Multicenter observational study of patients who underwent cardiac surgery and were hospitalized in an intensive care unit (BraSIS 2): study protocol and statistical analysis plan.

Background: The perioperative management of patients undergoing cardiac surgery is highly complex and involves numerous factors. There is a strong association between cardiac surgery and perioperative complications. The Brazilian Surgical Identification Study (BraSIS 2) aims to assess the incidence of death and early postoperative complications, identify potential risk factors, and examine both the demographic characteristics of patients and the epidemiology of cardiovascular procedures.

A nonparametric measure of contrast in x-ray images.

We propose a nonparametric figure of merit, the contrast equivalent distance CED, to measure contrast directly from clinical images.A relative brightness distanceis calculated by making use of the order statistic of the pixel values. By multiplyingwith the grey value range, the mean brightness distance MBD is obtained.

Good Pharmacy Practice Standardized for Community Pharmacists: The Lebanese Order of Pharmacists Initiative.

Objective: The community pharmacist's role is in constant evolution. It shifted from compounding and dispensing to patient-centered services. To guarantee that all pharmacists are providing a service of appropriate quality to every patient, the Lebanese Order of Pharmacists (OPL) took the initiative of developing good pharmacy practice (GPP) guidelines to be applied by community pharmacists for services' quality improvement.