The effectiveness of public health interventions to reduce the health impact of climate change:a systematic review of systematic reviews

Climate change is likely to be one of the most important threats to public health in the coming years. Yet despite the large number of papers considering the health impact of climate change, few have considered what public health interventions may be of most value in reducing the disease burden. We aimed to evaluate the effectiveness of public health interventions to reduce the disease burden of high priority climate sensitive diseases

A closed-tube methylation-sensitive high resolution melting assay (MS-HRMA) for the semi-quantitative determination of <it>CST6</it> promoter methylation in clinical samples

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p><it>CST6</it> promoter is highly methylated in cancer, and its detection can provide important prognostic information in breast cancer patients. The aim of our study was to develop a Methylation-Sensitive High Resolution Melting Analysis (MS-HRMA) assay for the investigation of <it>CST6</it> promoter methylation.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>We designed primers that amplify both methylated and unmethylated <it>CST6</it> sequences after sodium bisulfate (SB) treatment and used spiked control samples of fully methylated to unmethylated SB converted genomic DNA to optimize the assay. We first evaluated the assay by analyzing 36 samples (pilot training group) and further analyzed 80 FFPES from operable breast cancer patients (independent group). MS-HRMA assay results for all 116 samples were compared with Methylation-Specific PCR (MSP) and the results were comparable.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The developed assay is highly specific and sensitive since it can detect the presence of 1% methylated <it>CST6</it> sequence and provides additionally a semi-quantitative estimation of <it>CST6</it> promoter methylation. <it>CST6</it> promoter was methylated in 39/80 (48.75%) of FFPEs with methylation levels being very different among samples. MS-HRMA and MSP gave comparable results when all samples were analyzed by both assays.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>The developed MS-HRMA assay for <it>CST6</it> promoter methylation is closed tube, highly sensitive, cost-effective, rapid and easy-to-perform. It gives comparable results to MSP in less time, while it offers the advantage of additionally providing an estimation of the level of methylation.</p