La surveillance épidémiologique du risque de cancer

La santé fait partie intégrante du bien être. Certaines maladies bénignes sont faciles à supporter, surtout si elles durent quelques jours seulement. En revanche, d'autres maladies sévères sont lourdes, tant sur le plan individuel que collectif. Le cancer est l'une d'entre elles ; les risques de mortalité sont variables selon l'organe touché, mais, dans tous les cas, une prise en charge par le corps médical s'impose durant des temps longs, souvent plusieurs années. Aussi, des réseaux de surveillance, où médecins et géographes collaborent, ont-ils vu le jour pour mieux cerner les causes de ce fléau ; et, peut-être, en réduire le taux d'incidence1

Active Trachoma among Children in Mali: Clustering and Environmental Risk Factors

Active trachoma is not uniformly distributed in endemic areas, and local environmental factors influencing its prevalence are not yet adequately understood. Determining whether clustering is a consistent phenomenon may help predict likely modes of transmission and help to determine the appropriate level at which to target control interventions. In this work, we estimated the magnitude of clustering at different levels and investigated the influence of socio-economic factors and environmental features on active trachoma prevalence among children in Mali (1996–1997 nationwide survey). Clustering revealed significant results at the child, caretaker, household, and village levels. Moreover, beyond some well-established individual risk factors (age between 3 and 5, dirty face, and flies on the face), we found that temperature, sunshine fraction, and presence of rainy days were negatively associated with active trachoma prevalence. This study clearly indicates the importance of directing control efforts both at children with active trachoma as well as those with close contact, and at communities. These results support facial cleanliness and environmental improvements as population-health initiatives to combat blinding trachoma

Environmental justice in a French industrial region: Are polluting industrial facilities equally distributed?

International audienceRecent studies have suggested that minority or deprived groups are subject to the additional burden of a polluted living environment. Our goal is to determine whether such environmental inequalities occur in France's leading industrial region, using detailed socio-economic data and advanced Bayesian methods. Associations between proximity to hazardous facilities (i.e., within a 2km radius) and the socio-economic characteristics of populations are analyzed at fine geographical scales. Noxious facilities are disproportionately located in higher foreign-born communities after controlling for deprivation (Townsend score), population density and rural/urban status. High deprivation also appears as a predictive factor, although less strongly and less consistently

Incidence des hémopathies lymphoïdes: Intérêt de l'utilisation de typologies territoriales pour l'étude des déterminants sociaux

7

Comparison of British and French expatriate doctors’ characteristics and motivations

International audienceObjective: The aim of this study was to analyse the migration of doctors between the UK and France, in an attempt to identify the reasons for these migrations. Design: This was a cross-sectional study conducted using a self-completed questionnaire. Setting: The questionnaire was sent to all British doctors practising in France and to all French doctors practising in the UK. Participants: The doctors were identified, thanks to official data of the National Medical Councils. There were 244 French doctors practising in the UK and 86 British doctors practising in France. Outcome measures: A questionnaire was specifically developed for the study to determine the reasons why doctors moved to the other country and their level of satisfaction with regard to their expatriation

Dioxin emissions from a municipal solid waste incinerator and risk of invasive breast cancer: a population-based case-control study with GIS-derived exposure.

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>To date, few epidemiologic studies have examined the relationship between environmental PCDD/F exposure and breast cancer in human populations. Dioxin emissions from municipal solid waste incinerators (MSWIs) are one of the major sources of environmental dioxins and are therefore an exposure source of public concern. The purpose of this study was to examine the association between dioxins emitted from a polluting MSWI and invasive breast cancer risk among women residing in the area under direct influence of the facility.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>We compared 434 incident cases of invasive breast cancer diagnosed between 1996 and 2002, and 2170 controls randomly selected from the 1999 population census. A validated dispersion model was used as a proxy for dioxin exposure, yielding four exposure categories. The latter were linked to individual places of residence, using Geographic Information System technology.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The age distribution at diagnosis for all cases combined showed a bimodal pattern with incidence peaks near 50 and 70 years old. This prompted us to run models separately for women aged 20–59 years, and women aged 60 years or older. Among women younger than 60 years old, no increased or decreased risk was found for any dioxin exposure category. Conversely, women over 60 years old living in the highest exposed zone were 0.31 time less likely (95% confidence interval, 0.08–0.89) to develop invasive breast cancer.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Before speculating that this decreased risk reflects a dioxin anti-estrogenic activity with greater effect on late-onset acquired breast cancer, some residual confounding must be envisaged.</p

Modeled dioxin concentrations at the block level, on the North-East side of the municipal solid waste incinerator of Besançon, France

<p><b>Copyright information:</b></p><p>Taken from "Dioxin emissions from a municipal solid waste incinerator and risk of invasive breast cancer: a population-based case-control study with GIS-derived exposure"</p><p>http://www.ij-healthgeographics.com/content/7/1/4</p><p>International Journal of Health Geographics 2008;7():4-4.</p><p>Published online 28 Jan 2008</p><p>PMCID:PMC2267447.</p><p></p