Changes In Means Research Articles

Выбор языка программирования для старшеклассников

Currently, special attention is paid to the content of the training of schoolchildren in computer science. Interest in software development and code writing methods is growing every year. This is due to the change in methods and means of training in the field of writing program code associated with the emergence and development of new paradigms and programming languages. The purpose of the study is to substantiate the choice of a programming language for the preparation of high school students in the field of programming and solving the tasks of the Unified State Exam in computer science. Materials and methods of research: in the course of the research, a theoretical approach was used: the study, systematization and analysis of theoretical materials, scientific and methodological resources for teaching programming to schoolchildren, demos, test tasks, manuals, educational websites for preparing for the Unified State Exam in computer science, as well as many years of experience in teaching schoolchildren and students the basics of programming. Research results and their discussion: Programming languages PascalABC.NET and Python are currently the most popular in school education. The article analyzes the possibilities of these programming systems and the prospects of their application in teaching high school students the basics of programming. Examples of solving typical problems from the Unified State Exam in computer science in both languages are given to compare the speed and efficiency of the code. Conclusions. Language PascalABC.NET it has a number of advantages and can be recommended as a language for teaching programming. The language is high-performance, well structured, has strict typing and is adapted to the tasks of the Unified State Exam in computer science. When teaching future programmers, the basics of writing code, it is advisable to combine languages PascalABC.NET and Python.

Group trends and individual variability in writing development: a descriptive grammatical complexity analysis

Abstract This study aims to examine group trends and individual variability of descriptive Grammatical Complexity (GC) in writing development. A longitudinal sample of 41 high school EFL learners is followed for an academic year (12 waves of data collection), resulting in a corpus of 492 texts, coded for eight descriptive GC features of academic writing. Our analysis reveals different sets of descriptive GC features relevant to capturing group trends and individual variability in writing development. At the group level, two phrasal-level GC features could capture significant changes in group means over time; at the individual level, four types of clausal and phrasal GC features showed significant associations between individual variability over time (measured by Standard Deviation of differences) and gains (as measured by the increase of usage frequency). Findings are discussed with regard to modeling both inter-individual and intra-individual trajectories in writing development and pedagogical implications attuned to both group and individual needs.

The misappropriation of “woke”: discriminatory social media practices, contributory injustice and context collapse

This article aims to give an analysis of the phenomena of unjust misappropriation of marginalised groups’ terms online, using the example misappropriation of ‘woke’ from the Black community on Twitter. I argue that using terms such as these outside their original context warps their meaning, decreasing the intelligibility of the experiences of the marginalised agents who use them when attempting to express themselves both within their community and without. I intend to give an analysis of this phenomena, with the expectation that understanding it better will provide a crucial step in combatting it. To this end, I argue it can be understood as a specialised form of what Kristie Dotson calls ‘contributory injustice’, injustices which involve the suppression of a marginalised community’s existing hermeneutical resources, combined with a specific consequence of what Boyd and Marwick call ‘context collapse’, the removal of social norms created through the homogenising effect of social media sites like Twitter. The result is a novel misappropriation phenomenon, I label ‘Context-Collapsed Contributory Injustice’ or ‘CC.CI’. This type of misappropriation is particularly harmful due to it being faster-acting than historical varieties of misappropriation. Furthermore, unchecked continual cases of CC.CI can cause a novel from of what Miranda Fricker calls ‘hermeneutical injustice’, which is demarcated from standard cases by its ability to reintroduce conceptual lacunas through undermining existing hermeneutical resources. I finish by disambiguating cases of CC.CI from natural meaning change and critically analysing some existing philosophical treatments of “woke”.

Comparison of Hydrogel-Based Autologous Chondrocyte Implantation Versus Microfracture: A Propensity Score Matched-Pair Analysis.

