<p style="text-align: justify;"><span class="a_GcMg font-feature-liga-off font-feature-clig-off font-feature-calt-off text-decoration-none text-strikethrough-none">Dysautonomia, reflecting autonomic nervous system dysfunction, is frequently observed in patients with syncope, particularly those with orthostatic hypotension. </span><em><span class="a_GcMg font-feature-liga-off font-feature-clig-off font-feature-calt-off text-decoration-none text-strikethrough-none">Thymus serpyllum </span></em><span class="a_GcMg font-feature-liga-off font-feature-clig-off font-feature-calt-off text-decoration-none text-strikethrough-none">L. (wild thyme) has demonstrated antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, and cardiometabolic properties in preclinical studies. This study aimed to evaluate the effects of </span><em><span class="a_GcMg font-feature-liga-off font-feature-clig-off font-feature-calt-off text-decoration-none text-strikethrough-none">T. serpyllum </span></em><span class="a_GcMg font-feature-liga-off font-feature-clig-off font-feature-calt-off text-decoration-none text-strikethrough-none">essential oil on autonomic function and selected biochemical markers in patients with syncope. This prospective, single-center study included 15 patients with a history of syncope who received a capsule formulation of </span><em><span class="a_GcMg font-feature-liga-off font-feature-clig-off font-feature-calt-off text-decoration-none text-strikethrough-none">T. serpyllum</span></em><span class="a_GcMg font-feature-liga-off font-feature-clig-off font-feature-calt-off text-decoration-none text-strikethrough-none"><em> </em>essential oil for three months. Autonomic function was assessed using beat-to-beat heart rate and blood pressure variability analysis, 24-hour Holter ECG monitoring, and ambulatory blood pressure monitoring. Biochemical parameters were evaluated at baseline and after treatment. After three months, the beat-to-beat analysis showed increased LFnu values and a higher LF/HF ratio, along with decreased HF values, indicating a shift toward sympathetic predominance. No significant changes were observed in 24-hour heart rate or blood pressure parameters. Biochemical analyses revealed significant reductions in AST and C-reactive protein levels after treatment. In this pilot study, three-month supplementation with </span><em><span class="a_GcMg font-feature-liga-off font-feature-clig-off font-feature-calt-off text-decoration-none text-strikethrough-none">T. serpyllum </span></em><span class="a_GcMg font-feature-liga-off font-feature-clig-off font-feature-calt-off text-decoration-none text-strikethrough-none">essential oil was associated with changes in autonomic balance and favorable reductions in selected inflammatory and biochemical markers in patients with syncope. Further and larger placebo-controlled studies are required to confirm these findings and clarify their clinical significance.</span></p>

<p style="text-align: justify;"><span class="a_GcMg font-feature-liga-off font-feature-clig-off font-feature-calt-off text-decoration-none text-strikethrough-none">The COVID-19 pandemic has led to the development of several types of vaccines, among which messenger RNA (mRNA)-based vaccines have represented a significant breakthrough. This study aimed to evaluate attitudes towards COVID-19 and seasonal influenza vaccination among the general population and individuals with a medical background. A questionnaire was developed to collect sociodemographic data, personal health information, vaccination status, and information on participants&rsquo; attitudes towards and knowledge of vaccines. The profile of the typical participant was an employed woman with tertiary education, living with another person in an urban area and reporting generally good health. The typical participant had received at least two doses of the Sputnik V vaccine. Participants generally expressed favourable attitudes towards regular COVID-19 vaccination. The results showed no apparent differences between participants with and without a medical background regarding vaccine choice, the decision to receive a third dose, or seasonal influenza vaccination. Similarly, no apparent differences were observed in attitudes towards the AstraZeneca vaccine or mandatory COVID-19 vaccination between respondents with and without a medical background.</span></p>

