Search Results (9,528)

This study evaluated the relationship between age at first mating and gestation length, body development, reproductive performance and kid growth in Carpathian goats raised under a traditional production system. A total of 150 females were assigned to three groups according to age at first mating: L1 (7–8 months), L2 (12–13 months) and L3 (17–18 months). A reference group of 50 adult females was used to assess body development. Mean gestation length ranged from 150.74 to 151.55 days, without significant differences among groups (p > 0.05). During the first breeding season, mean body weight in L1, L2 and L3 represented 54.2%, 66.0% and 75.3% of adult female body weight, respectively. By 2024, these proportions had reached 91.9%, 96.3% and 98.1. Kidding rates differed significantly among groups (p < 0.001), with values of 70% in L1, 76% in L2 and 100% in L3, while live-born kids represented 78.9%, 88.9% and 95.3% of all kids born, respectively. L1 females therefore had the lowest kidding rate and the highest proportion of stillborn kids (21.1%), compared with 11.1% in L2 and 4.7% in L3. Single-born kids maintained higher body weights than twin-born kids until 90 days of age. The results indicate that first mating at 7–8 months of age was biologically possible in Carpathian females, but females in this group had a lower kidding rate and a lower level of body development than those in the more developed groups. These findings indicate that breeding readiness should be evaluated in relation to both age and body development, particularly body weight at first mating. Full article

Background/Objectives: Clinical placements are central to nursing education, but students’ experiences are shaped by the clinical learning environment, relationships with staff, autonomy, and assessment, as well as curricular design. This study explored nursing undergraduates’ lived experiences of clinical placements at the University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria (ULPGC), their perceptions of the current placement programme, and suggestions for improvement. Methods: A qualitative, interpretative, sequential study with a hermeneutic phenomenological orientation was conducted. Eligible third- and fourth-year nursing students were recruited during the 2025/2026 academic year (N = 14). Phase 1 comprised ten individual semi-structured interviews, analysed inductively using ATLAS.ti, with descriptive co-occurrence patterns supporting the interpretative synthesis. Phase 2 consisted of a focus group with four additional students, with the data analysed deductively using the Phase 1 thematic framework. Results: Fifteen subthemes were organised into five themes: general experience, relationship with staff, autonomy and learning, structure and organisation, and assessment. Participants generally perceived their clinical placements positively, although experiences varied across settings. They associated satisfaction and learning with team inclusion, relationships with clinical staff, progressive autonomy, and supervision, while identifying challenges in placement organisation and assessment, particularly the reliance on written assignments rather than direct observation of clinical performance. Across both phases, participants’ accounts reflected interconnected relational, educational, organisational, and assessment-related dimensions. Collective discussion further elaborated these experiences and potential improvements concerning supervision, placement organisation, and assessment. Conclusions: Nursing students’ accounts suggested that clinical placement experiences reflected the interaction of relational, educational, organisational, and assessment-related dimensions. Collective reflection further elaborated these experiences and enabled potential improvements concerning supervision, placement organisation, and assessment to be discussed. These context-specific findings may inform future curricular review, although their transferability and the feasibility of the proposed improvements require evaluation in broader and more diverse student populations. Full article

Background/Objectives: Identification of unknown individuals is an essential part of Forensic Medicine. Recent anthropological research has demonstrated subtle but consistent sexual dimorphism in the sella turcica, while indicating comparatively limited population-specific differences in its size, shape, and contour. The aim of this paper is to analyze the variability and sexual dimorphism of the sphenoid bone and to determine if there are statistically significant correlations between the sella turcica dimensions and the degree of pneumatization of the sphenoid sinus. Materials and Methods: We analyzed five hundred random unenhanced CT examinations of human dry skulls from the “Francisc I. Rainer” Craniological Collection of the Human Anthropological Institute in Bucharest, Romania. The “Francisc I. Rainer” Craniological Collection is a modern osteological collection of almost 6800 skulls that have been collected and prepared by Prof. Rainer during the first half of the XXth century. Most of the specimens are of Romanian origin, prepared during the interwar period, and over 3000 adult skulls are of known sex and age. Consequently, 600 CT examinations of Romanian patients underwent cerebral CT in the University Emergency Hospital of Bucharest. The overall sample (dried skulls and the skulls of the contemporary living individuals) consisted of 1100 CT examinations of skulls, 619 males and 481 females, with ages between 19 and 93 years. Results: we identified statistically significant differences regarding the degree of pneumatization of the sphenoid sinus (SS) between the two groups as a whole, with the conchal and presellar types being more frequent in the dry skull group, and the sellar and postsellar types being more frequent in the patient group. When analyzing whether there were correlations between the degree of pneumatization of the SS and the diameters of the sella turcica (ST), we identified a weak, but statistically significant negative correlation between the sella turcica height (STH) and the postsellar pneumatization type. This suggests that the smaller sellar heights tend to be associated with the postsellar type of SS. Type III interclinoid osseous bridges were more frequent in the contemporary living patients’ group. Conclusions: Knowledge of such variability of the sphenoid bone holds great importance in Forensic Sciences, as it may aid in the process of identification of individuals or human remains. Full article

