Castle Peak Hospital

Visibility can be interpreted as the largest distance of an object that can be recognized or detected under a bright environment that can be used as an environmental indicator for weather conditions and air pollution. The accuracy of the classical approach of visibility calculation, in which meteorological laws and image feature extraction from digital images are used, depends on the quality and noise disturbances of the image. Therefore, artificial intelligence (AI) and digital image approaches have been proposed for visibility estimation in the past. Image features for the whole digital image are generated by pre-trained convolutional neural networks, and the Artificial Neural Network (ANN) is designed for correlation between image features and visibilities. Instead of using the information of the whole digital images, past research has been proposed to identify effective subregions from which image features are generated. A generalized regression neural network (GRNN) was designed to correlate the image features with the visibilities. Past research results showed that this method is more accurate than the classical approach of using handcrafted features. However, the selection of effective subregions of digital images is not fully automated and is based on manual selection by expert judgments. In this paper, we proposed an automatic effective subregion selection method using landmark object extraction techniques. Image features are generated from these LMO subregions, and the ANN is designed to approximate the mapping between LMO regions’ feature values and visibility values. The experimental results show that this approach can minimize the reductant information for ANN training and improve the accuracy of visibility estimation as compared to the single image approach.

BackgroundScreening with low-dose computed tomography (LDCT) has been proven to potentially reduce the rate of mortality of lung cancer. Lack of real-world data outside of protocolized trials has been cited as an impediment to its more widespread implementation, especially in Asia. This report aims to provide such real-world data.MethodsA single round of LDCT was provided through a community-based charity program in Hong Kong, China to asymptomatic adults with a family history of lung cancer and/or smoking history. Anonymized data from this program were analyzed.ResultsLDCT was performed for 99 participants, including 98 (99%) who had one or more family members with history of lung cancer, and 70 (71%) who were never-smokers. After a single round of screening, a positive LDCT was noted in 47 participants (47%). A sister with a history of lung cancer (28% vs. 8%, P=0.01) and a multiplex family (MF) (47% vs. 23%, P=0.02) were factors associated with a positive LDCT. After a median period of 10 months (range, 5–16 months) following LDCT, lung cancer (all adenocarcinoma) was diagnosed as a direct consequence of positive LDCT findings in six participants (6%), of whom four had stage I disease and five received surgery with curative intent. In the 47 participants with a positive LDCT, having a sister with a history of lung cancer was associated with an increased risk of lung cancer (relative risk =5.23; 95% confidence interval: 1.09–25.21). Detected lesions categorized as Lung Imaging Reporting and Data System (Lung-RADS) 3 or above (odds ratio =12.08; 95% confidence interval: 1.27–114.64) or deemed by an experienced specialist to be suspicious (odds ratio =63.33; 95% confidence interval: 5.48–732.29) were significantly more likely to turn out to be a lung cancer.ConclusionsThis real-world data demonstrates that a single round of LDCT screening at a community level in East Asia can detect potentially curable lung cancer at a rate comparable to those reported by protocolized trials. When considering future LDCT screening programs in East Asia, a family history of lung cancer may be a key factor indicating a person for screening, and how features of a LDCT-detected lesion should trigger further intervention warrant further definition.

IntroductionSpinal deformities, including kyphoscoliosis, have been consistently documented in cetaceans. However, the majority of reported cases of kyphoscoliosis in cetaceans pertain to bottlenose dolphins, with limited information on its occurrence in narrow‐ridged finless porpoise (NFP) (Neophocaena asiaeorientalis).Materials and methodsIn November 2021, two deceased NFPs were discovered stranded on the shores of the Republic of Korea. As part of the pioneer stranded cetacean imaging programme in the Republic of Korea, both carcasses underwent post‐mortem computed tomography (PMCT), revealing congenital and degenerative traumatic kyphoscoliosis, respectively.ResultsAlthough kyphoscoliosis may not have directly caused the demise of these individuals, it is hypothesized that the reduced spinal range of motion and mobility associated with kyphoscoliosis may have contributed to their deaths.ConclusionThis case report presents the first documented cases of kyphoscoliosis in two NFPs stranded in Korean waters, utilizing PMCT as an efficient methodology for assessing skeletal abnormalities in cetaceans.

To compare predictive validity of the Wilson Sims Fall Risk Assessment Tool (WSFRAT) with that of the Morse Fall Scale (MFS) in psychogeriatric inpatients. Psychogeriatric patients from Shatin Hospital, Tai Po Hospital, Castle Peak Hospital, and United Christian Hospital who had fall incident between April 2019 and April 2020 were identified. Their fall risks were assessed by the WSFRAT and the MFS, and their falls incidents during hospitalisation were recorded. Patients were classified as having high fall risk when their MFS score was ≥45 and when their WSFRAT score was ≥7. Sensitivity, specificity, and positive and negative predictive values of the two scales were calculated. We identified 183 (90 male and 93 female) psychogeriatric patients aged ≥65 years who had fall incident and were assessed by both the WSFRAT and the MFS during the study period. Among the 183 patients, four sustained a fall during hospital stay, giving a prevalence of 2.19%. All four patients were classified as having high risk of fall by WSFRAT, but only two of them were classified so by MFS. The sensitivity of WSFRAT was 100%, which was higher than the 50% by MFS, but specificity of MFS was higher than that of WSFRAT (45.81% vs 54.75%). WSFRAT is a better fall risk assessment scale for psychiatric inpatients than MFS, because of higher sensitivity (100% vs 50%). It has items specific to psychiatric patients and should replace MFS in psychiatric settings.

