Random stuff

It’s been a long time since I last posted one of these posts, so a great number of links of interest has accumulated in my bookmarks. I intended to include a large number of these in this post and this of course means that I surely won’t cover each specific link included in this post in anywhere near the amount of detail it deserves, but that can’t be helped.

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i. Autism Spectrum Disorder Grown Up: A Chart Review of Adult Functioning.

“For those diagnosed with ASD in childhood, most will become adults with a significant degree of disability […] Seltzer et al […] concluded that, despite considerable heterogeneity in social outcomes, “few adults with autism live independently, marry, go to college, work in competitive jobs or develop a large network of friends”. However, the trend within individuals is for some functional improvement over time, as well as a decrease in autistic symptoms […]. Some authors suggest that a sub-group of 15–30% of adults with autism will show more positive outcomes […]. Howlin et al. (2004), and Cederlund et al. (2008) assigned global ratings of social functioning based on achieving independence, friendships/a steady relationship, and education and/or a job. These two papers described respectively 22% and 27% of groups of higher functioning (IQ above 70) ASD adults as attaining “Very Good” or “Good” outcomes.”

“[W]e evaluated the adult outcomes for 45 individuals diagnosed with ASD prior to age 18, and compared this with the functioning of 35 patients whose ASD was identified after 18 years. Concurrent mental illnesses were noted for both groups. […] Comparison of adult outcome within the group of subjects diagnosed with ASD prior to 18 years of age showed significantly poorer functioning for those with co-morbid Intellectual Disability, except in the domain of establishing intimate relationships [my emphasis. To make this point completely clear, one way to look at these results is that apparently in the domain of partner-search autistics diagnosed during childhood are doing so badly in general that being intellectually disabled on top of being autistic is apparently conferring no additional disadvantage]. Even in the normal IQ group, the mean total score, i.e. the sum of the 5 domains, was relatively low at 12.1 out of a possible 25. […] Those diagnosed as adults had achieved significantly more in the domains of education and independence […] Some authors have described a subgroup of 15–27% of adult ASD patients who attained more positive outcomes […]. Defining an arbitrary adaptive score of 20/25 as “Good” for our normal IQ patients, 8 of thirty four (25%) of those diagnosed as adults achieved this level. Only 5 of the thirty three (15%) diagnosed in childhood made the cutoff. (The cut off was consistent with a well, but not superlatively, functioning member of society […]). None of the Intellectually Disabled ASD subjects scored above 10. […] All three groups had a high rate of co-morbid psychiatric illnesses. Depression was particularly frequent in those diagnosed as adults, consistent with other reports […]. Anxiety disorders were also prevalent in the higher functioning participants, 25–27%. […] Most of the higher functioning ASD individuals, whether diagnosed before or after 18 years of age, were functioning well below the potential implied by their normal range intellect.”

Related papers: Social Outcomes in Mid- to Later Adulthood Among Individuals Diagnosed With Autism and Average Nonverbal IQ as Children, Adults With Autism Spectrum Disorders.

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ii. Premature mortality in autism spectrum disorder. This is a Swedish matched case cohort study. Some observations from the paper:

“The aim of the current study was to analyse all-cause and cause-specific mortality in ASD using nationwide Swedish population-based registers. A further aim was to address the role of intellectual disability and gender as possible moderators of mortality and causes of death in ASD. […] Odds ratios (ORs) were calculated for a population-based cohort of ASD probands (n = 27 122, diagnosed between 1987 and 2009) compared with gender-, age- and county of residence-matched controls (n = 2 672 185). […] During the observed period, 24 358 (0.91%) individuals in the general population died, whereas the corresponding figure for individuals with ASD was 706 (2.60%; OR = 2.56; 95% CI 2.38–2.76). Cause-specific analyses showed elevated mortality in ASD for almost all analysed diagnostic categories. Mortality and patterns for cause-specific mortality were partly moderated by gender and general intellectual ability. […] Premature mortality was markedly increased in ASD owing to a multitude of medical conditions. […] Mortality was significantly elevated in both genders relative to the general population (males: OR = 2.87; females OR = 2.24)”.

“Individuals in the control group died at a mean age of 70.20 years (s.d. = 24.16, median = 80), whereas the corresponding figure for the entire ASD group was 53.87 years (s.d. = 24.78, median = 55), for low-functioning ASD 39.50 years (s.d. = 21.55, median = 40) and high-functioning ASD 58.39 years (s.d. = 24.01, median = 63) respectively. […] Significantly elevated mortality was noted among individuals with ASD in all analysed categories of specific causes of death except for infections […] ORs were highest in cases of mortality because of diseases of the nervous system (OR = 7.49) and because of suicide (OR = 7.55), in comparison with matched general population controls.”

