Author Interviews, Brigham & Women's - Harvard, COVID -19 Coronavirus / 25.03.2021

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Hesam Dashti, PhD Brigham and Women's Hospital, Harvard Medical School Senior Computational Scientist The Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What parameters does the SARS2 score take into consideration? Response: While complex models have been developed for predicting the severity of COVID-19 from the medical history, laboratory, and imaging results of patients, simplified models with similar accuracy would be more practical for individualizing the decision making, especially when detailed medical history of patients is not readily available. In this study, we developed the SARS2 risk equations for estimating risk of hospitalization of patients with COVID-19 and also the risk of mortality among hospitalized patients. The “SARS2” risk equations are named for their input variables: Sex, Age, Race, Socioeconomic and Smoking status. To develop and validate the models, we used the electronic records from 12,347 patients who tested positive for COVID-19 at the Mass General Brigham medical centers in Massachusetts between 02/26/2020 and 07/14/2020 to construct derivation and validation cohorts for estimating 1) risk of hospitalization within 30 days of COVID-19 positive PCR test, and 2) for the hospitalized patients, risk of mortality within approximately 3 months. (more…)
Author Interviews, Infections, Respiratory / 25.03.2021

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Pranay Sinha, MD Section of Infectious Diseases Boston University School of Medicine MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: We hypothesized that mitigation measures such as physical distancing and mask wearing instituted in Boston would reduce transmission of common respiratory viruses such as influenza, Rhinovirus, and Parainfluenzavirus. We compared the rate of detection of such viruses at Boston Medical Center on comprehensive respiratory panels in the ambulatory, emergency room, and hospital settings in 2020 to rates in the previous five years. (more…)
Author Interviews, COVID -19 Coronavirus, Occupational Health, Vaccine Studies / 25.03.2021

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Michelle N. Meyer, PhD, JD Assistant Professor & Associate Director, Research Ethics, Center for Translational Bioethics & Health Care Policy Faculty Co-Director, Behavioral Insights Team, Steele Institute for Health Innovation Assistant Professor of Bioethics Geisinger Commonwealth School of Medicine Geisinger, PA MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?   Response: Earlier research had found people are less likely to say they'll receive a COVID-19 vaccine offered to them under an Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) than one offered to them following full FDA approval. Earlier surveys had also found that only around 30% of health care workers intended to receive a COVID-19 vaccine. Because the public often looks to local health care workers for health advice, and in most prioritization schemes they were slated to be offered vaccines first, this was quite concerning for the prospect of achieving population immunity. Commenters had warned that if the FDA chose to make COVID-19 vaccines available under EUAs, that substantial efforts would need to be made to ensure trust. On Dec. 4, 2020, an announcement about anticipated vaccine availability was emailed to all 23,784 Geisinger employees, who were asked to indicate their intention to receive a vaccine when one was available to them and the reasons for any hesitation they might have. (more…)
Author Interviews, Brigham & Women's - Harvard, Endocrinology, Insomnia, Menopause, Sleep Disorders, Weight Research / 23.03.2021

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Leilah K. Grant, PhD Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Medicine Brigham and Women’s Hospital Harvard Medical School  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: The prevalence of obesity increases in women around the age of menopause which increases the risk of diseases like diabetes and heart disease. Changes in hormones, like estrogen, are thought to contribute to weight gain during menopause, but other common symptoms of menopause such as sleep interruption may also play a role. While short sleep is known to adversely affect metabolism, little is known about the metabolic consequences of the type of sleep disruption most common in menopausal women – increased nighttime awakenings (i.e., sleep interruption) caused by hot flashes, but no change in overall sleep duration. We therefore did this study to see how an experimental model menopause-related sleep interruption would affect metabolic outcomes that may contribute to weight gain.  (more…)
Author Interviews, COVID -19 Coronavirus, Education, Mental Health Research, PLoS / 23.03.2021

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: David C. Rettew, MD Child & Adolescent Psychiatrist Associate Professor of Psychiatry and Pediatrics University of Vermont Larner College of Medicine MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Our group, the Wellness Environment Scientific Team at the University of Vermont, hadn’t planned to look at COVID at the outset of this study and instead were going to look at mental health and engagement in wellness activities in college students across a semester. The pandemic disrupted that plan when students were abruptly sent home but fortunately, they continued to do their daily app-based ratings of their mood, stress levels, and engagement in healthy activities.  We then realized we had some interesting pre-COVID to COVID data that was worth exploring.  (more…)
Author Interviews, Cost of Health Care, Genetic Research, Hematology, JAMA / 22.03.2021

