Background
Cannabis use is increasing among Andalusian adolescents, causing health, social and financial problems. School nurses visit schools and provide health promotion to adolescents in ...Andalusia. In order to better tailor health promotion programs, it is important to understand the sociodemographic and motivational factors related to cannabis use in Andalusian adolescents.
Design/Methods
In this cross‐sectional study, 369 students (aged 15–18 years) from secondary schools in Andalusia were involved. An anonymous questionnaire based on the I‐Change Model was self‐administered during school hours. Cannabis users were compared with non‐cannabis users regarding sociodemographic and motivational factors. Contingency tables, mean comparison tests, and logistic regression analyses were conducted.
Results
The prevalence of cannabis use in the last year was 21.6%. Non‐cannabis users had a few positive beliefs toward cannabis use (e.g. the ability to relax or medical benefits), as well as users. Users recognized some disadvantages of cannabis use but played down their importance and mentioned more advantages. Moreover, social influence, especially from peers, plays a critical role in cannabis use. Specific social situations and moods seemed to be special risk factors for cannabis use, such as being at a celebration or feeling good. Results of regression analysis showed that cannabis use is mainly associated with age, low family function, low family affluence, high pocket money, perceiving few disadvantages of cannabis use, much social modeling of cannabis use, social norm and pressure favoring cannabis, low self‐efficacy to resist using cannabis and positive intentions to use cannabis.
Conclusions
Based on our results, prevention programmes lead by nurses can be tailored to the factors important to prevent cannabis use, focusing on outlining the disadvantages of cannabis use, alternatives for using cannabis when feeling good, increasing salience of healthy social influences and reinforcing self‐efficacy to resist temptations to use cannabis are recommended.
Clinical Relevance
Nurses need to know the sociodemographic factors and motivations associated with the use of cannabis in adolescents in order to establish effective preventive interventions at school.
A systematic review was performed to summarize the key findings of the peer influence on cannabis use through Social Network Analysis (SNA) studies and identify limitations and gaps with the purpose ...of informing future research and practice. Longitudinal studies were included since they provide robust information about social relationships change over time.
Adolescents' cannabis use is a global problem, which has awakened an interest in its determinants such as social influences. Research has shown the importance of these influences on cannabis uptake and use. SNA is an useful relational approach to examine socialization mechanisms related to the onset of cannabis use in adolescents.
A search was conducted in PyscINFO, PubMed, Scopus and Web of Science for longitudinal articles published until February 2023, to examine cannabis use and peer's social networks. We focus on peers' influence of peers on cannabis use. Additionally, information about effect of cannabis use for peer selection was collected.
The results of the included studies (
= 8) showed that friends' cannabis use was most often/strongly associated with cannabis use. There was also an increase of cannabis use when the adolescent did not feel close to the school's peers, had a higher proportion of friendships relative to the total number of ties in the neighborhood, had a central position, did not belong to any group but had ties to members of two or more groups, had cannabis user friends (especially in early ages), and lived in a neighborhood where cannabis was used.
Cannabis use is mainly related to friends' use. Yet, future studies are warranted to control for relevant selection effects to further knowledge on network effects on cannabis use, improving the design, and improving the modeling of the network. This systematic review may inform about the critical aspects of preventing cannabis use among adolescents, taking into consideration their complex social environment.
To learn about the experiences and opinions of adolescent non-consumers and regular cannabis users about cannabis use and the factors that determine its use, using the I-Change explanatory model as a ...basis.
Qualitative methodology with a content analysis was used. Focus groups were conducted with adolescents who were non-regular cannabis users (those who had not tried cannabis or had only experimented with it before) and semi-structured interviews were conducted with adolescent and young adult in recovery who were in a detoxification program. A deductive analysis of the audio-recorded and transcribed interviews was performed, using the domains of the I-Change Model as a reference.
Personal problems, social problems or family problems can lead to cannabis use. There was a lack of knowledge and low risk perception about consumption of this drug. There are other factors that influence consumption, the perception of advantages, such as the feeling of freedom and the influence of the peer group. The consumption of this substance in girls is changing, becoming more and more equal to that of boys. The family has an important role to play in preventing drug use.
Knowledge of these factors is of vital importance as a prior step to the development of efficient intervention measures adjusted to the needs identified and the characteristics of the population.