Few studies exist for large defects comparing matrix-associated autologous chondrocyte implantation (M-ACI) with other cartilage repair methods due to the limited availability of suitable comparator treatments. To compare the clinical efficacy of a novel hydrogel-based M-ACI method (NOVOCART Inject plus) versus microfracture (MFx) in patients with knee cartilage defects. Cohort study; Level of evidence, 3. Propensity score matched-pair analysis was used to compare the 24-month outcomes between the M-ACI treatment group from a previous single-arm phase 3 study and the MFx control group from another phase 3 study. Patients were matched based on preoperative Knee injury and Osteoarthritis Outcomes Score (KOOS), symptom duration, previous knee surgeries, age, and sex, resulting in 144 patients in the matched-pair set (72 patients per group). The primary endpoint was the change in least-squares means (ΔLSmeans) for the KOOS from baseline to the 24-month assessment. Defect sizes in the M-ACI group were significantly larger than in the MFx group (6.4 versus 3.7 cm2). Other differences included defect location (no patellar or tibial defects in the MFx group), number of defects (33.3% with 2 defects in the M-ACI group versus 9.7% in the MFx group), and defect cause (more patients with degenerative lesions in the M-ACI group). The M-ACI group had higher posttreatment KOOS (M-ACI versus MFX: 81.8 ± 16.8 versus 73.0 ± 20.6 points) and KOOS ΔLSmeans from baseline to 24 months posttreatment (M-ACI versus MFX: 36.9 versus 26.9 points). Treatment contrasts in KOOS ΔLSmeans from baseline indicated statistical significance in favor of M-ACI from 3 to 24 months posttreatment (P = .0026). Significant and clinically meaningful differences in favor of M-ACI at 24 months were also found regarding International Knee Documentation Committee (IKDC) score ΔLSmeans from baseline (37.8 versus 30.4 points; P = .0334), KOOS responder rates at 24 months (≥10-point improvement from baseline; 94.4% versus 65.3%; P < .0001), IKDC responder rates at 24 months (>20.5-point improvement from baseline; 83.3% versus 61.1%, P = .0126) and MOCART (Magnetic Resonance Observation of Cartilage Repair Tissue) score in a subgroup of patients (LS means, 86.9 versus 69.1; P = .0096). In this exploratory analysis, M-ACI using an in situ crosslinked hydrogel demonstrated superior clinical and structural (MOCART) 24-month outcomes compared with MFx in patients with knee cartilage defects.

Impact of Different Therapeutic Strategies With Left Ventricular Assist Devices on Health-Related Quality of Life During Prolonged Device-Based Support.

Background: Left ventricular assist device (LVAD) implantation improves survival and health-related quality of life (HRQoL) of patients with heart failure. However, the impact of LVADs or different LVAD-based therapeutic strategies on long-term HRQoL has not been investigated. We evaluated the long-term HRQoL of Japanese patients who were treated with different LVAD-based therapeutic strategies. Methods and Results: Patients whose data were recorded in the Japanese Registry for Mechanical Assisted Circulatory Support between January 2010 and December 2018 were divided into 3 groups: primary implantable LVAD (G-iLVAD; n=483), primary paracorporeal LVAD (n=33), and bridge-to-bridge from paracorporeal to implantable LVAD (n=65). HRQoL was evaluated using the EuroQoL 5-dimension 3-level (EQ-5D-3L) before and 3 and 12 months after LVAD implantation; the mean EQ-5D-3L visual analog scale (VAS) score in the G-iLVAD group at these time points was 47.4, 71.1, and 72.9, respectively (where scores of 0 and 100 indicate worst and best imaginable health state, respectively). Changes in the least squares means of the VAS scores at 3 and 12 months after implantation differed significantly among the 3 groups. Social function, disability, and physical and mental problems were significantly lower in the G-iLVAD than other groups. Conclusions: HRQoL improved significantly at 3 and 12 months after LVAD implantation in all groups. Physical function showed a stronger improvement than did social function, disability, and mental function.

