Epidemiology and Genetic Variability of Human Metapneumovirus During a 4-Year-Long Study in Southeastern Brazil

Epidemiological and molecular characteristics of human metapneumovirus (hMPV) were compared with human respiratory syncytial virus (hRSV) in infants and young children admitted for acute lower respiratory tract infections in a prospective study during four consecutive years in subtropical Brazil. GeneScan polymerase chain assays (GeneScan RT-PCR) were used to detect hMPV and hRSV in nasopharyngeal aspirates of 1,670 children during January 2003 to December 2006. hMPV and hRSV were detected, respectively, in 191 (11.4%) and in 702 (42%) of the children admitted with acute lower respiratory tract infections at the Sao Paulo University Hospital. Sequencing data of the hMPV F gene revealed that two groups of the virus, each divided into two subgroups, co-circulated during three consecutive years. It was also shown that a clear dominance of genotype B1 occurred during the years 2004 and 2005, followed by genotype A2 during 2006. J. Med. Virol. 81:915-921,2009. (C) 2009 Wiley-Liss, Inc.

Dependence of Response Functions and Orbital Functionals on Occupation Numbers

Explicitly orbital-dependent approximations to the exchange-correlation energy functional of density functional theory typically not only depend on the single-particle Kohn-Sham orbitals but also on their occupation numbers in the ground-state Slater determinant. The variational calculation of the corresponding exchange-correlation potentials with the optimized effective potential (OEP) method therefore also requires a variation of the occupation numbers with respect to a variation in the effective single-particle potential, which is usually not taken into account. Here it is shown under which circumstances this procedure is justified.

Hot och våld i socialarbetares yrkesutövning : Threats and violence in the socialwelfare secretary occupation.

2004, the SSR, Akademikerförbundet, made a study on the threats and violence as a social secretary in the municipal social services are exposed in their occupation of the "social secretary of threats and violence at work" (T-110192), conducted by Temo ab. We have chosen to use the study on a smaller scale and then made contact with five municipalities in the middle of Sweden to investigate social secretaries experiences of threats and violence. Using the cross-sectional design and a convenience sample, we have gained access to data from 56 people. From a sociological perspective, we have chosen to use Norbert Elias theory of universal configuration and interdependence, and Michel Foucault’s theories concerning power search explanation for the existence of threats and violent situations in the contact between social workers and their clients.

How initial vocational education and training (IVET) teachers in Sweden perceive their prospects of being able to prepare upper secondary school pupils for a future occupation

Vocational teachers in Swedish upper secondary schools are a heterogeneous category of teachers, connected to different types of trade. These teachers represent a broad set of trade skills varying in content and character. In their teacher role, they continue to wear the clothes, speak the language, share the culture and remain mentally in their former professions. Still, it is central that they keep up this contact to be able to school the pupils into the environment of the trade in question, but also to help them to understand what skills a profession demands. However, the individual teacher also has to distance himself from the negative elements in the culture of the profession: patterns and habits that, for various reasons, have to be broken or changed. This paper draws attention to the ways in which a group of vocational teachers, who were participants in a project that aimed to train unauthorized vocational teachers, expressed their ambitions to prepare the pupils for a future professional career. When collecting information, we used the degree dissertations they produced and discussed in seminars, and informal dialogues. The result shows that it is important that the instruction location resembles a real working site as far as possible. These places are more or less realistic copies of a garage, a restaurant kitchen, a hairdressing salon, and so on, in order to give the pupils a realistic setting for instruction. However, the fact that these simulated workplaces lack the necessary support functions that exist in a company creates problems, problems which make a lot of extra work for the teachers. Vocational teachers also have to instruct the pupil in the experienced practitioner’s professional skills and working situation, but the pupil herself/himself must learn the job by doing it in practice. Some vocational upper secondary programs lack relevant course literature and the businesses give little support. This also makes extra work for the teachers. Moreover, the distance between the vocational programs and the trainee jobs was experienced as being difficult to overcome. One reason seems to be differences between businesses and differing preconditions between small and big companies’ abilities to take care of these pupils. The upper secondary school vocational programs also play a role in cementing existing gender roles, as well as perpetuating class-related patterns on the labour market.

