HPV vaccine knowledge and beliefs among Cambodian American parents and community leaders.

BACKGROUND: The cervical cancer incidence rate among Cambodian American women is 15.0 per 100,000, compared to 7.7 per 100,000 among non-Latina white women. HPV infection has been identified as a universal risk factor for cervical cancer. The HPV vaccine was recently approved in the United States for females aged 9-26 years. There is little information about HPV vaccination knowledge and beliefs in Southeast Asian communities. METHODS: We conducted 13 key informant interviews with Cambodian community leaders, as well as four focus groups with Cambodian parents (37 participants). Two of the focus groups included fathers and two of the focus groups included mothers. Interview and focus group questions addressed HPV vaccine barriers and facilitators. RESULTS: Participants had limited knowledge about HPV infection and the HPV vaccine. Barriers to HPV vaccination included a lack of information about the vaccine, as well as concerns about vaccine safety, effectiveness, and financial costs. The most important facilitators were a health care provider recommendation for vaccination and believing in the importance of disease prevention. DISCUSSION: Future cervical cancer control educational programs for Cambodians should promote use of the HPV vaccine for age-eligible individuals. Health care providers who serve Cambodian communities should be encouraged to recommend HPV vaccination

Hepatitis B knowledge and practices among Cambodian Americans.

Liver cancer occurs more frequently among Americans of Southeast Asian descent than any other group. This health disparity can be attributed to high rates of hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection. We examined HBV awareness, knowledge about HBV transmission, HBV testing levels, and HBV vaccination levels among Cambodian Americans

Factors associated with hepatitis B testing among cambodian american men and women.

Cambodian Americans have an elevated risk of liver cancer. This health disparity is attributable to high rates of hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection. Our study examined factors associated with HBV testing among Cambodian men and women. A population-based survey was conducted in the Seattle area. The Health Behavior Framework guided our survey instrument development. We attempted to interview a man and a woman in each household. The sample included 300 men and 367 women. About one-half of the male (45%) and female (54%) respondents had been tested for HBV. Two factors were independently associated with testing among men and women: a doctor had recommended testing and had asked a doctor for testing. Knowing that someone who looks and feels healthy can spread HBV was independently associated with testing among men. Low levels of HBV testing remain a public health problem among Cambodians. Interventions should improve patient-provider communication by encouraging providers who serve Cambodians to recommend HBV testing, as well as by empowering Cambodians to ask for testing

Loss of Catalytically Inactive Lipid Phosphatase Myotubularin-related Protein 12 Impairs Myotubularin Stability and Promotes Centronuclear Myopathy in Zebrafish

X-linked myotubular myopathy (XLMTM) is a congenital disorder caused by mutations of the myotubularin gene, MTM1. Myotubularin belongs to a large family of conserved lipid phosphatases that include both catalytically active and inactive myotubularin-related proteins (i.e., “MTMRs”). Biochemically, catalytically inactive MTMRs have been shown to form heteroligomers with active members within the myotubularin family through protein-protein interactions. However, the pathophysiological significance of catalytically inactive MTMRs remains unknown in muscle. By in vitro as well as in vivo studies, we have identified that catalytically inactive myotubularin-related protein 12 (MTMR12) binds to myotubularin in skeletal muscle. Knockdown of the mtmr12 gene in zebrafish resulted in skeletal muscle defects and impaired motor function. Analysis of mtmr12 morphant fish showed pathological changes with central nucleation, disorganized Triads, myofiber hypotrophy and whorled membrane structures similar to those seen in X-linked myotubular myopathy. Biochemical studies showed that deficiency of MTMR12 results in reduced levels of myotubularin protein in zebrafish and mammalian C2C12 cells. Loss of myotubularin also resulted in reduction of MTMR12 protein in C2C12 cells, mice and humans. Moreover, XLMTM mutations within the myotubularin interaction domain disrupted binding to MTMR12 in cell culture. Analysis of human XLMTM patient myotubes showed that mutations that disrupt the interaction between myotubularin and MTMR12 proteins result in reduction of both myotubularin and MTMR12. These studies strongly support the concept that interactions between myotubularin and MTMR12 are required for the stability of their functional protein complex in normal skeletal muscles. This work highlights an important physiological function of catalytically inactive phosphatases in the pathophysiology of myotubular myopathy and suggests a novel therapeutic approach through identification of drugs that could stabilize the myotubularin-MTMR12 complex and hence ameliorate this disorder

Chumnguh Thleum: Understanding Liver Illness and Hepatitis B Among Cambodian Immigrants