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Patrick DeMartino MD Pediatric Hematology and Oncology Fellow Doernbecher Children's Hospital Oregon Health & Science University MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Dozens of gene therapies are expected to be on the market within a decade or so. Much has been written about the high prices of the therapies currently on the market (exceeding $1 million). However, only a small number of patients are eligible for these existing therapies each year. Gene therapy for sickle cell disease (SCD) appears promising and would potentially apply to a relatively large number of individuals in the U.S. We sought to explore potential affordability challenges associated with a gene therapy for SCD. (more…)
Author Interviews, COVID -19 Coronavirus, UCLA / 20.03.2021

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Richard K. Leuchter, MD Resident Physician Department of Internal Medicine UCLA Health MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: There has been significant research demonstrating racial healthcare disparities among patients with COVID-19, but less exploring how the COVID-19 pandemic has affected the healthcare of racial & ethnic minority groups without COVID-19. It is important to understand the ways in which the pandemic has exacerbated the inequitable delivery of healthcare in order to design policies to address these racial injustices. We focused on potentially avoidable hospitalizations, which are admissions to a hospital (not for COVID-19) that likely could have been prevented through timely and high-quality outpatient care. Prior research has shown that avoidable hospitalizations are markers for access to outpatient care, and expose patients to preventable financial burden, separate them from their families, and put them at risk for hospital-acquired infections. (more…)
Author Interviews, CMAJ, COVID -19 Coronavirus, OBGYNE / 19.03.2021

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Nathalie Auger Professeure agrégée de clinique École de santé publique - Département de médecine sociale et preventive University of Montreal MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: COVID-19, caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2), has been a major public health concern. The number of infected pregnant women continues to increase. Pregnant women and infants are particularly susceptible to COVID-19 because the physiologic changes of pregnancy involve cardiovascular, respiratory, and immune changes that may alter the response to SARS-CoV-2 infection. Fetuses may be exposed to SARS-CoV-2 during critical periods of development. The nature of the association between COVID-19 and pregnancy outcomes remains unclear and meta-analyses of pregnant women with COVID-19 are lacking. (more…)
Author Interviews, Cost of Health Care, JAMA / 19.03.2021

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Sungchul Park, MPH PhD Assistant Professor, Health Management and Policy Dornsife School of Public Health Drexel University Philadelphia, PA 19104Sungchul Park, MPH PhD Assistant Professor, Health Management and Policy Dornsife School of Public Health Drexel University Philadelphia, PA 19104   MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Evidence suggests that a significant share of health care costs in the US is of low value. In some cases, low-value care can be associated with harmful patient outcomes. Thus, decreasing use of low-value care is a major goal for Medicare given the potential to decrease costs and harms. Compared with traditional fee-for-service Medicare (TM), Medicare Advantage (MA) is more strongly financially incentivized to decrease use of low-value care. (more…)
Author Interviews, ENT, JAMA / 18.03.2021

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Chao Cao, MPH PhD student in Movement Science, Program in Physical Therapy, Washington University School of Medicine. Senior author: Lin Yang, PhD Research Scientist/Epidemiologist Department of Cancer Epidemiology and Prevention Research Cancer Care Alberta | Alberta Health Services | Canada MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? dizziness-vertigoResponse: Dizziness and imbalance are common among US adults and increases the risk of serious injuries. However, research related to balance overwhelmingly focuses on functional outcomes among older adults, therefore our understanding on how balance function may affect the long-term health outcomes in adults of different age group is limited. MedicalResearch.com: What are the main findings?  Response: We found that balance disorder affects nearly 2/3 of older Americans (65+ yr) as well as 1/3 of those middle-aged (50-64 yr). Our study, for the first time, found that for middle-aged and older Americans, their overall and sensory-specific balance disorders (visual, proprioceptive, and vestibular) were associated with higher mortality risks driven by cancer and CVD death over 12 years.   (more…)
Author Interviews, COVID -19 Coronavirus, Dermatology, Lancet / 17.03.2021

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Matt Spick, Post-Graduate Researcher University of Surrey Faculty of Engineering and Physical Sciences Guildford, UK MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Are you measuring lipids or the virus? Response: In this study, we aimed to detect what the virus does to us, rather than the virus itself. The gold standard for detecting COVID-19 is the RT-PCR test, but by their nature, PCR tests only provide diagnostic information, and at times during the pandemic the availability of PCR tests has been a bottleneck for the identification of the disease. Our goal was to investigate a novel method for the diagnosis of COVID-19, at the same time as learning more about what the disease does to us through lipidomics. (more…)
Author Interviews, Brigham & Women's - Harvard, COVID -19 Coronavirus / 17.03.2021

