Novel toolkit translates neuroimaging data into audiovisual formats to aid interpretation
Simple audiovisualisation of wide field neural activity. Adapted from Thibodeaux et al., 2024, PLOS ONE, CC-BY 4.0
Complex neuroimaging data can be explored through translation into an audiovisual format – a video with accompanying musical soundtrack – to help interpret what happens in the brain when performing certain behaviours. David Thibodeaux and colleagues at Columbia University, US, present this technique in the open-access journal PLOS ONE on February 21, 2024. Examples of these beautiful “brain movies” are included below.
Recent technological advances have made it possible for multiple components of activity in the awake brain to be recorded in real time. Scientists can now observe, for instance, what happens in a mouse’s brain when it performs specific behaviours or receives a certain stimulus. However, such research produces large quantities of data that can be difficult to intuitively explore to gain insights into the biological mechanisms behind brain activity patterns.
Prior research has shown that some brain imaging data can be translated into audible representations. Building on such approaches, Thibodeaux and colleagues developed a flexible toolkit that enables translation of different types of brain imaging data – and accompanying video recordings of lab animal behaviour – into audiovisual representations.
The researchers then demonstrated the new technique in three different experimental settings, showing how audiovisual representations can be prepared with data from various brain imaging approaches, including 2D wide-field optical mapping (WFOM) and 3D swept confocally aligned planar excitation (SCAPE) microscopy.
The toolkit was applied to previously-collected WFOM data that detected both neural activity and brain blood flow changes in mice engaging in different behaviours, such as running or grooming. Neuronal data was represented by piano sounds that struck in time with spikes in brain activity, with the volume of each note indicating magnitude of activity and its pitch indicating the location in the brain where the activity occurred. Meanwhile, blood flow data were represented by violin sounds. The piano and violin sounds, played in real time, demonstrate the coupled relationship between neuronal activity and blood flow. Viewed alongside a video of the mouse, a viewer can discern which patterns of brain activity corresponded to different behaviours.
The authors note that their toolkit is not a substitute for quantitative analysis of neuroimaging data. Nonetheless, it could help scientists screen large datasets for patterns that might otherwise have gone unnoticed and are worth further analysis.
The authors add: “Listening to and seeing representations of [brain activity] data is an immersive experience that can tap into this capacity of ours to recognise and interpret patterns (consider the online security feature that asks you to “select traffic lights in this image” – a challenge beyond most computers, but trivial for our brains)…[It] is almost impossible to watch and focus on both the time-varying [brain activity] data and the behavior video at the same time, our eyes will need to flick back and forth to see things that happen together. You generally need to continually replay clips over and over to be able to figure out what happened at a particular moment. Having an auditory representation of the data makes it much simpler to see (and hear) when things happen at the exact same time.”
The funding required to initiate and sustain the National Health Insurance (NHI) project, aimed at achieving Universal Health Coverage for South Africa, has healthcare industry experts and some of the country’s leading economists raising fundamental questions about its financial viability as outlined in the NHI Bill.
“South Africa needs actionable solutions now to broaden healthcare access and improve affordability however, with the current debt to GDP ratio and many demands on the public purse, it is difficult to see how the State could afford to finance the NHI alone, as outlined in the NHI Bill,” said Craig Comrie, chairperson of the Health Funders Association (HFA).
“The existing regulatory framework could offer a more viable springboard to achieve the aims of Universal Health Coverage sooner through collaborative healthcare initiatives that improve healthcare access for all South Africans.”
He points out the substantial financial commitment demanded by the NHI, noting that an initial allocation of more than R20 billion has already been disbursed. “This allocation, which is merely the tip of the iceberg, accentuates the magnitude of the financial hurdle that lies ahead for the country and its people if the NHI Bill is enacted in its current form,” Comrie says.
“In the current economic climate marked by reduced GDP and tax collections, financing the NHI presents an impossible task for National Treasury, particularly with the exclusion of private health funding collaboration.
“We are therefore urging the Presidency to prioritise the exploration of alternative pathways towards realising Universal Health Coverage in South Africa. There is a critical, urgent need to reassess and redirect vital resources towards more pressing national priorities than the NHI’s potentially unsustainable framework.
