Systemic lupus erythematosus is associated with poor outcome after acute myocardial infarction.

BACKGROUND: Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is associated with a higher risk of cardiovascular disease. However, it is not clear whether or not SLE is associated with poor outcomes after acute myocardial infarction (AMI). METHODS AND RESULTS: Using the Taiwan National Health Insurance Database, we identified the SLE group as patients with AMI who have a concurrent discharge diagnosis of SLE. We also selected an age-, sex-, hospital level-, and admission calendar year-matched non-SLE group at a ratio of 1:3 from the total non-SLE group. One hundred fifty-one patients with SLE, 113,791 patients without SLE, and 453 matched patients without SLE were admitted with a diagnosis of AMI. Patients with SLE were significantly younger, predominantly female, and more likely to have chronic kidney disease than those without SLE. The in-hospital mortality rates were 12.6%, 9.0%, and 4.2% in the SLE, total non-SLE, and matched non-SLE groups, respectively. The in-hospital mortality was significantly higher in the SLE group than in the total non-SLE group (OR = 1.98; 95% CI = 1.2-3.26) and the matched non-SLE group (mortality OR = 2.20; 95% CI = 1.06-4.58). In addition, the SLE group was associated with a borderline significant risk of prolonged hospitalization when compared with the non-SLE group. CONCLUSION: SLE is associated with a higher risk of in-hospital mortality and a borderline significantly higher risk of prolonged hospitalization after AMI.

Using an analogical reasoning framework to infer language patterns for negative life events.

BACKGROUND: Feelings of depression can be caused by negative life events (NLE) such as the death of a family member, a quarrel with one's spouse, job loss, or strong criticism from an authority figure. The automatic and accurate identification of negative life event language patterns (NLE-LP) can help identify individuals potentially in need of psychiatric services. An NLE-LP combines a person (subject) and a reasonable negative life event (action), e.g. or < boyfriend:break_up>. METHODS: This paper proposes an analogical reasoning framework which combines a word representation approach and a pattern inference method to mine/extract NLE-LPs from psychiatric consultation documents. Word representation approaches such as skip-gram (SG) and continuous bag-of-words (CBOW) are used to generate word embeddings. Pattern inference methods such as cosine similarity (COSINE) and cosine multiplication similarity (COSMUL) are used to infer patterns. RESULTS: Experimental results show our proposed analogical reasoning framework outperforms the traditional methods such as positive pairwise mutual information (PPMI) and hyperspace analog to language (HAL), and can effectively mine highly precise NLE-LPs based on word embeddings. CBOW with COSINE of analogical reasoning is the best word representation and inference engine. In addition, both word embeddings and the inference engine provided by the analogical reasoning framework can further be used to improve the HAL model. CONCLUSIONS: Our proposed framework is a very simple matching function based on these word representation approaches and is applied to significantly improve HAL model mining performance.

Effect of socioeconomic inequalities on cholecystectomy outcomes: a 10-year population-based analysis.

BACKGROUND: Although numerous epidemiological studies on cholecystectomy have been conducted worldwide, only a few have considered the effect of socioeconomic inequalities on cholecystectomy outcomes. Specifically, few studies have focused on the low-income population (LIP). METHODS: A nationwide prospective study based on the Taiwan National Health Insurance dataset was conducted during 2003-2012. The International Classification of ICD-9-CM procedure codes 51.2 and 51.21-51.24 were identified as the inclusion criteria for cholecystectomy. Temporal trends were analyzed using a joinpoint regression, and the hierarchical linear modeling (HLM) method was used as an analytical strategy to evaluate the group-level and individual-level factors. Interactions between age, gender and SES were also tested in HLM model. RESULTS: Analyses were conducted on 225,558 patients. The incidence rates were 167.81 (95% CI: 159.78-175.83) per 100,000 individuals per year for the LIP and 123.24 (95% CI: 116.37-130.12) per 100,000 individuals per year for the general population (GP). After cholecystectomy, LIP patients showed higher rates of 30-day mortality, in-hospital complications, and readmission for complications, but a lower rate of routine discharge than GP patients. The hospital costs and length of stay for LIP patients were higher than those for GP patients. The multilevel analysis using HLM revealed that adverse socioeconomic status significantly negatively affects the outcomes of patients undergoing cholecystectomy. Additionally, male sex, advanced age, and high Charlson Comorbidity Index (CCI) scores were associated with higher rates of in-hospital complications and 30-day mortality. We also observed that the 30-day mortality rates for patients who underwent cholecystectomy in regional hospitals and district hospitals were significantly higher than those of patients receiving care in a medical center. CONCLUSION: Patients with a disadvantaged finance status appeared to be more vulnerable to cholecystectomy surgery. This result suggested that further interventions in the health care system are necessary to reduce this disparity.

