Anthropologie politique et morale

Didier Fassin, directeur d’études Les nouvelles frontières des sociétés contemporaines Dans le cadre d’une anthropologie politique et morale définie au cours des années précédentes, le séminaire a porté plus particulièrement cette année sur les nouvelles formes de problématisation des rapports entre altérité et inégalité dans les sociétés contemporaines. La question de la frontière, en tant que limite extérieure de la communauté et du territoire de la nation – ou d’ensembles plus vastes, nota..

Anthropologie politique et morale

Didier Fassin, directeur d’études Économie morale et action politique L’action politique, entendue comme l’ensemble des pratiques qui inscrivent dans l’espace public des attentes ou des critiques autour de biens communs, est sous-tendue par des valeurs et des normes, des jugements et des justifications – ce que l’on peut appeler une économie morale. Si l’anthropologie s’est depuis longtemps intéressée au politique, à ses Institutions et ses agents, en revanche elle s’est tenue à l’écart de la..

Anthropologie politique et morale

Didier Fassin, directeur d’études Économie morale et action politique L’action politique, entendue comme l’ensemble des pratiques qui inscrivent dans l’espace public des attentes ou des critiques autour de biens communs, est sous-tendue par des valeurs et des normes, des jugements et des justifications – ce que l’on peut appeler une économie morale. Si l’anthropologie s’est depuis longtemps intéressée au politique, à ses Institutions et ses agents, en revanche elle s’est tenue à l’écart de la..

Consanguinity Mapping of Congenital Heart Disease in a South Indian Population

Parental consanguinity is a risk factor for congenital heart disease (CHD) worldwide, suggesting that a recessive inheritance model may contribute substantially to CHD. In Bangalore, India, uncle-niece and first cousin marriages are common, presenting the opportunity for an international study involving consanguinity mapping of structural CHD. We sought to explore the recessive model of CHD by conducting a genome-wide linkage analysis utilizing high-density oligonucleotide microarrays and enrolling 83 CHD probands born to unaffected consanguineous parents. exons did not reveal causative mutations in Indian probands. In addition, genotyping of the linked allele (G) in 325 U.S. CHD cases revealed neither genotypic nor allele frequency differences in varied CHD cases compared to 605 non-CHD controls. may harbor recessive mutations leading to CHD in the Indian population. Further research involving large multinational cohorts of patients with specific subtypes of CHD is needed to attempt replication of the observed linkage peak on chromosome 14. In addition, we anticipate that a targeted re-sequencing approach may complement linkage analysis in future studies of recessive mutation detection in CHD

Explaining participation in regional transnational social movement organizations

Since the late 1980s, governments have focused intensely on formalizing political and economic relationships within regions. There has also been a concurrent rise in transnational, regional level organizing among social movement activists globally, suggesting the regionalization of 'global civil society.' However, opportunities for participation in transnational associations vary widely across countries. In this article, we examine the influence of international (both global and regional) institutional contexts, citizen participation in international society, and national level factors on varying levels of participation in regional transnational social movement organizations (TSMOs). We use negative binomial regression to examine relationships among these factors at three time points: 1980, 1990, and 2000. We find that in the early time period, citizen network connections to international society facilitated the formation of and participation in regionally organized TSMOs. Over time, however, regional and global institutional contexts were more predictive of participation in regional TSMOs than were international network ties. Our analysis also uncovered how qualitatively different forms of regionalism translated into significantly different levels of TSMO regionalization. In Europe, where the regional institutional structure is more elaborated than elsewhere in the world, the number of regional TSMOs in which citizens participated greatly outpaced that found elsewhere. Irrespective of international, institutional factors, however, state-level features remained crucial to explaining the development of regional TSMO sectors and the variable levels of participation in them. Citizens in states with restrictions on political rights and civil liberties had significantly lower participation in these organizations in 1990 and 2000. Even so, over time, citizens in states with more ties to global and regional multilateral processes found more ways to overcome this disadvantage and strengthen their participation in regional, transnational civil society. © 2007 SAGE Publications

Extracting information from the text of electronic medical records to improve case detection: a systematic review

