Hygiene and biosecurity conditions of initial examination on-spot in Portugal: One step toward game meat safety.

Background And Aim: Due to the particularities of the first steps of the game food chain, large game species are shot, bled, and handled in collection points (spot of evisceration and initial examination in the field). These steps of the game meat chain affect the microbiological quality of this type of meat, thus posing a risk to consumers. This study aimed to characterize the collection points in terms of central hygiene and biosecurity procedures/requirements.

Predictive factors of fragility fractures and associated mortality: assessment of patients observed at emergency department.

Aim: To assess the predictive factors for a subsequent fragility fracture (FF) and mortality.

Methods: Retrospective monocentric study including patients observed at the emergency department (ED) of a referral hospital with a FF, between 1st January 2017 and 31st December 2018. Fractures events were identified through discharge codes using the 9th International Classification of Diseases codes and FF were adjudicated after revision of the clinical files.

Efficiency Analysis in Brazil's Sao Paulo State Local Unified Health System (SUS): From Gender-Ethnicity-Power Inequities to the Dissolution of Health Effectiveness.

Health equity is cross sectioned by the reproduction of social relations of gender, ethnicity and power. The purpose of this article is to assess how intersectional health equity determines societal health levels, in a local efficiency analysis within Brazil's Unified Health System (SUS), among Sao Paulo state municipalities. Fixed Panel Effects Model and Data Envelopment Analysis techniques were applied, according to resources, health production and intersectoral dimensions.

Regional health inequalities: changes observed in Brazil from 2000-2016.

Advances in reducing poverty and inequalities in the 2000s had a paradoxical effect in Brazil. This article examines how socioeconomic transformations, and the complexity of health services, are expressed in the regions established for planning purposes and the inter-governmental management of the Brazilian Unified Health System. An effort was made to identify and explain differences in the compositions of the 438 existing health regions and their spatial distribution by comparing situations observed in 2016 with those in 2000.

Ethnic differences in medicinal plant use among University students: a cross-sectional survey of self-reported medicinal plant use at two Midwest Universities.

Background: Numerous surveys of medicinal plant use among college students abound, but none compare use between students enrolled in two different Universities with significantly different ethnic compositions. The objective of this study is to compare medicinal plant use between two different ethnic college populations and explore differences between student medicinal plant users and non-users for comparison with previous research.

Methods: Students (n = 721) at a large research university (n = 498) and a Pan-Tribal University for Native Americans (n = 233) completed surveys in October 2011 to assess past year medicinal plant use.

Co-ingestion of carbohydrate with branched-chain amino acids or L-leucine does not preferentially increase serum IGF-1 and expression of myogenic-related genes in response to a single bout of resistance exercise.

The purpose of this study was to determine if the co-ingestion of carbohydrate (CHO) with branched-chain amino acids (BCAA) or L-leucine (LEU) preferentially affected serum IGF-1 and the expression of myogenic-related genes in response to resistance exercise (RE). Forty-one college-age males were randomly assigned to 1 of 4 groups: CHO, CHO-BCAA, CHO-LEU, or placebo (PLC). Resistance exercise consisted of 4 sets of 10 repetitions of leg press and leg extension at 80 % 1RM.

Periexercise coingestion of branched-chain amino acids and carbohydrate in men does not preferentially augment resistance exercise-induced increases in phosphatidylinositol 3 kinase/protein kinase B-mammalian target of rapamycin pathway markers indicative of muscle protein synthesis.

The effects of a single bout of resistance exercise (RE) in conjunction with periexercise branched-chain amino acid (BCAA) and carbohydrate (CHO) ingestion on skeletal muscle signaling markers indicative of muscle protein synthesis were determined. It was hypothesized that CHO + BCAA would elicit a more profound effect on these signaling markers compared with CHO. Twenty-seven males were randomly assigned to CHO, CHO + BCAA, or placebo (PLC) groups.

[Structural conditions for regionalization in health care: typology of Regional Management Boards].