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iii. Adhesive capsulitis of shoulder. This one is related to a health scare I had a few months ago. A few quotes:

“Adhesive capsulitis (also known as frozen shoulder) is a painful and disabling disorder of unclear cause in which the shoulder capsule, the connective tissue surrounding the glenohumeral joint of the shoulder, becomes inflamed and stiff, greatly restricting motion and causing chronic pain. Pain is usually constant, worse at night, and with cold weather. Certain movements or bumps can provoke episodes of tremendous pain and cramping. […] People who suffer from adhesive capsulitis usually experience severe pain and sleep deprivation for prolonged periods due to pain that gets worse when lying still and restricted movement/positions. The condition can lead to depression, problems in the neck and back, and severe weight loss due to long-term lack of deep sleep. People who suffer from adhesive capsulitis may have extreme difficulty concentrating, working, or performing daily life activities for extended periods of time.”

Some other related links below:

The prevalence of a diabetic condition and adhesive capsulitis of the shoulder.
“Adhesive capsulitis is characterized by a progressive and painful loss of shoulder motion of unknown etiology. Previous studies have found the prevalence of adhesive capsulitis to be slightly greater than 2% in the general population. However, the relationship between adhesive capsulitis and diabetes mellitus (DM) is well documented, with the incidence of adhesive capsulitis being two to four times higher in diabetics than in the general population. It affects about 20% of people with diabetes and has been described as the most disabling of the common musculoskeletal manifestations of diabetes.”

Adhesive Capsulitis (review article).
“Patients with type I diabetes have a 40% chance of developing a frozen shoulder in their lifetimes […] Dominant arm involvement has been shown to have a good prognosis; associated intrinsic pathology or insulin-dependent diabetes of more than 10 years are poor prognostic indicators.¹⁵ Three stages of adhesive capsulitis have been described, with each phase lasting for about 6 months. The first stage is the freezing stage in which there is an insidious onset of pain. At the end of this period, shoulder ROM [range of motion] becomes limited. The second stage is the frozen stage, in which there might be a reduction in pain; however, there is still restricted ROM. The third stage is the thawing stage, in which ROM improves, but can take between 12 and 42 months to do so. Most patients regain a full ROM; however, 10% to 15% of patients suffer from continued pain and limited ROM.”

Musculoskeletal Complications in Type 1 Diabetes.
“The development of periarticular thickening of skin on the hands and limited joint mobility (cheiroarthropathy) is associated with diabetes and can lead to significant disability. The objective of this study was to describe the prevalence of cheiroarthropathy in the well-characterized Diabetes Control and Complications Trial/Epidemiology of Diabetes Interventions and Complications (DCCT/EDIC) cohort and examine associated risk factors […] This cross-sectional analysis was performed in 1,217 participants (95% of the active cohort) in EDIC years 18/19 after an average of 24 years of follow-up. Cheiroarthropathy — defined as the presence of any one of the following: adhesive capsulitis, carpal tunnel syndrome, flexor tenosynovitis, Dupuytren’s contracture, or a positive prayer sign [related link] — was assessed using a targeted medical history and standardized physical examination. […] Cheiroarthropathy was present in 66% of subjects […] Cheiroarthropathy is common in people with type 1 diabetes of long duration (∼30 years) and is related to longer duration and higher levels of glycemia. Clinicians should include cheiroarthropathy in their routine history and physical examination of patients with type 1 diabetes because it causes clinically significant functional disability.”

Musculoskeletal disorders in diabetes mellitus: an update.
“Diabetes mellitus (DM) is associated with several musculoskeletal disorders. […] The exact pathophysiology of most of these musculoskeletal disorders remains obscure. Connective tissue disorders, neuropathy, vasculopathy or combinations of these problems, may underlie the increased incidence of musculoskeletal disorders in DM. The development of musculoskeletal disorders is dependent on age and on the duration of DM; however, it has been difficult to show a direct correlation with the metabolic control of DM.”

Rheumatic Manifestations of Diabetes Mellitus.

Prevalence of symptoms and signs of shoulder problems in people with diabetes mellitus.

