New practice guideline by Mike LaMantia

Michael LaMantia, MD, Associate Professor of Medicine and Director of Geriatrics, has just published Dementia Care Practice recommendations. Because they are endorsed by the Alzheimer's Association, they are likely to be quite influential.

Mary Guerriero Austrom, Malaz Boustani, Michael A LaMantia; Ongoing Medical Management to Maximize Health and Well-being for Persons Living With Dementia, The Gerontologist, Volume 58, Issue suppl_1, 18 January 2018, Pages S48–S57, https://doi.org/10.1093/geront/gnx147

- Ben Littenberg

Clinical Research Oriented Workshop (CROW) Meeting: January 11, 2018

Present:   Levi Bonnell, Marianne Burke, Jessica Clifton, Justine Dee, Juvena Hitt, Kairn Kelley, Ben Littenberg, Connie van Eeghen

Start Up: Marianne’s last day as Director of the Dana is March 31, 2018 – CONGRATULATIONS!

1.                   CoHSTAR Poster – Justine’s abstract for an upcoming conference in Boston: Center for Health and Research Outcomes related to PT.  This was a workshop on how to get the word count down to a slim 250 while retaining the essential meaning and covering the basic information needed.

a.       Spell out acronyms

b.       Specify “therapies”

c.       Standardize number of significant digits

d.       Add to methods: controlling for potential confounders

e.       If necessary, present only the adjusted findings in the abstract

f.        Next step: outcomes and costs

g.       Medians were used due to non-normal, highly skewed distribution

2.                   Good challenges for us as developing scientists

a.       Article review – e.g. as part of comps, as Connie experienced

b.       Ben’s Online Course in advanced stats – create any study, pre-register it, go to Open Science Framework, create the project, post your protocol, create subfolders, with a brief report as a final

                                                   i.      Ben downloaded 1000 most popular movies (Kagal): do long movies get bad ratings?

                                                 ii.      Method: linear regression: long movies get higher ratings

3.                   Next Workshop Meeting(s): Thursdays, 11:00 a.m. – 12:00 p.m., at Given Courtyard South Level 4.

a.       Jan 18: Levi found an article using Google street view to identify cars in the pictures, and predict voter outcomes – we’ll review ahead and compare notes at CROW

b.       Jan 25: Connie – presentation draft: Building the Integrated Behavioral Health Team through Teamwork: A Structured Lean Problem-Solving Approach

c.       Future topics:

a.       Juvena: protocol development

b.       LaMantia: predictors of successful R01 applications: http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0155060

Recorder: Connie van Eeghen

Clinical Research Oriented Workshop (CROW) Meeting: January 4, 2018

Present:   Levi Bonnell, Marianne Burke, Nancy Gell, Kairn Kelley, Connie van Eeghen

Start Up: Generalized Linear Models: using a link function to model data linearly that is not normally distributed: what Kairn and Levi have to learn based on a reviewer’s recommendation in response to a manuscript

1.                   IBH-PC Temporal Control Study – Connie’s upcoming UVM Reach Grant application draft

a.       Description

                                                   i.      Clarify timeline

                                                 ii.      The innovation is the new method

                                               iii.      Clarify methods, what’s on the 3^rd page comes too late – front load this and the value (below)

b.       1^st page

                                                   i.      Why should I care – what’s the value

1.       We spend lots of money on control arms

2.       This could explode the way we do control arms

3.       Questions – get excited about these

a.       Can we create a comparator

b.       Can we detect similarities

c.       Can we detect differences

4.       Method of forming a control group has strengths: a random selection of subjects to create many possible control arms, one of which is randomly selected; strengthens the conclusions of any research project that uses this method: scale and randomness

                                                 ii.      Value and challenge

1.       Lower cost and greater impact for UVM researchers to use; increased capability and opportunities to share and network

2.       PCORI is the opportunity; this is a chance to take advantage of it

3.       Overcomes the challenges of lack of interoperability of EHRs through better use of data warehouses

                                               iii.      Take emphasis off the constraints of the current study; focus on the opportunity for future studies

c.       Re-read for language and acronyms

                                                   i.      Constellations of practices

d.       Researcher Goals:

                                                   i.      This provides important pilot data to be PI in a bigger grant

e.       Explain Part 2 earlier

                                                   i.      Also include in Research Goals: now we can answer these questions

2.                   Next Workshop Meeting(s): Thursdays, 11:30 p.m. – 12:45 p.m., at Given Courtyard South Level 4.

a.       Jan 11: Justine Dee’s abstract

b.       Jan 18: TBD

c.       Future topics:

a.       Juvena: protocol development

b.       LaMantia: predictors of successful R01 applications: http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0155060

Recorder: Connie van Eeghen