Factors associated with levels of physical activity at work and during leisure time]

Factors associated with levels of physical activity at work and during leisure time were analyzed among 577 subjects who had been selected as population controls for a case-control study by random selection from telephone directories. The intensity of physical activity at work was inversely associated with body mass index, the proportion of professionals & managers, consumption of western style breakfast, coffee, butter/margarine, and whisky; and positively associated with rice intake. Frequency of physical activities during leisure time was positively associated with consumption of vegetables, fruits, mushrooms, milk, cheese and coffee, and moderation in eating; and inversely associated with rice intake and the prevalence of gastrointestinal symptoms and medication. The association of physical activity with these factors should be considered in studying its relationship to disease risk.     

Klinische Erfahrungen mit der Knorpel-Knochen-Transplantation

The treatment of deep cartilage defects in load-bearing joints is a problem that still has no satisfactory solution. Full-thickness defects of the articular cartilage rarely heal spontaneously, usually leaving damage that can lead to early arthrosis. Techniques currently available for the treatment of chondral defects include abrasion, drilling, micro-fracturing, transplantation of tissue autografts and allografts, and cell transplantation. Osteochondral autograft transplantation is currently the only surgical cartilage repair technique known to lead to the formation of genuine hyaline articular cartilage and its retention at least in the medium term. The Draenert method, in which a water-cooled diamond bone-cutting system is used, is an effective procedure for resurfacing the joints affected by localised cartilaginous defects, even when there is also severe bone loss. Donor-side morbidity can be kept to a minimum by filling the defect caused by harvesting with a press-fit cylinder of cancellous bone covered with periosteum for protection.     

The concept of culture: A core issue in health disparities

Contemporary discourse contains numerous examples of use of the concept of culture by social and behavioral scientists. Simple reification, where the speaker makes culture into a thing capable of action exemplifies one usage in public discourse. Some quantitative social scientists attempt to characterize people’s cultural identities by means of a single categorical variable, which often “lumps” people into categories such as “Hispanic” or “Black” that in fact have numerous culturally bounded subcategories. Approaches that emphasize cultural process are preferable to those who attempt to categorize; more complex measures of acculturation help investigators to make convincing analyses of circumstances in which health disparities occur. Examples in which investigators make appropriate use of cultural characterizations demonstrate their utility in investigating health disparities in Haitian American women, injecting and noninjecting drug users, Hispanic youth, and adult Hispanics at risk of HIV infection. Focus on culture in the study of health disparities can identify entanglements between structural factors such as poverty and lack of education and cultural factors such as beliefs about health. Qualitative methods coupled with quantitative methods have great potential to improve investigators’ grasp of cultural nuance while capturing the distribution of qualitatively derived behaviors.     

Discussing options between patients and health care professionals in genetic diagnosis: ethical and legal criteria

The specific characteristics of genetic data lead to ethical-legal conflicts in the framework of genetic diagnosis. Several international organisations, including UNESCO and the Council of Europe, have enacted rules referring to the use of genetic information. This paper discusses possible legal and ethical criteria that could be used in genetic testing.