Clinical trials

Fibres found in food are mainly carbohydrates that are not broken down or absorbed during human digestion but instead pass to the colon to be fermented by microbes. Gases produced during bacterial fermentation (hydrogen, methane, and carbon dioxide), can cause unpleasant gastrointestinal symptoms in some individuals, such as bloating, flatulence, and stomach pain. Gas production varies between individuals and is influenced by the chemical structure of dietary fibres, the gut microbes' ability to ferment fibre, intestinal pH, and the transit time of intestinal contents. This randomized clinical trial in healthy adults will investigate how individual variations in the microbiome influence the level of gastrointestinal (GI) symptoms induced by different fibre types during short-term exposure.

The goal of this study is to investigate whether a shared reading intervention including emotion and mind-related dialogues (SAGA for Toddlers) supports the development of 11 to 36 moth-old-children in early childhood education and care. The main questions it aims to answer are: 1. Does the SAGA model support children's social-emotional development? 2. Does the SAGA model support children's language development? The participating children will attend the intervention at the early childhood education and care. The participating personnel at the early childhood education and care will receive training, implement the intervention, and answer questionnaires. The participating caregivers will attend caregiver-evenings and answers questionnaires.

The study aims to explore how an open bite malocclusion affects daily life of an individual, is its orthodontic treatment effective, and what kind of burden of care the treatment has caused.

The goal of this prospective, observational clinical cohort study is to study the effect of the preoperative condition of the tooth on the outcome of partial removal of carious tissue in mature teeth in adults. The main questions the study aims to answer are: * Do preoperative symptoms affect the outcome? * Does the depth of the carious lesion affect the outcome? One hundred participants will be recruited. Patients who meet the eligibility criteria will be asked to give their informed consent to participate in the study. Partial carious tissue removal will be performed regardless of participation in the study because selective carious tissue removal is the standard treatment of choice for a vital tooth with a deep carious lesion according to the Finnish national treatment guidelines. Participants will be asked to fill in a questionnaire regarding symptoms 7 days post-treatment. The teeth will then be followed up for 12-24 months. The null hypothesis is that there is no difference in the success between i) deep and extremely deep carious lesions and ii) initial and mild pulpitis.

The goal of this clinical trial is to test the ability of different bacterial products in restoring natural gut microbiota in C-section born infants. The main question it aims to answer is: Do maternally derived strains of bacteria perform better than commercially available probiotic strains in restoring the gut microbiota of C-section born infants? Researchers will compare the gut microbiota of treated infants to that of untreated C-section born infants and untreated vaginally born infants to see if the bacterial treatments cause the microbiota to resemble that of vaginally born infants. Participants will be given a bacterial product orally once daily for either one or four weeks and be asked to collect faecal, urine and saliva samples.

The goal of this trial is to learn if the Groups 4 Health (G4H) intervention is effective in supporting student well-being at the University of Helsinki. It will also learn about the factors that may influence the efficacy of the intervention (such as facilitators characteristics, stress physiology and changes in gene expression). The main questions it aims to answer are: 1. Is the G4H intervention effective and cost-effective in supporting student well-being? 2. To what extent participants' physiological, hormonal, or molecular characteristics mediate the therapeutic effect of the G4H 3. To what extent participants' genotype moderates the effect of the G4H 4. To what extent facilitators' characteristics mediate or moderate the effect of the G4H Data is collected from both the intervention participants and the facilitators. The G4H facilitators will: * Facilitate the G4H intervention. * Fill in questionnaires and provide physiological and molecular measurements before, during, and after the G4H intervention. The G4H participants will: * Participate in the G4H intervention. * Fill in questionnaires and provide physiological, hormonal and molecular measurements before, during, and after the G4H intervention.

The goal of this intervention is to investigate whether transcranial Direct Current Stimulation (tDCS) can alleviate Cancer-Related Cognitive Impairment (CRCI) in breast cancer survivors, as measured by changes in brain structures and cognitive performance. To assess the efficacy of tDCS, the investigators will compare outcomes between participants receiving active stimulation and those receiving sham stimulation (a placebo condition where participants believe they are receiving stimulation, but are not). Participants will: * Undergo a baseline MRI session * Receive either active or sham tDCS for six weeks * Undergo a follow-up MRI session * Complete cognitive tests and respond to psychosocial questionnaires before, during, and after the tDCS intervention

This study evaluates the applicability and clinical efficacy of conventional music therapy and digital music rehabilitation for dementia in home and care home settings.