“This is a heavy financial burden for the South African taxpayer to shoulder, particularly at this time, with cost projections ranging from R200 billion to a staggering R500 to R800 billion annually if fully implemented. This exorbitant sum, dwarfing recent and future government bailouts, presents an insurmountable challenge given our economic downturn and diminished tax revenue,” asserts Comrie.
The HFA, a professional body representing the majority of medical schemes in South Africa, proposes leveraging the existing regulatory framework to expedite Universal Health Coverage through collaborative healthcare initiatives, emphasising the urgency of exploring viable alternatives.
Comrie also addresses the limitations of tax increases as a revenue solution, emphasising the strain it not only places on families but on the broader economy.
“While NHI implementation may be decades away, we recognise that immediate action is imperative to enhance affordability and access to quality healthcare. We, therefore, must prioritise exploring sustainable solutions rooted in economic viability,” he urges.
“At this stage, realistic timelines for NHI implementation will be decades away, and in the meantime, there is much we could be doing to improve affordability and access to quality healthcare for more South Africans. A good starting place would be to finalise the Low Cost Benefit Options framework and ensure regular reviews of Prescribed Minimum Benefits [PMBs].
Highlighting the current ambiguity surrounding NHI services and the staggering cost projections, Comrie stresses the critical need for clarity from the Minister of Finance.
He emphasises that the HFA’s stance is firmly rooted in a deep commitment to quality healthcare and the implementation of sustainable solutions that can definitively grow accessibility. This mission necessitates prudent financial planning and a steadfast commitment to transparency in healthcare financing.
“With Treasury facing an impossible task to finance the NHI in its current proposed form, all alternatives must be considered. As a country, we cannot afford to gamble on a project lacking clear direction and financial viability.
“We advocate for a recalibration of priorities, urging policymakers to explore collaborative healthcare initiatives to deliver healthcare funding solutions within well-researched reforms including those indicated in the Health Market Inquiry.
“Now almost five years later, the reforms suggested by the Competition Commission have yet to be actioned. South Africans cannot wait decades for NHI implementation, and the real question is, can we afford to embark on this unproven and unrealistic model,” he asks.
“NHI is not the sole path to Universal Health Coverage, nor is it the most expedient. We must pursue reforms rooted in economic viability to safeguard healthcare assets and extend access. As the HFA continues to champion sustainable healthcare solutions, we affirm our commitment to preserve South Africa’s healthcare landscape for the benefit of all citizens,” he concludes.
Physicians argue that trying to combat dwindling numbers with increased medical school places ignores the real problem: gruelling hours and low pay
At several major South Korean hospitals, thousands of doctors walked out on Tuesday, causing widespread disruption in a protest at the government’s plan to increase the numbers of medical school students, The New York Times reports.
On Monday, over 6000 doctors had submitted resignations at Seoul’s five hospitals and left at 6am on Tuesday, the Health Department reported. One of the hospitals had up a sign saying that its emergency department was only handling cardiac arrest cases; the other four were on “red alert”.
Government sources state that 7813 doctors had walked off the job, Reuters reports.
South Korea may have one of the most advanced healthcare systems in the world, but it is plagued by a critical shortage of doctors. The protestors, interns and residents, say that this shortage is confined to certain areas such as emergency medicine, which are poorly compensated by the government and insurance providers. Cosmetic medicine on the other hand, is highly profitable.
One survey found that doctors in training regularly work shifts longer than 24 hours and many work for more than 80 hours a week. (In South Africa, a 2012 study found that interns regularly put in 150–200 hours of overtime per month, working out to 80–90 hours a week.)
Other factors such as an ageing population are putting more and more strain on doctors.
Early this month, the government announced a plan to increase South Korea’s medical school admissions quota from 3000 to 5000. The Ministry of Health and Welfare regulates the licences to practice medicine. Doctors were immediately critical of the plan, protesting with placards saying things like “end of health care.”
A new study from the Smidt Heart Institute at Cedars-Sinai shows there is a gender gap between women and men when it comes to exercise. The findings, published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology (JACC), show that women can exercise less often than men, yet receive greater cardiovascular gains.