<p style="text-align: justify;"><span class="a_GcMg font-feature-liga-off font-feature-clig-off font-feature-calt-off text-decoration-none text-strikethrough-none">Halogenated boroxine is an important enzyme inhibitor with potential applications in cancer therapy. This study aimed to evaluate its effects on hematological parameters in rats</span><span class="a_GcMg font-feature-liga-off font-feature-clig-off font-feature-calt-off text-decoration-none text-strikethrough-none"> <em>in vivo</em></span><span class="a_GcMg font-feature-liga-off font-feature-clig-off font-feature-calt-off text-decoration-none text-strikethrough-none"><em> </em>and creatine kinase activity </span><em><span class="a_GcMg font-feature-liga-off font-feature-clig-off font-feature-calt-off text-decoration-none text-strikethrough-none">in vitro</span></em><span class="a_GcMg font-feature-liga-off font-feature-clig-off font-feature-calt-off text-decoration-none text-strikethrough-none">. Halogenated boroxine, administered either intraperitoneally (IP) or orally, induced route-dependent changes in hematological parameters compared with controls. IP administration significantly increased neutrophils, mean corpuscular hemoglobin (MCH), and mean corpuscular hemoglobin concentration (MCHC), while decreasing hematocrit (HCT). In contrast, oral administration significantly decreased lymphocytes and increased basophils, while other hematological parameters remained unchanged. These effects were more pronounced following IP administration. </span><em><span class="a_GcMg font-feature-liga-off font-feature-clig-off font-feature-calt-off text-decoration-none text-strikethrough-none">In vitro</span></em><span class="a_GcMg font-feature-liga-off font-feature-clig-off font-feature-calt-off text-decoration-none text-strikethrough-none">, halogenated boroxine exhibited competitive inhibition of creatine kinase without pre-incubation, whereas after a 30-minute pre-incubation, the inhibition pattern indicated a non-competitive mechanism. Further analysis showed a time-dependent shift in creatine kinase inhibition mechanism following pre-incubation, characterized by a decrease in maximum reaction velocity (V</span><span class="a_GcMg font-feature-liga-off font-feature-clig-off font-feature-calt-off text-decoration-none text-strikethrough-none font-size-modifier vertical-align">max</span><span class="a_GcMg font-feature-liga-off font-feature-clig-off font-feature-calt-off text-decoration-none text-strikethrough-none">), while the Michaelis constant (K</span><span class="a_GcMg font-feature-liga-off font-feature-clig-off font-feature-calt-off text-decoration-none text-strikethrough-none font-size-modifier vertical-align">m</span><span class="a_GcMg font-feature-liga-off font-feature-clig-off font-feature-calt-off text-decoration-none text-strikethrough-none">) remained unaltered. These findings show that halogenated boroxine modulates specific hematological parameters and inhibits creatine kinase activity, with effects depending on the route of administration and experimental conditions.</span></p>

Background/aim: Hemodialysis patients face a high burden of cardiovascular diseases, which account for over 40% of mortality in this population. In these patients, approximately two-thirds of cardiovascular deaths are due to arrhythmia. The aim of this study was to determine whether the ultrafiltration rate is associated with morphological and functional parameters of the left heart and arrhythmias. Methods: This work was a cross-sectional observational clinical study, with 75 hemodialysis patients. Patients were divided into two groups based on ultrafiltration rate (UFR): higher-UFR group, ultrafiltration rate ≥ 10 mL/kg/h (n = 37); lower-UFR group, ultrafiltration rate < 10 mL/kg/h (n = 38). All patients were analyzed for myocardial morphological and functional parameters and arrhythmias. Results: Statistically significant higher values were observed for the left atrium diameter (LAD) (47.56 ± 4.82 vs. 44.75 ± 2.33 mm, p = 0.0019), the left atrial volume index (LAVI) (43.28 ± 7.13 vs. 36.43 ± 8.52 mL/m2, p = 0.0003), and the left ventricular mass index (LVMI) (138.47 ± 29.32 vs. 116.04 ± 31.64 g/m2, p = 0.0021) in the higher-UFR group. UFR was associated with LAD (OR: 3.6000, 95% CI: 1.3780–9.4053, p = 0.0089), LAVI (OR: 4.1067, 95% CI: 1.5478–10.8956, p = 0.0045), and LVMI (OR: 4.7619, 95% CI: 1.6825–13.4774, p = 0.0033). The frequency of ventricular and supraventricular arrhythmias was similar between the analyzed patient groups. Conclusions: Higher UFR was associated with structural changes in the left heart (LAVI, LAD, and LVMI), but not with other echocardiographic parameters or arrhythmias in hemodialysis patients.

