Aims and objectives. The aim of this study was to compare the differences in spiritual health between depressed and non‐depressed nurses.
Background. Previous studies have revealed that ...spirituality can buffer emotional pressure and maintain health, even in cases of depression. Nurses may have a tendency to develop depression; however, the relationship between depression and spirituality in nurses has been investigated only rarely.
Design. A correlational study.
Methods. The study was conducted using a convenience sample of 283 nurses who worked at a local hospital in northern Taiwan. We used a structured, self‐administered questionnaire to obtain the data. This questionnaire included a spiritual health scale, the Beck Depression Inventory and personal data. The quantitative data were analysed using the t‐test, one‐way analysis of variance and logistic regression.
Results. All the participants were women, and 22·6% of the participants were ascertained to have depression. The non‐depressed group had a higher average score for the different domains of the spiritual health scale than the depressed group. When personal and job‐related variables were controlled, spirituality was a significant explanatory variable for depression.
Conclusions. The spiritual health of the non‐depressed nurses was better than that of the depressed nurses. The result was consistent with the previous studies on other populations.
Relevance to clinical practice. The spiritual health and depression of nurses should be paid attention by nursing administrators. Spiritual promoting programme in preventing depression should be examined in future researches.
Asthma is a common respiratory disorder characterized by recurrent
episodes of coughing, wheezing and breathlessness. Although environmental
factors such as allergen exposure are risk factors in the ...development of
asthma, both twin and family studies point to a strong genetic component. To date, linkage studies have identified more than a dozen
genomic regions linked to asthma. In this study, we performed a
genome-wide scan on 460 Caucasian families and identified a locus on chromosome
20p13 that was linked to asthma (log10 of the likelihood ratio
(LOD), 2.94) and bronchial hyperresponsiveness (LOD, 3.93). A survey of 135
polymorphisms in 23 genes identified the ADAM33 gene as
being significantly associated with asthma using case-control, transmission
disequilibrium and haplotype analyses (P = 0.04-0.000003).
ADAM proteins are membrane-anchored metalloproteases with diverse functions,
which include the shedding of cell-surface proteins such as cytokines and
cytokine receptors. The identification and characterization of
ADAM33, a putative asthma susceptibility gene identified by positional
cloning in an outbred population, should provide insights into the pathogenesis
and natural history of this common disease.
Celotno besedilo
Dostopno za:
DOBA, IJS, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
The purpose of this study was to investigate the inter-language development of the Spanish past tense by Taiwanese learners who learned Spanish as a second foreign language. The analysis of this ...study was based on the Lexical Aspect Hypothesis, which focuses on the inherent lexical aspect of verbs. We came to the following conclusions. (1) Taiwanese learners, whose first language was Mandarin Chinese, demonstrated more accurate uses of the Spanish preterite than the imperfect in written texts at their early stages of development. The acquisition of the lexical aspects of verbs in the preterite in terms of lexical aspect demonstrated the following order achievement + accomplishment, activity and finally stative, whereas the acquisition of the imperfect showed the opposite sequence. (2) In the majority of the cases, the Taiwanese learners of Spanish demonstrated a similar pattern of acquisition of the Spanish past tense in terms of lexical aspect as that of English-speaking learner of Spanish. This paper will end with discussions on pedagogical implications of the findings and we hope this study will shed light on the current research on the second language acquisition of the Spanish tense/aspect.