“Women have historically and statistically lagged behind men in engaging in meaningful exercise,” said Martha Gulati, MD, director of Preventive Cardiology in the Department of Cardiology in the Smidt Heart Institute at Cedars-Sinai, the Anita Dann Friedman Chair in Women’s Cardiovascular Medicine and Research and co-lead author of the study.
“The beauty of this study is learning that women can get more out of each minute of moderate to vigorous activity than men do. It’s an incentivising notion that we hope women will take to heart.”
Investigators analysed data from 412 413 US adults utilising the National Health Interview Survey database. Participants between the time frame of 1997 to 2019 – 55% of whom were female – provided survey data on leisure-time physical activity.
Investigators examined gender-specific outcomes in relation to frequency, duration, intensity and type of physical activity.
“For all adults engaging in any regular physical activity, compared to being inactive, mortality risk was expectedly lower,” said Susan Cheng, MD, MPH, the Erika J. Glazer Chair in Women’s Cardiovascular Health and Population Science, director of the Institute for Research on Healthy Aging in the Department of Cardiology in the Smidt Heart Institute, and senior author of the study.
“Intriguingly, though, mortality risk was reduced by 24% in women and 15% in men.”
The research team then studied moderate to vigorous aerobic physical activity, such as brisk walking or cycling, and found that men reached their maximal survival benefit from doing this level of exercise for about five hours per week, whereas women achieved the same degree of survival benefit from exercising just under about 2 ½ hours per week.
Similarly, when it came to muscle-strengthening activity, such as weightlifting or core body exercises, men reached their peak benefit from doing three sessions per week and women gained the same amount of benefit from about one session per week.
Cheng said that women had even greater gains if they engaged in more than 2 ½ hours per week of moderate to vigorous aerobic activity, or in two or more sessions per week of muscle-strengthening activities.
The investigators note their findings help to translate a longstanding recognition of sex-specific physiology seen in the exercise lab to a now-expanded view of sex differences in exercise-related clinical outcomes.
With all types of exercise and variables accounted for, Gulati says there’s power in recommendations based on the study’s findings.
“Men get a maximal survival benefit when performing 300 minutes of moderate to vigorous activity per week, whereas women get the same benefit from 140 minutes per week,” Gulati said.
“Nonetheless, women continue to get further benefit for up to 300 minutes a week.”
Christine M. Albert, MD, MPH, chair of the Department of Cardiology in the Smidt Heart Institute and the Lee and Harold Kapelovitz Distinguished Chair in Cardiology, says concrete, novel studies like this don’t happen often.
“I am hopeful that this pioneering research will motivate women who are not currently engaged in regular physical activity to understand that they are in a position to gain tremendous benefit for each increment of regular exercise they are able to invest in their longer-term health,” said Albert, professor of Cardiology.
As a leader in Medical Technology innovation, InterSystems, a pioneer in healthcare data platform development, has learned, understood, and incorporated pivotal insights from its extensive experience in digital health solutions. That experience points up the need to give AI a strong foundation.
We understand the importance of leveraging AI to drive transformative change in healthcare. Our latest white paper, “Getting the Most from AI in MedTech Takes Data Know-How,” dives into the challenges and opportunities facing MedTech companies venturing into the realm of AI. From data cleanliness to privacy and security considerations, we address key issues that MedTech companies must navigate to succeed in today’s rapidly evolving healthcare landscape.
AI in MedTech Takes Data Know-How
The promise of AI in revolutionising MedTech is undeniable. AI in varying forms and degrees is forecasted to save hundreds of thousands of lives and billions of dollars a year. But here’s the catch- AI models are only as good as the data they’re built on. An AI application can sift through large amounts of data from various Electronic Health Record (EHR) environments and legacy systems and identify patterns within the scope of its model, but it can’t identify data that exists outside of those boundaries.
If one asks “What risk factors does the patient have for stroke?”, AI can only answer based on the information that’s there. Sometimes, things get lost in translation, and that’s why interoperability – the ability to exchange information in a way that ensures the sender and receiver understand data the same way is crucial.