KV cache memory and bandwidth costs grow with context length and batch size, which limits efficient long-context inference. To address this bottleneck, we introduce WUSH-KV for low-bit KV-cache quantization. It adapts WUSH, which constructs a data-aware transform from the second-order statistics of both factors in a matrix product to reduce quantization error. WUSH-KV uses calibration data to construct separate key and value transforms, with the value transform folded into the model weights and the key transform applied after RoPE. The transforms can be paired with clipped quantizers. For one such quantizer, QuEST INT, we show that, under mild assumptions, the WUSH transform is near-optimal. With this quantizer, WUSH-KV reduces layerwise reconstruction error and achieves the lowest end-to-end perplexity among other tested transforms. For end-to-end evaluation, we integrate WUSH-KV into SGLang using OSCAR-style percentile-clipped affine quantization. At 2-bit, WUSH-KV performs comparably to or outperforms the OSCAR transform across all evaluated models and downstream tasks.

The present study investigated whether script type (Latin vs. Cyrillic) differentially influences the temporal characteristics of handwriting in children with dyslexia, chronological age-matched controls (CA), and spelling-level matched controls (SL). Four tasks varying in cognitive and linguistic demands were administered: name and surname writing, an alphabet task, a dictation task including real words, pseudowords, and nonwords, and a text composition task. Temporal handwriting measures were obtained using Eye and Pen software. Writing in Cyrillic generally required longer total task duration than writing in Latin. Across groups, total task duration was longer in Cyrillic during the name and surname, alphabet, real word, and composition tasks. Significant Group × Script interactions for total task duration were observed only in the pseudoword and nonword tasks, indicating that the CA and SL groups required more time to write in Cyrillic than in Latin, whereas no significant script-related difference was observed in the children with dyslexia. A significant Group × Script interaction for pen speed was observed only in the pseudoword task, where children with dyslexia wrote faster in Cyrillic than in Latin. In the composition task, Cyrillic was associated with longer writing duration, longer pause duration, and a greater percentage of pause time across groups, whereas a significant Group × Script interaction was observed only for between-word pauses. The findings suggest that script-specific visual-orthographic characteristics contribute to handwriting performance, while differences between children with dyslexia and typically developing peers emerge for selected handwriting measures under specific task demands.

The demographic development of Bosnia and Herzegovina is a highly relevant topic in academic, political and public discourse, particularly amid ongoing depopulation trends that align with broader demographic challenges in Central, Eastern and South-eastern Europe. Negative natural population change and pronounced demographic ageing stem from post-war transitions and socio-economic conditions. While geographical, economic and social factors shape regional demographic disparities, spatial heterogeneity remains insufficiently researched. This paper analyzes local demographic trends through selected indicators and applies clustering methods to identify distinct demographic groups among municipalities and cities. The findings contribute to a better understanding of regional demographic patterns and provide a framework for comparative studies in broader European contexts.

Adipokines play an important role in immunometabolic regulation and systemic inflammation, processes profoundly disturbed in COVID-19. Leptin and adiponectin have attracted particular interest because of their opposing biological effects. However, most studies have relied on single time-point measurements, and data on serial adipokine dynamics in critically ill patients with COVID-19-associated acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) remain limited. This study aimed to evaluate circulating leptin and adiponectin concentrations and their temporal changes during the first week of intensive care unit (ICU) treatment. This single-center prospective observational study included 75 adults with COVID-19-associated ARDS admitted to the medical ICU (MICU). Serum leptin and adiponectin concentrations were measured on day 1 and day 7 using enzyme-linked immunosorbent assays. Clinical data, including respiratory support, vasopressor use, comorbidities, and 28-day survival, were prospectively collected. The overall 28-day mortality was 38.7%. Leptin concentrations did not significantly change between day 1 and day 7 in any subgroup. In contrast, adiponectin demonstrated significant temporal changes. Among non-survivors, adiponectin levels decreased markedly during the first week of MICU treatment (p<0.001), whereas no significant change was observed in survivors. Similar declines were observed in patients requiring invasive mechanical ventilation and vasopressor therapy, while patients managed without these interventions showed increasing adiponectin concentrations. The leptin-to-adiponectin ratio showed a trend toward higher values in non-survivors but did not reach statistical significance. In COVID-19-associated ARDS patients, adiponectin demonstrated dynamic changes associated with clinical deterioration, whereas leptin remained relatively stable. These findings suggest that serial adiponectin measurements may have potential for monitoring short-term disease progression in critically ill patients and warrant confirmation in larger prospective studies.

