The spectrum of disease severity and the insidiousness of clinical presentation make it difficult to recognize patients with coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) at higher risk of worse outcomes or ...death when they are seen in the early phases of the disease. There are now well-established risk factors for worse outcomes in patients with COVID-19. These should be factored in when assessing the prognosis of these patients. However, a more precise prognostic assessment in an individual patient may warrant the use of predictive tools. In this manuscript, we conduct a literature review on the severity of illness scores and biomarkers for the prognosis of patients with COVID-19. Several COVID-19-specific scores have been developed since the onset of the pandemic. Some of them are promising and can be integrated into the assessment of these patients. We also found that the well-known pneumonia severity index (PSI) and CURB-65 (confusion, uremia, respiratory rate, BP, age ≥ 65 years) are good predictors of mortality in hospitalized patients with COVID-19. While neither the PSI nor the CURB-65 should be used for the triage of outpatient versus inpatient treatment, they can be integrated by a clinician into the assessment of disease severity and can be used in epidemiological studies to determine the severity of illness in patient populations. Biomarkers also provide valuable prognostic information and, importantly, may depict the main physiological derangements in severe disease. We, however, do not advocate the isolated use of severity of illness scores or biomarkers for decision-making in an individual patient. Instead, we suggest the use of these tools on a case-by-case basis with the goal of enhancing clinician judgment.
To improve the identification and subsequent intervention of COVID-19 patients at risk for ICU admission, we constructed COVID-19 severity prediction models using logistic regression and artificial ...neural network (ANN) analysis and compared them with the four existing scoring systems (PSI, CURB-65, SMARTCOP, and MuLBSTA). In this prospective multi-center study, 296 patients with COVID-19 pneumonia were enrolled and split into the General-Ward-Care group (N = 238) and the ICU-Admission group (N = 58). The PSI model (AUC = 0.861) had the best results among the existing four scoring systems, followed by SMARTCOP (AUC = 0.770), motified-MuLBSTA (AUC = 0.761), and CURB-65 (AUC = 0.712). Data from 197 patients (training set) were analyzed for modeling. The beta coefficients from logistic regression were used to develop a severity prediction model and risk score calculator. The final model (NLHA2) included five covariates (consumes alcohol, neutrophil count, lymphocyte count, hemoglobin, and AKP). The NLHA2 model (training: AUC = 0.959; testing: AUC = 0.857) had similar results to the PSI model, but with fewer variable items. ANN analysis was used to build another complex model, which had higher accuracy (training: AUC = 1.000; testing: AUC = 0.907). Discrimination and calibration were further verified through bootstrapping (2000 replicates), Hosmer-Lemeshow goodness of fit testing, and Brier score calculation. In conclusion, the PSI model is the best existing system for predicting ICU admission among COVID-19 patients, while two newly-designed models (NLHA2 and ANN) performed better than PSI, and will provide a new approach for the development of prognostic evaluation system in a novel respiratory viral epidemic.
•PSI can effectively predict the severity risk of adult COVID-19 patients.•The NLHA2 model with only five variables had a similar predictive effect as PSI scoring.•The prediction model constructed by artificial neural network algorithm performed better than models.•Deep learning algorithms have great potential in clinical prediction.
Assessing the financial health of banks is crucial to ensure the stability of the financial system. This is not only a way to safeguard the interests of customers and shareholders but also to prevent ...inherent risks and ensure reliability in banking operations. Thus, evaluating financial health plays a crucial role in maintaining stability and sustainable development in the banking sector. This study employed three methods: RAM (Root Assessment Method), PSI (Preference Selection Index), and SRP (Simple Ranking Process), to assess the financial health of twenty-eight banks in Vietnam. Capital adequacy rating, asset quality rating, management rating, earnings rating, liquidity rating, and sensitivity to market risk rating are the six criteria used to characterize each bank. The evaluation results using these three methods were compared with each other and with the evaluation using the CAMELS rating system. The study identified banks with good financial health and those with weak financial health. The notable point is that the results of ranking financial health of banks using three methods: RAM, PSI, and SRP, and according to the CAMELS system are quite similar. These findings are vital in providing valuable information for managers and investors, aiding them in making informed decisions regarding investment, risk management, and development strategies based on empirical data.
