OBJECTIVE

Recent studies have highlighted the significance of the microbiome in human health and disease. Changes in the metabolites produced by microbiota have been implicated in several diseases. Our objective was to identify microbiome metabolites that are associated with type 2 diabetes.

OBJECTIVE

To determine the risk of cardiovascular disease (CVD), microvascular complications, and mortality in patients with type 2 diabetes who subsequently develop obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) compared with patients with type 2 diabetes without a diagnosis of OSA.

OBJECTIVE

Acrylamide exposure from daily-consumed food has raised global concern. We aimed to assess the exposure-response relationships of internal acrylamide exposure with oxidative DNA damage, lipid peroxidation, and fasting plasma glucose (FPG) alteration and investigate the mediating role of oxidative DNA damage and lipid peroxidation in the association of internal acrylamide exposure with FPG.

OBJECTIVE

To examine the association between manganese intake and the risk of type 2 diabetes in postmenopausal women and determine whether this association is mediated by circulating markers of inflammation.

OBJECTIVE

This study evaluated the ability of the Building, Relating, Assessing, and Validating Outcomes (BRAVO) risk engine to accurately project cardiovascular outcomes in three major clinical trials—BI 10773 (Empagliflozin) Cardiovascular Outcome Event Trial in Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus Patients (EMPA-REG OUTCOME), Canagliflozin Cardiovascular Assessment Study (CANVAS), and Dapagliflozin Effect on Cardiovascular Events–Thrombolysis in Myocardial Infarction (DECLARE-TIMI 58) trial—on sodium–glucose cotransporter 2 inhibitors (SGLT2is) to treat patients with type 2 diabetes.

OBJECTIVE

In patients with type 2 diabetes (T2D) and critical limb ischemia (CLI), migration of circulating CD34⁺ cells predicted cardiovascular mortality at 18 months after revascularization. This study aimed to provide long-term validation and mechanistic understanding of the biomarker.

OBJECTIVE

To examine whether low baseline diastolic blood pressure (DBP) modifies the effects of intensive systolic blood pressure (SBP) lowering on cardiovascular outcomes in type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM).

OBJECTIVE

The LEADER trial (ClinicalTrials.gov reg. no. NCT01179048) demonstrated a reduced risk of cardiovascular (CV) events for patients with type 2 diabetes who received the glucagon-like peptide 1 receptor agonist liraglutide versus placebo. The mechanisms behind this CV benefit remain unclear. We aimed to identify potential mediators for the CV benefit observed with liraglutide in the LEADER trial.

OBJECTIVE

Despite evidence of a relationship among obstructive sleep apnea (OSA), metabolic dysregulation, and diabetes, it is uncertain whether OSA treatment can improve metabolic parameters. We sought to determine effects of long-term continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) treatment on glycemic control and diabetes risk in patients with cardiovascular disease (CVD) and OSA.

OBJECTIVE

The role of U300 glargine insulin for the inpatient management of type 2 diabetes (T2D) has not been determined. We compared the safety and efficacy of glargine U300 versus glargine U100 in noncritically ill patients with T2D.

OBJECTIVE

The aim of this study was to examine the association of circulating retinol-binding protein 4 (RBP4) levels with β-cell function across the spectrum of glucose tolerance from normal to overt type 2 diabetes.

Classroom observations occur to document behaviors and to help provide insight to teachers. Teachers are teaching and are typically focused on the overall learning of the entire class. It is not possible for a teacher to catch all of the details of classroom while teaching. An outside observer, often a School Psychologist, can sit in the classroom and observe a student or the entire class. These insights can be used to help provide better instruction, create behavioral or academic interventions, or to document behaviors.

When do classroom observations occur?

- During a special education evaluation The classroom observation is a required component in a special education evaluation. It provides data and insight to the eligibility committee.

- Before a Behavior Intervention Plan or Functional Behavioral Assessment Classroom observations are important before implementing a Functional Behavioral Assessment or a Behavior Intervention Plan. It helps to clarify the current behaviors, identify possible triggers of the behavior, and determine the frequency of the behaviors.

- When a teacher is worried about a particular student Often a teacher will have a concern about a student and ask the School Psychologist to conduct an observation. After the observation the teacher and psychologist will meet to discuss and brainstorm strategies to assist in instruction.

