A multinational cohort study of trends in survival following dementia diagnosis

Background: Information on the survival of people living with dementia over time and across systems can help policymakers understand the real-world impact of dementia on health and social care systems. This multinational cohort study examines the trends in relative mortality risk following a dementia diagnosis. Methods: A common protocol was applied to population-based data from the UK, Germany, Finland, Canada (Ontario), New Zealand, South Korea, Taiwan and Hong Kong. Individuals aged 60+ with an incident dementia diagnosis recorded between 2000 and 2018 were followed until death or the end of the study period. Cox proportional hazards regression was used to assess the association of mortality in dementia patients with the year of dementia diagnosis. Results: Data from 1,272,495 individuals, with the mean age at diagnosis ranging from 76.8 years (South Korea) to 82.9 years (Germany), show that the overall median length of survival following recorded diagnosis ranges from 2.4 years (New Zealand) to 7.9 years (South Korea). Hazard ratios (HRs) estimated from Cox proportional hazard models decline consistently over the study period in the UK, Canada, South Korea, Taiwan and Hong Kong, which accounted for 84% of all participants. For example, the HR decreases from 0.97 (95% CI: 0.92–1.02) in 2001 to 0.72 (0.65–0.79) in 2016 in comparison to year 2000 in the UK. Conclusions: This study shows a steady trend of decreasing risk of mortality in five out of eight databases, which signals the potential positive effect of dementia plans and associated policies and provides reference for future policy evaluation

A multinational cohort study of trends in survival following dementia diagnosis

Background: Information on the survival of people living with dementia over time and across systems can help policymakers understand the real-world impact of dementia on health and social care systems. This multinational cohort study examines the trends in relative mortality risk following a dementia diagnosis. Methods: A common protocol was applied to population-based data from the UK, Germany, Finland, Canada (Ontario), New Zealand, South Korea, Taiwan and Hong Kong. Individuals aged 60+ with an incident dementia diagnosis recorded between 2000 and 2018 were followed until death or the end of the study period. Cox proportional hazards regression was used to assess the association of mortality in dementia patients with the year of dementia diagnosis. Results: Data from 1,272,495 individuals, with the mean age at diagnosis ranging from 76.8 years (South Korea) to 82.9 years (Germany), show that the overall median length of survival following recorded diagnosis ranges from 2.4 years (New Zealand) to 7.9 years (South Korea). Hazard ratios (HRs) estimated from Cox proportional hazard models decline consistently over the study period in the UK, Canada, South Korea, Taiwan and Hong Kong, which accounted for 84% of all participants. For example, the HR decreases from 0.97 (95% CI: 0.92–1.02) in 2001 to 0.72 (0.65–0.79) in 2016 in comparison to year 2000 in the UK. Conclusions: This study shows a steady trend of decreasing risk of mortality in five out of eight databases, which signals the potential positive effect of dementia plans and associated policies and provides reference for future policy evaluation

A flexible approach to assess fluorescence decay functions in complex energy transfer systems

Background Time-correlated Förster resonance energy transfer (FRET) probes molecular distances with greater accuracy than intensity-based calculation of FRET efficiency and provides a powerful tool to study biomolecular structure and dynamics. Moreover, time-correlated photon count measurements bear additional information on the variety of donor surroundings allowing more detailed differentiation between distinct structural geometries which are typically inaccessible to general fitting solutions. Results Here we develop a new approach based on Monte Carlo simulations of time-correlated FRET events to estimate the time-correlated single photon counts (TCSPC) histograms in complex systems. This simulation solution assesses the full statistics of time-correlated photon counts and distance distributions of fluorescently labeled biomolecules. The simulations are consistent with the theoretical predictions of the dye behavior in FRET systems with defined dye distances and measurements of randomly distributed dye solutions. We validate the simulation results using a highly heterogeneous aggregation system and explore the conditions to use this tool in complex systems. Conclusion This approach is powerful in distinguishing distance distributions in a wide variety of experimental setups, thus providing a versatile tool to accurately distinguish between different structural assemblies in highly complex systems

Will the Evolution of Information and Terrorism Affect Supply Chain Management?

In the last few decades, supply chain success has been achieved through management techniques that have aligned common goals and strategies with the connected entities in the chain. Future supply chain success will be achieved by those companies that can manage the plethora of information that is provided on e-based systems and technologies. Companies that plan for disruptions in the flow of goods and services (possibly due to terrorist activities) will move from just-in-time practices to just-in-case practices. Request a copy of the paper from the author: Christopher Roethlein ([email protected]

Magnetooptische Untersuchungen an semimagnetischen IV-VI-Halbleitern

Available from TIB Hannover: DW 3663 / FIZ - Fachinformationszzentrum Karlsruhe / TIB - Technische InformationsbibliothekSIGLEDEGerman

Components of Manufacturing Strategy within Levels of U.S. Manufacturing Supply Chains

This study built on past research that has identified manufacturing strategies from which a company derives its competitive advantages and related it to a multi-level analysis of manufacturing supply chains in the United States. Through a combination of literature review, structured interviews, and a questionnaire to a large national sample, 28 components of manufacturing strategy upon which a company uses to compete were identified. Factor analysis was used to group components into four factors that clustered logically into coherent manufacturing strategies across the five defined levels of supply chain. Significant differences in the importance of manufacturing strategy among the five levels of supply chain were found. This research provides a snapshot of the status of how present manufacturing companies view their competitive strengths and will help them understand and define strategies for their futures. Request a copy of the paper from the author: Christopher Roethlein ([email protected]

Optimal procurement decisions in the presence of total quantity discounts and alternative product recipes

We describe the purchasing decisions faced by a multi-plant company. The suppliers of this company offer complex discount schedules based on the total quantity (rather than cost) of ingredients purchased. The schedules simultaneously account both for corporate purchases and for purchases at the individual plant level. The complexity of the purchasing decisions is further increased due to the existence of alternative production recipes for each final product. We formulate the corresponding cost-minimization problem as a nonlinear mixed 0-1 programming problem. We propose various ways to linearize this formulation, and we evaluate the quality of the resulting models on real-world data. (C) 2003 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved