Comparing Oral and Pharyngeal Cancer Rates in Rural and Urban Areas

Background: Risk factors for oral and pharyngeal cancers include tobacco use, alcohol use, poor diet, HPV infection, poor oral care, low socio-economic status, gender and genetics, and age. This analysis aims to discover whether or not differences exist in incidence and survival rates in oral and pharyngeal cancer patients in rural and urban areas. Methods: Surveillance Epidemiology and End Results (SEER) data from 17 registries for the years 2000-2005 was used for this analysis. A Poisson regression and Survival analysis were performed. Results: Rural or urban residency was not significant in either analysis. Race, gender, and age were all significant at the 0.05 level. Conclusions: The dataset for this analysis was limited to variables in the SEER data and population data sets. Known risk factors could not be accounted for in this analysis, which could have had an impact on the results, especially in rural and urban differences

The crucial role of proof--a classical defense against mathematical empiricism

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Linguistics and Philosophy, 1993.Includes bibliographical references (leaves 135-137).by Catherine Allen Womack.Ph.D

Vitamin D levels and menopause-related symptoms.

Objective: To determine whether vitamin D levels are associated with menopause-related symptoms in older women. Methods: A randomly selected subset of 1,407 women, among 26,104 potentially eligible participants of the Women’s Health Initiative Calcium and Vitamin D (CaD) trial of postmenopausal women aged 51-80 years, had 25-hydroxyvitamin D [25(OH)D] levels measured at the CaD trial baseline visit. Information about menopause-related symptoms at baseline was obtained by questionnaire and included overall number of symptoms and composite measures of sleep disturbance, emotional well-being, and energy/fatigue, as well as individual symptoms. After exclusions for missing data, 530 women [mean age 66.2 years (SD 6.8)] were included in these analyses. Results: There were borderline significant associations between 25(OH)D levels and total number of menopausal symptoms (p values ranging from 0.05 to 0.06 for fully adjusted models); however, the effect was clinically insignificant and disappeared with correction for multiple testing. There were no associations between 25(OH)D levels and composite measures of sleep disturbance, emotional well-being, or energy/fatigue (p’s > 0.10 for fully adjusted models). Conclusions: There was no evidence of a clinically important association between serum 25(OH)D levels and menopause-related symptoms in postmenopausal women

White Matter Hyperintensity Longitudinal Morphometric Analysis In Association With Alzheimer Disease

INTRODUCTION: Vascular damage in Alzheimer\u27s disease (AD) has shown conflicting findings particularly when analyzing longitudinal data. We introduce white matter hyperintensity (WMH) longitudinal morphometric analysis (WLMA) that quantifies WMH expansion as the distance from lesion voxels to a region of interest boundary. METHODS: WMH segmentation maps were derived from 270 longitudinal fluid-attenuated inversion recovery (FLAIR) ADNI images. WLMA was performed on five data driven WMH patterns with distinct spatial distributions. Amyloid accumulation was evaluated with WMH expansion across the five WMH patterns. RESULTS: The preclinical group had significantly greater expansion in the posterior ventricular WM compared to controls. Amyloid significantly associated with frontal WMH expansion primarily within AD individuals. WLMA outperformed WMH volume changes for classifying AD from controls primarily in periventricular and posterior WMH. DISCUSSION: These data support the concept that localized WMH expansion continues to proliferate with amyloid accumulation throughout the entirety of the disease in distinct spatial locations

Studio Recital

Studio recital presenting the students of Charlotte Petersen. Featuring cellists and string ensembles.https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/music_programs/1124/thumbnail.jp

Associations between ACE-Inhibitors, Angiotensin Receptor Blockers, and Lean Body Mass in Community Dwelling Older Women