Abstract: Thoracic surgery without the use of modern general anesthesia and endotracheal intubation has a surprisingly long history in Asia. Over a half century ago, thoracic operations via thoracotomy were performed in China using acupuncture for pain suppression in awake patients. Today, East Asia continues to pioneer major thoracic operations using non-intubated techniques. A number of centers in Asia have now emerged as leaders in the development of the technique, production of clinical data, and training for the use of non-intubated thoracic surgery. Wider adoption of the non-intubated strategy across Asia is still relatively limited by the quality and evidence of the evidence thus far. However, encouraging developments in shaping and improving clinical research for non-intubated thoracic surgery in Asia suggest that this part of the world will continue to hold a central role in the future of the technique.

ABSTRACT Introduction Effort-reward imbalance (ERI) is a typical psychosocial stress. Schizotypal traits are attenuated features of schizophrenia in the general population. According to the diathesis-stress model, schizotypal traits and psychosocial stress contribute to the onset of schizophrenia. However, few studies examined the effects of these factors on brain alterations. This study aimed to examine relationships between ERI, schizotypal traits and brain structures and functions. Methods We recruited 37 (13 male, 24 female) participants with high levels of schizotypal traits and 36 (12 male, 24 female) participants with low levels of schizotypal traits by the Schizotypal Personality Questionnaire (SPQ). The Chinese school version of the effort-reward imbalance questionnaire (C-ERI-S) was used to measure ERI. We conducted the voxel-based morphometry (VBM) and whole brain resting-state functional connectivity (rsFC) analysis using reward or stress-related regions as seeds. Results Participants with high levels of schizotypal traits were more likely to perceive ERI. The severity of ERI was correlated with grey matter volume (GMV) reduction of the left pallidum and altered rsFC among the prefrontal, striatum and cerebellum in participants with high levels of schizotypal traits. Conclusion ERI is associated with GMV reduction and altered rsFC in individuals with high levels of schizotypal traits.

Prospective memory (PM) refers to the ability to remember to carry out a delayed intention in the future. Evidence suggests that emotionally salient cues can enhance PM functions in healthy population, but whether the benefit exists in schizophrenia and bipolar patients remains unclear. This study aimed to examine and compare the potential enhancement effect of emotional PM cues in schizophrenia patients and bipolar patients. Twenty-eight clinically stable schizophrenia participants, 26 euthymic bipolar participants and 29 controls completed a computerized PM task involving PM cues with different types of valences (i.e., positive, neutral and negative). All the three groups showed better PM performance when negative PM cues were presented compared with positive and neutral PM cues. The sizes of the enhancement effects of negative PM cues were large (all Cohen's d ≥ 1.00) and comparable across three groups. Our findings suggested that patients with schizophrenia and bipolar disorders could benefit from negative PM cues to an extent similar to healthy individuals, thus extended the notion of psychosis continuum to the important area of emotion-cognition interaction.

Temporal proximity is an important clue for multisensory integration. Previous evidence indicates that individuals with autism and schizophrenia are more likely to integrate multisensory inputs over a longer temporal binding window (TBW). However, whether such deficits in audiovisual temporal integration extend to subclinical populations with high schizotypal and autistic traits are unclear. Using audiovisual simultaneity judgment (SJ) tasks for nonspeech and speech stimuli, our results suggested that the width of the audiovisual TBW was not significantly correlated with self-reported schizotypal and autistic traits in a group of young adults. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) resting-state activity was also acquired to explore the neural correlates underlying inter-individual variability of TBW width. Across the entire sample, stronger resting-state functional connectivity (rsFC) between the left superior temporal cortex and the left precuneus, and weaker rsFC between the left cerebellum and the right dorsal lateral prefrontal cortex were correlated with a narrower TBW for speech stimuli. Meanwhile, stronger rsFC between the left anterior superior temporal gyrus and the right inferior temporal gyrus was correlated with a wider audiovisual TBW for non-speech stimuli. The TBW-related rsFC was not affected by levels of subclinical traits. In conclusion, this study indicates that audiovisual temporal processing may not be affected by autistic and schizotypal traits and rsFC between brain regions responding to multisensory information and timing may account for the inter-individual difference in TBW width. LAY SUMMARY: Individuals with ASD and schizophrenia are more likely to perceive asynchronous auditory and visual events as occurring simultaneously even if they are well separated in time. We investigated whether similar difficulties in audiovisual temporal processing were present in subclinical populations with high autistic and schizotypal traits. We found that the ability to detect audiovisual asynchrony was not affected by different levels of autistic and schizotypal traits. We also found that connectivity of some brain regions engaging in multisensory and timing tasks might explain an individual's tendency to bind multisensory information within a wide or narrow time window. Autism Res 2021, 14: 668-680. © 2020 International Society for Autism Research and Wiley Periodicals LLC.