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Persistent midwinter cold air pools produce multiday periods of cold, dreary weather in basins and valleys. Persistent stable stratification leads to the buildup of pollutants and moisture in the pool. Because the pool sometimes has temperatures below freezing while the air above is warmer, freezing precipitation often occurs, with consequent effects on transportation and safety. Forecasting the buildup and breakdown of these cold pools is difficult because the interacting physical mechanisms leading to their formation, maintenance, and destruction have received little study. In this paper, persistent wintertime cold pools in the Columbia River basin of eastern Washington are studied. First a succinct meteorological definition of a cold pool is provided and then a 10-yr database is used to develop a cold pool climatology. This is followed by a detailed examination of two cold pool episodes that were accompanied by fog and stratus using remote and in situ temperature and wind sounding data. The two episodes illustrate many of the physical mechanisms that affect cold pool evolution. In one case, the cold pool was formed by warm air advection above the basin and was destroyed by downslope winds that descended into the southern edge of the basin and progressively displaced the cold air in the basin. In the second case, the cold pool began with a basin temperature inversion on a clear night and strengthened when warm air was advected above the basin by a westerly flow that descended from the Cascade Mountains. The cold pool was nearly destroyed one afternoon by cold air advection aloft and by the growth of a convective boundary layer (CBL) following the partial breakup of the basin stratus. The cold pool restrengthened, however, with nighttime cooling and was destroyed the next afternoon by a growing CBL. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The composite dietary antioxidant index (CDAI) is commonly utilized to assess antioxidant intake across diseases, but its association with kidney stones is unclear. We hypothesized that higher CDAI is associated with reduced kidney stone risk. Using National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey 2007-2020 data, we calculated CDAI based on vitamins A, C, E, selenium, zinc, and carotenoids intake in 29,280 adults. Stone formers had lower CDAI, with significant gender differences. Restricted cubic spline showed an L-shaped curve, with the steepest decline before CDAI of 1.449. In multivariate logistic regression, moderate and high CDAI tertiles were associated with reduced kidney stone odds compared to the lowest tertile (odds ratio [95% CI]): 0.85 [0.73, 0.99], P = .035 and 0.80 [0.66, 0.95], P = .014, respectively). Vitamin C had the highest negative correlation weight with kidney stones. Significant interactions were found for age and diabetes subgroups. In conclusion, higher CDAI may reduce kidney stone risk, especially with adequate vitamin C intake. Further cohort studies are warranted to confirm the causal association., Competing Interests: Author Declarations The authors have declared no conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2024 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Aims: Understanding the national trends in cardiovascular risk factors control of individuals with prediabetes and diabetes is critical for diabetes prevention and management. Our study aims to estimate how cardiovascular risk factors changed in US adults with different glycemic statuses between 2007-2008 and 2017-2018., Methods and Results: This was a serial cross-sectional study based on the National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys (between 2007-2008 and 2017-2018 cycle). Non-pregnant American participants aged 20 years or older were included. Cardiovascular risk factors including weight, blood pressure, plasma cholesterol, and smoking by glycemic statuses were estimated. A total of 33 040 American adults were included. From 2007-2008 to 2017-2018, the age-adjusted proportions of individuals who reached weight control (body mass index <30 kg/m2) of both normoglycemia group and prediabetes group had a significant decrease over the study period, while the trend in participants with diabetes was not significant (mean difference: -5.34%, 95% confidence interval: -15.28%, 4.59%; P for trend = 0.298). The age-adjusted means of total cholesterol of all three groups decreased during the study decade (P for trend < 0.010), with participants with diabetes maintaining the lowest level. Individuals with high total cholesterol were more likely to receive statin therapy in the diabetes group. Notably, prediabetes participants had the highest level of total cholesterol and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol and were less likely to achieve lipid control with statin therapy. Sensitivity analysis with the second definition of prediabetes and diabetes resulted in a consistent trend., Conclusions: In this nationally representative cross-sectional study, we systematically estimated the cardiovascular risk factors control in American adults and found poor weight control in the normoglycemia and prediabetes group. Despite the significant decrease trend of plasma total cholesterol in all groups, the high cholesterol level in the prediabetes group deserves special concern., Competing Interests: Conflict of interest: None of the authors has any relevant disclosures related to this manuscript., (© The Author(s) 2023. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the European Society of Cardiology. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oup.com.)

