Standing desks in a grade 4 classroom over the full school year

© 2019 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. School-aged children are spending increasingly long periods of time engaged in sedentary activities such as sitting. Recent school-based studies have examined the intervention effects of introducing standing desks into the classroom in the short and medium term. The aim of this repeated-measures crossover design study was to assess the sit-stand behaviour, waking sedentary time and physical activity, and musculoskeletal discomfort at the start and the end of a full school year following the provision of standing desks into a Grade 4 classroom. Accelerometry and musculoskeletal discomfort were measured in both standing and traditional desk conditions at the start and at the end of the school year. At both time points, when students used a standing desk, there was an increase in standing time (17-26 min/school day) and a reduction in sitting time (17-40 min/school day). There was no significant difference in sit-stand behaviour during school hours or sedentary time and physical activity during waking hours between the start and the end of the school year. Students were less likely to report discomfort in the neck and shoulders when using a standing desk and this finding was consistent over the full school year. The beneficial effects of using a standing desk were maintained over the full school year, after the novelty of using a standing desk had worn off

Does a classroom standing desk intervention modify standing and sitting behaviour and musculoskeletal symptoms during school time and physical activity during waking time?

© 2018 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. Children are increasingly spending more time sedentary at school and during leisure time. This study examined the effects of a standing desk intervention in a classroom on children’s standing and sitting time at school, sedentary and physical activity levels throughout the day (waking hours), and musculoskeletal discomfort. A within-subjects crossover study design was used. Participants used either a standing desk or traditional seated desk for 21 days before swapping desks for another 21 days. Accelerometry and musculoskeletal discomfort data were collected during the last seven days of each 21-day period. Mixed models were used to analyse accelerometry data. Zero-inflated regression models and logistic regression models were used to analyse discomfort data. Forty-seven male students (aged 10–11 years) participated in the study. Standing time was 21 min/school day higher (p < 0.001) and sitting time was 24 min/school day lower (p = 0.003) when standing desks were used. No significant differences were found in sedentary and physical activity time during waking hours between the standing desk and seated desk conditions. Students were less likely to report musculoskeletal discomfort in the neck, shoulder, elbows and lower back when using standing desks (OR 0.52–0.74). Standing desks significantly increased classroom standing time and decreased musculoskeletal discomfort reports but had no overall effect on daily physical activity levels. Schools should consider moving towards classrooms enabling a variety of postures to potentially improve the long-term health of children

Brain hypoperfusion in adolescents dependent of multiple drugs

Brain SPECT imaging (BSI) with statistical parametric mapping (SPM) offers a clear and accurate vision of perfusion changes. Objective: To study brain perfusion abnormalities in adolescents' dependent of multiple drugs. Method: Sixteen male patients (15.1 +/- 2.1 years) were submitted to (99m)Tc-HMPAO BSI with SPM. Results: Cortical hypoperfusion occurred in 7/16 patients (44%). There was a significant inverse correlation between the number of hypoperfused regions and the patient's age (p= -0.6737; p=0.004) and with the age when the drug dependence began (p= -0.5616; p=0.023). There was also a tendency towards an inverse correlation between regions of hypoperfusion and the duration of the drug dependence. Conclusion: BSI with SPM can help detect hypoperfusion in adolescents dependent on multiple drugs. The younger the patients, the more regions of hypoperfusion are noted. Probably, the neuronal plasticity has an important role in this phenomenon because the highest neural activity occurs in childhood.68216116

Epidemiological Surveillance of Birth Defects Compatible with Thalidomide Embryopathy in Brazil

The thalidomide tragedy of the 1960s resulted in thousands of children being born with severe limb reduction defects (LRD), among other malformations. In Brazil, there are still babies born with thalidomide embryopathy (TE) because of leprosy prevalence, availability of thalidomide, and deficiencies in the control of drug dispensation. Our objective was to implement a system of proactive surveillance to identify birth defects compatible with TE. Along one year, newborns with LRD were assessed in the Brazilian hospitals participating in the Latin-American Collaborative Study of Congenital Malformations (ECLAMC). A phenotype of LRD called thalidomide embryopathy phenotype (TEP) was established for surveillance. Children with TEP born between the years 2000–2008 were monitored, and during the 2007–2008 period we clinically investigated in greater detail all cases with TEP (proactive period). The period from 1982 to 1999 was defined as the baseline period for the cumulative sum statistics. The frequency of TEP during the surveillance period, at 3.10/10,000 births (CI 95%: 2.50–3.70), was significantly higher than that observed in the baseline period (1.92/10,000 births; CI 95%: 1.60–2.20), and not uniformly distributed across different Brazilian regions. During the proactive surveillance (2007–2008), two cases of suspected TE were identified, although the two mothers had denied the use of the drug during pregnancy. Our results suggest that TEP has probably increased in recent years, which coincides with the period of greater thalidomide availability. Our proactive surveillance identified two newborns with suspected TE, proving to be a sensitive tool to detect TE. The high frequency of leprosy and the large use of thalidomide reinforce the need for a continuous monitoring of TEP across Brazil

Markedly Divergent Tree Assemblage Responses to Tropical Forest Loss and Fragmentation across a Strong Seasonality Gradient

We examine the effects of forest fragmentation on the structure and composition of tree assemblages within three seasonal and aseasonal forest types of southern Brazil, including evergreen, Araucaria, and deciduous forests. We sampled three southernmost Atlantic Forest landscapes, including the largest continuous forest protected areas within each forest type. Tree assemblages in each forest type were sampled within 10 plots of 0.1 ha in both continuous forests and 10 adjacent forest fragments. All trees within each plot were assigned to trait categories describing their regeneration strategy, vertical stratification, seed-dispersal mode, seed size, and wood density. We detected differences among both forest types and landscape contexts in terms of overall tree species richness, and the density and species richness of different functional groups in terms of regeneration strategy, seed dispersal mode and woody density. Overall, evergreen forest fragments exhibited the largest deviations from continuous forest plots in assemblage structure. Evergreen, Araucaria and deciduous forests diverge in the functional composition of tree floras, particularly in relation to regeneration strategy and stress tolerance. By supporting a more diversified light-demanding and stress-tolerant flora with reduced richness and abundance of shade-tolerant, old-growth species, both deciduous and Araucaria forest tree assemblages are more intrinsically resilient to contemporary human-disturbances, including fragmentation-induced edge effects, in terms of species erosion and functional shifts. We suggest that these intrinsic differences in the direction and magnitude of responses to changes in landscape structure between forest types should guide a wide range of conservation strategies in restoring fragmented tropical forest landscapes worldwide

Genome wide association mapping of grain arsenic, copper, molybdenum and zinc in rice (Oryza sativa L.) grown at four international field sites

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