Calidad de las imágenes,la lectura y el servicio de mamografía en cuatro centros de imagenología de Manizales,Colombia

IntroducciónLa calidad de la mamografía está directamente relacionada con la capacidad para detectar anormalidades y, por ello, es necesario el control de calidad en los centros de imágenes diagnósticas.ObjetivoEvaluar la calidad de la imagen, la lectura y el servicio de mamografía de algunos centros de imágenes diagnósticas en Manizales, Colombia.Materiales y métodosCuatro centros participaron de forma voluntaria y bajo acuerdos de confidencialidad en el estudio. De las 520 mujeres atendidas en ellos, a 318 se les hicieron mamografías. A partir de una inspección visual del servicio, se evaluaron la infraestructura, la tecnología y el personal de la unidad. Un radiólogo experto en lectura e interpretación clínica de imágenes mamarias evaluó la calidad de la imagen y la de su lectura. El análisis estadístico se hizo utilizando un anova y determinando el índice kappa y el porcentaje de desacuerdo.ResultadosSe encontró falta de calidad de las imágenes obtenidas, principalmente, por presencia de artificios en el 75% de ellas, e identificación y rotulación deficientes; además, en la toma de la proyección oblicua medio-lateral, se encontró falta de visualización del ángulo inframamario. El grado de concordancia en el reporte BI-RADS fue bajo en los cuatro centros, con diferencias importantes en el informe y la descripción de los hallazgos.ConclusiónLos centros de imágenes diagnósticas evaluados están habilitados para el funcionamiento, pero se encontraron deficiencias importantes en la calidad de las imágenes y en su lectura, lo que pone de manifiesto la necesidad de establecer estándares de calidad y mejorar los aspectos que se puedan mejorar.Palabras clave: mamografía, gestión de la calidad, diagnóstico por imagen, garantía de la calidad de atención de salud, servicio de mantenimiento e ingeniería en hospital, ingeniería biomédica     

Regioselective Mitsunobu Reaction of Partially Protected Uridine

Mitsunobu reaction of partially acylated uridine proceeds with high regioselectivity for intramolecular S_N2 anhydro linkage closuring. Under the reaction conditions, an isomeric mixture of diacyl uridine derivatives with either free 2′- or 3′-hydroxyl group was transformed into a single cyclonucleosidic product, 2,2′-anhydro-3′,5′-di-O-acyluridine. This paper presents a possible mechanism of the reactions, the explanation of observed phenomenon based on semiempirical and density functional theory (DFT) calculations and possible utility of this synthetic pathway.     

Influence of agricultural management form on the species structure of harvestman (Opiliones) communities

The paper is aimed at evaluation of the influence of two different agricultural management forms on harvestman (Opiliones) communities structure in relation to the optimization of land use on the model territory of Agricultural Cooperative (AC) Očová (Central Slovakia). The research was carried out using pitfall trapping through growing seasons from 2005 to 2007. Harvestmen were captured at four pairs of sites (8 sites in total). For each pair of sites the cultivation of the same crop with application of two different forms of agricultural management (conventional form and sustainable form with basic sustainable agro-environmental scheme) was characteristic. In total, 667 individuals of 8 species of the Phalangiidae family were captured during the research. The research results confirm the influence of management form on the structure of harvestman communities only partially. The obtained data indicate that the management form plays a significant role, especially in such agrocoenoses, in which the same crop is cultivated for several years (e.g., sites with alfalfa or permanent lawn), i.e., on the sites without ploughing or use of other similar agrotechnical measures. In these cases, the sites with the sustainable agro-environmental scheme showed higher diversity and equability of harvestman communities than the sites with the conventional form of agrotechnical management. Harvestman communities structure on sites with crop rotation and repeated ploughing was more influenced by additional factors than by the agricultural management form.     

Identifying drug targets for neurological and psychiatric disease via genetics and the brain transcriptome

Discovering drugs that efficiently treat brain diseases has been challenging. Genetic variants that modulate the expression of potential drug targets can be utilized to assess the efficacy of therapeutic interventions. We therefore employed Mendelian Randomization (MR) on gene expression measured in brain tissue to identify drug targets involved in neurological and psychiatric diseases. We conducted a two-sample MR using cis-acting brain-derived expression quantitative trait loci (eQTLs) from the Accelerating Medicines Partnership for Alzheimer’s Disease consortium (AMP-AD) and the CommonMind Consortium (CMC) meta-analysis study (n = 1,286) as genetic instruments to predict the effects of 7,137 genes on 12 neurological and psychiatric disorders. We conducted Bayesian colocalization analysis on the top MR findings (using P<6x10^-7 as evidence threshold, Bonferroni-corrected for 80,557 MR tests) to confirm sharing of the same causal variants between gene expression and trait in each genomic region. We then intersected the colocalized genes with known monogenic disease genes recorded in Online Mendelian Inheritance in Man (OMIM) and with genes annotated as drug targets in the Open Targets platform to identify promising drug targets. 80 eQTLs showed MR evidence of a causal effect, from which we prioritised 47 genes based on colocalization with the trait. We causally linked the expression of 23 genes with schizophrenia and a single gene each with anorexia, bipolar disorder and major depressive disorder within the psychiatric diseases and 9 genes with Alzheimer’s disease, 6 genes with Parkinson’s disease, 4 genes with multiple sclerosis and two genes with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis within the neurological diseases we tested. From these we identified five genes (ACE, GPNMB, KCNQ5, RERE and SUOX) as attractive drug targets that may warrant follow-up in functional studies and clinical trials, demonstrating the value of this study design for discovering drug targets in neuropsychiatric diseases.     

Jones matrix‐based speckle‐decorrelation angiography using polarization‐sensitive optical coherence tomography

We show that polarization‐sensitive optical coherence tomography angiography (PS‐OCTA) based on full Jones matrix assessment of speckle decorrelation offers improved contrast and depth of vessel imaging over conventional OCTA. We determine how best to combine the individual Jones matrix elements and compare the resulting image quality to that of a conventional OCT scanner by co‐locating and imaging the same skin locations with closely matched scanning setups. Vessel projection images from finger and forearm skin demonstrate the benefits of Jones matrix‐based PS‐OCTA. Our study provides a promising starting point and a useful reference for future pre‐clinical and clinical applications of Jones matrix‐based PS‐OCTA.