Background/Objectives: Acquired brain injury (ABI) affects tens of thousands of British Columbians, yet research priorities specific to pediatric populations have received limited attention. This transdisciplinary engagement study aimed to identify and rank key research priorities for health and care services for children and youth with ABI in British Columbia, Canada, by bringing together researchers, clinicians, community organization representatives, and people with lived experience (PWLE). Methods: A hybrid Nominal Group Technique (hNGT) combining virtual and in-person participation was employed from January to May 2025. Thirty advisory panel members—10 researchers, 13 clinicians, five community organization representatives, and two community members, representing a range of disciplines and geographic locations—participated across three phases: silent idea generation using an online platform, a hybrid round-robin clarification meeting, and priority ranking via an online survey. The hybrid approach was designed to maximize engagement and accessibility while preserving equitable opportunities to contribute. Results: The advisory panel contributed 49 initial ideas through the online brainstorming platform. Following round-robin clarification, 28 ideas remained in scope and were consolidated into 19 potential research priorities. Twenty advisory members completed the anonymous final ranking, which identified the 11 highest-ranked research priorities. The highest-ranked priority called for greater diversity among research participants to better represent the varied needs of children and youth with ABI. Seven of the 11 priorities addressed intersecting identities and the inclusion of underrepresented populations. Conclusions: This hNGT study identified 11 research priorities that can guide future ABI research. The findings emphasize the need for research that reflects the heterogeneous nature of pediatric ABI across diverse communities and contexts. Full article

Objectives: Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is a disease with an increasing incidence. Liver transplantation (LT) represents the sole curative treatment option. Downstaging (DS) therapy represents an option in selecting suitable candidates for transplantation who initially have tumors exceeding the MC. Consequently, patients undergoing DS for MC have demonstrated comparable survival rates to those who initially met the MC. Degradable starch microspheres with transcatheter arterial chemoembolization (DSM-TACE), a type of TACE, have also been recently introduced in clinical practice. Methods: This retrospective study encompassed 200 consecutive adult patients who underwent living-donor LT for HCC and cirrhosis at two different centers from March 2012 to December 2023. We aimed to compare long-term overall survival (OS) and recurrence-free survival (RFS) among patients with HCC who met the DSM-TACE criteria for MC following diagnosis, those initially within MC, and those outside MC following diagnosis. Results: The OS rate in the MC group was statistically comparable to that in the DS and beyond the MC groups. The MC and DS groups exhibited comparable long-term RFS rates. However, the MC and DS groups showed significantly better RFS rates than the beyond the MC group. Microvascular invasion (MVI), tumor size and number, and the beyond the MC group were identified as significant recurrence risk factors, whereas MVI alone was an independent prognostic factor. Conclusions: Our results showed good long-term OS and RFS in HCC patients following LDLT after staging into MC with DSM-TACE. Additionally, we achieved a more acceptable survival rate compared to other treatments in the group that underwent MC staging after DS. Full article

Intangible cultural heritage incorporates the living practices, expressions, and knowledge systems recognized by communities worldwide. Over the past decade, the increase in ICH research across diverse disciplines has made it difficult to conduct literature analysis using traditional manual reviews. This study addresses this issue by systematically mapping the thematic structure of the English-language, Scopus-indexed ICH research literature. We conducted a BERTopic-based topic modeling analysis of 15,944 English-language Scopus publications (2016–2025). The method derives topics from contextual sentence embeddings instead of word co-occurrence patterns, enabling documents with similar conceptual content but limited shared vocabulary to be grouped within the same topic. The analysis identified 28 distinct main topics (Coherence = 0.4848; Topic Diversity = 0.7464) clustered into distinct research domains. The findings show a modification in the composition of the published literature: the foundational themes (rituals, traditional craft) remain robust, but there is a pronounced increase in technological mediation (virtual and augmented reality), sustainable spatial management (traditional villages), and legal/economic frameworks (intellectual property rights, cultural tourism). This mapping explores the interdisciplinary integration of ICH in the context of recent societal transformation. Full article

