Dietary fiber is of paramount importance in the prevention of large-bowel diseases, yet fiber intake in many high income countries is well below daily recommendations. Vegetarian diets high in ...fiber-rich plant-foods have been associated with a higher frequency of bowel movements and softer stools. Thus, vegetarians appear to suffer less frequently from constipation and other bowel disorders. The number of studies investigating these associations, however, is limited. The present study sought to investigate bowel health and constipation prevalence in a self-identified vegetarian population from the U.S. National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (2007−2010). Bowel health assessment included Bristol Stool Scale (BSS), Bowel Movement (BM) frequency and Fecal Incontinence Severity Index (FISI). The present study included 9531 non-vegetarians and 212 vegetarians. We found no associations between vegetarian status and all examined bowel health items (BM frequency, BSS and FISI). Vegetarians consumed significantly more fiber than omnivores (21.33 vs. 16.43 g/d, p < 0.001) but had a lower moisture intake (2811.15 vs. 3042.78 g/d, p = 0.045). The lack of an association of vegetarian status and bowel health is surprising, and may be a result of the relatively low fiber intake in this particular vegetarian cohort, which did not meet the daily fiber recommendations.
As the number of subjects choosing vegan diets increases, healthcare providers must be prepared to give the best advice to vegan patients during all stages of life. A completely plant-based diet is ...suitable during pregnancy, lactation, infancy, and childhood, provided that it is well-planned. Balanced vegan diets meet energy requirements on a wide variety of plant foods and pay attention to some nutrients that may be critical, such as protein, fiber, omega-3 fatty acids, iron, zinc, iodine, calcium, vitamin D, and vitamin B12. This paper contains recommendations made by a panel of experts from the Scientific Society for Vegetarian Nutrition (SSNV) after examining the available literature concerning vegan diets during pregnancy, breastfeeding, infancy, and childhood. All healthcare professionals should follow an approach based on the available evidence in regard to the issue of vegan diets, as failing to do so may compromise the nutritional status of vegan patients in these delicate periods of life.
Recently, there has been a renewed interest in Cannabis sativa and its uses. The recreational use of inflorescences as a source of THC has led to the legal restriction of C. sativa cultivation to ...limit the detrimental effects of psychotropic substance abuse on health. However, this has also limited the cultivation of textile/industrial varieties with a low content of THC used for textile and nutritional purposes. While previously the bans had significantly penalized the cultivation of C. sativa, today many countries discriminate between recreational use (marijuana) and industrial and food use (hemp). The stalks of industrial hemp (low in psychotropic substances) have been used extensively for textile purposes while the seeds are nutritionally versatile. From hemp seeds, it is possible to obtain flours applicable in the bakery sector, oils rich in essential fatty acids, proteins with a high biological value and derivatives for fortification, supplementation and nutraceutical purposes. Hemp seed properties seem relevant for vegetarian diets, due to their high nutritional value and underestimated employment in the food sector. Hemp seed and their derivatives are a valuable source of protein, essential fatty acids and minerals that could provide additional benefit to vegetarian nutrition. This document aims to explore the information available in the literature about hemp seeds from a nutritional point of view, highlighting possible beneficial effects for humans with particular attention to vegetarian nutrition as a supplemental option for a well-planned diet.
The introduction of lockdowns and other containment measures during the COVID-19 pandemic substantially altered people's lifestyle and dietary behavior. Several studies evaluated the short-term ...effects of these measures; yet reports on long-term consequences are scarce. We sought to address this gap in the literature by analyzing dietary and lifestyle data collected at an obesity center in Rome, Italy. The Italian region of Lazio was hit hard by the pandemic. To evaluate the potential health impacts, we compared the pre- and post-lockdown data of 118 individuals. Contrary to the common belief that lockdown had adverse effects solely on people's dietary habits, we observed a significantly increased consumption of raw vegetables, whole grains, and water in our study sample. Favorable effects, however, were also accompanied by adverse trends, such as a higher prevalence of sleeping difficulties. Our data emphasize that the lockdowns associated with the pandemic also influenced participants' social behavior, with less individuals reporting eating out or in company. Our study highlights the substantial impact of lockdowns on many dimensions of life. As such, it is of utmost importance in the critical evaluation of such stringent containment measures.
To prospectively monitor the response in patients with locally advanced nonmucinous rectal cancer after chemoradiotherapy (CRT) using diffusion-weighted magnetic resonance imaging. The ...histopathologic finding was the reference standard.
The institutional review board approved the present study. A total of 62 patients (43 men and 19 women; mean age, 64 years; range, 28-83) provided informed consent. T(2)- and diffusion-weighted magnetic resonance imaging scans (b value, 0 and 1,000 mm(2)/s) were acquired before, during (mean 12 days), and 6-8 weeks after CRT. We compared the median apparent diffusion coefficients (ADCs) between responders and nonresponders and examined the associations with the Mandard tumor regression grade (TRG). The postoperative nodal status (ypN) was evaluated. The Mann-Whitney/Wilcoxon two-sample test was used to evaluate the relationships among the pretherapy ADCs, extramural vascular invasion, early percentage of increases in ADCs, and preoperative ADCs.
