140 research outputs found

    Miten perusopetus tukee esimurrosikäisen lapsen kokonaisvaltaista kasvua ja kehitystä?

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    Tiivistelmä. Tässä kandidaatintutkielmassa tarkastellaan sitä, miten suomalainen perusopetusjärjestelmä tukee lapsen kokonaisvaltaista kasvua ja kehitystä esimurrosiässä. Esimurrosikää kehitysvaiheena on syytä tarkastella, sillä se tuo mukanaan suuria muutoksia lapsen persoonallisessa, älyllisessä, sosiaalisessa ja fyysisessä kehityksessä. Tutkielma on tutkimusotteeltaan laadullinen eli kvalitatiivinen. Tutkimusmetodeina on käytetty kuvailevaa kirjallisuuskatsausta sekä haastattelua. Kuvailevan kirjallisuuskatsauksen keinoin on muodostettu tutkielman aiheen kannalta keskeinen teoreettinen viitekehys. Haastattelemalla kasvatusalan ammattilaisia on puolestaan saatu selville tutkielman aiheeseen liittyviä keskeisiä käytännön näkökulmia. Tutkielman tuloksena saatiin selville, että perusopetuksella on lapsen esimurrosiässä tapahtuvan kasvun ja kehityksen kannalta merkittävä rooli. Perusopetuksen opetussuunnitelmassa esimurrosikä ei käsitteenä ilmene. Opetussuunnitelman tulkinnanvaraisuuden vuoksi esimurrosikään liittyvä kasvun ja kehityksen tuki toteutuu ensisijaisesti käytännön kasvatus- ja opetustyössä. Tutkielman luotettavuuden kannalta merkittävinä tekijöinä voidaan pitää vertaisarvioitua tutkimuskirjallisuutta sekä haastateltavien pedagogiseen ammattitaitoon pohjautuvaa haastatteluaineistoa. Tutkielma tarjoaa aiheesta kiinnostuneille katsauksen siitä, mitä esimurrosikä kehitysvaiheena pitää sisällään, ja miten se saattaa näkyä koulun arjessa

    An economic way of reducing health, environmental, and other pressures of urban traffic: a decision analysis on trip aggregation

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    BACKGROUND: Traffic congestion is rapidly becoming the most important obstacle to urban development. In addition, traffic creates major health, environmental, and economical problems. Nonetheless, automobiles are crucial for the functions of the modern society. Most proposals for sustainable traffic solutions face major political opposition, economical consequences, or technical problems. METHODS: We performed a decision analysis in a poorly studied area, trip aggregation, and studied decisions from the perspective of two different stakeholders, the passenger and society. We modelled the impact and potential of composite traffic, a hypothetical large-scale demand-responsive public transport system for the Helsinki metropolitan area, where a centralised system would collect the information on all trip demands online, would merge the trips with the same origin and destination into public vehicles with eight or four seats, and then would transmit the trip instructions to the passengers' mobile phones. RESULTS: We show here that in an urban area with one million inhabitants, trip aggregation could reduce the health, environmental, and other detrimental impacts of car traffic typically by 50–70%, and if implemented could attract about half of the car passengers, and within a broad operational range would require no public subsidies. CONCLUSION: Composite traffic provides new degrees of freedom in urban decision-making in identifying novel solutions to the problems of urban traffic

    Clinical course of untreated cervical intraepithelial neoplasia grade 2 under active surveillance : systematic review and meta-analysis

