Urbanisation and women's health in Khayelitsha Part 11. Health status and use of health services

A study was conducted among women in Khayelitsha to determine the relationship between urbanisation, health status and use of health services; 722 households were visited, and 659 female respondents provided information on acute and chronic illness for the 3229 individuals who were members of their households. In addition, they provided information concerning their reproductive health, AIDS awareness, knowledge of cervical smears and use and knowledge of health services. Acute illness was reported for .4,3% of the study population, the commonest complaints being diarrhoea, abdominal pain and upper respiratory infections; 4,4% reported chronic illness, the commonest complaints being hypertension and tuberculosis; 16,2% of women reported gynaecological illness; 86% had of heard of AIDS (although their knowledge of transmission and prevention was poor); and 45% had heard of cervical smears. Patterns of illness and knowledge and use of health services vary in the different areas of residence of Khayelitsha. This appears to be related to urbanisation, age, and environmental and socio-economic factors

Urbanisation and women's health in Khayelitsha Part I. Demographic and socio-economic profile

Demographic and socio-economic data and information on migration patterns and urban/rural links was collected from 722 households in the formal housing area and the serviced and the unserviced site areas of Khayelitsha; 659 women and 61 men were interviewed. Thirty-eight per cent of the population were aged under 15 years and 77% under 35 years. There was a predominance of females in the 5 - 35-year age group. There was a mean of 4,9 persons per household, and 93,5% of sites contained 1 dwelling. Of the 659 female respondents, 7% had received no formal education, 39% had primary school education, and 54% had secondary school education. unemployment among women was 45%. Domestic service accounted for 66,2% of formal employment. Of all women 86% were unskilled, 71,9% had been born in a 'homeland', and 69,7% had migrated to an urban area before 1985. Ties to the rural areas were strong, particularly in the 'shack' areas. 'New arrivals' to an urban area were young, mostly unemployed, and lived in the worst environmental conditions. In the unserviced 'shack' areas, 47,5% of women had migrated to an urban area in the last 5 years. These are important target areas for a study of the health effects of urbanisation and for possible interventions. This study tends to confirm the 'quadruple' oppression of women in Khayelitsha, on the basis of race, social class and gender and as new arrivals in an urban environment

Contribution of thirdhand smoke to overall tobacco smoke exposure in pediatric patients: study protocol.

BackgroundThirdhand smoke (THS) is the persistent residue resulting from secondhand smoke (SHS) that accumulates in dust, objects, and on surfaces in homes where tobacco has been used, and is reemitted into air. Very little is known about the extent to which THS contributes to children's overall tobacco smoke exposure (OTS) levels, defined as their combined THS and SHS exposure. Even less is known about the effect of OTS and THS on children's health. This project will examine how different home smoking behaviors contribute to THS and OTS and if levels of THS are associated with respiratory illnesses in nonsmoking children.MethodsThis project leverages the experimental design from an ongoing pediatric emergency department-based tobacco cessation trial of caregivers who smoke and their children (NIHR01HD083354). At baseline and follow-up, we will collect urine and handwipe samples from children and samples of dust and air from the homes of smokers who smoke indoors, have smoking bans or who have quit smoking. These samples will be analyzed to examine to what extent THS pollution at home contributes to OTS exposure over and above SHS and to what extent THS continues to persist and contribute to OTS in homes of smokers who have quit or have smoking bans. Targeted and nontargeted chemical analyses of home dust samples will explore which types of THS pollutants are present in homes. Electronic medical record review will examine if THS and OTS levels are associated with child respiratory illness. Additionally, a repository of child and environmental samples will be created.DiscussionThe results of this study will be crucial to help close gaps in our understanding of the types, quantity, and clinical effects of OTS, THS exposure, and THS pollutants in a unique sample of tobacco smoke-exposed ill children and their homes. The potential impact of these findings is substantial, as currently the level of risk in OTS attributable to THS is unknown. This research has the potential to change how we protect children from OTS, by recognizing that SHS and THS exposure needs to be addressed separately and jointly as sources of pollution and exposure.Trial registrationClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT02531594 . Date of registration: August 24, 2015

