Effect of deprivation on weight gain in infancy

Weights were retrieved from child health records for an annual cohort of 3418 children, aged 18–30 months, to explore the relationship between deprivation and weight gain. Their level of deprivation was classified, using census data for their area of residence, as affluent (11%), intermediate (69%) or deprived (20%). Children from deprived areas were smaller at all ages with a widening gap: by one year of age, they were three times as likely as affluent children to be below the third centile for weight. The thrive index, a measure of the degree of centile shift, showed a slight gain over the first year in affluent and intermediate children, while in deprived children it decreased ( p = 0.001). Deprived children were 2.2 times more likely than intermediate children to have failure to thrive, as manifest by subnormal thrive index values ( p = 0.00008). Unexpectedly, children from affluent areas also showed slightly increased rates. We suggest that this may be explained by higher rates of breast feeding in affluent areas.     

Food and water intake and weight regulation in the pigeon

The interaction of eating and drinking and the relation between intake and body weight was examined in pigeons maintained under laboratory conditions in order to obtain normative data on intake and weight regulation in this species. Under ad lib conditions food and water intake values are correlated, while deprivation of either nutrient leads to a reduction in the intake of the other. A linear relation between the log food intake and the log body weight was found under both ad lib and deprivation conditions. Following a period of food deprivation the pigeon shows both a short-term and a long-term compensatory increase in food intake whose magnitude is directly proportional to the degree of body weight loss produced by deprivation. The findings for the pigeon are similar in many respects to those reported for the rat and are discussed in relation to weight regulation and motivational mechanisms in hunger and thirst.     

Effects of food deprivation,discrimination experience and physostigmine on choline acetylase and acetylcholine esterase in the dorsal hippocampus and frontal cortex of rats

The effects of food deprivation and preliminary training treatments on choline acetylase and acetylcholine esterase activity in the dorsal hippocampus and frontal cortex of rats have been investigated. In addition, blood sugar and adrenal epinephrine levels were examined. The activity of choline acetylase and the levels of blood sugar and adrenal epinephrine were significantly altered during various stages of preliminary training but all values were comparable to pre-experimental levels before discrimination commenced. In addition, rats were injected physostigmine salicylate (0.25 mg/kg) or saline i.p. each day immediately after receiving three training trials on a food-motivated black-white task. The physostigmine injected rats were significantly better than the controls in rate learning.No differences were observed in choline acetylase activity in the dorsal hippocampus and frontal cortex in discriminating rats treated with physostigmine or saline. However, choline acetylase activity is lower in treated and control rats which did not discriminate at the end of the 14th session.     

Selective migration, health and deprivation: a longitudinal analysis

Population migration is a major determinant of an area's age-sex structure and socio-economic characteristics. The suggestion that migration can contribute to an increase or decrease in place-specific rates of illness is not new. However, differences in health status between small geographical locations that may be affected by the inter-relationships between health, area-based deprivation and migration are under-researched. Using the Office for National Statistics (ONS) England and Wales Longitudinal Study (LS) 1971-1991, this research tracks individuals to identify any systematic sorting of people that has contributed to the area-level relationships between health (limiting long-term illness and mortality) and deprivation (Carstairs quintiles). The results demonstrate that among the young, migrants are generally healthier than non-migrants. Migrants who move from more to less deprived locations are healthier than migrants who move from less to more deprived locations. Within less deprived areas migrants are healthier than non-migrants but within deprived areas migrants are less healthy than non-migrants. Over the 20 year period, the largest absolute flow is by relatively healthy migrants moving away from more deprived areas towards less deprived areas. The effect is to raise ill-health and mortality rates in the origins and lower them in the destinations. This is reinforced by a significant group of people in poor health who move from less to more deprived locations. In contrast, a small group of unhealthy people moved away from more deprived into less deprived areas. These countercurrents of less healthy people have a slight ameliorating effect on the health-deprivation relationship. Whilst health-deprivation relationships are more marked for migrants there are also health (dis-) benefits for non-migrants if their location becomes relatively more or less deprived over time. Overall we found that between 1971 and 1991, inequalities in health increased between the least and most deprived areas, compared with the health-deprivation relationship which would have existed if peoples' locations and deprivation patterns had stayed geographically constant. Migration, rather than changes in the deprivation of the area that non-migrants live in, accounts for the large majority of change.     

THE CAT AS A MODEL FOR VISUAL DEPRIVATION

Both behavioural and neurophysiological changes can be observed in cats that have experienced interference with their normal visual environment. This visual deprivation may result from alterations to the path of light forming the normal image on the retina, and includes changes that cause the image to fall on an inappropriate part of the retina so that normal binocular interactions are affected. While some neurophysiological changes can be observed at the level of the lateral geniculate nucleus they become more prominent as information reaches the visual cortex, where cells commonly receive neural excitation from both eyes and require the information to come from corresponding parts of the two retinas and that the stimulus should have appropriate orientation and direction of movement. Many of the observations of deprivation in animals have clear parallels in the human environment.     

