BACKGROUND This study evaluated the performance of a new weight estimation strategy (Mercy Method) with four existing weight-estimation methods (APLS, ARC, Broselow, and Nelson) in children from Ouelessebougou, Mali. METHODS Otherwise healthy children, 2 mos to 16 yrs, were enrolled and weight, height, humeral length (HL) and mid-upper arm circumference (MUAC) obtained by trained raters. Weig...

The mechanisms by which vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) and soluble intercellular adhesion molecule-1 (sICAM-1) contribute to lung cancer growth have not been fully elucidated. This study aimed to assess the role of VEGF and sICAM-1 in control of pleural effusions (PE) and survival in patients with primary human lung adenocarcinoma. Using enzyme-linked immunoadsorbent assay, the conce...

In this paper we study stochastic dynamic games with many players that are relevant for a wide range of social, economic, and engineering applications. The standard solution concept for such games is Markov perfect equilibrium (MPE), but it is well known that MPE computation becomes intractable as the number of players increases. Further, MPE demands a perhaps implausible level of rationality o...

L-thyroxine (LT4) withdrawal prior to radioactive iodine (RAI) ablation therapy is a commonly used method for successful treatment of patients with papillary thyroid cancer (PTC). However, a prolonged period of hypothyroidism induced by LT4 withdrawal is sometimes associated with impaired quality of life and cardiopulmonary dysfunction in PTC patients. Furthermore, LT4 withdrawal may have a tro...

BACKGROUND Transthoracic ultrasound (US) is an important instrument to identify pleural effusions and safely conduct invasive procedures. It also allows systematic scanning of the pleural surface, though its value remains uncertain for differentiation between malignant (MPE) and nonmalignant pleural effusion (non-MPE) in routine clinical practice. OBJECTIVES To evaluate the utility of US feat...

We prove existence of Markov Perfect Equilibria (MPE) in nonstationary undiscounted infinite horizon dynamic games, by exploiting a structural property (Uniformly Bounded Reachability) of the state dynamics. This allows us to identify a suitable finite horizon equilibrium relaxation, the ending state Constrained MPE, that captures the relevant features of an infinite horizon MPE for a long enou...

Malignant pleural effusion (MPE) refers to the presence of neoplastic cells in the pleural fluid. Approximately 40 000 people per year in the UK are affected by MPE and it is associated with significant morbidity and an overall poor prognosis. Management should be prompt and care plans should be individualized and involve a multidisciplinary team of healthcare professionals. This article review...

The recent availability of massive amounts of imagery, both at home and on the Internet, has generated substantial interest in systems for automated image search and retrieval. In this work, we review a principle for the design of such systems, which formulates the retrieval problem as one of decision-theory. Under this principle, a retrieval system searches the images that are likely to satisf...

Antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) are naturally occurring, broad-spectrum antimicrobial agents that have recently been examined for their utility as therapeutic antibiotics. Unfortunately, they are expensive to produce and are often sensitive to protease digestion. To address this problem, we have examined the activity of a peptide mimetic whose design was based on the structure of magainin, exhibi...