A mixed-method comparison of physician-reported beliefs about and barriers to treatment with medications for opioid use disorder.

Background: Evidence demonstrates that medications for treating opioid use disorder (MOUD) -namely buprenorphine, methadone, and extended-release naltrexone-are effective at treating opioid use disorder (OUD) and reducing associated harms. However, MOUDs are heavily underutilized, largely due to the under-supply of providers trained and willing to prescribe the medications.

Methods: To understand comparative beliefs about MOUD and barriers to MOUD, we conducted a mixed-methods study that involved focus group interviews and an online survey disseminated to a random group of licensed U.

The inter- and intrarater reliability and agreement for field-based assessment of scapular control, shoulder range of motion, and shoulder isometric strength in elite adolescent athletes.

Objectives: To investigate the intra- and interrater reliability and agreement for field-based assessment of scapular control, shoulder range of motion (ROM), and shoulder isometric strength in elite youth athletes.

Design: Test-retest reliability and agreement study.

Setting: Eight blinded raters (two for each assessment) assessed players on field during two testing sessions separated by one week.

The SMS, Phone, and medical Examination sports injury surveillance system is a feasible and valid approach to measuring handball exposure, injury occurrence, and consequences in elite youth sport.

Current methods of sports injury surveillance are limited by lack of medical validation of self-reported injuries and/or incomplete information about injury consequences beyond time loss from sport. The aims of this study were to (a) evaluate the feasibility of the SMS, Phone, and medical Examination injury surveillance (SPEx) system (b) to evaluate the proportion of injuries and injury consequences reported by SPEx when compared to outcomes from a modified version of the Oslo Sports Trauma Research Centre (OSTRC) Overuse Injury Questionnaire. We followed 679 elite adolescent handball players over 31 weeks using the SPEx system.

Validity of the SMS, Phone, and medical staff Examination sports injury surveillance system for time-loss and medical attention injuries in sports.

The accurate measurement of sport exposure time and injury occurrence is key to effective injury prevention and management. Current measures are limited by their inability to identify all types of sport-related injury, narrow scope of injury information, or lack the perspective of the injured athlete. The aims of the study were to evaluate the proportion of injuries and the agreement between sport exposures reported by the SMS messaging and follow-up telephone part of the SMS, Phone, and medical staff Examination (SPEx) sports injury surveillance system when compared to measures obtained by trained on-field observers and medical staff (comparison method).

Handball load and shoulder injury rate: a 31-week cohort study of 679 elite youth handball players.

Background: Knowledge of injury patterns, an essential step towards injury prevention, is lacking in youth handball.

Aim: To investigate if an increase in handball load is associated with increased shoulder injury rates compared with a minor increase or decrease, and if an association is influenced by scapular control, isometric shoulder strength or glenohumeral range of motion (ROM).

Methods: 679 players (14-18 years) provided weekly reports on shoulder injury and handball load (training and competition hours) over 31 weeks using the SMS, phone and medical examination system.

Socio-economic inequalities in health and health service use among older adults in India: results from the WHO Study on Global AGEing and adult health survey.

Objective: The objectives of this study were to measure socio-economic inequalities in self-reported health (SRH) and healthcare visits and to identify factors contributing to health inequalities among older people aged 50-plus years.

Study Design: This study is based on a population-based, cross-sectional survey.

Methods: We accessed data of 7150 older adults from the World Health Organization's Study on Global AGEing and adult health Indian survey.

Health, Social, and Economic Variables Associated with Depression Among Older People in Low and Middle Income Countries: World Health Organization Study on Global AGEing and Adult Health.

Objective: Although depression among older people is an important public health problem worldwide, systematic studies evaluating its prevalence and determinants in low and middle income countries (LMICs) are sparse. The biopsychosocial model of depression and prevailing socioeconomic hardships for older people in LMICs have provided the impetus to determine the prevalence of geriatric depression; to study its associations with health, social, and economic variables; and to investigate socioeconomic inequalities in depression prevalence in LMICs.

Methods: The authors accessed the World Health Organization Study on Global AGEing and Adult Health Wave 1 data that studied nationally representative samples from six large LMICs (N = 14,877).

Health service use, out-of-pocket payments and catastrophic health expenditure among older people in India: the WHO Study on global AGEing and adult health (SAGE).

Background: Healthcare financing through out-of-pocket payments and inequities in healthcare utilisation are common in low and middle income countries (LMICs). Given the dearth of pertinent studies on these issues among older people in LMICs, we investigated the determinants of health service use, out-of-pocket and catastrophic health expenditures among older people in one LMIC, India.

Methods: We accessed data from a nationally representative, multistage sample of 2414 people aged 65 years and older from the WHO's Study on global AGEing and adult health in India.

Cost and burden of informal caregiving of dependent older people in a rural Indian community.

Background: Lack of state supported care services begets the informal caregiving by family members as the mainstay of care provided to the dependent older people in many Low and Middle Income Countries (LMICs), including India. Little is known about the time spent on caregiving, its cost and the burden experienced by these informal caregivers. We aimed to estimate the costs of informal caregiving and to evaluate the nature as well as correlates of caregivers' burden in a rural Indian community.

Induced abortion and breast cancer among parous women: a Danish cohort study.

Objective: We investigated whether induced abortion is associated with breast cancer when lifestyle confounders, including smoking and alcohol consumption, are adjusted for. Design. Prospective cohort study.

Epidemiology of non-hereditary angioedema.

The prevalence of non-hereditary angioedema was investigated in a general population sample (n = 7,931) and in a sample of Danish patients (n = 7,433) tested for deficiency of functional complement C(1) esterase inhibitor protein (functional C(1) INH). The general population sample (44% response rate) reported a lifetime prevalence of 7.4% for angioedema.