This guest post is written by Angela Peterson who writes on the topic of Online Psychology Degrees and can be emailed at angela_peterson@rediffmail.com

It’s not easy raising a child, and when he or she is affected by a severe disorder or disease, you have a greater challenge ahead of you. You have to put in extra effort, energy and thought into your child’s development and progress, one aspect of which includes their education. Some parents of children with special needs may be tempted to overprotect by keeping them in cloistered environments and limiting their interaction with the outside world. This usually only hampers the child instead of helping them. If you’re a parent with a child who has special needs, here’s some strategies:

* Understand your child: Some children may be able to express themselves while others are limited because of their disability. Whatever the case, understand your child and know that they have a mind of their own even if they are unable to speak it. Instead of forcing your will on them, get to know what they wish to do and cater to their needs as much as possible as long as it does not cause them any harm.

* Be patient: It’s a tough task, but you need to have an enormous amount of patience with your child. You need to condition yourself to be patient through practice and experience, otherwise you and your child will be subject to a great deal of stress.

* Decide on their education: There are many options for providing education to your special needs child, so look for what is available in your area. If you plan to homeschool, you will need to do some research before you’re up to the task. Many feel that it’s better to let the professionals handle this task who are trained and more experienced. Also, your child gets to mingle with other children and interact with them on a regular basis, which is very important to his or her social development.

*Think about inclusive classrooms: Parents often want their special needs children to attend regular schools. Learn about inclusive classrooms and determine if it is a good fit for your child. Consider if your child is up to the task of being educated with general education children and if he/she can cope with the curriculum in such classrooms. Although teachers in inclusive classrooms are trained to deal with children with special needs, there may be times when your child could be bullied or teased by the other kids for not being like them. Take all these facts into consideration before you decide on an inclusive classroom for your child.


Children with special needs need all the help and support they can get from parents and teachers, and it’s up to you to decide on the best form of education for them.

The eligibility criteria for special education services is black and white. (I'm not talking about the color of skin.) Either the student fits the criteria or does not fit the criteria. The committee comes together with all the test data and then reviews the criteria for each disability. Either the student is eligible or not. They meet the criteria or they do not meet the criteria. Sounds easy, right? The kids who obviously fit the criteria easily qualify for special education services. The kids who clearly do not fit criteria for special education do not qualify for special education services. It should just be that easy. Sometimes it is.

I've been in the field long enough to see that eligibility is not always this magical process that determines special education from regular education. Sometimes eligibility decisions are a nightmare. What about all the gray kids that aren't clearly black or white?! For some kids, determining if they meet the criteria is tough. The black and white criteria makes it difficult to know what to do for the gray kids. The most difficult eligibility meetings are the ones where some members feel the student meets criteria and other members do not. These can lead to heated discussions. There are sometimes different ways to look at data and opinions of how to look at it may vary. Remember that the real issue the student who is cared about by school staff and especially parents which makes the decision emotional. It can be hard to be objective at times. It is not uncommon to hear "but they need it," even when the data does not support it.

There are kids who qualify for special education services at one point, then are found ineligible at another time. Sometimes this happens because the student has made improvements and no longer requires special education services to be successful. Other times this happens because criteria has changed, the criteria is slightly different in a new different school system, or because test data is slightly different after a few years. In my opinion, this is when the system and criteria fails. I'd like to see ways to address the students who at one time fit the criteria, no longer fit criteria, but still require services.

Why is the criteria so rigid? The main reason is because special education is funded by the government and they keep a tight reign on eligibility criteria. School staff is pressured by the administration, who is pressured by the State, who is pressured by the Federal government. There is a call for identification to be accurate to ensure that funds are properly spent. The only way the government can determine if the funds are being used appropriately is to enforce that schools are using clear criteria guidelines for identification.

All that being said, I believe in the process (for the most part). However, it's created by humans meaning there will be errors. If I had a say, I'd make some changes. I do believe there needs to be criteria. No matter who sets the criteria there will always be those gray kids that are just right on the border of eligible or not eligible. The worst mistake that can be made in my opinion is telling a family that the child has a disability when in fact the child does not. The child grows up with the belief that he or she has a disabling condition, when that could have been prevented. Disability identification can be life changing for a person. That is why I believe we need criteria. A strong opinion by a teacher or parent that "she needs it" is not enough data for me to look a child and say they are struggling because of a disability.

Want to learn more about the eligibility process?
Eligibility Process FAQ
What every parent needs to know about the referral process
Ineligible for special education

Over the last few years I have been very busy working with teachers to create individualized behavior plans for several different elementary school students. There have been amazingly successful plans where some of the most significant behavior problems in the school have turned it around. Children who made daily trips to the office are only there now to receive praise from the administration. Teachers previously brought to tears from the behaviors have stopped me in the hall to say "Oh my goodness, he's like a different kid!" Students who were close to being sent to a day placement school are now succeeding in a regular classroom. It's very encouraging if I focus on those students. However, there have also been some plans that have been revised and revised and revised and the student is still struggling and the teacher is still severely frustrated. I have been reflecting on why some behavior plans work and others don't. Of course one of the biggest factors is the student. All students are different and the motivation for the misbehavior or lacking skill is different in each student. While this is important to consider, this particular article does not focus on this. I'm going to focus today on the teacher's role in making the behavior plan successful.

