Evaluation of food photographs assessing the dietary intake of children up to 10 years old

OBJECTIVE: Young children lack basic skills related to recognizing the types of foods they consume and dietary surveys often rely on parents' response. The present study aimed to evaluate how well parents of children aged from 3 months to 10 years perceive images of portions of foods commonly consumed by young children. DESIGN: Pre-weighed, actual food portions (n 2314) were shown to the study participants who were asked to indicate the picture that corresponded to the food in view. Mean differences between picture numbers selected and shown were estimated and compared using unpaired t tests or Tukey-Cramer pairwise comparisons. SETTING: Real-time testing of parents' perception of food images presenting portion sizes consumed by children up to 10 years old. SUBJECTS: A convenience sample of 138 parents/caregivers of young children (69 % females). RESULTS: Individuals selected the correct or adjacent image in about 97 % of the assessments. Images presenting amorphous solids (i.e. pies and pastries with a filling), liquid or semi-liquid dishes (i.e. soups, porridges, fruit and vegetable purées) were more prone to bias. There was no indication that personal characteristics (gender, age, educational background, age, number of offspring) were associated with differences in the way parents/caregivers perceived the food pictures. CONCLUSIONS: Food pictures may not be appropriate to quantify the intake of liquid, semi-liquid or amorphous solid foods in surveys addressing young children and studies evaluating their performance as food portion anchors should ensure the inclusion of several and various amorphous foods in the assessment

Adiposity, mediating biomarkers and risk of colon cancer in the European prospective investigation into cancer and nutrition study

Adiposity is a risk factor for colon cancer, but underlying mechanisms are not well understood. We evaluated the extent to which eleven biomarkers with inflammatory and metabolic actions mediate the association of adiposity measures, waist circumference (WC) and body mass index (BMI), with colon cancer in men and women. We analysed data from a prospective nested case-control study among 662 incident colon cancer cases matched within risk-sets to 662 controls. Relative risks (RRs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were calculated using conditional logistic regression. The percent effect change and corresponding CI-s were estimated after adjusting for biomarkers shown to be associated with colon cancer risk. After multivariable adjustment, WC was associated with colon cancer risk in men (top vs bottom tertile RR 1.68, 95% CI 1.06 - 2.65; Ptrend = 0.02) and in women (RR 1.67, 95% CI 1.09 - 2.56; Ptrend = 0.03). BMI was associated with risk only in men. The association of WC with colon cancer was accounted mostly for by three biomarkers, high-density lipoprotein cholesterol, non-high-molecular-weight adiponectin and soluble leptin receptor, which in combination explained 46% (95% CI 37 to 57%) of the association in men and 50% (95% CI 40 to 65%) of the association in women. Similar results were observed for the associations with BMI in men. These data suggests that alterations in levels of these metabolic biomarkers may represent a primary mechanism of action in the relation of adiposity with colon cancer. Further studies are warranted to determine whether altering their concentrations may reduce colon cancer risk

Flavonoid and lignan intake and pancreatic cancer risk in the European prospective investigation into cancer and nutrition cohort.

Despite the potential cancer preventive effects of flavonoids and lignans, their ability to reduce pancreatic cancer risk has not been demonstrated in epidemiological studies. Our aim was to examine the association between dietary intakes of flavonoids and lignans and pancreatic cancer risk in the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition (EPIC) cohort. A total of 865 exocrine pancreatic cancer cases occurred after 11.3 years of follow-up of 477,309 cohort members. Dietary flavonoid and lignan intake was estimated through validated dietary questionnaires and the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) and Phenol Explorer databases. Hazard ratios (HR) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were calculated using age, sex and center-stratified Cox proportional hazards models, adjusted for energy intake, body mass index (BMI), smoking, alcohol and diabetes status. Our results showed that neither overall dietary intake of flavonoids nor of lignans were associated with pancreatic cancer risk (multivariable-adjusted HR for a doubling of intake = 1.03, 95% CI: 0.95-1.11 and 1.02; 95% CI: 0.89-1.17, respectively). Statistically significant associations were also not observed by flavonoid subclasses. An inverse association between intake of flavanones and pancreatic cancer risk was apparent, without reaching statistical significance, in microscopically confirmed cases (HR for a doubling of intake = 0.96, 95% CI: 0.91-1.00). In conclusion, we did not observe an association between intake of flavonoids, flavonoid subclasses or lignans and pancreatic cancer risk in the EPIC cohort.The coordination of EPIC is financially supported by the European Commission (DG-SANCO) and the International Agency for Research on Cancer. The national cohorts are supported by Danish Cancer Society (Denmark); Ligue Contre le Cancer, Institut Gustave Roussy, Mutuelle Générale de l’Education Nationale, Institut Nation al de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale (INSERM) (France); German Cancer Aid, German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ), Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), Deutsche Krebshilfe, Deutsches Krebsforschungszentrum and Federal Ministry of Education and Research (Germany); the Hellenic Health Foundation (Greece); Associazione Italiana per la Ricerca sul Cancro-AIRC-Italy and National Research Council (Italy); Dutch Ministry of Public Health, Welfare and Sports (VWS), Netherlands Cancer Registry (NKR), LK Research Funds, Dutch Prevention Funds, Dutch ZON (Zorg Onderzoek Nederland), World Cancer Research Fund (WCRF), Statistics Netherlands (The Netherlands); ERC-2009-AdG 232997 and Nordforsk, Nordic Centre of Excellence programme on Food, Nutrition and Health (Norway); Health Research Fund (FIS), PI12/00002 co-funded by ERDF, PI13/00061 to Granada, PI13/01162 to EPIC-Murcia, Regional Governments of Andalucía, Asturias, Basque Country, Murcia and Navarra, ISCIII RETIC (RD06/0020) (Spain); WCR (Grant Reference Number: 15-0391); Swedish Cancer Society, Swedish Research Council and County Councils of Skåne and Västerbotten (Sweden); Cancer Research UK (14136 to EPIC-Norfolk; C570/A16491 and C8221/A19170 to EPIC-Oxford), Medical Research Council (1000143 to EPIC-Norfolk, MR/M012190/1 to EPIC-Oxford) (United Kingdom).This is the final vesion of the article. It first appeared from Wiley via 10.1002/ijc.3019

Understanding and Developing a Threat Assessment Model

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61. Sakalis (D). Ἡ γνησιότητα τοῦ « Ψευδοσοφιστὴ » τοῦ Λουκιάνου

Vidalis A. M. 61. Sakalis (D). Ἡ γνησιότητα τοῦ « Ψευδοσοφιστὴ » τοῦ Λουκιάνου. In: Revue des Études Grecques, tome 93, fascicule 442-444, Juillet-décembre 1980. pp. 600-602

61. Sakalis (D). Ἡ γνησιότητα τοῦ « Ψευδοσοφιστὴ » τοῦ Λουκιάνου

Vidalis A. M. 61. Sakalis (D). Ἡ γνησιότητα τοῦ « Ψευδοσοφιστὴ » τοῦ Λουκιάνου. In: Revue des Études Grecques, tome 93, fascicule 442-444, Juillet-décembre 1980. pp. 600-602