Objectives This study sought to examine the relationships between right ventricular (RV) function, body composition, and prognosis in patients with advanced heart failure (HF). Background Previous ...studies investigating HF-related cachexia have not examined the impact of RV function on body composition. We hypothesized that RV dysfunction is linked to weight loss, abnormal body composition, and worsened prognosis in advanced HF. Methods Subjects with advanced HF (n = 408) underwent prospective assessment of body composition (skinfold thickness, dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry), comprehensive echocardiography, and blood testing. Subjects were followed up for adverse events (defined as death, transplantation, or circulatory assist device). Results Subjects with RV dysfunction (51%) had lower body mass index, lower fat mass index, and were more likely to display cachexia (19%). The extent of RV dysfunction correlated with greater antecedent weight loss and a lower fat/lean body mass ratio. Over a median follow-up of 541 days, there were 150 events (37%). Risk of event was greater in subjects with RV dysfunction (hazard ratio: 3.09 95% confidence interval (CI): 2.18 to 4.45) and cachexia (hazard ratio: 2.90 95% CI: 2.00 to 4.12) in univariate and multivariate analyses. Increased body mass index was associated with a lower event rate (HR per kg/m2 : 0.92 95% CI: 0.88 to 0.96), and this protection was mediated by a higher fat mass (0.91 95% CI: 0.87 to 0.96) but not a fat-free mass index (0.97 95% CI: 0.92 to 1.03). Conclusions RV dysfunction and cardiac cachexia often coexist, have additive adverse impact, and might be mechanistically interrelated. Wasting of fat but not of lean mass was predictive of adverse outcome, suggesting that fat loss is either a surrogate of enhanced catabolism or adipose tissue is cardioprotective in the context of HF.
The COVID-19 pandemic has affected all areas of our society. The effects of the pandemic on the economy have not only affected mainly the development of transport and tourism but most especially air ...transport. Many airports in Europe and around the world have experienced a drop in passengers and cargo due to the COVID-19 pandemic. For many airports, this period, which began in 2019, meant huge losses due to a drop in passengers, leading to the collapse of several airlines. Despite the gradually improving situation, the impact of the pandemic is still being felt, and the number of passengers at airports is growing rather slowly. Thus, airports had to deal with the current situation and adapt their future operation to the current conditions. Even the leading airport in Central Europe - the Schwechat Airport in Vienna - was not spared from the effects of the current pandemic. This article aims to evaluate the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on Schwechat airport. It focuses on the analysis of the development of the airport before and during the pandemic up to the present. Further, this article describes the problems that Schwechat airport dealt with throughout the period, with the loss of passengers, delays and the collapse of carriers. Subsequently, this article is part of a study aimed at identifying the negative effects of the pandemic on air transport and related industries worldwide. Predicting the development of the airport is a very important aspect, especially for the company's management and should be part of the risk management of every company.
The operating conditions of the production process significantly influence the resulting dimensional and form accuracy of the workpiece. The operating conditions include the position of the workpiece ...location, with internal and external heat sources influenced not only by the machine location but also by its operation. In addition, there are the cutting conditions and the feed rate requirements of CNC machine tools. These changes, such as workpiece position, feed rates, and machine heat load, are further reflected in the ability of the machine to run at the position required and interpolate within the given tolerances of circularity. For the accuracy and repeatability of positioning, the machine was set up according to ISO 230-2 and for the circular interpolation tests according to ISO 230-4. The obtained results show the importance of attention to the appropriate setting of the operating conditions of the production process, where the knowledge of the geometric accuracy of the CNC machine tool in its working space can systematically increase the manufacturing accuracy itself or be another tool suitable for predicting the dimensional and form accuracy of workpieces.
A 64-year-old woman with extensive tumorous infiltration of the mitral and aortic valves underwent partial resection of a tumor of the left ventricular outflow tract and replacement of both affected ...valves. Histology revealed an inflammatory pseudotumor with a significant number of immunoglobulin-G4–positive plasma cells. The histologic and clinical findings suggested immunoglobulin-G4–related disease of the heart.
This paper addresses the issue of transmission error (TE) evaluation. The motivation for writing this paper is the research on TE measurement and calculation, which focuses on finding a correlation ...between TE and the noise performance of spur gears. In the context of the study a research of an accurate description of the procedure for evaluating the TE waveform was carried out, but only incomplete descriptions were found. Therefore, the author tries to describe this problema according to the available sources and his own experience. The beginning of this article includes a description of what transmission error is and how it can be determined. The main part of this article, however, concerns developing a method for evaluating transmission error and introducing some new ideas on how to evaluate this magnitude more accurately.