PURPOSE/BACKGROUND Tumors with microsatellite instability high/mismatch repair-deficient (MSI-H/dMMR) exhibit distinct biological features and are associated with Lynch syndrome. Current approaches for detecting MSI-H/dMMR status rely on immunohistochemistry or molecular assays. Recent advances in digital pathology have enabled the extraction of clinically relevant molecular tumor features from routine hematoxylin and eosin (H&E)-stained diagnostic slides. Image-based deep learning approaches have the potential to screen for MSI-H/dMMR at scale in tumor types such as localized prostate cancer, in which MSI-H/dMMR is so rare that traditional testing is not routinely performed. EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN We developed and validated PathStage-MSI, a multi-stage transfer learning framework to predict MSI-H/dMMR status from H&E-stained slides. The model was trained and validated on 984 standard-of-care whole slide images (n = 906 patients) from three international clinical prostate cancer cohorts with matched H&E images and genomic data. To assess model generalizability and stability, we additionally evaluated PathStage-MSI in an independent metastatic prostate cancer cohort comprising 85 WSIs from 29 patients. RESULTS PathStage-MSI achieved the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUROC) of 0.89 [0.79 - 0.96] and 0.91 [0.81 - 0.98] in two internal hold-out validation cohorts, 0.75 [0.57 - 0.88] and 0.81 [0.66 - 0.94] in two independent external validation cohorts. CONCLUSIONS PathStage-MSI is a deep learning-based image analysis framework for detecting MSI-H/dMMR prostate cancer directly from routine histopathology. By enabling efficient pre-screening for this rare molecular subtype, it has the potential to improve patient identification for precision therapies and appropriate germline genetic testing.

Achieving sustainability while considering various sociological and technological factors represents a challenging task. Through this research, it is necessary to determine the feasibility of electrifying the vehicle fleet of a local utility company and its intention to place primary emphasis on the use of clean technologies and the achievement of greater technological sustainability. The aim of the research is to identify the most suitable electric vehicle for the collection and transport of non-hazardous municipal waste by applying a multi-criteria model, as support for the transition to carbon-neutral transport. The main methodological contribution of the paper is the development of a new STENOZA (STEvic NOvarlic ZAvadskas) method for the evaluation and ranking of potential solutions. The evaluation and selection of the electric vehicle were carried out using three MCDM (Multi-Criteria Decision-Making) methods: MEREC (MEthod Based on the Removal Effects of Criteria), FUCOM (FUll COnsistency Method), and STENOZA. The objective-subjective MEREC-FUCOM model was applied to determine the weights of nine influential criteria, while STENOZA was used to evaluate and rank the electric vehicles. The results indicate that EV2 is the best option, regardless of any changes in conditions, as confirmed by verification tests and additional analyses conducted in this paper.

The influence of the impact model on the dynamic behavior of a vibro-impact system with non-ideal excitation is analyzed in this paper. The system consists of a crank-slider mechanism and an oscillator, and its mathematical model is derived using Lagrange’s equations of motion. Three soft impact models (Spring-Damper, Hertz, and Brake) and one hard impact model (Newton) are considered. The system response is analyzed numerically using frequency response diagrams, phase portraits, displacement-time histories, and basins of attraction. Three response regions are identified for all four models: non-impact, impact, and multiple solution regions. The multiple solution region corresponds to excitation-parameter values for which the system response depends on the initial conditions. For all models, the non-impact regime occurs for , while the impact regime occurs for . The largest differences between the models occur in the multiple solution region. Its upper boundary is  for the Newton model,  for the Spring-Damper model, and  for the Hertz and Brake models. At lower values of the excitation control parameter, all four models predict similar dynamic responses, whereas noticeable differences emerge at higher values. These results demonstrate that impact-model selection becomes increasingly important at higher excitation levels for accurately predicting the system response and its sensitivity to initial conditions.