Perinatal factors associate with vertebral size and shape but not lumbar lordosis in 10-year-old children

Acknowledgements Ethical approval for this study was granted by the North of Scotland Research Ethics Committees (13/NS/0162). We would like to thank the authors and radiographers and participants involved in the original study from which MR images and data were used. We thank Dr Onyedikachi Eseonu for his contribution to data generation and marking up spinal images. AVP was supported by a PhD studentship kindly donated by Roemex Ltd. to the Aberdeen Centre of the Oliver Bird Rheumatism Programme at the Nuffield Foundation. The funders played no part in the design, execution or publication of this study and the authors have no interests to declarePeer reviewedPostprintPostprin

Impacts of climate variability and future climate change on harmful algal blooms and human health

This is the final version of the article. Available from BioMed Central via the DOI in this record.Anthropogenically-derived increases in atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations have been implicated in recent climate change, and are projected to substantially impact the climate on a global scale in the future. For marine and freshwater systems, increasing concentrations of greenhouse gases are expected to increase surface temperatures, lower pH, and cause changes to vertical mixing, upwelling, precipitation, and evaporation patterns. The potential consequences of these changes for harmful algal blooms (HABs) have received relatively little attention and are not well understood. Given the apparent increase in HABs around the world and the potential for greater problems as a result of climate change and ocean acidification, substantial research is needed to evaluate the direct and indirect associations between HABs, climate change, ocean acidification, and human health. This research will require a multidisciplinary approach utilizing expertise in climatology, oceanography, biology, epidemiology, and other disciplines. We review the interactions between selected patterns of large-scale climate variability and climate change, oceanic conditions, and harmful algae.This work was funded in part through grants from the NSF/NIEHS Centers for Oceans and Human Health, grant numbers NSF OCE04-32479 and NIEHS P50 ES012740 (EAL), NSF OCE-0432368 and NIEHS P50 ES012736 (LEF), NIEHS P50 ES012762 and NSF OCE-0434087 (SKM, MSP). SKM, VLT and NJM also were supported in part by the West Coast Center for Oceans and Human Health (WCCOHH) as part of the NOAA Oceans and Human Health Initiative, and this is WCCOHH publication no. 26. The WCCOHH is part of the National Marine Fisheries Service's Northwest Fisheries Science Center, Seattle, Washington

School Psychologists’ Knowledge and Self-Efficacy in Working with Students with TBI

Approximately 145,000 U.S. children experience lasting effects of traumatic brain injury (TBI) that manifest in social, behavioural, physical, and cognitive challenges in the school setting. School psychologists have an essential role in identifying students who need support and in determining eligibility under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. The purpose of this study was to assess the knowledge and perception of abilities related to TBI in a sample of school psychologists currently working in public schools. We surveyed school psychologists and found persistently low levels of knowledge and of perceived preparedness to work with these students. School psychologists with more experience working with students with TBI rated themselves significantly higher on their perceived ability to perform nearly all key duties of a school psychologist. To meet the academic and behavioural needs of students with TBI, all school psychologists need effective training in working with and evaluating students with TBI

Organic food and farming research needs in the UK:A report on a stakeholder participatory consultation process

During 2005 Defra commissioned a study to identify and analyse issues and aspirations that organic stakeholders felt should be addressed by publicly funded organic food and farming research in the UK. How this was undertaken is presented in this paper. A series of 12 workshops were undertaken with stakeholders throughout the UK. Nearly 300 stakeholders attended the workshops. These workshops used participatory approaches to identify and record the most important issues and aspirations from those attending. The use of a highly participatory style was greatly appreciated by stakeholders. In most cases the interaction between stakeholders worked well and resulted in lively discussions. The workshops have served to open up a useful dialogue between groups of stakeholders who do not normally communicate directly. They have produced a significant number of interesting and challenging issues and aspirations

Cross-sectional associations between sleep duration, sedentary time, physical activity, and adiposity indicators among Canadian preschool-aged children using compositional analyses

