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Background: Post-stroke emotionalism (PSE) is common. Trials of antidepressants for PSE suggest only modest clinical benefit and risk of side effects. There have been no trials of non-pharmacological treatments for PSE; in fact, little is known about the non-pharmacological treatments actually provided to PSE sufferers in clinical practice. Objectives: To determine the non-pharmacological interventions provided by stroke professionals, their perceived effectiveness, and the factors associated with the intention to provide them. Methods: Focus groups and published sources of information were used to construct a comprehensive list of non-pharmacological approaches for PSE. This was followed by a national (online) survey of 220 UK stroke clinicians from nursing, medicine, and the allied health professions to investigate the approaches used in clinical practice, using Theory of Planned Behavior components to determine the factors associated with intention to provide them. Results: Most respondents reported high intention to provide non-pharmacological interventions from the list that was constructed. Offering reassurance and talking to patients about goals were the commonest interventions, and distraction and tensing facial muscles least common. Respondents who perceived others to hold them professionally responsible for carrying out non-pharmacological approaches were more likely to use them, as were respondents who held more positive attitudes. Conclusions: Our survey data reveal that stroke clinicians report regular use of non-pharmacological interventions for PSE. There is a pressing need for well-conducted clinical trials to evaluate the effectiveness of these approaches. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aims To compare ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) and non-STEMI (NSTEMI) mortality between Sweden and the UK, adjusting for background population rates of expected death, case mix, and treatments. Methods and results National data were collected from hospitals in Sweden [ n  = 73 hospitals, 180 368 patients, Swedish Web-system for Enhancement and Development of Evidence-based care in Heart disease Evaluated According to Recommended Therapies (SWEDEHEART)] and the UK [ n  = 247, 662 529 patients, Myocardial Ischaemia National Audit Project (MINAP)] between 2003 and 2013. There were lower rates of revascularization [STEMI (43.8% vs. 74.9%); NSTEMI (27.5% vs. 43.6%)] and pharmacotherapies at time of hospital discharge including [aspirin (82.9% vs. 90.2%) and (79.9% vs. 88.0%), β-blockers (73.4% vs. 86.4%) and (65.3% vs. 85.1%)] in the UK compared with Sweden, respectively. Standardized net probability of death (NPD) between admission and 1 month was higher in the UK for STEMI [8.0 (95% confidence interval 7.4–8.5) vs. 6.7 (6.5–6.9)] and NSTEMI [6.8 (6.4–7.2) vs. 4.9 (4.7–5.0)]. Between 6 months and 1 year and more than 1 year, NPD remained higher in the UK for NSTEMI [2.9 (2.5–3.3) vs. 2.3 (2.2–2.5)] and [21.4 (20.0–22.8) vs. 18.3 (17.6–19.0)], but was similar for STEMI [0.7 (0.4–1.0) vs. 0.9 (0.7–1.0)] and [8.4 (6.7–10.1) vs. 8.3 (7.5–9.1)]. Conclusion Short-term mortality following STEMI and NSTEMI was higher in the UK compared with Sweden. Mid- and longer-term mortality remained higher in the UK for NSTEMI but was similar for STEMI. Differences in mortality may be due to differential use of guideline-indicated treatments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim: To define trajectories of perceived health-related quality of life (HRQoL) among survivors of acute myocardial infarction (AMI) and identify factors associated with trajectories.Methods: Data on HRQoL among 9566 survivors of AMI were collected from 77 National Health Service hospitals in England between 1 November 2011 and 24 June 2015. Longitudinal HRQoL was collected using the EuroQol five-dimension questionnaire measured at hospitalisation, 1, 6 and 12 months post-AMI. Trajectories of perceived HRQoL post-MI were determined using multilevel regression analysis and latent class growth analysis (LCGA).Results: One or more percieved health problems in mobility, self-care, usual activities, pain/discomfort and anxiety/depression was reported by 69.1% (6607/9566) at hospitalisation and 59.7% (3011/5047) at 12 months. Reduced HRQoL was associated with women (-4.07, 95% CI -4.88 to -3.25), diabetes (-2.87, 95% CI -3.87 to -1.88), previous AMI (-1.60, 95% CI -2.72 to -0.48), previous angina (-1.72, 95% CI -2.77 to -0.67), chronic renal failure (-2.96, 95% CI -5.08 to -0.84; -3.10, 95% CI -5.72 to -0.49), chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (-3.89, 95% CI -5.07 to -2.72) and cerebrovascular disease (-2.60, 95% CI -4.24 to -0.96). LCGA identified three subgroups of HRQoL which we labelled: improvers (68.1%), non-improvers (22.1%) and dis-improvers (9.8%). Non-improvers and dis-improvers were more likely to be women, non-ST-elevation myocardial infarction (NSTEMI) and have long-term health conditions, compared with improvers.Conclusions: Quality of life improves for the majority of survivors of AMI but is significantly worse and more likely to decline for women, NSTEMI and those with long-term health conditions. Assessing HRQoL both in hospital and postdischarge may be important in determining which patients could benefit from tailored interventions.Trial Registration: NCT01808027 and NCT01819103. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction Hip and knee arthroplasties have revolutionised the management of degenerative joint diseases and, due to an ageing population, are becoming increasingly common. Follow-up of joint prostheses is to identify problems in symptomatic or asymptomatic patients due to infection, osteolysis, bone loss or potential periprosthetic fracture, enabling timely intervention to prevent catastrophic failure at a later date. Early revision is usually more straight-forward surgically and less traumatic for the patient. However, routine long-term follow-up is costly and requires considerable clinical time. Therefore, some centres in the UK have curtailed this aspect of primary hip and knee arthroplasty services, doing so without an evidence base that such disinvestment is clinically or cost-effective. Methods Given the timeline from joint replacement to revision, conducting a randomised controlled trial (RCT) to determine potential consequences of disinvestment in hip and knee arthroplasty follow-up is not feasible. Furthermore, the low revision rates of modern prostheses, less than 10% at 10 years, would necessitate thousands of patients to adequately power such a study. The huge variation in follow-up practice across the UK also limits the generalisability of an RCT. This study will therefore use a mixed-methods approach to examine the requirements for arthroplasty follow-up and produce evidence-based and consensus-based recommendations as to how, when and on whom follow-up should be conducted. Four interconnected work packages will be completed: (1) a systematic literature review; (2a) analysis of routinely collected National Health Service data from five national data sets to understand when and which patients present for revision surgery; (2b) prospective data regarding how patients currently present for revision surgery; (3) economic modelling to simulate long-term costs and quality-adjusted life years associated with different follow-up care models and (4) a Delphi-consensus process, involving all stakeholders, to develop a policy document which includes a stratification algorithm to determine appropriate follow-up care for an individual patient. Ethics and Dissemination Favourable ethical opinion has been obtained for WP2a (RO-HES) (220520) and WP2B (220316) from the National Research Ethics Committee. Following advice from the Confidentiality Advisory Group (17/CAG/0122), data controllers for the data sets used in WP2a (RO-HES) - NHS Digital and The Phoenix Partnership - confirmed that Section 251 support was not required as no identifiable data was flowing into or out of these parties. Application for approval of WP2a (RO-HES) from the Independent Group Advising on the Release of Data (IGARD) at NHS Digital is in progress (DARS-NIC-147997). Section 251 support (17/CAG/0030) and NHS Digital approval (DARS-NIC-172121-G0Z1H-v0.11) have been obtained for WP2a (NJR-HES-PROMS). ISAC (11_050MnA2R2) approval has been obtained for WP2a (CPRD-HES). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Context: Pain is one of the most devastating symptoms for cancer patients. One third of patients who experience pain do not receive effective treatment. A key barrier to effective pain management is lack of routine measurement and monitoring of pain. Patient‐reported outcome measures (PROMs) are recommended for measuring cancer pain. However, evidence to guide the selection of the most appropriate measure to identify and monitor cancer pain is limited. A systematic review of measurement properties of PROMs for pain in cancer patients is needed to identify the best validated measure for adoption to an electronic platform. Objectives: To systematically review measurement properties of PROMs used for adult cancer patients to measure pain and, as a secondary goal, to investigate the evidence of validated mobile health (mHealth) applications used to measure pain (registration number: CRD42017065575). Methods: Medline, Embase, and the Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature (CINAHL) were systematically searched in March 2018 for studies examining measurement properties for PROMs for pain in adult cancer patients. The methodological quality of the studies and their results were appraised using the Consensus‐based Standards for the