Rhythmic Auditory Music Stimulation increases task-distraction during exercise among cardiac rehabilitation patients: A secondary analysis of a randomized controlled trial

ObjectiveThe aim of this study was to determine the mechanisms by which Rhythmic Auditory Music Stimulation (RAMS) improves exercise among patients participating in cardiac rehabilitation.Methods168 English speaking patients over the age of 18 years, were recruited from the Cardiac Rehabilitation and Prevention Program. Participants were randomly assigned to one of three groups (n = 56 each) as part of a 12-week intervention: (1) RAMS (2) preference-based audiobooks, or (3) white noise or silence audio-controls. All participants received an iPod with the audio intervention to maintain blinding. Study outcomes included pace-deviation between actual vs. prescribed exercise, self-reported arousal, perceived exertion, task-attentiveness during exercise and perceptual experiences associated with the audio-content itself.Trial registryClinicaltrials. gov NCT02946060.ResultsAn individual's actual exercise pace was highly correlated with their prescribed exercise pace, with no significant differences in pace deviation across interventions (P = 0.61). Patients randomized to RAMS or audiobooks reported significantly lower arousal scores during exercise (P = 0.01), lower exercise-attentiveness (P < 0.001), and modestly lower perceived exertion (P = 0.06) during exercise than did controls. Participants assigned to RAMS and audiobooks reported being more attentive to, and happy with, their overall audio-experiences during exercise than controls (P < 0.001).ConclusionsRAMS playlists and audiobooks induced a mood-enhancing task-distraction effect during exercise. Such findings may underscore the potential benefits of preference-based audio-content during exercise.     

基于模式分类的中医医案分析技术

中医药经历数千年的发展,已积累了大量数据,特别是从古到今的医案数据,但这些数据因没有用现代信息手段整理、分析,而不能为中医药的科学研究提供支持。本文将模式分类技术应用于医案数据的分析中,从已知的病症推断出所属的证型。该方法能够进行自动学习,不需要专家的辅助即可从医案中学习到病症和证型的联系。     

Global Diversification in Medicine Regulation: Insights from Regenerative Stem Cell Medicine

ABSTRACT

Medicine regulation worldwide has undergone a process of regulatory diversification. The evidence-based medicine (EBM) paradigm, centered on multi-phase randomized controlled trials, is increasingly contested and replaced by new models of clinical validation. To explain these changes, STS research has cited just a few factors, e.g. growing pressure form health consumers; the role of pharmaceutical companies to lobby for fast, affordable drug development; the influence of neoliberal ideas and libertarian advocacy of deregulation; and the agency of national governments to enable domestic innovation opportunities in the context of global competition and inequalities. Those factors individually cannot account for the increasing variation in medicine regulation at both national and global levels. Instead it is helpful to integrate elements of existing explanations into a framework with four pairs of conflicting regulatory choices, which play a central role in the formation of medicine regulation. We use this framework to compare regulatory changes in the USA, European Union, China, India, Argentina, and Japan. Across these jurisdictions, the case studies illustrate four dynamics of diversification. Key regulatory concepts such as evidence, risk, safety, efficacy, responsibility and accountability acquire different meanings, reshaping medicine innovation in far-reaching and often contradictory ways. The boundaries between medical research and healthcare provision, commerce and humanitarian service, as well as state control and medical self-regulation are re-defined.     

Islamic practice and state policies towards religion in post-Soviet Russia

ABSTRACT

What has the Russian state policy towards Islam been in the first two decades after the Soviet collapse, and how has it affected Islamic practice in the country? This study explores Russian state policies towards religion from 1990 to 2017 and discusses their impact on Islamic practice in the country. In the 1990s, relations between the Russian state and Islam (state-Islam relations) were accommodationist: the state granted unrestricted access in the Russian public sphere for all Muslim communities and allowed a wide range of Islamic religious practices. State-Islam relations in the 2000s became increasingly regulatory: the state assumed a more active interventionist role in the affairs of the domestic Islamic community in order to control religious practices of certain Muslim factions and to ensure privileged access in the Russian public sphere for state-approved ‘traditional’ religious organisations. This contribution reveals the dynamics of the Russian state’s attitudes towards the largest minority religion in the country in the first two decades after the collapse of the Soviet state. It also offers analytical insights on the dynamic nature of state-religion relations in other secular states with religiously diverse populations.     

Surface electromyography-based biofeedback and knee rehabilitation: A review of the literature

The number of total knee arthroplasties (TKA) performed yearly is rapidly increasing. Additionally, upwards of 50% of patients who receive TKA never achieve a full functional recovery. This suggests considerable room for improvement. This need for improvement expands beyond TKA as similar effects are noted across knee injuries. Electromyography-based biofeedback (EMGBF) involves the delivery of feedback based on the activity of targeted muscle. By providing feedback contingent on changes in muscle amplitude, EMGBF may be an effective tool for strengthening quadricep muscles. This review aims to evaluate the utility of sEMGBF during physical therapy for various knee injuries. All studies were evaluated for the effectiveness of sEMGBF at improving muscle strength, range of motion, and reducing pain. Most studies reviewed found that including sEMGBF in physical therapy produced greater clinical benefits for patients than exercise alone. Further research is necessary to determine the best practice for including EMGBF in physical therapy.     

Alter-Standardizing Clinical Trials: The Gold Standard in the Crossfire

ABSTRACT

The international landscape of medical research is in the midst of a process of diversification and change. The randomized controlled trial (RCT), long considered the global gold standard for clinical research, has become increasingly contested and is partly replaced by alternative methodologies, standards and forms of evidence. The contours of mainstream medical research are changing as a result. Regulatory paradigms and standards are, literally, being rewritten, at a global level. The evidence-based medicine (EBM) hierarchy of evidence is redefined. This special issue explores these developments through the concept of ‘alter-standardization’. The term refers to the processes, controversies and negotiations through which multiphase RCTs and the EBM system are challenged and gradually superseded by alternative methodological and regulatory forms and standards. This special issue examines the conceptual, practical and theoretical implications of these changes, and the ways in which these transformations influence the situation and possibilities of patients, knowledge producers, physicians, large pharmaceutical corporations, smaller biotech companies, as well as regulatory bodies, civil societal organizations and national health care systems. The articles in this special issue make use of comparative and historical perspectives that focus on scientific, social, economic and regulatory developments in the European Union, China, India, Japan, Argentina, the UK and the USA. They show that the alter-standardizing of clinical trials arises in a pluralistic way, that is driven by a variety of often conflicting factors, developments and expectations. These changes reflect a broad transformation in the culture and politics of biomedicine today, with implications for the ways in which new medicinal products, devices, procedures and technologies are developed, approved for clinical use, sold to consumers, and licensed by health care systems.