Perilla frutescens (L.) Britt Labiatae (Pl), known as "Zi-So" and widely grown in China (red cultivar, Rpl) and Japan (green cultivar, Gpl), is frequently served on "Sa-Shi-Mi" dishes. Considering ...whether the perilla leaves substantially possess antimicrobial activity, we prepared the essential oils (EO: EOr and EOg), the pentane and ether E: E(rp) and E(gp) subfractions, the aqueous Rpl(w) and Gpl(w) and ethanolic extracts pl(E), Rpl(E) and Gpl(E) to compare their biological activities. Results indicated Gpl(E) and Rpl(E) contained huge amount (in mg/100 g) of polyphenoilcs (1472±1.0 vs. 1269.8±1.7), rutin (20.8±0.8 vs. 11.4±0.6), quercetin (29.8±0.9 vs. 13.6±0.6), and lutein (13.9±0.7 vs. 14.2±0.8). The total number of volatile constituents present in EOr and EOg were 27 in each but different phytochemicals. The top five major constituents (in %) in EOr were perilla aldehyde (54.35%), limonene (23.81%), trans-caryophyllene (7.2%), cis,trans-α-farnescene (7.02%), and linalool (2.40%); that in EOg were perilla aldehyde (65.26%), limonene (12.49%), cis,trans-α-farnescene (7.31%), trans- caryophyllene (5.91%), and linalool (2.75%); The top two constituents in E(rp) were perilla aldehyde (93.19%) and linalool (4.02%); that of E(gp) were perilla aldehyde (84.40%) and linalool (5.03%). EO and E showed moderate DPPH free radical scavenging-, ferrous ion chelating-, superoxide anion- and H
2
O
2
-scavenging capabilities. At 1.0 mg/mL the Es always revealed to be superior to EOs against E. coli, S. aureus, V. parahemolyticus, and T. mentagrophytes. Amazingly, E was stronger than perilla aldehyde against S. typhimurium,. The cytotoxicity test indicated Gpl(E) was more toxic than Rpl(E) and the pl(E)s were more toxic than pl(w)s. Conversely, the pl(w)s showed stronger TNF-α suppressing activity than pl(E)s. The pentane subfractions were entirely ineffective. Conclusively, the Perilla EOs contain huge amount of polyphenoilcs, the Es exhibit the rather good antimicrobial and cytotoxic effects, while the pl(w)s possess rather promising anti-inflammatory effect, underlying the promising antimicrobial and antiinflammtory effects of perilla leaves.
Backgrounds and Aims: Patients with cirrhosis are susceptible to sepsis and septic shock. Cirrhotic patients also have increased capillary permeability and are prone to developing volume overload. ...Patients with septic shock may have an enhanced pulmonary vascular permeability index (PVPI) and extravascular lung water index (EVLWI), both of which are associated with an unfavorable prognosis. It is plausible that pre-existing hyperpermeability may deteriorate when cirrhotic patients develop septic shock. However, it remains unknown whether PVPI and EVLWI can predict the prognosis of cirrhotic patients with septic shock. Pulse Indicator Continuous Cardiac Output (PiCCO) is an established tool to measure PVPI and EVLWI. Therefore, we conducted this retrospective study to investigate the prognostic significance of PVPI and EVLWI in cirrhotic patients with septic shock using PiCCO monitoring. Methods: We included 83 patients with liver cirrhosis and septic shock. EVLW indexed to actual body weight (aEVLWI), EVLW indexed to predicted body weight (pEVLWI), PVPI, disease severity scores, and other biomarkers were analyzed. We collected the PiCCO data on the first 2 days. Results: The overall 28-day mortality was 43.4%. The values of PVPI, aEVLWI, and pEVLWI on day 2 (PVPID2, aEVLWID2, EVLWID2) were significantly higher in non-survivors. The discriminating power of PVPID2 and EVLWID2 to predict 28-day mortality was tested using the area under a ROC curve. The areas under ROC curves (mean ± SEM) were 0.713 ± 0.061 and 0.650 ± 0.063 for PVPID2 and pEVLWID2. In the multivariate analysis, PVPID2, bilirubin, and lactate were independent factors which predicted 28-day mortality. Conclusions: Higher levels of PVPID2 and pEVLWID2 are associated with higher 28-day mortality rates in cirrhotic patients with septic shock. PVPI and pEVLWI may be useful to guide fluid management in this clinical setting.
