Travel Support Research Articles

Critical Implications of IVDR for Innovation in Diagnostics: Input From the BioMed Alliance Diagnostics Task Force.

Critical Implications of IVDR for Innovation in Diagnostics: Input From the BioMed Alliance Diagnostics Task Force.

Emergency Psychiatry before and during COVID-19 pandemia

IntroductionThe COVID-19 pandemic had a significant impact worldwide. Consultations in the Emergency Service of the Hospital Clínic of Barcelona varied in terms of reasons for consultations, psychopathology, and other aspects, before and after the pandemic.ObjectivesTo examine changes in the profile of patients admitted before and during the COVID-19 pandemic to our Psychiatric Emergency Service.MethodsAll children, adolescent and adult psychiatric inpatients admitted from December 4th 2019 to March 31st 2021 to the Psychiatric Emergency Service of Hospital Clínic of Barcelona, Spain, were retrospectively included for analysis and divided into two groups –groups 1 or 2- including the first one all patients who attended before lockdown and the second group those who attended during the pandemic.ResultsA total of 1991 patients were included -1224 in the first group and 767 in the second group. The majority of patients were male (52.08%), with a mean age of 41.21 years (SD 16.53). A proportion significantly higher of men was found in the second group (p<0.05). The proportion of patients consulting with substance use disorders was significantly higher in the second group (p<0.05). Patients from the second group presented a significantly higher proportion of admissions in an acute psychiatric ward (p<0.05), and also a significantly higher proportion of consultations of patients with dementia (p<0.05).ConclusionsThe COVID-19 pandemic lead to a significant reduction in the overall consultations, with a higher proportion of severe cases. The lack of availability of caregivers and telework might have influenced the increase in consultations of patients with dementia.DisclosureAG has received travel and financial support from Janssen, Otsuka-Lundbeck and Angelini, and research support from Instituto de Salud Carlos III, and declares no support related with the subject of this presentation.

Immunocompromised patients have been neglected in COVID-19 trials: a call for action

Immunocompromised patients have been neglected in COVID-19 trials: a call for action

Perceptions and desires of Chinese senior outbound tourists receiving travel support from adult children: a qualitative study

PurposeThis qualitative study explores how Chinese senior outbound tourists perceive support from their adult children and what kinds of support they desire.Design/methodology/approachQualitative data were collected from semi-structured interviews with 26 participants. Transcribed interviews were analysed via thematic analysis.FindingsThis study captured the contradictory feelings of different types of Chinese senior outbound tourists (i.e. independent, neutral, and dependent) according to the degree of desire for support from their adult children. The results further identified the real desires among Chinese senior outbound tourists for children's attitudinal support, caring support, appropriate financial support, companionship, and timing support.Research limitations/implicationsSince this qualitative research is based on small samples with typical social and cultural characteristics, our research results only describe an existence. Our findings provide insight into the existence of the phenomenon, rather than allowing the results to be generalized to the wider population (Gram et al., 2019).Practical implicationsThe tourism industry could develop products to alleviate such feelings. Integrating the concept of filial piety into adult children's support for their parents' overseas travel can not only meet parents' expectations but also relieve parents' ambivalence. Destination operators and travel agencies could thus design mixed products targeting Chinese elderly parents and their adult children by providing activities for both generations. Purchasing behaviour represents a type of emotional and instrumental support for the elderly. Destination operators and travel agencies can also launch products suitable for in-depth outbound travel that cater to adult children's leisure travel while meeting the elderly's travel needs.Originality/valueThis study also extends both intergenerational support theory and intergenerational ambivalence theory regarding Chinese senior outbound tourists.

SARS-CoV-2 Infection Evolution Among Nephrologists During the Pandemic: Clinical Features and Impact of Vaccination

SARS-CoV-2 Infection Evolution Among Nephrologists During the Pandemic: Clinical Features and Impact of Vaccination

Antibody response to herpes simplex virus-1 is increased in autoimmune encephalitis.

