Social media, including online health communities, have become popular platforms for individuals to discuss health challenges and exchange social support with others. These platforms can provide ...support for individuals who are concerned about social stigma and discrimination associated with their illness. Although mental health conditions can share similar symptoms and even co-occur, the extent to which discussion topics in online mental health communities are similar, different, or overlapping is unknown. Discovering the topical similarities and differences could potentially inform the design of related mental health communities and patient education programs. This study employs text mining, qualitative analysis, and visualization techniques to compare discussion topics in publicly accessible online mental health communities for three conditions: Anxiety, Depression and Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.
First, online discussion content for the three conditions was collected from three Reddit communities (r/Anxiety, r/Depression, and r/PTSD). Second, content was pre-processed, and then clustered using the k-means algorithm to identify themes that were commonly discussed by members. Third, we qualitatively examined the common themes to better understand them as well as their similarities and differences. Fourth, we employed multiple visualization techniques to form a deeper understanding of the relationships among the identified themes for the three mental health conditions.
The three mental health communities shared four themes: sharing of positive emotion, gratitude for receiving emotional support, and sleep- and work-related issues. Depression clusters tended to focus on self-expressed contextual aspects of depression, whereas the Anxiety Disorders and Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder clusters addressed more treatment- and medication-related issues. Visualizations showed that discussion topics from the Anxiety Disorders and Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder subreddits shared more similarities to one another than to the depression subreddit.
We observed that the members of the three communities shared several overlapping concerns (i.e., sleep- and work-related problems) and discussion patterns (i.e., sharing of positive emotion and showing gratitude for receiving emotional support). We also highlighted that the discussions from the r/Anxiety and r/PTSD communities were more similar to one another than to discussions from the r/Depression community. The r/Anxiety and r/PTSD subreddit members are more likely to be individuals whose experiences with a condition are long-term, and who are interested in treatments and medications. The r/Depression subreddit members may be a comparatively diffuse group, many of whom are dealing with transient issues that cause depressed mood. The findings from this study could be used to inform the design of online mental health communities and patient education programs for these conditions. Moreover, we suggest that researchers employ multiple methods to fully understand the subtle differences when comparing similar discussions from online health communities.
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•Compares the nature of online discussion from online mental health communities.•Identifies the common themes as well as the contextual variations in common themes.•Highlights the differences in participations and discussion styles.
•This research examines the consumption of luxury services while traveling.•Perceived luxury value of luxury restaurants can affect consumers’ attitudes toward luxury restaurants.•Attitude effects ...consumers’ intentions to dine at luxury restaurant while traveling.•Food image moderates the impact of attitude on purchase intentions.
This study incorporates a “food image” variable into a luxury value-attitude-behavior model. The aim is to examine Taiwanese tourists’ attitudes toward luxury restaurants and purchase intentions, i.e., to dine at luxury restaurants while traveling for tourism purposes. A total of 361 participants were recruited to complete the questionnaires. The results indicated that the perceived functional value, perceived symbolic/expressive value, and perceived hedonic value may influence consumers’ attitudes toward luxury restaurants, which, in turn, may affect their purchase intentions − to dine at luxury restaurants while participating in tourism activities. In addition, a destination’s food image moderates the relationship between attitude and purchase intentions. The managerial implications of this research are discussed.
It is widely recognized that affect and cognition can have a profound influence on information behavior. However, how these factors affect information behavior in the context of chronic, stigmatized ...conditions is less clear. This study employed a qualitative approach to explore the interrelatedness of affect, cognition, and information behavior among persons with fibromyalgia. Persons with fibromyalgia were recruited using multiple recruitment strategies (e.g., listservs and social media) for an interview study. The interview guided participants to tell their story as they drew a timeline. Data were analyzed using qualitative data analysis methods based on the Grounded Theory Methodology. Participants' narratives illustrated that affect and cognition had diverse effects on participants' information and health behaviors: uncertainty and negative affect promoted information seeking; affect and information facilitated reconceptualization and self‐growth; and online venues facilitated venting, gave rise to validating experiences, and provided opportunities to help others. This study's findings contribute to extant knowledge by connecting affect, cognition, and action in long‐term health management. The study also provides recommendations for practice: a need to focus on practical management strategies in information provision, develop information resources to address the needs of diverse populations, and promote empathy and awareness concerning invisible conditions.
•Luxury value (i.e., symbolic, experiential, and functional values) will affect consumers’ attitude toward luxury hotels.•Chinese consumers’ attitude toward luxury hotels will influence their staying ...behavior.•Luxury hotels’ symbolic and experiential values will directly affect Chinese consumers’ luxury hotel staying behavior.
The value of the luxury goods market is about to exceed US$302 billion worldwide in 2012. In addition, the top 3% of travelers in the world represent 20% of the total tourism expenditure. Although the growth has been significant, few studies have examined the consumption of luxury tourism and hospitality products. The purpose of this paper is to examine consumers’ luxury hotel staying behavior when traveling for leisure purpose. To examine this issue of growing importance, a modified value–attitude–behavior model was proposed. Following exploratory qualitative research, 368 Chinese consumers were recruited for the main study. Data were analyzed through structural equation modeling. The results show that hotels’ luxury value will influence lodgers’ attitude toward luxury hotels. Furthermore, the better their attitude toward luxury hotels, the more likely they will stay in luxury hotels when traveling. The implications of this study are discussed within the literature of hospitality and consumer studies.
Polymyxins are a class of cyclic peptides with antimicrobial activity against Gram-negative bacteria. In
, the PhoQ/PhoP and PmrB/PmrA two-component systems regulate many genes that confer resistance ...to both polymyxins and host antimicrobial peptides. The activities of these two-component systems are modulated by additional proteins that are conserved across
, such as MgrB, a negative regulator of PhoQ, and PmrD, a "connector" protein that activates PmrB/PmrA in response to PhoQ/PhoP stimulation. Despite the conservation of many protein components of the PhoQ/PhoP-PmrD-PmrB/PmrA network, the specific molecular interactions and regulatory mechanisms vary across different genera. Here, we explore the role of PmrD in modulating this signaling network in
and
We show that in
, PmrD is not required for polymyxin resistance arising from mutation of
-the most common cause of spontaneous polymyxin resistance in this bacterium-suggesting that direct activation of polymyxin resistance genes by PhoQ/PhoP plays a critical role in this resistance pathway. However, for conditions of low pH or intermediate iron concentrations, both of which stimulate PmrB/PmrA, we find that PmrD does contribute to resistance. We further show that in
, PmrD functions as a connector between PhoQ/PhoP and PmrB/PmrA, in contrast with previous reports. In this case, activity also depends on PmrB/PmrA stimulation, or on very high activation of PhoQ/PhoP. Our results indicate that the importance of the PmrD connector in modulating the polymyxin resistance network depends on both the network organization and on the environmental conditions associated with PmrB stimulation.
Macroeconomic changes are associated with population health outcomes, such as mortality, accidents, and alcohol use. Diet quality is a risk or protective factor that could be influenced by economic ...conditions.
This study examined the trajectory of diet quality measured by the Healthy Eating Index 2015 before, during, and after the 2008-2009 Great Recession.
Repeated cross-sectional survey data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey were analyzed.
The analytic sample included 48,679 adults who completed at least one dietary recall from National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey 1999-2018.
Diet quality was assessed with a 24-hour dietary recall to calculate the Healthy Eating Index 2015 total scores, a measure of the conformance with the 2015-2020 Dietary Guidelines for Americans.
Least squares regression was used to adjust for demographic changes across waves.
Diet quality improved noticeably during the Great Recession and deteriorated as economic conditions improved.
Deteriorating economic circumstances may constrain choices, but that does not necessarily imply a worsening of dietary quality. During the Great Recession, American diets became more consistent with Dietary Guidelines for Americans recommendations, possibly because of a shift toward food prepared at home instead of prepared food bought away from home.
Abstract Objective This study sought to characterize and compare online discussion forums for three conditions: breast cancer, type 1 diabetes and fibromyalgia. Though there has been considerable ...work examining online support groups, few studies have considered differences in discussion content between health conditions. In addition, in contrast to the extant literature, this study sought to employ a semi-automated approach to examine health-related online communities. Methods Online discussion content for the three conditions was compiled, pre-processed, and clustered at the thread level using the bisecting k -means algorithm. Results Though the clusters for each condition differed, the clusters fell into a set of common categories: Generic, Support, Patient-Centered, Experiential Knowledge, Treatments/Procedures, Medications, and Condition Management. Conclusion The cluster analyses facilitate an increased understanding of various aspects of patient experience, including significant emotional and temporal aspects of the illness experience. Practice implications The clusters highlighted the changing nature of patients’ information needs. Information provided to patients should be tailored to address their needs at various points during their illness. In addition, cluster analysis may be integrated into online support groups or other types of online interventions to assist patients in finding information.