ALIH KODE DAN CAMPUR KODE DALAM INTERAKSI SEHARI-HARI OLEH SANTRIWATI PONDOK MODERN DARUL FALACH TEMANGGUNG (KAJIAN SOSIOLINGUISTIK)

Santriwati Tahfidzul Qur'an Pondok Modern Darul Falach Temanggung is a modern hut that applies the use of three languages. Thus, santriwati uses three languages in their daily lives, namely Arabic, English and Indonesian. This is what triggers the occurrence of code switching and code mixing events in interactions in which it is indicated that there is a change in the meaning of the Arabic language. This study aims to describe the form of code switching and code mixing as well as the factors causing code switching and code mixing itself. This research is a qualitative research with ethnographic design. The data in this study is the daily speech of santriwati tahfidzul qur'an. the instrument in this study is in the form of a data card. The data collection technique in this study used the listening method and the interview method. Data analysis techniques in this study used the descriptive method of quality. The results of this study showed that the language used in communication by Tahfidzul Quran santriwati Pondok Modern Darul Falach Temanggung found 113 data with the following details; 27 data in the form of code transfer, 75 data in the form of code mixes and 11 data indicated changes in the meaning of Arabic in Indonesian, Javanese and English. From this data, code mix data is the most data than code transfer data and meaning changes, and for the least data is meaning change data.

THE POSITION AND TRANSFORMATION OF THE PUBLIC SPHERE IN THE INTERNET ENVIRONMENT

Contemporary media theories increasingly encounter intense changes in social relations that are the result of changes in communication techniques and means. McLuhan called this dynamic a media-centric driver of social change. Media theories and communication disciplines are becoming more current because they have a historical opportunity to follow (post)modern society, which is in a state of constant change mediated by digital technologies. The aim of this paper is to examine whether communication and organizing people through social networks can lead to the transformation of the public sphere as defined by Habermas and related authors. We will build on Habermas’ categorization of historical transformations of the public sphere in order to understand the context and epoch of the current transformation. The second hypothetical question of the paper is whether the Internet could replace some social institutions and question the authorities and conventions achieved, especially if we pay attention to the criticism of democracy by authors like Colin Crouch (2018: 9) who questions the legitimacy of current democratic elections concluding that “people are not offered essential possibility to participate in political processes”. Finally, the question remains whether the Internet as a mass medium has a systemictechnocratic character of maintaining the status quo or whether it can serve as a driver of change or a means of direct democracy for users. We believe that this kind of work will be a nice link or a quality overview of theories and anticipations concerning the issue of political and electoral motivation - the topic with which Columbia University’s major research on media effects began.

Assessing response shifts and true changes in longitudinal evaluation research: the impact of the first COVID-19 lockdown on subjective well-being in Italy

Latent constructs measured at multiple points in time are frequently used in social and evaluation research to assess the impact of interven-tions or relevant phenomena on individuals and groups (e.g. training programs, policies, exogenous events, etc.). However, researchers of-ten do not consider the accuracy of such models depends on the as-sumption of longitudinal measurement invariance (LMI), which states that repeatedly measured latent variables should effectively represent the same construct in the same metric over time. Non-invariance can incur when individuals recalibrate their standards of measurement, reprioritize their values or reconceptualize the target construct as a di-rect consequence of the intervention or the phenomena under study. Such response shifts may obfuscate true changes in the latent means of the construct, thus leading to inaccurate inferences. The present study aims to explore this issue by first offering a detailed description of the potential sources of response shifts and the general procedures used for LMI testing in a structural equation modelling framework. An em-pirical application is then carried out on a sample of Italian respond-ents interviewed before and immediately after the COVID-19 lock-down and, based on the results of the analysis, practical implications for evaluation research using latent outcome variables in a longitudinal setting are discussed.

