Von Willebrand disease: diagnosis and management

Von Willebrand Disease is a common cause of excessive bruising and bleeding in children. This short article gives advice on diagnosis and management for paediatricians. Given its prevalence and presenting symptoms, VWD should always be considered in the assessment of children suspected of non-accidental injury. Its diagnosis can be challenging, not only because of the various subtypes of the disorder but because of the considerable overlap between VWD and normal individuals. Laboratory diagnosis requires a range of quantitative and qualitative tests of the VWF protein, with targeted gene analysis increasingly used to confirm the diagnosis of type 2 and type 3 VWD. Bleeding Assessment Tools may be helpful in directed laboratory testing but are often less so in young children who have had limited haemostatic challenges. Treatment for VWD includes the use of antifibrinolytic drugs, vasopressin or VWF-containing clotting factor concentrates. Treatment is often on-demand for individual bleeding episodes but there are specific indications for the use of prophylactic treatment in children.     

Demonstration of a modelling-based multi-criteria decision analysis procedure for prioritisation of occupational risks from manufactured nanomaterials

Several tools to facilitate the risk assessment and management of manufactured nanomaterials (MN) have been developed. Most of them require input data on physicochemical properties, toxicity and scenario-specific exposure information. However, such data are yet not readily available, and tools that can handle data gaps in a structured way to ensure transparent risk analysis for industrial and regulatory decision making are needed. This paper proposes such a quantitative risk prioritisation tool, based on a multi-criteria decision analysis algorithm, which combines advanced exposure and dose-response modelling to calculate margins of exposure (MoE) for a number of MN in order to rank their occupational risks. We demonstrated the tool in a number of workplace exposure scenarios (ES) involving the production and handling of nanoscale titanium dioxide, zinc oxide (ZnO), silver and multi-walled carbon nanotubes. The results of this application demonstrated that bag/bin filling, manual un/loading and dumping of large amounts of dry powders led to high emissions, which resulted in high risk associated with these ES. The ZnO MN revealed considerable hazard potential in vivo, which significantly influenced the risk prioritisation results. In order to study how variations in the input data affect our results, we performed probabilistic Monte Carlo sensitivity/uncertainty analysis, which demonstrated that the performance of the proposed model is stable against changes in the exposure and hazard input variables.     

责任指数对口腔医学专业学生职业精神考核的设想

医学生的责任心体现在其一定行为表现上，是医学生职业精神培养的重要内涵，因此对影响医学生责任心的负向行为进行一定的干预具有重要意义。分析国内外医学院校应用责任指数考核在医学生行为督导养成的评价研究，遵循我国口腔医学专业人才培养的规律，结合口腔医学生成长的特点，借鉴职业精神考核的相关指标——责任指数考核法，试设计口腔医学生行为责任指数测评方案，并预设可行性，为拓宽口腔医学生职业精神的培养提供思路。     

肺腺癌对一代EGFR-TKIs原发耐药的危险因素分析

目的:分析对一代表皮生长因子受体酪氨酸激酶抑制剂(epidermal growth factor receptor-tyrosine kinase inhibitors,EGFR-TKIs)原发耐药的EGFR突变肺腺癌患者的临床特征,为预测肺腺癌患者是否对一代EGFR-TKIs原发耐药提供依据。方法:收集2014年01月至2019年04月于本院住院,一线使用一代EGFR-TKIs且随访时间超过6个月的EGFR敏感突变(19Del/21L858R)肺腺癌患者,根据疗效纳入原发性耐药组(NR=40)和敏感组(NS=237),比较两组患者的临床、影像特征及实验室指标之间的差异,分析对一代EGFR-TKIs原发耐药的危险因素。结果:EGFR敏感突变患者的原发性耐药发生率为14.4%。原发性耐药组与敏感组患者相比,二者在吸烟指数(P=0.004)及淋巴结转移(P=0.03)的差异有统计学意义。血清神经元特异性烯醇化酶(neuron specific enolase,NSE)≥10.725 ng/mL、肿瘤直径≥3.55 cm的患者更易对一代EGFR-TKIs耐药(P<0.05),各因素AUC值分别为0.615、0.716。联合NSE+肿瘤直径两项指标时AUC为0.735(95%CI:0.665~0.804),联合NSE+肿瘤直径+吸烟指数三项指标时AUC为0.751(95%CI:0.679~0.822),均优于单项指标。多因素Logistics回归分析证实,血清NSE浓度、肿瘤直径及吸烟指数是预测EGFR敏感突变患者对一代EGFR-TKI原发耐药的独立影响因素(P<0.05)。结论:吸烟指数≥400、病灶直径≥3.55 cm、血清NSE浓度≥10.725 ng/mL的患者更易对一代EGFR-TKIs原发耐药。单因素对预测EGFR突变患者是否对一代EGFR-TKIs原发耐药准确性较低,综合上述三项指标预测效果更好。     

Sex Disparities in Risk of Mortality Among Children With ESRD

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The feasibility of the draw-and-write technique in exploring the resilience of children orphaned by AIDS

Worldwide, researchers routinely study children indirectly through adults who act as proxies for such children. The call for researchers to rather study children directly and adopt less intrusive child-friendly methodologies has become louder. The draw-and-write technique is regarded as a less intrusive child-friendly method of collecting data that can be used for this purpose. This paper reports the findings of a qualitative study that sought to establish the feasibility of the draw-and-write technique in exploring the resilience of children orphaned by AIDS. This study involved a convenience sample of 23 IsiXhosa-speaking orphaned children aged from 13 to 17. The participants were in grades 6 to 10 and they resided in two child and youth care centres in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa. As part of the draw-and-write technique the participants were asked to make drawings of what enabled them to cope with their lives and to write short narratives in which they explained their drawings. Inductive content analysis was used to analyse the data and this process yielded two main themes, namely: personal protective resources and socio-ecological protective resources. The findings show that complex combinations of personal and socio-ecological resilience resources enabled the resilience of the orphaned children. The findings challenge researchers not to be oblivious to alternative child-friendly methods of research such as the draw-and-write technique when young people are the unit of analysis. The findings of this study have implications for research as well as practice in the field of education and psychology.     

Opportunities and barriers to effective operation and maintenance of public toilets in informal settlements: perspectives from toilet operators in Kampala

Although classified by the Joint Monitoring Programme (JMP) as unimproved sanitation facilities, public toilets still play a critical role in eliminating open defecation in informal settlements. We explored perspectives of toilet operators on opportunities and barriers to operation and maintenance (O&M) of public toilets in informal settlements. A cross-sectional study design was used. Up to 20 in-depth interviews were used to obtain data on the experiences of public toilet operators. Thematic content analysis was used.

Ressults show that opportunities for improving O&M include; operation of public toilets is a source of livelihood; operators are knowledgeable on occupational risks, and the community is involvedin sanitation activities. Barriers to effective O&M include; high operation costs, failure to break even and a lack of investments in occupational health Therefore, there is need to recognise the significance of public toilets as a viable alternative to open defecation in areas where ownership of private sanitation facilities is difficult. Failure to observe the health and safety of toilet operators may further compromise O&M.