European cancer mortality predictions for the year 2015: does lung cancer have the highest death rate in EU women?

Total cancer mortality rates in the EU are predicted to fall 7.5% in men and 6% in women between 2009 and 2015. However, due to population aging, total number of cancer deaths will rise to 1 359 100. Cancer mortality outlook for 2015 remains favourable, except for pancreas in both sexes and female lung that is predicted to overtake breast becoming the female cancer with the highest rate (14.24/100 000

European cancer mortality predictions for the year 2015 : does lung cancer have the highest death rate in EU women?

BACKGROUND: Cancer mortality statistics for 2015 were projected from the most recent available data for the European Union (EU) and its six more populous countries. Prostate cancer was analysed in detail. PATIENTS AND METHODS: Population and death certification data from stomach, colorectum, pancreas, lung, breast, uterus, prostate, leukaemias and total cancers were obtained from the World Health Organisation database and Eurostat. Figures were derived for the EU, France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Spain and the UK. Projected 2015 numbers of deaths by age group were obtained by linear regression on estimated numbers of deaths over the most recent time period identified by a joinpoint regression model. RESULTS: A total of 1 359 100 cancer deaths are predicted in the EU in 2015 (766 200 men and 592 900 women), corresponding to standardised death rates of 138.4/100 000 men and 83.9/100 000 women, falling 7.5% and 6%, respectively, since 2009. In men, predicted rates for the three major cancers (lung, colorectum and prostate) are lower than in 2009, falling 9%, 5% and 12%. Prostate cancer showed predicted falls of 14%, 17% and 9% in the 35-64, 65-74 and 75+ age groups. In women, breast and colorectal cancers had favourable trends (-10% and -8%), but predicted lung cancer rates rise 9% to 14.24/100 000 becoming the cancer with the highest rate, reaching and possibly overtaking breast cancer rates-though the total number of deaths remain higher for breast (90 800) than lung (87 500). Pancreatic cancer has a negative outlook in both sexes, rising 4% in men and 5% in women between 2009 and 2015. CONCLUSIONS: Cancer mortality predictions for 2015 confirm the overall favourable cancer mortality trend in the EU, translating to an overall 26% fall in men since its peak in 1988, and 21% in women, and the avoidance of over 325 000 deaths in 2015 compared with the peak rate

Legionella pneumophila serogroup 3 pneumonia in a patient with low-grade 4 non-Hodgkin lymphoma: a case report

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Introduction</p> <p>Nosocomial legionellosis has generally been described in immunodepressed patients, but <it>Legionella pneumophila </it>serogroup 3 has rarely been identified as the causative agent.</p> <p>Case presentation</p> <p>We report the case of nosocomial <it>L. pneumophila </it>serogroup 3 pneumonia in a 70-year-old Caucasian man with non-Hodgkin lymphoma. Diagnosis was carried out by culture and real-time polymerase chain reaction of bronchoalveolar lavage fluid. The results of a urinary antigen test were negative. A hospital environmental investigation revealed that the hospital water system was highly colonized by <it>L. pneumophila </it>serogroups 3, 4, and 8. The hospital team involved in the prevention of infections was informed, long-term control measures to reduce the environmental bacterial load were adopted, and clinical monitoring of legionellosis occurrence in high-risk patients was performed. No further cases of <it>Legionella </it>pneumonia have been observed so far.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>In this report, we describe a case of legionellosis caused by <it>L. pneumophila </it>serogroup 3, which is not usually a causative agent of nosocomial infection. Our research confirms the importance of carrying out cultures of respiratory secretions to diagnose legionellosis and highlights the limited value of the urinary antigen test for hospital infections, especially in immunocompromised patients. It also indicates that, to reduce the bacterial load and prevent nosocomial legionellosis, appropriate control measures should be implemented with systematic monitoring of hospital water systems.</p

The protective effect of dietary folate intake on gastric cancer is modified by alcohol consumption: A pooled analysis of the StoP Consortium