Navigating the highs and lows of entrepreneurial identity threats to persist: The countervailing force of a relational identity with God

While an economic paradigm has been productive for entrepreneurship, religion has been proposed as an alternative rationality to advance research in our field. To extend a theological turn in entrepreneurship and identity research, our study inductively develops a conceptual model that explains how individuals navigate entrepreneurial identity threats based on the interaction between a relational identity with God (RIG) and an entrepreneurial identity to persist in entrepreneurial action. Our study suggests this can happen when entrepreneurs engage in inter-identity work mechanisms - affirming and humbling - to mitigate these identity threats. Specifically, a relational identity with God acts as a countervailing force to an entrepreneurial identity during times of identity threats to generate inter-identity meaning change, resulting in interidentity stability and entrepreneurial persistence. Through our study, we advance knowledge on the theological turn in entrepreneurship and identity by inductively developing theory on a new religious identity construct (RIG), elaborating theory of inter-identity work by shifting the focus from structural to content changes, and extending theory on entrepreneurial action, persistence, and well-being based on theological rather than economic considerations.

The evolution of lexical semantics dynamics, directionality, and drift

IntroductionThe directionality of semantic change is problematic in traditional comparative models of language reconstruction. Compared to, e.g., phonological and morphological change, the directions of meaning change over time are potentially endless and difficult to reconstruct. The current paper attempts to reconstruct the mechanisms of lexical meaning change by a quantitative model. We use a data set of 104 core concepts in 160 Eurasian languages from several families, which are coded for colexification as well as cognacy, including semantic change of lexemes in etymologies. In addition, the various meanings are coded for semantic relation to the core concept, including relations such as metaphor, metonymy, generalization, specialization, holonymy, and meronymy. Further, concepts are coded into classes and semantic properties, including factors such as animacy, count/mass, concrete/abstract, or cultural connotations, such as taboo/non-taboo.MethodologyWe use a phylogenetic comparative model to reconstruct the probability of presence at hidden nodes of different colexifying meanings inside etymological trees. We find that these reconstructions come close to meaning reconstructions based on the comparative method. By means of the phylogenetic reconstructions, we measure the evolutionary dynamics of meaning loss of co-lexifying meanings as well as concepts.Results and discussionThese change rates are highly varying, from almost complete stability to complete unstability. Change rates vary between different semantic classes, where for instance wild animals have low change rates and domestic animals and implements have high change rates. We find a negative correlation between taboo animals and change rate, i.e., taboo animals have lower change rates than non-taboo words. Further, we find a negative correlation between animacy and change rate, indicating that animate nouns have lower change rate than inanimate nouns. A further result is a negative correlation between change rate and degree of borrowing (borrowability) of concepts, indicating that lexemes that are more likely to be borrowed are less likely to change semantically. Among semantic relations, we find that metonomy is more frequent than any other change, including metaphor, and that a change from general to more specific is in all cases more frequent than the other way round.

Does technology really outpace policy, and does it matter? A primer for technical experts and others

AbstractThis paper reconsiders the outpacing argument, the belief that changes in law and other means of regulation cannot keep pace with recent changes in technology. We focus on information and communication technologies (ICTs) in and of themselves as well as applied in computer science, telecommunications, health, finance, and other applications, but our argument applies also in rapidly developing technological fields such as environmental science, materials science, and genetic engineering. First, we discuss why the outpacing argument is so closely associated with information and computing technologies. We then outline 12 arguments that support the outpacing argument, by pointing to some particular weaknesses of policy making, using the United States as the primary example. Then arguing in the opposite direction, we present 4 brief and 3 more extended criticisms of the outpacing thesis. The paper's final section responds to calls within the technical community for greater engagement of policy and ethical concerns and reviews the paper's major arguments. While the paper focuses on ICTs and policy making in the United States, our critique of the outpacing argument and our exploration of its complex character are of utility to actors in other political contexts and in other technical fields.

