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Objectives: To assess the direct hospital costs for unplanned re-admissions within 30 days of hospitalisations with heart failure in Australia; to estimate the proportion of these costs attributable to potentially preventable re-admissions., Study Design: Retrospective cohort study; analysis of linked admitted patient data collections data., Setting, Participants: People admitted to hospital (all public and most private hospitals in Australia) with primary diagnoses of heart failure, 1 January 2013 - 31 December 2017, who were discharged alive and re-admitted to hospital at least once (any cause) within 30 days of discharge., Main Outcome Measures: Estimated re-admission costs based on National Hospital Cost Data Collection, by unplanned re-admission category based on the primary re-admission diagnosis: potentially hospital-acquired condition; recurrence of heart failure; other diagnoses related to heart failure; all other diagnoses. The first two groups were deemed the most preventable., Results: The 165 612 eligible hospitalisations of people with heart failure during 2013-2017 (mean age, 79 years [standard deviation, 12 years]; 85 964 men [51.9%]) incurred direct hospital costs of $1881.4 million (95% confidence interval [CI], $1872.5-1890.2 million), or $376.3 million per year (95% CI, $374.5-378.1 million per year) and $11 360 per patient (95% CI, $11 312-11 408 per patient). A total of 41 125 people (24.8%) experienced a total of 58 977 unplanned re-admissions within 30 days of discharge from index admissions; these re-admissions incurred direct hospital costs of $604.4 million (95% CI, $598.2-610.5 million), or 32% of total index admission costs; that is, $120.9 million per year (95% CI, $119.6-122.1 million per year), and $14 695 per patient (95% CI, $14 535-14 856 per patient). Re-admissions with potentially hospital-acquired conditions (21 641 re-admissions) accounted for 40.1% of unplanned re-admission costs, recurrence of heart failure (18 666 re-admissions) for 35.6% of re-admission costs., Conclusion: Unplanned re-admissions after hospitalisations with heart failure are expensive, incurring costs equivalent to 32% of those for the initial hospitalisations; a large proportion of these costs are associated with potentially preventable re-admissions. Reducing the number of unplanned re-admissions could improve outcomes for people with heart failure and reduce hospital costs., (© 2024 The Author(s). Medical Journal of Australia published by John Wiley & Sons Australia, Ltd on behalf of AMPCo Pty Ltd.)

New astronomical observations point to a nucleosynthesis picture that goes beyond what was accepted until recently. The intermediate "i" process was proposed as a plausible scenario to explain some of the unusual abundance patterns observed in metal-poor stars. The most important nuclear physics properties entering i-process calculations are the neutron-capture cross sections and they are almost exclusively not known experimentally. Here we provide the first experimental constraints on the ^{139}Ba(n,γ)^{140}Ba reaction rate, which is the dominant source of uncertainty for the production of lanthanum, a key indicator of i-process conditions. This is an important step towards identifying the exact astrophysical site of stars carrying the i-process signature.

Background: Troponin I (cTnI) elevation is common in patients with atrial fibrillation (AF) but does not reliably indicate underlying coronary ischemia. We investigated whether dynamic changes in cTnI value (delta troponin) are useful in revealing significant coronary artery disease (sCAD) in patients presenting with symptomatic AF., Methods: We conducted a retrospective case-control study analyzing serial cTnI values in 231 patients presenting with symptomatic AF who had an objective assessment for underlying CAD within 6 months of the index admission. Diagnostic performance of an elevated cTnI (>0.04 μg/L) only, and elevated cTnI coupled with Youden Index derived cutoffs for absolute and relative changes in troponin, for distinguishing patients with sCAD, was evaluated., Results: A total of 107 patients had an elevated cTnI on serial measurements. In this group, the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve was 0.69 [95% confidence interval (CI), 0.56-0.81] for relative delta troponin and 0.71 (95% CI, 0.59-0.83) for absolute delta troponin. The optimal diagnostic cutoff for relative delta troponin was > -0.42, and > -0.055 μg/L for absolute delta troponin. The specificity of elevated troponin to diagnose sCAD increased from 56 to 77% when relative delta troponin was added, and to 88% with absolute delta troponin. Although the sensitivity of cTnI elevation (57.1%) decreased to 50% for relative and 35.7% for absolute delta troponin, the negative predictive values were high and similar at 86%., Conclusion: When added to the troponin peak, delta troponin is a promising test for the diagnosis of significant coronary artery disease in patients presenting with symptomatic AF with elevated cTnI. This result requires prospective validation in a larger cohort of patients., (Copyright © 2023 Wolters Kluwer Health, Inc. All rights reserved.)

Polar ZnO surfaces with O- and Zn-termination were studied with atomic and lateral force microscopy and force curves. Adsorbed fluid layers on both surfaces are found to dominate their adhesion properties in air. The hydrophilic O-surface has a substantially thicker adsorbed layer and larger residual particle densities. Our data suggest that different preparation is required for the two surfaces before use in epitaxy, and may resolve some contradictions in the literature. The data also indicate that adsorbed fluid layers may be important in the growth of certain ZnO nanostructures., (Published under licence by IOP Publishing Ltd.)