Coping strategies: gender differences and development throughout life span.

Development during life-span implies to cope with stressful events, and this coping may be done with several strategies. It could be useful to know if these coping strategies differ as a consequence of personal characteristics. This work uses the Coping with Stress Questionnaire with this aim using a sample of 400 participants.

Physiotherapy intervention for preventing the respiratory muscle deterioration in institutionalized older women with functional impairment.

Introduction: In elderly seniors (>80 years), respiratory function may be compromised when, in addition to the presence of comorbidity and loss of mobility, there is also reduced respiratory muscle (RM) strength. The literature has shown that RM training could be an effective method to improve RM function and prevent clinical deterioration, particularly in population with RM weakness. The main purpose of this paper was to assess the effectiveness of RM training on the respiratory muscle strength and endurance of institutionalized elderly women with functional impairment.

Urethral exudates of men with Neisseria gonorrhoeae infections select a restricted lipooligosaccharide phenotype during transmission.

Neisseria gonorrhoeae lipooligosaccharides (LOSs) induce immunoglobulin G that protects men from experimental infection. This raises the possibility that an LOS vaccine might prevent gonorrhea. Gonococci make different LOS molecules, depending on whether 3 genes, lgtA, lgtC, and lgtD, are in frame (IF) or out of frame (OOF).

How we compensate for memory loss in old age: adapting and validating the Memory Compensation Questionnaire (MCQ) for Spanish populations.

Compensating entails using external strategies and mechanisms that help overcome or alleviate the decreasing memory function that comes with age. This study aims to adapt and validate the MCQ in the elderly Spanish population. A total of 403 elderly people aged between 65 and 92 in the city of Valencia (Spain) completed the questionnaire for the validation process.

PCR offers no advantage over culture for microbiologic diagnosis in cellulitis.

Purpose: Most cases of cellulitis are traditionally attributed to β-hemolytic Streptococcus and Staphylococcus species, although in most cases, no organism is identified. Development of PCR using the conserved bacterial 16 S rRNA DNA permits identification of bacteria independent of conventional culture approaches and prior use of antibiotics.

Methods: We used PCR-based techniques to identify cellulitis etiology using aspirate samples from affected skin.

Resilience and coping as predictors of general well-being in the elderly: a structural equation modeling approach.

Objectives: The aims of this article are: (a) to test for the validity of the three constructs involved in the structural model; (b) to test for the effects of both coping strategies and resilient coping on well-being in a sample of elderly, by means of a structural model with latent variables; (c) to empirically study whether a brief scale of resilient coping could predict well-being over and above that predicted by the coping resources.

Methods: The research is a survey design. The sample consisted of 225 non-institutionalized elderly people living in the city of Valencia (Spain).

Recognition memory deficits in mild cognitive impairment.

There is no agreement on the pattern of recognition memory deficits characteristic of patients diagnosed with mild cognitive impairment (MCI). Whereas lower performance in recollection is the hallmark of MCI, there is a strong controversy about possible deficits in familiarity estimates when using recognition memory tasks. The aim of this research is to shed light on the pattern of responding in recollection and familiarity in MCI.

Chronology of metastasis in cutaneous melanoma: growth rate model.

In humans, it is not possible to obtain experimental evidence of when a cancer begins to metastasize. The purpose of this study was to estimate the time of onset of metastatic dissemination in cutaneous melanoma using a model based on its growth rate (GR). The critical time of onset of metastatic dissemination below which no cases of fatal melanomas were seen may be described with a potential function in which this time is inversely proportional to the GR.

The importance of a multifaceted approach to characterizing the microbial flora of chronic wounds.

Chronic wounds contain complex polymicrobial communities of sessile organisms that have been underappreciated because of limitations of standard culture techniques. The aim of this work was to combine recently developed next-generation investigative techniques to comprehensively describe the microbial characteristics of chronic wounds. Tissue samples were obtained from 15 patients with chronic wounds presenting to the Johns Hopkins Wound Center.

Emergence of quinolone resistance and cephalosporin MIC creep in Neisseria gonorrhoeae isolates from a cohort of young men in Kisumu, Kenya, 2002 to 2009.

We evaluated antimicrobial resistance in Neisseria gonorrhoeae isolated from men enrolled in a randomized trial of male circumcision to prevent HIV. Urethral specimens from men with discharge were cultured for N. gonorrhoeae.

A case control study of anovaginal distance and bacterial vaginosis.