Outcome comparison between percutaneous cholecystostomy and cholecystectomy: a 10-year population-based analysis.

BACKGROUND: Controversy surrounding the role of percutaneous cholecystostomy (PC) is fed by the absence of large amounts of data concerning its outcomes, and many authors have maintained that there is no evidence to support a recommendation for PC rather than cholecystectomy (CCS) in elderly or critically ill patients with acute cholecystitis (AC). METHODS: We conducted this study by tracking trends in the utilization and outcomes of PC and CCS using longitudinal health research data in Taiwan. RESULTS: Analyses were conducted on 236,742 patients, 11,184 of whom had undergone PC and 225,558 of whom had undergone CCS. Average annual percentage changes (AAPCs) from 2003 to 2012 increased significantly by 18.34% each year for PC and by 2.82% each year for CCS. The subset analyzes showed that the mortality rates were far higher in patients underwent PC than in patients underwent CCS in all subgroups, which increased from a minimum of 1.45-fold to a maximum of 34.22-fold. The gap of the mortality rates between PC group and CCS group narrowed as the patients aged and with the seriousness of the diseases increased. Most patients with PC or CCS who died in-hospital or within 30 days after discharge were 70 years of age or older, and a large number of them received a CCI score of at least 1. The AAPCs of the overall mortality rates from 2003 to 2012 decreased by 6.78% each year for PC and by 7.33% each year for CCS. PC was related to a higher rate of cholecystitis recurrence and readmission for complications, but a lower rate of in-hospital complications and routine discharge than CCS, and 36.41% of all patients treated with PC underwent subsequent CCS. Additionally, the patients with PC experienced longer hospital stays and generated higher costs than the patients with CCS. CONCLUSION: Patients who underwent PC demonstrated poorer prognoses than did patients who underwent CCS. The role of PC in the Tokyo guidelines may be overstated; it is not as safe as the Tokyo guidelines have suggested in moderate-grade cholecystitis cases, and it should be limited to only the elderly and sicker patients.

Ambient Air Pollution and the Risk of Central Retinal Artery Occlusion.

PURPOSE: To investigate whether daily changes in ambient air pollution were associated with an increased risk of central retinal artery occlusion (CRAO). DESIGN: Retrospective population-based cohort study. PARTICIPANTS: We identified patients newly diagnosed with CRAO between 2001 and 2013 in a representative database of 1 000 000 patients that were randomly selected from all registered beneficiaries of the National Health Insurance program in Taiwan. We identified air pollutant monitoring stations located near these patients' residences in different administrative areas in Taiwan to determine the recorded concentrations of particulate matter ≤2.5 µm (PM2.5), particulate matter ≤10 µm (PM10), nitrogen dioxide (NO2), sulfur dioxide (SO2), and ozone (O3). Patients without corresponding monitoring stations were excluded. METHODS: We used a time-stratified case-crossover study design and conditional logistic regression analysis to assess associations between the risk of CRAO and the air pollutant levels in the days preceding each event. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs). RESULTS: We enrolled 96 patients with CRAO in this study. The mean age was 65.6 years (standard deviation, 12.7 years) and 67.7% of patients were male. The risk of CRAO onset was significantly increased (OR, 1.09; 95% CI, 1.01-1.17; P = 0.03) during a 5-day period following a 1 part per billion increase in NO2 levels. After multipollutant adjustment, the increase in risk was most prominent after 4 days (OR, 1.40; 95% CI, 1.05-1.87; P = 0.02) to 5 days (OR, 2.16; 95% CI, 1.10-4.23; P = 0.03) of elevated NO2 levels in diabetic patients. The risk of CRAO onset also significantly increased in patients with hypertension and in patients ≥65 years old, after 1 day of elevated SO2 levels (OR, 1.88; 95% CI, 1.07-3.29; P = 0.03 and OR, 1.90; 95% CI, 1.13-3.21; P = 0.02, respectively). The transient concentration of the other air pollutants, including PM2.5, PM10, and O3, did not significantly affect the occurrence of CRAO in this study. CONCLUSIONS: These results demonstrated a positive association between air pollution and CRAO onset, particularly in patients with diabetes or hypertension and those older than 65 years.