How initial vocational education and training (IVET) teachers in Sweden perceive their prospects of being able to prepare upper secondary school pupils for a future occupation

Vocational teachers in Swedish upper secondary schools are a heterogeneous category of teachers, connected to different types of trade. These teachers represent a broad set of trade skills varying in content and character. In their teacher role, they continue to wear the clothes, speak the language, share the culture and remain mentally in their former professions. Still, it is central that they keep up this contact to be able to school the pupils into the environment of the trade in question, but also to help them to understand what skills a profession demands. However, the individual teacher also has to distance himself from the negative elements in the culture of the profession: patterns and habits that, for various reasons, have to be broken or changed. This paper draws attention to the ways in which a group of vocational teachers, who were participants in a project that aimed to train unauthorized vocational teachers, expressed their ambitions to prepare the pupils for a future professional career. When collecting information, we used the degree dissertations they produced and discussed in seminars, and informal dialogues. The result shows that it is important that the instruction location resembles a real working site as far as possible. These places are more or less realistic copies of a garage, a restaurant kitchen, a hairdressing salon, and so on, in order to give the pupils a realistic setting for instruction. However, the fact that these simulated workplaces lack the necessary support functions that exist in a company creates problems, problems which make a lot of extra work for the teachers. Vocational teachers also have to instruct the pupil in the experienced practitioner’s professional skills and working situation, but the pupil herself/himself must learn the job by doing it in practice. Some vocational upper secondary programs lack relevant course literature and the businesses give little support. This also makes extra work for the teachers. Moreover, the distance between the vocational programs and the trainee jobs was experienced as being difficult to overcome. One reason seems to be differences between businesses and differing preconditions between small and big companies’ abilities to take care of these pupils. The upper secondary school vocational programs also play a role in cementing existing gender roles, as well as perpetuating class-related patterns on the labour market.

Towards an ontology for mathematical modeling with application to epidemiology

EMAp - Escola de Matemática Aplicada

Semiparametric modeling of the spatial distribution of occupational accident risk in the casual labor market, Piracicaba, southeast Brazil

The objective of this study was to estimate the spatial distribution of work accident risk in the informal work market in the urban zone of an industrialized city in southeast Brazil and to examine concomitant effects of age, gender, and type of occupation after controlling for spatial risk variation. The basic methodology adopted was that of a population-based case-control study with particular interest focused on the spatial location of work. Cases were all casual workers in the city suffering work accidents during a one-year period; controls were selected from the source population of casual laborers by systematic random sampling of urban homes. The spatial distribution of work accidents was estimated via a semiparametric generalized additive model with a nonparametric bidimensional spline of the geographical coordinates of cases and controls as the nonlinear spatial component, and including age, gender, and occupation as linear predictive variables in the parametric component. We analyzed 1,918 cases and 2,245 controls between 1/11/2003 and 31/10/2004 in Piracicaba, Brazil. Areas of significantly high and low accident risk were identified in relation to mean risk in the study region (p < 0.01). Work accident risk for informal workers varied significantly in the study area. Significant age, gender, and occupational group effects on accident risk were identified after correcting for this spatial variation. A good understanding of high-risk groups and high-risk regions underpins the formulation of hypotheses concerning accident causality and the development of effective public accident prevention policies.

Molecular epidemiology of Staphylococcus aureus isolates at different sites in the milk producing dairy farms

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP)

Riscos ocupacionais e acidentes de trabalho em um serviço de atendimento móvel de urgência do Rio Grande do Norte

Exploratory, descriptive and quantitative study with prospective data, performed in the Mobile Emergency Care Service in the metropolitan region of Natal/RN, in order to identify the knowledge of the multidisciplinary team about the rules of standard precautions and worker safety, to identify occupational hazards peculiar to the activities of this service; characterize work-related accidents (WRA) and know the procedures adopted after each WRA. The population consisted of 162 professionals and data were collected between the months of November and December 2010. As for personal and professional characteristics, of the 162 professional, 12,96% were physicians; 6,79%, nurses; 33,95%, nursing technicians, 46,29%, conductors; 74,70% were male; 43,21% were between 31 and 40 years old; 69,33% lived in Natal/RN, 50,00% had completed high school; 58,64% were married; 69,75% had children, 46,91% were between 1 and 4 years of training; 61,73% had improvement courses; 59,25% had 3 to 4 years of service; 54,32%, with 1-4 years experience in emergency; 44,44% received 1-2 minimum wages; 78,40% received insalubrity premium; 67,28% worked in Basic Support Unit (BSU); 83,95% had journey on SAMU Metropolitano of 31-40 hours per week; 52,47% had other employments. As for knowledge of rules of standard precautions, safety and occupational hazards, 99,38% knew what it was WRA; 62,96% gave incomplete answers; 74,07% knew the rules of prevent WRA; 46,67% acquired this knowledge in lectures; 53,09% knew Personal Protective Equipment (PPE); 71,60% gave incorrect answers about the importance of standard precautions; 45,06% never received an educational intervention on this issue; 89,51% said that educational interventions in the prevention of WRA are very important; 90,12% pointed out this as a very important issue in the workplace; 27,00% suggested guidance on the topic in the workplace; regarding the physical hazards, 34,57% considered noise as the most important; about chemical hazards, 78,40% chose the gases and smoke; for biological hazards, 48,77% reported contact with the blood; for mechanical hazards, 80,86% said that were transport accidents; about ergonomic risks, 40,12% say it is the tension/stress in the care of critically ill, psychiatric and aggressive patients; and there was an average of 4,5 to the feeling of safety in the workplace. Regarding the data on the WRAs occurred, 31,48% experienced at least one accident event; 72,55% did not notify it; 60,98% answered that there was no routine for notification; 56,86% were performing patient transportation; 49,02% were hurt in the Basic Support Unit/Rescue Unit (BSU/RH); 60,78% occurred during the day; 96,08% of professionals were in normal work schedule (24 hours on duty); 31,37% had contusion; 58.82% had damage to members/pelvic girdle; 43,14% had traffic accidents. About the evolution of the WRA, 62,75% did not have to take time away from work; 76,47% had no sequelae; 88,24% did not require rehabilitation; no professional had a change of occupation. And by means of univariate logistic regression, showed that the nurses and male sex were risk factors for the occurrence of WRA. We conclude that there were gaps in the knowledge of staff regarding WRA, emphasizing the need for continuing education in biosafety in the service.

