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Topic Review
Meibomian Gland Dysfunction
Meibomian gland dysfunction (MGD) is the leading cause of dry eye disease and loss of ocular surface homeostasis. Increasingly, several observational clinical studies suggest that dyslipidemia (elevated blood cholesterol, triglyceride, or lipoprotein levels) can initiate the development of MGD. 
  • 1.1K
  • 23 Nov 2021
Topic Review
Role of Blockchain Technology in COVID-19 Crisis
To obtain adequate performance in resolving issues that are associated with the COVID-19 pandemic, blockchain can be combined with other available technologies to establish a robust healthcare architecture.
  • 1.1K
  • 29 Jan 2022
Topic Review
Caregiving in Parkinson´s Disease and Deep Brain Stimulation
In Parkinson’s disease (PD) patients, the progressive nature of the disease and the variability of disabling motor and non-motor symptoms contribute to the growing caregiver burden (CB) of PD partners and conflicts in their relationships. In advanced stages of the disease, Deep Brain Stimulation (DBS) improves PD symptoms and patients quality of life but the effect of DBS on CB of PD partners seems to be heterogeneous. The CB in the context of DBS framing both pre-, peri- and postoperative aspects aims to be illuminated, and further recognition of caregiver burden in partners of PD patients with DBS will be stimulated.
  • 1.1K
  • 18 Feb 2022
Topic Review
Ontology-Based Parkinson’s Disease Monitoring and Alerting with PHKG-GNNs
In the realm of Parkinson’s Disease (PD) research, the integration of wearable sensor data with personal health records (PHR) has emerged as a pivotal avenue for patient alerting and monitoring. The complex domain of PD patient care was delved into, with a specific emphasis on harnessing the potential of wearable sensors to capture, represent and semantically analyze crucial movement data and knowledge. The primary objective is to enhance the assessment of PD patients by establishing a robust foundation for personalized health insights through the development of Personal Health Knowledge Graphs (PHKGs) and the employment of personal health Graph Neural Networks (PHGNNs) that utilize PHKGs. The objective is to formalize the representation of related integrated data, unified sensor and PHR data in higher levels of abstraction, i.e., in a PHKG, to facilitate interoperability and support rule-based high-level event recognition such as patient’s missing dose or falling. This is an extension of researchers' previous related work, presents the Wear4PDmove ontology in detail and evaluates the ontology within the development of an experimental PHKG. Furthermore, the integration and evaluation of PHKG within the implementation of a Graph Neural Network (GNN) are focused on. The importance of integrating PD-related data for monitoring and alerting patients with appropriate notifications are emphasized. These notifications offer health experts precise and timely information for the continuous evaluation of personal health-related events, ultimately contributing to enhanced patient care and well-informed medical decision-making. Finally, a novel approach for integrating personal health KGs and GNNs for PD monitoring and alerting solutions is proposed.
  • 1.1K
  • 18 Mar 2024
Topic Review
Sustainable Employability Based on the swAge-Model
Sustainable employability commonly refers to the ability of employees to participate in work and the labour market during their lifetimes. The swAge-model, a tool that helps us understand how to make working life more sustainable and healthier for all ages, can be the basis of sustainable employability.
  • 1.1K
  • 29 Dec 2021
Topic Review
High-Intensity Interval Training
High-Intensity Interval Training (HIIT) could have effects on inflammatory biomarkers, based on the investigation conducted of an anti-inflammatory nature, provided that its characteristics are able to trigger the necessary impact to do so.
  • 1.1K
  • 07 Apr 2025
Topic Review
Comprehensive Framework for Active Health Governance
Health policies are regarded as a governance mechanism crucial for reducing health inequity and improving overall health outcomes. However, the current literature in health policy largely focused on some specific health policy changes and their tangible outcomes, or on specific inequality of health policies in gender, age, racial, or socio-economic status, short of comprehensively responding to and addressing the shift from disease-centered to active-health-oriented. A comprehensive framework is proposed to identify the main elements of a well-defined active health governance and the interactions between these elements. The proposed framework is composed of four elements and three approaches that are dynamically interacted to achieve two active health outcomes. 
