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As a result of the upcoming Federal reauthorization of the Individuals With Disabilities Education Improvement Act (IDEA), practitioners and researchers have begun vigorously debating what constitutes evidence-based assessment for the identification of specific learning disability (SLD). This debate has resulted in strong support for a method that appraises an individual's profile of cognitive test scores for the purposes of determining cognitive processing strengths and weaknesses, commonly referred to as patterns of strengths and weaknesses (PSW). Following the Fuchs and Deshler model, questions regarding the psychometric and conceptual integrity of the PSW model are addressed. Despite the strong claims made by many PSW proponents, the findings by this review demonstrate the need for additional information to determine whether PSW is a viable alternative to existing eligibility models and worthy for large scale adoption for SLD identification. Implications for public policy and future SLD research are also discussed.

Objective: Technology continuously advances with new innovations and the evolution of existing devices, requiring health service providers to adapt and keep up with these changes in order to provide optimal services to their patients. Expertise limited to a single technological modality or device will quickly become outdated as new revisions, updates, and alternatives are released into the marketplace. Methods: This article presents several of the critical concerns and issues practitioners must consider when evaluating their current and future uses of technology within their provision of outpatient or private practice services, particularly as it relates to direct care. Current literature and use of key telepractice resources, such as those from the American Telemedicine Association and the American Psychological Association, are presented, to provide practitioners with advanced knowledge and considerations for evaluating technology within their own practice settings. Results: Practitioners can be prepared to remain on top of this “arms race” of technology when they focus on the critical issues related to the selection and use of technology devices, applications, and modes of use; for example, Internet, phone, email, or text message. Two vignettes illustrate how practitioners may implement technology in their practices. Conclusions: Technology can be readily incorporated into outpatient settings to augment practitioners' delivery of health services and improve their experience in clinical practice.

The authors' website (SeedsofHope .com) indicates that \"although the four youth in My Story are fictional, the stories are real... the blogs are a compilation of real-life experiences of military kids we have been honored to meet and learn from.\"

As a result of the upcoming Federal reauthorization of the Individuals With Disabilities Education Improvement Act (IDEA), practitioners and researchers have begun vigorously debating what constitutes evidence-based assessment for the identification of specific learning disability (SLD). This debate has resulted in strong support for a method that appraises an individual’s profile of cognitive test scores for the purposes of determining cognitive processing strengths and weaknesses, commonly referred to as patterns of strengths and weaknesses (PSW). Following the Fuchs and Deshler model, questions regarding the psychometric and conceptual integrity of the PSW model are addressed. Despite the strong claims made by many PSW proponents, the findings by this review demonstrate the need for additional information to determine whether PSW is a viable alternative to existing eligibility models and worthy for large scale adoption for SLD identification. Implications for public policy and future SLD research are also discussed.

Earning a passing score on the Educational Testing Service (ETS) School Psychology Praxis™ II examination is a requirement for obtaining national certification as well as the requisite credential to practice in most states. However, empirical investigations of the technical characteristics and relevant outcomes related to Praxis™ II School Psychology exam scores in the professional literature have been scarce. Accordingly, the present study was conducted to examine the degree to which 2010-2012 Praxis™ II outcomes were affected by salient characteristics of school psychology training programs. Significant differences in aggregate program scores were observed when examining the effects of program accreditation status and training-level (e.g., specialist versus doctoral) on exam outcomes. These results suggest that additional consideration of specific training program attributes may be beneficial when appraising variability in performance on the Praxis™ II exam. Implications for professional practice and the training of school psychologists are discussed. Keywords: Praxis™ II, Professional credentialing, Accreditation, Training

Heart failure (HF) patients show brain injury in autonomic, affective, and cognitive sites, which can change resting-state functional connectivity (FC), potentially altering overall functional brain network organization. However, the status of such connectivity or functional organization is unknown in HF. Determination of that status was the aim here, and we examined region-to-region FC and brain network topological properties across the whole-brain in 27 HF patients compared to 53 controls with resting-state functional MRI procedures. Decreased FC in HF appeared between the caudate and cerebellar regions, olfactory and cerebellar sites, vermis and medial frontal regions, and precentral gyri and cerebellar areas. However, increased FC emerged between the middle frontal gyrus and sensorimotor areas, superior parietal gyrus and orbito/medial frontal regions, inferior temporal gyrus and lingual gyrus/cerebellar lobe/pallidum, fusiform gyrus and superior orbitofrontal gyrus and cerebellar sites, and within vermis and cerebellar areas; these connections were largely in the right hemisphere (p<0.005; 10,000 permutations). The topology of functional integration and specialized characteristics in HF are significantly changed in regions showing altered FC, an outcome which would interfere with brain network organization (p<0.05; 10,000 permutations). Brain dysfunction in HF extends to resting conditions, and autonomic, cognitive, and affective deficits may stem from altered FC and brain network organization that may contribute to higher morbidity and mortality in the condition. Our findings likely result from the prominent axonal and nuclear structural changes reported earlier in HF; protecting neural tissue may improve FC integrity, and thus, increase quality of life and reduce morbidity and mortality.