Introduction: There is the need of a simple but highly reliable score system for stratifying the risk of mortality and Intensive Care Unit (ICU) transfer in patients with SARS-CoV-2 pneumonia at the ...Emergency Room. Purpose: In this study, the ability of CURB-65, extended CURB-65, PSI and CALL scores and C-Reactive Protein (CRP) to predict intra-hospital mortality and ICU admission in patients with SARS-CoV-2 pneumonia were evaluated. Methods: During March-May 2020, a retrospective, single-center study including all consecutive adult patients with diagnosis of SARS-CoV-2 pneumonia was conducted. Clinical, laboratory and radiological data as well as CURB-65, expanded CURB-65, PSI and CALL scores were calculated based on data recorded at hospital admission. Results: Overall, 224 patients with documented SARS-CoV-2 pneumonia were included in the study. As for intrahospital mortality (24/224, 11%), PSI performed better than all the other tested scores, which showed lower AUC values (AUC=0.890 for PSI
versus
AUC=0.885, AUC=0.858 and AUC=0.743 for expanded CURB-65, CURB-65 and CALL scores, respectively). Of note, the addition of hypoalbuminemia to the CURB-65 score increased the prediction value of intra-hospital mortality (AUC=0.905). All the tested scores were less predictive for the need of ICU transfer (26/224, 12%), with the best AUC for extended CURB-65 score (AUC= 0.708). Conclusion: The addition of albumin level to the easy-to-calculate CURB-65 score at hospital admission is able to improve the quality of prediction of intra-hospital mortality in patients with SARS-CoV-2 pneumonia.
•GoFDR predicts GO functions using sequence alignment prepared from PSI-BLAST.•GoFDR identifies the Functional Discriminating Residues for each target GO.•GoFDR applies score-probability table to ...convert raw scores to probabilities.•GoFDR ranked one of the best methods in CAFA2 experiment.
In this study, we developed a method named GoFDR for predicting Gene Ontology (GO)-based protein functions. The input for GoFDR is simply a query sequence-based multiple sequence alignment (MSA) produced by PSI-BLAST. For each GO term annotated to the sequences in the MSA, GoFDR identifies a number of functionally discriminating residues (FDRs) specific to the GO term, and scores the query sequence using a position specific scoring matrix (PSSM) constructed for the FDRs. The raw score is then converted into a probability score according to a score-to-probability table prepared from training sequences. GoFDR outperformed three sequence-based methods for predicting GO functions in a benchmark of 18,520 sequences. In addition, GoFDR was ranked one of the top methods according to the preliminary evaluation report released by the 2nd Critical Assessment of Function Annotation (CAFA2) project. Finally, we applied GoFDR to the complete human proteome sequences, and showed that the predictions made by GoFDR with high confidence significantly expanded current annotations of human proteome. As such, GoFDR is of great value not only for annotating protein functions in newly sequenced genomes, but also for characterizing the function of proteins of interest.
As an indispensable component of various living organisms, the antioxidant proteins have been studied for anti-aging and prevention of various diseases, such as altitude sickness, coronary heart ...disease, and even cancer. However, the traditional experimental methods for identifying the antioxidant proteins are very expensive and time-consuming. Thus, to address the challenge, a new predictor, named ANOX, was developed in this study. Multiple features, such as frequency matrix features (FRE), amino acid and dipeptide composition (AADP), evolutionary difference formula features (EEDP), k-separated bigrams (KSB), and PSI-PRED secondary structure (PRED), were extracted to generate the original feature space. To find the optimized feature subset, the Max-Relevance-Max-Distance (MRMD) algorithm was implemented for feature ranking and our model received the best performance with the top 1170 features. Rigorous tests were performed to evaluate the performance of ANOX, and the results showed that ANOX achieved a major improvement in the prediction accuracy of the antioxidant proteins (AUC:0.930 and 0.935 using 5-fold cross-validation or the jackknife test) compared to the state-of-the-art predictor AOPs-SVM (AUC:0.869 and 0.885). The dataset used in this study and the source code of ANOX are all available at https://github.com/NWAFU-LiuLab/ANOX.
