Factors Associated with Home Meal Preparation and Fast-Food Sources Use among Low-Income Urban African American Adults

This study aimed to assess the factors associated with home meal preparation (HMP) and fast-food sources use (FFS) frequencies of low-income African-American adults and their healthy food beliefs and attitudes, food-related psychosocial factors, food acquisition patterns, food sources use, and BMI. We used cross-sectional data from 295 adults living in Baltimore, USA. HMP was inversely associated with FFS, which had lower odds of HMP ≥1 time/day and higher BMI scores. HMP was positively associated with positive beliefs and self-efficacy toward healthy foods, getting food from healthier food sources, and lower FFS. Higher odds of HMP ≥1 time/day were associated with getting food from farmers’ market and supermarkets or grocery stores. FFS had an inverse association with positive beliefs and self-efficacy toward healthy foods, and a positive association with less healthy food acquisition scores. Higher odds of FFS ≥1 time/week were associated with getting food from corner stores, sit-down restaurants, and convenience stores.     

Will biomarker-based diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease maximize scientific progress? Evaluating proposed diagnostic criteria

A recently published framework for the diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease (AD) in research studies would allow diagnosis on the sole basis of two biomarkers (β-amyloid and pathologic tau), even in people with no objective or subjective memory or cognitive changes. This revision will have substantial implications for future Alzheimer’s research, and the changes should be rigorously evaluated before widespread adoption. We propose three principles for evaluating any revision to diagnostic frameworks for AD: (1) does the revision improve the validity of the diagnosis; (2) does the revision improve the reliability or reduce the expense of the diagnosis; and (3) will the revision foster innovative and rigorous research across populations. The new diagnostic framework is unlikely to achieve any of these goals. Instead, it has the potential to handicap future researchers, and slow progress towards identifying effective strategies to prevent or treat AD.     

Validación psicométrica de la Escala de gravedad de fatiga en médicos residentes mexicanos

Resident physicians are continually exposed to fatigue, which can lead to work, academic and personal problems, so it is important to have reliable and valid instruments to measure it. One of the most used is Fatigue Severity Scale, but, there are versions with different number of items in different populations. Therefore, the purpose of this work was to translate, adapt culturally relevant and compare versions with different numbers of items, to identify the most appropriate in Mexican resident physicians. With three different groups of participants; first one for translation by seven expert judges in the language, second for psychometric validation with 100 resident physicians, and third for confirmatory factor analysis and invariance test by type of program (specialty and high specialty) with 182 resident physicians. Distribution, discrimination, reliability and factor structure of the scale were tested in an exploratory and confirmatory analysis, leaving a final scale of 6 items with good fit (X²[9] = 9,39, p = 0,40; CFI = 0,99; RMSEA = 0,02), with a reliability = 0,91 and strict factorial invariance by type of residence program.     

The SLC6A3 3′-UTR VNTR and intron 8 VNTR polymorphisms association in the time estimation

Objective

The present study investigated the association of 3′-UTR VNTR and intron 8 VNTR polymorphisms with a time estimation task performance.

Materials and methods

One hundred and eight men in a Brazilian Northeast population (18–32 years old) participated in the experiment. The 3′-UTR VNTR and intron 8 VNTR polymorphisms were associated alone and combined to absolute error (AE) and relative error (RE) in a time estimation task (target duration: 1 s, 4 s, 7 s and 9 s).

Results

We found an association of the behavioral variable with intron 8 VNTR for the time intervals of 1 s and 9 s (p < 0.001) and polymorphisms combinatorial effect for 1 s (p ≤ 0.05).

Conclusion

The intron 8 VNTR polymorphism and the combinatorial effect can modulate the time estimate in the domain of supra seconds, and thus our study indicates a role of the dopamine transporter in the neurobiological areas related to the time intervals judgment.

     

Chronic invasive rhinosinusitis by Conidiobolus coronatus,an emerging microorganism

Fungi from the Conidiobolus genus have been implicated in the development of chronic invasive fungal rhinosinusitis, mainly in tropical countries. The mycosis associated to these fungi may cause irreversible facial deformities and is potentially fatal. The authors present the first case of a chronic invasive fungal rhinosinusitis due to Conidiobolus coronatus diagnosed in a 66-year-old Caucasian male patient, living in Portugal without any travels abroad and complaining of progressive refractory nasal obstruction, facial pain and anosmia. Upon the culture of samples collected during sinus endoscopic surgery, colonies that presented a macroscopic aspect remembering wax were detected. The microscopic evaluation allowed the observation of simple conidiophores forming spherical conidia, and of conidiophores that presented hair-like appendages. Together, these characteristics allowed the identification of the fungi as a Conidiobolus, which was confirmed upon the DNA sequencing. The authors emphasised the role of this fungi as an emergent microorganism as well as the difficulties associated to the diagnosis and treatment.