Study protocol of a cluster randomised controlled trial investigating the effectiveness of a tailored energy balance programme for recent retirees

BACKGROUND: People in transitional life stages, such as occupational retirement, are likely to gain weight and accumulate abdominal fat mass caused by changes in physical activity and diet. Hence, retirees are an important target group for weight gain prevention programmes, as described in the present paper. METHODS/DESIGN: A systematic and stepwise approach (Intervention Mapping) is used to develop a low-intensity energy balance intervention programme for recent retirees. This one-year, low-intensity multifaceted programme aims to prevent accumulation of abdominal fat mass and general weight gain by increasing awareness of energy balance and influencing related behaviours of participants' preference. These behaviours are physical activity, fibre intake, portion size and fat consumption. The effectiveness of the intervention programme is tested in a cluster randomised controlled trial. Measurements of anthropometry, physical activity, energy intake, and related psychosocial determinants are performed at baseline and repeated at 6 months for intermediate effect, at 12 months to evaluate short-term intervention effects and at 24 months to test the sustainability of the effects. DISCUSSION: This intervention programme is unique in its focus on retirees and energy balance. It aims at increasing awareness and takes into account personal preferences of the users by offering several options for behaviour change. Moreover, the intervention programme is evaluated at short-term and long-term and includes consecutive outcome measures (determinants, behaviour and body composition)

Palynology, nomenclature and terminology

Some of the basic concepts common to plant taxonomy, palaeobotany and palynology are discussed such as “taxon”, “taxonomic categories”, “genus and species concepts”, as well as “organ and form genera”. The development of the specifically palaeobotanical and palynological concepts of organ and form genera is briefly treated in the light of the shaping of palaeobotanical thought and methods since Adolphe Brongniart. The need for a single category of an artificial nature (i.e., form genus) is acknowledged; the need for a second category of such nature (i.e., organ genus) is questioned. The general guide lines for good palynological practice given by Faegri et al. (1950) are recommended for future use and are reprinted as an appendix to this paper

The Tulip and the Netherlands

Volume: 11-15Start Page: 35End Page: 4

Our botanical heritage

On 31 May 1938 our predecessor professor Pulle delivered an address on the ”stocktaking of the heritage of our forefathers” on the occasion of the opening of the enlarged and reorganized Laboratory of special Botany and Plant Geography” of the University of Utrecht. The ”renewal” had been radical: a totally new herbarium building had been built in the southern-most part of the old Botanical Garden at the Lange Nieuwstraat in Utrecht. Pulle’s address still merits reading. The printed version, in Dutch, was handed out after the delivery of the address. In case Pulle actually read the complete text, this must have taken some ninety minutes. I shall not take that long and I also do not plan to hand you a printed version at the end of the ceremony. Even so I would like to use this opportunity to tell you something about this ”heritage”, and about the herbarium and its use as well as about the history of our institution. The use of the term ”stocktaking of our forefathers’ heritage” goes back to the Dutch agronomist and botanist Willem Frederik van Eeden, who, in his capacity as director of our first ”Colonial Museum” wrote a paper in 1896 in the ”Indische Mercuur”: ”What are the goals of science in the Netherlands? Contributing its mite towards the general structure of science; the diligent research with respect to our incompletely known colonies; the stocktaking .....”. W.F. van Eeden was also founder of what was later called the ”Van Eeden-fonds for botanical research in Suriname and the West-Indian islands”. Thanks to this fund our institute could publish its Flora of Suriname and organize numerous exploratory activities in those territories