This article concerns a study of the spur gear noise (i.e. sound pressure level) of automotive gearboxes. The aim is to verify a direct correlation between transmission error and noise emission of a ...gearing. The article includes a description of some gearbox noise sources and focuses on the gears itself, which is a main source of vibration and noise. A risk analysis is performed to assess the factors influencing gear noise, to show a significance of transmission error. The main part of this article, however, concerns experimentally identified transmission error and its correlation with measured noise.
Lipomatosis of nerve (LN) is a massive enlargement of a nerve due to abundant proliferation of adipose and fibrotic tissue within the epineurium-part of the spectrum of adipose lesions of nerves, ...including intra- and extraneural lipomas. LN has been frequently associated with soft-tissue and/or osseous overgrowth. Unfortunately, much confusion exists since many names have been used for LN (e.g., fibrolipomatous hamartoma, macrodystrophia lipomatosa, and so on). To better understand this condition and to evaluate its association with nerve-territory overgrowth, the authors attempted to compile the world's literature on published LN cases.
PubMed and Google Scholar databases were searched to identify published articles on LN cases, using a variety of terms. Publications in all languages were assessed. All publications with cases determined likely to be LN were read. Cases that provided clear clinicopathological and/or radiological evidence of LN were labeled as "definite" and cases that demonstrated features of LN (e.g., nerve-territory overgrowth) but lacked definite proof of nerve involvement were labeled as "probable."
Initial screening revealed a total of 2465 papers. After exclusions, 281 publications reported cases with a definite diagnosis of LN and 120 articles reported cases with a probable diagnosis of LN. The authors identified 618 definite and 407 probable cases of LN. Sex distribution was balanced (51% female). Early diagnosis was common, with two-thirds of patients having symptoms in the 1st decade of life. The most commonly affected nerve was the median nerve (n = 391). Nerve-territory overgrowth was common (62% definite LN; 78% combined cases); overgrowth was exclusive to the territory of the affected nerve in all cases but 5.
The authors present a comprehensive review and analysis of the literature of LN cases. One of the main findings was the nerve-territory overgrowth was associated with LN, especially when present earlier in life. The authors believe that all cases of LN associated with overgrowth can be explained on anatomical grounds, even in the few reported cases in which this is not immediately obvious.
We discuss two approaches to multilateration with a particular focus on numerical aspects for a given dataset. More precisely, we calculate the volumetric errors of the MCV 754 milling machine from ...the data measured by a LaserTRACER and provide criteria showing which numerical method is appropriate for the solution of the multilateration problem with respect to a given measurement dataset. In the first case, we consider two cost functions of the optimisation problem; in the second, we use the extremal principle method. We discuss the calculation accuracy depending on the matrix condition number. Our results are compared to the reference results produced by the Trac-Cal software, which is a standard used by most producers for error compensations.
The objective of this study was to compare long-term clinical effects of biventricular pacing with isolated left ventricular pacing.
Forty consecutive patients with idiopathic dilated cardiomyopathy ...and indication for cardiac resynchronization therapy were randomized to biventricular or isolated left ventricular pacing. Clinical and echocardiographic parameters were studied regularly prior to implantation and during 1 year of follow-up. Patients with atrial fibrillation were excluded from the study. A retrospective cross-sectional outcome analysis was performed 4 years after the beginning of the study. Biventricular pacing was associated with more pronounced clinical and echocardiographic benefit compared with left ventricular pacing. Biventricular pacing was associated with significantly more distinct reverse remodelling. Left ventricular ejection fraction improved by 12.5 per cent-points (95% CI 7.3-17.7) compared with 5.1 per cent-points (95% CI 1.1-9.2) (P = 0.01) and left ventricular end-diastolic diameter decreased by 8.69 mm (95% CI 5.2-12.2) compared with 5.1 mm (95% CI 1.5-8.7) (P = 0.05) in the biventricular and left-ventricular pacing group, respectively. Semi-quantitative summarization of response points revealed a greater benefit in the biventricular vs. left ventricular pacing group mean sum of response points 3.25 (95% CI 2.62-3.88) vs. 2.35 (95% CI 1.74-2.96), respectively, P = 0.06. After 3 years of follow-up, there was no cardiovascular death in the biventricular pacing group compared with three cardiovascular deaths in the left ventricular pacing group.
In patients with idiopathic dilated cardiomyopathy, biventricular pacing is associated with significantly more pronounced benefit in clinical outcomes and reverse remodelling. A retrospective analysis after 3 years of follow-up suggests that isolated left ventricular pacing may be associated with a higher mortality rate compared with biventricular pacing.
PDF