Antibody response to herpes simplex virus-1 is increased in autoimmune encephalitis.

Immunogenicity after second and third mRNA-1273 vaccination doses in patients receiving chemotherapy, immunotherapy, or both for solid tumours.

Immunogenicity after second and third mRNA-1273 vaccination doses in patients receiving chemotherapy, immunotherapy, or both for solid tumours.

High prostate-specific membrane antigen (PSMA) positron emission tomography (PET) maximum standardized uptake value in men with PI-RADS score 4 or 5 confers a high probability of significant prostate cancer.

High prostate-specific membrane antigen (PSMA) positron emission tomography (PET) maximum standardized uptake value in men with PI-RADS score 4 or 5 confers a high probability of significant prostate cancer.

Analysis of the Challenges to Healthcare Access among the Economically Disadvantaged Population during the Movement Control Order for COVID-19 Pandemic in Selangor - Malaysia

Background and Aim: The Healthcare systems all over the world were severely affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. Most of the burden is affecting the economically disadvantaged population (B40). This study aims to determine the challenges to healthcare access among B40 populations during the movement control order (MCO) for COVID-19 pandemic in Selangor, Malaysia.
 Methodology: A cross-sectional study was done using a remote data collection method by distribution of questionnaires to 381 participants among the B40 populations in Selangor.
 Results: The response rate was 80%. The participants agreed that it was very easy (16.3%), easy (29.1%) and moderate (28.3%) to access healthcare services during the pandemic. The challenges faced by the participants in accessing the healthcare service include transportation (35.4%), distance to obtain health care service (19.4%), delay in getting the service (38.1%), E-health service (18.6%), financial support for travel (18.6%) and financial support for healthcare service (35.7%). Participants who reduced spending on essential needs during the pandemic were 45.9%. More than half of the participants (61.4%) do not have a health financial protection plan as the government is subsidizing almost 98% of the healthcare cost. During the MCO period, 50.9% of the participants utilized the outpatient services which comprises 70.1% of public facilities and 29.9% of private facilities. In contrast, only 13.9% of participants utilized inpatient services from which public and private facilities were 75.5% and 24.5% respectively. The result shows the response of the study participants according to the satisfactory/dissatisfactory level regarding the quality of service being effective (45.8%/ 2.5%), safe (48.3%/ 2.0%), people centered (51.7%/ 2.0%), timely (37.4%/ 13.8%), equitable (47.8%/ 2.0%) and integrated (40.4%/ 3.0%).
 Conclusion: It is concluded that healthcare services were accessible among the B40 population during the COVID-19 in Selangor and the biggest challenge was the delay in medical services.

The influence of limited financial resources on daily travel practices. A case study of low-income households with children in the Hanover Region (Germany)

Being mobile is essential to participate in social life. However, as transport involves costs, this is a particular challenge for people on low incomes. Households with children are, especially, at an increased risk of poverty. To provide a deeper understanding of how financial poverty affects the daily travel practices of low-income families and how they cope with their limited financial resources, we conducted 16 qualitative problem-centred interviews with low-income families in Ronnenberg (Hanover Region, Germany). Although all the interviewees have to cope with limited financial resources, their daily travel practices differ. We identify four types of daily travel practices for these families: (1) car-centred, (2) car-reduced, (3) public transport oriented and (4) non-motorised. For a more detailed analysis on how poverty affects transport and participation, we use the practice theory perspective (Shove et al., 2012). Our analysis highlights that the car plays a significant role despite poverty for some families. However, other low-income families manage their daily life with public transport and non-motorised modes only. Our results show that low-income households with children have several strategies for organising and financing their daily travel practices. One strategy is direct and indirect support for travel from their social network. Furthermore, some families forgo leisure activities with entrance fees or higher travel costs.

Mavacamten for hypertrophic cardiomyopathy: effectiveness and value.