Significance of herpesvirus immediate early gene expression in cellular immunity to cytomegalovirus infection

Interstitial pneumonia linked with reactivation of latent human cytomegalovirus due to iatrogenic immunosuppression can be a serious complication of bone marrow transplantation therapy of aplastic anaemia and acute leukaemia1. Cellular immunity plays a critical role in the immune surveillance of inapparent cytomegalovirus infections in man and the mouse1−7. The molecular basis of latency, however, and the interaction between latently or recurrently infected cells and the immune system of the host are poorfy understood. We have detected a so far unknown antigen in the mouse model. This antigen is found in infected cells in association with the expression of the herpesvirus 'immediate early' genes and is recognized by cytolytic T lymphocytes (CTL)8. We now demonstrate that an unexpectedly high proportion of the CTL precursors generated in vivo during acute murine cytomegalovirus infection are specific for cells that selectively synthesize immediate early proteins, indicating an immunodominant role of viral non-structural proteins

Expedited batch processing and analysis of transposon insertions

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>With advances in sequencing technology, greater and greater amounts of eukaryotic genome data are becoming available. Often, large portions of these genomes consist of transposable elements, frequently accounting for 50% or more in vertebrates. Each transposable element family may have thousands or tens of thousands of individual copies within a given genome, and therefore it can take an exorbitant amount of time and effort to process data in a meaningful fashion.</p> <p>Findings</p> <p>In order to combat this problem, we developed a set of bioinformatics techniques and programs to streamline the analysis. This includes a unique Perl script which automates the process of taking BLAST, Repeatmasker and similar data to extract and manipulate the hit sequences from the genome. This script, called Process_hits uses an object-oriented methodology to compile all hit locations from a given file for processing, organize this data into useable categories, and output it in multiple formats.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>The program proved capable of handling large amounts of transposon data in an efficient fashion. It is equipped with a number of useful sub-functions, each of which is contained within its own sub-module to allow for greater expandability and as a foundation for future program design.</p

Spatial Guilds in the Serengeti Food Web Revealed by a Bayesian Group Model

Food webs, networks of feeding relationships among organisms, provide fundamental insights into mechanisms that determine ecosystem stability and persistence. Despite long-standing interest in the compartmental structure of food webs, past network analyses of food webs have been constrained by a standard definition of compartments, or modules, that requires many links within compartments and few links between them. Empirical analyses have been further limited by low-resolution data for primary producers. In this paper, we present a Bayesian computational method for identifying group structure in food webs using a flexible definition of a group that can describe both functional roles and standard compartments. The Serengeti ecosystem provides an opportunity to examine structure in a newly compiled food web that includes species-level resolution among plants, allowing us to address whether groups in the food web correspond to tightly-connected compartments or functional groups, and whether network structure reflects spatial or trophic organization, or a combination of the two. We have compiled the major mammalian and plant components of the Serengeti food web from published literature, and we infer its group structure using our method. We find that network structure corresponds to spatially distinct plant groups coupled at higher trophic levels by groups of herbivores, which are in turn coupled by carnivore groups. Thus the group structure of the Serengeti web represents a mixture of trophic guild structure and spatial patterns, in contrast to the standard compartments typically identified in ecological networks. From data consisting only of nodes and links, the group structure that emerges supports recent ideas on spatial coupling and energy channels in ecosystems that have been proposed as important for persistence.Comment: 28 pages, 6 figures (+ 3 supporting), 2 tables (+ 4 supporting

Mutations in protocadherin 15 and cadherin 23 affect tip links and mechanotransduction in mammalian sensory hair cells