"Raised by Implication": C.S. Lewis's Studies in Words and Historical and Moral Judgment

C. S. Lewis wrote Studies in Words "to help students understand the lexical and historical meaning of certain common words, in effect, to assist “a more accurate reading of old books.” His choice of words, with their classical, European, and British contexts, is reflective of Lewis’s vocation as a professor of English literature. However, the chosen words also contain moral meanings. While the primary purpose of Studies is to train the reader in making conceptual distinctions, it also provides a kind of training in interpretive and historical responsibility that runs parallel with Lewis’s view of the natural moral law. The twin concerns of historical accuracy and ethical judgment are always beneath the surface in Studies in Words, for Lewis is modeling for his readers an understanding of public meaning and lexical change, along with a psychology of agency based on beliefs and intentions that is worth engaging, even accepting or rejecting.5 That is, he is practicing what he recommends in The Abolition of Man—a formative education with commitment.

Negotiating ‘access’ to the international ‘rules-based order’: Taiwan’s South China Sea policy

Maritime governance of international waterways such as the South China Sea (SCS) is still an overdue policy objective in a region fraught with ongoing political and military rivalry over natural as well as symbolic resources. Competition among supporters and challengers of the international ‘rules-based order’ is reshaping the normative-discursive framework in which negotiations over access to and management of maritime space are carried out. Among the players, the Republic of China (Taiwan)’s particular international status and geographic position make it a special case study, having shaped over the past decades its foreign policy into a liberal, international law (IL) stance. This article seeks to describe a contentious encounter at the boundary of these competing discourses by showing the extent to which the ‘rules-based order’, a normative-discursive structure represented by the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), is coming under increasing pressure in maritime governance, an area of growing importance to international relations. My findings show how Taiwanese policy discourse regains symbolic ‘access’ to this framework through meaning change. I argue that, ultimately, this adjustment of a foreign policy discourse proves the resilience of the ‘rules-based order’.

Change in cardiometabolic risk factors in a pilot safety-net plant-based lifestyle medicine program.

Interventions emphasizing healthful lifestyle behaviors are proliferating in traditional health care settings, yet there is a paucity of published clinical outcomes, outside of pay-out-of-pocket or employee health programs. We assessed weight, hemoglobin A1c (HbA1c), blood pressure, and cholesterol for 173 patients of the Plant-Based Lifestyle Medicine Program piloted in a New York City safety-net hospital. We used Wilcoxon signed-rank tests to assess changes in means, from baseline to six-months, for the full sample and within baseline diagnoses (i.e., overweight or obesity, type 2 diabetes, prediabetes, hypertension, hyperlipidemia). We calculated the percentage of patients with clinically meaningful changes in outcomes for the full sample and within diagnoses. The full sample had statistically significant improvements in weight, HbA1c, and diastolic blood pressure. Patients with prediabetes or overweight or obesity experienced significant improvements in weight and those with type 2 diabetes had significant improvements in weight and HbA1c. Patients with hypertension had significant reductions in diastolic blood pressure and weight. Data did not show differences in non-high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (non-HDL-C), but differences in low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C) were approaching significance for the full sample and those with hyperlipidemia. The majority of patients achieved clinically meaningful improvements on all outcomes besides systolic blood pressure. Our study demonstrates that a lifestyle medicine intervention within a traditional, safety-net clinical setting improved biomarkers of cardiometabolic disease. Our findings are limited by small sample sizes. Additional large-scale, rigorous studies are needed to further establish the effectiveness of lifestyle medicine interventions in similar settings.

Biogeophysical Effects of Land-Use and Land-Cover Changes in South Asia: An Analysis of CMIP6 Models

The identification of the biogeophysical effects due to land-use, land-cover, and land- management changes (LULCC) is yet to be clearly understood. A range of factors, such as the inclusion of an interactive ocean model component, representation of land management, transient LULCC, and accountability for atmospheric feedback, potentially shifts how models may detect the impacts of the land surface on the climate system. Previous studies on the biogeophysical effects of LULCC in South Asia have either neglected one of those factors or are single model results. Therefore, we analyzed the outputs from 11 models, participants of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project in its Sixth Phase (CMIP6), which derived from experiments with and without LULCC and compared the two simulations with respect to changes in near-surface temperature and total precipitation means. The CMIP6 simulations, to a certain extent, accounted for the elements previously overlooked. We examined the grid cells that robustly indicated a climatic impact from LULCC. Additionally, we investigated the atmospheric feedback and the dominant fluxes with their associated land surface variables involved in the changes in temperature and precipitation. Our results indicated that the biogeophysical effects from LULCC favored surface net cooling and surface net drying over the robust areas at all seasons. The surface net cooling was strongly influenced by the decrease in available energy and the increase in latent heat and total evapotranspiration. Surface net drying was highly promoted by local hydrological processes, especially in areas outside the monsoon core. The study also revealed that non-local sources might influence precipitation in some parts of South Asia, although this was inconclusive. Our research presented similar results to previous studies but with different magnitudes, which highlighted the added value of CMIP6-GCMs simulations but also their pitfalls.