DISCLOSURES: Funding for this summary was contributed by Arnold Ventures, The Donaghue Foundation, Harvard Pilgrim Health Care, and Kaiser Foundation Health Plan to the Institute for Clinical and Economic Review (ICER), an independent organization that evaluates the evidence on the value of health care interventions. ICER's annual policy summit is supported by dues from AbbVie, America's Health Insurance Plans, Anthem, Alnylam, AstraZeneca, Biogen, Blue Shield of CA, Boehringer-Ingelheim, Cambia Health Services, CVS, Editas, Evolve Pharmacy, Express Scripts, Genentech/Roche, GlaxoSmithKline, Harvard Pilgrim, Health Care Service Corporation, HealthFirst, Health Partners, Humana, Johnson & Johnson (Janssen), Kaiser Permanente, LEO Pharma, Mallinckrodt, Merck, Novartis, National Pharmaceutical Council, Pfizer, Premera, Prime Therapeutics, Regeneron, Sanofi, Sun Life Financial, uniQure, and United Healthcare. Beinfeld, Nhan, Rind, and Pearson are employed by ICER. Through their affiliated institutions, Wasfy, Walton, and Sarker received funding from ICER for the work described in this summary. Walton also reports consulting fees from Second City Outcomes Research. Wasfy reports personal fees from Biotronik and Pfizer; grants from National Institutes of Health, National Football League Players Association and American Heart Association; and travel support from American College of Cardiology. Sarker has nothing additional to disclose.

Analysis of bus travel characteristics and predictions of elderly passenger flow based on smart card data

<abstract> <p>Preferential public transport policies provide an important social welfare support for travel by the elderly. However, the travel problems faced by the elderly, such as traffic congestion during peak hours, have not attracted enough attention from transportation-related departments. This study proposes a passenger flow prediction model for the elderly taking public transport and validates it using bus smart card data. The study incorporates short time series clustering (STSC) to integrate the elements of the heterogeneity of bus trips taken by the elderly, and accurately identifies the needs of elderly passengers by analysing passenger flow spatiotemporal characteristics. According to the needs and characteristics of passenger flow, a short time series clustering Seasonal Autoregressive Integrated Moving Average (STSC-SARIMA) model was constructed to predict passenger flow. The analysis of spatiotemporal travel characteristics identified three peak periods for the elderly to travel every day. The number of people traveling in the morning peak was significantly larger compared to other periods. At the same time, compared with bus lines running through central urban areas, multi-community, and densely populated areas, the passenger flow of bus lines in other areas dropped significantly. The study model was applied to Lhasa, China. The prediction results verify that the model has high prediction accuracy and applicability. In addition to the initial application, this predictive model provides new directions for bus passenger flow forecasting to support better public transport policy-making and improve elderly mobility.</p> </abstract>

Reducing the burdens of forced abortion travel: Referrals, financial and emotional support, and opportunities for positive experiences in traveling for third-trimester abortion care

In the United States, travel is a fact of the abortion care provision landscape. This is largely due to the uneven geographical distribution of providers and state-level gestational duration bans that constrain what abortion care is available locally. When abortion travel is compelled by legal restriction, it is forced travel. Research has comprehensively documented that forced abortion travel is burdensome; people who must travel for abortion experience financial, logistical, and emotional burdens. Generally overlooked, however, is variation in the experience of travel-related burdens and whether and how such burdens can be reduced. Given current political hostility to abortion, the number of people who must travel and the distances they must travel for abortion are likely to grow, making the question of how travel-related burdens can be reduced in the absence of policy change of increasing relevance. Using thematic analysis of semi-structured interviews with 30 cisgender women in the United States who were forced to travel to obtain third-trimester abortion care, I identify three ways that the burdens of forced abortion travel can be mitigated without policy change: prompt referrals; financial and practical support for travel; and emotional support. In some instances, respondents experienced the received emotional support as so valuable as to offset the other burdens of travel, pointing to the possibility that some people might prefer to travel for abortion care whether or not they are forced to do so. Respondents also reported unexpected positive aspects of traveling, including experiences of kindness and human connection, underscoring that not all aspects of abortion travel are negative. Findings thicken our understanding of forced abortion travel and identify structural and interpersonal practices that can reduce the associated burdens, complementing legal and policy-oriented critiques of legal regulation that makes abortion travel necessary.