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    OBJECTIVE To estimate the regression, persistence, and progression of untreated cervical intraepithelial neoplasia grade 2 (CIN2) lesions managed conservatively as well as compliance with follow-up protocols. DESIGN Systematic review and meta-analysis. DATA SOURCES Medline, Embase, and the Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature (CINAHL) from 1 January 1973 to 20 August 2016. ELIGIBILITY CRITERIA Studies reporting on outcomes of histologically confirmed CIN2 in non-pregnant women, managed conservatively for three or more months. DATA SYNTHESIS Two reviewers extracted data and assessed risk of bias. Random effects model was used to calculate pooled proportions for each outcome, and heterogeneity was assessed using I-2 statistics. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES Rates of regression, persistence, or progression of CIN2 and default rates at different follow-up time points (3, 6, 12, 24, 36, and 60 months). RESULTS 36 studies that included 3160 women were identified (seven randomised trials, 16 prospective cohorts, and 13 retrospective cohorts; 50% of the studies were at low risk of bias). At 24 months, the pooled rates were 50% (11 studies, 819/1470 women, 95% confidence interval 43% to 57%; I-2= 77%) for regression, 32% (eight studies, 334/1257 women, 23% to 42%; I-2= 82%) for persistence, and 18% (nine studies, 282/1445 women, 11% to 27%; I-2= 90%) for progression. In a subgroup analysis including 1069 women aged less than 30 years, the rates were 60% (four studies, 638/1069 women, 57% to 63%; I-2= 0%), 23% (two studies, 226/938 women, 20% to 26%; I-2= 97%), and 11% (three studies, 163/1033 women, 5% to 19%; I-2= 67%), respectively. The rate of non-compliance (at six to 24 months of follow-up) in prospective studies was around 10%. CONCLUSIONS Most CIN2 lesions, particularly in young women (<30 years), regress spontaneously. Active surveillance, rather than immediate intervention, is therefore justified, especially among young women who are likely to adhere to monitoring.Peer reviewe

    Health impact assessment of particulate pollution in Tallinn using fine spatial resolution and modeling techniques

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    <p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Health impact assessments (HIA) use information on exposure, baseline mortality/morbidity and exposure-response functions from epidemiological studies in order to quantify the health impacts of existing situations and/or alternative scenarios. The aim of this study was to improve HIA methods for air pollution studies in situations where exposures can be estimated using GIS with high spatial resolution and dispersion modeling approaches.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Tallinn was divided into 84 sections according to neighborhoods, with a total population of approx. 390 000 persons. Actual baseline rates for total mortality and hospitalization with cardiovascular and respiratory diagnosis were identified. The exposure to fine particles (PM<sub>2.5</sub>) from local emissions was defined as the modeled annual levels. The model validation and morbidity assessment were based on 2006 PM<sub>10 </sub>or PM<sub>2.5 </sub>levels at 3 monitoring stations. The exposure-response coefficients used were for total mortality 6.2% (95% CI 1.6–11%) per 10 μg/m<sup>3 </sup>increase of annual mean PM<sub>2.5 </sub>concentration and for the assessment of respiratory and cardiovascular hospitalizations 1.14% (95% CI 0.62–1.67%) and 0.73% (95% CI 0.47–0.93%) per 10 μg/m<sup>3 </sup>increase of PM<sub>10</sub>. The direct costs related to morbidity were calculated according to hospital treatment expenses in 2005 and the cost of premature deaths using the concept of Value of Life Year (VOLY).</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The annual population-weighted-modeled exposure to locally emitted PM<sub>2.5 </sub>in Tallinn was 11.6 μg/m<sup>3</sup>. Our analysis showed that it corresponds to 296 (95% CI 76528) premature deaths resulting in 3859 (95% CI 10236636) Years of Life Lost (YLL) per year. The average decrease in life-expectancy at birth per resident of Tallinn was estimated to be 0.64 (95% CI 0.17–1.10) years. While in the polluted city centre this may reach 1.17 years, in the least polluted neighborhoods it remains between 0.1 and 0.3 years. When dividing the YLL by the number of premature deaths, the decrease in life expectancy among the actual cases is around 13 years. As for the morbidity, the short-term effects of air pollution were estimated to result in an additional 71 (95% CI 43–104) respiratory and 204 (95% CI 131–260) cardiovascular hospitalizations per year. The biggest external costs are related to the long-term effects on mortality: this is on average €150 (95% CI 40–260) million annually. In comparison, the costs of short-term air-pollution driven hospitalizations are small €0.3 (95% CI 0.2–0.4) million.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Sectioning the city for analysis and using GIS systems can help to improve the accuracy of air pollution health impact estimations, especially in study areas with poor air pollution monitoring data but available dispersion models.</p

    Parameter and model uncertainty in a life-table model for fine particles (PM2.5): a statistical modeling study

