Chlamydia infection, pelvic inflammatory disease, ectopic pregnancy and infertility: cross-national study

Objectives To describe, using routine data in selected countries, chlamydia control activities and rates of chlamydia infection, pelvic inflammatory disease (PID), ectopic pregnancy and infertility and to compare trends in chlamydia positivity with rates of PID and ectopic pregnancy. Methods Cross-national comparison including national data from Australia, Denmark, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Sweden and Switzerland. Routine data sources about chlamydia diagnosis and testing and International Classification of Disease-10 coded diagnoses of PID, ectopic pregnancy and infertility in women aged 15–39 years from 1999 to 2008 were described. Trends over time and relevant associations were examined using Poisson regression. Results Opportunistic chlamydia testing was recommended in all countries except Switzerland, but target groups differed. Rates of chlamydia testing were highest in New Zealand. Chlamydia positivity was similar in all countries with available data (Denmark, New Zealand and Sweden) and increased over time. Increasing chlamydia positivity rates were associated with decreasing PID rates in Denmark and Sweden and with decreasing ectopic pregnancy rates in Denmark, New Zealand and Sweden. Ectopic pregnancy rates appeared to increase over time in 15–19-year-olds in several countries. Trends in infertility diagnoses were very variable. Conclusions The intensity of recommendations about chlamydia control varied between countries but was not consistently related to levels of chlamydia diagnosis or testing. Relationships between levels of chlamydia infection and complication rates between or within countries over time were not straightforward. Development and validation of indicators of chlamydia-related morbidity that can be compared across countries and over time should be pursued.

Estudo da expansão da Leishmaniose Visceral no estado de São Paulo e de fatores intervenientes

INTRODUÇÃO: Leishmaniose visceral (LV) é uma doença negligenciada que afeta milhões de pessoas no mundo e que constitui um grave problema de saúde pública. OBJETIVOS: Descrever no tempo e no espaço, a dispersão de Lutzomyia longipalpis e a expansão da LV no estado de São Paulo (SP); identificar fatores associados a estes processos. MÉTODOS: Foram realizados estudos descritivos, ecológicos e de análise de sobrevida. Informações sobre o vetor e os casos foram obtidas na Superintendência de Controle de Endemias e no Sistema de Informações de Agravos de Notificação para o período de 1997 a 2014. A área de estudo foi composta pelos 645 municípios de SP. Foram produzidos mapas temáticos e de fluxo e calcularam-se incidência, mortalidade e letalidade por LV em humanos (LVH). Utilizou-se a técnica de análise de sobrevida (Curvas de Kaplan-Meier e Regressão de Cox) para a identificação de fatores associados à dispersão do vetor e expansão da LV. RESULTADOS: A partir da detecção de Lu. longipalpis em Araçatuba em 1997, deram-se a ocorrência do primeiro caso canino (LVC) (1998) e o primeiro caso humano (LVH) autóctones (1999) em SP. Até 2014, foi detectada a presença do vetor em 173 (26,8 por cento ) municípios, LVC em 108 (16,7 por cento ) e LVH em 84 (13 por cento ). A expansão dos três fenômenos ocorreu no sentido noroeste para sudeste e se deram a velocidades constantes. Na região de São José do Rio Preto, a dispersão do vetor deu-se por vizinhança com municípios anteriormente infestados, a expansão da LV relacionou-se com os municípios sede das microrregiões e a doença ocorreu com maior intensidade nas áreas periféricas dos municípios. A presença da Rodovia Marechal Rondon e a divisa com o Mato Grosso do Sul foram fatores associados à ocorrência dos três eventos, assim como a presença da Rodovia Euclides da Cunha para presença do vetor e casos caninos, e, presença de presídios para casos humanos. CONCLUSÕES: A dispersão do vetor e da LV em SP iniciou-se, a partir de 1997, próximo à divisa com o estado do Mato Grosso do Sul, avançou no sentido noroeste para sudeste, na trajetória da rodovia Marechal Rondon, e ocorreu em progressão aritmética, com as sedes das microrregiões de SP tendo papel preponderante neste processo. A ocorrência autóctone de LVC e LVH iniciou-se na sequência da detecção de Lu. longipalpis em Araçatuba e de seu espalhamento por SP e não a partir dos locais onde anteriormente ele já estava presente. O uso da análise de sobrevida permitiu identificar fatores associados à dispersão do vetor e a expansão da LV. Os resultados deste estudo podem ser úteis para aprimorar as atividades de vigilância e controle da LV, no sentido de retardar sua expansão e/ou de mitigar seus efeitos, quando de sua ocorrência.

