Six month incidence of major adverse cardiovascular events among adults with HIV in northern Tanzania: a prospective observational study

OBJECTIVES

We aimed to prospectively describe incident cardiovascular events among people living with HIV (PLWH) in northern Tanzania. Secondary aims of this study were to understand non-communicable disease care-seeking behaviour and patient preferences for cardiovascular care and education.

DESIGN

A prospective observational study.

SETTING

This study was conducted at the Majengo HIV Care and Treatment Clinic, an outpatient government-funded clinic in Moshi, Tanzania PARTICIPANTS: Adult patients presenting to an HIV clinic for routine care in northern Tanzania were enrolled from 1 September 2020 to 1 March 2021.

INTERVENTIONS

At enrolment, participants completed a survey and a resting 12-lead ECG was obtained. At 6 month follow-up, a repeat survey regarding interim health events and repeat ECG was obtained.

PRIMARY AND SECONDARY OUTCOME MEASURES

Interim major adverse cardiovascular events (MACE) were defined by: self-reported interim stroke, self-reported hospitalisation for heart failure, self-reported interim myocardial infarction, interim myocardial infarction by ECG criteria (new pathologic Q waves in two contiguous leads) or death due to cardiovascular disease (CVD).

RESULTS

Of 500 enrolled participants, 477 (95.4%) completed 6 month follow-up and 3 (0.6%) died. Over the 6 month follow-up period, 11 MACE occurred (3 strokes, 6 myocardial infarctions, 1 heart failure hospitalisation and 1 cardiovascular death), resulting in an incidence rate of 4.58 MACE per 100 person-years. Of participants completing 6 month follow-up, 31 (6.5%) reported a new non-communicable disease diagnosis, including 23 (4.8%) with a new hypertension diagnosis.

CONCLUSIONS

The incidence of MACE among PLWH in Tanzania is high. These findings are an important preliminary step in understanding the landscape of CVD among PLWH in Tanzania and highlight the need for interventions to reduce cardiovascular risk in this population.

Neighborhood Socioeconomic Disadvantage, Healthcare Access, and Outcomes of Hospitalizations for Common Pulmonary Conditions: A National Study of Medicare Beneficiaries

Rationale: Understanding how systemic forces and environmental exposures impact patient outcomes is critical to advancing health equity and improving population health for patients with pulmonary disease. This relationship has not yet been assessed at the population level nationally. Objectives: To determine whether neighborhood socioeconomic deprivation is independently associated with 30-day mortality and readmission for hospitalized patients with pulmonary conditions, after controlling for demographics, access to healthcare resources, and characteristics of admitting healthcare facilities. Methods: This was a retrospective, population-level cohort study of 100% of United States nationwide Medicare inpatient and outpatient claims from 2016-2019. Patients were admitted for one of four pulmonary conditions (pulmonary infections, chronic lower respiratory disease, pulmonary embolism, and pleural and interstitial lung diseases), defined by diagnosis-related group. The primary exposure was neighborhood socioeconomic deprivation, measured by the area deprivation index. The main outcomes were 30-day mortality and 30-day unplanned readmission, defined by Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services methodologies. Generalized estimating equations were used to estimate logistic regression models for the primary outcomes, addressing clustering by hospital. A sequential adjustment strategy was first adjusted for age, legal sex, Medicare-Medicaid dual eligibility, and comorbidity burden, then adjusted for metrics of access to healthcare resources, and finally adjusted for characteristics of the admitting healthcare facility. Results: After full adjustment, patients from low socioeconomic status neighborhoods had greater 30-day mortality after admission for pulmonary embolism (odds ratio [OR], 1.26; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.13-1.40), respiratory infections (OR, 1.20; 95% CI, 1.16-1.25), chronic lower respiratory disease (OR, 1.31; 95% CI, 1.22-1.41), and interstitial lung disease (OR, 1.15; 95% CI, 1.04-1.27) when compared to patients from the highest SES neighborhoods. Low neighborhood socioeconomic status was also associated with 30-day readmission for all groups except the interstitial lung disease group. Conclusions: Neighborhood socioeconomic deprivation may be a key factor driving poor health outcomes for patients with pulmonary diseases.

Neighborhood socioeconomic deprivation, healthcare access, and 30-day mortality and readmission after sepsis or critical illness: findings from a nationwide study

BACKGROUND

To determine if neighborhood socioeconomic deprivation independently predicts 30-day mortality and readmission for patients with sepsis or critical illness after adjusting for individual poverty, demographics, comorbidity burden, access to healthcare, and characteristics of treating healthcare facilities.

METHODS

We performed a nationwide study of United States Medicare beneficiaries from 2017 to 2019. We identified hospitalized patients with severe sepsis and patients requiring prolonged mechanical ventilation, tracheostomy, or extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) through Diagnosis Related Groups (DRGs). We estimated the association between neighborhood socioeconomic deprivation, measured by the Area Deprivation Index (ADI), and 30-day mortality and unplanned readmission using logistic regression models with restricted cubic splines. We sequentially adjusted for demographics, individual poverty, and medical comorbidities, access to healthcare services; and characteristics of treating healthcare facilities.

RESULTS

A total of 1,526,405 admissions were included in the mortality analysis and 1,354,548 were included in the readmission analysis. After full adjustment, 30-day mortality for patients was higher for those from most-deprived neighborhoods (ADI 100) compared to least deprived neighborhoods (ADI 1) for patients with severe sepsis (OR 1.35 95% [CI 1.29-1.42]) or with prolonged mechanical ventilation with or without sepsis (OR 1.42 [95% CI 1.31, 1.54]). This association was linear and dose dependent. However, neighborhood socioeconomic deprivation was not associated with 30-day unplanned readmission for patients with severe sepsis and was inversely associated with readmission for patients requiring prolonged mechanical ventilation with or without sepsis.

CONCLUSIONS

A strong association between neighborhood socioeconomic deprivation and 30-day mortality for critically ill patients is not explained by differences in individual poverty, demographics, measured baseline medical risk, access to healthcare resources, or characteristics of treating hospitals.

Spider prey-wrapping silk is an α-helical coiled-coil/β-sheet hybrid nanofiber

Solid-State NMR results on 13C-Ala/Ser and 13C-Val enriched Argiope argentata prey-wrapping silk show that native, freshly spun aciniform silk nanofibers are dominated by α-helical (∼50% total) and random-coil (∼35% total) secondary structures, with minor β-sheet nanocrystalline domains (∼15% total). This is the most in-depth study to date characterizing the protein structural conformation of the toughest natural biopolymer: aciniform prey-wrapping silks.

Aromatic amine acetyltransferase as a marker for colorectal cancer: environmental and demographic associations

In this pilot, case-controlled investigation of 43 colorectal and 41 control male patients, we compared associations of colorectal cancer with the aromatic amine acetyltransferase polymorphism, nutritional and demographic characteristics, medical histories, industrial and occupational histories, and exposures from home environments and personal habits. Persons with the "fast" acetylator trait were at greater risk of colorectal cancer (odds ratio: 2.48; 95% confidence interval: 1.02, 6.03). Results that differed from previous reports were positive associations of colorectal cancer with agricultural and manufacturing industries and with consumption of meats prepared by smoking, curing, and barbecueing. As expected, exercise frequency, cruciferous vegetables, and dietary fiber served as protective factors.