| 1. |
- Burisch, Johan, et al.
(author)
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Costs and resource utilization for diagnosis and treatment during the initial year in a European inflammatory bowel disease inception cohort : an ECCO-EpiCom Study
- 2015
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In: Inflammatory Bowel Diseases. - 1078-0998 .- 1536-4844. ; 21:1, s. 121-131
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- BACKGROUND: No direct comparison of health care cost in patients with inflammatory bowel disease across the European continent exists. The aim of this study was to assess the costs of investigations and treatment for diagnostics and during the first year after diagnosis in Europe.METHODS: The EpiCom cohort is a prospective population-based inception cohort of unselected inflammatory bowel disease patients from 31 Western and Eastern European centers. Patients were followed every third month from diagnosis, and clinical data regarding treatment and investigations were collected. Costs were calculated in euros (&OV0556;) using the Danish Health Costs Register.RESULTS: One thousand three hundred sixty-seven patients were followed, 710 with ulcerative colitis, 509 with Crohn's disease, and 148 with inflammatory bowel disease unclassified. Total expenditure for the cohort was &OV0556;5,408,174 (investigations: &OV0556;2,042,990 [38%], surgery: &OV0556;1,427,648 [26%], biologicals: &OV0556;781,089 [14%], and standard treatment: &OV0556;1,156,520 [22%)]). Mean crude expenditure per patient in Western Europe (Eastern Europe) with Crohn's disease: investigations &OV0556;1803 (&OV0556;2160) (P = 0.44), surgery &OV0556;11,489 (&OV0556;13,973) (P = 0.14), standard treatment &OV0556;1027 (&OV0556;824) (P = 0.51), and biologicals &OV0556;7376 (&OV0556;8307) (P = 0.31). Mean crude expenditure per patient in Western Europe (Eastern Europe) with ulcerative colitis: investigations &OV0556;1189 (&OV0556;1518) (P < 0.01), surgery &OV0556;18,414 (&OV0556;12,395) (P = 0.18), standard treatment &OV0556;896 (&OV0556;798) (P < 0.05), and biologicals &OV0556;5681 (&OV0556;72) (P = 0.51).CONCLUSIONS: In this population-based unselected cohort, costs during the first year of disease were mainly incurred by investigative procedures and surgeries. However, biologicals accounted for >15% of costs. Long-term follow-up of the cohort is needed to assess the cost-effectiveness of biological agents.
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| 2. |
- Burisch, Johan, et al.
(author)
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Initial Disease Course and Treatment in an Inflammatory Bowel Disease Inception Cohort in Europe : The ECCO-EpiCom Cohort
- 2014
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In: Inflammatory Bowel Diseases. - : Lippincott Williams & Wilkins. - 1078-0998 .- 1536-4844. ; 20:1, s. 36-46
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Background:The EpiCom cohort is a prospective, population-based, inception cohort of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) patients from 31 European centers covering a background population of 10.1 million. The aim of this study was to assess the 1-year outcome in the EpiCom cohort.Methods:Patients were followed-up every third month during the first 12 (3) months, and clinical data, demographics, disease activity, medical therapy, surgery, cancers, and deaths were collected and entered in a Web-based database (www.epicom-ecco.eu).Results:In total, 1367 patients were included in the 1-year follow-up. In western Europe, 65 Crohn's disease (CD) (16%), 20 ulcerative colitis (UC) (4%), and 4 IBD unclassified (4%) patients underwent surgery, and in eastern Europe, 12 CD (12%) and 2 UC (1%) patients underwent surgery. Eighty-one CD (20%), 80 UC (14%), and 13 (9%) IBD unclassified patients were hospitalized in western Europe compared with 17 CD (16%) and 12 UC (8%) patients in eastern Europe. The cumulative probability of receiving immunomodulators was 57% for CD in western (median time to treatment 2 months) and 44% (1 month) in eastern Europe, and 21% (5 months) and 5% (6 months) for biological therapy, respectively. For UC patients, the cumulative probability was 22% (4 months) and 15% (3 months) for immunomodulators and 6% (3 months) and 1% (12 months) for biological therapy, respectively in the western and eastern Europe.Discussion:In this cohort, immunological therapy was initiated within the first months of disease. Surgery and hospitalization rates did not differ between patients from eastern and western Europe, although more western European patients received biological agents and were comparable to previous population-based inception cohorts.
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| 3. |
- Junninen, Heikki, et al.
(author)
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Terpene emissions from boreal wetlands can initiate stronger atmospheric new particle formation than boreal forests
- 2022
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In: Communications Earth and Environment. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 2662-4435. ; 3:1
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Aerosols and their interaction with clouds constitute the largest uncertainty in estimating the radiative forcing affecting the climate system. Secondary aerosol formation is responsible for a large fraction of the cloud condensation nuclei in the global atmosphere. Wetlands are important to the budgets of methane and carbon dioxide, but the potential role of wetlands in aerosol formation has not been investigated. Here we use direct atmospheric sampling at the Siikaneva wetland in Finland to investigate the emission of methane and volatile organic compounds, and subsequently formed atmospheric clusters and aerosols. We find that terpenes initiate stronger atmospheric new particle formation than is typically observed over boreal forests and that, in addition to large emissions of methane which cause a warming effect, wetlands also have a cooling effect through emissions of these terpenes. We suggest that new wetlands produced by melting permafrost need to be taken into consideration as sources of secondary aerosol particles when estimating the role of increasing wetland extent in future climate change.
