Retrospective study of the epidemiological risk and serological diagnosis of human babesiosis in Asturias, Northwestern Spain.

Background: Babesiosis is a globally growing tick-borne disease in humans. Severe babesiosis caused by Babesia divergens has been reported in two patients from Asturias (Northwestern Spain), suggesting an undetected risk for the disease. To analyze this risk, we retrospectively evaluated the seroprevalence of babesiosis in the Asturian population from 2015 through 2017, a period covering the intermediate years in which these two severe cases occurred.

The Biopsychosocial Puzzle of Painful Sex.

Genital pain associated with sex is a prevalent and distressing problem with a complex research and clinical profile. This article reviews the historical context of the "sexual pain disorders" and the circuitous trajectory that has led from the first mention of painful sex in ancient documents to the latest diagnostic category of genito-pelvic pain penetration disorder in the fifth edition of the as well as in other existing and proposed nomenclatures. Prominent etiologic research and emergent theoretical models are critically assessed, as is the latest treatment outcome research of note.

Determinants of depressive symptoms in Filipino senior citizens of the community-based ENGAGE study.

Objective: This study investigated the factors associated with depressive symptoms among community-dwelling Filipino senior citizens.

Methods: We conducted a cross-sectional study among 1021 Filipino senior citizens aged 60-91 years. We used multiple linear regression analysis to identify the factors independently associated with levels of depressive symptoms.

Sex differences in concordance rates between auditory event-related potentials and subjective sexual arousal.

Much research indicates men show a greater concordance between subjective and genital sexual arousal than do women. We investigated the relationship between subjective sexual arousal and brain activation in men and women. Subjective sexual arousal and auditory N1 and P3b ERP amplitudes were measured while 38 participants viewed erotic and non-erotic films.

Developments and trends in sex therapy.

Recent developments and trends in sex therapy are reviewed and assessed. Major trends identified are: (1) multidisciplinarity in the treatment of sexual problems, whereby psychological interventions are combined with medical and other types of treatment (e.g.

Early dyspareunia experience in young women: confusion, consequences, and help-seeking barriers.

Introduction: Recurrent painful intercourse or dyspareunia is a highly prevalent health problem associated with impairments in sexual function and psychosocial well-being. Despite its particularly high prevalence in young women, little is known about how young women experience the onset of dyspareunia and how they attempt to manage or address the problem.

Aims: To explore the subjective experience of early dyspareunia symptoms in young women so as to model its cognitive, emotional, behavioral, and help-seeking trajectory.

Priorities for endometriosis research: a proposed focus on deep dyspareunia.

Women with endometriosis have a substantial increase in risk of deep dyspareunia with respect to the general female population of corresponding age. This symptom has personal and intimate implications, including unfavorable emotional impact in partners. Deep dyspareunia caused by endometriosis can be viewed as an originally visceral type of pain secondary to chronic inflammation (nociception) but with several superimposed components, including hyperalgesia, abnormal cortical perception, and psychological factors.

Why did passion wane? A qualitative study of married women's attributions for declines in sexual desire.

The high prevalence of sexual desire complaints in women have led a number of researchers and theorists to argue for a reconceptualization of female sexual desire that deemphasizes the drive model and places more focus on relational factors. Lacking in this effort has been a critical mass of qualitative research that asks women to report on their causal attributions for low desire. In this study, the authors conducted open-ended interviews with 19 married women who had lost desire in their marriage and asked what causal attributions they made for their loss of sexual desire and what barriers they perceived to be blocking its reinstatement.

Elucidating women's (hetero)sexual desire: definitional challenges and content expansion.

The literature on women's sexual desire is reviewed with an emphasis on definitional challenges, an assessment of the empirical basis for the distinction between spontaneous and responsive desire, a reconsideration of the extent to which women's sexual desire is relational in nature, and an exploration of the incentive value of sex for women as a factor partially independent from the experience of sexual desire. Nine recommendations are made regarding research and diagnostic directions. The article concludes with an appeal for the inclusion of eroticism in research and clinical work on sexual desire.

Visual attention to erotic images in women reporting pain with intercourse.

The coupling of sex and pain creates an interesting theoretical conundrum of clinical significance: Are women with dyspareunia distracted from sexual stimuli, or are they hypervigilant to sexual stimuli because these stimuli elicit thoughts and expectations of pain? This study measured attention to sexual stimuli in women reporting persistent pain with intercourse, women reporting low sexual desire, and women reporting no sexual problems. Participants viewed a series of erotic images, each containing an object intended to distract from the erotic scene regions, while an eye tracker recorded their eye movements. Women with pain looked for shorter periods of time and fewer times at the sexual scene region than did both women with low sexual desire (p = .

The future of sex therapy: specialization or marginalization?

Sex therapy's claims to specialization may be exaggerated and ultimately damaging to the integrated treatment of sexual dysfunction. In fact, sex therapy does not have a unified underlying theory, a unique set of practices, or an empirically demonstrated efficacious treatment outcome. Paradoxically, the practice of sex therapy has gained widespread professional and popular acceptance since the publication in 1970 of Human Sexual Inadequacy by Masters and Johnson.

Misremembering pain: memory bias for pain words in women reporting sexual pain.

Introduction: The debate over the classification of dyspareunia as a sexual dysfunction or as a pain disorder raises the question of the comparative cognitive salience of sex and/or pain in the experience of women who report pain with intercourse. Refinements in our understanding of cognitive factors in the experience of pain with intercourse may be important in the development of effective treatments.