Musculoskeletal Disorders of the Hand and Shoulder in Patients with Diabetes.
“In addition to micro- and macroangiopathic complications, diabetes mellitus is also associated with several musculoskeletal disorders of the hand and shoulder that can be debilitating (1,2). Limited joint mobility, also termed diabetic hand syndrome or cheiropathy (3), is characterized by skin thickening over the dorsum of the hands and restricted mobility of multiple joints. While this syndrome is painless and usually not disabling (2,4), other musculoskeletal problems occur with increased frequency in diabetic patients, including Dupuytren’s disease [“Dupuytren’s disease […] may be observed in up to 42% of adults with diabetes mellitus, typically in patients with long-standing T1D” – link], carpal tunnel syndrome [“The prevalence of [carpal tunnel syndrome, CTS] in patients with diabetes has been estimated at 11–30 % […], and is dependent on the duration of diabetes. […] Type I DM patients have a high prevalence of CTS with increasing duration of disease, up to 85 % after 54 years of DM” – link], palmar flexor tenosynovitis or trigger finger [“The incidence of trigger finger [/stenosing tenosynovitis] is 7–20 % of patients with diabetes comparing to only about 1–2 % in nondiabetic patients” – link], and adhesive capsulitis of the shoulder (5–10). The association of adhesive capsulitis with pain, swelling, dystrophic skin, and vasomotor instability of the hand constitutes the “shoulder-hand syndrome,” a rare but potentially disabling manifestation of diabetes (1,2).”

“The prevalence of musculoskeletal disorders was greater in diabetic patients than in control patients (36% vs. 9%, P < 0.01). Adhesive capsulitis was present in 12% of the diabetic patients and none of the control patients (P < 0.01), Dupuytren’s disease in 16% of diabetic and 3% of control patients (P < 0.01), and flexor tenosynovitis in 12% of diabetic and 2% of control patients (P < 0.04), while carpal tunnel syndrome occurred in 12% of diabetic patients and 8% of control patients (P = 0.29). Musculoskeletal disorders were more common in patients with type 1 diabetes than in those with type 2 diabetes […]. Forty-three patients [out of 100] with type 1 diabetes had either hand or shoulder disorders (37 with hand disorders, 6 with adhesive capsulitis of the shoulder, and 10 with both syndromes), compared with 28 patients [again out of 100] with type 2 diabetes (24 with hand disorders, 4 with adhesive capsulitis of the shoulder, and 3 with both syndromes, P = 0.03).”

Association of Diabetes Mellitus With the Risk of Developing Adhesive Capsulitis of the Shoulder: A Longitudinal Population-Based Followup Study.
“A total of 78,827 subjects with at least 2 ambulatory care visits with a principal diagnosis of DM in 2001 were recruited for the DM group. The non-DM group comprised 236,481 age- and sex-matched randomly sampled subjects without DM. […] During a 3-year followup period, 946 subjects (1.20%) in the DM group and 2,254 subjects (0.95%) in the non-DM group developed ACS. The crude HR of developing ACS for the DM group compared to the non-DM group was 1.333 […] the association between DM and ACS may be explained at least in part by a DM-related chronic inflammatory process with increased growth factor expression, which in turn leads to joint synovitis and subsequent capsular fibrosis.”

It is important to note when interpreting the results of the above paper that these results are based on Taiwanese population-level data, and type 1 diabetes – which is obviously the high-risk diabetes subgroup in this particular context – is rare in East Asian populations (as observed in Sperling et al., “A child in Helsinki, Finland is almost 400 times more likely to develop diabetes than a child in Sichuan, China”. Taiwanese incidence of type 1 DM in children is estimated at ~5 in 100.000).

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iv. Parents who let diabetic son starve to death found guilty of first-degree murder. It’s been a while since I last saw one of these ‘boost-your-faith-in-humanity’-cases, but they in my impression do pop up every now and then. I should probably keep at hand one of these articles in case my parents ever express worry to me that they weren’t good parents; they could have done a lot worse…

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v. Freedom of medicine. One quote from the conclusion of Cochran’s post:

“[I]t is surely possible to materially improve the efficacy of drug development, of medical research as a whole. We’re doing better than we did 500 years ago – although probably worse than we did 50 years ago. But I would approach it by learning as much as possible about medical history, demographics, epidemiology, evolutionary medicine, theory of senescence, genetics, etc. Read Koch, not Hayek. There is no royal road to medical progress.”

I agree, and I was considering including some related comments and observations about health economics in this post – however I ultimately decided against doing that in part because the post was growing unwieldy; I might include those observations in another post later on. Here’s another somewhat older Westhunt post I at some point decided to bookmark – I in particular like the following neat quote from the comments, which expresses a view I have of course expressed myself in the past here on this blog:

“When you think about it, falsehoods, stupid crap, make the best group identifiers, because anyone might agree with you when you’re obviously right. Signing up to clear nonsense is a better test of group loyalty. A true friend is with you when you’re wrong. Ideally, not just wrong, but barking mad, rolling around in your own vomit wrong.”

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vi. Economic Costs of Diabetes in the U.S. in 2012.

