SUCCESSES AND CHALLENGES OF COMMUNITY-BASED FARMING AND THEIR INTERRELATIONSHIP WITH SIGNIFICANT CHANGES IN FARM FAMILIES AND RURAL COMMUNITIES

Japan has seen a significant development in community-based farming (CBF), particularly in part-time rice farming areas. CBF is a farming system that is performed by a cooperative organization composed of farm households within a traditional rural community aiming to secure efficient and economical management by pooling all the resources.  How and why could CBF have developed remarkably? What kind of successes and difficulties has CBF accomplished and faced? How do they interrelate with the changes in farm families and rural communities? To these questions, we offer plausible responses on the basis of our case study in Fukui prefecture. Our study shows that CBF has succeeded in reducing the financial difficulties and labor shortage in participant family farms, as well as sustaining the farmland and the milieu of the community as a whole. However, ironically, the successes have led to a weakening of individual family farms and to promote their dependence on CBF. And then, it has led to the fears about the long-term viability of CBF itself with generational change. At the beginning, CBF was a solution supposing the conventional ways of farm family and community. But its implementation accelerated the changes in such conventional ways and produced the need for rebuilding the original system of management and recruitment

Stage at diagnosis of colorectal cancer through diagnostic route: Who should be screened?

Background: Colorectal cancer (CRC) is a global health concern, with advanced-stage diagnoses contributing to poor prognoses. The efficacy of CRC screening has been well-established; nevertheless, a significant proportion of patients remain unscreened, with > 70% of cases diagnosed outside screening. Although identifying specific subgroups for whom CRC screening should be particularly recommended is crucial owing to limited resources, the association between the diagnostic routes and identification of these subgroups has been less appreciated. In the Japanese cancer registry, the diagnostic routes for groups discovered outside of screening are primarily categorized into those with comorbidities found during hospital visits and those with CRC-related symptoms. Aim: To clarify the stage at CRC diagnosis based on diagnostic routes. Methods: We conducted a retrospective observational study using a cancer registry of patients with CRC between January 2016 and December 2019 at two hospitals. The diagnostic routes were primarily classified into three groups: Cancer screening, follow-up, and symptomatic. The early-stage was defined as Stages 0 or I. Multivariate and univariate logistic regressions were exploited to determine the odds of early-stage diagnosis in the symptomatic and cancer screening groups, referencing the follow-up group. The adjusted covariates were age, sex, and tumor location. Results: Of the 2083 patients, 715 (34.4%), 1064 (51.1%), and 304 (14.6%) belonged to the follow-up, symptomatic, and cancer screening groups, respectively. Among the 2083 patients, CRCs diagnosed at an early stage were 57.3% (410 of 715), 23.9% (254 of 1064), and 59.5% (181 of 304) in the follow-up, symptomatic, and cancer screening groups, respectively. The symptomatic group exhibited a lower likelihood of early-stage diagnosis than the follow-up group [P < 0.001, adjusted odds ratio (aOR), 0.23; 95% confidence interval (95%CI): 0.19-0.29]. The likelihood of diagnosis at an early stage was similar between the follow-up and cancer screening groups (P = 0.493, aOR for early-stage diagnosis in the cancer screening group vs follow-up group = 1.11; 95%CI = 0.82-1.49). Conclusion: CRCs detected during hospital visits for comorbidities were diagnosed earlier, similar to cancer screening. CRC screening should be recommended, particularly for patients without periodical hospital visits for comorbidities

Drug retention rates and relevant risk factors for drug discontinuation due to adverse events in rheumatoid arthritis patients receiving anticytokine therapy with different target molecules

Objective: To compare reasons for discontinuation and drug retention rates per reason among anticytokine therapies, infliximab, etanercept and tocilizumab, and the risk of discontinuation of biological agents due to adverse events (AE) in patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA). Method: This prospective cohort study included Japanese RA patients who started infliximab (n=412, 636.0 patientyears (PY)), etanercept (n=442, 765.3 PY), or tocilizumab (n=168, 206.5 PY) as the first biological therapy after their enrolment in the Registry of Japanese Rheumatoid Arthritis Patients for Long-term Safety (REAL) database. Drug retention rates were calculated using the Kaplan-Meier method. To compare risks of drug discontinuation due to AE for patients treated with these biological agents, the Cox proportional hazard model was applied. Results: The authors found significant differences among the three therapeutic groups in demography, clinical status, comorbidities and usage of concomitant drugs. Development of AE was the most frequent reason for discontinuation of biological agents in the etanercept and tocilizumab groups, and the second most frequent reason in the infliximab group. Discontinuation due to good control was observed most frequently in the infliximab group. Compared with etanercept, the use of infliximab (HR 1.69; 95% CI 1.14 to 2.51) and tocilizumab (HR 1.98; 95% CI 1.04 to 3.76) was significantly associated with a higher risk of discontinuation of biological agents due to AE. Conclusions: Reasons for discontinuation are significantly different among biological agents. The use of infliximab and tocilizumab was significantly associated with treatment discontinuation due to AE compared with etanercept

Genetic Heterogeneity of Hepatitis C Virus in Association with Antiviral Therapy Determined by Ultra-Deep Sequencing

The hepatitis C virus (HCV) invariably shows wide heterogeneity in infected patients, referred to as a quasispecies population. Massive amounts of genetic information due to the abundance of HCV variants could be an obstacle to evaluate the viral genetic heterogeneity in detail.Using a newly developed massive-parallel ultra-deep sequencing technique, we investigated the viral genetic heterogeneity in 27 chronic hepatitis C patients receiving peg-interferon (IFN) α2b plus ribavirin therapy.Ultra-deep sequencing determined a total of more than 10 million nucleotides of the HCV genome, corresponding to a mean of more than 1000 clones in each specimen, and unveiled extremely high genetic heterogeneity in the genotype 1b HCV population. There was no significant difference in the level of viral complexity between immediate virologic responders and non-responders at baseline (p = 0.39). Immediate virologic responders (n = 8) showed a significant reduction in the genetic complexity spanning all the viral genetic regions at the early phase of IFN administration (p = 0.037). In contrast, non-virologic responders (n = 8) showed no significant changes in the level of viral quasispecies (p = 0.12), indicating that very few viral clones are sensitive to IFN treatment. We also demonstrated that clones resistant to direct-acting antivirals for HCV, such as viral protease and polymerase inhibitors, preexist with various abundances in all 27 treatment-naïve patients, suggesting the risk of the development of drug resistance against these agents.Use of the ultra-deep sequencing technology revealed massive genetic heterogeneity of HCV, which has important implications regarding the treatment response and outcome of antiviral therapy

March 2016 Arizona thoracic society ntoes

No abstract available. Article truncated at 150 words. The March 2016 Arizona Thoracic Society meeting was held on Wednesday, March 23, 2016 at the Scottsdale Shea Hospital beginning at 6:30 PM. This was a dinner meeting with case presentations. There were 17 in attendance representing the pulmonary, critical care, sleep, and radiology communities. Of note, Dr. Elijah Poulos drove from Flagstaff to attend the meeting. Dr. Rick Robbins gave a summary of ATS Hill Day and the possibility of collecting dues for the Arizona Thoracic Society along with American Thoracic Society dues. Dr. Robbins also presented the results of emailing the Table of Contents of the Southwest Journal of Pulmonary and Critical Care to the ATS members in Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, and Nevada along with listing the contents in Inspirations the California Thoracic Society newsletter. The number of page views doubled over usual the following day. Dr. George Parides presented a short presentation on whether coccidioidomycosis nodules ..

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