Development time and survival of Verrallina funerea (Theobald) (Diptera : Culicidae) immatures and other brackish water mosquito species in southeast Queensland, Australia

Verrallina funerea (Theobald) is a brackish water mosquito that is recognised as an important pest and vector in southeast Queensland, Australia. Immature development time and survival of Ve. funerea was defined in the laboratory in response to a range of temperatures (17-34 degrees C) and salinities (0-35 parts per thousand (p.p.t)). The expression of autogeny in this species was also assessed. Salinity only had a slight effect on mean development time from hatching to adult emergence (7.0-7.4 d at salinities of 0, 17.5 and 31.5 p.p.t) and survival was uniformly high (97.5-99.0%). Mean development times were shorter at 26, 29 and 32 degrees C (7.0, 6.8 and 6.8 d, respectively) and longest at 17 degrees C (12.2 d). The threshold temperature (t) was 5.8 degrees C and the thermal constant (K) was 142.9 degree-days above t. Survival to adulthood decreased from > 95% (at 17-29 degrees C) to 78% (at 32 degrees C) and 0% (at 34 degrees C). No expression of autogeny was observed. Immature development times of Ve. funerea, Ochlerotatus vigilax (Skuse) and Oc. procax (Skuse) were then determined under field conditions at Maroochy Shire. Following tide and rain inundation, cohorts of newly hatched larvae were monitored daily by dipping, and time until pupation was noted. Tidal inundation triggered hatching of Ve. funerea and Oc. vigilax larvae whereas Oc. procax larvae were found only after rain inundation. Estimates of Ve. funerea and Oc. vigilax field development times were similar (8-9 d) while Oc. procax development time was slightly longer (9-10 d). Based on these survey results, control activities targeting Ve. funerea must be initiated 4 d (if using Bacillus thuringiensis var. israelensis de Barjac) or 5 d (if using s-methoprene) after inundation. However, Casuarina glauca Sieber canopy and branchlets covering breeding habitats may present a problem for the penetration of such treatments.

A quantitative approach to the organizational design problem

The span of control is the most discussed single concept in classical and modern management theory. In specifying conditions for organizational effectiveness, the span of control has generally been regarded as a critical factor. Existing research work has focused mainly on qualitative methods to analyze this concept, for example heuristic rules based on experiences and/or intuition. This research takes a quantitative approach to this problem and formulates it as a binary integer model, which is used as a tool to study the organizational design issue. This model considers a range of requirements affecting management and supervision of a given set of jobs in a company. These decision variables include allocation of jobs to workers, considering complexity and compatibility of each job with respect to workers, and the requirement of management for planning, execution, training, and control activities in a hierarchical organization. The objective of the model is minimal operations cost, which is the sum of supervision costs at each level of the hierarchy, and the costs of workers assigned to jobs. The model is intended for application in the make-to-order industries as a design tool. It could also be applied to make-to-stock companies as an evaluation tool, to assess the optimality of their current organizational structure. Extensive experiments were conducted to validate the model, to study its behavior, and to evaluate the impact of changing parameters with practical problems. This research proposes a meta-heuristic approach to solving large-size problems, based on the concept of greedy algorithms and the Meta-RaPS algorithm. The proposed heuristic was evaluated with two measures of performance: solution quality and computational speed. The quality is assessed by comparing the obtained objective function value to the one achieved by the optimal solution. The computational efficiency is assessed by comparing the computer time used by the proposed heuristic to the time taken by a commercial software system. Test results show the proposed heuristic procedure generates good solutions in a time-efficient manner.