Due to the intersection of factors such as cultural practices, socioeconomic context and living conditions, not only the educational experiences and outcomes, but also the environmental attitudes of Roma students are potentially different from those of non-Roma students; this suggests that the commonly implemented environmental education programs and recycling awareness campaigns may not be as effective as previously assumed. Yet, empirical research focusing on Roma students’ environmental behavior remains scarce; the aim of this study is to examine the environmental attitudes and recycling behavior of Roma students to inform the existing environmental education approaches and to detect the areas that require attention. Results based on quantitative data showed that most students (57.9%) did not recycle, while the availability of recycling infrastructure emerged as a decisive factor for the respondents who reported recycling. Irrespective of their recycling engagement, most students perceived that environmental protection contributes to quality of life and acknowledged the negative impact of waste on human health. Moreover, categorical regression analysis showed that recycling engagement was associated with parents’ occupation and the place of residence. Finally, despite the socioeconomic challenges, the findings indicate an overall positive attitude towards environmental protection, challenging widespread stereotypical assumptions about this ethnic group. Full article

Protracted displacement remains one of the most significant social consequences of armed conflict. Yet little is known about how internally displaced women themselves experience and interpret everyday life in long-term displacement settings. This study explores the lived experiences of internally displaced women residing in Tserovani, one of the largest compact settlements for internally displaced persons (IDPs) in Georgia. Using Photovoice, a participatory visual methodology, the research examined how women understand identity, belonging, health, community life, and future aspirations nearly two decades after displacement from Akhalgori. Data were collected through five Photovoice sessions involving participant-generated photographs, group discussions, and reflective narratives. Thematic analysis revealed five interconnected themes: (1) displacement as an unfinished experience characterized by enduring attachment to home; (2) identities rooted in family, relationships, and meaningful social roles rather than displacement alone; (3) beauty, nature, and everyday practices as sources of resilience; (4) community solidarity and collective coping within the settlement; and (5) future orientations shaped by both hope and uncertainty. The findings suggest that the experiences of internally displaced women are best understood through the intersection of ambiguous loss, place attachment, and everyday resilience. While participants have adapted to life in displacement, emotional connections to their homeland remain strong and continue to shape identity, belonging, and future planning. By centering women’s voices through Photovoice, the study moves beyond deficit-oriented narratives of trauma and vulnerability and highlights the active ways in which women create meaning, sustain social relationships, and cultivate resilience in contexts of prolonged uncertainty. The study contributes to scholarship on forced displacement, gender, visual methodologies, and social work practice in post-conflict settings. Full article

Documented skeletal collections provide many of the samples necessary for forensic anthropological research, including the creation and validation of skeletal analytical methods. Although modern collections are considered more representative of the current living population, they often differ significantly from each other by geographic location, organization, and procurement strategies. As these factors influence which donors are included in a particular collection, they also create collection-specific sample bias. This research aims to identify how that bias impacts skeletal variation across collections and whether it obscures normal patterns of human skeletal variation. Craniometric and demographic data were collected from a sample of individuals from eight modern United States-based documented skeletal collections (n = 1161). The results indicate that collection-specific sample bias influences average cranial morphology, but to a lesser extent than sex or population. Across analyses, samples consistently and preferentially clustered with individuals from similar population and sex groups rather than with individuals from the same collection of origin. These analyses suggest that normal patterns of human variation are not obscured by collection origin and that documented skeletal collections therefore remain valid and reliable sources of data for understanding population diversity and sex differences, even when some level of collection-specific bias is present. Full article

Microbiome diversity varies significantly across countries and social groups due to geographic, ethnic, lifestyle, and dietary factors, with populations in traditional and rural settings tending to harbor more diverse microbial communities than those in industrialized urban environments. In Saudi Arabia, the influx of migrant workers from regions with distinct health and ecological backgrounds represents a public health concern. In particular, these workers may carry novel microbial species from their places of origin, thereby increasing the risk of infectious diseases spreading in the local population. This may also result in disruption of gut microbial homeostasis, thereby elevating risks related to infection, metabolic disorders, and disease susceptibility. Furthermore, the potential emergence of drug-resistant or locally uncommon microbial strains is particularly concerning. In this study, bacterial diversity was assessed in 28 fecal samples collected from migrant workers living in Saudi Arabia, using 16S rRNA gene sequencing targeting the V3–V4 regions. Operational taxonomic units (OTUs) were clustered at 97% sequence similarity, and alpha diversity indices (Shannon, Simpson, Chao1, ACE) were calculated to evaluate microbial richness and evenness. The results revealed considerable inter-individual variability, with Segatella copri, Peptostreptococcus, and Lachnospiraceae identified as dominant taxa across multiple samples. Principal component analysis (PCA) demonstrated distinct patterns of inter-individual variation, indicating compositional heterogeneity within the cohort. Functional predictions using PICRUSt2 suggested enrichment in metabolic pathways related to carbohydrate and amino acid processing. These findings offer a comprehensive characterization of the gut microbiome structure and predicted functionality in a population characterized by diverse geographic origins. Full article

