not ASD. Although PAF was associated with right thalamic volume in TDC (R2 = 0.12, p = 0.01) but not ASD (R2 = 0.01, p = 0.35), this group difference was not large enough to reach significance. Findings thus showed unusual maturation of brain function and structure in ASD as well as an across-group thalamic contribution to alpha rhythms.

2020), https://www.oed.com/view/Entry/229713. 3 Will Steffen, Paul J. Crutzen, and John R. McNeill, “The Anthropocene: Are Humans Now Overwhelmning the Great Forces of Nature?” Ambio 36, no. 8 (2007): 614–21; John R. McNeill and Peter Engelke, The Great Acceleration: An Environmental History of the Anthropocene since 1945 (Cambridge: Belknap Press, 2016); Jan Zalasiewicz et al., “The Working Group on the Anthropocene: Summary of Evidence and Interim Recommendations,” Anthropocene 19 (2017): 55–60. 4 Attenborough, A Life on Our Planet, 215. 5 Donna Haraway, “Anthropocene, Capitalocene, Plantationocene, Chthulucene: Making Kin,” Environmental Humanities 6, no. 1 (2015): 159–65; Gregg Mitman, Reflections on the Plantationocene: A Conversation with Donna Haraway and Anna Tsing (Madison: Edge Effects Magazine, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 2019). 6 While these populations may have a different relationship with the environment than Western ones, we should be wary of stereotyping Indigenous populations as being inherently more “ecological.” See Shepard Krech III, The Ecological Indian: Myth and History (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1999). 7 William Cronon, “The Trouble with Wilderness: Or, Getting Back to the Wrong Nature,” in Uncommon Ground: Rethinking the Human Place in Nature, ed. William Cronon (New York: W. W. Norton, 1995). At the same time, I note that episode 6 of Attenborough’s Planet Earth II (2016) features cities as habitats. 8 Louise Boscacci, “Wit(h)nessing,” Environmental Humanities 10, no. 1 (2018): 343–47. 9 Stephen Wearing, Anne Buchmann, and Chantelle Jobberns, “Free Willy: The Whale-watching Legacy,” Worldwide Hospitality and Tourism Themes 3, no. 2 (2011): 127–40. 10 Dan Brockington, “Powerful Environmentalisms: Conservation, Celebrity and Capitalism,” Media Culture Society 30 (2008): 551–68. 11 Oxford English Dictionary Online, definition 8. 12 Kelly Oliver, “Witnessing, Recognition, and Response Ethics,” Philosophy & Rhetoric 48, no. 4 (2015): 486.

ABSTRACT To date, digital intervention into modernist studies has had a largely textual impulse, with ventures such as the Modernist Archives Publishing Project (MAPP) and the Modernist Journals Project seeking to broaden the accessibility of archival material. Utilizing the Modernist Podcast as a case study, this paper reframes the debate along aural lines by surveying the potential of podcasting for modernist studies. Thinking through the podcast as an alternate model of scholarly production, the paper examines the multifaceted feminist potentiality of podcasting as both a method of knowledge sharing and a pedagogical tool. Following this, the paper critiques the intersectional limitations of the podcast as a form, focusing on issues surrounding accessibility and viability.

BACKGROUND: Low rectal tumors are often treated with sphincter-preserving resection followed by coloanal anastomosis. OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this study was to compare the short-term complications following straight coloanal anastomosis vs colonic J-pouch anal anastomosis. DESIGN: Patients were identified who underwent proctectomy for rectal neoplasia followed by coloanal anastomosis in the 2008 to 2013 American College of Surgeons National Surgical Quality Improvement Program database. Demographic characteristics and 30-day postoperative complications were compared between groups. SETTINGS: A national sample was extracted from the American College of Surgeons National Surgical Quality Improvement Project database. PATIENTS: Inpatients following proctectomy and coloanal anastomosis for rectal cancer were selected. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Demographic characteristics and 30-day postoperative complications were compared between the 2 groups. RESULTS: One thousand three hundred seventy patients were included, 624 in the straight anastomosis group and 746 in the colonic J-pouch group. Preoperative characteristics were similar between groups, with the exception of preoperative radiation therapy (straight anastomosis 35% vs colonic J-pouch 48%, p = 0.0004). Univariate analysis demonstrated that deep surgical site infection (3.7% vs 1.4%, p = 0.01), septic shock (2.25% vs 0.8%, p = 0.04), and return to the operating room (8.8% vs 5.0%, p = 0.0006) were more frequent in the straight anastomosis group vs the colonic J-pouch group. Major complications were also higher (23% vs 14%, p = 0.0001) and length of stay was longer in the straight anastomosis group vs the colonic J-pouch group (8.9 days vs 8.1 days, p = 0.02). After adjusting for covariates, major complications were less following colonic J-pouch vs straight anastomosis (OR, 0.57; CI, 0.38–0.84; p = 0.005). Subgroup analysis of patients who received preoperative radiation therapy demonstrated no difference in major complications between groups. LIMITATIONS: This study had those limitations inherent to a retrospective study using an inpatient database. CONCLUSION: Postoperative complications were less following colonic J-pouch anastomosis vs straight anastomosis. Patients who received preoperative radiation had similar rates of complications, regardless of the reconstructive technique used following low anterior resection. See Video Abstract at http://links.lww.com/DCR/A468.