We aimed to test the hypothesis that a short anovaginal distance may increase the risk of bacterial vaginosis (BV) due to faecal contamination and disruption of the vaginal microbiota. Women attending two sexually transmitted infection (STI) clinics in Baltimore, Maryland, USA, who complained of a vaginal discharge were asked to participate in a study to measure mucosal immune responses. In this pilot study of all enrolled women, a small plastic ruler was used to measure the anatomic distance from the posterior fourchette to the anus with the participant in the lithotomy position.

Loss of RhoA in neural progenitor cells causes the disruption of adherens junctions and hyperproliferation.

The organization of neural progenitors in the developing mammalian neuroepithelium is marked by cadherin-based adherens junctions. Whereas RhoA, a founding member of the small Rho GTPase family, has been shown to play important roles in epithelial adherens junctions, its physiological roles in neural development remain uncertain due to the lack of specific loss-of-function studies. Here, we show that RhoA protein accumulates at adherens junctions in the developing mouse brain and colocalizes to the cadherin-catenin complex.

RhoA GTPase is dispensable for actomyosin regulation but is essential for mitosis in primary mouse embryonic fibroblasts.

RhoA, the founding member of mammalian Rho GTPase family, is thought to be essential for actomyosin regulation. To date, the physiologic function of RhoA in mammalian cell regulation has yet to be determined genetically. Here we have created RhoA conditional knock-out mice.

Medication profiles of patients in the University of Puerto Rico inflammatory bowel disease registry.

Objective: The prevalence of inflammatory bowel disease [IBD, Crohn's disease (CD) and ulcerative colitis (UC)] in Puerto Rico has increased significantly in recent years. Experience with these diseases outside of a referral center is limited. A registry for IBD, created by the University of Puerto Rico (UPR) Center for IBD, has collected data from subjects all over the island for 15 years.

Manganese superoxide dismutase (Sod2) and redox-control of signaling events that drive metastasis.

Manganese superoxide dismutase (Sod2) has emerged as a key enzyme with a dual role in tumorigenic progression. Early studies were primarily directed at defining the tumor suppressive function of Sod2 based on its low level expression in many tumor types. It is now commonly held that loss of Sod2 expression is likely an early event in tumor progression allowing for further propagation of the tumorigenic phenotype resulting from steady state increases in free radical production.

Procalcitonin as a marker for the detection of bacteremia and sepsis in the emergency department.

Rapid diagnosis of bloodstream infections (BSIs) in the emergency department (ED) is challenging, with turnaround times exceeding the timeline for rapid diagnosis. We studied the usefulness of procalcitonin as a marker of BSI in 367 adults admitted to our ED with symptoms of systemic infection. Serum samples obtained at the same time as blood cultures were available from 295 patients.

Signaling role of Cdc42 in regulating mammalian physiology.

Cdc42 is a member of the Rho GTPase family of intracellular molecular switches regulating multiple signaling pathways involved in actomyosin organization and cell proliferation. Knowledge of its signaling function in mammalian cells came mostly from studies using the dominant-negative or constitutively active mutant overexpression approach in the past 2 decades. Such an approach imposes a number of experimental limitations related to specificity, dosage, and/or clonal variability.

Real-time PCR assays compared to culture-based approaches for identification of aerobic bacteria in chronic wounds.

Chronic wounds cause substantial morbidity and disability. Infection in chronic wounds is clinically defined by routine culture methods that can take several days to obtain a final result, and may not fully describe the community of organisms or biome within these wounds. Molecular diagnostic approaches offer promise for a more rapid and complete assessment.

One-component bimetallic aluminium(salen)-based catalysts for cyclic carbonate synthesis and their immobilization.

The development of one-component, bimetallic μ-oxoaluminium(salen) complexes as highly active catalysts for the synthesis of cyclic carbonates from terminal epoxides is described. The resulting homogeneous catalysts are used in batch reactions at room temperature and one atmosphere pressure. The catalysts have also been immobilized onto various support materials and used in either batch reactions or gas-phase flow reactions with ethylene and propylene oxides.

Grandparent-grandchild relationships from the children's perspective: shared activities and socialization styles.

The objective of this study is to describe the relationships between grandchildren and their favourite grandparents, by studying the socialization styles used by latter and the shared activities undertaken. The participants were 360 children between 10 and 12 years old, who completed the grandparent-grandchild relationship questionnaire of Rico, Serra and Viguer (2001) and the socialization questionnaire of Rey and Ruiz (1990). The results demonstrate the importance of gender and family line in the selection of the favourite grandparent, differences being shown in the types of shared activities and in socialization styles.