Background: Electronic medical records (EMRs) are revolutionizing health-related research. One key issue for study quality is the accurate identification of patients with the condition of interest. Information in EMRs can be entered as structured codes or unstructured free text. The majority of research studies have used only coded parts of EMRs for case-detection, which may bias findings, miss cases, and reduce study quality. This review examines whether incorporating information from text into case-detection algorithms can improve research quality. Methods: A systematic search returned 9659 papers, 67 of which reported on the extraction of information from free text of EMRs with the stated purpose of detecting cases of a named clinical condition. Methods for extracting information from text and the technical accuracy of case-detection algorithms were reviewed. Results: Studies mainly used US hospital-based EMRs, and extracted information from text for 41 conditions using keyword searches, rule-based algorithms, and machine learning methods. There was no clear difference in case-detection algorithm accuracy between rule-based and machine learning methods of extraction. Inclusion of information from text resulted in a significant improvement in algorithm sensitivity and area under the receiver operating characteristic in comparison to codes alone (median sensitivity 78% (codes + text) vs 62% (codes), P = .03; median area under the receiver operating characteristic 95% (codes + text) vs 88% (codes), P = .025). Conclusions: Text in EMRs is accessible, especially with open source information extraction algorithms, and significantly improves case detection when combined with codes. More harmonization of reporting within EMR studies is needed, particularly standardized reporting of algorithm accuracy metrics like positive predictive value (precision) and sensitivity (recall)

Evaluation of polygenic risk scores for breast and ovarian cancer risk prediction in BRCA1 and BRCA2 mutation carriers

Background: Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have identified 94 common single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) associated with breast cancer (BC) risk and 18 associated with ovarian cancer (OC) risk. Several of these are also associated with risk of BC or OC for women who carry a pathogenic mutation in the high-risk BC and OC genes BRCA1 or BRCA2. The combined effects of these variants on BC or OC risk for BRCA1 and BRCA2 mutation carriers have not yet been assessed while their clinical management could benefit from improved personalized risk estimates. Methods: We constructed polygenic risk scores (PRS) using BC and OC susceptibility SNPs identified through population-based GWAS: for BC (overall, estrogen receptor [ER]-positive, and ER-negative) and for OC. Using data from 15 252 female BRCA1 and 8211 BRCA2 carriers, the association of each PRS with BC or OC risk was evaluated using a weighted cohort approach, with time to diagnosis as the outcome and estimation of the hazard ratios (HRs) per standard deviation increase in the PRS. Results: The PRS for ER-negative BC displayed the strongest association with BC risk in BRCA1 carriers (HR = 1.27, 95% confidence interval [CI] = 1.23 to 1.31, P = 8.2 x 10(53)). In BRCA2 carriers, the strongest association with BC risk was seen for the overall BC PRS (HR = 1.22, 95% CI = 1.17 to 1.28, P = 7.2 x 10(-20)). The OC PRS was strongly associated with OC risk for both BRCA1 and BRCA2 carriers. These translate to differences in absolute risks (more than 10% in each case) between the top and bottom deciles of the PRS distribution; for example, the OC risk was 6% by age 80 years for BRCA2 carriers at the 10th percentile of the OC PRS compared with 19% risk for those at the 90th percentile of PRS. Conclusions: BC and OC PRS are predictive of cancer risk in BRCA1 and BRCA2 carriers. Incorporation of the PRS into risk prediction models has promise to better inform decisions on cancer risk management

Aspects of physical and chemical alterations to proteins during food processing - some implications for nutrition

In this paper, we give an overview of our research exploring the impact of physical and chemical processing on food proteins. There are three themes, applied to the proteins of wheat, soya, egg and dairy foods. Firstly, the impact of the Maillard reaction on food proteins is discussed, with a particular focus on how the reactions might be harnessed to manipulate food texture. Secondly, the potential of enzymatic protein-protein crosslinking is considered, especially the enzyme transglutaminase. Thirdly, the broader question of how the aggregation of proteins within a food is altered by chemical and physical modification and how, in turn, this might impact on the overall nutritional quality of the food is considered

Implementing sustainable tourism: a multi-stakeholder involvement management framework

Within the extensive body of literature on sustainable tourism (ST), its successful implementation is an emerging and important theme. The lack of or ineffective stakeholder participation is a major obstacle to ST realisation and there is little clarity as to how best to resolve this problem. This paper presents the findings of a purposive UK-based case study that evaluated stakeholder involvement in the implementation of ST. Using over fifty stakeholders’ accounts drawn from eight primary stakeholder groups, a ‘multi-stakeholder involvement management’ (MSIM) framework was developed. The MSIM framework consists of three strategic levels: attraction, integration and management of stakeholder involvement. Six stages are embedded within the three levels: scene-setting, recognition of stakeholder involvement capacity, stakeholder relationship management, pursuit of achievable objectives, influencing implementation capacity and monitoring stakeholder involvement. These are supported by the overarching notion of ‘hand-holding’ and key actions [e.g. managing stakeholder adaptability] that enhance stakeholder involvement in ST. Key words: Implementation, Sustainable Tourism, Stakeholder Involvement, Stakeholder framewor