InterSystems: Your Data Sherpa:
Ever wondered why some AI models in MedTech fall short? It’s all about the data. This means MedTech companies can’t just lean on their currently used standard but should consider all those in which relevant data is captured in the market or build on a platform that does.
With InterSystems by your side, you gain access to a treasure trove of healthcare data expertise. One of the benefits of our business is that it’s much broader than a single EHR. This means providing software solutions like The HL7® FHIR® (Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources) offering a comprehensive view of patient data, accelerating development timelines, and delivering tangible results that showcase the value of your innovations.
Clean Data Is a Must
Data cleanliness is key in the world of AI. Pulling data from various sources presents its own set of challenges, from ensuring data cleanliness to reconciling discrepancies and omissions. Raw data is often messy, inconsistent, and filled with gaps like missing labels. If the data fed into an AI model is incomplete and error-ridden, the conclusions drawn from its analysis will be similarly flawed and suspect. Thus, maintaining high standards of data quality is essential to ensure the accuracy and effectiveness of AI-driven insights.
Henry Adams, Country Manager, InterSystems South Africa, says: “InterSystems advocates for robust preprocessing, cleaning, and labelling techniques to ensure data quality and integrity. Our platform keeps track of data lineage, simplifies labelling, and aggregates health data into a single, patient-centric model ready for analysis”.
Privacy, Security, and Reliability:The Sweet Success!
Privacy and security are essential across industries, but they are even more critical for MedTech product developers. Handling sensitive patient data necessitates strict adherence to regulations like HIPAA and GDPR to safeguard patient confidentiality and comply with legal requirements. Beyond regulatory compliance, ensuring privacy and security is crucial for maintaining patient safety, preserving reputation and trust, and fostering collaboration within the industry.
To help MedTech companies comply with regulations and safeguard patient data, InterSystems’ platform meets needs across major deployments, such as a nonprofit health data network and uses techniques like redundant processing and queues built into the connective tissue of their software. Reliable connectivity solutions ensure seamless data exchange, even in the most demanding healthcare environments.
Charting the Course Forward
If you are a MedTech company still struggling to make sense of siloed healthcare data for your AI initiatives? We have the answers-collaboration with the right partner is essential for integrating AI into medical practices. An ideal partner understands the need for data acquisition, aggregation, cleaning, privacy, and security regulations. “With InterSystems as your partner and by your side, you can navigate the complexities of AI integration and drive transformative innovation in healthcare, making MedTech excellence easier to attain,” concludes Adams.
There’s a comeback of sexually transmitted infections (STIs) in South Africa and around the world. The Gauteng Department of Health recently reported an increase of newly acquired STIs, in particular gonorrhoea and chlamydia. This spike in cases call for management guidelines and awareness programmes to be reviewed, reports Ufrieda Ho.
A rise in reported cases of sexually transmitted infections in Gauteng in 2023 is a wake-up call that control and management strategies are not keeping pace with the growing disease burden in South Africa’s most populous province.
“The Gauteng information confirms the rise in STIs that we are seeing in South Africa and across the world, including in the United States and Canada,” said Dr Nomathemba Chandiwana, a director and principal scientist at Ezintsha Research Centre at Wits University. She is also a co-author of the 2022 guidelines on the management of sexually transmitted infections produced by the Southern Africa HIV Clinicians Society.
Chandiwana said any increase in STIs should raise alarms because it means “we simply don’t have control over the things we thought we had under control”.
The World Health Organization (WHO) in 2022 noted that countries reported low coverage for preventive, testing and treatment services related to STIs, because of Covid-19 lockdown restrictions. The WHO confirmed that this had led to a “resurgence of STIs and the emergence of non-classical STIs [such as Shigella sonnei, hepatitis A, Neisseria meningitidis, Zika and Ebola] globally”. It also reported that currently more than 1 million new STIs are acquired around the world each day “posing a significant global health challenge”.
Since the middle of 2023, the WHO has pushed for low-cost point of care tests to be more readily available in low and middle income countries, saying this would improve screening and diagnosis, data collection and make STI services more effective. South Africa has not made such tests accessible, still relying on a syndromic approach, which is clinical diagnosis made by assessing a patient’s symptoms and other visible signs.