Studies suggest that ACE-inhibitors (ACE-I) and angiotensin receptor blockers (ARBs) may preserve skeletal muscle with aging. We evaluated longitudinal differences in lean body mass (LBM) among women diagnosed with hypertension and classified as ACE-I/ARB users and nonusers among Women’s Health Initiative participants that received dual energy X-ray absorptiometry scans to estimate body composition (n=10,635) at baseline and at years 3 and 6 of follow-up. Of those, 2642 were treated for hypertension at baseline. Multivariate linear regression models, adjusted for relevant demographics, behaviors, and medications, assessed ACE-I/ARB use/nonuse and LBM associations at baseline, as well as change in LBM over 3 and 6 years. Although BMI did not differ by ACE-I/ARB use, LBM (%) was significantly higher in ACE-I/ARB users versus nonusers at baseline (52.2% versus 51.3%, resp., p=0.001). There was no association between ACE-I/ARB usage and change in LBM over time. Reasons for higher LBM with ACE-I/ARB use cross sectionally, but not longitundinally, are unclear and may reflect a threshold effect of these medications on LBM that is attenuated over time. Nevertheless, ACE-I/ARB use does not appear to negatively impact LBM in the long term

Population policies and education: exploring the contradictions of neo-liberal globalisation

The world is increasingly characterised by profound income, health and social inequalities (Appadurai, 2000). In recent decades development initiatives aimed at reducing these inequalities have been situated in a context of increasing globalisation with a dominant neo-liberal economic orthodoxy. This paper argues that neo-liberal globalisation contains inherent contradictions regarding choice and uniformity. This is illustrated in this paper through an exploration of the impact of neo-liberal globalisation on population policies and programmes. The dominant neo-liberal economic ideology that has influenced development over the last few decades has often led to alternative global visions being overlooked. Many current population and development debates are characterised by polarised arguments with strongly opposing aims and views. This raises the challenge of finding alternatives situated in more middle ground that both identify and promote the socially positive elements of neo-liberalism and state intervention, but also to limit their worst excesses within the population field and more broadly. This paper concludes with a discussion outling the positive nature of middle ground and other possible alternatives

Fracture Risk in Men With Congestive Heart Failure Risk Reduction With Spironolactone

ObjectivesThe purpose of this study was to determine whether spironolactone use is associated with fractures in men with congestive heart failure (CHF).BackgroundIn rats with aldosteronism, spironolactone preserves skeletal strength. However, in humans, the relationship of spironolactone to fractures is not known.MethodsThe medical records of all male patients with CHF from 1999 to 2005 treated at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center, Memphis, Tennessee, were reviewed (n = 4,735). Odds ratios with 95% confidence intervals of having a fracture associated with spironolactone use were estimated using conditional logistic regression.ResultsWe identified 167 cases with a single-incident fracture and matched these by age and race to 668 control subjects without fractures. After adjustment for covariates, spironolactone use was inversely associated with total fracture (odds ratio: 0.575; 95% confidence interval: 0.346 to 0.955, p = 0.0324).ConclusionsThe use of spironolactone is inversely associated with fractures in men with CHF

Baseline age and time to major fracture in younger postmenopausal women

To estimate the incidence of first hip or clinical vertebral fracture or major osteoporotic (hip, clinical vertebral, proximal humerus or wrist) fracture in postmenopausal women receiving their first bone mineral density (BMD) test before age 65

Finishing the euchromatic sequence of the human genome

The sequence of the human genome encodes the genetic instructions for human physiology, as well as rich information about human evolution. In 2001, the International Human Genome Sequencing Consortium reported a draft sequence of the euchromatic portion of the human genome. Since then, the international collaboration has worked to convert this draft into a genome sequence with high accuracy and nearly complete coverage. Here, we report the result of this finishing process. The current genome sequence (Build 35) contains 2.85 billion nucleotides interrupted by only 341 gaps. It covers ∼99% of the euchromatic genome and is accurate to an error rate of ∼1 event per 100,000 bases. Many of the remaining euchromatic gaps are associated with segmental duplications and will require focused work with new methods. The near-complete sequence, the first for a vertebrate, greatly improves the precision of biological analyses of the human genome including studies of gene number, birth and death. Notably, the human enome seems to encode only 20,000-25,000 protein-coding genes. The genome sequence reported here should serve as a firm foundation for biomedical research in the decades ahead