Trends and outcomes in the utilization of laparoscopic appendectomies in a low-income population in Taiwan from 2003 to 2011.

BACKGROUND: Numerous epidemiological studies have compared outcomes between laparoscopic appendectomies (LA) and open appendectomies (OA); however, few studies have assessed the efficacy of LA specifically in a low-income population (LIP). METHODS: We analyzed the trends in the utilization and outcomes of LA versus OA in an LIP in Taiwan using data from the National Health Insurance (NHI) Research Database. RESULTS: Steady temporal growth trends were observed for the patients who underwent LA in both the LIP and general population (GP); however, in each study year, the proportion of LIP patients who underwent LA was lower than the proportion of GP patients who underwent the procedure. The LIP patients were more susceptible to payment policies than the GP patients; thus, more attention should be paid to vulnerable patient populations when formulating and revising NHI payment policies. Compared with OAs, LAs were associated with a slightly higher rate of routine patient discharges and a lower rate of in-hospital complications (1.48% vs. 3.76%, p < 0.05). The rate of readmission for complications was lower in patients after LA than in patients after OA (1.64% vs. 3.89%, p < 0.05). The overall case-fatality rate of LIP patients who underwent LA was lower than that of those who underwent OA. LA was correlated with a significantly shorter length of hospital stay (LOS) compared with OA (3.80 ± 0.08 vs. 5.51 ± 0.11, p < 0.05). The average hospital cost for LA was slightly less than that for OA (1178 ± 13 vs. 1191 ± 19 USD, p < 0.05). A higher percentage of patients who underwent OA required an LOS longer than 14 days compared to patients who underwent LA (7.73% vs. 1.97%, p < 0.05). Regarding hospital costs and LOS, LA showed significant advantages over OA in the subpopulations of male patients, patients 45 years old and older, patients with Charlson Comorbidity Index (CCI) scores of two or more, and patients with complicated cases of appendicitis. CONCLUSION: The LIP patients benefited more from the LA approach than the OA approach in the treatment of appendicitis, especially regarding LOS, in-hospital complications, in-hospital mortality, and routine discharge rates.

Investigating the effect of daily sleep on memory capacity in college students.

BACKGROUND: Sleep is a natural periodic state of rest for body and mind and daily sleep affects physical and mental health. However, it is essential to address intensity of sleep characteristics affecting the memory capacity of humans positively or negatively. OBJECTIVE: Using wearable devices to observe and assess the effect of daily sleep on memory capacity of college students. METHODS: This study assessed the daily sleep characteristics and memory capacity of 39 college students who used wrist-worn devices. The spatial span test (SST) was used to evaluate the memory capacity. RESULTS: The study indicated a negative correlation between memory capacity and awake count on the test date and during the week before the test date (r=-0.153 (95% CI: -0.032, -0.282), r=-0.391 (95% CI: -0.520, -0.235), respectively). However, the minutes asleep on the test date and during the week before the test date positively affected memory capacity (r= 0.127 (95% CI: 0.220, 0.025), r= 0.370 (95% CI: 0.208, 0.500), respectively). In addition, spending ⩾ 6 hours and 42 minutes asleep on the test date or ⩾ 6 hours and 37 minutes asleep per day on average during the week before the test date resulted in a better memory capacity. CONCLUSIONS: A lower awake count led to a higher memory capacity in college students, as did more minutes asleep.

A Study of the Effects of Daily Physical Activity on Memory and Attention Capacities in College Students.