An explanation is required for the delay in implementing the regionalization strategy and the fragile nature of the combined decentralization and regionalization initiatives in Brazil. The article raises some hypotheses to clarify this intricate issue and reviews the structural conditioning factors of the regionalization process ongoing in the states. A national typology of the health care regions is prepared, differentiating them according to the degree of socio-economic development and the characteristics of the health care network and of the municipalities that form the Regional Management Boards (CGR), formally implanted by January 2010.

Alcohol consumption by aging adults in the United States: health benefits and detriments.

The most rapidly growing segment of the US population is that of older adults (> or =65 years). Trends of aging adults (those aged > or =50 years) show that fewer women than men consume alcohol, women consume less alcohol than men, and total alcohol intake decreases after retirement. A U- or J-shaped relationship between alcohol intake and mortality exists among middle-aged (age 45 to 65 years) and older adults.

[Knowledge and risk perception on HIV/AIDS by Brazilian population, 1998 and 2005].

Objective: To describe the level of knowledge and risk perception on HIV/AIDS of the Brazilian Population.

Methods: Data base from a national survey on sexual behavior and HIV/AIDS risk perception in the Brazilian population, in 1998 and 2005, were used. A synthetic indicator was used, composed by nine questions on the level of knowledge and risk perception on the forms of transmission of the virus and risk situations, according to population subgroups.

Alcohol consumption: the good, the bad, and the indifferent.

Dietary ethanol (alcohol) is the most widely consumed drug worldwide. High levels of mortality, morbidity, and social malaise are associated with abuse of alcohol, and increasing numbers of women and youth are abusing alcohol. However, strong epidemiological data demonstrate a U- or J-shaped relationship between volume of alcohol consumed and all-cause mortality or disease burden.

Accelerated hypertrophic chondrocyte kinetics in GDF-7 deficient murine tibial growth plates.

The Growth/Differentiation Factors (GDFs) are a subgroup of the Bone Morphogenetic Proteins (BMPs) well known for their role in joint formation and chondrogenesis. Mice deficient in one of these signaling molecules, GDF-5, have recently been shown to exhibit a decreased rate of endochondral bone growth in the proximal tibia due to a significantly longer hypertrophic phase duration. GDF-7 is a related family member, which exhibits a high degree of sequence identity with GDF-5.

Effects of calcium pyruvate supplementation during training on body composition, exercise capacity, and metabolic responses to exercise.

Objective: We evaluated the effects of calcium pyruvate supplementation during training on body composition and metabolic responses to exercise.

Methods: Twenty-three untrained females were matched and assigned to ingest in a double blind and randomized manner either 5 g of calcium pyruvate (PYR) or a placebo (PL) twice daily for 30 d while participating in a supervised exercise program. Prior to and following supplementation, subjects had body composition determined via hydrodensiometry; performed a maximal cardiopulmonary exercise test; and performed a 45-min walk test at 70% of pre-training VO2 max in which fasting pre- and post exercise blood samples determined.

[Knowledge and risk perception of HIV/AIDS: a profile of the Brazilian people in 1998].

This paper focuses on cognitive aspects related to HIV/AIDS by presenting distinct subgroups of the Brazilian population. Four subgroups were created according to their different levels of knowledge regarding HIV/AIDS and risk perception: subgroup 1 (no awareness and no risk perception); subgroup 2 (no awareness, with some risk perception); subgroup 3 (some awareness and no risk perception); and subgroup 4 (some awareness and some risk perception). The data come from the National Survey on Sexual Behavior and HIV/AIDS Risk Perception in the Brazilian Population, conducted by CEBRAP (the Brazilian Analysis and Planning Agency) together with the Ministry of Health, in 1998.

Effects of conjugated linoleic acid supplementation during resistance training on body composition, bone density, strength, and selected hematological markers.

Conjugated linoleic acids (CLA) are essential fatty acids that have been reported in animal studies to decrease catabolism, promote fat loss, increase bone density, enhance immunity, and serve as an antiatherogenic and anticarcinogenic agent. For this reason, CLA has been marketed as a supplement to promote weight loss and general health. CLA has also been heavily marketed to resistance-trained athletes as a supplement that may help lessen catabolism, decrease body fat, and promote greater gains in strength and muscle mass during training.