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    <p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>The estimation of health impacts involves often uncertain input variables and assumptions which have to be incorporated into the model structure. These uncertainties may have significant effects on the results obtained with model, and, thus, on decision making. Fine particles (PM<sub>2.5</sub>) are believed to cause major health impacts, and, consequently, uncertainties in their health impact assessment have clear relevance to policy-making. We studied the effects of various uncertain input variables by building a life-table model for fine particles.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Life-expectancy of the Helsinki metropolitan area population and the change in life-expectancy due to fine particle exposures were predicted using a life-table model. A number of parameter and model uncertainties were estimated. Sensitivity analysis for input variables was performed by calculating rank-order correlations between input and output variables. The studied model uncertainties were (i) plausibility of mortality outcomes and (ii) lag, and parameter uncertainties (iii) exposure-response coefficients for different mortality outcomes, and (iv) exposure estimates for different age groups. The monetary value of the years-of-life-lost and the relative importance of the uncertainties related to monetary valuation were predicted to compare the relative importance of the monetary valuation on the health effect uncertainties.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The magnitude of the health effects costs depended mostly on discount rate, exposure-response coefficient, and plausibility of the cardiopulmonary mortality. Other mortality outcomes (lung cancer, other non-accidental and infant mortality) and lag had only minor impact on the output. The results highlight the importance of the uncertainties associated with cardiopulmonary mortality in the fine particle impact assessment when compared with other uncertainties.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>When estimating life-expectancy, the estimates used for cardiopulmonary exposure-response coefficient, discount rate, and plausibility require careful assessment, while complicated lag estimates can be omitted without this having any major effect on the results.</p

    Cycling behaviour in 17 countries across 6 continents : levels of cycling, who cycles, for what purpose, and how far?

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    International comparisons of cycling behaviour have typically been limited to high-income countries and often limited to the prevalence of cycling, with lack of discussions on demographic and trip characteristics. We used a combination of city, regional, and national travel surveys from 17 countries across the six continents, ranging from years 2009 through 2019. We present a descriptive analysis of cycling behaviour including level of cycling, trip purpose and distance, and user demographics, at the city-level for 35 major cities (>1 million population) and in urbanised areas nationwide for 11 countries. The Netherlands, Japan and Germany are among the highest cycling countries and their cities among the highest cycling cities. In cities and countries with high cycling levels, cycling rates tend to be more equal between work and non-work trips, whereas in geographies with low cycling levels, cycling to work is higher than cycling for other trips. In terms of cycling distance, patterns in high- and low-cycling geographies are more similar. We found a strong positive association between the level of cycling and women’s representation among cyclists. In almost all geographies with cycling mode share greater than 7% women made as many cycle trips as men, and sometimes even greater. The share of cycling trips by women is much lower in geographies with cycling mode shares less than 7%. Among the geographies with higher levels of cycling, children (60 years) remain underrepresented in all geographies but have relatively better representation where levels of cycling are high. In low-cycling settings, females are underrepresented across all the age groups, and more so when older than 16 years. With increasing level of cycling, representation of females improves across all the age groups, and most significantly among children and older adults. Clustering the cities and countries into homogeneous cycling typologies reveals that high cycling levels always coincide with high representation of females and good representations of all age groups. In low-cycling settings, it is the reverse. We recommend that evaluations of cycling policies include usage by gender and age groups as benchmarks in addition to overall use. To achieve representation across different age and gender groups, making neighbourhoods cycling friendly and developing safer routes to school, should be equally high on the agenda as cycling corridors that often cater to commuting traffic

    Clinical course of untreated cervical intraepithelial neoplasia grade 2 under active surveillance: systematic review and meta-analysis