• Focus on the Positive!!! The behavior plans that have had the most dramatic success are plans that allow the teacher to focus on the positive. Classroom consequences are still in place, but are not connected to the plan. Here is an example: Johnny's teachers will offer positive reinforcement frequently in the classroom by giving Johnny a “warm fuzzy” pom pom when he is caught engaging in a desired behavior. Johnny will chose the bag to keep the “warm fuzzies” in and carry the bag with him to every class. Once the bag is full, he receives an immediate reward. There is no limit to how many “warm fuzzies” he can earn in a day. He does not loose “warm fuzzies” that he has already earned. All teachers and staff who work with Johnny can give him “warm fuzzies” for his bag. This plan works because Johnny who was used to receiving a lot of negative feedback, is now getting positive attention frequently throughout the day. He receives something tangible (the warm fuzzy) that he can put into his bag. This begins to change his perception of himself, which changes his behavior, which changes his teacher's perception of him, which can potentially change his future. Plans that offer positive rewards completely separate from the classroom consequences seem to have the most significant effects.




• Be Consistent. Teachers who are able to be consistent and are able to follow through every time have the most success with the plan. Oppositional children are excellent at pushing limits to see how far they can push. Consistent teachers have more success because they don't offer the wiggle room.




• Be Flexible. This is not the opposite of being consistent. This is having flexibility in your expectations and stating them upfront. If the student was able to behave like everyone else in the class she would be. She may need some flexibility in some areas. For example you may need to have area for her to work in the classroom for times she needs to cool down and get away from a stimulus. The teacher may need to allow her extra time to finish projects if it is the transition that sets her off. Being flexible and willing to make acceptable changes for the student sets everyone up for success.




• Remember that all students are different. The behaviors may be exactly the same as a student you had two years ago. However, that doesn't mean that the motivation for the behavior or the lacking skills are the same. What works for one student may not work for the next. That is the reason for the individualized plan. I strongly recommend doing a formal Functional Behavioral Assessment and a Behavior Intervention Plan.

Teachers have a HUGE part in making the Behavior Plan sucessful. It is the teacher who has to follow through and implement it consistently every day. It is the teacher who has to push forward even when it appears it isn't working at first. It is the teacher who has a tremendous positive impact on the student when the behavior starts turning around. It is the teacher who does the work to change lives!

With the Trump administration having announced the end of the DACA program, Congress is facing growing calls to protect unauthorized immigrants who came to the U.S. as children. This fact sheet examines DREAM Act bills introduced in Congress as of mid-2017, offering estimates of who might earn conditional legal status—and ultimately legal permanent residence—based on educational, professional, and other requirements in the legislation.

2017 saw the introduction of several bills—two of them by Senate Republicans in the weeks following the Trump administration’s announcement that it would terminate the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program—that would provide a pathway to conditional and then legal permanent residence to unauthorized immigrants brought to the United States as children, if they meet a range of educational, professional, and other criteria.

This Migration Policy Institute Europe webinar examines possible scenarios for how social, economic, and technological trends could affect jobs, labor market policy, education and social policies, and migrant integration. Speakers also explored the potential of coding schools for refugees to help alleviate skills shortages and provide a pathway to work.

This fact sheet and accompanying interactive data tools provide characteristics of the estimated 11.3 million unauthorized immigrants in the United States, using a unique MPI methodology that assigns legal status to U.S. Census Bureau data. The fact sheet and tools offer statistics on these immigrants’ origins, U.S. destinations, educational attainment, English proficiency, employment, income, home ownership, and more.

As the population of gray wolves expands across the northern United States, researchers are finding a surprising side-effect: Their presence appears to lead to a reduction in the coyote population.

The United States economy shed more than 20 million jobs last month, the greatest month-to-month decline in history, the Labor Department said Friday in its monthly employment analysis.

Cleveland police say they have used DNA research to solve the 33-year-old strangling of a teenage girl, and arrest her killer.

Mars' ancient magnetic field emerged earlier and persisted for longer than scientists previously thought, according to a new study.

The two astronauts who are to begin a new era of human spaceflight from U.S. soil this month said Friday they hope to inspire generations of Americans.