This study evaluated the relationship between daily physical activity (DPA) and memory capacity, as well as the association between daily activity and attention capacity, in college students in Taiwan. Participants (mean age = 20.79) wore wearable trackers for 106 days in order to collect DPA. These data were analyzed in association with their memory and attention capacities, as assessed using the spatial span test (SST) and the trail making test (TMT). The study showed significant negative correlations between memory capacity, time spent on the attention test (TSAT), calories burnt, and very active time duration (VATD) on the day before testing (r = -0.272, r = -0.176, r = 0.289, r = 0.254, resp.) and during the week prior to testing (r = -0.364, r = -0.395, r = 0.268, r = 0.241, resp.). The calories burnt and the VATD per day thresholds, which at best discriminated between normal-to-good and low attention capacity, were ≥2283 calories day-1, ≥20 minutes day-1 of very high activity (VHA) on the day before testing, or ≥13,640 calories week-1, ≥76 minutes week-1 of VHA during the week prior to testing. Findings indicated the short-term effects that VATD and calories burnt on the day before or during the week before testing significantly and negatively associated with memory and attention capacities of college students.

A New Scheme to Characterize and Identify Protein Ubiquitination Sites.

Protein ubiquitination, involving the conjugation of ubiquitin on lysine residue, serves as an important modulator of many cellular functions in eukaryotes. Recent advancements in proteomic technology have stimulated increasing interest in identifying ubiquitination sites. However, most computational tools for predicting ubiquitination sites are focused on small-scale data. With an increasing number of experimentally verified ubiquitination sites, we were motivated to design a predictive model for identifying lysine ubiquitination sites for large-scale proteome dataset. This work assessed not only single features, such as amino acid composition (AAC), amino acid pair composition (AAPC) and evolutionary information, but also the effectiveness of incorporating two or more features into a hybrid approach to model construction. The support vector machine (SVM) was applied to generate the prediction models for ubiquitination site identification. Evaluation by five-fold cross-validation showed that the SVM models learned from the combination of hybrid features delivered a better prediction performance. Additionally, a motif discovery tool, MDDLogo, was adopted to characterize the potential substrate motifs of ubiquitination sites. The SVM models integrating the MDDLogo-identified substrate motifs could yield an average accuracy of 68.70 percent. Furthermore, the independent testing result showed that the MDDLogo-clustered SVM models could provide a promising accuracy (78.50 percent) and perform better than other prediction tools. Two cases have demonstrated the effective prediction of ubiquitination sites with corresponding substrate motifs.

Outcomes in the Utilization of Single Percutaneous Cholecystostomy in a Low-Income Population.

Numerous studies have investigated the applicable populations for percutaneous cholecystostomy (PC) procedures, but the outcomes of PC in low-income populations (LIPs) have been insufficiently studied. Data for 11,184 patients who underwent PC were collected from the National Health Insurance Research Database of Taiwan during 2003 and 2012. The overall crude rate of single PC for the LIP was 64% higher than that for the general population (GP). After propensity score matching for the LIP and GP at a ratio of 1:5, the outcome analysis of patients who underwent PC showed that in-hospital mortality was significantly higher in the LIP group than in the GP group, but one-year recurrence was lower. The rates of 30-day mortality and in-hospital complications were higher for the LIP patients than for the GP patients, and the rate of routine discharge was lower, but the differences were not significant. In conclusion, LIP patients undergoing PC exhibit poor prognoses relative to GP patients, indicating that a low socioeconomic status has an adverse impact on the outcome of PC. We suggest that surgeons fully consider the patient's financial situation during the operation and further consider the possible poor post-surgical outcomes for LIP patients.

Differences in Spontaneous Intracerebral Hemorrhage Cases between Urban and Rural Regions of Taiwan: Big Data Analytics of Government Open Data.

This study evaluated the differences in spontaneous intracerebral hemorrhage (sICH) between rural and urban areas of Taiwan with big data analysis. We used big data analytics and visualization tools to examine government open data, which included the residents' health medical administrative data, economic status, educational status, and relevant information. The study subjects included sICH patients of Taipei region (29,741 cases) and Eastern Taiwan (4565 cases). The incidence of sICH per 100,000 population per year in Eastern Taiwan (71.3 cases) was significantly higher than that of the Taipei region (42.3 cases). The mean coverage area per hospital in Eastern Taiwan (452.4 km²) was significantly larger than the Taipei region (24 km²). The residents educational level in the Taipei region was significantly higher than that in Eastern Taiwan. The mean hospital length of stay in the Taipei region (17.9 days) was significantly greater than that in Eastern Taiwan (16.3 days) (p < 0.001). There were no significant differences in other medical profiles between two areas. Distance and educational barriers were two possible reasons for the higher incidence of sICH in the rural area of Eastern Taiwan. Further studies are necessary in order to understand these phenomena in greater depth.