New public health threats
Chandiwana said a review of STI treatment and management guidelines is necessary because the rising numbers pose significant new public health threats. Of particular concern, she said, is that having STIs pushes up a person’s risk to contract HIV, which is “a chronic and serious disease” as well as developing other long term or irreversible medical risks, including reproductive complications.
Earlier in February, the Gauteng Department of Health reported that the incidence of Male Urethritis Syndrome (MUS) in men aged 15 to 49 in the province had increased from 12% in 2020 to 15% in 2023. The department did not provide actual figures for the comparison, which is also somewhat complicated by the fact that in 2020 there were strict COVID-19 lockdowns and restrictions in place.
The department’s information from 2023 showed that 167 109 males aged 15 to 49 visited health facilities across the province from April to December. Of these patients, 67 400 (40% of the 167 109) were treated for MUS.
The diagnosis of MUS is an indicator of newly acquired STIs, in particular gonorrhoea and chlamydia, which according to the Gauteng Department of Health are the most prevalent STIs in South Africa.
Chandiwana said diagnosis of MUS in men and pelvic inflammatory disease (PID) among women, are made by assessing symptoms of pain, discomfort and genital discharge and sores. Conventionally, it’s treated with broad range antibiotics.
She explained South Africa’s guidelines to treatment and management is to make clinical decisions based on a patient’s symptoms and signs. “While this standard approach has worked, we are calling for a move to targeted diagnosis and targeted treatment. It’s because you want to know which STI someone has and to treat them for that particular disease,” said Chandiwana.
Different STIs can also result in different complications. Syphilis for instance, she said, can result in women giving birth to children who are deaf or blind or raises the risks for infertility. (Spotlight previously reported on congenital syphilis in South Africa in more depth here.)
“We also have STIs that are present but not visible, so asymptomatic STIs, including HPV (human papillomavirus), which is the leading cause of cervical cancer in black women in South Africa,” Chandiwana said.
“Of course it’s complicated in a public healthcare system where we might not have lab services everywhere, and where there may be lab testing there is a long turnaround for results,” she added.
What to do
It means a multi-pronged approach is still necessary. This she said, has to include a shift from blaming and policing people’s sexual behaviour. Her comments are in response to Gauteng MEC for health and wellness Nomantu Nkomo-Ralehoko’s remarks in the same Gauteng Department of Health press release in which the MEC drew a link between a higher number of women coming forward to be initiated on Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis (PrEP) – an antiretroviral drug prescribed for HIV-negative people to stop HIV infection – and the higher recorded number of STIs. The MEC is quoted saying: “We believe that the high uptake of PrEP among women has led this group to having unprotected sex resulting in high incidence of MUS. The studies have reported that STI incidence is also high among young women receiving PrEP.”
Chandiwana dismissed the conclusion of a causal relationship. “PrEP is a very important tool because it’s something people can take to prevent HIV. But before we had PrEP it was not like people were using condoms – people were using nothing. So I disagree, the uptake of PrEP is not directly involved with the increase of STIs,” she said.
What’s needed instead, she said, is to ask why people are not using condoms more often and why South Africa is not creating STI friendly services that include differentiated care for key populations such as sex workers, men who have sex with men, or people who inject drugs. There should also be more peer navigators, services that are quick, efficient and confidential as well as investment and development of rapid testing kits, she added.
Preliminary findings from the Sixth South African National HIV Prevalence, Incidence, and Behaviour survey released by the Human Sciences Research Council in November indicated that condom use had dropped substantially among young people from 2017 to 2022. It did prompt MEC Nkomo-Ralehoko to call for more uptake of PrEP. “We would like to encourage more males to get initiated on PrEP to protect themselves against STI. Additionally, both men and women who are on PrEP should use condoms to protect themselves against STIs, HIV and unwanted pregnancies,” she was quoted in the press release.
Role of medical male circumcision
Meanwhile, the NGO Right to Care is promoting voluntary medical male circumcision as another strategy to combat the rise in STI cases. “Uncircumcised men are more susceptible to STIs than men who are circumcised, especially STIs that cause ulcers or wounds,” said Dr Nelson Igaba, senior technical specialist for voluntary medical male circumcision at the NGO.