Cambodian immigrants are over 25 times more likely to have evidence of chronic hepatitis B infection than the general US population. Carriers of HBV are over 100 times more likely to develop liver cancer than non-carriers. Liver cancer incidence is the second leading cancer for Cambodian men and the sixth for Cambodian women. Despite this, this underserved population has received very little attention from health disparities researchers. Culturally and linguistically appropriate interventions are necessary to increase hepatitis B knowledge, serologic testing, and vaccination among Cambodian Americans. Eight group interviews were held with Cambodian American men (48) and women (49). Focus group discussion revealed unanticipated information about sociocultural influences on participants’ understanding about hepatitis B transmission, disease course, and prevention and treatment informed by humoral theories underlying Khmer medicine, by biomedicine, and by migration experiences. Our findings reveal the value of qualitative exploration to providing cultural context to biomedical information—a formula for effective health promotion and practice

PLoS Genet

X-linked myotubular myopathy (XLMTM) is a congenital disorder caused by mutations of the myotubularin gene, MTM1. Myotubularin belongs to a large family of conserved lipid phosphatases that include both catalytically active and inactive myotubularin-related proteins (i.e., "MTMRs"). Biochemically, catalytically inactive MTMRs have been shown to form heteroligomers with active members within the myotubularin family through protein-protein interactions. However, the pathophysiological significance of catalytically inactive MTMRs remains unknown in muscle. By in vitro as well as in vivo studies, we have identified that catalytically inactive myotubularin-related protein 12 (MTMR12) binds to myotubularin in skeletal muscle. Knockdown of the mtmr12 gene in zebrafish resulted in skeletal muscle defects and impaired motor function. Analysis of mtmr12 morphant fish showed pathological changes with central nucleation, disorganized Triads, myofiber hypotrophy and whorled membrane structures similar to those seen in X-linked myotubular myopathy. Biochemical studies showed that deficiency of MTMR12 results in reduced levels of myotubularin protein in zebrafish and mammalian C2C12 cells. Loss of myotubularin also resulted in reduction of MTMR12 protein in C2C12 cells, mice and humans. Moreover, XLMTM mutations within the myotubularin interaction domain disrupted binding to MTMR12 in cell culture. Analysis of human XLMTM patient myotubes showed that mutations that disrupt the interaction between myotubularin and MTMR12 proteins result in reduction of both myotubularin and MTMR12. These studies strongly support the concept that interactions between myotubularin and MTMR12 are required for the stability of their functional protein complex in normal skeletal muscles. This work highlights an important physiological function of catalytically inactive phosphatases in the pathophysiology of myotubular myopathy and suggests a novel therapeutic approach through identification of drugs that could stabilize the myotubularin-MTMR12 complex and hence ameliorate this disorder

Efficient robust d-dimensional path operators

International audiencePath openings and closings are efficient morphological operators that use flexible oriented paths as structuring elements. They are employed in a similar way to operators with rotated line segments as structuring elements, but are more effective at detecting linear structures that are not necessarily locally perfectly straight. While their theory has always allowed paths in arbitrary dimensions, de facto implementations were only proposed in 2D. Recently, a new implementation was proposed enabling the computation of efficient -dimensional path operators. However this implementation is limited in the sense that it is not robust to noise. Indeed, in practical applications, for path operators to be effective, structuring elements must be sufficiently long so that they correspond to the length of the desired features to be detected. Yet, path operators are increasingly sensitive to noise as their length parameter increases. To cope with this limitation, we propose an efficient -dimensional algorithm, the Robust Path Operator, which uses a larger and more flexible family of flexible structuring elements. Given an arbitrary length parameter G, path propagation is allowed if disconnections between two pixels belonging to a path is less or equal to G and so, render it independent of . This simple assumption leads to constant memory bookkeeping and results in a low complexity

Selective and robust d-dimensional path operators

International audiencePath operators are powerful tools for the enhancement of thin and elongated objects in an image. In order to cope with noisy acquisition a variant of the path operators was recently proposed. However, both approaches cannot properly handle thin objects with tortuous shapes since strong variations of an object curvature produce disconnections in the paths. In order to address this issue, we propose a novel operator able to properly handle paths in tortuous shapes. It relies on the coupling of attribute filters based on the geodesic tortuosity and conventional path operators. Analogously to the complete version of the path operators, by allowing disconnections within paths it is possible also to define a path operator that is both robust and selective. The effectiveness of the proposed operators in filtering thin and tortuous image objects is proved on a 2D and 3D biomedical image

Mathematical Morphology and Its Applications to Signal and Image Processing: 12th International Symposium, ISMM 2015, Reykjavik, Iceland, May 27-29, 2015. Proceedings

International audienceThis book contains the thoroughly refereed proceedings of the 12th International Symposium on Mathematical Morphology, ISMM 2015 held in Reykjavik, Iceland, in May 2015. The 62 revised full papers were carefully reviewed and selected from 72 submissions. The papers are organized in topical sections on evaluations and applications; hierarchies; color, multivalued and orientation fields; optimization, differential calculus and probabilities; topology and discrete geometry; and algorithms and implementation