Background: Differentiating alcohol-related liver disease (ARLD) from chronic liver injury caused by other etiologies remains a clinically relevant challenge in cross-sectional imaging. In particular, alcoholic hepatitis and alcoholic cirrhosis may overlap morphologically with HBV-related cirrhosis on CT imaging. To develop and assess an attention-residual hybrid Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) for multiclass CT image classification of alcoholic hepatitis, alcoholic cirrhosis, HBV-related cirrhosis, and living liver donors. Methods: A four-class liver image dataset comprising 5760 CT images from 144 individuals (36 per group) was constructed using images from alcoholic hepatitis, alcoholic cirrhosis, HBV-related cirrhosis, and living liver donors. The dataset was partitioned into training, validation, and test sets at the patient level. Five pretrained CNN architectures, including DenseNet121, ResNet50, MobileNetV3-Large, EfficientNetB0, and ConvNeXt-Tiny, were first fine-tuned and comparatively evaluated. Based on F1-score ranking, DenseNet121 and ConvNeXt-Tiny were selected as the two backbone networks for the proposed hybrid model. The final architecture integrated Attention Pooling, Feature-wise Linear Modulation (FiLM), Multi-head Attention, Gated Linear Units, Residual Connections, and layer normalization to improve feature fusion and contextual representation. Results: The proposed model demonstrated the best overall performance among all evaluated architectures on the test set. It achieved an accuracy of 99.55%, a weighted F1-score of 99.55%, an MCC of 0.9941, and a Cohen’s kappa coefficient of 0.9940. The model also achieved ROC-AUC and PR-AUC values of 100.00% and 99.99%, respectively, together with an NPV of 99.85%. The proposed model’s performance was also balanced across classes. For Alcoholic Cirrhosis, precision, recall, and F1-score were all 99.64%. For Alcoholic Hepatitis, the corresponding values were 100.00%, 98.93%, and 99.46%, respectively, while HBV-related Cirrhosis achieved 99.29% precision, 99.64% recall, and 99.47% F1-score. Living Liver Donors achieved 99.29% precision, 100.00% recall, and 99.64% F1-score. Conclusions: The findings of this exploratory study suggest that routine CT images may contain image-based differences potentially relevant to etiology-oriented classification of diffuse liver disease. Beyond distinguishing ARLD from HBV-related cirrhosis and images from living liver donors, the model also captured image-based differences between major ARLD subgroups, including alcoholic hepatitis and alcoholic cirrhosis. These findings support further investigation of CT-derived image-based differences in larger independent and multicenter datasets. Full article

Background: Physical inactivity is common among people living with chronic non-communicable disease, and nurses are frequently the professionals with the most sustained patient contact. How nursing support for physical activity is experienced by patients, and how nurses understand their own role in providing it, remain poorly described. Objective: To explore how patients with chronic diseases and nursing professionals describe nursing support for physical activity and exercise adherence, and where their accounts converge or diverge. Methods: A qualitative descriptive study using individual semi-structured interviews and reflexive thematic analysis. Seventeen participants (nine patients with chronic diseases and eight nursing professionals) were purposively recruited from five healthcare institutions in the Riyadh region of Saudi Arabia. Interviews lasted 30 to 60 min (mean 45 min) and were conducted between December 2025 and February 2026. No quantitative measures of exercise frequency, intensity, duration, or session regularity were collected, so the study reports perceptions and experiences rather than measured adherence, and no causal relationships were examined. Rigor was addressed through researcher reflexivity, member checking, peer debriefing, and an audit trail; reporting follows COREQ. Results: Five themes were constructed: (1) Nursing-Facilitated Empowerment Through Education and Guidance; (2) Personalized Support and Accountability Mechanisms; (3) Barriers and Facilitators to Exercise Adherence; (4) Perceived Health Benefits and Motivation Enhancement; and (5) Gaps in Current Nursing Practice and Opportunities for Enhancement. Participants identified individualized explanation, graduated goal-setting, correction of fear-based misconceptions, scheduled exercise-specific review, and family involvement as the components of support they valued most, and lapsed follow-up, generic advice, limited interdisciplinary coordination, and scarce patient resources as the principal shortfalls. Conclusions: Patients and nurses in this setting described sustained, individualized nursing support as central to how patients engage with exercise, while both groups identified structural constraints that limit it. These accounts indicate targets that intervention studies with objective activity measurement could test; they do not establish that nursing support changes exercise behavior. Full article