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| 4. |
- Kulmala, Markku, et al.
(author)
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Direct Observations of Atmospheric Aerosol Nucleation
- 2013
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In: Science. - : American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). - 0036-8075 .- 1095-9203. ; 339:6122, s. 943-946
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Atmospheric nucleation is the dominant source of aerosol particles in the global atmosphere and an important player in aerosol climatic effects. The key steps of this process occur in the sub-2-nanometer (nm) size range, in which direct size-segregated observations have not been possible until very recently. Here, we present detailed observations of atmospheric nanoparticles and clusters down to 1-nm mobility diameter. We identified three separate size regimes below 2-nm diameter that build up a physically, chemically, and dynamically consistent framework on atmospheric nucleation-more specifically, aerosol formation via neutral pathways. Our findings emphasize the important role of organic compounds in atmospheric aerosol formation, subsequent aerosol growth, radiative forcing and associated feedbacks between biogenic emissions, clouds, and climate.
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| 5. |
- Laitinen, Antti, et al.
(author)
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A graphene resonator as an ultrasound detector for generalized Love waves in a polymer film with two level states
- 2019
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In: Journal of Physics D: Applied Physics. - : IOP Publishing. - 1361-6463 .- 0022-3727. ; 52:24
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- We have investigated surface shear waves at 22 MHz in a 0.5 micron thick polymer film on a SiO2/Si substrate at low temperatures using suspended and non-suspended graphene as detectors. By tracking ultrasound modes detected by oscillations of a trilayer graphene membrane both in vacuum and in helium superfluid, we assign the resonances to surface shear modes, generalized Love waves, in the resist/silicon-substrate system loaded with gold. The propagation velocity of these shear modes displays a logarithmic temperature dependence below 1 K, which is characteristic for modification of the elastic properties of a disordered solid owing to a large density of two level state systems. For the dissipation of the shear mode, we find a striking logarithmic temperature dependence, which indicates a basic relation between the speed of the surface wave propagation and the mode dissipation.
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| 6. |
- Salek, Pawel, et al.
(author)
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Linear-scaling implementation of molecular electronic self-consistent field theory
- 2007
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In: Journal of Chemical Physics. - : AIP Publishing. - 0021-9606 .- 1089-7690. ; 126:11, s. 85-98
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- A linear-scaling implementation of Hartree-Fock and Kohn-Sham self-consistent field (SCF) theories is presented and illustrated with applications to molecules consisting of more than 1000 atoms. The diagonalization bottleneck of traditional SCF methods is avoided by carrying out a minimization of the Roothaan-Hall (RH) energy function and solving the Newton equations using the preconditioned conjugate-gradient (PCG) method. For rapid PCG convergence, the Lowdin orthogonal atomic orbital basis is used. The resulting linear-scaling trust-region Roothaan-Hall (LS-TRRH) method works by the introduction of a level-shift parameter in the RH Newton equations. A great advantage of the LS-TRRH method is that the optimal level shift can be determined at no extra cost, ensuring fast and robust convergence of both the SCF iterations and the level-shifted Newton equations. For density averaging, the authors use the trust-region density-subspace minimization (TRDSM) method, which, unlike the traditional direct inversion in the iterative subspace (DIIS) scheme, is firmly based on the principle of energy minimization. When combined with a linear-scaling evaluation of the Fock/Kohn-Sham matrix (including a boxed fitting of the electron density), LS-TRRH and TRDSM methods constitute the linear-scaling trust-region SCF (LS-TRSCF) method. The LS-TRSCF method compares favorably with the traditional SCF/DIIS scheme, converging smoothly and reliably in cases where the latter method fails. In one case where the LS-TRSCF method converges smoothly to a minimum, the SCF/DIIS method converges to a saddle point.
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| 7. |
- Sundqvist, Jesper, 1987-, et al.
(author)
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Laser surface hardening of 11% Cr ferritic stainless steel and its sensitisation behaviour
- 2018
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In: Surface & Coatings Technology. - : Elsevier. - 0257-8972 .- 1879-3347. ; 344, s. 673-679
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- 11% Cr ferritic stainless steel conforming to EN 1.4003 standard was surface hardened by a continuous-wave fibre laser beam. Both single-pass and multi-pass laser hardening was investigated. Different laser parameters were compared and their influence on hardness, microstructure, geometry of the hardened zone and sensitisation was investigated, especially for overlapping passes. The experiments showed that a surface hardness which is double that of the base material hardness was obtainable via martensitic phase transformation and high cooling rate, in spite of the low carbon and nitrogen content. This behaviour could be predicted from the chemical composition using the Kaltenhauser Ferrite Factor. Hardening at higher power levels gives more coarse-grained lath martensite but does not increase the hardness. Sensitisation was not a problem in single-pass hardening. However, the production of overlapping tracks could be detrimental to corrosion resistance in 11% Cr steel due to the formation of chromium carbides and nitrides.
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