Objectives: This study assessed potential differences between girls and boys in the prevalence rates of cannabis use, sociodemographic factors, and beliefs about cannabis use. Methods: 1,896 ...Andalusian adolescents aged 14–18 participated in an online survey based on the I-Change model. The survey assessed their beliefs about cannabis use, including attitudes, social influences, self-efficacy, action planning, and intention to use. Multivariate analyses of variance were then conducted to examine potential gender differences in these beliefs, while controlling for last month’s cannabis use. Results: Significantly more boys used cannabis in the last month, had boyfriends/girlfriends, and had more pocket money compared to girls. Additionally, girls – in comparison to boys - were more convinced of the disadvantages of cannabis use, but were also more convinced of some of the advantages (such as freedom from boredom, and medicinal use), reported having less favorable social norms for cannabis use, had more female best friends using cannabis, and felt pressure to use cannabis from their female peers. Conclusion: These findings highlight the need for cannabis prevention programs to consider gender differences in beliefs about cannabis use. Programs should not only address general risk factors for cannabis use but also evaluate if their interventions effectively target beliefs that are particularly important for girls and boys.
The Saladas de Sástago-Bujaraloz is an endorheic and arheic complex of lagoons located in the Ebro Basin and protected by the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands. Due to the semi-arid climate of the region ...and the high salinity of their waters, these lagoons constitute an extreme environment. We surveyed the biodiversity of salt-tolerant and halophilic fungi residents of the Laguna de Pito, a lagoon belonging to this complex. Therefore, we collected several samples of water, sediments, and soil of the periphery. Throughout the study, we isolated 21 fungal species, including a strain morphologically related to the family
. However, this strain did not morphologically match any of genera within this family. After an in-depth morphological characterization and phylogenetic analysis using a concatenated sequence dataset of four phylogenetically informative molecular markers (the internal transcribed spacer region (ITS) of the nuclear ribosomal DNA (nrDNA); the D1-D2 domains of the 28S gene of the nuclear ribosomal RNA (LSU); and a fragment of the translation elongation factor 1-alpha (
) and the β-tubulin (
2) genes), we established the new genus
, with
as its species. Additionally, as a result of our taxonomic study, we reclassified the paraphyletic genus
into three different genera:
,
gen. nov., and
gen. nov., with
(formerly
) and
(formerly
) as the type species of their respective genera. Furthermore, we propose new combinations, including
(formerly
) and
(formerly
).
Small-cell lung cancer (SCLC) is an aggressive disease with high metastatic potential and poor prognosis. Due to its low prevalence, epidemiological and clinical information of SCLC patients ...retrieved from lung cancer registries is scarce. This was an observational multicenter study that enrolled patients with lung cancer and thoracic tumors, recruited from August 2016 to January 2020 at 50 Spanish hospitals. Demographic and clinical data, treatment patterns and survival of SCLC patients included in the Thoracic Tumor Registry (TTR) were analyzed. With a total of 956 cases, the age of 64.7 ± 9.1 years, 78.6% were men, 60.6% smokers, and ECOG PS 0, 1 or greater than or equal to 2 in 23.1%, 53.0% and 23.8% of cases, respectively. Twenty percent of patients had brain metastases at the diagnosis. First-line chemotherapy (CT), mainly carboplatin or cisplatin plus etoposide was administered to >90% of patients. In total, 36.0% and 13.8% of patients received a second and third line of CT, respectively. Median overall survival was 9.5 months (95% CI 8.8-10.2 months), with an estimated rate of 70.3% (95% CI 67.2-73.4%), 38.9% (95% CI 35.4-42.4%), and 14.8% (95% CI 11.8-17.8%) at 6, 12 and 24 months respectively. Median progression-free survival was 6.3 months. Higher mortality and progression rates were significantly associated with male sex, older age, smoking habit, and ECOG PS 1-2. Long-term survival (> 2 years) was confirmed in 6.6% of patients, showing a positive correlation with better ECOG PS, poor smoking and absence of certain metastases at diagnosis. This study provides an updated overview of the clinical situation and treatment landscape of ES-SCLC in Spain. Our results might assist oncologists to improve current clinical practice towards a better prognosis for these patients.