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Benjamin E. Gewurz MD, PhD Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, Cambridge, Division of Infectious Disease, Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Department of Microbiology, Harvard Medical School Boston, MABenjamin E. Gewurz MD, PhD Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, Cambridge, Division of Infectious Disease, Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Department of Microbiology, Harvard Medical School Boston, MA  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: When the Covid-19 virus infects cells, it takes over and redirects our cells resources towards the projection of virus building blocks and new viruses.  Building blocks include large amounts of RNAs that encode for the viral proteins, much as the mRNA vaccines direct our bodies to make the spike protein. We wondered how the virus changes cell metabolism in order to support the synthesis of vast amounts of viral RNAs within hours of infection. (more…)
Author Interviews, Dermatology, JAMA, Melanoma / 17.03.2021

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Anne Cust | PhD, Professor of Cancer Epidemiology The University of Sydney Faculty of Medicine and Health Sydney School of Public Health MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Are the screeners specially trained, use full body photographs, dermoscopy etc? Response: The Melanoma High-risk Clinic Study was developed to optimise the early detection of new melanomas in people at high risk of developing melanoma. A previous single-centre study observed fewer excisions and healthcare costs, thinner melanomas and better quality of life when surveillance of high risk patients was conducted in a melanoma dermatology clinic with a structured surveillance protocol involving 6-monthly full body examinations aided by total body photography (TBP) and sequential digital dermoscopy imaging (SDDI). The initial pilot study was performed in a single tertiary referral specialist centre using trained dermatologists who routinely used the diagnostic interventions. Our objective was to examine longer-term sustainability and expansion of the program to multiple practices including a primary care skin cancer clinic setting. The hypothesis was that the outcomes would be similar if using the same protocol and diagnostic tools. The participating doctors were trained to follow the protocol, which included instruction on how to respond and interpret changing lesions, but not in use of dermoscopy or skin examinations, which were routinely and consistently used in all clinics prior to the study commencing. There were 593 participants assessed as very high risk of melanoma who participated in the Melanoma High-risk Clinic Study from 2012-2018. Nearly all of the participants had had a previous melanoma and had additional melanoma risk factors. 57% were male and the median age at study entry was 58 years. (more…)
Author Interviews, Cancer Research, JAMA, Lung Cancer, Smoking, USPSTF / 16.03.2021

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: John B. Wong, M.D. Chief Scientific Officer, Vice Chair for Clinical Affairs Chief of the Division of Clinical Decision Making Primary Care Clinician Department of Medicine Tufts Medical Center  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death for both men and women in the United States. More than 200,000 people are diagnosed with this devastating disease each year. Smoking is the leading cause of lung cancer, resulting in the vast majority of lung cancers in the United States. (more…)
Alzheimer's - Dementia, Author Interviews, Eli Lilly, NEJM / 16.03.2021

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Stephen Salloway, M.D., M.S. Director of Neurology and the Memory and Aging Program, Butler Hospital Martin M. Zucker Professor of Psychiatry and Human Behavior Professor of Neurology, Alpert Medical School of Brown University Providence, RI 02906  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: This 78 week phase 2 study tested donanemab in patients with early Alzheimer’s disease. Donanemab is a an anti-amyloid monoclonal antibody that targets the N3 pyroglutamate epitope.  MedicalResearch.com: What are the main findings? Response: The drug produced a substantial lowering of amyloid plaques and showed a slowing in cognitive decline. Key innovations included using PET scans to ensure all patients were amyloid positive and had a moderate level of tau build-up and switching from drug to placebo once the amyloid level was below the expected cut-off for Alzheimer’s disease. There were no new safety signals. The main side-effect was amyloid-related imaging abnormalities (ARIA) that have been seen with other anti-amyloid treatments. ARIA is managed with regular safety MRI scans.  Donanemab is now being tested in a larger phase 3 trial that could lead to regulatory approval. (more…)
Author Interviews, Gender Differences, Menopause, Urology / 15.03.2021

