Thyroid neoplasia risk is increased nearly 30 years after the Chernobyl accident

To evaluate risk of thyroid neoplasia nearly 30 years following exposure to radioactive iodine (I‐131) from the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear accident, we conducted a fifth cycle of thyroid screening of the Ukrainian‐American cohort during 2012–2015, following four previous screening cycles started in 1998. We identified 47 thyroid cancers (TC) and 33 follicular adenomas (FA) among 10,073 individuals who were <18 years at the time of the accident and had a mean I‐131 dose of 0.62 Gy. We found a significant I‐131 dose response for both TC and FA, with an excess odd ratio per Gy of 1.36 (95% CI: 0.39–4.15) and 2.03 (95% CI: 0.55–6.69), respectively. The excess risk of malignant and benign thyroid neoplasia persists nearly three decades after exposure and underscores the importance of continued follow‐up of this cohort to characterize long‐term pattern of I‐131 risk.     

Endothelial Notch1 Activity Facilitates Metastasis

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Evaluation of a new expert system for fully automated detection of the Alzheimer's dementia pattern in FDG PET

OBJECTIVE: Fluorodeoxyglucose (FDG) positron emission tomography (PET) is increasingly used to support a diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease. The aim of the present study was to evaluate a new expert system (PALZ) for the fully automated analysis of FDG PET images for diagnosis of the disease. METHODS: The PALZ tool is based on the detection of the typical disease pattern in FDG PET images. Its potential for this task was evaluated in 22 consecutive patients with suspected Alzheimer's disease who had been graded as positive for the pattern by an experienced reader (visual analysis supported by statistical parametric mapping (SPM)), and in 18 controls. Dependence on scanner performance was assessed by variation of the spatial resolution of the PET images. RESULTS: All the Alzheimer's disease subjects were classified as pattern-positive by the PALZ tool. Fifteen controls were classified as normal. Sensitivity and specificity for differentiation of the patients with suspected Alzheimer's disease from the controls were 100% and 83%, respectively. The false positive finding in three controls most likely was caused by differences in attenuation correction between the normal data base of the PALZ tool (cold transmission scan) and the local data sets (hot transmission scan). There was only mild dependence on spatial resolution. CONCLUSIONS: The results of the present study suggest that the PALZ tool provides similar performance for the detection of the typical Alzheimer's disease pattern in FDG PET images as an experienced reader supported by SPM. The PALZ tool is fully automated, easy to use, and insensitive to the spatial resolution of the PET scanner used. Therefore, it has the potential for widespread clinical use.     

IBZM tool: a fully automated expert system for the evaluation of IBZM SPECT studies

Purpose Visual reading of [¹²³I]IBZM SPECT scans depends on the experience of the interpreter. Therefore, semi-quantification of striatal IBZM uptake is commonly considered mandatory. However, semi-quantification is time consuming and prone to error, particularly if the volumes of interest (VOIs) are positioned manually. Therefore, the present paper proposes a new software tool (“IBZM tool”) for fully automated and standardised processing, evaluation and documentation of [¹²³I]IBZM SPECT scans. Methods The IBZM tool is an easy-to-use SPM toolbox. It includes automated procedures for realignment and summation of multiple frames (motion correction), stereotactic normalisation, scaling, VOI analysis of striatum-to-reference ratio R, classification of R and standardised display. In order to evaluate the tool, which was developed at the University of Hamburg, the tool was transferred to the University of Hannover. There it was applied to 27 well-documented subjects: eight patients with multi-system atrophy (MSA), 12 patients with Parkinson’s disease (PD) and seven controls. The IBZM tool was compared with manual VOI analysis. Results The sensitivity and specificity of the IBZM tool for the differentiation of the MSA subjects from the controls were 100% and 86%, respectively. The IBZM tool provided improved statistical power compared with manual VOI analysis. Conclusion The IBZM tool is an expert system for the detection of reduced striatal D₂ availability on [¹²³I]IBZM SPECT scans. The standardised documentation supports visual and semi-quantitative evaluation, and it is useful for presenting the findings to the referring physician. The IBZM tool has the potential for widespread use, since it appears to be fairly independent of the performance characteristics of the particular SPECT system used. The tool is available free of charge.     

Associations Between Neighborhood Resources and Physical Activity in Inner-City Minority Children

ObjectiveThe role of neighborhood physical activity resources on childhood physical activity level is increasingly examined in pediatric obesity research. We describe how availability of physical activity resources varies by individual and block characteristics and then examine its associations with physical activity levels of Latino and black children in East Harlem, New York City.MethodsPhysical activity resource availability by individual and block characteristics were assessed in 324 children. Availability was measured against 4 physical activity measures: average weekly hours of outdoor unscheduled physical activity, average weekly metabolic hours of scheduled physical activity, daily hours of sedentary behavior, and daily steps.ResultsPhysical activity resource availability differed by race/ethnicity, caregiver education, and income. Presence of one or more playgrounds on a child's block was positively associated with outdoor unscheduled physical activity (odds ratio [OR] = 1.95, 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.11–3.43). Presence of an after-school program on a child's block was associated with increased hours of scheduled physical activity (OR = 3.25, 95% CI 1.41–7.50) and decreased sedentary behavior (OR = 3.24, 95% CI 1.30–8.07). The more resources a child had available, the greater the level of outdoor unscheduled physical activity (P for linear trend = .026).ConclusionsNeighborhood physical activity resource availability differs by demographic factors, potentially placing certain groups at risk for low physical activity level. Availability of select physical activity resources was associated with reported physical activity levels of East Harlem children but not with objective measures of physical activity.