Intern kontroll: En fallstudie på Trafikverket

Internal control is something that’s grown more important for enterprises to keep in mind. The community is increasingly affected by the IT-development which demands a bigger degree of security. Enterprises needs to make sure that their systems are up to date and secure enough to keep it safe from unauthorized to take part of sensitive information. Internal control can exist in a major part of the work. If an enterprise have a goal for no harm or serious injury at work, internal control is necessary to reach that goal. The purpose for this essay is to examine how five different departments of Trafikverket practices internal control. How internal control is described. How the guidance from the managements is described and how it reaches the rest of the enterprise. This will lead to a proposal of improvement of the internal control at Trafikverket. We focus our frame of reference on the COSO-model and its five components. The components included in the COSO-model are control environment, risk valuation, control activities, information and communication and monitoring. The essay is a case-study of Trafikverket. We have chosen a qualitative method and interviewed five respondents from the different departments on Trafikverket. The respondents we interviewed works with internal control in their everyday work or have a god insight in the subject. We used a semi structured interview guide with questions based on the COSO framework. The results from our study shows that it exist big variations between how the departments work with internal control. It emerged that there are new guidelines for how the work should be done. This makes it necessary with education to implement the new ways to work. How the departments use the COSO-model varies. Some of them have incorporated the model in their new ways to work others have never heard of it. The conclusion of our study shows that the COSO-model and it´s components contribute to a functioning internal control. Implementing the components is important and the most important feature to good internal control is the corporate management. Education within the enterprise is the most effective way to inform the staff about the model and to implement it.

Malaria in gold-mining areas in Colombia

Gold-mining may play an important role in the maintenance of malaria worldwide. Gold-mining, mostly illegal, has significantly expanded in Colombia during the last decade in areas with limited health care and disease prevention. We report a descriptive study that was carried out to determine the malaria prevalence in gold-mining areas of Colombia, using data from the public health surveillance system (National Health Institute) during the period 2010- 2013. Gold-mining was more prevalent in the departments of Antioquia, Córdoba, Bolívar, Chocó, Nariño, Cauca, and Valle, which contributed 89.3% (270,753 cases) of the national malaria incidence from 2010-2013 and 31.6% of malaria cases were from mining areas. Mining regions, such as El Bagre, Zaragoza, and Segovia, in Antioquia, Puerto Libertador and Montelíbano, in Córdoba, and Buenaventura, in Valle del Cauca, were the most endemic areas. The annual parasite index (API) correlated with gold production (R2 0.82, p < 0.0001); for every 100 kg of gold produced, the API increased by 0.54 cases per 1,000 inhabitants. Lack of malaria control activities, together with high migration and proliferation of mosquito breeding sites, contribute to malaria in gold-mining regions. Specific control activities must be introduced to control this significant source of malaria in Colombia.

Evaluación de los riesgos en el manejo de inventarios de las Empresas distribuidoras de productos de consumo masivo de la ciudad de Cuenca, aplicado a la distribuidora “DIPROSUM” por el período comprendido del 01 de enero al 31 de diciembre del 2014

