Tabernacles of the Spirit

In the classic tradition of the exploratory essay, George Gammack examines the theme of community in this paper. He details varied aspects of the creation of community among those who are retired, taking as its focus the Men’s Sheds movement. The paper explores the relationship between persons and community in later years, looking in particular at how those with a lifetime’s worth of skills and knowledge can continue to contribute to the life of a community. Along the way we are introduced to the work of authors such as Charles Taylor, Richard Niebuhr, Primo Levi, Seamus Heaney and Richard Sennett on the subject of work and what comes after it.Publisher PD

Cumulative incidence of atrial fibrillation or flutter rates in patients with periodontitis and in individuals without periodontitis.

Cumulative incidence of atrial fibrillation or flutter rates in patients with periodontitis and in individuals without periodontitis.</p

Risk of Atrial Fibrillation or Flutter Associated with Periodontitis: A Nationwide, Population-Based, Cohort Study

<div><p>Objective</p><p>To investigate the risk of atrial fibrillation or atrial flutter in patients with periodontitis (PD) in comparison with individuals without PD.</p><p>Methods</p><p>We used the 1999–2010 Taiwanese National Health Insurance Research Database to identify cases of PD in the year 2000 matching (1:1) with persons without PD during 1999–2000 according to sex and individual age as the control group. Using Cox proportional regression analysis adjusting for potential confounders, including age, sex, and comorbidities at baseline, and average annual number of ambulatory visits and dental scaling frequency during the follow-up period, we estimated hazard ratios (HRs) with 95% confidence intervals (CIs) to examine the risk of atrial fibrillation or flutter in PD patients in comparison with the control group. Subgroup analyses according to age, gender, or comorbidities were conducted to study the robustness of the association and investigate possible interaction effects.</p><p>Results</p><p>We enrolled 393,745 patients with PD and 393,745 non-PD individuals. The incidence rates of atrial fibrillation or flutter were 200 per 10⁵ years among the PD group and 181 per 10⁵ years in the non-PD group (incidence rate ratio, 1.10; 95% CI, 1.06–1.14). After adjusting for potential confounders, we found an increased risk of atrial fibrillation or flutter in the PD group compared with the non-PD group (HR, 1.31; 95% CI, 1.25–1.36). The greater risk of atrial fibrillation or flutter in the PD group remained significant across all disease subgroups except hyperthyroidism and sleep apnea.</p><p>Conclusion</p><p>The present study results indicate an increased risk of atrial fibrillation or flutter in patients with PD. Lack of individual information about alcohol consumption, obesity, and tobacco use was a major limitation.</p></div

Demographic data and clinical characteristics of the study subjects.

Demographic data and clinical characteristics of the study subjects.</p

Univariate and multivariate analyses of the risk of atrial fibrillation or flutter associated with each variable shown as hazard ratio with 95% confidence intervals.

<p>Univariate and multivariate analyses of the risk of atrial fibrillation or flutter associated with each variable shown as hazard ratio with 95% confidence intervals.</p

Risk of atrial fibrillation or flutter associated with periodontitis in the subgroups as stratified by other covariates.

<p>Adjusted variables included age, gender, average annual number of outpatient visits, and dental scaling frequency during the observation period and comorbidities.</p

Incidence rates of atrial fibrillation and flutter according to periodontitis status.

<p>Incidence rates of atrial fibrillation and flutter according to periodontitis status.</p

Demographic data and clinical characteristics of SLE patients with dilated cardiomyopathies (DCM) and valvular heart diseases (VHD).^a

<p>SLE: systemic lupus erythematosus; Nephritis was defined as persistent proteinuria (>0.5 g/24 hours) or pathological confirmation of renal biopsy specimens showing lupus nephritis; C3: complement 3; C4: complement 4; Anti-dsDNA: anti-double strand DNA antibody; SLEDAI: SLE disease activity index.</p>a<p>Data are presented as mean ±SD or number (percentage).</p>b<p>Include hydroxychloroquine, azathioprine, cyclophosphamide, mycophenolate mofetil or ciclosporine.</p><p>Demographic data and clinical characteristics of SLE patients with dilated cardiomyopathies (DCM) and valvular heart diseases (VHD).^{<a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0113889#nt102" target="_blank">a</a>}</p

Rheumatoid Arthritis Risk Associated with Periodontitis Exposure: A Nationwide, Population-Based Cohort Study

<div><p>Background</p><p>The risk of periodontitis (PD) is increased in the patient group of rheumatoid arthritis (RA). RA and PD also shared some pathological mechanism. The aim of this study is to investigate the risk of RA associated with PD exposure.</p><p>Methods and Findings</p><p>This study identified 3 mutually exclusive cohorts using the 1999–2010 Taiwanese National Health Insurance Research Database (NHIRD) to investigate the association between PD and the risk of incident RA. All patients with PD in 2000 were identified from the database of all enrollees as the PD cohort. From the representative database of 1,000,000 enrollees randomly selected in 2010 (LHID2010), individuals without any periodontal disease (PO) during 1999–2010 were selected as the non-PO cohort. Individuals who were not included in the non-PO cohort and received dental scaling (DS) no more than two times per year during 1999–2010 were selected as the DS cohort from LHID2010. Using cox proportional regression analysis, hazard ratios (HRs) with 95% confidence intervals (Cis) were calculated to quantify the association between PD exposure and RA development. In the three-group comparison using the non-PO cohort as reference, we found that the risk of RA was higher in the PD and DS cohorts (HRs, 1.89 and 1.43; 95% CIs, 1.56–2.29 and 1.09–1.87, respectively). For comparisons between two cohorts, the PD cohort had a higher risk of RA than the non-PO and DS cohorts (HRs, 1.91 and 1.35; 95% CIs, 1.57–2.30 and 1.09–1.67, respectively).</p><p>Conclusion</p><p>PD was associated with an increased risk of RA development.</p></div

The difference in the levels of IL-17, IL-6, IL-1β and TNF-α (A) between SLE patients with anti-B19-VP1u IgG [VP1u (+)] and without anti-B19-VP1u IgG [VP1u (−)], and (B) between SLE patients with anti-B19-NS1 IgG [NS1 (+)] and without anti-B19-NS1 IgG [NS1(−)].

<p>Data are presented as mean ± SEM. *<i>p</i><0.05, **<i>p</i><0.01, ***<i>p</i><0.005, versus SLE patients without anti-B19-VP1u IgG or anti-B19-NS1 IgG.</p