The impact of oral English proficiency on humanitarian migrants’ experiences of settling in Australia

© 2017, © 2017 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. Key drivers for migrants’ social integration are education, employment, and skills in the dominant language of the settlement country. Data from Building a New Life in Australia: The Longitudinal Study of Humanitarian Migrants were used to examine migrants’ English proficiency and how oral English proficiency facilitated or hindered participation in activities that may help them become self-sufficient and settle. Participants were 2399 humanitarian migrants interviewed in the first wave of data collection (during 2013/14). Before arrival in Australia, 80.1% reported they spoke English not well or not at all. After arrival, oral English proficiency was a statistically significant predictor of self-sufficiency (knowing how to look for a job, get help in an emergency, etc.) explaining 21% of the variance while controlling for confounding variables such as age and education. After English proficiency, age (neither too young nor too old), gender (male), education (more than 12 years), and time since arrival (more than one year) were significant predictors of self-sufficiency. Identification of factors that predict self-sufficiency informs the understanding of people who provide support for humanitarian migrants. These findings indicate poor oral English skills may profoundly hinder humanitarian migrants’ ability to settle and highlight the importance of supporting migrants’ English learning

Advancing Workplace Diversity Through the Culturally Responsive Teamwork Framework.

Purpose Diversification of the profession is an important element of combating racism, bias, and prejudice in the speech-language pathology workforce at national and systemic levels. However, national and systemic change needs to be combined with equipping individual speech-language pathologists to adapt to the challenges that they face to engaging in culturally responsive practice. This paper presents four interacting levels of practice within the Culturally Responsive Teamwork Framework (CRTF): (a) intrapersonal practices, (b) interpersonal practices, (c) intraprofessional practices, and (d) the interprofessional practices. Conclusion CRTF is a practical, strengths-based framework that draws on international research and expertise to expand personal and professional practice and describe critical behaviors within the workplace that can be used to promote principles of evidence-based practice and social justice, especially when working with people from nondominant cultural or linguistic groups

Application of next generation sequencing to CEPH cell lines to discover variants associated with FDA approved chemotherapeutics

After publication of this work [1], it has come to our attention that there is an error in the author list of the initial version of this manuscript; rather than Ernest J Lam, the second author of the manuscript should be listed as Ernest T Lam

Cancer pharmacogenetics

The large number of active combination chemotherapy regimens for most cancers has led to the need for better information to guide the \u27standard\u27 treatment for each patient. In an attempt to individualise therapy, pharmacogenetics and pharmacogenomics (a polygenic approach to pharmacogenetic studies) encompass the search for answers to the hereditary basis for interindividual differences in drug response. This review will focus on the results of studies assessing the effects of polymorphisms in drug-metabolising enzymes and drug targets on the toxicity and response to commonly used chemotherapy drugs. In addition, the need for polygenic pharmacogenomic strategies to identify patients at risk for adverse drug reactions will be highlighted

c-erbB-2 is not a major factor in the development of colorectal cancer

We have investigated c-erbB-2 protein expression in a large cohort of well-characterized colorectal tumours, and in a subset of lymph node metastases. We have also evaluated a Val655Ile single nucleotide polymorphism, which is associated with an increased risk of breast cancer, in a subset of the colorectal cancer patients and in healthy control subjects. Immunohistochemical studies revealed that while 81.8% of tumours expressed c-erbB-2, in the majority of cases equivalent levels of c-erb-B2 were seen in adjacent normal mucosa. Colon tumours were significantly more likely to express c-erbB-2 than rectal tumours (P=0.015). Only 52.4% of the metastases displayed staining patterns concordant with their primary tumour, indicating that determination of c-erbB-2 protein in colorectal tumours cannot predict the status of lymph node metastases. PCR–RFLP analysis of the Val655Ile single nucleotide polymorphism demonstrated that allele frequencies were identical between colorectal cancer patients and a control group of Caucasian subjects (Ile=0.80 and Val=0.20 in each case), indicating that it is not related to the risk of developing colorectal cancer in this population. Furthermore, there was no relationship between c-erbB-2 protein expression and gene polymorphism (P=0.58). In terms of prognosis, no association was seen between either c-erbB-2 protein expression or the presence of the Val allele and patient survival (P>0.05 in each case), suggesting that c-erbB-2 is not a prognostic marker in colorectal cancer

CYP3A4 and CYP3A5 genotyping by Pyrosequencing

BACKGROUND: Human cytochrome P450 3A enzymes, particularly CYP3A4 and CYP3A5, play an important role in drug metabolism. CYP3A expression exhibits substantial interindividual variation, much of which may result from genetic variation. This study describes Pyrosequencing assays for key SNPs in CYP3A4 (CYP3A4*1B, CYP3A4*2, and CYP3A4*3) and CYP3A5 (CYP3A5*3C and CYP3A5*6). METHODS: Genotyping of 95 healthy European and 95 healthy African volunteers was performed using Pyrosequencing. Linkage disequilibrium, haplotype inference, Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium, and tag SNPs were also determined for these samples. RESULTS: CYP3A4*1B allele frequencies were 4% in Europeans and 82% in Africans. The CYP3A4*2 allele was found in neither population sample. CYP3A4*3 had an allele frequency of 2% in Europeans and 0% in Africans. The frequency of CYP3A5*3C was 94% in Europeans and 12% in Africans. No CYP3A5*6 variants were found in the European samples, but this allele had a frequency of 16% in the African samples. Allele frequencies and haplotypes show interethnic variation, highlighting the need to analyze clinically relevant SNPs and haplotypes in a variety of ethnic groups. CONCLUSION: Pyrosequencing is a versatile technique that could improve the efficiency of SNP analysis for pharmacogenomic research with the ultimate goal of pre-screening patients for individual therapy selection

Lambda and Antilambda polarization from deep inelastic muon scattering

We report results of the first measurements of Lambda and Antilambda polarization produced in deep inelastic polarized muon scattering on the nucleon. The results are consistent with an expected trend towards positive polarization with increasing x_F. The polarizations of Lambda and Antilambda appear to have opposite signs. A large negative polarization for Lambda at low positive x_F is observed and is not explained by existing models.A possible interpretation is presented.Comment: 9 pages, 2 figure

Evaluation of the activity of CYP2C19 in Gujrati and Marwadi subjects living in Mumbai (Bombay)

BACKGROUND: Inherited differences in the metabolism and disposition of drugs, and genetic polymorphisms in the targets of drug therapy (e.g., receptors), can greatly influence efficacy and toxicity of medications. Marked interethnic differences in CYP2C19 (a member of the cytochrome P-450 enzyme superfamily catalyzing phase I drug metabolism) which affects the metabolism of a number of clinically important drugs have been documented. The present study evaluated the activity of CYP2C19 in normal, healthy Gujrati and Marwadi subjects by phenotyping (a western Indian population). METHODS: All subjects received 20 mg of omeprazole, which was followed by blood collection at 3 hrs to estimate the metabolic ratio of omeprazole to 5-hydroxyomeprazole. The analysis was done by HPLC. RESULTS: It was seen that 10.36% of this population were poor metabolizers(PM) whereas 89.63% were extensive metabolizers(EM). CONCLUSION: A genotyping evaluation would better help in identifying population specific genotypes and thus help individualize drug therapy