El presente trabajo de titulación consiste en evaluar los riesgos en el manejo de inventarios de las distribuidoras de productos de consumo masivo de la ciudad de Cuenca, mediante una investigación de mercado, con el objetivo de elaborar un estudio actual sobre los riesgos más frecuentes a los que se ven expuestas en su manejo de inventarios, si los identifican y los evalúan, y, cuáles son los controles que utilizan para prevenirlos; investigación ejecutada mediante la aplicación de encuestas realizadas a un grupo de distribuidoras, representativas de la población total; resultados que permiten emitir soluciones al caso práctico Distribuidora DIPROSUM. El caso práctico, consiste en la evaluación de los riesgos en el manejo de inventarios de la Distribuidora DIPROSUM correspondiente al período del 01 de Enero al 31 de Diciembre de 2014, aplicando el modelo COSO I del Comité de Organizaciones Patrocinadoras de la Comisión de Treadway, compuesto de cinco componentes que son: Ambiente de Control, Evaluación de Riesgos, Actividades de Control, Información y Comunicación y, Monitoreo, mediante la metodología de cuestionarios para la obtención de los aspectos negativos o débiles considerados como riesgos que afectan al correcto manejo del inventario, calificando y evaluando los riesgos identificados, en la que los resultados se ven reflejados en el informe final con sus respectivas conclusiones y recomendaciones.

Perforin and interferon-gamma activities independently control tumor initiation, growth, and metastasis

Perforin (pfp) and interferon-gamma (IFN-gamma) together in C57BL/6 (B6) and BALB/c mouse strains provided optimal protection in 3 separate tumor models controlled by innate immunity. Using experimental (B6, RM-1 prostate carcinoma) and spontaneous (BALB/c, DA3 mammary carcinoma) models of metastatic cancer, mice deficient in both pfp and IFN-gamma were significantly less proficient than pfp- or IFN-gamma -deficient mice in preventing metastasis of tumor cells to the lung. Pfp and IFN-gamma -deficient mice were as susceptible as mice depleted of natural killer (NK) cells in both tumor metastasis models, and IFN-gamma appeared to play an early role in protection from metastasis, Previous experiments in a model of fibrosarcoma induced by the chemical carcinogen methylcholanthrene indicated an important role for NK1.1(+) T cells, Herein, both pfp and IFN-gamma played critical and independent roles in providing the host with protection equivalent to that mediated by NK1.1+ T cells, Further analysis demonstrated that IFN-gamma, but not pfp, controlled the growth rate of sarcomas arising in these mice. Thus, this is the first study to demonstrate that host IFN-gamma, and direct cytotoxicity mediated by cytotoxic lymphocytes expressing pfp independently contribute antitumor effector functions that together control the initiation, growth, and spread of tumors in mice, (C) 2001 by The American Society of Hematology.

Promise for plant pest control: root-associated pseudomonads with insecticidal activities.

Insects are an important and probably the most challenging pest to control in agriculture, in particular when they feed on belowground parts of plants. The application of synthetic pesticides is problematic owing to side effects on the environment, concerns for public health and the rapid development of resistance. Entomopathogenic bacteria, notably Bacillus thuringiensis and Photorhabdus/Xenorhabdus species, are promising alternatives to chemical insecticides, for they are able to efficiently kill insects and are considered to be environmentally sound and harmless to mammals. However, they have the handicap of showing limited environmental persistence or of depending on a nematode vector for insect infection. Intriguingly, certain strains of plant root-colonizing Pseudomonas bacteria display insect pathogenicity and thus could be formulated to extend the present range of bioinsecticides for protection of plants against root-feeding insects. These entomopathogenic pseudomonads belong to a group of plant-beneficial rhizobacteria that have the remarkable ability to suppress soil-borne plant pathogens, promote plant growth, and induce systemic plant defenses. Here we review for the first time the current knowledge about the occurrence and the molecular basis of insecticidal activity in pseudomonads with an emphasis on plant-beneficial and prominent pathogenic species. We discuss how this fascinating Pseudomonas trait may be exploited for novel root-based approaches to insect control in an integrated pest management framework.

