Borg Loomis (stevenfir40)

The increasing prevalence of non-communicable diseases, namely cancer, Alzheimer's (AD) and cardiovascular diseases (CVDs), worldwide continues to be a major health burden. Research attempts have been made to understand the pathophysiology and develop effective therapeutic agents for these diseases using conventional in vitro and ex vivo models. Due to the complexity of human disease mechanisms, often these models fail to recapitulate clinically relevant pathologies. As such, interests are arising in the exploration of three-dimensional (3D) in-vitro models, which create an artificial environment to closely mimic in vivo human conditions. Several studies have developed 3D models for cancer, AD and CVD research which can greatly improve the understanding of biological mechanisms and mirror clinical drug activities. Thus, 3D cultures may provide new in-vitro models that recapitulate the architecture and biological mechanisms of human diseases prior to the need for the use of sentient animals. Chronic kidney disease (CKD) can increase serum carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA) levels. We thus aimed to evaluate the impact of CKD on CEA prognostic accuracy in colorectal cancer. Altogether, 429 patients who underwent curative resection for stages I-III colorectal adenocarcinoma were grouped according to postoperative CEA levels and history of CKD. Three-year disease-free survival (DFS) was higher in patients with normal postoperative CEA (group A, 83.4%) than in those with elevated postoperative CEA (group B, 64.3%) (p<0.001). CKD patients had higher postoperative CEA levels than non-CKD patients (odds ratio 3.27, 95% confidence interval 1.78-5.99, p<0.001). In multivariable analysis, postoperative CEA level was an independent prognostic factor for DFS in non-CKD, but not CKD, patients. CKD can increase postoperative CEA levels in colorectal cancer patients. Elevated postoperative CEA levels were associated with shorter DFS in non-CKD, but not CKD, patients. CKD can increase postoperative CEA levels in colorectal cancer patients. Elevated postoperative CEA levels were associated with shorter DFS in non-CKD, but not CKD, patients. In a surgical field, where surgeons are, "sometimes wrong, but never in doubt," lack of confidence can have detrimental effects on career advancement. In other fields there is evidence that a gap exists between women and men in the amount of confidence they display, and that confidence is a proxy for success. This study used the General Self Efficacy Scale and Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale confidence surveys to assess self confidence amongst female trainees and attending plastic surgeons, to search for baseline characteristics associated with higher confidence scores. Of the 73 participants, protective factors associated with increased female plastic surgeon confidence include age, parity, more advanced academic status, and mentorship. In order to matriculate into a surgical training program, there must be a measure of confidence and resiliency, but further work needs to be done to identify and address gender gaps in training and early academic careers. In order to matriculate into a surgical training program, there must be a measure of confidence and resiliency, but further work needs to be done to identify and address gender gaps in training and early academic careers. Although stereophotogrammetry is increasingly popular for 3-dimensional face scanning, commercial solutions remain quite expensive, limiting its accessibility. We propose a more affordable, custom-built photogrammetry setup (Stereo-Face 3D, SF3D) and evaluate its variability within and between systems. Twenty-nine subjects and a mannequin head were imaged 3 times using SF3D and a commercially available system. An anthropometric mask was mapped viscoelastically onto the reconstructed meshes using MeshMonk (https//github.com/TheWebM