Smallholder farming across the Global South increasingly fails to provide a full livelihood. West Java, Indonesia, shows the paradox sharply since paddy farming there is financially viable yet insufficient to live on for most who practise it. Using a survey of 1037 households in four regencies and a structure and agency framework, this study asks how inherited conditions of land and water separate farm performance from household livelihood. Paddy farming returns more than it costs in every size class, with a revenue-to-cost ratio rising from 1.65 to 1.93, while cost per hectare does not differ significantly by farm size. Profitability nonetheless fails to become sufficiency. Annual income covers 79% of household expenditure on small holdings against 153% on large ones, and 61% of small and 48% of medium farms fall short of their own needs. The disadvantage concentrates below 0.3 hectares, where returns approach break-even. Farmer-group membership and access to technical knowledge do not vary with farm size, so what differs is not whether farmers act but what their actions can reach. When farming no longer reproduces the household, in what sense does the farming population remain a population of farmers? Full article

Environmental conditions have an impact on animals’ immune systems. Neutrophils, as key components of innate immunity, rapidly respond to bacterial stimuli through the activation of inflammatory and migratory pathways. This study evaluated the transcriptional and functional responses of neutrophils derived from dogs living under different housing environments following in vitro lipopolysaccharide (LPS) stimulation. Distinct transcriptional profiles were observed among groups in genes associated with leukocyte adhesion (CD11b), chemokine signaling (CXCR1, CXCR2, and CXCL8), and cytokines (TNF-α, IL-1β, and IL-6). Additional cytokine analyses confirmed neutrophil activation and revealed differences in the magnitude and duration of cytokine secretion between groups. These findings indicate that environmental background may be associated with differences in both transcriptional responsiveness and cytokine production in canine neutrophils. Dogs originating from different housing conditions exhibited distinct patterns of inflammatory activation. The combined assessment of gene expression and cytokine secretion provides valuable insight into innate immune adaptation and might represent a useful approach for monitoring immune status in dogs. Full article

Background/Objectives: Most evidence on SARS-CoV-2 infection in pregnancy comes from hospitalised or symptomatic cohorts sampled early in the pandemic. We described maternal and neonatal outcomes in an unselected cohort of PCR-confirmed infections ending in live birth, identified characteristics associated with neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) admission and with prolonged maternal hospitalisation, and benchmarked event rates against national data. Methods: A retrospective cohort of all pregnant women with a positive nasopharyngeal SARS-CoV-2 RT-PCR result at a Turkish tertiary centre between March 2020 and May 2023. Of 151 women identified, 133 had retrievable records; eight pregnancies did not end in a live birth, leaving 125. Prespecified subgroups (NICU admission; maternal stay > 3 days) were compared using Mann–Whitney U and χ²/Fisher exact tests, and cohort proportions with 2024 Turkish national rates by one-sample exact binomial tests. Results: The mean maternal age was 29.9 ± 5.5 years and gestational age at delivery was 38.0 ± 2.0 weeks; 19 women (15.2%) delivered preterm and 76 (60.8%) were diagnosed in the third trimester. Sixteen neonates (12.8%) required NICU care and two mothers (1.6%) intensive care; there were no maternal deaths or stillbirths. NICU admission was associated with preterm birth (56.2% vs. 9.2%, p < 0.001) and lower Apgar scores, and prolonged maternal stay with preterm birth, pregnancy-related comorbidity, and caesarean delivery (all p ≤ 0.001). Neither the trimester of infection nor vaccination status was associated with either outcome. Caesarean (64.0%) and preterm birth (15.2%) rates did not exceed national values (p = 0.58 and p = 0.42). Conclusions: Adverse outcomes clustered with preterm delivery and pre-existing pregnancy complications rather than with the timing of infection. Without a matched control group, and with power limited to large effects, these descriptive findings cannot exclude a clinically important effect of SARS-CoV-2. Full article