  • 1.1K
  • 21 Feb 2022
Biography
Roy (Robert Alexander) McConkey
Roy McConkey is Emeritus Professor of Developmental Disabilities at Ulster University, Northern Ireland. A psychologist by training and a native of Belfast, with degrees from Queen’s University, Belfast (BA) and the Victoria University of Manchester, England (Ph.D). He has previously held posts in England, Scotland and the Republic of Ireland in both academia and as director of support service
  • 1.1K
  • 26 Jan 2024
Topic Review
Sleep Dysfunction in COVID-19 Patients
Sleep is an important factor for human well being in order to maintain daily functions, while lack of sleep may lead to an increase in accidents, mood changes, impaired psychological functioning and concentration, and decreased immune response.Sleep problems appear to be rather common in COVID-19 patients and are related to higher levels of psychological distress such as traumatic stress, depression and anxiety and worse coronavirus related outcomes including severity and mortality.Effective programs for the treatment of sleep problems, may lead to the reduction of psychological distress and vice versa and improving the sleep quality of infected patients may improve their outcomes. There is a need for appropriate and tailored management strategies and interventions across different populations including the general public and high risk groups such as Healthcare providers and COVID-19 patients including improved sleep hygiene, identification of various risk factors at individual, interpersonal, institutional and community levels and early and accurate recognition of sleep dysfunction and psychological distress.
  • 1.1K
  • 15 Dec 2021
Topic Review
Virtual Reality and Its Influence on Brain Health
Dynamic technological development and its enormous impact on modern societies are posing new challenges for 21st-century neuroscience. A special place is occupied by technologies based on virtual reality (VR). VR tools have already played a significant role in both basic and clinical neuroscience due to their high accuracy, sensitivity and specificity and, above all, high ecological value. Being in a digital world affects the functioning of the body as a whole and its individual systems. The data obtained so far, both from experimental and modeling studies, as well as (clinical) observations, indicate their great and promising potential, but apart from the benefits, there are also losses and negative consequences for users.
  • 1.1K
  • 01 Feb 2024
Topic Review
Bacteria in Healthcare Units
Healthcare units consist of numerous people circulating daily, such as workers, patients, and companions, and these people are vehicles for the transmission of microorganisms, such as bacteria. Bacteria species may have different allergenic, pathogenic, infectious, or toxic properties that can affect humans.
  • 1.1K
  • 07 Mar 2022
Topic Review
Income Inequality and Race/Ethnicity Drive Obesity
Obesity is a major public health problem both globally and within the U.S. It varies by multiple factors, including but not limited to income and sex. After controlling for potential covariates, there is little evidence to determine the association between income and obesity and how obesity may be moderated by sex and family income. We examined the association between income and obesity in U.S. adults aged 20 years and older, and tested whether this relationship differs by race or ethnicity groups. For this analysis, we used data from the 1999–2016 National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys (NHANES). Obesity was determined using Body Mass Index ≥ 30 kg/m2; the Gini coefficient (GC) was calculated to measure income inequality using the Poverty Income Ratio (PIR). We categorized the PIR into five quintiles to examine the relationship between income inequality and obesity. For the first set of analyses, we used a modified Poisson regression in a sample of 36,665 adults, with an almost equal number of men and women (women’s ratio was 50.6%), including 17,303 white non-Hispanics (WNH), 7475 black non-Hispanics (BNHs), and 6281 Mexican Americans. The models included age, racial/ethnic groups, marital status, education, health behaviors (smoking and drinking status and physical activities), health insurance coverage, self-reported health, and household structure (live alone and size of household). Adjusting for potential confounders, our findings showed that the association between PIR and obesity was positive and significant more frequently among WNH and BNH in middle and top PIR quintiles than among lower-PIR quintiles; this association was not significant in Mexican Americans (MAs). Results of GC in obese women showed that in comparison with WNHs (GC: 0.34, S.E.: 0.002), BNHs (GC: 0.38, S.E.: 0.004) and MAs (GC: 0.41, S.E.: 0.006) experienced higher income inequality, and that BNH obese men experienced the highest income inequality (GC: 0.45, S.E.: 0.011). The association between PIR and obesity was significant among WNHs and BNHs men in the 3rd, 4th and 5th PIR quintiles. The same association was not found for women. In treating obesity, policymakers should consider not only race/ethnicity and sex, but also strategies to reduce inequality in income. 