Tisagenlecleucel Vs Standard of Care As Second-Line Therapy of Primary Refractory or Relapsed Aggressive B-Cell Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma: Analysis of the Phase III Belinda Study

Tisagenlecleucel Vs Standard of Care As Second-Line Therapy of Primary Refractory or Relapsed Aggressive B-Cell Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma: Analysis of the Phase III Belinda Study

LBA2 Updated analysis and patient-reported outcomes (PROs) from CITYSCAPE: A randomised, double-blind, phase II study of the anti-TIGIT antibody tiragolumab + atezolizumab (TA) versus placebo + atezolizumab (PA) as first-line treatment for PD-L1+ NSCLC

LBA2 Updated analysis and patient-reported outcomes (PROs) from CITYSCAPE: A randomised, double-blind, phase II study of the anti-TIGIT antibody tiragolumab + atezolizumab (TA) versus placebo + atezolizumab (PA) as first-line treatment for PD-L1+ NSCLC

Latest advances in cholangiocarcinoma

Biliary tract cancers include cholangiocarcinoma (CCA) and gallbladder cancer (GBC). Despite being considered rare tumours, their incidence is increasing, especially due to an increased incidence of intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma (iCCA).1 The majority of patients are diagnosed at late stages, mainly due to challenges at the time of diagnosis.2 This means that for the majority of patients, the only treatment option available is palliative management; thus, prognosis remains poor with a 5-year survival of around 5%-15% when all stages are analysed together.1 This current special issue includes an overview of the main areas of interest in the field of cholangiocarcinoma.3 Firstly, aiming to improve patients’ outcomes, early diagnosis is key. In order to achieve this, in depth knowledge of current endoscopic diagnostic techniques is crucial.4 In addition, the development of new strategies and technologies is the only way of securing adequate early diagnosis and acquisition of tissue to secure sufficient sample for diagnostic and molecular profiling purposes. Endoscopy is also key for the management of one of the most common and clinically relevant complications identified on patients with biliary malignancies: malignant biliary obstruction. Malignant biliary obstruction is considered one of the oncological emergencies and its early release is of much importance to avoid life threatening complications and prevent early and potentially avoidable clinical deterioration. Secondly, treatment for patients with the advanced disease currently relies on the use of palliative chemotherapy.1 However, the emergence of targeted therapies is rapidly changing this,5 especially for iCCA which are most likely to harbour targetable alterations such as fibroblast growth factor receptor (FGFR)-2 fusions and isocitrate dehydrogenase (IDH)-1 mutations, within others. Despite recent studies supporting the role of these precision medicine strategies in cholangiocarcinoma, lots of unanswered questions remain and will need specific research to better understand, not only primary and secondary resistance to these treatments, but also adequate sequencing and combination strategies.6 Thirdly, none of the advances on diagnosis and treatment strategies could have taken place without a close collaboration between basic, translational and clinical researchers. Such collaborations allow identification of diagnostic biomarkers, predictive tools for adequate treatment selection and also understanding of acquired secondary resistance to novel therapies. Within the field of cholangiocarcinoma, many unmet needs can be identified and lots of effort is going into getting this sorted with the aim of moving the field forward.7 In summary, diagnosis and management of cholangiocarcinoma is a rapidly evolving field that requires teamwork and multidisciplinary collaboration to benefit our current and future patients. The articles included in this special issue provide an overview of the current knowledge and unanswered questions for some of the main topics of interest.4, 6, 7 Dr Angela Lamarca received funding from The Christie Charity and the European Union's Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme [grant number 825510, ESCALON]. Travel and educational support from Ipsen, Pfizer, Bayer, AAA, SirtEx, Novartis, Mylan and Delcath; speaker honoraria from Merck, Pfizer, Ipsen, Incyte, AAA, QED and Servier; advisory honoraria from EISAI, Nutricia Ipsen, QED, Roche and Servier; member of the Knowledge Network and NETConnect Initiatives funded by Ipsen. Data sharing is not applicable to this article as no new data were created or analysed in this study.

