Relationship between functional fitness, medication costs and mood in elderly people

Objective: to verify if functional fitness (FF) is associated with the annual cost of medication consumption and mood states (MSt) in elderly people. Methods: a cross-sectional study with 229 elderly people aged 65 years or more at Santa Casa de Misericórdia de Coimbra, Portugal. Seniors with physical and psychological limitations were excluded, as well as those using medication that limits performance on the tests. The Senior Fitness Test was used to evaluate FF, and the Profile of Mood States - Short Form to evaluate the MSt. The statistical analysis was based on Mancova, with adjustment for age, for comparison between men and women, and adjustment for sex, for comparison between cardiorespiratory fitness quintiles. The association between the variables under study was made with partial correlation, controlling for the effects of age, sex and body mass index. Results: an inverse correlation between cardiorespiratory fitness and the annual cost of medication consumption was found (p < 0.01). FF is also inversely associated with MSt (p < 0.05). Comparisons between cardiorespiratory fitness quintiles showed higher medication consumption costs in seniors with lower aerobic endurance, as well as higher deterioration in MSt (p < 0.01). Conclusion: elderly people with better FF and, specifically, better cardiorespiratory fitness present lower medication consumption costs and a more positive MSt

O processo de internacionalização do grupo Casais: sequencial ou irregular?

O fenómeno da globalização, a liberalização dos mercados e a eliminação de “fronteiras” entre países colocaram novos desafios às empresas portuguesas, com muitas delas a encarar esses desafios como oportunidades. Desta forma, estas acabam por ponderar a exploração de mercados externos, iniciando a internacionalização. À medida que o número de empresas que se internacionalizaram aumenta, a relevância dos estudos referentes aos processos de internacionalização também aumenta. Utilizando a metodologia de estudo de caso, procedemos à análise do processo de internacionalização do Grupo Casais, uma empresa portuguesa do setor da Construção e Engenharia. Após estudar o processo, chegamos à conclusão de que o processo de internacionalização do Grupo Casais é sequencial, estando intimamente ligado à Teoria das Redes devido à presença da organização em redes que facilitam o acesso à informação sobre os mercados externos e a entrada nos mesmos.The phenomenon of globalization, the liberalization of markets and the elimination of “borders” between countries have set new challenges for Portuguese companies, with many of them seeing these challenges as opportunities. So they end up considering the exploration of foreign markets, starting the internationalization process. As the number of companies that have internationalized increases, the relevance of studies regarding internationalization processes also increases. Using the case study methodology, we proceeded to analyze the internationalization process of the Grupo Casais, a Portuguese company in the Construction and Engineering sector. After studying the process, we have concluded that the internationalization process of the Grupo Casais Casais is gradual, being closely linked to the Networks Theory due to the presence of the company in networks that facilitate access to and information about foreign markets

Quality of life of caregivers for patients of cerebrovascular accidents: association of (socio-demographic) characteristics and burden

OBJECTIVE Investigating the association between quality of life with socio-demographic characteristics and the burden of caregivers for individuals with cerebrovascular accident sequelae. METHOD A descriptive, cross-sectional study with a sample composed of 136 caregivers. For data collection, a semi-structured questionnaire, the Barthel, Burden Interview and Short-Form-36 scales were used. Correlation analysis, t-Student test and F-test were used for the analysis in order to compare averages. RESULTS Significant averages in quality of life were demonstrated in association with female caregivers and those over 60 years in the field 'functional capacity,' and in the domains of 'mental health' and 'vitality' for those with higher income. Regarding burden association, the highlighted areas were 'functional capacity,' 'physical aspects,' 'emotional aspects' and 'pain.' CONCLUSION The creation of public policies and social support to effectively reduce the burden on caregivers is a necessity

Pervasive transition of the Brazilian land-use system

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Rare disease gene association discovery in the 100,000 Genomes Project

\ua9 The Author(s) 2025. Up to 80% of rare disease patients remain undiagnosed after genomic sequencing1, with many probably involving pathogenic variants in yet to be discovered disease–gene associations. To search for such associations, we developed a rare variant gene burden analytical framework for Mendelian diseases, and applied it to protein-coding variants from whole-genome sequencing of 34,851 cases and their family members recruited to the 100,000 Genomes Project2. A total of 141 new associations were identified, including five for which independent disease–gene evidence was recently published. Following in silico triaging and clinical expert review, 69 associations were prioritized, of which 30 could be linked to existing experimental evidence. The five associations with strongest overall genetic and experimental evidence were monogenic diabetes with the known β cell regulator3,4UNC13A, schizophrenia with GPR17, epilepsy with RBFOX3, Charcot–Marie–Tooth disease with ARPC3 and anterior segment ocular abnormalities with POMK. Further confirmation of these and other associations could lead to numerous diagnoses, highlighting the clinical impact of large-scale statistical approaches to rare disease–gene association discovery

Rare disease gene association discovery in the 100,000 Genomes Project

Up to 80% of rare disease patients remain undiagnosed after genomic sequencing1, with many probably involving pathogenic variants in yet to be discovered disease–gene associations. To search for such associations, we developed a rare variant gene burden analytical framework for Mendelian diseases, and applied it to protein-coding variants from whole-genome sequencing of 34,851 cases and their family members recruited to the 100,000 Genomes Project2. A total of 141 new associations were identified, including five for which independent disease–gene evidence was recently published. Following in silico triaging and clinical expert review, 69 associations were prioritized, of which 30 could be linked to existing experimental evidence. The five associations with strongest overall genetic and experimental evidence were monogenic diabetes with the known β cell regulator3,4 UNC13A, schizophrenia with GPR17, epilepsy with RBFOX3, Charcot–Marie–Tooth disease with ARPC3 and anterior segment ocular abnormalities with POMK. Further confirmation of these and other associations could lead to numerous diagnoses, highlighting the clinical impact of large-scale statistical approaches to rare disease–gene association discovery