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Τρίτη 31 Ιανουαρίου 2023

Detect and suppress future zoonotic‐derived outbreaks: A lesson from last two decades

alexandrossfakianakis shared this article with you from Inoreader

Abstract

COVID-19 pandemic has revealed how vulnerable and inexperienced we are when dealing with an unprecedented global infectious threat. Looking back on the last few decades, there has been a surge in zoonotic-derived viruses globally. Notably, these outbreaks emerged as harmless zoonotic diseases within a favorable environment, then spilled over to humans and widely spread to become outbreaks. Most of these are respiratory viruses (particularly Orthomyxoviridae Orthomyxoviridae or Coronaviridae Coronaviridae family), with high transmissibility and can be easily spread. Low- and middle-income countries, particularly those with tropical climates, provide ideal environments for the growth and evolution of these zoonotic viruses. Nevertheless, a lot of our advanced centers for infectious diseases are located in high-income countries (HIC) and focus on human pathogens only (e.g., influenza, RSV, adenovirus). We should critically think about reallocating health resources in th e near-term. It is an urge for a few surveillance centers aim to detect surges in cases of respiratory pathogens or any spikes in cases, and suppress the transmission chain from an early stage. In this article, we digest lessons learned from the previous spillover pandemics and suggest actionable tactics to deal with future pandemics properly.

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Automated Creak Differentiates Adductor Laryngeal Dystonia and Muscle Tension Dysphonia

alexandrossfakianakis shared this article with you from Inoreader

Objective

The purpose of this study was to determine whether automated estimates of vocal creak would differentiate speakers with adductor laryngeal dystonia (AdLD) from speakers with muscle tension dysphonia (MTD) and speakers without voice disorders.

Methods

Sixteen speakers with AdLD, sixteen speakers with MTD, and sixteen speakers without voice disorders were recorded in a quiet environment reading aloud a standard paragraph. An open-source creak detector was used to calculate the percentage of creak (% creak) in each of the speaker's six recorded sentences.

Results

A Kruskal-Wallis one-way analysis of variance revealed a statistically significant effect of group on the % creak with a large effect size. Pairwise Wilcoxon tests revealed a statistically significant difference in % creak between speakers with AdLD and controls as well as between speakers with AdLD and MTD. Receiver operating characteristic curve analyses indicated that % creak differentiated AdLD from both controls and speakers with MTD with high sensitivity and specificity (area under the curve statistics of 0.94 and 0.86, respectively).

Conclusion

Percentage of creak as calculated by an automated creak detector may be useful as a quantitative indicator of AdLD, demonstrating the potential for use as a screening tool or to aid in a differential diagnosis.

Level of Evidence

3 Laryngoscope, 2023
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Use of incorrect and correct methods to account for age in studies on epigenetic accelerated aging: implications and recommendations for best practices

alexandrossfakianakis shared this article with you from Inoreader
Abstract
Motivated by our conduct of a literature review on social exposures and accelerated aging as measured by a growing number of epigenetic "clocks" (which estimate age via DNA methylation patterns (DNAm)), we report on three different approaches – 1 incorrect and 2 correct – in the epidemiologic literature on treatment of age in these and other studies using other common exposures (i.e., body mass index and alcohol consumption). Among the 50 empirical articles reviewed, the majority (n = 29; 58%) used the incorrect method of analyzing accelerated aging detrended for age as the outcome and did not control for age as a covariate. By contrast, only 42% used the correct methods, which are either to analyze accelerated aging detrended for age as the outcome and control for age as a covariate (n = 16; 32%), or to analyze raw DNAm age as the outcome and control for age as a covariate (n = 5; 10%). In accord with prior demonstrations of bias introdu ced by the incorrect approach, we provide simulation analyses and additional empirical analyses to illustrate how the incorrect method can lead to bias to the null, and we discuss implications for extant research and recommendations for best practices.
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