Virulence characteristics and epidemiology of Yersinia enterocolitica and Yersiniae other than Y-pseudotuberculosis and Y-pestis isolated from water and sewage

Aims: To determine the species, bio-sero-phagetypes, antimicrobial drug resistance and also the pathogenic potential of 144 strains of Yersinia spp. isolated from water sources and sewage in Brazil.Methods and Results: the 144 Yersinia strains were characterized biochemically, serologically and had their antibiotic resistance and phenotypic virulence markers determined by microbiological and serological standard techniques. The Y. enterocolitica strains related to human diseases were also tested for the presence of virulence genes, by the PCR technique. The isolates were classified as Y. enterocolitica, Y. intermedia, Y. frederiksenii, Y. kristensenii and Yersinia biochemically atypical. The 144 isolates belonged to various bio-serogroups. Half of the strains showed resistance to three or more drugs. The Y. enterocolitica strains related to human diseases exhibited phenotypic virulence characteristics and virulence genes.Conclusions: Water from various sources and sewage are contaminated with Yersinia spp. in Brasil. Among these bacteria, virulent strains of Y. enterocolitica were found, with biotypes and serogroups related to human diseases.Significance and Impact of the Study: This is the first documented description of the occurrence of pathogenic Y. enterocolitica in water sources and sewage in Brazil. The occurrence of virulence strains of Y. enterocolitica shows that the environment is a potential source of human infection by this species in this country.

Influência de fatores de risco na prevalência de hábitos bucais deletérios em crianças de 0 a 5 anos na cidade do Natal-RN

Literature has demonstrated to the narrow relation between deleterious habits and the occurrence of malocclusion in minors of 5 years. The existence of these habits, however, already considered as risk factors, having also, its determinative ones, which present cultural dimensions and economic social, many of them related to the parents of the child, having in account that such habits if develop in phases in which the child establish a narrow relation of dependence. This study it had an objective to investigate the prevalence of deleterious buccal habits in children and its relation with the economic social and characteristics of the parents. It was developed an epidemiologist study of transversal character with interview, through daily pay-tested form, with 218 parents in the day of the National Campaign of Vaccination. In the cast of the variable that had composed the study, they had been used, as changeable dependents, the use of the baby's bottle, bottle and the digital suction, being considered as outcomes of the research. Amongst the independent variable, the economic social factors (type of occupation, number of children, civil state, sort, schooling and age) and staffs of the parents (self perception in oral health) had entered as the variable to be analyzed in the problems of the infantile odontology. The collected data had been submitted to the analysis descriptive and inferential statistics, being used the test qui-square and the analysis of the possibility reasons. As main results, it was found that breast feeding before the six months if presents as one of the main factors of risk for the use of baby's bottle (p< 0.001, OR= 2.8, I.C= 1.589 4.906), bottle (p< 0.001, OR= 3.7, I.C.= 2.076 6.624) and digital suction (p< 0.014, OR= 3.5, I.C.= 1.225 10.181). From the data found, one concludes that breast-feeding is considered a primordial factor for not the installation of deleterious oral habits and that the economic social and cultural factors can reflect in central way in the performance of this act

Venous ulcer: epidemiology, physiopathology, diagnosis and treatment

This review discusses the epidemiology, pathogenesis, diagnosis and current therapeutic options for venous ulcer. Venous ulcer is a severe clinical manifestation of chronic venous insufficiency (CVI). It is responsible for about 70% of chronic ulcers of the lower limbs. The high prevalence of venous ulcer has a significant socioeconomic impact in terms of medical care, days off work and reduced quality of life. Long-term therapeutics are needed to heal venous ulcers and recurrence is quite common, ranging from 54 to 78%. Thrombophlebitis and trauma with long-term immobilization predisposing to deep venous thrombosis are important risk factors for CVI and venous ulcer. The most recent theories about pathogenesis of venous ulcer have associated it with microcirculatory abnormalities and generation of an inflammatory response. Management of venous leg ulcers is based on understanding the pathogenesis. In recent years novel therapeutic approaches for venous ulcers have offered valuable tools for the management of patients with this disorder.