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    OBJECTIVETo estimate the regression, persistence, and progression of untreated cervical intraepithelial neoplasia grade 2 (CIN2) lesions managed conservatively as well as compliance with follow-up protocols.DESIGNSystematic review and meta-analysis.DATA SOURCESMedline, Embase, and the Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature (CINAHL) from 1 January 1973 to 20 August 2016.ELIGIBILITY CRITERIAStudies reporting on outcomes of histologically confirmed CIN2 in non-pregnant women, managed conservatively for three or more months.DATA SYNTHESISTwo reviewers extracted data and assessed risk of bias. Random effects model was used to calculate pooled proportions for each outcome, and heterogeneity was assessed using I-2 statistics.MAIN OUTCOME MEASURESRates of regression, persistence, or progression of CIN2 and default rates at different follow-up time points (3, 6, 12, 24, 36, and 60 months).RESULTS36 studies that included 3160 women were identified (seven randomised trials, 16 prospective cohorts, and 13 retrospective cohorts; 50% of the studies were at low risk of bias). At 24 months, the pooled rates were 50% (11 studies, 819/1470 women, 95% confidence interval 43% to 57%; I-2= 77%) for regression, 32% (eight studies, 334/1257 women, 23% to 42%; I-2= 82%) for persistence, and 18% (nine studies, 282/1445 women, 11% to 27%; I-2= 90%) for progression. In a subgroup analysis including 1069 women aged less than 30 years, the rates were 60% (four studies, 638/1069 women, 57% to 63%; I-2= 0%), 23% (two studies, 226/938 women, 20% to 26%; I-2= 97%), and 11% (three studies, 163/1033 women, 5% to 19%; I-2= 67%), respectively. The rate of non-compliance (at six to 24 months of follow-up) in prospective studies was around 10%.CONCLUSIONSMost CIN2 lesions, particularly in young women (< 30 years), regress spontaneously. Active surveillance, rather than immediate intervention, is therefore justified, especially among young women who are likely to adhere to monitoring.</p

    Study protocol of the European Urban Burden of Disease Project: a health impact assessment study

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    Introduction Cities have long been known to be society’s predominant engine of innovation and wealth creation, yet they are also hotspots of pollution and disease partly due to current urban and transport practices. The aim of the European Urban Burden of Disease project is to evaluate the health burden and its determinants related to current and future potential urban and transport planning practices and related exposures in European cities and make this evidence available for policy and decision making for healthy and sustainable futures. Methods and analysis Drawing on an established comparative risk assessment methodology (ie, Urban and Transport Planning Health Impact Assessment) tool), in nearly 1000 European cities we will (1) quantify the health impacts of current urban and transport planning related exposures (eg, air pollution, noise, excess heat, lack of green space) (2) and evaluate the relationship between current levels of exposure, health impacts and city characteristics (eg, size, density, design, mobility) (3) rank and compare the cities based on exposure levels and the health impacts, (4) in a number of selected cities assess in-depth the linkages between urban and transport planning, environment, physical activity and health, and model the health impacts of alternative and realistic urban and transport planning scenarios, and, finally, (5) construct a healthy city index and set up an effective knowledge translation hub to generate impact in society and policy. Ethics and dissemination All data to be used in the project are publicly available data and do not need ethics approval. We will request consent for personal data on opinions and views and create data agreements for those providing information on current and future urban and transport planning scenarios. For dissemination and to generate impact, we will create a knowledge translation hub with information tailored to various stakeholders

    Global Intraurban Intake Fractions for Primary Air Pollutants from Vehicles and Other Distributed Sources

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    We model intraurban intake fraction (iF) values for distributed ground-level emissions in all 3646 global cities with more than 100,000 inhabitants, encompassing a total population of 2.0 billion. For conserved primary pollutants, population-weighted median, mean, and interquartile range iF values are 26, 39, and 14-52 ppm, respectively, where 1 ppm signifies 1 g inhaled/t emitted. The global mean urban iF reported here is roughly twice as large as previous estimates for cities in the United States and Europe. Intake fractions vary among cities owing to differences in population size, population density, and meteorology. Sorting by size, population-weighted mean iF values are 65, 35, and 15 ppm, respectively, for cities with populations larger than 3, 0.6-3, and 0.1-0.6 million. The 20 worldwide megacities (each &gt;10 million people) have a population-weighted mean iF of 83 ppm. Mean intraurban iF values are greatest in Asia and lowest in land-rich high-income regions. Country-average iF values vary by a factor of 3 among the 10 nations with the largest urban populations
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