Pharmacometrics is an emerging science that interprets drug, disease, and trial information in a mathematical fashion to inform and facilitate efficient drug development and/or regulatory decisions. Pharmacometrics study is increasingly adopted in the regulatory review of new antimicrobial agents. We summarized the 31 antimicrobial agents approved by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the 26 antimicrobial agents approved by European Medicines Agency (EMA) from January 2001 to May 2019. We also reviewed recent examples of utilizing pharmacometrics to support antimicrobial agent's registration in China, including modeling and simulation methods, effects of internal/external factors on pharmacokinetic (PK) parameters, safety and efficacy evaluation in terms of exposure-response analysis, refinement of the wording of product labeling and package leaflet, and possible postmarketing clinical trial. Ongoing communication among regulator, academia, and industry regarding pharmacometrics is encouraged to streamline and facilitate the development of new antimicrobial agents. The industry can maximize its benefit in drug development through continued pharmacometrics education/training., (© 2021 The Authors. CPT: Pharmacometrics & Systems Pharmacology published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of American Society for Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics.)

Background: The number of cancer survivors has increased rapidly, and there is a higher risk of developing a second cancer. Whether a prior malignancy could affect survival outcomes is unknown. We aimed to investigate the clinical characteristics and prognostic outcomes of prior malignancies in patients with gastric cancer., Methods: Patient data were extracted from the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) database. We used the Kaplan-Meier method, competing risk models, and Cox regression models to evaluate the impact of prior malignancy on survival outcomes., Results: Among 71,809 patients with primary gastric cancer, 6667 (9.3%) patients had a pre-existing cancer. Prostate (31.86%), breast (14.34%), and colon and rectum (10.32%) cancer were the most common types. A significant difference was observed in the overall survival rates between patients with and without prior cancer (log-rank=139.73, p < 0.001). In the subgroup analysis, patients with prostate, uterine corpus, lung and bronchus, colon and rectum, esophagus, urinary bladder, leukemia, brain and other nervous system, oral cavity and pharynx, and breast cancer faced inferior survival than those without prior cancer., Conclusions: A history of prior cancer was associated with worse overall survival in patients with gastric cancer, and the effects varied by different initial cancer types. The exclusion and inclusion of patients who had previous malignancies should be reconsidered according to the specific malignancy types., (© 2021 The Authors. Cancer Medicine published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.)

BACKGROUND The suicide risk of patients with cancer is higher than the general population. Our research aimed to explore the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) database to define incidence and quest risk factors for death of suicide in patients with Kaposi's sarcoma (KS) in the United States (US). MATERIAL AND METHODS We screened KS patients without human immunodeficiency virus status in the SEER database from 1980 to 2016, calculated the standardized mortality ratios of them by comparing the rates with those of the US general population from 1980 to 2016, and identified relevant suicide risk factors by univariable and multivariable logistic regression analyses. RESULTS The suicide rates of KS patients and US general population were 115.31 (110 suicides among 21 405 patients) and 15.1 per 100 000 person-years, respectively, thus the standardized mortality ratio was 7.64 (95% confidence interval [CI], 6.28-9.21). The multivariate analysis showed that black race (versus white race, hazard ratio [HR]: 0.43, 95% CI: 0.21-0.89, P=0.022), advanced age at diagnosis (≥55 years versus 18-44 years, HR: 0.31, 95% CI: 0.14-0.66, P=0.002), and chemotherapy (versus no chemotherapy, HR: 0.60, 95% CI: 0.37-0.96, P=0.032) were protective factors for suicide among KS patients. CONCLUSIONS Clinicians and caregivers can apply our findings to identify KS patients with high suicide risk characteristics (white race, age of 18-44 years, non-chemotherapy) and exert timely interventions during patient diagnosis, treatment, and follow-up to reduce the suicide rate in this population.

The Ages & Stages Questionnaire: Social-Emotional (ASQ:SE; Squires, Bricker, & Twombly, 2002a), developed in the United States, was translated and adapted for use in China. Lack of valid and reliable instruments for identifying social and emotional delays in young children is a worldwide issue. Professionals in China have recently focused efforts on developing methods for early identification of social, emotional, and behavioral issues in the birth-to-5 population. Following the guidelines of the International Test Commission, the ASQ:SE was translated into Simplified Chinese (ASQ:SE-C) to collect a normative sample of 2,528 children across China. Data were analyzed to evaluate the psychometric properties of the ASQ:SE-C, using both classical test theory and item response theory, including generating cutoff points appropriate for the Chinese sample. A panel of Chinese experts was surveyed to assess face validity and estimated utility of the newly adapted tool. Discussions of research findings and implications for future studies are provided., (© 2017 Michigan Association for Infant Mental Health.)