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Aims/Introduction Crossing capillaries in the finger nailfold might potentially be a novel diabetic retinopathy (DR) biomarker that could be assessed non‐invasively in the clinical setting. However, the association between crossing capillaries and DR is controversial. This study aimed to investigate the association between the percentage of crossing capillaries in the finger nailfold and DR in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus. Materials and Methods This cross‐sectional study enrolled 108 type 2 diabetes mellitus patients (aged 40–75 years) who visited the outpatient diabetic clinic at Osaka University Hospital, Osaka, Japan, between May and October 2019. Capillary morphology was assessed using nailfold capillaroscopy based on the simple capillaroscopic definitions of the European League Against Rheumatism Study Group. Details of DR and other laboratory data were obtained from medical records. The association between the tertile of the percentage of the crossing capillary and DR was analyzed using multivariable logistic regression. Results After adjusting for age, sex, diabetes duration, glycated hemoglobin, systolic blood pressure, body mass index, and use of renin–angiotensin system inhibitor and antihyperlipidemic medication, the percentage of crossing capillaries was significantly associated with DR (multivariable‐adjusted odds ratios for increasing tertiles of the percentage of crossing capillary: 1 [reference], 2.05 [95% confidence interval 0.53–7.94], and 4.33 [95% confidence interval 1.16–16.21]; P‐trend = 0.028). Conclusions A higher percentage of crossing capillaries in the nailfold was associated with a higher risk of DR, independent of traditional risk and inhibiting factors, in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus., Crossing capillaries in the finger nailfold might potentially be a novel diabetic retinopathy biomarker that could be assessed non‐invasively in a clinical setting. We investigated the association between crossing capillaries and diabetic retinopathy in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus. A higher percentage of crossing capillaries in the nailfold was associated with a higher risk of diabetic retinopathy in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus, independent of traditional risk and inhibiting factors.

Purpose This study compared age differences in risk factors for falls requiring treatment in psychiatric patients. Design and methods An incident database was used to compare fall incidents in patients aged less than 65 years and those aged greater than or equal to 65 years. Findings Approximately 30% of fallers were less than 65 years. Mental status and medication were the main risk factors. Decreased activities of daily living were associated with the most falls in patients greater than or equal to 65 years. Practice implications Fall risk differed between the two age groups. Medication may play a major role in falls among patients less than 65 years.

AIM: Increased crossing of finger nailfold capillaries could be a novel visual marker of early microvascular damage among type 2 diabetes mellitus patients. Although abdominal obesity is an important driver of early microvascular damage, its association with an increase in the percentage of crossing capillaries remains uncertain. We investigated the association between abdominal obesity and an increase in the percentage of crossing capillaries in the finger nailfold in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus. METHODS: This cross-sectional study enrolled 123 type 2 diabetes mellitus patients (age 40–75 years) who visited the outpatient diabetic clinic at Osaka University Hospital between May and October 2019. Abdominal obesity was defined as a waist circumference ≥ 90 cm in women and ≥ 85 cm in men. Capillary morphology was assessed by nailfold capillaroscopy based on the simple capillaroscopic definitions of the European League Against Rheumatism Study Group. The association between abdominal obesity and a high percentage of crossing capillaries in the finger nailfold (defined as the highest tertile of crossing capillaries) was analyzed using multivariable logistic regression. RESULTS: After adjusting for age, sex, smoking status, regular exercise, duration of diabetes, glycated hemoglobin, hypertension, and dyslipidemia, abdominal obesity was significantly associated with a high percentage of crossing capillaries (multivariable-adjusted odds ratios [95% confidence interval] = 2.70 [1.05–6.90], p = 0.038). CONCLUSIONS: Abdominal obesity may play an important role in the increase in the percentage of crossing capillaries in the finger nailfold in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1007/s13340-020-00480-4) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Hiesho is a well known health problem for Asian women. The common condition for Hiesho is feeling cold at foot toes. Plantar tactile sensation plays essential role in postural stability, which is affected by skin temperature. However, whether Hiesho has influence on plantar tactile sensation is still unknown. In this study, we aim to declare the relationship between Hiesho and plantar tactile sensation. Twenty nine young females participated in this study. Tactile sensations at five plantar points were tested with two kinds of stimulation order, ascending and descending. Hiesho was defined through 15 °C cooling recover test. As a result, cooling recover rate for Hiesho was 67% lower than it for Non-Hiesho. Compared with Non-Hiesho, Hiesho group showed significant higher tactile sensation threshold at first toe, the first metatarsal head, and the fifth metatarsal head. It was concluded that subjects with Hiesho had poorer ability of cooling recover and higher threshold of plantar tactile sensation.

OBJECTIVES The objective of this study was to evaluate the validity of Eurolung risk models in a Japanese population and assess their utility as predictive indicators for the prognosis. METHODS Between 2007 and 2014, 612 anatomic lung resections were performed among 694 lung cancer patients in our institution. We analysed the cardiopulmonary morbidity and mortality and compared them with the predicted results. We also investigated the association between the Eurolung aggregate risk scores and the long-term outcomes using the Kaplan–Meier method and a multivariable analysis. RESULTS The percentage of cardiopulmonary complications was lower than that predicted by Eurolung 1 (22.4% vs 24.6%). The mortality rate was significantly lower than predicted by Eurolung 2 (0.7% vs 3.0%). The morbidity rate was stratified by Aggregate Eurolung 1. The stratification of the mortality rate by the Eurolung 2 aggregate score was also in line with the increase in score, although the observed number of deaths was quite small (4 cases). The 5-year overall survival was clearly separated according to the stratified Aggregate Eurolung 1 and 2 (P CONCLUSIONS Eurolung risk models cannot be directly applied to the patients in our institution. However, Eurolung aggregate risk scores were helpful not only for stratifying morbidity and mortality after anatomic lung resection but also for predicting the long-term outcomes.

