The effect of cardiac rehabilitation exercise programs on feelings of energy and fatigue: a meta-analysis of research from 1945 to 2005.

BACKGROUND: Physical activity is a healthful behavior that has promise for combating feelings of low energy and fatigue. Despite evidence suggesting that fatigue is a prodromal symptom of major cardiac events, improvements in feelings of energy and fatigue have largely been ignored by reviewers of cardiac rehabilitation literature who have focused on anxiety, depression and general measures of quality of life. DESIGN: A meta-analytical review. METHODS AND RESULTS: Computer databases were searched from January 1945 to May 2005 to identify relevant literature. A total of 36 studies consisting of 4765 subjects were included. Cardiac rehabilitation exercise programs were consistently associated with increases in energy and decreases in fatigue. The magnitude of the effect was moderately large (mean delta 0.51; 95% confidence interval 0.42-0.61) but was heterogeneous and modified by features of the research design. Comparison of effect sizes in cardiac rehabilitation studies concurrently measuring energy/fatigue, anxiety and depression suggest that exercise-based cardiac rehabilitation programs have larger effects on feelings of energy and fatigue compared with anxiety and depression. CONCLUSION: This review quantifies the potential benefit of cardiac rehabilitation exercise programs on feelings of energy and fatigue, and suggests that cardiac rehabilitation researchers and practitioners may benefit from examining, and perhaps even focusing on, feelings of energy and fatigue as an important outcome variable. A greater understanding of the effect of cardiac rehabilitation exercise programs on feelings of energy and fatigue will be reached when more true experiments are conducted thereby avoiding the primary limitation of the literature reviewed; that is, the frequent use of non-experimental research designs.     

Robust rigid registration of retinal angiograms through optimization

Retinal fundus photographs are employed as standard diagnostic tools in ophthalmology. Serial photographs of the flow of fluorescein and indocyanine green (ICG) dye are used to determine the areas of the retinal lesions. For objective measurements of features, the registration of the images is a necessity. In this paper, we employ optimization techniques for registration with the help of 2-parameter translational motion model of retinal angiograms, based on non-linear pre-processing (Wiener filtering and morphological gradient) and computation of the similarity criteria for the alignment of the two gradient images for any given rigid transformation. The optimization methods are effectively employed to minimize the similarity criterion.

The presence of noise, the variations in the background and the temporal variation of the fluorescence level pose serious problems in obtaining a robust registration of the retinal images. Moreover, local search strategies are not robust in the case of ICG angiograms, even if one uses a multiresolution approach.

The present work makes a systematic comparison of different optimization techniques, namely the minimization method derived from the optical flow formulation, the Nelder-Mead local search and the HCIAC ant colony metaheuristic, each optimizing a similarity criterion for the gradient images. The impact of the resolution and median filtering of gradient image is studied and the robustness of the approaches is tested through experimental studies, performed on macular fluorescein and ICG angiographies.

Our proposed optimization techniques have shown interesting results especially for high resolution difficult registration problems. Moreover, this approach seems promising for affine (6-parameter motion model) or elastical registrations.     

不同强度运动对大鼠心脏降钙素基因相关肽的影响

目的:探讨不同强度运动训练对降钙素基因相关肽(CGRP)在心脏组织中表达的影响及其作用机制。方法:将60只SD大鼠随机分为对照组(C组)、小强度运动组(LE组)、中等强度运动组(ME组)和大强度运动组(HE组),每组15只。建立8周不同强度运动训练动物模型,采用免疫组织化学法和计算机图像分析技术,对大鼠心脏形态结构进行观察,并进行心脏CGRP免疫组化分析。结果:8周小强度运动后,大鼠心脏CGRP表达较对照组变化不明显;8周中等强度运动后,大鼠心脏CGRP表达较对照组显著增加(P<0.05),HE染色、HBFP染色和变色酸2R亮绿染色显示心肌组织形态结构无明显改变,仅心肌纤维有轻度缺血缺氧改变;8周大强度运动后,大鼠心脏CGRP表达较对照组显著减少(P<0.05),HE染色、HBFP染色和变色酸2R亮绿染色显示心肌形态结构发生改变并存在明显的缺血缺氧损伤。结果表明,长期中等强度运动使心脏CGRP表达增加,改善了冠状循环和心肌血液供应,对心肌细胞具有保护作用;长期大强度运动使心脏CGRP对心肌细胞的保护作用减弱,可能是导致心肌发生缺血缺氧性损伤的重要原因之一。     

AN UNUSUAL BILATERAL VAGAL PARAGANGLIOMAS： ONE CASE STUDY

VAGAL paraganglioma VP)is an uncommonneoplasm originating from neural crest paragan-glion cells located along the vagus nerve,repre-senting less than5%of all paragangliomas of the head andneck.1Despite improvement in microsurgical techniques,management of…