“Approximately 59% of all health care expenditures attributed to diabetes are for health resources used by the population aged 65 years and older, much of which is borne by the Medicare program […]. The population 45–64 years of age incurs 33% of diabetes-attributed costs, with the remaining 8% incurred by the population under 45 years of age. The annual attributed health care cost per person with diabetes […] increases with age, primarily as a result of increased use of hospital inpatient and nursing facility resources, physician office visits, and prescription medications. Dividing the total attributed health care expenditures by the number of people with diabetes, we estimate the average annual excess expenditures for the population aged under 45 years, 45–64 years, and 65 years and above, respectively, at $4,394, $5,611, and $11,825.”

“Our logistic regression analysis with NHIS data suggests that diabetes is associated with a 2.4 percentage point increase in the likelihood of leaving the workforce for disability. This equates to approximately 541,000 working-age adults leaving the workforce prematurely and 130 million lost workdays in 2012. For the population that leaves the workforce early because of diabetes-associated disability, we estimate that their average daily earnings would have been $166 per person (with the amount varying by demographic). Presenteeism accounted for 30% of the indirect cost of diabetes. The estimate of a 6.6% annual decline in productivity attributed to diabetes (in excess of the estimated decline in the absence of diabetes) equates to 113 million lost workdays per year.”

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vii. Total red meat intake of ≥0.5 servings/d does not negatively influence cardiovascular disease risk factors: a systemically searched meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials.

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viii. Effect of longer term modest salt reduction on blood pressure: Cochrane systematic review and meta-analysis of randomised trials. Did I blog this paper at some point in the past? I could not find any coverage of it on the blog when I searched for it so I decided to include it here, even if I have a nagging suspicion I may have talked about these findings before. What did they find? The short version is this:

“A modest reduction in salt intake for four or more weeks causes significant and, from a population viewpoint, important falls in blood pressure in both hypertensive and normotensive individuals, irrespective of sex and ethnic group. Salt reduction is associated with a small physiological increase in plasma renin activity, aldosterone, and noradrenaline and no significant change in lipid concentrations. These results support a reduction in population salt intake, which will lower population blood pressure and thereby reduce cardiovascular disease.”

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ix. Some wikipedia links:

Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration (featured).

Wien’s displacement law.

Kuiper belt (featured).

Treason (one quote worth including here: “Currently, the consensus among major Islamic schools is that apostasy (leaving Islam) is considered treason and that the penalty is death; this is supported not in the Quran but in the Hadith.^{[42][43][44][45][46][47]}“).

Lymphatic filariasis.

File:World map of countries by number of cigarettes smoked per adult per year.

Australian gold rushes.

Savant syndrome (“It is estimated that 10% of those with autism have some form of savant abilities”). A small sidenote of interest to Danish readers: The Danish Broadcasting Corporation recently featured a series about autistics with ‘special abilities’ – the show was called ‘The hidden talents’ (De skjulte talenter), and after multiple people had nagged me to watch it I ended up deciding to do so. Most of the people in that show presumably had some degree of ‘savantism’ combined with autism at the milder end of the spectrum, i.e. Asperger’s. I was somewhat conflicted about what to think about the show and did consider blogging it in detail (in Danish?), but I decided against it. However I do want to add here to Danish readers reading along who’ve seen the show that they would do well to repeatedly keep in mind that a) the great majority of autistics do not have abilities like these, b) many autistics with abilities like these presumably do quite poorly, and c) that many autistics have even greater social impairments than do people like e.g. (the very likeable, I have to add…) Louise Wille from the show).

Quark–gluon plasma.

Simo Häyhä.

Chernobyl liquidators.

Black Death (“Over 60% of Norway’s population died in 1348–1350”).

Renault FT (“among the most revolutionary and influential tank designs in history”).

Weierstrass function (“an example of a pathological real-valued function on the real line. The function has the property of being continuous everywhere but differentiable nowhere”).

W Ursae Majoris variable.

Void coefficient. (“a number that can be used to estimate how much the reactivity of a nuclear reactor changes as voids (typically steam bubbles) form in the reactor moderator or coolant. […] Reactivity is directly related to the tendency of the reactor core to change power level: if reactivity is positive, the core power tends to increase; if it is negative, the core power tends to decrease; if it is zero, the core power tends to remain stable. […] A positive void coefficient means that the reactivity increases as the void content inside the reactor increases due to increased boiling or loss of coolant; for example, if the coolant acts as a neutron absorber. If the void coefficient is large enough and control systems do not respond quickly enough, this can form a positive feedback loop which can quickly boil all the coolant in the reactor. This happened in the RBMK reactor that was destroyed in the Chernobyl disaster.”).

Gregor MacGregor (featured) (“a Scottish soldier, adventurer, and confidence trickster […] MacGregor’s Poyais scheme has been called one of the most brazen confidence tricks in history.”).

Stimming.

Irish Civil War.