Rising rural body-mass index is the main driver of the global obesity epidemic in adults

Body-mass index (BMI) has increased steadily in most countries in parallel with a rise in the proportion of the population who live in cities 1,2 . This has led to a widely reported view that urbanization is one of the most important drivers of the global rise in obesity 3�6 . Here we use 2,009 population-based studies, with measurements of height and weight in more than 112 million adults, to report national, regional and global trends in mean BMI segregated by place of residence (a rural or urban area) from 1985 to 2017. We show that, contrary to the dominant paradigm, more than 55 of the global rise in mean BMI from 1985 to 2017�and more than 80 in some low- and middle-income regions�was due to increases in BMI in rural areas. This large contribution stems from the fact that, with the exception of women in sub-Saharan Africa, BMI is increasing at the same rate or faster in rural areas than in cities in low- and middle-income regions. These trends have in turn resulted in a closing�and in some countries reversal�of the gap in BMI between urban and rural areas in low- and middle-income countries, especially for women. In high-income and industrialized countries, we noted a persistently higher rural BMI, especially for women. There is an urgent need for an integrated approach to rural nutrition that enhances financial and physical access to healthy foods, to avoid replacing the rural undernutrition disadvantage in poor countries with a more general malnutrition disadvantage that entails excessive consumption of low-quality calories. © 2019, The Author(s)

Medical students attitude towards pressure ulcer: a cross sectional study from Iran

Background and aim: Knowledge about medical student’s attitude toward pressure ulcers prevention and management is very important. However study about medical student’s attitude toward pressure ulcers is limited. In present study, we examined attitude of Iranian medical students about pressure ulcers. Methods: This cross sectional descriptive study conducted between Aprils to July 2015 in Shahrekord, South west of Iran. All medical interns’ (semester 8 and higher) were invited to participate. The data were collected, using a questionnaire with items relating to demographic data and an attitude questionnaire. All statistical analyses were performed using SPSS software (v17.0; PASW Statistics). Results: The mean age of students was 23.2±2.5. The mean of attitude score were 31.6±5.3 (range 20 t0 55). In total, 48% of students reported that in their courses not received any education regards to pressure ulcer prevention, care and treatment. Of 52% that received education, 84.9% reported that their education were not enough. About 70% of students reported that needs to more education with regards to pressure ulcer. Conclusion: Educating medical students with regard to pressure ulcers first requires a primary assessment of attitude of the topic. Results of present study revealed that Iranian medical students have not positive attitude regards pressure ulcers. Further study in this regards recommended strongly. Key words: Pressure ulcer, medical education, attitude, wound managemen

An Adaptive Human-Aware Software Agent Supporting Attention-Demanding Tasks

Abstract. This paper presents a human-aware software agent to support a human performing a task that demands substantial amounts of attention. The agent obtains human awareness in an adaptive manner by use of a dynamical model of human attention which is parameterised for specific characteristics of the human. The agent uses a built-in adaptation model to adapt on the fly the values of these parameters to the personal characteristics of the human. The software agent has been implemented in a component-based manner within the Adobe ® Flex ® environment