Dietary folate intake has been identified as a potentially modifiable factor of gastric cancer (GC) risk, although the evidence is still inconsistent. We evaluate the association between dietary folate intake and the risk of GC as well as the potential modification effect of alcohol consumption. We pooled data for 2829 histologically confirmed GC cases and 8141 controls from 11 case–control studies from the international Stomach Cancer Pooling Consortium. Dietary folate intake was estimated using food frequency questionnaires. We used linear mixed models with random intercepts for each study to calculate adjusted odds ratios (OR) and 95% confidence interval (CI). Higher folate intake was associated with a lower risk of GC, although this association was not observed among participants who consumed >2.0 alcoholic drinks/day. The OR for the highest quartile of folate intake, compared with the lowest quartile, was 0.78 (95% CI, 0.67–0.90, P-trend = 0.0002). The OR per each quartile increment was 0.92 (95% CI, 0.87–0.96) and, per every 100 μg/day of folate intake, was 0.89 (95% CI, 0.84–0.95). There was a significant interaction between folate intake and alcohol consumption (P-interaction = 0.02). The lower risk of GC associated with higher folate intake was not observed in participants who consumed >2.0 drinks per day, ORQ4v Q1 = 1.15 (95% CI, 0.85–1.56), and the OR100 μg/day = 1.02 (95% CI, 0.92–1.15). Our study supports a beneficial effect of folate intake on GC risk, although the consumption of >2.0 alcoholic drinks/day counteracts this beneficial effect. © 2024 The Authors. International Journal of Cancer published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of UICC.This study was funded by the Associazione Italiana per la Ricerca sul Cancro (Project number 21378, Investigator Grant). NL and SM are funded under the Unidade de Investigação em Epidemiologia – Instituto de Saúde Pública da Universidade do Porto (EPIUnit; UIDB/04750/2020) financed by national funds from the Foundation for Science and Technology – FCT (Portuguese Ministry of Science, Technology and Higher Education) and the Laboratório para a Investigação Integrativa e Translacional em Saúde Populacional (ITR; LA/P/0064/2020). SM also received funding under the scope of the project “NEON-PC – Neuro-oncological complications of prostate cancer: longitudinal study of cognitive decline” (POCI-01-0145-FEDER-032358; Ref. PTDC/SAU-EPI/32358/2017) funded by FEDER through the Operational Program Competitiveness and Internationalization, and national funding from FCT, and the EPIUnit – Junior Research – Prog Financing (UIDP/04750/2020). This research was supported in part by the Intramural Research Program of the US National Cancer Institute. The study was also supported by the Italian Ministry of Health through the project “Interaction of genomic and dietary aspects in gastric cancer risk: the global StoP project” (Grant number RF-2021-12373951). This research was funded by the AICO/2021/347 grants for consolidated research groups from the Generalitat Valenciana. MHW and CSR also received funding from National Institutes of Health (ZIA CP010212 - Molecular mechanisms of infection-related cancer). [Correction added on 29 May 2024, after first online publication: The funding information has been updated.]

Prolyl Isomerase Pin1 Regulates Mouse Embryonic Fibroblast Differentiation into Adipose Cells

isomerase, Pin1, regulates insulin signal transduction. Pin1 reduces responses to insulin stimulation by binding CRTC2 (CREB-regulated transcriptional co-activator 2) and PPARγ (peroxisome prolifereator- activated receptor γ), but conversely enhances insulin signaling by binding IRS-1 (insulin receptor substrate-1), Akt kinase, and Smad3. Therefore, it is still unclear whether Pin1 inhibits or enhances adipose cell differentiation. mice was restored by increasing expression of Pin1. We found that Pin1 binds to phosphoThr172- and phosphoSer271-Pro sites in CREB suppress the activity in COS-7 cells.Pin1 enhanced the uptake of triglycerides and the differentiation of MEF cells into adipose cells in response to insulin stimulation. Results of this study suggest that Pin1 down-regulation could be a potential approach in obesity-related dysfunctions, such as high blood pressure, diabetes, non-alcoholic steatohepatitis

Addressing ethnic disparities in neurological research in the United Kingdom: An example from the prospective multicentre COVID-19 Clinical Neuroscience Study

\ua9 2024 The Author(s). Background: Minority ethnic groups have often been underrepresented in research, posing a problem in relation to external validity and extrapolation of findings. Here, we aimed to assess recruitment and retainment strategies in a large observational study assessing neurological complications following SARS-CoV-2 infection. Methods: Participants were recruited following confirmed infection with SARS-CoV-2 and hospitalisation. Self-reported ethnicity was recorded alongside other demographic data to identify potential barriers to recruitment. Results: 807 participants were recruited to COVID-CNS, and ethnicity data were available for 93.2%. We identified a proportionate representation of self-reported ethnicity categories, and distribution of broad ethnicity categories mirrored individual centres’ catchment areas. White ethnicity within individual centres ranged between 44.5% and 89.1%, with highest percentage of participants with non-White ethnicity in London-based centres. Examples are provided how to reach potentially underrepresented minority ethnic groups. Conclusions: Recruitment barriers in relation to potentially underrepresented ethnic groups may be overcome with strategies identified here

FONZIE: An optimized pipeline for minisatellite marker discovery and primer design from large sequence data sets

