Prevalence of bullying and victimization among children in early elementary school:Do family and school neighbourhood socioeconomic status matter?

BACKGROUND: Bullying and victimization are widespread phenomena in childhood and can have a serious impact on well-being. Children from families with a low socioeconomic background have an increased risk of this behaviour, but it is unknown whether socioeconomic status (SES) of school neighbourhoods is also related to bullying behaviour. Furthermore, as previous bullying research mainly focused on older children and adolescents, it remains unclear to what extent bullying and victimization affects the lives of younger children. The aim of this study is to examine the prevalence and socioeconomic disparities in bullying behaviour among young elementary school children. METHODS: The study was part of a population-based survey in the Netherlands. Teacher reports of bullying behaviour and indicators of SES of families and schools were available for 6379 children aged 5–6 years. RESULTS: One-third of the children were involved in bullying, most of them as bullies (17%) or bully-victims (13%), and less as pure victims (4%). All indicators of low family SES and poor school neighbourhood SES were associated with an increased risk of being a bully or bully-victim. Parental educational level was the only indicator of SES related with victimization. The influence of school neighbourhood SES on bullying attenuated to statistical non-significance once adjusted for family SES. CONCLUSIONS: Bullying and victimization are already common problems in early elementary school. Children from socioeconomically disadvantaged families, rather than children visiting schools in disadvantaged neighbourhoods, have a particularly high risk of involvement in bullying. These findings suggest the need of timely bullying preventions and interventions that should have a special focus on children of families with a low socioeconomic background. Future studies are necessary to evaluate the effectiveness of such programs

Prevalence of bullying and victimization among children in early elementary school: Do family and school neighbourhood socioeconomic status matter?

Background: Bullying and victimization are widespread phenomena in childhood and can have a serious impact on well-being. Children from families with a low socioeconomic background have an increased risk of this behaviour, but it is unknown whether socioeconomic status (SES) of school neighbourhoods is also related to bullying behaviour. Furthermore, as previous bullying research mainly focused on older children and adolescents, it remains unclear to what extent bullying and victimization affects the lives of younger children. The aim of this study is to examine the prevalence and socioeconomic disparities in bullying behaviour among young elementary school children. Methods. The study was part of a population-based survey in the Netherlands. Teacher reports of bullying behaviour and indicators of SES of families and schools were available for 6379 children aged 5-6 years. Results: One-third of the children were involved in bullying, most of them as bullies (17%) or bully-victims (13%), and less as pure victims (4%). All indicators of low family SES and poor school neighbourhood SES were associated with an increased risk of being a bully or bully-victim. Parental educational level was the only indicator of SES related with victimization. The influence of school neighbourhood SES on bullying attenuated to statistical non-significance once adjusted for family SES. Conclusions: Bullying and victimization are already common problems in early elementary school. Children from socioeconomically disadvantaged families, rather than children visiting schools in disadvantaged neighbourhoods, have a particularly high risk of involvement in bullying. These findings suggest the need of timely bullying preventions and interventions that should have a special focus on children of families with a low socioeconomic background. Future studies are necessary to evaluate the effectiveness of such programs

Bullying and Victimization Among Young Elementary School Children: The Role of Child Ethnicity and Ethnic School Composition