Aim: This study aimed to compare the cognitive salience of sex and pain word stimuli in women reporting pain with intercourse and in a control group of women without sexual dysfunction.

Negative affect and somatically focused anxiety in young women reporting pain with intercourse.

After a long history of privileging psychosexual etiological factors over pain and physiological processes, dyspareunia has enjoyed 1 decade of pointed research focused on the presenting problem of pain. Although it is generally acknowledged that certain affective and cognitive styles may play a role in an individual's experience of pain in general, investigations into these questions specifically as they pertain to pain that occurs during sex are relatively scarce. To add to this growing body of knowledge, 759 women aged 18 to 29 completed questionnaires about current sexual functioning, gynecologic history, expectations about intercourse, and various personality and health-related anxiety measures.

Acculturation and sexuality: investigating gender differences in erotic plasticity.

The contention that women are more erotically plastic than men is supported by a significant body of data, from which it has been inferred (Baumeister, 2000) that female sexuality may be more flexible and more heavily influenced by contextual factors than that of men. As a direct test of erotic plasticity, the present study investigated the extent to which acculturation was associated differentially (as would be predicted by the theory of greater female erotic plasticity) with the sexual attitudes and experiences of 111 college men and 167 college women. For sexual attitudes, main effects were found for gender, acculturation level, and ethnicity.

Subtalar joint kinematic correlations with footprint arch index in race walkers.

Aim: The aim of the paper was to analyze the relationship between footprint arch index and subtalar joint movement in race walkers.

Methods: Thirteen young, highly skilled race walkers volunteered to participate. We obtained dominant-foot footprints in a bipedal stance.

Annexin A2 localizes to the basal epithelial layer and is down-regulated in dysplasia and head and neck squamous cell carcinoma.

Annexin A2 is a highly expressed gene with important roles in cell membrane physiology and is frequently dysregulated in cancer. The objective of this study was to determine the pattern of expression and prognostic significance of annexin A2 protein in head and neck squamous cell carcinoma. We assessed both quantitative changes and qualitative distribution of annexin A2 mRNA and protein expression in normal and diseased tissues by immunohistochemistry, immunofluorescence and in situ hybridization.

Ankle taping does not impair performance in jump or balance tests.

This study aimed to investigate the influence of prophylactic ankle taping on two balance tests (static and dynamic balance) and one jump test, in the push off and the landing phase. Fifteen active young subjects (age: 21.0 ± 4.

Psychosexual characteristics of vestibulodynia couples: partner solicitousness and hostility are associated with pain.

Introduction: Provoked vestibulodynia is a prevalent yet misunderstood women's sexual health issue. In particular, data concerning relationship characteristics and psychosexual functioning of partners of these women are scarce. Moreover, no research to date has examined the role of the partner in vestibulodynia.

Remembering the pain: accuracy of pain recall in endometriosis.

Endometriosis diagnosis and treatment planning are guided primarily by retrospective pain recall, despite the facts that (1) there is only a tenuous relationship between pain reports and physical pathology, and (2) the accuracy of pain recall has never been assessed in this population. The current study investigated the accuracy of endometriotic pain recall for pain experienced over a 30-day period, as well as potential psychological mediators of pain recall accuracy, including psychological wellbeing, distress specific to infertility, passive and active coping, and pain present at time of recall in 100 women with endometriosis. Findings indicated that women were relatively accurate in their recall of pain.

Sex differences in visual attention to erotic and non-erotic stimuli.

It has been suggested that sex differences in the processing of erotic material (e.g., memory, genital arousal, brain activation patterns) may also be reflected by differential attention to visual cues in erotic material.

Kinematics of ankle taping after a training session.

This study aimed to test the effectiveness of ankle taping on the limitation of forced supination during a change of direction, as well as the losses of effectiveness after a 30-minute training session. Fifteen young men with no ankle injury volunteered for the study. The static and dynamic ranges of movement (ROM) were measured before and after a training session.

Detection of differential viewing patterns to erotic and non-erotic stimuli using eye-tracking methodology.

As a first step in the investigation of the role of visual attention in the processing of erotic stimuli, eye-tracking methodology was employed to measure eye movements during erotic scene presentation. Because eye-tracking is a novel methodology in sexuality research, we attempted to determine whether the eye-tracker could detect differences (should they exist) in visual attention to erotic and non-erotic scenes. A total of 20 men and 20 women were presented with a series of erotic and non-erotic images and tracked their eye movements during image presentation.

Gender differences in the content of cognitive distraction during sex.

This study compared 220 college men and 237 college women on two types of self-reported cognitive distraction during sex, performance- and appearance-based. Affect, psychological distress, sexual knowledge, attitudes, fantasies, experiences, body image, satisfaction, and sexual function were assessed with the Derogatis Sexual Functioning Inventory and the Sexual History Form to determine associations with distraction. Between-gender analyses revealed that women reported higher levels of overall and appearance-based distraction than did men, but similar levels of performance-based distraction.

Older immigrant Tamil women and their doctors: attitudes toward breast cancer screening.

Cultural beliefs have been hypothesized to be powerful barriers to breast cancer screening in minority women and physician recommendation is consistently reported to be the strongest incentive. This study investigated (1) beliefs regarding breast cancer and (2) the perception of barriers to mammography and clinical breast examination in a sample of immigrant Tamil women, as well as in a sample of primary care physicians. Three focus groups, each consisting of 10 immigrant Tamil women from Sri Lanka aged 50 years or over were conducted and 52 primary care physicians who serve this population completed mailed surveys.