Participation in high school Physical Education (PE) contributes to the overall health of adolescents. However, many girls discontinue enrollment in PE as soon as the mandatory credits are met. ...Tailored PE courses designed to meet the needs and interests of girls may motivate them to continue participating in PE. This case study explored one girl’s story of her past experiences in PE, as well as her current experiences in a tailored elective PE course. We explored how this girl’s experiences with the course content, learning environment, and assessment affected her perceptions of PE. Findings emphasized the importance of variety within PE course content, a welcoming environment, fair and private assessment, and feelings of confidence, social safety, and competence for girls in PE.
Retrospective cohort.
To investigate the effects of lifetime exposure to commonly suspected risk factors on disc degeneration using magnetic resonance imaging, and to estimate the effects of these ...suspected risk factors relative to age and familial aggregation, reflecting genetic and shared environmental influences.
Structural and biochemical changes associated with disc degeneration are suspected as the underlying conditions of many back-related symptoms. Little is known about the determinants of disc degeneration.
Based on lifetime discordance in suspected environmental risk factors for disc degeneration, 115 male identical twin pairs were selected. An in-depth interview was conducted of occupational and leisure time physical loading, driving, and smoking. Disc degeneration was evaluated using observational and digital magnetic resonance imaging assessment methods.
Heavier lifetime occupational and leisure physical loading was associated with greater disc degeneration in the upper lumbar levels (P = 0.055 - 0.001), whereas sedentary work was associated with lesser degeneration (P = 0.006). These univariate associations did not reach statistical significance in the lower lumbar region. In multivariate analyses of the upper lumbar levels, the mean job code explained 7% of the variability in observational disc degeneration scores; the addition of age explained 16%, and familial aggregation improved the model such that 77% of the variability was explained. In the lower lumbar levels, leisure time physical loading entered the multivariate model, explaining 2% of the variability. Adding age explained 9%, and familial aggregation raised the variability in disc degeneration scores explained to 43%.
The present study findings suggest that disc degeneration may be explained primarily by genetic influences and by unidentified factors, which may include complex, unpredictable interactions. The particular environmental factors studied, which have been among those most widely suspected of accelerating disc degeneration, had very modest effects.
We identified the population of schizophrenic patients under 65 in a geographically defined area. The number using psychiatric services based on a new District General Hospital unit in the course of ...one year was 364, a prevalence of 2.2 per 1000 adult population. Half the patients lived in supportive private households, most often with spouses or mothers. More women than men married and retained supporters. Patients and their primary supporters were interviewed separately. The PSE Catego programme classed 47 per cent of patients as psychotic. Supporters reported disturbed behavior in 65 per cent of patients, and restricted social performance in 78 per cent. There was evidence of hardship (emotional and physical ill-health, problems with children) in 90 per cent of households. Supporters' subjective distress was directly related to the presence of psychosis and disturbed behaviour and inversely related to the duration of the illness. Drop-out and failure to take medication appeared to be causes of the relatively high prevalence of psychosis.
Before the recent implementation of the Hague Convention requirements on intercountry adoption in Guatemala, most children in the process of being adopted by foreign nationals were cared for by ...foster parents. In the present study, 16 Guatemalan foster parents were interviewed regarding their experiences with and attitudes toward international and domestic adoption and fostering. Although adoption was generally described in positive terms as a means to improve the child's future, respondents also emphasized the economic dimension of international adoption. Foster parents' views implied actions that are important for implementation of the Hague Convention requirements, including addressing poverty as the root cause of child relinquishment, reducing structural and attitudinal barriers to domestic adoption, and enlisting the aid of extended families in caring for children. With training and licensing, foster parents themselves might play a role in post-Hague procedures for providing families for children.
The COVID-19 (Coronavirus disease 2019) pandemic has caused an unprecedented strain on healthcare systems across the globe. Apart from being a major hurdle to delivery of basic healthcare services, ...this may be associated with potential harm for cancer patients. Usually being immunocompromised, cancer patients are at a higher risk of contracting the disease and with hospitals being a potential source of the infection, an urgent need to reorganise the structure of delivery of cancer care is essential. Cancer departments must balance patient care whilst also minimising transmission among patients and healthcare professionals. The Oxford Sarcoma Service was re-structured based on the guidelines issued by the National Health Service (NHS) and the British Orthopaedic Oncology Society (BOOS) to deliver unhindered care to patients. Prioritising patients who needed urgent surgery, weighing the risk-benefit ratio while delivering adjuvant treatments and conducting regular virtual multi-disciplinary team (MDT) meetings combined with personal protection equipment (PPE) usage by all involved healthcare workers were salient features in terms of ensuring the delivery of effective care during the COVID-19 pandemic. Our new model of modus operandi during this global crisis was effective in delivering high standard of care to patients and might serve as a guide to similar units managing bone and soft tissue tumours.
