The impact of short-term multimodal prehabilitation on functional capacity in patients with gynecologic malignancies during the perioperative period: A prospective study.

PURPOSE: To explore the effect of a short-term, hospital-based, multimodal preoperative prehabilitation intervention on perioperative functional ability of patients with gynecological malignant tumors. METHODS: According to the order in which they underwent surgery, 97 patients were divided into the control group (48 cases) and the intervention group (49 cases). The control group was given routine preoperative guidance, whereas the intervention group was given short-term multimodal prehabilitation guidance on the basis of the control group intervention. The 6-min walk test was performed on the day of admission to the hospital, the day before surgery, and the 30th day after surgery. RESULTS: Compared with the control group, the intervention group had significantly better 6-min walk distance and superior physical and psychological status on the day before surgery and the 30th day after surgery (P < 0.001). For three consecutive days after surgery, the quality of recovery in the intervention group was significantly higher than that in the control group (P < 0.001), and the first ambulation time and exhaust time were achieved earlier in the intervention group than in the control group (P < 0.05). CONCLUSION: The preoperative intervention group showed improved preoperative exercise ability and reduced anxiety in patients with gynecological cancer. Furthermore, this intervention improved the overall health of patients and accelerated their postoperative recovery.

Doll therapy for improving behavior, psychology and cognition among older nursing home residents with dementia: A systematic review and meta-analysis.

OBJECTIVE: To explore the effectiveness of doll therapy (DT) on behavior, psychology and cognition among older nursing home residents with dementia. METHODS: A systematic review and meta-analysis was conducted. Subgroup analyses were performed to determine whether the intervention characteristics influenced effect sizes. RESULTS: Ten studies met the inclusion criteria and were selected for qualitative and quantitative synthesis. The overall methodological quality was relatively high. DT significantly improved all behaviors [SMD=-0.42, P=0.01], including agitation [SMD=-0.94, P<0.001], apathy, irritability and wandering, and psychological states (i.e., pleasure, anxiety and depression). However, there was no significant difference in the improvement of cognition. Subgroup analyses revealed that the DT process employing empathy dolls and coordinating with caregivers was more beneficial for improving all behaviors (P=0.01; P=0.02). CONCLUSION: DT significantly reduced behavioral and psychological disturbances among older nursing home residents with dementia. Specifically, administering empathy dolls and coordinating with caregivers may be the most appropriate and effective option.

External application of dandelion combined with borneol effectively reduced pain and facial swelling after jaw surgery.

BACKGROUND: To explore the effects of the combination of dandelion with borneol on the maxillofacial region of patients after jaw surgery in reducing the acute inflammatory reaction after surgery, the degree of facial swelling, pain, and limitation of mouth opening, and increasing patient satisfaction. METHODS: A total of 120 patients who met the inclusion criteria were randomly divided into 4 groups: group A: ice compress; Group B: dandelion; Group C: borneol; Group D: dandelion combined with borneol. Patients were evaluated on the day of the operation, the first day, and the second day after the operation. RESULTS: External application of dandelion combined with borneol had a better controlling effect on facial swelling and limited mouth opening compared with the single treatment groups, and the satisfaction score was higher ( P  < .05). CONCLUSION: External application of dandelion combined with borneol was effective in the treatment of maxillofacial swelling and pain. This approach quickly relieved swelling, restored the limitation of mouth opening, and improved patient satisfaction.

Experimental demonstration of hidden nonlocality with local filters.

The violation of the Bell inequalities implies that quantum mechanics cannot be interpreted using any local hidden variable theory. However, particular quantum states that can originally be described using a local hidden variable model surprisingly exhibit nonlocality by employing local filters before a standard Bell test is performed. This is referred to as hidden nonlocality. In this study, we provide the experimental demonstration of hidden nonlocality through linear optics towards the local states which are put forword by Hirsch et al., PRL 111, 160402 (2013). A class of local states is generated through a spontaneous parametric down-conversion process, and the violation of the Clauser-Horne-Shimony-Holt (CHSH)-Bell inequality is observed by applying local filters. Our experimental results confirm the superiority of local filters, and throw light on deep understanding the intriguing phenomena of hidden nonlocality and local states.

An Improved Single Shot Multibox Detector Method Applied in Body Condition Score for Dairy Cows.

Body condition scores (BCS) is an important parameter, which is in high correlation with the health status of a dairy cow, metabolic disorder and milk composition during the production period. To evaluate BCS, the traditional methods rely on veterinary experts or skilled staff to look at a cow and touch it. These methods have low efficiency especially on large-scale farms. Computer vision methods are widely used but there are some improvements to increase BCS accuracy. In this study, a low cost BCS evaluation method based on deep learning and machine vision is proposed. Firstly, the back-view images of the cows are captured by network cameras, resulting in 8972 images that constituted the sample data set. The camera is a common 2D camera, which is cheaper and easier to install compared with 3D cameras. Secondly, the key body parts such as tails, pins and rump in the images were labeled manually, the Sing Shot multi-box Detector (SSD) method was used to detect the tail and evaluate the BCS. Inspired by DenseNet and Inception-v4, a new SSD was introduced by changing the network connection method of the original SSD. Finally, the experiments show that the improved SSD method can achieve 98.46% classification accuracy and 89.63% location accuracy, and it has: (1) faster detection speed with 115 fps; (2) smaller model size with 23.1 MB compared to original SSD and YOLO-v3, these are significant advantages for reducing hardware costs.