Autonomic, cognitive, and neuropsychologic deficits appear in heart failure (HF) subjects, and these compromised functions depend on cerebral cortex integrity in addition to that of subcortical and brainstem sites. Impaired autoregulation, low cardiac output, sleep-disordered-breathing, hypertension, and diabetic conditions in HF offer considerable potential to affect cortical areas by loss of neurons and glia, which would be expressed as reduced cortical thicknesses. However, except for gross descriptions of cortical volume loss/injury, regional cortical thickness integrity in HF is unknown. Our goal was to assess regional cortical thicknesses across the brain in HF, compared to control subjects. We examined localized cortical thicknesses in 35 HF and 61 control subjects with high-resolution T1-weighted images (3.0-Tesla MRI) using FreeSurfer software, and assessed group differences with analysis-of-covariance (covariates; age, gender; p<0.05; FDR). Significantly-reduced cortical thicknesses appeared in HF over controls in multiple areas, including the frontal, parietal, temporal, and occipital lobes, more markedly on the left side, within areas that control autonomic, cognitive, affective, language, and visual functions. Heart failure subjects show reduced regional cortical thicknesses in sites that control autonomic, cognitive, affective, language, and visual functions that are deficient in the condition. The findings suggest chronic tissue alterations, with regional changes reflecting loss of neurons and glia, and presumably are related to earlier-described axonal changes. The pathological mechanisms contributing to reduced cortical thicknesses likely include hypoxia/ischemia, accompanying impaired cerebral perfusion from reduced cardiac output and sleep-disordered-breathing and other comorbidities in HF.

Severe helminth infections are negatively associated to allergic diseases like asthma; therefore, the immunomodulatory properties of parasite-derived components have been analyzed, raising the possibility of their use as anti-inflammatory molecules. We evaluated the immunomodulatory properties of recombinant cysteine protease inhibitor (rAl-CPI) in a mouse model of allergic airway inflammation induced by the house dust mite (HDM) and its effects on human monocyte-derived dendritic cells (HmoDCs). The sensitized/challenged mice developed extensive cellular airway inflammatory response, which was significantly reduced upon treatment with rAl-CPI prior to sensitization, affecting particularly the perivascular/peribronchial infiltrate cells, eosinophils/neutrophils, and goblet cells. A significant decrease of Th2 cytokines, total, and specific IgE antibodies was observed in rAl-CPI treated mice. The antibody response was biased to IgG, mainly IgG2a. Administration of rAl-CPI-alone and rAl-CPI before mite sensitization were associated with a significant increase of regulatory T cells (Tregs) in spleen and elevated IL-10 levels in BAL and splenocytes culture supernatants, which was partially affected by anti-IL10 receptor use. , rAl-CPI showed a modulatory effect on HmoDCs, lowering the expression of HLA-DR, CD83, and CD86, while inducing IL-10 and IL-6 production. This suggests an inhibition of HmoDC maturation and a possible link with the inhibition of the allergic response observed in the murine model.

Introduction Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) subjects show impaired autonomic, affective, executive, sensorimotor, and cognitive functions. Brain injury in OSA subjects appears in multiple sites regulating these functions, but the integrity of functional networks within the regulatory sites remains unclear. Our aim was to examine the functional interactions and the complex network organization of these interactions across the whole brain in OSA, using regional functional connectivity (FC) and brain network topological properties. Methods We collected resting‐state functional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) data, using a 3.0‐Tesla MRI scanner, from 69 newly diagnosed, treatment‐naïve, moderate‐to‐severe OSA (age, 48.3 ± 9.2 years; body mass index, 31 ± 6.2 kg/m2; apnea–hypopnea index (AHI), 35.6 ± 23.3 events/h) and 82 control subjects (47.6 ± 9.1 years; body mass index, 25.1 ± 3.5 kg/m2). Data were analyzed to examine FC in OSA over controls as interregional correlations and brain network topological properties. Results Obstructive sleep apnea subjects showed significantly altered FC in the cerebellar, frontal, parietal, temporal, occipital, limbic, and basal ganglia regions (FDR, P < 0.05). Entire functional brain networks in OSA subjects showed significantly less efficient integration, and their regional topological properties of functional integration and specialization characteristics also showed declined trends in areas showing altered FC, an outcome which would interfere with brain network organization (P < 0.05; 10,000 permutations). Brain sites with abnormal topological properties in OSA showed significant relationships with AHI scores. Conclusions Our findings suggest that the dysfunction extends to resting conditions, and the altered FC and impaired network organization may underlie the impaired responses in autonomic, cognitive, and sensorimotor functions. The outcomes likely result from the prominent structural changes in both axons and nuclear structures, which occur in the condition. This study is aimed to examine resting functional interactions and the complex network organization of these interactions across the whole brain in 69 obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) subjects, relative to 82 control subjects. OSA subjects showed significantly altered functional connectivity in various brain regions regulating autonomic, affective, executive, sensorimotor, and cognitive functions and entire functional brain network in OSA emerged significantly less efficient integration. Previous studies in OSA showed altered functional responses to evoked autonomic, motor, or ventilatory challenges; the findings here suggest that the dysfunction extends to resting conditions, and the altered connectivity and impaired network organization may underlie the impaired responses in cognitive, autonomic, and sensorimotor functions.