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Micro-and minisatellites are among the most powerful genetic markers known to date. They have been used as tools for a large number of applications ranging from gene mapping to phylogenetic studies and isolate typing. However, identifying micro-and minisatellite markers on large sequence data sets is often a laborious process.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>FONZIE was designed to successively 1) perform a search for markers via the external software Tandem Repeat Finder, 2) exclude user-defined specific genomic regions, 3) screen for the size and the percent matches of each relevant marker found by Tandem Repeat Finder, 4) evaluate marker specificity (i.e., occurrence of the marker as a single copy in the genome) using BLAST2.0, 5) design minisatellite primer pairs via the external software Primer3, and 6) check the specificity of each final PCR product by BLAST. A final file returns to users all the results required to amplify markers. A biological validation of the approach was performed using the whole genome sequence of the phytopathogenic fungus <it>Leptosphaeria maculans</it>, showing that more than 90% of the minisatellite primer pairs generated by the pipeline amplified a PCR product, 44.8% of which showed agarose-gel resolvable polymorphism between isolates. Segregation analyses confirmed that the polymorphic minisatellites corresponded to single-locus markers.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>FONZIE is a stand-alone and user-friendly application developed to minimize tedious manual operations, reduce errors, and speed up the search for efficient minisatellite and microsatellite markers departing from whole-genome sequence data. This pipeline facilitates the integration of data and provides a set of specific primer sequences for PCR amplification of single-locus markers. FONZIE is freely downloadable at: <url>http://www.versailles-grignon.inra.fr/bioger/equipes/leptosphaeria_maculans/outils_d_analyses/fonzie</url></p

Education and gastric cancer risk-An individual participant data meta-analysis in the StoP project consortium

Low socioeconomic position (SEP) is a strong risk factor for incidence and premature mortality from several cancers. Our study aimed at quantifying the association between SEP and gastric cancer (GC) risk through an individual participant data meta-analysis within the "Stomach cancer Pooling (StoP) Project". Educational level and household income were used as proxies for the SEP. We estimated pooled odds ratios (ORs) and the corresponding 95% confidence intervals (CIs) across levels of education and household income by pooling study-specific ORs through random-effects meta-analytic models. The relative index of inequality (RII) was also computed. A total of 9,773 GC cases and 24,373 controls from 25 studies from Europe, Asia and America were included. The pooled OR for the highest compared to the lowest level of education was 0.60 (95% CI, 0.44-0.84), while the pooled RII was 0.45 (95% CI, 0.29-0.69). A strong inverse association was observed both for noncardia (OR 0.39, 95% CI, 0.22-0.70) and cardia GC (OR 0.47, 95% CI, 0.22-0.99). The relation was stronger among H. pylori negative subjects (RII 0.14, 95% CI, 0.04-0.48) as compared to H. pylori positive ones (RII 0.29, 95% CI, 0.10-0.84), in the absence of a significant interaction (p\u2009=\u20090.28). The highest household income category showed a pooled OR of 0.65 (95% CI, 0.48-0.89), while the corresponding RII was 0.40 (95% CI, 0.22-0.72). Our collaborative pooled-analysis showed a strong inverse relationship between SEP indicators and GC risk. Our data call for public health interventions to reduce GC risk among the more vulnerable groups of the population

Family history and gastric cancer risk: A pooled investigation in the stomach cancer pooling (STOP) project consortium

Research is still required to establish the relationship between family history (FH) and gastric cancer (GC) in relation to different histological types and anatomical sites. The present work aimed to examine the influence of first-degree FH on the risk of GC, also according to the GC location and histological type, including 5946 cases and 12,776 controls from 17 studies of 11 countries in three continents participating in the Stomach Cancer Pooling (StoP) Project consortium. This analysis confirms the effect of FH on the risk of GC, reporting an approximately doubled risk, and provides further quantification of the risk of GC according to the subsite and histotype. Although there is a clear relationship between family history (FH) and the risk of gastric cancer (GC), quantification is still needed in relation to different histological types and anatomical sites, and in strata of covariates. The objective was to analyze the risk of GC according to first-degree FH in a uniquely large epidemiological consortium of GC. This investigation includes 5946 cases and 12,776 controls from 17 studies of the Stomach Cancer Pooling (StoP) Project consortium. Summary odds ratios (OR) and the corresponding 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were calculated by pooling study-specific ORs using fixed-effect model meta-analysis techniques. Stratified analyses were carried out by sex, age, tumor location and histological type, smoking habit, socioeconomic status, alcohol intake and fruit consumption. The pooled OR for GC was 1.84 (95% CI: 1.64-2.04; I2 = 6.1%, P heterogeneity = 0.383) in subjects with vs. those without first-degree relatives with GC. No significant differences were observed among subgroups of sex, age, geographic area or study period. Associations tended to be stronger for non-cardia (OR = 1.82; 95% CI: 1.59-2.05 for subjects with FH) than for cardia GC (OR = 1.38; 95% CI: 0.98-1.77), and for the intestinal (OR = 1.92; 95% CI: 1.62-2.23) than for the diffuse histotype (OR = 1.62; 95% CI: 1.28-1.96). This analysis confirms the effect of FH on the risk of GC, reporting an approximately doubled risk, and provides further quantification of the risk of GC according to the subsite and histotype. Considering these findings, accounting for the presence of FH to carry out correct prevention and diagnosis measures is of the utmost importance