Occupational correlates of low back pain among U.S. Marines following combat deployment.

Many U.S. Marines have experienced routine combat deployments during Operation Iraqi Freedom, which present numerous occupational hazards that may result in low back pain (LBP).

Injuries from combat explosions in Iraq: injury type, location, and severity.

Introduction: Explosions have caused a greater percentage of injuries in Iraq and Afghanistan than in any other large-scale conflict. Improvements in body armour and field medical care have improved survival and changed the injury profile of service personnel. This study's objective was to determine the nature, body region, and severity of injuries caused by an explosion episode in male service personnel.

A modular approach to disease registry design: successful adoption of an internet-based rare disease registry.

There is a need to develop Internet-based rare disease registries to support health care stakeholders to deliver improved quality patient outcomes. Such systems should be architected to enable multiple-level access by a range of user groups within a region or across regional/country borders in a secure and private way. However, this functionality is currently not available in many existing systems.

Treating patients with schizophrenia deficit with erythropoietin?

This systematic review summarizes and critically appraises the literature on the effect of erythropoietin (EPO) in schizophrenia patients and the pathophysiological mechanisms that may explain the potential of its use in this disease. EPO is mainly known for its regulatory activity in the synthesis of erythrocytes and is frequently used in treatment of chronic anemia. This cytokine, however, has many other properties, some of which may improve the symptoms of psychiatric illness.

Postconcussive symptom reporting among US combat veterans with mild traumatic brain injury from Operation Iraqi Freedom.

Objective: To examine the association between postconcussive symptoms and mild traumatic brain injury (MTBI) among combat veterans while adjusting for posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and depression.

Patients: Military personnel with provider-diagnosed MTBI (n = 334) or nonhead injury (n = 658) were identified from the Expeditionary Medical Encounter Database.

Main Outcome Measures: Post-Deployment Health Assessments and Re-Assessments were used to examine postconcussive symptoms and self-rated health.

A further evaluation of decision-making under risk and under ambiguity in schizophrenia.

Abnormal decision-making has been described as a key-concept to understand some behavioral disturbances in schizophrenia. However, whether schizophrenia patients display impairments in profitable decision-making on experimental designs is still controversial (1) to assess performance on decision-making paradigms under ambiguity and under risk conditions in a large sample of schizophrenia patients and (2) to study the impact of clinical variables on decision-making performance in schizophrenia. The Iowa gambling task (IGT) and the game of dice task (GDT) were administered to assess, respectively, decision-making under ambiguity and under risk in 63 schizophrenia patients and 67 healthy controls.

An evaluation of rheumatology practitioner outreach clinics: a qualitative study.

Background: Services for Rheumatoid Arthritis (RA) have evolved with the development of independently led outreach Rheumatology Practitioner (RP) clinics in Primary Care (PC). Their clinical and cost effectiveness, compared with Secondary Care (SC) services, has not been assessed. The RECIPROCATE study aims to evaluate their clinical and cost effectiveness.

Age differences in genetic and environmental variations in stress-coping during adulthood: a study of female twins.

The way people cope with stressors of day to day living has an important influence on health. The aim of the present study was to explore whether genetic and environmental variations in stress-coping differ over time during adulthood. The brief COPE was mailed to a large sample of the UK female twins (N = 4,736) having a wide range of age (20-87 years).

Habitual flavonoid intakes are positively associated with bone mineral density in women.

Dietary flavonoids exert bone-protective effects in animal models, but there is limited information on the effect of different flavonoid subclasses on bone health in humans. The aim of this observational study was to examine the association between habitual intake of flavonoid subclasses with bone mineral density (BMD) in a cohort of female twins. A total of 3160 women from the TwinsUK adult twin registry participated in the study.

Antipsychotic drugs: pro-cancer or anti-cancer? A systematic review.

Introduction: Important data was recently published on the potential genotoxic or carcinogenic effects of antipsychotics, as well as on their cytotoxic properties on cancer cells, that must be considered by psychiatrists in the benefit/risk ratio of their prescriptions.

Aim Of The Study: To answer whether or not antipsychotics, as a class or only some specific molecules, may influence cancer risk among treated patients. METHODS ELIGIBILITY CRITERIA: All studies (in vitro, animal studies and human studies) concerning effects of antipsychotic drugs on cancer development were included.

An information revolution in orthopaedics.

With the established success of the National Joint Registry and the emergence of a range of new national initiatives for the capture of electronic data in the National Health Service, orthopaedic surgery in the United Kingdom has found itself thrust to the forefront of an information revolution. In this review we consider the benefits and threats that this revolution poses, and how orthopaedic surgeons should marshal their resources to ensure that this is a force for good.

Effect of dwell time on the mental health of US military personnel with multiple combat tours.

Objective: We investigated the association of the length of time spent at home between deployments, or dwell time, with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and other mental health disorders.

Methods: We included US Marine Corps personnel identified from military deployment records who deployed to Operation Iraqi Freedom once (n = 49,328) or twice (n = 16,376). New-onset mental health diagnoses from military medical databases were included.

Yabi: An online research environment for grid, high performance and cloud computing.