Selection of Health Measurement Instruments (COSMIN) checklist and specific measurement properties criteria, respectively. Results: Sixteen studies evaluating 8 instruments were included. No studies using a PROM in an mHealth application were identified. The methodological quality of the measurement properties ranged between poor and fair. No instrument showed strong positive evidence for all the evaluated measurement properties. Based on the available evidence, the Brief Pain Inventory‐Short Form (BPI‐SF) had the strongest evidence to support its selection for the measurement of cancer pain. Conclusion: The BPI‐SF was the best performing measure across all properties evaluated through COSMIN. Better quality validation studies of PROMs for cancer pain are needed to explore the full range of measurement properties. Utilizing mHealth applications to measure pain in cancer patients is an innovative approach worthy of further investigation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An interview with poet Robert Morgan is presented. When asked about whether it is still his habit of waking up early and writing for several hours daily, he replied that early morning is his favorite time of the day as he can work undisturbed. Other topics include his poetry writing style, why his metrical poems do not rhyme, and his favorite books and poems.

Hickey et al. (1) described the magnetic stratigraphy (not magnetic anomaly profile) and biostratigraphy of Upper Cretaceous and Lower Cenozoic sediments of the Eureka Sound Foundation (2, 3) of arctic [...]

Background: Recruitment of representative samples in primary care research is essential to ensure high-quality, generalizable results. This is particularly important for research using routinely recorded patient data to examine the delivery of care. Yet little is known about how different recruitment strategies influence the characteristics of the practices included in research.Objective: We describe three approaches for recruiting practices to data-sharing studies, examining differences in recruitment levels and practice representativeness.Methods: We examined three studies that included varying populations of practices from West Yorkshire, UK. All used anonymized patient data to explore aspects of clinical practice. Recruitment strategies were 'opt-in', 'mixed opt-in and opt-out' and 'opt-out'. We compared aggregated practice data between recruited and not-recruited practices for practice list size, deprivation, chronic disease management, patient experience and rates of unplanned hospital admission.Results: The opt-out strategy had the highest recruitment (80%), followed by mixed (70%) and opt-in (58%). Practices opting-in were larger (median 7153 versus 4722 patients, P = 0.03) than practices that declined to opt-in. Practices recruited by mixed approach were larger (median 7091 versus 5857 patients, P = 0.04) and had differences in the clinical quality measure (58.4% versus 53.9% of diabetic patients with HbA1c ≤ 59 mmol/mol, P < 0.01). We found no differences between practices recruited and not recruited using the opt-out strategy for any demographic or quality of care measures.Conclusion: Opt-out recruitment appears to be a relatively efficient approach to ensuring participation of typical general practices. Researchers should, with appropriate ethical safeguards, consider opt-out recruitment of practices for studies involving anonymized patient data sharing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Several studies have reported that emotional lability is a common consequence of stroke. However, there is uncertainty about the "true" prevalence of the condition because, across these studies, patients have been recruited at different stages of recovery, from different settings, and using different diagnostic methods. There have been no systematic reviews of the published evidence to ascertain how the prevalence of poststroke pseudobulbar affect (PBA) might vary according to these factors.Methods: A systematic review and meta-analysis of the published literature were undertaken.Results: A total of 15 studies (n = 3391 participants) met inclusion criteria for the review. Meta-analysis estimated that the prevalence of PBA was 17% (95% confidence interval 12%-24%) acutely (<1 month post stroke), 20% (14%-29%) post acutely (1-6 months post stroke), and 12% (8%-17%) in the medium to longer term (>6 months post stroke). The evidence from the published literature, although limited, is that crying is a more common PBA presentation following stroke than laughter.Conclusions: PBA is a common condition that affects approximately 1 in 5 stroke survivors at the acute and postacute phases, and 1 in 8 survivors beyond 6 months post stroke. These prevalence data are very important for clinicians and the commissioners of services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]