Over the course of a chronic illness, patients face many challenges, including understanding what is happening to them and developing an effective strategy for managing illness. While there is ...existing literature concerning how people seek health-related information and cope with chronic illnesses, there is a need for additional research on how information affects patients' understandings of their illness, and how changes in this understanding affect their health management strategies over time.
This study examined how health management, information seeking, and information consumption and use processes are related throughout an illness.
A diversified recruitment strategy involving multiple media channels was used to recruit participants for an interview study. During the interviews, participants were asked to draw an "illness journey" timeline. The data were analyzed using a qualitative approach drawn from Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis and Grounded Theory.
The study identified four main health management features of illness journeys: onset, progression toward diagnosis, acceptance, and development of an effective management strategy. The study then focused on how information seeking changes over illness journeys, particularly in terms of a transition from active information seeking to monitoring with intermittent focused searching. Last, the paper describes the information consumption and use processes that patients engaged in throughout their journey.
This study makes three important contributions to the field. First, it presents an integrated conceptualization of how health management and information behaviors are related on illness journeys. Second, it adds to our existing knowledge on health literacy and self-management of chronic illness. Third, the study has implications for health interface design.
Celotno besedilo
Dostopno za:
DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
Web-based interventions aimed at supporting informal caregivers of people living with dementia have the potential to improve caregivers' well-being and psychological health. However, few ...interventions are widely implemented for this population, and none of the prior reviews have systematically examined the use of behavior change techniques (BCTs), theories, and agents in web-based interventions for informal caregivers of people living with dementia. To better understand this implementation gap, we reviewed the literature to map behavioral factors (BCTs, theories, and agents) deployed in the studies. Furthermore, because there is an emerging consensus that retention could be shaped by participant characteristics and behavioral factors, we explored relationships between these features and retention rates across studies.
We pursued 3 objectives: to map behavioral factors involved in the web-based interventions for informal caregivers of people living with dementia; to examine the relationship between behavioral change elements and retention in the studies; and to examine the relationship between participant characteristics (gender, age, and spouse or adult children caregiver proportion) and study retention.
We conducted a literature review using the following keywords and their corresponding Medical Subject Headings terms: dementia, caregivers, and web-based intervention. The time limits were January 1998 to March 2022. Using the BCTv1 taxonomy, which specifies active behavioral components in interventions, 2 coders collected, summarized, and analyzed the frequency distributions of BCTs. Similarly, they abstracted and analyzed participant characteristics, behavior change theories, behavior change agents, and retention rates in the studies.
The average age was 61.5 (SD 7.4) years, and the average proportion of spousal informal caregivers, adult children informal caregivers, and retention rates were 51.2% (SD 24.8%), 44.8% (SD 22%), and 70.4% (SD 17%), respectively. Only 53% (17/32) of the studies used behavior change theories, but 81% (26/32) included behavior change agents. The most common BCTv1 clusters were shaping knowledge and social support. The median number of BCTv1 clusters was 5 (IQR 3). We observed a negative correlation between the proportion of spousal informal caregivers and the retention rate (r=-0.45; P=.02) and between the number of BCTv1 clusters and retention rates (r=-0.47; P=.01). We also found that the proportion of adult children informal caregivers in the study was significantly and positively correlated with the retention rate (r=0.5; P=.03). No other participant characteristics or behavioral factors were associated with retention rates.
We found that almost half of the studies were not informed by behavior change theories. In addition, spousal involvement and a higher number of BCTs were each associated with lower retention rates, while the involvement of adult children caregivers in the study was associated with higher retention. In planning future studies, researchers should consider matching participant characteristics with their intended intervention as the alignment might improve their retention rates.
Celotno besedilo
Dostopno za:
DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
10.
Growth rate of vestibular schwannoma Paldor, Iddo; Chen, Annie S; Kaye, Andrew H
Journal of clinical neuroscience,
10/2016, Letnik:
32
Journal Article
Recenzirano
Highlights • One third of newly diagnosed vestibular schwannomas (VS) will grow in 1–3 years, and one half will grow on 5-year follow-up. • Age and gender do not influence growth of VS. • Tumor size ...and location do not predict tumor growth. • Growth in the first observation year predicts further tumor growth. • The average growth rate of a VS is 1 mm/year, whilst the average growth rate of a VS shown to grow is 3 mm/year.
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