Publications by authors named "Michael Callens"

Short-term exposure to air pollution has pro-thrombotic effects and triggers thrombo-embolic events such as myocardial infarction or stroke in adults. This study evaluates the association between short-term variation in air pollution and treatments for acute thrombo-embolic events among the whole Belgian population. In a bidirectional time-stratified case-crossover design, we included 227,861 events treated with endovascular intervention and 74,942 with antithrombotic enzymes that were reimbursed by the Belgian Social Security between January 1st, 2009 and December 31st, 2013.

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Background: Most of the existing studies demonstrating the relationships between health literacy and health service use have been conducted outside Europe and cannot be generalised to European healthcare systems. Moreover, the majority of studies measure healthcare use via self-reports. This study investigated whether health literacy is related to the use of health services measured objectively via patient records in a European country.

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Vaccination can place selective pressures on viral populations, leading to changes in the distribution of strains as viruses evolve to escape immunity from the vaccine. Vaccine-driven strain replacement is a major concern after nationwide rotavirus vaccine introductions. However, the distribution of the predominant rotavirus genotypes varies from year to year in the absence of vaccination, making it difficult to determine what changes can be attributed to the vaccines.

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Emotional competence (EC; also called "emotional intelligence"), which refers to individual differences in the identification, understanding, expression, regulation, and use of one's emotions and those of others, has been found to be an important predictor of individuals' adaptation to their environment. Higher EC is associated with greater happiness, better mental health, more satisfying social and marital relationships, and greater occupational success. Whereas a considerable amount of research has documented the significance of EC, 1 domain has been crucially under investigated: the relationship between EC and physical health.

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Background: Haemophilia is a rare hereditary haemorrhagic disease that requires regular intravenous injections of clotting factor (CF) concentrates. This study sought to estimate the health and economic burden of haemophilia in Belgium. This is the first study of its type to be conducted, and reflects the Belgian authorities' growing interest for haemophilia as part of their priority planning for rare and chronic diseases.

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