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Lin Yang, PhD Research Scientist/Epidemiologist Department of Cancer Epidemiology and Prevention Research Cancer Care Alberta | Alberta Health Services | Canada Adjunct Assistant Professor Departments of Oncology and Community Health Sciences University of Calgary | Canada  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Urinary incontinence disproportionately affects women. Urinary incontinence results in significant physical, social, and psychological adverse consequences that impair women’s quality of life and contribute to considerable healthcare costs. At the moment, the contemporary prevalence and recent trends in urinary incontinence in US women are unknown. More importantly, there is a growing awareness that urinary incontinence is not part of normal aging, but very little information is available to inform prevention strategies. Therefore, we were also interested in exploring correlates of urinary incontinence in a population-based sample of US women. (more…)
Author Interviews, Breast Cancer, Cancer Research, Sugar / 14.03.2021

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Nadia Koyratty PhD student Department of Epidemiology and Environmental Health University at Buffalo State University of New York MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: The literature suggests that sugars contribute to the incidence of breast cancer, but few exists on the prognosis after a breast cancer diagnosis. MedicalResearch.com: What are the main findings? Response: Compared to breast cancer patients who never or rarely drank non-diet soda, those who reported drinking non-diet soda five times or more per week had a 62% higher likelihood of dying from any causes, and were 85% more likely to die from breast cancer specifically. (more…)
Author Interviews, COVID -19 Coronavirus, Infections, UCSD / 13.03.2021

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Abhishek Saha, PhD Assistant Professor Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering University of California San Diego MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: At a very early stage of COVID 19 pandemic, the scientific community identified that respiratory droplet is the primary mode of transmission of the SARS-CoV2 virus. Naturally, the health agencies have encouraged facemasks to restrict these droplets from spreading during respiratory events, like coughing, sneezing, talking, etc. While WHO recommended using either N95 masks or other types of three-layer masks, due to a sharp increase in demand and scarcity in supplies, a variety of either home-made or locally purchased masks became popular. Naturally, one wonders if these single- and double-layer masks provide enough protection. To provide some insight into this critical question, our team, which also includes Professor Swetaprovo Chaudhuri from the University of Toronto, and Professor Saptarshi Basu of the Indian Institute of Science, experimentally analyzed what happens to the respiratory droplets when they impact single- and multi-layer masks.  (more…)
AHA Journals, Author Interviews, Heart Disease, Stroke / 12.03.2021

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Brandon K Fornwalt, MD, PhD Associate Professor, Director Department of Imaging Science and Innovation Geisinger MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Atrial fibrillation (AF) is an abnormal heart rhythm that is associated with outcomes such as stroke, heart failure and death. If we know a patient has atrial fibrillation, we can treat them to reduce the risk of stroke by nearly two-thirds. Unfortunately, patients often don’t know they have AF. They present initially with a stroke, and we have no chance to treat them before this happens. If we could predict who is at high risk of either currently having AF or developing it in the near future, we could intervene earlier and hopefully reduce bad outcomes like stroke. Artificial intelligence approaches may be able to help with this task. (more…)
Author Interviews, Blood Pressure - Hypertension, Pediatrics / 12.03.2021

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Melanie Clark PhD candidate Murdoch Children's Research Institute The Royal Children's Hospital  blood-pressure-children-hypertensionMedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Hypertension in children is a growing problem around the world, but when diagnosing hypertension, most of the time blood pressure is only measured in one arm. Our study showed that children can have a blood pressure difference between arms that may be considered significant in a clinical setting. One in four children had a difference between left and right arms that could mean that blood pressure appears normal in one arm, but in the other arm it would be classified as a high blood pressure. This means that if a doctor measures blood pressure in one arm only, a diagnosis of high blood pressure could be missed. (more…)
Author Interviews, CDC, COVID -19 Coronavirus, Emory, JAMA, Occupational Health / 12.03.2021

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Jesse T. Jacob, MD School of Medicine Director, Antibiotic Stewardship Program Emory University, Atlanta, Georgia MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Since coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) was recognized in the United States in January 2020, the risk of infection with severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) attributed to exposures in the health care workplace has been studied with conflicting results, and the role of job functions (such as nurse) or specific workplace activities, including care for individuals with known and unknown SARS-CoV-2 positivity, increase the risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection. We assessed more than 24,000 healthcare providers between April and August 2020 across four large academic medical systems (Emory, Johns Hopkins, Rush University Medical Center, and University of Maryland) which collaborate in the CDC’s Prevention Epicenter Program and conduct innovative infection prevention research. Each site conducted voluntary COVID-19 antibody testing on its health care workers, as well as offered a questionnaire/survey on the employees’ occupational activities and possible exposures to individuals with COVID-19 infection both inside and outside the workplace. We also looked at three-digit residential zip-code prefixes to determine COVID-19 prevalence in communities.   (more…)
Author Interviews, Genetic Research, Ophthalmology, Science / 12.03.2021

