Culture
Highlights
Dialysis reimbursement policies in most countries are focused on conventional in-center hemodialysis, although home hemodialysis and peritoneal dialysis might contribute to quality of life and cost savings.
The reimbursement for dialysis in low- and middle-income countries is insufficient to treat all patients with kidney failure and has a disproportionately high impact on public health expenditure in those countries.
LA JOLLA--(December 13, 2018) When a building is damaged, a general contractor often oversees various subcontractors--framers, electricians, plumbers and drywall hangers--to ensure repairs are done in the correct order and on time.
Similarly, when DNA is damaged, a molecular general contractor oversees a network of genetic subcontractors to ensure that the diverse cellular tasks needed to protect and repair the genome are carried out correctly and on time.
New research published in Diabetologia (the journal of the European Association for the Study of Diabetes [EASD]) shows that in older people living in the community, type 2 diabetes (T2D) is associated with a decline in verbal memory and fluency over 5 years.
However, contrary to previous studies, the decrease in brain volume often found in older people with T2D was not found to be directly associated with cognitive decline during this time period. Yet compared with people without T2D, those with T2D had evidence of greater brain atrophy at the beginning of the study.
Scientists have identified 66 alien plant and animal species, not yet established in the European Union, that pose the greatest potential threat to biodiversity and ecosystems in the region.
From an initial working list of 329 alien species considered to pose threats to biodiversity recently published by the EU, scientists have derived and agreed a list of eight species considered to be very high risk, 40 considered to be high risk, and 18 considered to be medium risk.
To help patients with muscle disorders, scientists at The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth) have engineered a new stem cell line to study the conversion of stem cells into muscle. Findings appeared in Cell Reports.
Researchers at Stanley Manne Children's Research Institute at Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children's Hospital of Chicago, and colleagues, used a blood test and microarray technology to identify distinct molecular signatures in children with cystic fibrosis. These patterns of gene expression ultimately could help predict disease severity and treatment response, and lead to therapies tailored to each patient's precise biology. Findings were published in Physiological Genomics.
When households in sub-Saharan Africa don't have an adequate number of insecticide-treated bed nets, pregnant women and children under five are the most likely family members to sleep under the ones they have, leaving men and school-aged children more exposed to malaria, new Johns Hopkins Center for Communication Programs (CCP) research suggests. CCP is based at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.
WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. - New "classification models" sense how well humans trust intelligent machines they collaborate with, a step toward improving the quality of interactions and teamwork.
The long-term goal of the overall field of research is to design intelligent machines capable of changing their behavior to enhance human trust in them. The new models were developed in research led by assistant professor Neera Jain and associate professor Tahira Reid, in Purdue University's School of Mechanical Engineering.
Research investigating how the brain responds to visual patterns in people with autism has shown that sensory responses change between childhood and adulthood.
The differences observed between adult and young people mimicked those seen in a strain of fruit flies that had a genetic change associated with autism and other developmental conditions.
This demonstrates that sensory issues in autism can be modelled in fruit flies, providing an opportunity to further understand the complexities of the condition.
A £36k lifetime cap on care costs for older people would cost £3.6 billion by 2035 - according to research from the University of East Anglia, the London School of Economics and Political Science and the Pensions Policy Institute.
Rolling out a minimum level of social care to all older people with high needs and limited resources would cost a similar amount.
A new report published today reveals the costs and trade-offs of reforming long-term care funding for older people in England, and identifies those who stand to gain and lose from a range of proposed reforms.
Philadelphia, December 12, 2018 - Pseudoachondroplasia (PSACH) is a severe inherited dwarfing condition characterized by disproportionate short stature, joint laxity, pain, and early onset osteoarthritis. In PSACH, a genetic mutation leads to abnormal retention of cartilage oligomeric matrix protein (COMP) within the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) of cartilage-producing cells (chondrocytes), which interferes with function and cell viability.
Fire and water. Timeless, opposing forces, they are actually linked in powerful ways that can have major impacts on communities and ecosystems.
The 2011 Las Conchas mega-fire in New Mexico burned more than 150,000 acres and threatened the Los Alamos National Laboratory. Now, using data from the fire, researchers at Los Alamos have created an experimental model that will help us better understand the interactions of fire and water in the soil.
Considering end-of-year bonuses for your employees? Supervisors be forewarned, a new study finds that while incentive rewards can help motivate and increase employee performance it can also lead to unethical behavior in the workplace.
"Goal fixation can have a profound impact on employee behavior, and the damaging effects appear to be growing stronger in today's competitive business landscape," says Bill Becker, co-author of the study and associate professor of management in the Pamplin College of Business at Virginia Tech.
Sixty years after melatonin was isolated and with more than 23,000 published studies showing the many functions of this hormone secreted by the pineal gland, guidelines should be discussed and established for its therapeutic use.
Using data gleaned from historical reports, researchers have now identified the sources of some of the most destructive Indonesian earthquakes in Java, Bali and Nusa Tenggara, using these data to independently test how well Indonesia's 2010 and 2017 seismic hazard assessments perform in predicting damaging ground motion.