The effect of social relationships on survival in elderly residents of a Southern European community: a cohort study

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Comparative evidence regarding the effects of social relationships on mortality in Mediterranean communities will increase our knowledge of their strengths and the ways in which they influence longevity across cultures. Men and women may benefit differently from social relationships because of cultural differences in gender roles. Psychosocial mechanisms such as social support, which may explain the effects of social networks, may also vary by culture.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Detailed information on the social relationships of a representative sample of 1,174 community-dwelling older adults was collected in Leganés, a city in central Spain. Mortality over a 6-year follow-up period was ascertained. Information on socio-demographic, health and disability variables was also collected. Cox proportional hazards models were fitted separately for men and women and for the combined sample.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Having a confidant was associated with a 25% (95% CI 5–40%) reduction in the mortality risk. The hazard ratio for lack of social participation was 1.5 (95% CI 1.3–1.7). Being engaged in meaningful roles protected against mortality, while receipt of emotional support did not affect survival. These results were comparable for men and women. Having contact with all family ties was associated with reduced mortality only in men. Structural aspects of social networks make a unique contribution to survival, independently of emotional support and the role played in the lives of significant others.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>In this elderly Southern European population, the beneficial effects of social networks, social participation, engagement in the life of significant others and having a confidant call for public policies that foster intergenerational and community exchanges.</p

Hystricognathy vs Sciurognathy in the Rodent Jaw: A New Morphometric Assessment of Hystricognathy Applied to the Living Fossil Laonastes (Diatomyidae)

While exceptional for an intense diversification of lineages, the evolutionary history of the order Rodentia comprises only a limited number of morphological morphotypes for the mandible. This situation could partly explain the intense debates about the taxonomic position of the latest described member of this clade, the Laotian rock rat Laonastes aenigmamus (Diatomyidae). This discovery has re-launched the debate on the definition of the Hystricognathi suborder identified using the angle of the jaw relative to the plane of the incisors. Our study aims to end this ambiguity. For clarity, it became necessary to revisit the entire morphological diversity of the mandible in extant and extinct rodents. However, current and past rodent diversity brings out the limitations of the qualitative descriptive approach and highlights the need for a quantitative approach. Here, we present the first descriptive comparison of the masticatory apparatus within the Ctenohystrica clade, in combining classic comparative anatomy with morphometrical methods. First, we quantified the shape of the mandible in rodents using 3D landmarks. Then, the analysis of osteological features was compared to myological features in order to understand the biomechanical origin of this morphological diversity. Among the morphological variation observed, the mandible of Laonastes aenigmamus displays an intermediate association of features that could be considered neither as sciurognathous nor as hystricognathous

A922 Sequential measurement of 1 hour creatinine clearance (1-CRCL) in critically ill patients at risk of acute kidney injury (AKI)

Meeting abstrac

Cardiovascular disease, chronic kidney disease, and diabetes mortality burden of cardiometabolic risk factors from 1980 to 2010: a comparative risk assessment

Background High blood pressure, blood glucose, serum cholesterol, and BMI are risk factors for cardiovascular diseases and some of these factors also increase the risk of chronic kidney disease and diabetes. We estimated mortality from cardiovascular diseases, chronic kidney disease, and diabetes that was attributable to these four cardiometabolic risk factors for all countries and regions from 1980 to 2010. Methods We used data for exposure to risk factors by country, age group, and sex from pooled analyses of populationbased health surveys. We obtained relative risks for the eff ects of risk factors on cause-specifi c mortality from metaanalyses of large prospective studies. We calculated the population attributable fractions for- each risk factor alone, and for the combination of all risk factors, accounting for multicausality and for mediation of the eff ects of BMI by the other three risks. We calculated attributable deaths by multiplying the cause-specifi c population attributable fractions by the number of disease-specifi c deaths. We obtained cause-specifi c mortality from the Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries, and Risk Factors 2010 Study. We propagated the uncertainties of all the inputs to the fi nal estimates. Findings In 2010, high blood pressure was the leading risk factor for deaths due to cardiovascular diseases, chronic kidney disease, and diabetes in every region, causing more than 40% of worldwide deaths from these diseases; high BMI and glucose were each responsible for about 15% of deaths, and high cholesterol for more than 10%. After accounting for multicausality, 63% (10\ub78 million deaths, 95% CI 10\ub71\u201311\ub75) of deaths from these diseases in 2010 were attributable to the combined eff ect of these four metabolic risk factors, compared with 67% (7\ub71 million deaths, 6\ub76\u20137\ub76) in 1980. The mortality burden of high BMI and glucose nearly doubled from 1980 to 2010. At the country level, age-standardised death rates from these diseases attributable to the combined eff ects of these four risk factors surpassed 925 deaths per 100 000 for men in Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Mongolia, but were less than 130 deaths per 100 000 for women and less than 200 for men in some high-income countries including Australia, Canada, France, Japan, the Netherlands, Singapore, South Korea, and Spain. Interpretation The salient features of the cardiometabolic disease and risk factor epidemic at the beginning of the 21st century are high blood pressure and an increasing eff ect of obesity and diabetes. The mortality burden of cardiometabolic risk factors has shifted from high-income to low-income and middle-income countries. Lowering cardiometabolic risks through dietary, behavioural, and pharmacological interventions should be a part of the globalresponse to non-communicable diseases

Guidelines for the use and interpretation of assays for monitoring autophagy (4th edition)1.

In 2008, we published the first set of guidelines for standardizing research in autophagy. Since then, this topic has received increasing attention, and many scientists have entered the field. Our knowledge base and relevant new technologies have also been expanding. Thus, it is important to formulate on a regular basis updated guidelines for monitoring autophagy in different organisms. Despite numerous reviews, there continues to be confusion regarding acceptable methods to evaluate autophagy, especially in multicellular eukaryotes. Here, we present a set of guidelines for investigators to select and interpret methods to examine autophagy and related processes, and for reviewers to provide realistic and reasonable critiques of reports that are focused on these processes. These guidelines are not meant to be a dogmatic set of rules, because the appropriateness of any assay largely depends on the question being asked and the system being used. Moreover, no individual assay is perfect for every situation, calling for the use of multiple techniques to properly monitor autophagy in each experimental setting. Finally, several core components of the autophagy machinery have been implicated in distinct autophagic processes (canonical and noncanonical autophagy), implying that genetic approaches to block autophagy should rely on targeting two or more autophagy-related genes that ideally participate in distinct steps of the pathway. Along similar lines, because multiple proteins involved in autophagy also regulate other cellular pathways including apoptosis, not all of them can be used as a specific marker for bona fide autophagic responses. Here, we critically discuss current methods of assessing autophagy and the information they can, or cannot, provide. Our ultimate goal is to encourage intellectual and technical innovation in the field