  • 1.1K
  • 28 Oct 2021
Topic Review
Circulating Tumor Cells in Metastatic Cascade
Circulating tumor cells (CTCs) are a heterogeneous population of tumor cells that have shed from a tumor into the lymphatics and vasculature, ultimately disseminating into blood circulation. Circulating tumor cells are a key player in cancer metastasis, a multi-step and complex process that involves (1) local invasion of primary tumor cells into adjacent tissue; (2) intravasation (trans-endothelial migration into nearby blood vessels); (3) circulation (transient travel and survival in the circulatory system as CTCs); (4) extravasation; (5) colonization. To successfully metastasize, CTCs must evade immune surveillance at every step once they leave the immunosuppressive tumor microenvironment. On the other hand, immune cells can promote or inhibit tumorigenesis, depending on the cell type and context.
  • 1.1K
  • 04 Mar 2022
Topic Review
World-Renowned “Swiss” Pediatricians
The early and correct recognition of rare pediatric diseases is essential for decisions related to treatment options, the monitoring of treatment results, and the prevention of complications, as well as the estimation of prognosis and the counselling of patients, parents, and caregivers, including a risk estimation for recurrence in future pregnancies.
  • 1.1K
  • 04 Dec 2023
Topic Review
Primary, Secondary and Tertiary Prevention of Pediatric OCD
Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) is a psychiatric disorder characterized by intrusive, repeated and persistent thoughts, desires or images, with subsequent repetitive behaviors or thinking patterns that the individual performs in an attempt to decrease the anxiety or distress or simply according to rigid rules (i.e. compulsions).As a distinctive subtype of OCD, pediatric-onset OCD affects around 2% to 4% of children and adolescents. Considering that children and adolescents are in a critical stage of physical and cognitive development, the onset of OCD during this period may lead to additional developmental disruptions.There is an urgent need for early diagnosis and treatment for OCD, especially the strategies targeting the childhood age group. 
  • 1.1K
  • 11 Apr 2023
Topic Review
Lung Nodule Segmentation
The accurate segmentation of lung nodules is challenging due to their small size, especially at the edge of the lung and near the blood vessels. Lung nodule segmentation is relatively broad and varies in terms of architecture, image pre-processing, and training strategy.
  • 1.1K
  • 24 Feb 2022
Topic Review
SARS-CoV-2 Vaccine Hesitancy
The underlying factors of vaccine hesitancy are complex and context-specific, varying across time and socio-demographic variables. Vaccine hesitancy can also be influenced by other factors such as health inequalities, socioeconomic disadvantages, systemic racism, and level of exposure to misinformation online, with some factors being more dominant in certain countries than others. Therefore, strategies tailored to cultures and socio-psychological factors need to be developed to reduce vaccine hesitancy and aid informed decision-making. 
  • 1.0K
  • 13 Dec 2021
Topic Review
Structure of Help-Seeking Barriers Scale
Despite the high prevalence of adverse health and trauma-related outcomes associated with intimate partner violence (IPV), help-seeking and service utilization among survivors is low. A mixed methods legitimation strategy of integration was employed to evaluate the construct validation evidence of the Barriers to Help-Seeking for Trauma (BHS-TR) scale in samples of IPV survivors. The merging of qualitative (n = 17) and quantitative (n = 137) data through a joint display analysis revealed the conceptual structure of Structural Barriers (Financial Concerns; Unavailable/Not Helpful; External Constraints; Inconvenience; Discrimination) and Internal Barriers (Reveals Weakness; Problem Management Beliefs; Frozen/Confused; Shame; Mistrust/Rejection; Safeguard Yourself). Moreover, the analysis showed mainly complementarity findings, strengthening the BHS-TR scale’s overall trustworthiness and validity evidence.
  • 1.0K
  • 23 May 2022
Topic Review
COVID-19 and Gestational Diabetes
Gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) is defined as glucose intolerance first identified during pregnancy and usually resolving after birth. Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, there has been a growing interest in the association between GDM and COVID-19.
  • 1.0K
  • 13 Sep 2022
Topic Review
People Feel about Robot-Assisted Surgery
The goal of the entry was to establish the factors that influence how people feel about having a medical operation performed on them by a robot. 
  • 1.0K
  • 14 Dec 2021
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