Traits of ADHD and autism in girls with a twin brother: a Mendelian randomization study.

It has been hypothesized that prenatal exposure to testosterone may be associated with traits of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) or autism spectrum disorder (ASD). We conducted a population-based study of dizygotic female twins to elucidate this hypothesis, assuming that the sex of the co-twin influences the level of prenatal exposure to testosterone. We invited parents of 24,552 3- to 15-year-old twins to answer questionnaires on traits of ADHD and ASD.

Injury risk in Danish youth and senior elite handball using a new SMS text messages approach.

Objective: To assess the injury incidence in elite handball, and if gender and previous injuries are risk factors for new injuries.

Methods: Cohort study of 517 male and female elite handball players (age groups under (u)16, u-18 and senior). Participants completed a web survey establishing injury history, demographic information and sports experience, and provided weekly reports of time-loss injuries and handball exposure for 31 weeks by short message service text messaging (SMS).

Soluble CD36 (sCD36) clusters with markers of insulin resistance, and high sCD36 is associated with increased type 2 diabetes risk.

Context And Objective: Soluble CD36 (sCD36) may be an early marker of insulin resistance and atherosclerosis. The objective of this prospective study was to evaluate sCD36 as a predictor of type 2 diabetes and to study its relationship with components of the metabolic syndrome (MetSy). DESIGN, SETTING, PARTICIPANTS, AND OUTCOME MEASURES: We conducted a case-referent study nested within a population-based health survey.

Polymorphisms in the tumor necrosis factor alpha and interleukin 1-beta promoters with possible gene regulatory functions increase the risk of preterm birth.

Objective: To investigate the relation between 19 selected single nucleotide polymorphisms in three cytokine genes, tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNFA), interleukin 1-beta (IL1B) and interleukin 6 (IL6) and preterm birth (<37 weeks' gestation).

Design: Case-control association study.

Sample: A total of 117 singleton pregnant Danish Caucasian women, including 62 preterm birth cases and 55 controls (birth>or=37 weeks).

Patients with rheumatoid arthritis treated with methotrexate (MTX): concentrations of steady-state erythrocyte MTX correlate to plasma concentrations and clinical efficacy.

Objective: To investigate the accumulation of methotrexate (MTX) in circulating erythrocytes and the association with pharmacokinetic variables, weekly dose, and clinical efficacy in 2 cohorts of patients with chronic active rheumatoid arthritis (RA) undergoing MTX monotherapy.

Methods: Seventy-six patients with RA were included in this open prospective study: 40 were included before initiation of MTX therapy. Laboratory analyses, intracellular MTX concentrations in erythrocytes (Ery-MTX), and clinical examinations including toxicity data were performed prospectively for 52 weeks.

Macrophage serum markers in pneumococcal bacteremia: Prediction of survival by soluble CD163.

Objective: Soluble CD163 (sCD163) is a new macrophage-specific serum marker. This study investigated sCD163 and other markers of macrophage activation (neopterin, ferritin, transcobalamin, and soluble urokinase plasminogen activator receptor [suPAR]) as prognostic factors in patients with pneumococcal bacteremia.

Design: Observational cohort study.

Longitudinal and cross-sectional studies of HIV-1 RNA and DNA loads in blood and the female genital tract.

Objective: To examine if correlates of HIV-1 genital shedding in cross-sectional studies can be used to determine the risk of shedding in individual HIV-1-positive women.

Study Design: Longitudinal samples from blood and cervix were obtained from 18 HIV-1 infected women, and HIV-1 RNA and cell-associated DNA virus, and beta-chemokine levels, were measured. Associations between variables were analyzed at both individual and group level.

Respiratory effects of experimental exposure to office dust.

Unlabelled: The aim of this experiment was to test if healthy persons respond to exposures to normal office dust with objective or subjective effects in a dose-related way. If they did, the importance of their personal characteristics should be investigated. This paper presents the results related to respiratory effects caused by exposures to office dust.

Patient-specific errors in agreement between International Normalized Ratios measured by a whole blood coagulometer and by a routine plasma-based method.

We applied a new statistical method to improve comparisons between systems measuring prothrombin time (PT) by splitting disagreement into systematic errors, which can be eliminated, and random errors, which can not. We found that the disagreement between International Normalized Ratio (INR) measurements based on plasma and whole blood was significantly patient-dependent.

Precision of INR measured with a patient operated whole blood coagulometer.

Introduction: The objective of the present study was to evaluate the precision of a portable whole blood coagulometer (CoaguChek S) in the hands of self-managing patients on oral anticoagulant therapy (OAT).

Materials And Methods: Fifteen patients on self-managed OAT performed measurements of INR by two types of portable whole blood coagulometers (CoaguChek and CoaguChek S) at home for 10 weeks.

Results: The coefficient of variation (CV) of INRs determined at home by CoaguChek S by patients on self-managed OAT was 5.

Inaccuracy of international normalized ratio (INR) measurements and suggestions for improved WHO guidelines for calibration of reference preparations--a statistical study.

Numerous empirical studies show that the accuracy of international normalized ratio (INR) measurements is unsatisfactory and worse than generally expected. We demonstrate that a plausible reason for this large inaccuracy is a conventional calibration procedure of reference preparations with (i) an erroneous assumption that the line relating logarithmic prothrombin times (log PTs) of patients passes through the mean log PT of the 'normal' population (mean normal PT); (ii) non-perceived interactions between patients and PT systems; and (iii) systematic exclusions of 'outliers'. The same conventional procedure also results in serious overestimation of the accuracy of INR measurements, thus leading to a false sense of security in oral anticoagulant therapy.