Machine learning model to predict vehicle electrification impacts on urban air quality and related human health effects

Air pollution is a prevailing environmental problem in cities worldwide. The future vehicle electrification (VE), which in Europe will be importantly fostered by the ban of thermal engines from 2035, is expected to have an important effect on urban air quality. Machine learning models represent an optimal tool for predicting changes in air pollutants concentrations in the context of future VE. For the city of Valencia (Spain), a XGBoost (eXtreme Gradient Boosting package) model was used in combination with SHAP (SHapley Additive exPlanations) analysis, both to investigate the importance of different factors explaining air pollution concentrations and predicting the effect of different levels of VE. The model was trained with 5 years of data including the COVID-19 lockdown period in 2020, in which mobility was strongly reduced resulting in unprecedent changes in air pollution concentrations. The interannual meteorological variability of 10 years was also considered in the analyses. For a 70% VE, the model predicted: 1) improvements in nitrogen dioxide pollution (−34% to −55% change in annual mean concentrations, for the different air quality stations), 2) a very limited effect on particulate matter concentrations (−1 to −4% change in annual means of PM2.5 and PM10), 3) heterogeneous responses in ground-level ozone concentrations (−2% to +12% change in the annual means of the daily maximum 8-h average concentrations). Even at a high VE increase of 70%, the 2021 World Health Organization Air Quality Guidelines will be exceeded for all pollutants in some stations. VE has a potentially important impact in terms of reducing NO2-associated premature mortality, but complementary strategies for reducing traffic and controlling all different air pollution sources should also be implemented to protect human health.

A computational analysis of crosslinguistic regularity in semantic change

Semantic change is attested commonly in the historical development of lexicons across the world's languages. Extensive research has sought to characterize regularity in semantic change, but existing studies have typically relied on manual approaches or the analysis of a restricted set of languages. We present a large-scale computational analysis to explore regular patterns in word meaning change shared across many languages. We focus on two levels of analysis: (1) regularity in directionality, which we explore by inferring the historical direction of semantic change between a source meaning and a target meaning; (2) regularity in source-target mapping, which we explore by inferring the target meaning given a source meaning. We work with DatSemShift, the world's largest public database of semantic change that records thousands of meaning changes from over hundreds of languages. For directionality inference, we find that concreteness explains directionality in more than 70% of the attested cases of semantic change and is the strongest predictor among the alternatives including frequency and valence. For target inference, we find that a parallelogram-style analogy model based on contextual embeddings predicts the attested source-target mappings substantially better than chance and similarity-based models. Clustering the meaning pairs of semantic change reveals regular meaning shiftings between domains, such as body parts to geological formations. Our study provides an automated approach and large-scale evidence for multifaceted regularity in semantic change across languages.