He described the Gauteng statistics as “worrying” and said it should be read as a prompt for more men to opt for circumcision. The NGO will connect men to their nearest public facility to have the procedure done for free. (They can be contacted at 082 808 6152.)
Dr Tendesayi Kufa-Chakezha, a senior epidemiologist at the Centre for HIV and STIs at the National Institute of Communicable Diseases (NICD), also homes in on the need for more awareness building.
“As a country we are not talking about STIs enough, among ourselves or with our children. More healthcare workers are needed and more training can be made available. We also need a massive campaign to educate communities on the causes of STI syndromes, symptoms, where to get treatment, types of treatments, complications and to go back to facilities if they don’t get better.”
Kufa-Chakezha said South Africa’s STI treatment guidelines do conform with existing WHO guidelines. She said the NICD regularly collects information and specimens from health facilities, which allows them to determine the most common causes associated with the symptoms that are most commonly seen. The NICD uses these findings to inform the country’s STI management and treatment strategies that are based on diagnosis and treatment of the most prevalent STIs.
“If as a country we are not able to get more people with or without STI symptoms screened and treated, we will continue to have people acquiring STIs, developing symptoms associated with them, becoming ill and developing complications from them,” she added.
People using anabolic steroids could be increasing their underlying risk of atrial fibrillation, according to new research published in the Journal of Physiology.
The team found that male sex hormones, such as testosterone, also called androgenic anabolic steroids (AAS), which are misused for muscle building particularly among in young men can increase the risk of atrial fibrillation in individuals genetically predisposed to heart diseases.
Dr Laura Sommerfeld, Postdoctoral Researcher at the UKE Hamburg, who completed her PhD at the Institute of Cardiovascular Sciences at the University of Birmingham focusing on this work is lead author of the study.
Dr Sommerfeld said: “Our study can significantly contribute to understanding the impact on the heart health of young men who misuse anabolic steroids to increase muscle mass. Recent reports have shown that young men in particular are being targeted on social media such as TikTok being sold testosterone products, but we have shown how the misuse of steroids carries a specific risk that many people will not be aware of.”
Professor Larissa Fabritz, Chair of Inherited Cardiac Conditions at UKE Hamburg and Honorary Chair in the Institute of Cardiovascular Sciences at the University of Birmingham added:
“Heart muscle diseases like ARVC affect young, athletic individuals and can lead to life-threatening heart rhythm disturbances. Atrial fibrillation is a common condition in the general population. Elevated testosterone levels can result in an earlier onset of these diseases.”
The scientists examined potential effects on a condition called arrhythmogenic right ventricular cardiomyopathy (ARVC), which is genetically determined and primarily attributed to disruptions in the formation of cell connections critical for heart muscle stability.
The scientists initially confirmed, based on clinical patient data from UHB and elsewhere, that ARVC occurs more frequently and severely in men than in women.
In laboratory experiments, they discovered that six weeks of AAS intake, combined with impaired cell connections, could lead to reduced sodium channel function in heart tissue and a slowing of signal conduction within the atria.
Dr Andrew Holmes, co-author and Assistant Professor in the Institute of Clinical Sciences at the University of Birmingham said:
“This work implies that young male individuals with key inherited genetic changes have a greater risk of developing electrical problems in the heart in response to anabolic steroid abuse.”
The research was conducted by an interdisciplinary consortium of clinicians and researchers led by University of Birmingham and collaborators in Germany.
It is not uncommon for people to “hit the wall” at work and experience burnout for short or long periods of time.
“We have found that approximately 13 per cent of Norwegian employees are at high risk of burnout,” says Leon De Beer, Associate Professor of Work and Organizational Psychology at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) Department of Psychology.
De Beer has contributed to a new study on burnout published in the Scandinavian Journal of Psychology with colleagues from the Healthy Workplaces research group.
They are working on a new tool that can identify people at risk of burnout.
Signs that you might be at risk of burnout
If you are facing demands and stress at work that seem to be intractable, and you have frequently experienced the following symptoms in recent weeks, it might be a sign that you are on the verge of burning out:
You feel mentally exhausted at work.
You struggle to feel enthusiastic about your job.
You have trouble concentrating when working.