Does the Short-Term Effect of Air Pollution Influence the Incidence of Spontaneous Intracerebral Hemorrhage in Different Patient Groups? Big Data Analysis in Taiwan.

Spontaneous intracerebral hemorrhage (sICH) has a high mortality rate. Research has demonstrated that the occurrence of sICH is related to air pollution. This study used big data analysis to explore the impact of air pollution on the risk of sICH in patients of differing age and geographic location. 39,053 cases were included in this study; 14,041 in the Taipei region (Taipei City and New Taipei City), 5537 in Taoyuan City, 7654 in Taichung City, 4739 in Tainan City, and 7082 in Kaohsiung City. The results of correlation analysis indicated that there were two pollutants groups, the CO and NO2 group and the PM2.5 and PM10 group. Furthermore, variations in the correlations of sICH with air pollutants were identified in different age groups. The co-factors of the influence of air pollutants in the different age groups were explored using regression analysis. This study integrated Taiwan National Health Insurance data and air pollution data to explore the risk factors of sICH using big data analytics. We found that PM2.5 and PM10 are very important risk factors for sICH, and age is an important modulating factor that allows air pollutants to influence the incidence of sICH.

UbiNet: an online resource for exploring the functional associations and regulatory networks of protein ubiquitylation.

Protein ubiquitylation catalyzed by E3 ubiquitin ligases are crucial in the regulation of many cellular processes. Owing to the high throughput of mass spectrometry-based proteomics, a number of methods have been developed for the experimental determination of ubiquitylation sites, leading to a large collection of ubiquitylation data. However, there exist no resources for the exploration of E3-ligase-associated regulatory networks of for ubiquitylated proteins in humans. Therefore, the UbiNet database was developed to provide a full investigation of protein ubiquitylation networks by incorporating experimentally verified E3 ligases, ubiquitylated substrates and protein-protein interactions (PPIs). To date, UbiNet has accumulated 43 948 experimentally verified ubiquitylation sites from 14 692 ubiquitylated proteins of humans. Additionally, we have manually curated 499 E3 ligases as well as two E1 activating and 46 E2 conjugating enzymes. To delineate the regulatory networks among E3 ligases and ubiquitylated proteins, a total of 430 530 PPIs were integrated into UbiNet for the exploration of ubiquitylation networks with an interactive network viewer. A case study demonstrated that UbiNet was able to decipher a scheme for the ubiquitylation of tumor proteins p63 and p73 that is consistent with their functions. Although the essential role of Mdm2 in p53 regulation is well studied, UbiNet revealed that Mdm2 and additional E3 ligases might be implicated in the regulation of other tumor proteins by protein ubiquitylation. Moreover, UbiNet could identify potential substrates for a specific E3 ligase based on PPIs and substrate motifs. With limited knowledge about the mechanisms through which ubiquitylated proteins are regulated by E3 ligases, UbiNet offers users an effective means for conducting preliminary analyses of protein ubiquitylation. The UbiNet database is now freely accessible via http://csb.cse.yzu.edu.tw/UbiNet/ The content is regularly updated with the literature and newly released data.Database URL: http://csb.cse.yzu.edu.tw/UbiNet/.

Who will pass? Analyzing learner behaviors in MOOCs.

