The aim of this study was to identify anatomical and clinical factors associated with limb-based patency (LBP) loss, major adverse limb events (MALEs), and poor amputation-free survival (AFS) after an infrapopliteal arterial bypass (IAB) surgery according to the Global Limb Anatomic Staging System. A retrospective analysis of patients undergoing IAB surgery between January 2010 and December 2021 at a single institution was performed. Two-year AFS, freedom from LBP loss, and freedom from MALEs were assessed using the Kaplan-Meier method. Anatomical and clinical predictors were assessed using multivariate analysis. The total number of risk factors was used to calculate risk scores for subsequent categorization into low-, moderate-, and high-risk groups. IABs were performed on 103 patients. The rates of two-year freedom from LBP loss, freedom from MALEs, and AFS were 71.3%, 76.1%, and 77.0%, respectively. The multivariate analysis showed that poor run-off beyond the ankle and a bypass vein caliber of < 3 mm were significantly associated with LBP loss and MALEs. Moreover, end-stage renal disease, non-ambulatory status, and a body mass index of < 18.5 were significantly associated with poor AFS. The rates of freedom from LBP loss and MALEs and the AFS rate were significantly lower in the high-risk group than in the other two groups (12-month low-risk rates: 92.2%, 94.8%, and 94.4%, respectively; 12-month moderate-risk rates: 58.6%, 84.6%, and 78.3%, respectively; 12-month high-risk rates: 11.1%, 17.6%, and 56.2%, respectively; p < 0.001, p < 0.001, and p < 0.001, respectively). IAB is associated with poor clinical outcomes in terms of LBP, MALEs, and AFS in high-risk patients. Risk stratification based on these predictors is useful for long-term prognosis.

In sumo wrestling, a traditional sport in Japan, many wrestlers suffer from injuries through bouts. In 2019, an average of 5.2 out of 42 wrestlers in the top division of professional sumo wrestling were absent in each grand sumo tournament due to injury. As the number of injury occurrences increases, professional sumo wrestling becomes less interesting for sumo fans, requiring systems to prevent future occurrences. Statistical injury prediction is a useful way to communicate the risk of injuries for wrestlers and their coaches. However, the existing statistical methods of injury prediction are not always accurate because they do not consider the long-term effects of injuries. Here, we propose a statistical model of injury occurrences for sumo wrestlers. The proposed model provides the estimated probability of the next potential injury occurrence for a wrestler. In addition, it can support making a risk-based injury prevention scenario for wrestlers. While a previous study modeled injury occurrences by using the Poisson process, we model it by using the Hawkes process to consider the long-term effect of injuries. The proposed model can also be applied to injury prediction for athletes of other sports.

Deep neck abscess is a severe infection encountered in otolaryngology practice, that can be associated with serious complications, such as descending mediastinitis, internal carotid thrombosis, and necrotizing fasciitis; development of pseudoaneurysms has also been reported as a rare complication. Herein, we report successful treatment of a patient with a pseudoaneurysm of the internal carotid artery that developed from an abscess in the carotid artery space, with a review of the literature.

BACKGROUND:The demand for endovascular revascularization (ER) to treat peripheral artery disease (PAD) has steadily increased. However, ER comes at the cost of increased contrast and radiation exposure, particularly in more complex cases. Fusion imaging is a new technology that may address these issues. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the efficacy of fusion imaging in ER of the superficial femoral artery (SFA). METHODS:Patients with PAD undergoing ER of the SFA from February 2016 to July 2020 were retrospectively evaluated. A group of patients treated using fusion imaging was compared with a control group treated without fusion imaging. The primary end points were the contrast dose, fluoroscopy time, radiation dose, and operative time. RESULTS:A total of 51 patients (fusion group, n = 26; control group, n = 25) underwent ER during the study period. Significantly lower iodinated contrast doses were observed in the fusion than in the control group (56.1 ± 23.7 vs. 87.9 ± 44.9 mL; P = 0.003), as well as significantly shorter fluoroscopy times (21.2 ± 11.1 vs. 44.9 ± 31.4 min; P = 0.001), lower radiation exposure (29.9 ± 8.9 vs. 122.2 ± 223.1 mGy; P = 0.04), and shorter operative times (88.3 ± 32.1 vs. 126.1 ± 66.8 min; P = 0.013). CONCLUSIONS:The use of fusion imaging technology during ER of the SFA can significantly reduce the contrast dose, fluoroscopy time, radiation dose, and operative time.

An n-variate Farlie-Gumbel-Morgenstern (FGM) copula consists of 2(n) - n - 1 parameters that express multivariate dependence among random variables. Motivated by the dependence structure of the n-variate FGM copula, we derive the exact range of the n-variate FGM copula's parameter. The exact range of the parameter is given by a closed-form expression under the condition that all parameters take the same value. Moreover, under the same condition, we reveal that the n-variate FGM copula becomes the independence copula for n -> infinity. This result contributes to the dependence modeling such as reliability analysis considering dependent failure occurrence.