You sometimes overreact at work without meaning to.
Early intervention is key
It is important to identify the early signs of burnout in order to mitigate the harmful effects. The warning signs are often present before things have gone too far, as long as we manage to identify them.
“Not addressing the risk of employee burnout in time can have long-term consequences,” says De Beer.
The physical and psychological effects of burnout include cardiovascular disease, pain related to musculoskeletal injuries, sleeping problems, and depression. Organisations can also lose talented employees and experience an increase in sickness absence and lost productivity.
A new tool may become standard
De Beer’s research group has trialled a new measurement tool to identify the early warning signs of burnout. In the past, it has not always been that easy.
“Previously, we have not had a detailed enough measurement tool for use in both the field of practice and research that identifies workers who are at risk of burnout,” says De Beer.
There is currently no international standard for assessing burnout.
The new tool is called the Burnout Assessment Tool, or BAT among researchers who have a penchant for amusing abbreviations. The BAT consortium, of which the researchers are a part, is now testing the instrument in more than 30 countries.
“Our studies show that BAT is a good tool for identifying the risk of burnout,” says De Beer.
Burnout is the body’s response to stress
BAT measures four main groups of risk factors: exhaustion, mental distancing, cognitive impairment and emotional impairment.
Burnout is not really an illness, but a feeling of being mentally or physically exhausted — the body’s response to a lasting, demanding situation.
Burnout is normally defined as a work-related syndrome, but there is evidence that work-life balance also plays a role. Stress and burnout don’t necessarily stop when you go home at the end of the day, as these effects often extend into other areas of life and vice versa.
Some may experience years of burnout
For some people, burnout can be stopped in its tracks and solutions found to improve their situation. For others, however, burnout can last for years if the problem isn’t addressed.
“We can deal with burnout through individual treatment, but it is of little use if people return to a workplace where the demands are too high and there are few resources. It is then highly likely that the employee will become ill again. Therefore, it is important to create good working conditions and structures that safeguard the health of employees,” says Professor Marit Christensen at NTNU’s Department of Psychology.
Culturally independent
The researchers studied a representative sample of 500 Norwegian workers. Norway is roughly on par with the EU average when it comes to mental health, but somewhat better when it comes to work-related matters.
A lower percentage of the Norwegian population struggles with exhaustion in connection with work. Somewhat fewer people than the EU average report health hazards at work, and we experience a better work-life balance.
“Using a recognised method, we found that around 13 per cent of the 500 surveyed workers were at high risk of burnout,” says Professor Christensen.
The tool can help identify who requires the most urgent follow up so that the risk of burnout can be reduced.
We do not yet know whether the prevalence of burnout in Norway is high in an international context. The Norwegian study is among several BAT studies that are currently taking place, so these answers will be available at a later date.
The tool is intended to be culturally independent, and it certainly works well in Norway. The researchers also found that the tool works regardless of gender.
“For entertainment and educational purposes, interested parties can use our online tool to test if they are at risk of burnout,” says Professor Christensen.
“Please note that the tool only gives an indication of risk and does not provide any type of formal diagnosis or medical advice. If you are concerned about your levels of work-related stress, we encourage you to visit a health care provider to discuss the matter,” says Professor Christensen.
Scientists have demonstrated the first successful use of a neural prosthetic device to recall specific memories. The findings appear online in Frontiers in Computational Neuroscience.
This groundbreaking research was derived from a 2018 study led by Robert Hampson, PhD, professor of regenerative medicine, translational neuroscience and neurology at Wake Forest University School of Medicine. That study demonstrated the successful implementation of a prosthetic system that uses a person’s own memory patterns to facilitate the brain’s ability to encode and recall memory, improving recall by as much as 37%.
In the previous study, the team’s electronic prosthetic system was based on a multi-input multi-output (MIMO) nonlinear mathematical model, and the researchers influenced the firing patterns of multiple neurons in the hippocampus, a part of the brain involved in making new memories.
In this study, researchers from Wake Forest and University of Southern California (USC) built a new model of processes that assists the hippocampus in helping people remember specific information.
When the brain tries to store or recall information such as, “I turned off the stove” or “Where did I put my car keys?” groups of cells work together in neural ensembles that activate so that the information is stored or recalled.