Background The survival of patients with lung cancer has substantially increased in the last decade by about 15%. This increase is, basically, due to targeted therapies available for advanced stages ...and the emergence of immunotherapy itself. This work aims to study the situation of biomarker testing in Spain. Patients and methods The Thoracic Tumours Registry (TTR) is an observational, prospective, registry-based study that included patients diagnosed with lung cancer and other thoracic tumours, from September 2016 to 2020. This TTR study was sponsored by the Spanish Lung Cancer Group (GECP) Foundation, an independent, scientific, multidisciplinary oncology society that coordinates more than 550 experts and 182 hospitals across the Spanish territory. Results Nine thousand two hundred thirty-nine patients diagnosed with stage IV non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) between 2106 and 2020 were analysed. 7,467 (80.8%) were non-squamous and 1,772 (19.2%) were squamous. Tumour marker testing was performed in 85.0% of patients with non-squamous tumours vs 56.3% in those with squamous tumours (p-value < 0.001). The global testing of EGFR, ALK, and ROS1 was 78.9, 64.7, 35.6% respectively, in non-squamous histology. PDL1 was determined globally in the same period (46.9%), although if we focus on the last 3 years it exceeds 85%. There has been a significant increase in the last few years of all determinations and there are even close to 10% of molecular determinations that do not yet have targeted drug approval but will have it in the near future. 4,115 cases had a positive result (44.5%) for either EGFR, ALK, KRAS, BRAF, ROS1, or high PDL1. Conclusions Despite the lack of a national project and standard protocol in Spain that regulates the determination of biomarkers, the situation is similar to other European countries. Given the growing number of different determinations and their high positivity, national strategies are urgently needed to implement next-generation sequencing (NGS) in an integrated and cost-effective way in lung cancer. Keywords: Biomarkers, Testing, Metastatic lung cancer, Targeted therapies
Plasma samples from 72 EGFR‐mutant advanced NSCLC patients, collected upon progression to first‐line TKI, were analyzed by seven methodologies (two NGS‐based methods, three high‐sensitivity PCR‐based ...platforms, and two FDA‐approved methods). Our study demonstrates a good to excellent agreement between methodologies and supports the use of liquid biopsies for therapy decision‐making.
Several platforms for noninvasive EGFR testing are currently used in the clinical setting with sensitivities ranging from 30% to 100%. Prospective studies evaluating agreement and sources for discordant results remain lacking. Herein, seven methodologies including two next‐generation sequencing (NGS)‐based methods, three high‐sensitivity PCR‐based platforms, and two FDA‐approved methods were compared using 72 plasma samples, from EGFR‐mutant non‐small‐cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients progressing on a first‐line tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI). NGS platforms as well as high‐sensitivity PCR‐based methodologies showed excellent agreement for EGFR‐sensitizing mutations (K = 0.80–0.89) and substantial agreement for T790M testing (K = 0.77 and 0.68, respectively). Mutant allele frequencies (MAFs) obtained by different quantitative methods showed an excellent reproducibility (intraclass correlation coefficients 0.86–0.98). Among other technical factors, discordant calls mostly occurred at mutant allele frequencies (MAFs) ≤ 0.5%. Agreement significantly improved when discarding samples with MAF ≤ 0.5%. EGFR mutations were detected at significantly lower MAFs in patients with brain metastases, suggesting that these patients risk for a false‐positive result. Our results support the use of liquid biopsies for noninvasive EGFR testing and highlight the need to systematically report MAFs.
The present work reviews the role of biogas as advanced biofuel in the renewable energy system, summarizing the main raw materials used for biogas production and the most common technologies for ...biogas upgrading and delving into emerging biological methanation processes. In addition, it provides a description of current European legislative framework and the potential biomethane business models as well as the main biogas production issues to be addressed to fully deploy these upgrading technologies. Biomethane could be competitive due to negative or zero waste feedstock prices, and competitive to fossil fuels in the transport sector and power generation if upgrading technologies become cheaper and environmentally sustainable.
Diesel is a complex pollutant composed of a mixture of aliphatic and aromatic hydrocarbons. Because of this complexity, diesel bioremediation requires multiple microorganisms, which harbor the ...catabolic pathways to degrade the mixture. By enrichment cultivation of rhizospheric soil from a diesel-polluted site, we have isolated a bacterial consortium that can grow aerobically with diesel and different alkanes and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) as the sole carbon and energy source. Microbiome diversity analyses based on 16S rRNA gene showed that the diesel-degrading consortium consists of 76 amplicon sequence variants (ASVs) and it is dominated by
,
,
, and
Changes in microbiome composition were observed when growing on specific hydrocarbons, reflecting that different populations degrade different hydrocarbons. Shotgun metagenome sequence analysis of the consortium growing on diesel has identified redundant genes encoding enzymes implicated in the initial oxidation of alkanes (AlkB, LadA, CYP450) and a variety of hydroxylating and ring-cleavage dioxygenases involved in aromatic and polyaromatic hydrocarbon degradation. The phylogenetic assignment of these enzymes to specific genera allowed us to model the role of specific populations in the diesel-degrading consortium. Rhizoremediation of diesel-polluted soil microcosms using the consortium, resulted in an important enhancement in the reduction of total petroleum hydrocarbons (TPHs), making it suited for rhizoremediation applications.
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