Objective: The Global Vascular Guidelines (GVG) propose a novel Global Anatomic Staging System (GLASS) with the Wound, Ischemia, and foot Infection (WIfI) classification system as a clinical decision-making tool for interventions in chronic limb-threatening ischemia (CLTI). We assessed the validity of clinical staging and the relationship between the treatments recommended by the GVG and the outcomes of the actual procedures. Methods: This retrospective, single-center, observational study included 117 patients with CLTI undergoing infrainguinal revascularization in our hospital between 2015 and 2019. Of those patients, 55 underwent open bypass (OB) and 62 underwent endovascular revascularization (EVR). Femoropopliteal, infrapopliteal, and inframalleolar GLASS grades were assigned based on angiographic images. These grades were combined to determine the revascularization strategy recommended by the GVG: "endovascular," "indeterminate," and "open bypass." The indeterminate category includes three subcategories: GLASS stage III, WIfI stage 2; GLASS stage II, WIfI stage 3; and GLASS stage II, WIfI stage 4. For the purposes of this study, we labeled these subcategories A, B, and C, respectively. The primary outcome was the correlation between the revascularization strategies recommended by the GVG and the actual procedures performed. The relationships between the actual procedures and overall survival, limb salvage, and patency were also examined. Results: The femoropopliteal and infrapopliteal GLASS grades were higher in the OB group. EVR was performed more often for GLASS stages I and II and was more often classified as indeterminate B and C, whereas OB was performed more often in GLASS stage III and was more often classified as indeterminate A. There were no statistically significant differences in the inframalleolar/pedal disease descriptor or in the 30-day postoperative complication rates between the two groups. In higher GLASS stages, the technical success rate of EVR was lower, and lesion complexity was more severe. Patients for whom the recommended strategy according to the GVG would have been OB but who underwent EVR were associated with low limb salvage and patency rates. Conclusions: The GVG provide good guidance for the selection of the revascularization strategy. When the GVG indicate OB, it should be the treatment of choice, rather than EVR, for patients who are fit to undergo the procedure.

This paper focuses on the parameter estimation for the d-variate Farlie–Gumbel–Morgenstern (FGM) copula ( $$d\ge 2$$ ), which has $$2^d-d-1$$ dependence parameters to be estimated; therefore, maximum likelihood estimation is not practical for a large d from the viewpoint of computational complexity. Besides, the restriction for the FGM copula’s parameters becomes increasingly complex as d becomes large, which makes parameter estimation difficult. We propose an effective estimation algorithm for the d-variate FGM copula by using the method of inference functions for margins under the restriction of the parameters. We then discuss its asymptotic normality as well as its performance determined through simulation studies. The proposed method is also applied to real data analysis of bearing reliability.

Many reliability models of systems with dependent components have been developed in order to assess the reliability of such systems. In particular, a copula that can build various multivariate distributions is used to model the dependence. However, most of the copulas such as Archimedean copulas consist of only one parameter expressing the dependence. Hence, the reliability model based on the copulas cannot flexibly design the dependence among multi-component. In this study, we propose a new reliability model that can represent coherent systems with n dependent components with flexibility based on factor copulas. More specifically, the proposed model of an n-component system has at least n parameters for expressing the dependence. Simple examples illustrate the use of the model. This study contributes to reliability analysis under dependent failure occurrence.

This paper deals with the minimum and maximum value distributions based on the n-variate FGM copula with one dependence parameter. The ranges of dependence parameters are theoretically determined so that the probability density function always takes a non-negative value. However, the closed-form conditions of the ranges for the dependence parameters have not been known in the literature. In this paper, we newly provide the necessary conditions of the ranges of the dependence parameters for the minimum and maximum value distributions which are derived from FGM copula, and show the asymptotic properties of the ranges.

Large-batch stochastic gradient descent (SGD) is widely used for training in distributed deep learning because of its training-time efficiency, however, extremely large-batch SGD leads to poor generalization and easily converges to sharp minima, which prevents naive large-scale data-parallel SGD (DP-SGD) from converging to good minima. To overcome this difficulty, we propose gradient noise convolution (GNC), which effectively smooths sharper minima of the loss function. For DP-SGD, GNC utilizes so-called gradient noise, which is induced by stochastic gradient variation and convolved to the loss function as a smoothing effect. GNC computation can be performed by simply computing the stochastic gradient on each parallel worker and merging them, and is therefore extremely easy to implement. Due to convolving with the gradient noise, which tends to spread along a sharper direction of the loss function, GNC can effectively smooth sharp minima and achieve better generalization, whereas isotropic random noise cannot. We empirically show this effect by comparing GNC with isotropic random noise, and show that it achieves state-of-the-art generalization performance for large-scale deep neural network optimization.