Using recordings of the activity of these brain cells, the researchers created a memory decoding model (MDM) which let them decode what neural activity is used to store different pieces of specific information.
The neural activity decoded by the MDM was then used to create a pattern, or code, which was used to apply neurostimulation to the hippocampus when the brain was trying to store that information.
“Here, we not only highlight an innovative technique for neurostimulation to enhance memory, but we also demonstrate that stimulating memory isn’t just limited to a general approach but can also be applied to specific information that is critical to a person,” said Brent Roeder, Ph.D., a research fellow in the department of translational neuroscience at Wake Forest University School of Medicine and the study’s corresponding author.
The team enrolled 14 adults with epilepsy who were participating in a diagnostic brain-mapping procedure that used surgically implanted electrodes placed in various parts of the brain to pinpoint the origin of their seizures.
Participants underwent all surgical procedures, post-operative monitoring and neurocognitive testing at one of the three sites participating in this study including Atrium Health Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center, Keck Hospital of USC in Los Angeles and Rancho Los Amigo National Rehabilitation Center in Downey, California.
The team delivered MDM electrical stimulation during visual recognition memory tasks to see if the stimulation could help people remember images better.
They found that when they used this electrical stimulation, there were significant changes in how well people remembered things. In about 22% of cases, there was a noticeable difference in performance.
When they looked specifically at participants with impaired memory function, who were given the stimulation on both sides of their brain, almost 40% of them showed significant changes in memory performance.
“Our goal is to create an intervention that can restore memory function that’s lost because of Alzheimer’s disease, stroke or head injury,” Roeder said.
“We found the most pronounced change occurred in people who had impaired memory.”
Roeder said he hopes the technology can be refined to help people live independently by helping them recall critical information such as whether medication has been taken or whether a door is locked.
“While much more research is needed, we know that MDM-based stimulation has the potential to be used to significantly modify memory,” Roeder said.
In the human body, a protein carrier called SPNS2 transports S1P molecules from endothelial cells to rally immune cell response in infected organs and tissues, resulting in inflammation. By enlarging the entire SPNS2 structure using nanoparticles, the S1P molecules contained within can be viewed via cryogenic electron microscopy. Using this information, small molecules can be developed to inhibit this signalling pathway and treat inflammatory diseases.
Scientists at the National University of Singapore and colleagues in China have analysed the structure of the SPNS2 protein at an atomic level that could provide greater insights into how S1P signalling molecules are released to communicate with the immune cells to regulate inflammatory responses. Their findings are published in Cell Research.
“Seeing is believing. This work shows that SPNS2 is directly exporting S1P for signalling and it is possible to inhibit its transport function with small molecules. This work provides the foundation for understanding of how S1P is released by SPNS2 and how this protein function is inhibited by small molecules for treatment of inflammatory diseases,” said team leader Dr Nguyen Nam Long.
The SPNS2 protein allows the binding of the S1P signalling molecules to trigger the immune cells to leave the lymph nodes and induce inflammation in different parts of the body when needed.
Made up of amino acids, the SPNS2 protein is malleable enough to change its shape and structure to release the S1P signalling molecules through small cavities found within the protein.
Through the discovery of how the SPNS2 protein releases S1P molecules, the SPNS2 structure can be exploited for future drug development.
Similar to discovering how the shape of the lock looks like before the key can be designed, this finding sheds more light into how future drugs can be designed to better target the protein to increase drug efficacy.
This finding builds on previous research which found that deleting SPNS2 protein from a pre-clinical model effectively blocks the S1P signalling pathway so that the S1P signalling molecules are unable to be transported to prompt immune cells to leave the lymph node to induce inflammation.
Both SPNS2 protein and S1P signalling molecule are required for immune cell recruitment to inflammatory organs, which goes towards treating various inflammatory diseases.
“Using pre-clinical models, we have shown that targeting SPNS2 proteins in the body blocks inflammatory responses in disease conditions, such as multiple sclerosis. This work has provided us a possibility to inhibit its transport function with small molecules that will go a long way to treating inflammatory diseases more efficiently and effectively,” said Dr Nguyen.