Abstract Background Sleep duration, sedentary behaviour, and physical activity are three co-dependent behaviours that fall on the movement/non-movement intensity continuum. Compositional data analyses provide an appropriate method for analyzing the association between co-dependent movement behaviour data and health indicators. The objectives of this study were to examine: (1) the combined associations of the composition of time spent in sleep, sedentary behaviour, light-intensity physical activity (LPA), and moderate- to vigorous-intensity physical activity (MVPA) with adiposity indicators; and (2) the association of the time spent in sleep, sedentary behaviour, LPA, or MVPA with adiposity indicators relative to the time spent in the other behaviours in a representative sample of Canadian preschool-aged children. Methods Participants were 552 children aged 3 to 4 years from cycles 2 and 3 of the Canadian Health Measures Survey. Sedentary time, LPA, and MVPA were measured with Actical accelerometers (Philips Respironics, Bend, OR USA), and sleep duration was parental reported. Adiposity indicators included waist circumference (WC) and body mass index (BMI) z-scores based on World Health Organization growth standards. Compositional data analyses were used to examine the cross-sectional associations. Results The composition of movement behaviours was significantly associated with BMI z-scores (p = 0.006) but not with WC (p = 0.718). Further, the time spent in sleep (BMI z-score: γ sleep  = −0.72; p = 0.138; WC: γ sleep  = −1.95; p = 0.285), sedentary behaviour (BMI z-score: γ SB  = 0.19; p = 0.624; WC: γ SB  = 0.87; p = 0.614), LPA (BMI z-score: γ LPA  = 0.62; p = 0.213, WC: γ LPA  = 0.23; p = 0.902), or MVPA (BMI z-score: γ MVPA  = −0.09; p = 0.733, WC: γ MVPA  = 0.08; p = 0.288) relative to the other behaviours was not significantly associated with the adiposity indicators. Conclusions This study is the first to use compositional analyses when examining associations of co-dependent sleep duration, sedentary time, and physical activity behaviours with adiposity indicators in preschool-aged children. The overall composition of movement behaviours appears important for healthy BMI z-scores in preschool-aged children. Future research is needed to determine the optimal movement behaviour composition that should be promoted in this age group

A broad distribution of the alternative oxidase in microsporidian parasites

Microsporidia are a group of obligate intracellular parasitic eukaryotes that were considered to be amitochondriate until the recent discovery of highly reduced mitochondrial organelles called mitosomes. Analysis of the complete genome of Encephalitozoon cuniculi revealed a highly reduced set of proteins in the organelle, mostly related to the assembly of ironsulphur clusters. Oxidative phosphorylation and the Krebs cycle proteins were absent, in keeping with the notion that the microsporidia and their mitosomes are anaerobic, as is the case for other mitosome bearing eukaryotes, such as Giardia. Here we provide evidence opening the possibility that mitosomes in a number of microsporidian lineages are not completely anaerobic. Specifically, we have identified and characterized a gene encoding the alternative oxidase (AOX), a typically mitochondrial terminal oxidase in eukaryotes, in the genomes of several distantly related microsporidian species, even though this gene is absent from the complete genome of E. cuniculi. In order to confirm that these genes encode functional proteins, AOX genes from both A. locustae and T. hominis were over-expressed in E. coli and AOX activity measured spectrophotometrically using ubiquinol-1 (UQ-1) as substrate. Both A. locustae and T. hominis AOX proteins reduced UQ-1 in a cyanide and antimycin-resistant manner that was sensitive to ascofuranone, a potent inhibitor of the trypanosomal AOX. The physiological role of AOX microsporidia may be to reoxidise reducing equivalents produced by glycolysis, in a manner comparable to that observed in trypanosome

An insurance value modeling approach that captures the wider value of a novel antimicrobial to health systems, patients, and the population.

Background: Traditional health economic evaluations of antimicrobials currently underestimate their value to wider society. They can be supplemented by additional value elements including insurance value, which captures the value of an antimicrobial in preventing or mitigating impacts of adverse risk events. Despite being commonplace in other sectors, constituents of the impacts and approaches for estimating insurance value have not been investigated. Objectives: This study assessed the insurance value of a novel gram-negative antimicrobial from operational healthcare, wider population health, productivity, and informal care perspectives. Methods: A novel mixed-methods approach was used to model insurance value in the United Kingdom: (1) literature review and multidisciplinary expert workshops to identify risk events for 4 relevant scenarios: ward closures, unavoidable shortage of conventional antimicrobials, viral respiratory pandemics, and catastrophic antimicrobial resistance (AMR); (2) parameterizing mitigable costs and frequencies of risk events across perspectives and scenarios; (3) estimating insurance value through a Monte Carlo simulation model for extreme events and a dynamic disease transmission model. Results: The mean insurance value across all scenarios and perspectives over 10 years in the UK was £718 million, should AMR remain unchanged, where only £134 million related to operational healthcare costs. It would be 50%-70% higher if AMR steadily increased or if a more risk-averse view (1-in-10 year downside) of future events is taken. Discussion: The overall insurance value if AMR remains at current levels (a conservative projection), is over 5 times greater than insurance value from just the operational healthcare costs perspective, traditionally the sole perspective used in health budgeting. Insurance value was generally larger for nationwide or universal (catastrophic AMR, pandemic, and conventional antimicrobial shortages) rather than localized (ward closure) scenarios, across perspectives. Components of this insurance value match previously published estimates of operational costs and mortality impacts. Conclusions: Insurance value of novel antimicrobials can be systematically modeled and substantially augments their traditional health economic value in normal circumstances. These approaches are generalizable to similar health interventions and form a framework for health systems and governments to capture broader value in health technology assessments, improve healthcare access, and increase resilience by planning for adverse scenarios