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•An SVM-based model was proposed to identify the antioxidant proteins.•Multiple features were extracted to generate the original feature space.•The Max-Relevance-Max-Distance algorithm is implemented for feature selection.•Our model performs better than the state-of-the art predictor.
•Improvisers showed distinct network connectivity when categorizing musical structures.•Improvisers showed inter-network connectivity in the α-band before a motor-response.•Connectivity between DMN ...and VN was strongly linked to improvisation expertise.•More experienced musicians showed stronger connectivity between DMN, DAN and CCN.
Musical improvisers are trained to categorize certain musical structures into functional classes, which is thought to facilitate improvisation. Using a novel auditory oddball paradigm (Goldman et al., 2020) which enables us to disassociate a deviant (i.e. musical chord inversion) from a consistent functional class, we recorded scalp EEG from a group of musicians who spanned a range of improvisational and classically trained experience. Using a spatiospectral based inter and intra network connectivity analysis, we found that improvisers showed a variety of differences in connectivity within and between large-scale cortical networks compared to classically trained musicians, as a function of deviant type. Inter-network connectivity in the alpha band, for a time window leading up to the behavioural response, was strongly linked to improvisation experience, with the default mode network acting as a hub. Spatiospectral networks post response were substantially different between improvisers and classically trained musicians, with greater inter-network connectivity (specific to the alpha and beta bands) seen in improvisers whereas those with more classical training had largely reduced inter-network activity (mostly in the gamma band). More generally, we interpret our findings in the context of network-level correlates of expectation violation as a function of subject expertise, and we discuss how these may generalize to other and more ecologically valid scenarios.
Anti-prion systems in yeast Wickner, Reed B.
Journal of biological chemistry/The Journal of biological chemistry,
02/2019, Letnik:
294, Številka:
5
Journal Article
Recenzirano
Odprti dostop
Yeast prions have become important models for the study of the basic mechanisms underlying human amyloid diseases. Yeast prions are pathogenic (unlike the Het-s prion of Podospora anserina), and most ...are amyloid-based with the same in-register parallel β-sheet architecture as most of the disease-causing human amyloids studied. Normal yeast cells eliminate the large majority of prion variants arising, and several anti-prion/anti-amyloid systems that eliminate them have been identified. It is likely that mammalian cells also have anti-amyloid systems, which may be useful in the same way humoral, cellular, and innate immune systems are used to treat or prevent bacterial and viral infections.
The aim of the present study was to improve the accuracy and reliability of ORIF in patients with condylar head fractures (CHFs) by developing a design for patient specific fixators, navigation and ...repositioning guides, as well as the algorithms of their clinical application.
14 patients with 16 CHFs were treated by ORIF with the use of CAD/CAM technology. After virtual reduction of the bony fragments, the appropriate length and diameter of the screws was chosen. In biomechanically unfavorable cases (type p) patient specific reinforcement plates were used together with the positional screws for reinforcement of the bone-fixator system. And in cases of severely comminuted fractures patient specific 3-D plate was applied.
The CT data, obtained immediately after the operation revealed the good anatomical reduction. Any deviations of the small fragments noted were near 1 mm in all cases. Postoperative clinical examination at 3 months follow up showed good occlusion and mouth opening not less than 3 cm in all patients. The lateral and anterior mobility of the mandible was restored with small limitations of protrusive mobility in 1 case. All the patients were satisfied with the outcomes.
The application of the CAD/CAM technologies and the new design of the surgical guides and patient specific reinforcement plates for CHFs helps to improve the accuracy and quality of fragments reduction and stability of fixation with minimal risks of intraoperative complications.
CAD/CAM technologies improve the clinical effectiveness of treatment patients with the CHFs.
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