Summaries are in Finnish for attendees are availabe and reviewed in ethical approcval process

With an ageing population, the number of patients with heart failure with preserved ejection fraction (HFpEF) or diastolic heart failure is increasing rapidly. This condition is associated with significantly increased morbidity and mortality, but effective treatment options that improve prognosis are very limited. Further understanding of the nature and determinants of this disease is needed to develop better treatments of HFpEF and to improve the prognosis and quality of life of these patients. This study will collect a comprehensive, prospective dataset of patients with HFpEF and determine which factors influence the prognosis of this patient group. The specific aim is to create an accurate description of the spectrum and subtypes of HFpEF enabling better tools to plan and implement individualised treatment for patients. The main objectives of the study are: * to describe and categorize the phenotype of HFpEF patients (deep phenotyping) using the latest biochemical, functional and imaging techniques * identifying factors affecting prognosis and potential new prognostic markers * prospective follow-up of a contemproary cohort of HFpEF patients to assess outcomes, such as hospitalisations for heart failure, mortality, and quality of life * identification of specific or aberrant HFpEF phenotypes for genetic studies. Target population: * Patients (minimum18 years old) with hospitalization for heart failure (1' or 2' cause for hospitalization) or outpatients with heart failure AND * Left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) \>40% within 12 months prior to or during index hospitalization (assessed by ECHO, MRI, LV-cineangiography or radionuclide imaging) AND * Elevated BNP/NTproBNP AND * Impaired myocardial relaxation (diastolic dysfunction) assessed by tissue doppler imaging (TDI) velocities on ECHO: lateral mitral annulus velocity (lat E') \>9cm/s or septal annulus velocity (sept E') \>8 cm/s * Both de-novo HF and patients with previously diagnosed HF will be eligible The study prospective, observational study is carried out at Helsinki and Uusimaa Hospital District (HUS).

The goal of this clinical trial is to compare the efficacy of adjuvant therapies in women with stage I-II molecular integrated high-intermediate or high-risk endometrial carcinoma. Specifically, the invesigators want to compare: * Chemotherapy vs. chemoradiotherapy in p53 abn subtype and nonendometrioid carcinomas. * Vaginal brachytherapy vs. whole pelvic radiotherapy in the MMR-D molecular subgroup. * Vaginal brachytherapy vs. whole pelvic radiotherapy in the NSMP molecular subgroup.

The psychological, social, and health consequences of psychological ill-being, particularly loneliness, are well-documented among students, which underlines the importance of providing adequate support. Groups 4 Health (G4H) is a promising psychosocial group intervention focused on improving well-being by supporting social connectedness and belonging. In earlier Australian studies G4H has decreased loneliness and social anxiety and increased group memberships significantly more than treatment as usual. When compared to cognitive behavioral therapy G4H has showed continued reduction in the participants' loneliness at the end of the intervention period and in the follow-up. Research on the G4H intervention's effectiveness outside Australia and research on the intervention's cost-effectiveness is lacking. Therefore, this clinical study investigates the feasibility, effectiveness, and cost-effectiveness of the G4H among the University of Helsinki students in Finland. The effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of the G4H will be compared to two other active intervention groups: the well-being groups facilitated by the study psychologists at the University of Helsinki and an online course for students' well-being. Effectiveness will also be compared to students who do not participate in any well-being courses or interventions. The investigators hypothesize that all the active intervention groups promote student well-being. Questionnaires and University of Helsinki registry data will be gathered before and after the interventions to evaluate the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of the interventions. The factors that influence the intervention's effectiveness and cost-effectiveness will also be studied. In addition to these research questions, qualitative methods are used to explore the challenges and possibilities identified in the G4H-intervention regarding inclusion and equality.

This is an observational substudy embedded in the STEPCARE Trial. The study involves EEG analysis, covered by the ethics approval of STEPCARE Trial. The investigators aim to compare the accuracy of a continuously measured algorithm-based EEG index, C-Trend Index, with retrospective visual analysis of continuous EEG in predicting favorable functional outcome in adult patients treated in intensive care units after out-of-hospital cardiac arrest. The primary hypothesis is that the accuracy of C-Trend Index has at least 10% better accuracy in predicting favorable outcome than the visual analysis of cEEG, when assessed early, 9-12 hours after return of spontaneous circulation (ROSC).

The purpose of this study is to examine the impact and cost effectiveness of a workplace-based intervention aimed at reducing prolonged occupational sitting among office-based workers. The study will be conducted in three phases. Phase I: is an Integrative review on economic evaluations of workplace-based interventions for reducing occupational sitting time. Phase II: is a secondary analysis of register data within the Northern Finland Birth Cohort 1966 (NFBC-1966). This is aimed at evaluating the association between prolonged sitting time with societal and/or organization economic perspective across different occupational categories at midlife. Phase III will be a Randomized Control Trial (RCT) of an office-based intervention designed to reduce prolonged occupational sitting time. The sample for the RCT will be 140 office-based workers - 70 participants will be enrolled in the control group whilst 70 participants will be enrolled within the intervention group. The study will be conducted from 2021 to 2025. An article-based dissertation will be completed at the end of the study, this will be mainly based on four articles that will be published in international peer reviewed journals.

The overall aim is to identify effective therapeutic strategies to ovarian cancer (OC) using serial tumor, ascites and blood samples, and carry out state-of-the-art sequencing approaches, functional assays and associated bioinformatics to understand mechanisms behind chemoresistance in OC and identify new treatment options for OC patients. In this observational trial, we will systematically collect, analyze and interpret functional, molecular and clinical data from real-world ovarian cancer patients.