Healthcare organizations are under increasing pressure to account for their performance to outside constituencies. This chapter reviews the background, nature, and consequences of organized efforts to enhance transparency in healthcare. The driving forces differ between regions, but the trends are broad enough to result in similar developments across Europe. Market reforms and quality concerns cre

Sepsis is a global health challenge, with over 49 million cases annually. Recent medical advancements have increased in-hospital survival rates to approximately 80%, but the escalating incidence of sepsis, owing to an ageing population, rise in chronic diseases, and antibiotic resistance, have also increased the number of sepsis survivors. Subsequently, there is a growing prevalence of “post-sepsi

Tirzepatide is a dual GIP and GLP-1 receptor co-agonist which is approved for glucose-lowering therapy in type 2 diabetes. Here, we explored its effects on beta cell function, insulin sensitivity and insulin-independent glucose elimination (glucose effectiveness) in normal mice. Anesthetized female C57/BL/6 J mice were injected intravenously with saline or glucose (0.125, 0.35 or 0.75 g/kg) with o

Silicon (Si) is an essential macronutrient for diatoms, an important component of lacustrine primary productivity that represents a link between the carbon and silicon cycles. Reconstructions of lake silicon cycling thus provide an underexploited window onto lake and catchment biogeochemistry. Silicon isotope geochemistry has potential to provide these reconstructions, given the competing source a

Aim: To explore nurses’ experiences of using the Integrated Palliative care Outcome Scale (IPOS) as a communication tool in specialized palliative care. Design: This study employed a qualitative inductive approach. The Standards for Reporting Qualitative Research were followed for reporting. Methods: Five focus groups were conducted with nurses from four specialized palliative care units, and the

Introduction: Commissioning, calibration, and quality control procedures for nuclear medicine imaging systems are typically performed using hollow containers filled with radionuclide solutions. This leads to multiple sources of uncertainty, many of which can be overcome by using traceable, sealed, long-lived surrogate sources containing a radionuclide of comparable energies and emission probabilit

Background: The savannah ecosystems of Sahel have experienced continuous and heavy grazing of livestock for centuries but still, their vegetation response to grazing pressure remains poorly understood. In this study, we analysed the herbaceous plant dynamics, measured by species diversity, composition, cover, and biomass in response to grazing pressure in the savannah ecosystems of Sahel. In Seneg

Systems with strong electronic Coulomb correlations often display rich phase diagrams exhibiting different ordered phases involving spin, charge, or orbital degrees of freedom. The theoretical description of the interplay of the corresponding collective fluctuations giving rise to this phenomenology, however, remains a tremendous challenge. Here, we introduce a multichannel extension of the recent

The underlying mechanisms of many pain conditions are not known and many conditions have no effective treatment. Modern dynamic neuroimaging has increased the understanding of altered nervous system (CNS) processing in multiple pain conditions. This chapter describes the potential and the limitations of functional neuroimaging in the evaluation and treatment of clinical pain syndromes. It consider

Climate change predictions suggest that arctic and subarctic ecosystems will be particularly affected by rising temperatures and extreme weather events, including severe heat waves. Temperature is one of the most important environmental factors controlling and regulating microbial decomposition in soils; therefore, it is critical to understand its impact on soil microorganisms and their feedback t

Increased core body temperature and dehydration are critical thermal physiological responses to heat disorders. Dehydration is preventable through adequate water intake. However, a simple heat balance equation for assessing the heatstroke risk considering the core body temperature is currently lacking. Hence, this study proposes an equation for evaluating heatstroke risk. To derive the equation, t

Background: Patients with bacteraemia caused by gram-positive bacteria are at risk for infective endocarditis (IE). Because IE needs long antibiotic treatment and sometimes heart valve surgery, it is very important to identify patients with IE. Objectives: In this narrative review we present and discuss how to determine which investigations to detect IE that are needed in individual patients with

A tool called LARCalc, for calculating the radiological consequences of accidental large scale nuclear power plant releases based on estimates of 137Cs ground deposition, is presented. LARCalc is based on a previously developed models that has been further developed and packaged into an easy-to-use decision support tool for training of decision makers. The software visualises the radiological impa

This study sheds light upon how memes about rioting in present-day Belfast are read by their audiences. As such, it answers to a distinct research gap in the meme studies literature, which has mostly shied away from in-depth engagements with audiences, favouring instead the intertwined concepts ‘imagined audience’ and the ideological ‘directionality’ of memes. Drawing on semi-structured interviews

Background: Recombination reshuffles alleles at linked loci, allowing genes to evolve independently and consequently enhancing the efficiency of selection. This makes quantifying recombination along chromosomes an important goal for understanding how selection and drift are acting on genes and chromosomes. Results: We present RecView, an interactive R application and its homonymous R package, to f

Climate change is predicted to cause milder winters and thus exacerbate soil freeze–thaw perturbations in the subarctic, recasting the environmental challenges that soil microorganisms need to endure. Historical exposure to environmental stressors can facilitate the microbial resilience to new cycles of that same stress. However, whether and how such microbial memory or stress legacy can modulate