School-aged children with an ethnic minority background are relatively often involved in bullying and victimization, but the role of ethnic composition of schools in this context remains unclear. This study examined the relation between ethnic minority background, ethnic school composition, and bullying behaviour around primary school entry in the Netherlands. The study was based on a 2008/2009 school survey in Rotterdam, a Dutch city where about 50 % of children have a non-Dutch background. For 8523 children, teacher reports of bullying behaviour at age 5–6 years were available. Children with a non-Dutch background had higher odds of being a victim (adjusted OR 1.41, 95 % CI 1.11, 1.80), bully (OR 1.38, 95 % CI 1.20, 1.58) or bully-victim (OR 1.38, 95 % CI 1.19, 1.62) than children of Dutch national origin. Ethnic diversity in schools increased children’s risk of bullying behaviour (e.g. ORvictim per 0.1 increase in 0–1 diversity range = 1.06, 95 % CI 1.00, 1.13), with children of both Dutch and non-Dutch national origin relatively more often involved in bullying in ethnically diverse schools. The proportion of same-ethnic peers in school reduced the risk of bullying among children of Dutch national origin (e.g. ORvictim per 10 % more same-ethnic children = 0.90, 95 % CI 0.83, 0.98), but not among non-Dutch children. In conclusion, ethnic minority background and ethnic diversity within schools are risk factors for bullying among 5–6 year olds. Plausibly, reductions in absolute numbers of bullying events may be obtained with tailor-made interventions in ethnically diverse schools. Such interventions should preferably be offered early in the school curriculum

Dendritic cell vaccination as postremission treatment to prevent or delay relapse in acute myeloid leukemia

Relapse is a major problem in acute myeloid leukemia (AML) and adversely impacts survival. In this phase II study, we investigated the effect of vaccination with dendritic cells (DCs) electroporated with Wilms’ tumor 1 (WT1) mRNA as post-remission treatment in 30 AML patients at very high risk of relapse. There was a demonstrable anti-leukemic response in 13 patients. Nine patients achieved molecular remission as demonstrated by normalization of WT1 transcript levels, 5 of which are sustained after a median follow-up of 109.4 months. Disease stabilization was achieved in 4 other patients. Five-year overall survival (OS) was higher in responders than in non-responders (53.8% vs. 25.0%; P=0.01). In patients receiving DCs in first complete remission (CR1), there was a vaccine-induced relapse reduction rate of 25% and the 5-year relapse-free survival was higher in responders than in non-responders (50% vs. 7.7%; P65 years who received DCs in CR1, 5-year OS was 69.2% and 30.8% respectively, as compared to 51.7% and 18% in the Swedish Acute Leukemia Registry (SALR). Long-term clinical response was correlated with increased circulating frequencies of poly-epitope WT1-specific CD8+ T-cells. Long-term OS was correlated with interferon-γ+ and tumor necrosis factor-α+ WT1-specific responses in delayed type hypersensitivity-infiltrating CD8+ T-lymphocytes. In conclusion, vaccination of AML patients with WT1 mRNA-electroporated DCs can be an effective strategy to prevent or delay relapse after standard chemotherapy, translating into improved OS rates, which are correlated with the induction of WT1-specific CD8+ T-cell response. This trial was registered at www.clinicaltrials.gov as #NCT00965224

“Fine-Weather Books”: Representations of Readers and Reading in <i>Chance</i>

Management of fever in prolonged profound neutropenia remains challenging with many possible infectious and non-infectious causes. We investigated whether procalcitonin (PCT) is superior to C-reactive protein (CRP) in discriminating between different etiologies of fever in this setting. CRP and PCT were tested daily during 93 neutropenic episodes in 66 patients. During this study period 121 febrile episodes occurred and were classified into four categories based on clinical and microbiological findings: microbiologically documented infection (MDI); clinically documented infection (CDI); proven or probable invasive fungal disease (IFD); fever of unknown origin (FUO). Values of PCT and CRP at fever onset as well as 2 days later were considered for analysis of their performance in distinguishing etiologies of fever. At fever onset no significant difference in PCT values was observed between different etiologies of fever, whereas median CRP values were significantly higher in case of IFD (median 98.8 mg/L vs 28.8 mg/L, p=0.027). Both PCT and CRP reached their peak at a median of 2 days after fever onset. Median PCT values on day 2 showed no significant difference between etiologies of fever. Median CRP values on day 2 were significantly higher in IFD (median 172 mg/L versus 78.4 mg/L, p=0.002). In MDI median CRP values rose > 100 mg/L, whereas they did not in CDI or FUO. PCT has no added value over CRP for clinical management of fever in prolonged profound neutropenia. When performing reassessment 2 days after fever onset, CRP has better discriminatory power between etiologies of fever