Experience preferred: insights from our newest public health professionals on how internships/practicums promote career development.

Universities offering undergraduate degrees in health promotion or health education and/or graduate degrees in public health typically require an internship, practicum, or fieldwork experience. This type of mentored experience is an important aspect of career development for the next generation of public health professionals and benefits not only the students but also the profession and the communities in which they work. This article provides perspectives from four public health professionals who have recently graduated from designated minority-serving institutions and highlights the ways in which internship, practicum, or fieldwork experiences have contributed to their career development.

[Cystic fibrosis: molecular update and clinical implications].

Cystic fibrosis (CF) is an autosomal recessive disorder characterized by chronic pneumopathy, pancreatic insufficiency, elevated sweat chloride levels and male infertility. It is caused by defects in the CF transmembrane conductance regulator (CFTR) gene, which encodes a protein that functions as a chloride channel. The identification of the CF-causing gene was a landmark in molecular medicine.

Using multiple cutpoints for the free-to-total prostate specific antigen ratio improves the accuracy of prostate cancer detection.

Background: Using a single cutpoint for the free-to-total (F/T) prostate specific antigen (PSA) ratio loses important diagnostic information. We evaluated the performance of multiple F/T PSA cutpoints in detecting prostate cancer in men with nonspecific PSA values.

Methods: We extracted sensitivity and specificity data from 12 studies reporting on >or=30 cancer patients with PSA values between 2.