Seasonal and regional contrasts of future trends in interannual arctic climate variability

Future changes in interannual variability (IAV) of Arctic climate indicators such as sea ice and precipitation are still fairly uncertain. Alongside global warming-induced changes in means, a thorough understanding of IAV is needed to more accurately predict sea ice variability, distinguish trends and natural variability, as well as to reduce uncertainty around the likelihood of extreme events. In this study we rank and select CMIP6 models based on their ability to replicate observations, and quantify simulated IAV trends (1981–2100) of Arctic surface air temperature, evaporation, precipitation, and sea ice concentration under continued global warming. We argue that calculating IAV on grid points before area-averaging allows for a more realistic picture of Arctic-wide changes. Large model ensembles suggest that on shorter time scales (30 years), IAV of all variables is strongly dominated by natural variability (e.g. 93% for sea ice area in March). Long-term trends of IAV are more robust, and reveal strong seasonal and regional differences in their magnitude or even sign. For example, IAV of surface temperature increases in the Central Arctic, but decreases in lower latitudes. Arctic precipitation variability increases more in summer than in winter; especially over land, where in the future it will dominantly fall as rain. Our results emphasize the need to address such seasonal and regional differences when portraying future trends of Arctic climate variability.

Impact of COVID-19 Mandatory Lockdown Measures on Cognitive and Neuropsychiatric Symptoms in Persons with Alzheimer's Disease in Lima, Peru.

Neuropsychiatric symptoms (NPS) in patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD) worsened during the COVID-19 lockdowns, but their progression thereafter is unknown. We present the first longitudinal study tracking them before, during, and after restrictions. To describe the effect of the COVID-19 mandatory lockdowns on Cognitive and Neuropsychiatric symptoms in patients with Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI) and Alzheimer's Disease (AD). Cohort of 48 patients with amnestic MCI and 38 with AD in Lima, Peru. They received three rounds of cognitive (RUDAS, CDR, M@T), behavioral (NPI), and functional (ADCS-ADL) assessments. We assessed the change in score means across the time points and for each domain of NPS and tracked the changes in individual patients. RUDAS declined 0.9 (SD 1.0) from baseline to lockdown and 0.7 (SD 1.0) after restrictions. M@T declined 1.0 (SD 1.5) from baseline to lockdown and 1.4 (SD 2.0) after restrictions. CDR worsened in 72 patients (83.72%) from baseline to post-lockdown. NPI worsened by 10 (SD 8.3) from baseline to lockdown but improved by 4.8 (SD 6.4) after restrictions. Proportionally, 81.3% of all patients had worsened NPS during the lockdowns, but only 10.7% saw an increase thereafter. Improvement was statistically significant for specific NPS domains except hallucinations, delusions, and appetite changes. Anxiety, irritability, apathy, and disinhibition returned to baseline levels. Following confinement, cognition continued to decline, but NPS demonstrated either stability or improvement. This highlights the role modifiable risk factors may have on the progression of NPS.

Prediabetes Reduction from Food Allergen Elimination

The CDC reports that over 38% of the adults in the USA have Prediabetes mellitus (PMD) and in this population of 96 million Americans, 50% likelihood that they will develop Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus (DM2) with a 50% greater chance of obesity. The purpose of this case report was to discuss prediabetes reduction and obesity reduction in an African American subject. Case: A 50-year-old female patient of African American descent presented with HbA1c 6.4%, BMI 32.2, Weight 194.lbs., BP 185/95, Hip Circumference 44.5” and Fat Mass of 92 lbs. (47.5%). After consent was given, the patient was briefed on healthier eating (i.e. eliminate processed foods, high fructose corn syrup, etc.). Then four vials of blood were drawn for ALCAT, Leukocyte Reaction, food allergen testing. Ten days later, the tests results were discussed, and of the 250 foods tested, the patient showed moderate allergic reaction to 36 foods. These foods were eliminated from her diet for the duration of this 12-month treatment plan and alternative food choices were discussed (i.e., eating peaches instead of pears) which showed a significant Leukocyte reaction). She was also taught how to eat smaller positions (&lt; 2 cups) more frequently (every 3-4 hours). The patient showed 99% compliance to the food allergen elimination. Results: All of the variables tested (HbA1c, BMI, Weight, Fat Mass, Blood Pressure, and Hip Circumference) displayed a -26% change in means. Food allergen elimination was an effective in reducing Prediabetes in this woman of African American descent (HbA1c values went from 6.0% to 5.0% in 12 months without medication).