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: eye-eyecolor-geneticsDr Pirro Hysi Senior Lecturer in Ophthalmology Kings College London MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: - Iris (eye) color is an important human trait. It is one of the main features that makes our faces unique and recognizable. Iris color is similar to other pigmentatio traits, like hair and skin color, in that it is determined by the concentration and relative ratios of the melanin pigment. Pigmentation traits are roughly determined by several of the same genes regulating pigmentation, but many other genes seem to selectively determine pigmentation in any of these tissues. (more…)
Author Interviews, Brigham & Women's - Harvard, Kidney Disease, Transplantation / 12.03.2021

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Jamil R. Azzi MD Associate Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School Medical Director, Vascularized Composite Allotransplantation Associate Director, Kidney and Pancreas Transplantation Director, Kidney Transplant Fellowship Engineering in Medicine, Brigham and Women’s Hospital Renal Division, Brigham and Women's Hospital MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Would you explain what is meant by an exosome?  Response: Kidney transplant recipients are always at risk of developing rejection where the immune system recognizes the transplanted kidney as “foreign body” and attacks it. The risk is up to 20% the first year after transplant and many more develop chronic rejection which ultimately leads to kidney failure. Currently, most clinicians monitor for kidney rejection by measuring serum creatinine and urine protein. However, creatinine is neither sensitive nor specific for rejection. On the other hand, performing kidney biopsies to make accurate diagnosis of rejection is invasive and has many complications. In our study, when clinicians decided on performing biopsies based on the clinical informations they have including changes in serum creatinine, the biopsies did not show rejection in almost 70% of the cases. Furthermore, serum creatinine can remain stable while the patient may be undergoing a rejection (subclinical rejection). In fact, some centers currently perform routine biopsies at different time points for all their patients regardless of creatinine despite the high risks, costs and inconveniences of doing biopsies. Out of this frustration with the current tools, we have been working on novel technologies to diagnose rejection through the urine. The idea started from the bench as we were studying exosomes, those are tiny vesicles (less than 100 nm in size) released by all cells. We were interested on how immune cells communicate via those vesicles so we developed assays to identify them. We then showed that if immune cells are invading the kidney during rejection, vesicles derived from those immune cells are found in the urine. This gave us the idea of developing a urine test based on these findings. (more…)
Author Interviews, COVID -19 Coronavirus, JAMA, Kidney Disease, Yale / 11.03.2021

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Jim Nugent, MD MPH Pediatric Nephrology Fellow Yale University School of Medicine MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: It is now well-established that acute kidney injury is common in patients hospitalized with COVID-19. In addition, patients with COVID-19 tend to have more severe acute kidney injury than patients who have acute kidney injury due to other causes. However, the intermediate and longer-term kidney outcomes after COVID-19-associated acute kidney injury have not yet been described. Our study compares the rate of change in estimated glomerular filtration rate after hospital discharge between patients with and without COVID-19 who experienced in-hospital acute kidney injury. Due to their more severe acute kidney injury in the hospital, we hypothesized that patients with COVID-19-associated acute kidney injury would have greater decline in kidney function after discharge compared to patients with acute kidney injury who tested negative for COVID-19. In order to answer this question, we reviewed the medical records of adult patients at 5 hospitals in Connecticut and Rhode Island admitted between March and August 2020 who had developed acute kidney injury during their hospitalization, survived until discharge, and were discharged off dialysis. For our study, we included patients who had at least one outpatient serum creatinine measurement after discharge. (more…)
Author Interviews, COVID -19 Coronavirus, Dermatology, JAMA / 11.03.2021

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Jonathan Silverberg, MD, PHD, MPH Associate Professor Director of Clinical Research Director of Patch Testing George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences Washington, DC MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: The COVID pandemic hit the Orthodox Jewish community in the United States particularly hard, especially in the early days when much was unknown. At that time of great loss, Jewish communities around the United States rallied to help the millions of other people impacted by the pandemic. A partnership was established of local community organizations across 5 states with premier academic universities across the United States and Canada. Over a 10 day period in May 2020, more than 6500 people came out to participate in the The Multi-Institutional Study Analyzing anti-CoV-2 Antibodies (MITZVA) cohort. Participants completed surveys and donated blood in order to become potential convalescent plasma donors and help learn more about the science of COVID. (more…)