Behavioural pharmacology of food, water and salt intake in relation to drug actions at benzodiazepine receptors

Drugs which are agonists at benzodiazepine receptors produce many interesting behavioural effects, and amongst these are the stimulation of food, water and salt intake. This review examines the evidence for benzodiazepine effects on these forms of ingestion, and makes tentative proposals about their modes of action. The recent advent of putative benzodiazepine antagonists and inverse agonists provides important new pharmacological tools for the analysis of factors which control ingestion. Preliminary data on examples of such drugs are considered. Anorectic effects of inverse agonists are described. It is clear, though, that the categorization of a drug in one test situation may not apply to another. For example, the compound Ro15-1788 appears as a specific antagonist in one test, a partial agonist in another, and apparently lacks effect in a third. We are not yet sufficiently forward in our understanding of drug actions at benzodiazepine receptors, and their interactions with particular test circumstances, to predict and account for divergent effects of this kind.     

A feasibility study of an intervention to enhance family support for breast feeding in a deprived area in Bristol, UK

OBJECTIVE: to assess fathers' and grandmothers' knowledge of breast feeding and their ability to support successful breast feeding. To design a suitable intervention for fathers and grandmothers to support breast-feeding mothers, to assess the acceptability and feasibility of the intervention and monitor its likely effects on breast-feeding rates. DESIGN: qualitative focus groups and interviews. Evaluation of the feasibility of an antenatal intervention. SETTING: Community Health Centre and family homes in an area of relative social and economic deprivation in South Bristol, UK, from November 2001 to May 2003. PARTICIPANTS: 10 grandmothers and five fathers in focus groups and interviews. Twenty-nine families in the intervention. INTERVENTION: an antenatal intervention for grandmothers or partners to support breast feeding, which combined the benefits and mechanics of breast feeding with ways of providing support for breast feeding. FINDINGS: using an antenatal session based around a leaflet, specifically written for grandmothers and partners, and including a demonstration of good breast-feeding positioning and attachment in addition to the discussion of specific issues around the health benefits and mechanics of breast feeding was found to be acceptable, useful and enjoyable by all participants, particularly for first-time parents. The importance of fathers and grandmothers in providing emotional and practical support for breast-feeding mothers is highlighted, since those who were still breast feeding at eight weeks all felt that they were receiving similar or better support postnatally than they were antenatally. Significantly more intervention mothers were breast feeding their babies at eight weeks than in the wider practice population of mothers outside the study who intended to breast feed. Fathers' attitudes to breast feeding postnatally were fairly similar to those before the baby was born with breast feeding in public and knowing how much milk the baby was getting having the most influence on whether they felt that their partner should continue to breast feed. IMPLICATIONS FOR PRACTICE: this type of intervention could be part of a multi-faceted approach towards improving breast-feeding initiation and continuation, particularly in areas of low prevalence. Health professionals should be opportunistic about involving other family members in discussions about breast feeding whenever possible, both antenatally and postnatally.     

The effect of socioeconomic deprivation on fracture incidence in the United Kingdom

Lifestyle factors such as diet and physical activity vary in different social and income groups, and are known to be important influences on the incidence of osteoporotic fractures. Financial and social pressures are a common concern for older people. We set out to study the effect of socioeconomic deprivation on the incidence of fracture in older people and to compare the findings with those for younger groups. The All Wales Injury Surveillance System (AWISS) is a computerized system that collects injury data from most A&E departments throughout Wales. In this population-based study of 1.8 million people living in the 445 electoral tracts covered by AWISS in south, west, and northeastern Wales, we identified all 60,106 residents who presented with a fracture in 1999 and 2000. We linked details of their fracture with published Townsend deprivation scores for the electoral tract in which they were living and calculated fracture rates by fifths of deprivation. We observed the expected pattern of increasing fracture incidence in older age groups. Fracture incidence was significantly higher in electoral wards with poorer Townsend scores, resulting from a marked effect of socioeconomic deprivation on fracture incidence among younger adults with a rate ratio of 1.64 (95% CI, 1.57 to 1.72). This effect diminished with age, and was not observed in older age groups. At ages 85 and over the rate ratio was 0.94 (95% CI, 0.87 to 1.01). Socioeconomic factors clearly play a part in the causation of fracture in younger adults. Lifestyle influences are important in older age groups, but socioeconomic deprivation does not appear to be a risk factor for the development of osteoporotic fractures in elderly people.     

Colorectal cancer, screening and survival: the influence of socio-economic deprivation

OBJECTIVES: To determine the extent to which socio-economic deprivation explains colorectal cancer prevalence, subject participation in screening, and postoperative survival and life expectancy. METHODS: Regression analyses of clinical data from a large randomized controlled trial, augmented by geographical-based indices of deprivation. RESULTS: Deprivation appears to exert no significant impact on colorectal cancer prevalence but is a major factor explaining subject participation in screening. Cancer detection at later stages reduces life expectancy at time of treatment. Females from more-deprived areas have poorer post-treatment life expectancies and survival prospects, independently of their screening behaviour. CONCLUSIONS: Screening increases the chances of having a cancer treated at an earlier stage, and treatment at an earlier stage is associated with longer subsequent life expectancy. However, those from more-deprived areas are less likely to accept an invitation to be screened.