Recent research on consumption and subjective well-being has revealed that experiential purchases and prosocial spending promote happiness by enhancing the purchasers’ social relationships. This study (N = 1523) explored whether undergraduate students’ consumption behaviors during summer break would be associated with their post-break happiness, and whether the consumption–happiness relationship would be mediated by a positive influence on their social relationships. The results showed that both experiential purchases and prosocial spending during summer break were associated with greater post-break happiness, but only when these purchases had a positive influence on the purchasers’ social relationships. These effects remained significant after controlling for respondents’ personality traits, financial standing, and sex. Moreover, both experiential purchases and prosocial spending were more likely to have a positive influence on social relationships than luxury purchases. These results are congruent with ...

The present study examined effects of the perception of a communicative context on the transmission of information. The study specifically tested whether a communicator could transmit information for a recipient depending on the perceived relevance between the message recipient and the target of the communication. Thirty-six participants were assigned the role of communicator, and they were all informed that the recipient was from the marketing department of "Company A". In the high relevance condition (i.e., own product condition), the target was a computer made by Company A. On the other hand, in the low relevance condition (i.e., other product condition), the target was a computer made by a rival Company B. Results showed that communicators reproduced and transmitted a greater amount of negative information than that of positive information in the high relevance condition. In the low relevance condition, communicators referred to both negative and positive information in almost equal amount. This is interpreted that communicators could transmit adequate information depending on the perception of the relevance between the recipient and the target. Furthermore, this study demonstrated that the effect of relevance between the recipient and the target on the memory was mediated by the contents of the message and evaluation. This shows that evaluation facilitated the communicators' memory about the target. Characteristics of social cognition in a communicative context are discussed.

Our decision about whether to trust and cooperate with someone is influenced by the individual's facial appearance despite its limited predictive power. Thus, remembering trustworthy-looking cheaters is more important than remembering untrustworthy-looking cheaters because we are more likely to trust and cooperate with the former, resulting in a higher risk of unreciprocated cooperation. The present study investigated whether our mind adaptively copes with this problem by enhancing memory for trustworthy-looking cheaters. Participants played a debt game, wherein they learned to discriminate among good, neutral, and bad lenders, who respectively charged no, moderate, and high interest on the debt. Each lender had either a trustworthy- or untrustworthy-looking face. A subsequent memory test revealed that participants remembered the bad traits of trustworthy-looking lenders more accurately than those of untrustworthy-looking lenders. The results demonstrate enhanced memory for trustworthy-looking cheaters, or wolves in sheep's clothing, implying that humans are equipped with protective mechanisms against disguised, unfaithful signs of trustworthiness.

Our ability to learn about the reputations of others-that is, who is likely to cooperate versus cheat-contributes greatly to cooperativeness in society. There has been recent debate whether humans employ memory bias favoring cheaters (i.e., there is an evolved module for the detection of cheaters) or whether no such bias exists (i.e., reputation learning is flexibly modulated by contextual factors). We report 3 experiments that address this issue by comparing persistence against extinction-which is a reliable measure of prepared fear learning (Ohman & Mineka, 2001)-between memories regarding cheaters and cooperators. In all experiments, participants learned to classify unfamiliar persons as either cooperators or cheaters, and, then, they were instructed to disregard those learned associations and told that they had been determined arbitrarily, which simulated a verbal extinction procedure in the fear conditioning paradigm (Hugdahl & Ohman, 1977). The results indicated that while postlearning changes in perceived trustworthiness were modulated by a contextual factor (appearance of the facial stimulus), the persistence of learning exhibited a cheater advantage: Cheaters remained perceived as untrustworthy to a greater extent than cooperators as trustworthy at the extinction period. Thus, there exists a cheater bias in human reputation learning, the proximate and ultimate mechanisms of which warrant further study.

Our decision about whether to trust and cooperate with someone is influenced by the individual's facial appearance despite its limited predictive power. Thus, remembering trustworthy-looking cheaters is more important than remembering untrustworthy-looking cheaters because we are more likely to trust and cooperate with the former, resulting in a higher risk of unreciprocated cooperation. The present study investigated whether our mind adaptively copes with this problem by enhancing memory for trustworthy-looking cheaters. Participants played a debt game, wherein they learned to discriminate among good, neutral, and bad lenders, who respectively charged no, moderate, and high interest on the debt. Each lender had either a trustworthy- or untrustworthy-looking face. A subsequent memory test revealed that participants remembered the bad traits of trustworthy-looking lenders more accurately than those of untrustworthy-looking lenders. The results demonstrate enhanced memory for trustworthy-looking cheaters, or wolves in sheep's clothing, implying that humans are equipped with protective mechanisms against disguised, unfaithful signs of trustworthiness.

Five studies are reported testing the hypothesis that Westerners (Italians) rely more on trait adjectives and that East Asians (Japanese) rely more on behavior-descriptive verbs in person description and memory. In Studies 1 (N = 80) and 2 (N = 128), Italians used more adjectives and fewer verbs than Japanese to describe individuals and groups. Likewise, Studies 3 (N = 161) and 4 (N = 84) revealed that Italians committed more memory errors indicative of behavior-to-trait inferences, whereas Japanese showed an opposite tendency (Study 3) or no difference (Study 4). Study 5 (N = 64) revealed that in both languages, adjectives were perceived to provide more information about the actor and that verbs were perceived to provide more information about the situation. Yet, Japanese participants found adjectives less predictive of future behavior but facilitative of the process of imagining a concrete situation. These results are interpreted as providing evidence for systematic cultural differences in the elaboration of social information.