For the assessment of value of new therapies in healthcare, Health Technology Assessment (HTA) agencies often review the cost per quality-adjusted life-year (QALY) gained. Some HTA agencies accept a higher cost per QALY gained when treatment is aimed at prolonging survival for patients with a short expected remaining lifetime, a so-called end-of-life (EoL) premium. The objective of this study is t

Background: Serotonin (5-HT) is considered to play a role in pulmonary arterial hypertension by regulating vascular remodeling and smooth muscle contractility. Here, arteries from mice with inducible and smooth muscle-specific deletion of Dicer were used to address mechanisms by which microRNAs control 5-HT-induced contraction. Methods: Mice were used 5 weeks after Dicer deletion, and pulmonary ar

In this work we study the impact of chromatic focusing of few-cycle laser pulses on high-order-harmonic generation (HHG) through analysis of the emitted extreme ultraviolet (XUV) radiation. Chromatic focusing is usually avoided in the few-cycle regime, as the pulse spatiotemporal structure may be highly distorted by the spatiotemporal aberrations. Here, however, we demonstrate it as an additional

Background: There is a lack of theoretical framework supporting stem cell transplant nurses in their assessment, judgment and caring interventions of sibling stem cell donors. Objective: The purpose of this study was to explore sibling stem cell donors’ main concerns and how they deal with them before and after donation. Method: Ten healthy sibling donors, 5 men and 5 women, with a median age of 5

Aortic aneurysms are defined as an irreversible increase in arterial diameter by morethan 50% relative to the normal vessel diameter. The incidence of aneurysm rupture isabout 10 in 100,000 persons per year and ruptured arterial aneurysms inevitably resultsin serious complications, which are fatal in about 40% of cases. There is also a hereditarycomponent of the disease and dilation of the ascendi

Suboptimal fluid intake may require enhanced release of antidiuretic hormone (ADH) or vasopressin for the maintenance of adequate hydration. Enhanced copeptin levels (reflecting enhanced vasopressin levels) in 25% of the common population are associated with enhanced risk of metabolic syndrome with abdominal obesity, type 2 diabetes, hypertension, coronary artery disease, heart failure, vascular d

This article seeks to explain what policy approaches and policy measures are best suited for promoting new regional industrial path development and what needs and possibilities there are for such policy to change and adapt to new conditions in order to remain efficient. The article departs from the notion of Smart Specialization and discusses how regional strategies that are inspired by this appro

We collected bat carcasses at three wind farms in Taiwan, located along the west coast mostly near the sea and/or in former coastal wetland habitats. We found 43 bat carcasses, mostly of common aerial-hawking species such as Pipistrellus abramus and Scotophilus kuhlii, but the island endemics Eptesicus serotinus horikawai and Myotis formosus flavus were also recovered. All bat species affected are

We prove that functions analytic in the unit disk and continuous up to the boundary are dense in the de Branges-Rovnyak spaces induced by the extreme points of the unit ball of H∞. Together with previous theorems, it follows that this class of functions is dense in any de Branges-Rovnyak space.

Vineyards shape important economic, cultural, and ecological systems in many temperate biomes. Like other agricultural systems, they can be multifunctional landscapes that not only produce grapes, but also for example serve as wildlife habitat, sequester carbon, and are places of rich traditions. However, research and management practices often focus mostly on individual, specific ecosystem servic

We present a nonresonant circular polarization selective structure (CPSS) based on multiple layers of stacked meander line sheets arranged closely after each other. The structure has a total thickness of 13.5 mm (0.68 wavelengths at center frequency 15 GHz) and is realized by cascading printed circuit boards interspaced with a low-permittivity foam material, and the different layers are bonded tog

Abstract: We present a technique for performing high-accuracy measurements of the transmission and reflection properties in circular polarizations (CPs) of a test panel. Using linearly polarized antennas and measuring at four different antenna orientations, all with a relative rotation of 45°, an efficient normalization of each scattering component can be utilized. This method achieves a high sign