Sorafenib, a multikinase inhibitor, is currently the only approved drug for advanced hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). The current study tested the hypothesis whether inhibition of the Wnt/β-catenin ...signaling pathway could improve the anti-tumor effects of sorafenib in HCC. ICG-001, a small molecule which blocks the interaction of β-catenin with its transcriptional coactivator CBP, dose-dependently enhanced the growth-suppressive and apoptosis-induction effects of sorafenib in multiple HCC cell lines. Downregulation of β-catenin by RNA interference increased sorafenib sensitivity, whereas overexpression of β-catenin reduced sorafenib sensitivity in Huh7 cells. The sorafenib-sensitization effect of short hairpin RNA (shRNA)-mediated β-catenin downregulation in Huh7 cells was attenuated by β-catenin overexpression. Mechanistically, sorafenib combined with ICG-001 or shRNA-mediated β-catenin downregulation augmented the induction of apoptosis, and resulted in a significant downregulation of Mcl-1 in HCC cells. In Huh7 cell mouse xenograft model, the combination of ICG-001 and sorafenib showed a more significant growth-retarding effect than single agent treatment of sorafenib or ICG-001. Our data indicate that inhibition of the Wnt/β-catenin signaling pathway improves the antitumor effects of sorafenib against HCC in vitro and in vivo.
We aimed to assess the impact of nationwide hepatitis B virus (HBV) vaccination program on the seroprevalence of HBV infection among human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-positive persons in a country ...where most HBV exposure occurs during the perinatal period or in early childhood.
Data on HBV surface antigen (HBsAg), anti-HBV surface (anti-HBs), anti-HBV core (anti-HBc), and anti-hepatitis C virus (anti-HCV) antibody were retrospectively collected from 3,164 HIV-positive and 2,594 HIV-negative persons between 2004 and 2007. Comparisons of serological markers of HBV and HCV were made between HIV-positive and -negative adults born before and after the implementation of the HBV vaccination program in Taiwan in July 1984.
Compared with HIV-negative persons, the adjusted odds ratio for HBsAg seropositivity was 1.100 (95% confidence interval, 0.921-1.315) among HIV-positive persons. Although the seroprevalence of anti-HCV antibody remained similar between HIV-positive persons born before and those born after 1984, the seroprevalence of HBsAg declined from 20.3 to 3.3% in HIV-positive persons (P<0.001) and from 15.5 to 8.5% in HIV-negative persons (P<0.001). Despite the high seroprevalence of anti-HCV antibody (97.1%) in HIV-positive injecting drug users (IDUs), there was no statistically significant difference in the seroprevalence of HBsAg (5.6% vs. 8.5%, P=0.75) or anti-HBc antibody (40.7% vs. 27.9%, P=0.14) between HIV-positive IDUs and HIV-negative persons who were born after 1984.
Our study showed a significant decline of seroprevalence of HBV infection among both HIV-negative and -positive persons who were born in the era of the nationwide HBV vaccination in Taiwan.
Few studies address quality of care in pay-for-performance (P4P) programs from the perspective of patients' perceptions. This study aimed to examine and compare the patient assessment of diabetes ...chronic care as perceived by diabetic patients enrolled and not enrolled in a P4P program from the patients' self-reported perspectives.
A cross-sectional study with case and comparison group design.
A large-scale survey was conducted from February to November 2013 in 18 healthcare institutions in Taiwan.
A total of 1458 P4P (n = 1037) and non-P4P (n = 421) diabetic patients participated in this large survey. The Chinese version of the Patient Assessment of Chronic Illness Care (PACIC) instrument was used and patients' clinical outcome data (e.g. HbA1c, LDL) were collected.
None.
Five subscales from the PACIC were measured, including patient activation, delivery system design/system support, goal setting/tailoring, problem solving/contextual and follow-up/coordination. Patient clinical outcomes were also measured. Multiple linear regression and logistic regression models were used and controlled for patient demographic and health institution characteristics statistically.
After adjusting for covariates, P4P patients had higher overall scores on the PACIC and five subscales than non-P4P patients. P4P patients also had better clinical processes of care (e.g. HbA1c test) and intermediate outcomes.
Patients who participated in the program likely received better patient-centered care given the original Chronic Care Model. Better perceptions of diabetic care assessment also better clinical outcomes. The PACIC instrument can be used for the patient assessment of chronic care in a P4P program.
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