A diverting loop ileostomy is commonly constructed to protect a distal anastomosis after proctectomy for rectal cancer. Little data are available on whether closing the ileostomy before or after adjuvant chemotherapy affects survival. We conducted a retrospective review of patients with rectal cancer who underwent a low anterior resection with diverting loop ileostomy followed by adjuvant chemotherapy at Ochsner Medical Center. The primary outcome was the long-term survival in patients who had their loop ileostomies closed before chemotherapy (BC) vs after chemotherapy (AC). Seventy-two patients were identified (22 in the BC group vs 50 in the AC group). No difference in mean age (BC 59.5 ± 9.8 vs AC 59.2 ± 12.6, P=0.9) or preoperative clinical stage was seen between study groups. The mean interval from ileostomy creation to closure was significantly shorter in the BC group vs AC group (16.9 ± 14.5 weeks vs 33.6 ± 18.1 weeks, P=0.0001). Follow-up data revealed a similar mean duratio...

This article considers problems in the manner in which the constitution conceptualises elections and election law. There are many deficiencies in the detailed content and organisation of that law: its structural and other flaws are remnants of its unreconstructed roots in nineteenth-century legislation. A joint project by the Law Commissions on the consolidation of the law aims to address some of those. This discussion has a broader purpose, which is to illuminate weaknesses in the way in which election law is constructed as a form of discourse within constitutional law and practice. It considers in particular the under-recognition of election law as a separable form of discourse from wider constitutional law, and the implications of this for the quality of the legislative foundations of the subject. It is argued that those problems are traceable to features of our constitutional traditions surrounding election law-making, and to a constitutional discourse that tends to caricature elections as instrumental devices for populating representative institutions. This neglects their claim to be characterised as a separate and substantive institution of the constitution and its laws. Election law structures democratic contests in ways that are constitutive as well as regulatory: by instituting voting systems and creating opportunities for individuals to practise candidature, for

Dignity therapy (DT) is a psychotherapeutic intervention with increasing evidence of acceptability and utility in palliative care settings. The aim of this study was to evaluate the legacy creation component of DT by comparing this intervention with life review (LR) and waitlist control (WC) groups. Seventy adults with advanced terminal disease were randomly allocated to DT, LR, or WC followed by DT, of which 56 completed the study protocol. LR followed an identical protocol to DT except that no legacy document was created in LR. Primary outcome measures were the Brief Generativity and Ego-Integrity Questionnaire, Patient Dignity Inventory, Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy-General, version 4, and treatment evaluation questionnaires. Unlike LR and WC groups, DT recipients demonstrated significantly increased generativity and ego-integrity scores at study completion. There were no significant changes for dignity-related distress or physical, social, emotional, and functional we...

Single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in cytokine genes can affect gene expression and thereby modulate inflammation and carcinogenesis. However, the data on the association between SNPs in the interleukin 1 beta gene (IL1B) and colorectal cancer (CRC) are conflicting. We found an association between a 4-SNP haplotype block of the IL1B (-3737C/-1464G/-511T/-31C) and CRC risk, and this association was exclusively observed in individuals with a higher proportion of African ancestry, such as individuals from the Coastal Colombian region (odds ratio, OR 2.06; 95% CI 1.31-3.25; p < 0.01). Moreover, a significant interaction between this CRC risk haplotype and local African ancestry dosage was identified in locus 2q14 (p = 0.03). We conclude that Colombian individuals with high African ancestry proportions at locus 2q14 harbour more IL1B-CGTC copies and are consequently at an increased risk of CRC. This haplotype has been previously found to increase the IL1B promoter activity and is ...

A meta-analysis was performed to quantify the magnitude and nature of the association between adjuvant chemotherapy and performance on a range of cognitive domains among breast cancer patients. A total of 27 studies (14 cross-sectional, 8 both cross-sectional and prospective, and 5 prospective) were included in the analyses, involving 1562 breast cancer patients who had undergone adjuvant chemotherapy and 2799 controls that included breast cancer patients who did not receive adjuvant chemotherapy. A total of 737 effect sizes (Cohen's d) were calculated for cross-sectional and prospective longitudinal studies separately and classified into eight cognitive domains. The mean effect sizes varied across cross-sectional and prospective longitudinal studies (ranging from -1.12 to 0.62 and -0.29 to 1.12, respectively). Each cognitive domain produced small effect sizes for cross-sectional and prospective longitudinal studies (ranging from -0.25 to 0.41). Results from cross-sectional stud...

We describe a case of acquired methaemoglobinaemia due to frequent use of the 'legal high' known as 'Pink Panthers'. This contains 5,6-Methylenedioxy-2-aminoindane and 2-Aminoindane, both amphetamine analogues with the potential to cause methaemoglobinaemia. Furthermore, the most common 'cutting agent' for legal highs in the UK is benzocaine, also known to cause methaemoglobinaemia. Given the increasing prevalence of legal highs, particularly those containing added benzocaine, such presentations may become more common. Furthermore, in one case series, benzocaine gel used for toothache was the second most common reason for hospitalisation due to acquired methaemoglobinaemia after dapsone use. Indeed, the Federal Drug Agency has issued as public warning as to the risk of these products. We therefore think that clinicians and the public should be made more aware of the risk associated with such agents.

The authors, an astronomer and an artist, have collaborated on a series of seven mixed-media constructions and prose pieces that follow the flow and themes of Impey's book on astrobiology, The Living Cosmos. The book summarizes recent research on astrobiology, from the origin of life on Earth and its environmental range on this planet to the search for life in

Effects of Hormonal Treatments, Appraisal, and Coping on Cognitive and Psychosocial Functioning of M en W ith Non-Localised Prostate Cancer Heather Joy Green BSc (Hons) School of Psychology and Department of Surgery The University of Queensland 27 June 2001 ...

Escherichia coli 32 (rpoH) mutant. In addition, we show that recombinant RpoHI and RpoHII each transcribe two E. coli 32 -dependent promoters (rpoD PHS and dnaK P1) when reconstituted with E. coli core RNA polymerase. We observed differences, however, in the ability of each sigma factor to recognize six R. sphaeroides promoters (cycA P1, groESL1, rpoD PHS, dnaK P1, hslO,