Chronic intermittent hypoxia alters glutamatergic control of sympathetic and respiratory activities in the commissural NTS of rats

Costa-Silva JH, Zoccal DB, Machado BH. Chronic intermittent hypoxia alters glutamatergic control of sympathetic and respiratory activities in the commissural NTS of rats. Am J Physiol Regul Integr Comp Physiol 302: R785-R793, 2012. First published December 28, 2011; doi:10.1152/ajpregu.00363.2011.-Sympathetic overactivity and altered respiratory control are commonly observed after chronic intermittent hypoxia (CIH) exposure. However, the central mechanisms underlying such neurovegetative dysfunctions remain unclear. Herein, we hypothesized that CIH (6% O-2 every 9 min, 8 h/day, 10 days) in juvenile rats alters glutamatergic transmission in the commissural nucleus tractus solitarius (cNTS), a pivotal site for integration of peripheral chemoreceptor inputs. Using an in situ working heart-brain stem preparation, we found that L-glutamate microinjections (1, 3, and 10 mM) into the cNTS of control rats (n = 8) evoked increases in thoracic sympathetic nerve (tSN) and central vagus nerve (cVN) activities combined with inhibition of phrenic nerve (PN) activity. Besides, the ionotropic glutamatergic receptor antagonism with kynurenic acid (KYN; 250 mM) in the cNTS of control group (n = 7) increased PN burst duration and frequency. In the CIH group (n = 10), the magnitude of L-glutamate-induced cVN excitation was smaller, and the PN inhibitory response was blunted (P < 0.05). In addition, KYN microinjections into the cNTS of CIH rats (n = 9) did not alter PN burst duration and produced smaller increases in its frequency compared with controls. Moreover, KYN microinjections into the cNTS attenuated the sympathoexcitatory response to peripheral chemoreflex activation in control but not in CIH rats (P < 0.05). These functional CIH-induced alterations were accompanied by a significant 10% increase of N-methyl-D-aspartate receptor 1 (NMDAR1) and glutamate receptor 2/3 (GluR2/3) receptor subunit density in the cNTS (n = 3-8, P < 0.05), evaluated by Western blot analysis. These data indicate that glutamatergic transmission is altered in the cNTS of CIH rats and may contribute to the sympathetic and respiratory changes observed in this experimental model.

Patients with Alzheimer's disease have reduced activities in midlife compared with healthy control-group members

The development of Alzheimer's disease (AD) later in life may be reflective of environmental factors operating over the course of a lifetime. Educational and occupational attainments have been found to be protective against the development of the disease but participation in activities has received little attention. In a case-control study, we collected questionnaire data about 26 nonoccupational activities from ages 20 to 60. Participants included 193 people with probable or possible AD and 358 healthy control-group members. Activity patterns for intellectual, passive, and physical activities were classified by using an adaptation of a published scale in terms of “diversity” (total number of activities), “intensity” (hours per month), and “percentage intensity” (percentage of total activity hours devoted to each activity category). The control group was more active during midlife than the case group was for all three activity categories, even after controlling for age, gender, income adequacy, and education. The odds ratio for AD in those performing less than the mean value of activities was 3.85 (95% confidence interval: 2.65–5.58, P < 0.001). The increase in time devoted to intellectual activities from early adulthood (20–39) to middle adulthood (40–60) was associated with a significant decrease in the probability of membership in the case group. We conclude that diversity of activities and intensity of intellectual activities were reduced in patients with AD as compared with the control group. These findings may be because inactivity is a risk factor for the disease or because inactivity is a reflection of very early subclinical effects of the disease, or both.

Control and Guidance of Low-Cost Robots via Gesture Perception for Monitoring Activities in the Home

This paper describes the development of a low-cost mini-robot that is controlled by visual gestures. The prototype allows a person with disabilities to perform visual inspections indoors and in domestic spaces. Such a device could be used as the operator's eyes obviating the need for him to move about. The robot is equipped with a motorised webcam that is also controlled by visual gestures. This camera is used to monitor tasks in the home using the mini-robot while the operator remains quiet and motionless. The prototype was evaluated through several experiments testing the ability to use the mini-robot’s kinematics and communication systems to make it follow certain paths. The mini-robot can be programmed with specific orders and can be tele-operated by means of 3D hand gestures to enable the operator to perform movements and monitor tasks from a distance.