Massive open online courses (MOOCs) have recently gained worldwide attention from educational institutes. MOOCs provide a new option for learning, yet measurable learning benefits of MOOCs still need to be investigated. Collecting data of three MOOCs at Yuan Ze University (YZU), this paper intended to classify learning behaviors among 1489 students on the MOOC platform at YZU. This study further examined learning outcomes in MOOCs by different types of learners. The Ward's hierarchical and k-means non-hierarchical clustering methods were employed to classify types of learners' behavior while they engaged in learning activities on the MOOC platform. Three types of MOOC learners were classified-active learner, passive learner, and bystander. Active learners who submitted assignments on time and frequently watched lecture videos showed a higher completion rate and a better grade in the course. MOOC learners who participated in online discussion forum reported a higher rate of passing the course and a better score than those inactive classmates. The finding of this study suggested that the first 2 weeks was a critical point of time to retain students in MOOCs. MOOC instructors need to carefully design course and detect risk behaviors of students in early of the classes to prevent students from dropping out of the course. The feature design of discussion forum is to provide peer interaction and facilitate online learning. Our results suggested that timely feedback by instructors or facilitators on discussion forum could enhance students' engagement in MOOCs.

Pre-emergency-department care-seeking patterns are associated with the severity of presenting condition for emergency department visit and subsequent adverse events: a timeframe episode analysis.

BACKGROUND: Many patients treated in Emergency Department (ED) visits can be treated at primary or urgent care sectors, despite the fact that a number of ED visitors seek other forms of care prior to an ED visit. However, little is known regarding how the pre-ED activity episodes affect ED visits. OBJECTIVES: We investigated whether care-seeking patterns involve the use of health care services of various types prior to ED visits and examined the associations of these patterns with the severity of the presenting condition for the ED visit (EDVS) and subsequent events. METHODS: This retrospective observational study used administrative data on beneficiaries of the universal health care insurance program in Taiwan. The service type, treatment capacity, and relative diagnosis were used to classify pre-ED visits into 8 care types. Frequent pattern analysis was used to identify sequential care-seeking patterns and to classify 667,183 eligible pre-ED episodes into patterns. Generalized linear models were developed using generalized estimating equations to examine the associations of these patterns with EDVS and subsequent events. RESULTS: The results revealed 17 care-seeking patterns. The EDVS and likelihood of subsequent events significantly differed among patterns. The ED severity index of patterns differ from patterns seeking directly ED care (coefficients ranged from -0.05 to 0.13), and the odds-ratios for the likelihood of subsequent ED visits and hospitalization ranged from 1.18 to 1.86 and 1.16 to 2.84, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: The pre-ED care-seeking patterns differ in severity of presenting condition and subsequent events that may represent different causes of ED visit. Future health policy maker may adopt different intervention strategies for targeted population to reduce unnecessary ED visit effectively.

Epidemiology and socioeconomic features of appendicitis in Taiwan: a 12-year population-based study.

INTRODUCTION: This paper presents an epidemiologic study of appendicitis in Taiwan over a twelve-year period. An analysis of the incidence in the low-income population (LIP) is included to explore the effects of lower socioeconomic status on appendicitis. METHODS: We analyzed the epidemiological features of appendicitis in Taiwan using data from the National Health Insurance Research Database (NHIRD) from 2000 to 2011. All cases diagnosed as appendicitis were enrolled. RESULTS: The overall incidences of appendicitis, primary appendectomy, and perforated appendicitis were 107.76, 101.58, and 27.20 per 100,000 per year, respectively. The highest incidence of appendicitis was found in persons aged 15 to 29 years; males had higher rates of appendicitis than females at all ages except for 70 years and older. Appendicitis rates were 11.76 % higher in the summer than in the winter months. A multilevel analysis with hierarchical linear modeling (HLM) revealed that male patients, younger patients (aged ≤14 years), and elderly patients (aged ≥60 years) had a higher risk of perforated appendicitis; among adults, the incidence increased with age. Moreover, the risk of perforation was higher in patients with one or more comorbidities. LIP patients comprised 1.25 % of the total number of patients with appendicitis from 2000 to 2011. The overall incidence of appendicitis was 34.99 % higher in the LIP than in the normal population (NP), and the incidence of perforated appendicitis was 40.40 % higher in the LIP than in the NP. After multivariate adjustment, the adjusted hospital costs and length of hospital stay (LOS) for the LIP patients were higher than those for the NP patients. CONCLUSIONS: Appendicitis and appendectomy in Taiwan had similar overall incidences, seasonality patterns, and declining trends compared to numerous previous studies. Compared to NP patients, LIP patients had a higher risk of appendicitis, longer LOS and higher hospital costs as a result of appendectomy.