How Do I Look? Body Image Perceptions among University Students from England and Denmark

This study examined differences in body image perception between university students in two European countries, United Kingdom and Denmark. A total of 816 British and 548 Danish university students participated in a cross-sectional survey. A self-administered questionnaire assessed socio-demographic information, body image perception (as “too thin”, “just right” or “too fat”), and the association of related factors with body image perception (nutrition behaviour, social support, perceived stressors and quality of life). The proportions of students who perceived themselves as “too thin”, “just right”, or “too fat” were 8.6%, 37.7%, and 53.7% respectively. Multi-factorial logistic regression analysis showed that students who perceived themselves as “too fat” were more likely to be from the British university, to be females, to be older than 30 years, to report stress due to their financial situation and were less likely to have a high quality of life. The findings highlight the need for interventions with focus on healthy food choices whilst acknowledging financial stressors and quality of life

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Accurate protocol for nanoparticles analysis (size, size distribution, concentration) by SAXS and spICPMS

International audienceSmall Angles X-Ray Scattering (SAXS) has been established as a metrological method for the determination of nanoparticles size and size distribution. Modern SAXS Laboratory experiments, by involving synchrotron-based instrumentation at lower price and very stable X-ray source, are more and more use in nanomaterials domain. In the frame of the Innanopart project we have develop a methodology for the size and concentration determination of spheric Silica nanoparticles. This protocol involves a precise sample preparation, and a set of homemade software tools for the data processing-from the acquisition, the absolute scaling, to the analysis. spICPMs is not a metrological traceable technique but has many strengths to become a useful complement of nanoparticle characterization methods such as SAXS and microscopy. It can also measure highly diluted nanoparticles suspensions which is not the case of Dynamic Light scattering (DLS) or SAXS. Finally, ICPMS analyzes inorganic ions in liquid solution in a very large range of concentration, which should allow linear diameter measurement range over at least 3 orders of magnitude by spICPMS. In this work, we confront spICPMS, as a counting technique, with SAXS in order to investigate the method and the developed protocols on a set of commercial Gold Nanoparticles

Contribution to accurate Spherical Gold Nanoparticles analysis (size, size distribution) by SpICPMS and SAXS

International audienceSmall-Angles X-Ray Scattering (SAXS) has been established as a metrological method for the determination of nanoparticles size and size distribution. Modern SAXS Laboratory experiments, by involving synchrotron-based instrumentation at lower price and very stable X-ray source, are more and more used in nanomaterials domain. In the frame of the EMPIR Innanopart project, we have developed a methodology for the size, size distribution and concentration determination of spherical nanoparticles. This protocol involves a precise sample preparation, and a set of homemade software tools for the data processing-from the acquisition, the absolute scaling, to the analysis. spICPMs is not a metrological traceable technique but has many strengths to become a useful complement of nanoparticle characterization methods such as SAXS and microscopy. It can also measure highly diluted nanoparticles suspensions which is not the case of Dynamic Light scattering (DLS) or SAXS. Finally, ICPMS analyzes inorganic ions in liquid solution in a very large range of concentration, which should allow linear diameter measurement range over at least 3 orders of magnitude. In this work, we confront spICPMS with SAXS in order to investigate the method and the developed protocols on a set of commercial spherical Gold Nanoparticles. Comparison between SAXS and spIPCMS method for the determination of size of spherical Gold Nanoparticle

The association of knowledge and perception of medications with compliance and health states among hypertension patients: A prospective study

The purposes of this prospective study were () to describe the associations among patients\u27 knowledge of medications and perceptions of side effects and benefits of medications, () to clarify the independent effects of knowledge and perceptions of side effects upon patients\u27 reports of compliance with medications, and (c) to describe the relationship between compliance and patients\u27 health states as measured by a reduction in diastolic blood pressure. Eighty‐eight diagnosed hypertensive patients were interviewed at the onset of a medication regimen and at the end of 5 months. Audits of medical records were completed for the entire 5‐month period. The results indicated that both knowledge and perceptions of benefits from medications were significantly correlated with patient compliance at the beginning and at the end observations. The partial correlations, however, indicated that knowledge of medications had a greater independent association with compliance at the beginning of the study and that perceptions of benefits from medications had a greater independent association with compliance at the end observation period. Finally, patients who, on the average, complied with their medications more than two‐thirds of the time experienced a clinically significant reduction in their diastolic blood pressure. The results of the study suggest that knowledge may serve to stimulate compliance at the beginning of a treatment regimen, whereas perceptions are more effective stimulants once therapy has begun. These findings are discussed in view of the literature on patient knowledge and their implications for primary care providers