The patho-anatomy of patellofemoral subluxation Monk, A P; Doll, H A; Gibbons, C L M H ...
Journal of bone and joint surgery. British volume,
10/2011, Letnik:
93, Številka:
10
Journal Article
Patella subluxation assessed on dynamic MRI has previously been shown to be associated with anterior knee pain. In this MRI study of 60 patients we investigated the relationship between subluxation ...and multiple bony, cartilaginous and soft-tissue factors that might predispose to subluxation using discriminant function analysis. Patella engagement (% of patella cartilage overlapping with trochlea cartilage) had the strongest relationship with subluxation. Patellae with > 30% engagement tended not to sublux; those with < 30% tended to sublux. Other factors that were associated with subluxation included the tibial tubercle-trochlea notch distance, vastus medialis obliquus distance from patella, patella alta, and the bony and cartilaginous sulcus angles in the superior part of the trochlea. No relationship was found between subluxation and sulcus angles for cartilage and bone in the middle and lower part of the trochlea, cartilage thicknesses and Wiberg classification of the patella. This study indicates that patella engagement is a key factor associated with patellar subluxation. This suggests that in patients with anterior knee pain with subluxation, resistant to conservative management, surgery directed towards improving patella engagement should be considered. A clinical trial is necessary to test this hypothesis.
Objective: The relationship between breast cancer risk and residential proximity to paper mills, pulp mills, petroleum refineries, steel mills, thermal power plants, alum smelters, nickel smelters, ...lead smelters, copper smelters, and zinc smelters was assessed. Methods: We conducted a population-based case-control study of 2343 cases with breast cancer and 2467 controls using residential proximity at some time between 1960 and 5 years before the completion of questionnaire in Canada. Results: Adjusted odds ratios were statistically significantly increased for residing near steel mills (0.8 to 3.2 km) and thermal power plants (<0.8 km) in premenopausal women, petroleum refinery (0.8 to 3.2 km) and pulp mills (0.8 to 3.2 km) in postmenopausal women, and for 10 or more years of residing near thermal power plants of 0.8 km. Conclusions: Our preliminary results suggested possible weak associations between breast cancer and proximity to steel mills, pulp mills, petroleum refineries, and thermal power plants.
To determine the relation of age-related auditory processing dysfunction and executive functioning.
Central auditory dysfunction is common in Alzheimer dementia, but the mechanism is not established.
...A total of 313 volunteers from the Adult Changes in Thought surveillance cohort with adequate peripheral hearing were included in the study. Outcome measures such as (1) peripheral audition; (2) auditory-evoked potentials; (3) central auditory tests (Synthetic Sentence Identification with Ipsilateral Competing Message, Dichotic Sentence Identification, Dichotic Digits); (4) Executive Functioning: Trail Making; Clock Drawing, Stroop Color and Word, and subtests from the Cognitive Abilities Screening Instrument were used to measuring the mental concentration. A composite executive functioning score was created using item response theory.
The composite executive functioning score was significantly associated with each central auditory measure, explaining 8% to 21% of the variance. Trails B test was most strongly associated with the auditory outcomes, explaining 8% to 14% of the variance. The relation between executive functioning and central auditory function was still significant when participants diagnosed with memory impairment or dementia were excluded.
In elderly persons, reduced executive functioning is associated with central auditory processing, but not with primary auditory function. This suggests that central presbycusis and executive dysfunction may result from similar neurodegenerative processes.
B lymphocyte precursor cells are ultrasensitive to DNA damage induced by irradiation and drugs and die by apoptosis at very low levels of exposure. Previous studies have shown that this high level ...sensitivity is p53-dependent, associated with very low level expression of Bcl-2 protein and can be reversed by expression of a bcl-2 transgene. We show here that transition from the pro-B to pre-B and then mature B cell stages of murine lymphopoiesis is accompanied by changes in proliferating cells in sensitivity to X-irradiation induced apoptosis and that this is paralleled by variation in the ratio of anti-(Bcl-2/Bcl-chiL) to pro-(Bax) apoptotic proteins. These are however not fixed or invariant features of developmental stage as they can be modulated by interactions via adhesive interactions with stromal cells, stromal proteins and growth factors. We interpret these data in the context of the stringent developmental regulation of clonal lymphopoiesis and the contingency programming of cells that have extensive proliferative potential with a very low threshold for apoptosis following DNA damage.
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