Immunocytochemical studies have shown that protocadherin-15 (PCDH15) and cadherin-23 (CDH23) are associated with tip links, structures thought to gate the mechanotransducer channels of hair cells in the sensory epithelia of the inner ear. The present report describes functional and structural analyses of hair cells from Pcdh15av3J (av3J), Pcdh15av6J (av6J) and Cdh23v2J (v2J) mice. The av3J and v2J mice carry point mutations that are predicted to introduce premature stop codons in the transcripts for Pcdh15 and Cdh23, respectively, and av6J mice have an in-frame deletion predicted to remove most of the 9th cadherin ectodomain from PCDH15. Severe disruption of hair-bundle morphology is observed throughout the early-postnatal cochlea in av3J/av3J and v2J/v2J mice. In contrast, only mild-to-moderate bundle disruption is evident in the av6J/av6J mice. Hair cells from av3J/av3J mice are unaffected by aminoglycosides and fail to load with [3H]-gentamicin or FM1-43, compounds that permeate the hair cell's mechanotransducer channels. In contrast, hair cells from av6J/av6J mice load with both FM1-43 and [3H]-gentamicin, and are aminoglycoside sensitive. Transducer currents can be recorded from hair cells of all three mutants but are reduced in amplitude in all mutants and have abnormal directional sensitivity in the av3J/av3J and v2J/v2J mutants. Scanning electron microscopy of early postnatal cochlear hair cells reveals tip-link like links in av6J/av6J mice, substantially reduced numbers of links in the av3J/av3J mice and virtually none in the v2J/v2J mice. Analysis of mature vestibular hair bundles reveals an absence of tip links in the av3J/av3J and v2J/v2J mice and a reduction in av6J/av6J mice. These results therefore provide genetic evidence consistent with PCDH15 and CDH23 being part of the tip-link complex and necessary for normal mechanotransduction

Mifamurtide for the treatment of nonmetastatic osteosarcoma

International audienceINTRODUCTION: The standard treatment for osteosarcoma requires both macroscopic surgical wide resection and postoperative multi-drug chemotherapy in neoadjuvant and adjuvant settings. However, the 5-year event-free survival has remained at a plateau of 60-70% of patients with nonmetastatic osteosarcoma for more than 30 years. AREAS COVERED: Mifamurtide (liposomal muramyl tripeptide phosphatidylethanolamine; L-MTP-PE) is a new agent. L-MTP-PE is a nonspecific immunomodulator, which is a synthetic analog of a component of bacterial cell walls. L-MTP-PE activates macrophages and monocytes as a potent activator of immune response in addition to standard chemotherapy. It also improves the overall survival from 70 to 78% and results in a one-third reduction in the risk of death from osteosarcoma. This review summarizes the most recent findings about L-MTP-PE and its therapeutic application for nonmetastatic osteosarcoma. EXPERT OPINION: Recently, L-MTP-PE has been approved in Europe for the treatment of nonmetastatic osteosarcoma with chemotherapy. L-MTP-PE in combination with traditional treatment is expected to go mainstream and to be beneficial for patients with osteosarcoma. Information about potential benefit regarding mifamurtide use in the neoadjuvant setting (i.e., before surgery) and/or usefulness of L-MTP-PE in metastatic in relapsed and metastatic osteosarcoma requires analysis of expanded access and/or future clinical trials of L-MTP-PE in high-burden and low-burden situations

Rheotaxis in Larval Zebrafish Is Mediated by Lateral Line Mechanosensory Hair Cells

The lateral line sensory system, found in fish and amphibians, is used in prey detection, predator avoidance and schooling behavior. This system includes cell clusters, called superficial neuromasts, located on the surface of head and trunk of developing larvae. Mechanosensory hair cells in the center of each neuromast respond to disturbances in the water and convey information to the brain via the lateral line ganglia. The convenient location of mechanosensory hair cells on the body surface has made the lateral line a valuable system in which to study hair cell damage and regeneration. One way to measure hair cell survival and recovery is to assay behaviors that depend on their function. We built a system in which orientation against constant water flow, positive rheotaxis, can be quantitatively assessed. We found that zebrafish larvae perform positive rheotaxis and that, similar to adult fish, larvae use both visual and lateral line input to perform this behavior. Disruption or damage of hair cells in the absence of vision leads to a marked decrease in rheotaxis that recovers upon hair cell repair or regeneration