Aneuploidy rates and morphokinetic parameters of embryos cultured in distinct culture media: a sibling oocyte study.

Do embryos from sibling oocytes assigned to distinct single-step media culture systems demonstrate differences in early embryo development, morphokinectics or aneuploidy rates? Embryo quality, morphokinetic parameters and aneuploidy rates from trophectoderm biopsy were similar between sibling embryos cultured in distinct media systems from the time of gamete isolation. Studies on the effect of commercially available embryo culture media systems have demonstrated inconsistent impact on human embryonic development, morphokinetics, aneuploidy rates and clinical outcomes. In addition, these studies have been primarily randomized at the level of the embryo or the patient to culture media. Prospective sibling oocyte cohort derived from 200 subjects undergoing IVF at a tertiary academic medical center between February 2018 and November 2019. Sibling oocytes were allocated to Global® or SAGE® media system based upon laterality of ovary from which they were retrieved. All embryos were cultured in a time-lapse incubator. Blastocysts underwent trophectoderm biopsy for preimplantation genetic testing for aneuploidy using next-generation sequencing. One hundred twenty-seven subjects (n = 127) had paired blastocysts for biopsy in each culture media system. There was no difference in top quality blastocyst formation (47.1 ± 31.0 vs 48.1 ± 27.2%; P = 0.87) nor aneuploidy rate (62.3 ± 34.0 vs 56.1 ± 34.4%; P = 0.07) for sibling embryos cultured in Global versus SAGE media system. Embryo morphokinetic parameters including time to each cell division from two cells (t2) to eight cells (t8), time to morula stage (tM), time to blastocele formation (tSB), time to fully formed blastocyst (tB) and time to expansion of the blastocyst (tEB) were similar between paired blastocysts from each culture media system. Pregnancy outcomes and offspring health data were not available for analysis. Commercially available culture media may not have a differential impact on embryo development and blastocyst aneuploidy rate when patient and stimulation-related factors are held constant. There was no external funding for this study. C.H. is owner of a consultancy company, IVF Professionals, Chief Scientific Officer at Apricity, Executive Director at TMRW and co-owner and shareholder of Aria Fertility. She has received speaker fees, consulting fees and travel support from Cooper Surgical and Vitrolife. J.B. is an employee and shareholder of vitrolife. N/A.

Genomic Landscape and Molecular Risk in Patients with Advanced Myelofibrosis Treated within the Multicenter Phase Ib/II MPNSG0212 (POMINC) Trial

Genomic Landscape and Molecular Risk in Patients with Advanced Myelofibrosis Treated within the Multicenter Phase Ib/II MPNSG0212 (POMINC) Trial

Modified Risk-Stratified Sequential Treatment in B-Cell Post-Transplant Lymphoproliferative Disorder (PTLD) after Solid Organ Transplantation (SOT): The Prospective Multicenter Phase II PTLD-2 Trial

Modified Risk-Stratified Sequential Treatment in B-Cell Post-Transplant Lymphoproliferative Disorder (PTLD) after Solid Organ Transplantation (SOT): The Prospective Multicenter Phase II PTLD-2 Trial

Primary Analysis of ZUMA-7: A Phase 3 Randomized Trial of Axicabtagene Ciloleucel (Axi-Cel) Versus Standard-of-Care Therapy in Patients with Relapsed/Refractory Large B-Cell Lymphoma

Primary Analysis of ZUMA-7: A Phase 3 Randomized Trial of Axicabtagene Ciloleucel (Axi-Cel) Versus Standard-of-Care Therapy in Patients with Relapsed/Refractory Large B-Cell Lymphoma