The system used to analyze the process of the formation of latent image specks (LISs) in silver-salt photographic materials due to radiation exposure to obtain the dispersion index, which is the number of LISs in a silver halide grain formed by one impact of high-energy particle, was improved. By using the electron beam from a transmission electron microscope, electrons of uniform energy could be produced for irradiation purposes. The number of electrons impacting a single silver halide grain along with the energy of each electron was controlled by varying the current density and the applied voltage. A new analysis method which included the probability that LIS may not be formed despite an impact of high-energy particle was proposed. The number of LISs was counted by the arrested development method. The probability and the dispersion index were estimated at approximately 0.5 and 1, respectively, for an unsensitized emulsion with cubic grains. This method will be useful in the design of new nuclear emulsion plates.

Differentiated thyroid carcinoma is an uncommon malignancy of childhood and adolescence that is unique because it has an overall favorable prognosis despite its relatively high rate of nodal and distant metastases. Total thyroidectomy and positive 131I therapy are recommended for cases with pulmonary metastases. In contrast, anaplastic thyroid cancer is one of the most aggressive malignancies that have an unfavorable and miserable prognosis. We report a case with an impressively long history. The patient had multiple pulmonary metastases that had been diagnosed by 131I administration when he was 14 years old, about 45 years before he underwent thyroidectomy. He had been kept unaware of his disease by his family and received no treatment for most of his life. Pulmonary nodules were noted at several medical checkups and showed a remarkable decrease in size during the untreated 44-year period after the 131I administration. At age 58, his thyroid cancer was first detected and total thyroidectomy was performed, with subsequent radioiodine therapy for pulmonary metastases. Unfortunately, anaplastic carcinoma developed and he died of disseminated tumors later.

Background: Spinocerebellar-degeneration (SCD) has been reported to show a variety of abnormal neurootological findings on electronystagmography (ENG) rather in a late stage of disease developing process, but not in an earlier stage. Purpose: We have analysed ENG findings derived from 79 patients confirmed with SCD, in order to assess a diagnostic value of ENG and determine which manifestations are helpful in diagnosing SCD. Results: We observed a high incidence of saccadic pursuit, severely impaired optokinetic nystagmus, and impaired visual suppression; observations that likely to be useful in diagnosing SCD. For each abnormal finding, we compared the data among patients with different types of SCD (olivopontocerebellar cortical atrophy, late cerebellar cortical atrophy, Shy-Drager syndrome, and hereditary SCD). We also studied the relationship between MRI findings and ocular abnormalities in these patients with SCD. In typical cases, the abnormal neuro-otological findings are effective in an earlier diagnosis of SCD. Conclusion: In our present study, neuro-otological examinations are demonstrated to be useful for evaluating patients with SCD.

Reliability Modeling with Computer and Maintenance Applications, pp. 155-173 (2017) No AccessChapter 8: Some Reliability Properties of n-Component Parallel/Series Systems with Interdependent FailuresMitsuhiro Kimura, Shuhei Ota, and Shogo AbeMitsuhiro KimuraDepartment of Industrial & Systems Engineering, Hosei University, Japan, Shuhei OtaGraduate School of Hosei University, Japan, and Shogo AbeDepartment of Industrial & Systems Engineering, Hosei University, Japanhttps://doi.org/10.1142/9789813224506_0008Cited by:1 PreviousNext AboutSectionsPDF/EPUB ToolsAdd to favoritesDownload CitationsTrack CitationsRecommend to Library ShareShare onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditEmail Abstract: The following sections are included: Introduction Notation Sklar's Theorem Eyraud–Farlie–Gumbel–Morgenstern Copula Dependence Parameters Reliability Assessment of n-Component Systems Under Dependent Failure-Occurrence Environment Parallel System with Interdependent Failures Series System with Interdependent Failures Numerical Illustrations Basic Behavior of EFGM Copula with Exponential Marginals Relationship with Rank Correlation Indices Parallel System with Interdependent Failures Series System with Interdependent Failures Conclusion Acknowledgments References FiguresReferencesRelatedDetailsCited By 1On Necessary Conditions for Dependence Parameters of Minimum and Maximum Value Distributions Based on n-Variate FGM CopulaShuhei OTA and Mitsuhiro KIMURA1 Mar 2019 | IEICE Transactions on Fundamentals of Electronics, Communications and Computer Sciences, Vol. E102.A, No. 3 Reliability Modeling with Computer and Maintenance ApplicationsMetrics History PDF download