Low pretreatment ADCs (<1.0 × 10(-3)mm(2)/s) were correlated with TRG 4 scores (p = .0011) and associated to extramural vascular invasion with ypN+ (85.7% positive predictive value for ypN+). During treatment, the mean percentage of increase in tumor ADC was significantly greater in the responders than in the nonresponders (p < .0001) and a >23% ADC increase had a 96.3% negative predictive value for TRG 4. In 9 of 16 complete responders, CRT-related tumor downsizing prevented ADC evaluations. The preoperative ADCs were significantly different (p = .0012) between the patients with and without downstaging (preoperative ADC ≥1.4 × 10(-3)mm(2)/s showed a positive and negative predictive value of 78.9% and 61.8%, respectively, for response assessment). The TRG 1 and TRG 2-4 groups were not significantly different.
Diffusion-weighted magnetic resonance imaging seems to be a promising tool for monitoring the response to CRT.
Peroxisome proliferator-activated receptors (PPARs) have demonstrated a lot of important effects in the regulation of glucose and lipid metabolism and in the correct functioning of adipose tissue. ...Recently, many studies have evaluated a possible effect of PPARs on tumor cells. The purpose of this review is to describe the effects of PPARs, their action and their future prospective;
Narrative review aimed to synthesize cutting-edge evidence retrieved from searches of computerized databases;
PPARs play a key role in metabolic diseases, which include several cardiovascular diseases, insulin resistance, type 2 diabetes, metabolic syndrome, impaired immunity and the increasing risk of cancer; in particular, PPARα and PPARβ/δ mainly enable energy combustion, while PPARγ contributes to energy storage by enhancing adipogenesis;
PPAR agonists could represent interesting types of molecules that can treat not only metabolic diseases, but also inflammation and cancer. Additional research is needed for the identification of high-affinity, high-specificity agonists for the treatment of obesity, type 2 diabetes (T2DM) and other metabolic diseases. Further studies are needed also to elucidate the role of PPARs in cancer.
Traditionally, energy efficiency aspects have been included in the wireless access network design space only in the context of power control aimed at interference mitigation and for the increase of ...the terminal battery lifetime. Energy consumption of network components has also, for a long time, not been considered an issue, neither in equipment design nor in network planning and management. However, in recent years, with the user demand increasing at nearly exponential pace and margins rapidly shrinking, concerns about energy efficiency have been raised, with the objective of reducing network operational costs (not to mention the environmental issues). Installing more energy-efficient hardware does not seem to fully solve the problem, since wireless access networks are almost invariably (over)provisioned with respect to the peak user demand. This means that efficient resource management schemes, which are capable of controlling how much of the network infrastructure is actually needed and which parts can be temporarily powered off to save energy, can be extremely effective and provide quite large cost reductions. Considering that most of the energy in wireless access networks is consumed in the radio part, dynamic provisioning of wireless access network resources is crucial to achieving energy-efficient operation. The consensus on this approach in the research community has been wide in the last few years, and a large number of solutions have been proposed. In this paper, we survey the most important proposals, considering the two most common wireless access technologies, namely, cellular and WLAN. The main features of the proposed solutions are analyzed and compared, with an outlook on their applicability in typical network scenarios that also include cooperation between both access technologies. Moreover, we provide an overview of the practical implementation aspects that must be addressed to achieve truly energy-efficient wireless access networks, including current standardization work, and trends in the development of energy-efficient hardware.
Omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids and B vitamins are linked to metabolic and degenerative disorders, such as cardiovascular disease and cognitive decline. In the last two decades, the interplay ...between B vitamins and omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids gained increasing attention. Expression control on enzymes involved in the pathway of homocysteine by polyunsaturated fatty acids has been proposed. The methylation process seems crucial for the metabolism of polyunsaturated fatty acids and their distribution within the body. This review summarizes the available data in humans about the link between homocysteine and omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids, with a special focus on the meta-analyses of randomized clinical trials. Even if the paucity of available information about the topic does not allow for definitive conclusions, a synergic action between polyunsaturated fatty acids and B vitamins may play a key role in regulating several metabolic pathways. This element could explain a stronger action on homocysteine levels when omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids and B vitamins are supplemented simultaneously. To date, a robust rationale of intervention to prevent metabolic diseases is lacking and could be beneficial for individual health and healthcare policy.
Content dissemination in Vehicular Ad-hoc Networks (VANETs) has the potential to enable a myriad of applications, ranging from advertising, traffic and emergency warnings to infotainment. This ...variety in applications and services calls for mechanisms able to optimize content storing, retrieval and forwarding among vehicles, without jeopardizing network resources. Content Centric Networking (CCN), takes advantage of inherent content redundancy in the network in order to decrease the utilization of network resources, improve response time and content availability, coping efficiently with some of the effects of mobility. Floating Content (FC), on the other hand, holds potential to implement efficiently a large amount of vehicular applications thanks to its property of geographic content replication, while Software Defined Networking (SDN), is an attractive solution for the lack of flexibility and dynamic programmability that characterizes current VANET architectures. By implementing a logical centralization of the network, SDN enables dynamic and efficient management of network resources. In this paper, for a few reference scenarios, we illustrate how approaches that combine CCN, FC and SDN enable an innovative adaptive VANET architecture able to efficiently accommodate to intermittent connectivity, fluctuating node density and mobility patterns on one side and application performance and network resources on the other side, aiming to achieve high QoS. For each scenario, we highlight the main open research challenges, and we describe possible solutions to improve content dissemination and reduce replication without affecting content availability.
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