Background: There is a significant demand for creating pipelines or workflows in the life science discipline that chain a number of discrete compute and data intensive analysis tasks into sophisticated analysis procedures. This need has led to the development of general as well as domain-specific workflow environments that are either complex desktop applications or Internet-based applications. Complexities can arise when configuring these applications in heterogeneous compute and storage environments if the execution and data access models are not designed appropriately.

The contrasting epidemiology of granulomatosis with polyangiitis (Wegener's) and microscopic polyangiitis.

Objectives: Granulomatosis with polyangiitis (Wegener's) (GPA) and microscopic polyangiitis (MPA) are uncommon and have unknown aetiology. The aim of the study was to investigate the epidemiology of GPA and MPA in a stable, well-defined population looking for differences in the pattern of occurrence, which might suggest a different aetiology.

Methods: Since 1988, we have maintained a prospective register of all patients with systemic vasculitis attending the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital.

Repeated concussion among U.S. military personnel during Operation Iraqi Freedom.

Concussions are a predominant injury of the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. The aims of this study were to describe repeated concussive events among U.S.

Rizatriptan for treatment of acute migraine in patients taking topiramate for migraine prophylaxis.

Objective: To assess efficacy and tolerability of rizatriptan orally disintegrating tablet (ODT) for treatment of acute migraine in patients using topiramate for migraine prophylaxis.

Background: There are limited data from prospective controlled trials demonstrating the benefit of triptans in patients who experience migraine attacks while taking prophylactic medication.

Methods: This was a worldwide, randomized, placebo-controlled, double-blind, multiple-attack study in adults with a >1-year history of migraine taking a stable dose of topiramate for migraine prophylaxis and experiencing ≥2 moderate/severe attacks per month.

Diet and bone mineral density study in postmenopausal women from the TwinsUK registry shows a negative association with a traditional English dietary pattern and a positive association with wine.

Background: The effect of diet on bone mineral density (BMD) remains controversial, mainly because of difficulties in isolating dietary factors from the confounding influences of age, lifestyle, and genetic factors.

Objective: The aim of this study was to use a novel method to examine the relation between BMD and diet.

Design: A co-twin control study design with linear regression modeling was used to test for associations between BMD and habitual intakes of calcium, vitamin D, protein, and alcohol plus 5 previously identified dietary patterns in postmenopausal women from the TwinsUK registry.

Blast-related mild traumatic brain injury is associated with a decline in self-rated health amongst US military personnel.

Introduction: Mild traumatic brain injury (MTBI) has emerged as the preeminent injury of combat from the recent conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. Very little is known about short- and long-term outcomes after combat-related MTBI. As a measure of outcome after injury, self-rated health is a reliable, widely used measure that assesses perceived health.

Lumbar disc degeneration and genetic factors are the main risk factors for low back pain in women: the UK Twin Spine Study.

Objective: Low back pain (LBP) is a common musculoskeletal disorder, but it is still unclear which individuals develop it. The authors examined the contribution of genetic factors, lumbar disc degeneration (LDD) and other risk factors in a female sample of the general population.

Material And Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted among 2256 women (371 and 698 monozygotic and dizygotic twin pairs and 29 sibling pairs and 60 singletons) with a mean age of 50 years (18-84).

Weight changes among male Navy personnel deployed to Iraq or Kuwait in 2005-2008.

The objective of this study was to identify changes in weight that occurred during deployment to Iraq or Kuwait between 2005 and 2008. Data on length and type of deployment among 16,365 male U.S.

Sex matters: evaluating sex and gender in migraine and headache research.

Significant sex differences exist in migraine and other headache disorders. Several hypotheses have been proposed to explain these differences, including fluctuations in sex hormones and receptor binding, genetic factors, differences in exposure to environmental stressors, as well as differences in response to stress and pain perception; but how valid are some of these findings and can we improve the quality of research in this field? It is notable that the preponderance of animal pain studies use male subjects to study a predominantly female disorder. Furthermore, with respect to headache and migraine sex differences, limited data have been derived from animal models.

Cigarette smoking, body mass index, and physical fitness changes among male navy personnel.

Introduction: Cigarette smoking has been reported to be higher among deployed military men than among similarly aged civilian or nondeployed men, but the short-term effect of smoking on physical fitness among these young healthy men is unclear. This study examined self-reported smoking status and change in objectively measured fitness over 1-4 years while controlling for body mass index (BMI).

Methods: This study included a large sample of male U.

Injuries sustained in noncombat motor vehicle accidents during Operation Iraqi Freedom.

Objective: To examine injuries sustained in noncombat motor vehicle accidents (MVAs) during Operation Iraqi Freedom by injury type, site, and severity.

Methods: Three hundred and forty-eight military personnel injured in noncombat MVAs from March 2004-June 2007 were identified from clinical records completed near the point of injury.

Results: On average, personnel suffered two injuries per accident.

Progression of lumbar disc degeneration over a decade: a heritability study.

Objectives: Lumbar disc degeneration (LDD) is prevalent, age-related and contributes to low back pain. Cross-sectional LDD as determined by MRI scan is known to be highly heritable. The authors postulated that the rate of progression might also be controlled by genetic factors.