Halley's Comet only orbits the sun once every 75 years, but each year in early May, the Earth passes through some of the debris that it left behind.

The last supermoon of 2020, May's so-called "Flower Moon," will be visible in the night skies this week, and its brightness will likely obscure the yearly Eta Aquarids meteor shower, according to NASA.

Engineers in China have developed a fossil fuel-free jet propulsion prototype design that uses microwave air plasmas.

Scientists have discovered the closest black hole to Earth, located just 1,000 light-years away.

While migration once was a lower-priority topic for African governments, the last decade has seen a deepening in governance. Policymakers have integrated migration into their national development strategies and mainstreamed it across policy domains such as health and education. The actions are promising on paper, yet questions remain about the extent to which they will translate to more effective migration management.

A timeline of key immigration laws and policy developments between 1986 and 2013.

This fact sheet compares key components of immigration reform outlined in the 2013 Senate immigration bill against provisions included in bills considered by the Senate in 2006 and 2007: border security, detention, and enforcement; worksite enforcement; visa reforms; earned legalization of unauthorized immigrants; strengthening the U.S. economy and workforce; and integration of new Americans.

MPI has completed an analysis of the major provisions in the 2013 framework, comparing them to provisions of the legislation the Senate considered in 2006 and 2007. 

This fact sheet is formatted as a chart comparing the framework of comprehensive immigration reform outlined in the 2013 Senate immigration bill against provisions included in bills considered by the Senate in 2006 and 2007.

The 10th annual Immigration Law and Policy Conference featured keynotes by U.S. Senator John McCain (R-AZ) and former Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour, as well as panel discussions covering a range of key immigration topics.

This Transatlantic Council on Migration Statement assesses the continuum of policies needed to disrupt illegal migration-related activities and addresses the conditions that make them possible. It examines the role of migration "bad actors"—human traffickers and unscrupulous employers, among them—who operate and profit in this environment, and considers how governments can deploy resources to discourage their actions.

Testimony of Marc Rosenblum before the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs for the March 26, 2015 hearing on the characteristics of unauthorized immigrants in the United States and how to address future flows.

With the growing urbanization and consolidation of Nicaraguan immigrants in sectors such as construction and domestic service, Costa Rica has shifted its focus from immigration enforcement to integration. Tension has emerged between the government and private sector as a new mechanism for regularizing unauthorized immigrant workers has failed to gain traction.

An MPI Leadership Visions discussion with the Foreign Minister of Mexico, Claudia Ruiz-Massieu, for her first public appearance in Washington, DC. 

An unannounced sweep of 98 convenience stores by U.S. immigration authorities—resulting in the arrest of 21 unauthorized workers—may signal a new approach to worksite enforcement under the Trump administration, moving away from a strategy of paper-based audits that resulted in higher employer fines and fewer worker arrests. This article explores worksite enforcement over recent decades.

Here’s my Q&A column from the WSJ this week — and if you have any questions for me, you can tweet them to @danariely with the hashtag #askariely, post a comment on my Ask Ariely Facebook page, or email them to AskAriely@wsj.com. ___________________________________________________ Dear Dan, One of my credit cards bears...

Here’s my Q&A column from the WSJ this week — and if you have any questions for me, you can tweet them to @danariely with the hashtag #askariely, post a comment on my Ask Ariely Facebook page, or email them to AskAriely@wsj.com. ___________________________________________________ Dear Dan, I shop at two different grocery...

Poland announced a delay of its Sunday presidential election, Europe's first planned vote during the coronavirus pandemic.

Lawmakers in Hong Kong broke out in a scuffle Friday as they fought over who would take control of a committee.

Based on the newest forecasting models, AccuWeather forecasters have extended the upper range of hurricanes predicted for the Atlantic hurricane season.

On May 9, 1980, a Liberian freighter rammed a bridge in Florida's Tampa Bay, collapsing part of the span and dropping 35 people to their deaths.

Federal health officials fined a New Jersey nursing home where last month authorities discovered 17 bodies piled in a small morgue.

Director Rachel Lee Goldenberg discusses how her "Valley Girl" musical remake puts a twist on the hit music of the '80s.

Google's homepage features arcade classic "Pac-Man" in the latest Doodle.

"Real Housewives of New York" star Tinsley Mortimer gave an update on her wedding plans amid the coronavirus pandemic.

Kelly Clarkson discussed the challenges of filming "The Voice" at home amid the coronavirus pandemic.

"I May Destroy You," a new series from "Chewing Gum" creator Michaela Coel, will premiere on HBO in June.