Using Intervention Mapping to develop a programme to prevent sexually transmittable infections,including HIV,among heterosexual migrant men

Background  

There is little experience with carefully developed interventions in the HIV/STI prevention field aimed at adult heterosexual target groups in the Netherlands. The ability to apply intervention development protocols, like Intervention Mapping, in daily practice outside of academia, is a matter of concern. An urgent need also exists for interventions aimed at the prevention of STI in migrant populations in the Netherlands. This article describes the theory and evidence based development of HIV/STI prevention interventions by the Municipal Public Health Service Rotterdam Area (MPHS), the Netherlands, for heterosexual migrant men with Surinamese, Dutch-Caribbean, Cape Verdean, Turkish and Moroccan backgrounds.     

There is an association between disease location and gestational age at birth in newborns submitted to surgery due to necrotizing enterocolitis

Objectives

To evaluate if there are differences regarding disease location and mortality of necrotizing enterocolitis, according to the gestational age at birth, in newborns submitted to surgery due to enterocolite.

There are differences in cytogenetic abnormalities among histologic subtypes of the non-Hodgkin's lymphomas

Although many recurring chromosome abnormalities have been found in malignant lymphoma (ML) in recent years, their relationship to histology remains largely undefined. We have correlated, in the same tumor mass, chromosome findings with histology, defined by the International Working Formulation for Clinical Usage, in 120 patients. We find differences among histologies in the frequency of normal metaphases and the modal number of the predominant abnormal clone. In addition, most histologies have been significantly (P less than .01) associated with specific chromosome abnormalities. In particular, ML, follicular, predominantly small cleaved cell was associated with t(14;18)(q32;q21); ML, follicular, mixed small cleaved cell and large cell with t(14;18)(q32;q21) and trisomy 8; ML, follicular, predominantly large cell with trisomy 7 and breaks in 17q21-q25; ML, diffuse, mixed small cell and large cell with breaks in 11p; ML, diffuse, large cell with trisomy 21 and breaks in 2q and 9q; ML, large cell, immunoblastic with breaks at 6q21; and ML, small noncleaved cell with t(8;14)(q24;q32). Only the associations with t(14;18) and t(8;14) have been previously reported. The associated chromosome abnormality usually occurred in 30% to 70% of a given histology, raising the possibility that cytogenetics may add important prognostic information in lymphoma as it does in the acute leukemias.     

Mutations of factor VIII cleavage sites in hemophilia A

Hemophilia A is caused by a defect in coagulation factor VIII, a protein that undergoes extensive proteolysis during its activation and inactivation. To determine whether some cases of hemophilia are caused by mutations in important cleavage sites, we screened patient DNA samples for mutations in these sites by a two-step process. Regions of interest were amplified from genomic DNA by repeated rounds of primer- directed DNA synthesis. The amplified DNAs were then screened for mutations by discriminant hybridization using oligonucleotide probes. Two cleavage site mutations were found in a survey of 215 patients. A nonsense mutation in the activated protein C cleavage site at amino acid 336 was discovered in a patient with severe hemophilia. In another severely affected patient, a mis-sense mutation results in a substitution of cysteine for arginine in the thrombin activation site at amino acid 1689. This defect is associated with no detectable factor VIII activity, but with normal levels of factor VIII antigen. The severe hemophilia in this patient was sporadic; analysis of the mother suggested that the mutation originated in her gametes or during her embryogenesis. The results demonstrate that this approach can be used to identify factor VIII gene mutations in regions of the molecule known to be important for function.