Exploration of inter-jurisdictional TB programming and mobility in a Canadian First Nation community.

Background: Colonially imposed jurisdictional boundaries that have little meaning to Indigenous peoples in Canada may confound tuberculosis (TB) prevention and care activities. This study explores how inter-jurisdictional mobility and the current accommodation of mobility through policies and programming sustain a regional TB epidemic in northwestern Saskatchewan, and northeastern Alberta.

Methods: A qualitative instrumental case study was performed using a community based participatory approach.

Stigma Reduction Interventions of Dementia: A Scoping Review.

Despite its global importance and the recognition of dementia as an international public health priority, interventions to reduce stigma of dementia are a relatively new and emerging field. The purpose of this review was to synthesize the existing literature and identify key components of interventions to reduce stigma of dementia. We followed Arksey and O'Malley's scoping review process to examine peer-reviewed literature of interventions to reduce dementia-related stigma.

Addressing the needs of rural and remote people in a national dementia strategy for Canada.

A number of organizations such as the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences have identified the growing need for a National Dementia Strategy in Canada to improve the quality of life for people with dementia. This commentary highlights the necessity of addressing stigma, social inclusion, and supports for people affected by dementia, specifically those living in rural and remote communities. Drawing on Saskatchewan-based examples, we discuss the importance of recognizing the unique needs of rural and remote communities in developing a National Dementia Strategy for Canada.

The Contribution of Project Environmental Assessment to Assessing and Managing Cumulative Effects: Individually and Collectively Insignificant?

This paper explores the opportunities and constraints to project-based environmental assessment as a means to support the assessment and management of cumulative environmental effects. A case study of the hydroelectric sector is used to determine whether sufficient information is available over time through project-by-project assessments to support an adequate understanding of cumulative change. Results show inconsistency from one project to the next in terms of the components and indicators assessed, limited transfer of baseline information between project assessments over time, and the same issues and concerns being raised by review panels-even though the projects reviewed are operating in the same watershed and operated by the same proponent.

Facet Theory and the Mapping Sentence As Hermeneutically Consistent Structured Meta-Ontology and Structured Meta-Mereology.

When behavior is interpreted in a reliable manner (i.e., robustly across different situations and times) its explained meaning may be seen to possess hermeneutic consistency.

Treaties and tuberculosis: First Nations people in late 19th-century western Canada, a political and economic transformation.

This paper examines the explosion of tuberculosis infections among First Nations communities of western Canada during the critical period from Canada's acquisition of the Northwest to the early 1880s. In the early 1870s, the disease was relatively rare among the indigenous population of the plains. Within a few years, the situation changed dramatically.

From past to present: understanding First Nations health patterns in a historical context.

By many measures of health, Canada's First Nations compare very poorly to the non-Native population as a whole. The need to explain, and to correct, this disparity has led public health researchers to consider a wide variety of community characteristics. One area that is as yet under-utilized, but may yield important insights into the complex question of First Nations health, is history.

Radio-frequency ablation of large, nonresectable hepatic tumors.

Patients with nonresectable hepatic metastases who are not treated survive an average of 6 months. We report our experience with radio-frequency ablation (RFA) of nonresectable hepatic tumors 4 cm or greater in size. A retrospective chart review of all patients undergoing RFA of hepatic tumors 4 cm or greater from October 1, 1999, through August 31, 2002, was performed.

Averting disaster: the Hudson's Bay Company and smallpox in western Canada during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.

During the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries the Hudson's Bay Company served as a de facto public health agency across western Canada. Among its biggest challenges was combating the smallpox epidemics that periodically threatened the Aboriginal people of the region. Initially, the Company's employees turned to quarantine over variolation in order to prevent the spread of the disease to Hudson Bay in the summer of 1782.

Serum proteomic patterns for detection of prostate cancer.

Pathologic states within the prostate may be reflected by changes in serum proteomic patterns. To test this hypothesis, we analyzed serum proteomic mass spectra with a bioinformatics tool to reveal the most fit pattern that discriminated the training set of sera of men with a histopathologic diagnosis of prostate cancer (serum prostate-specific antigen [PSA] > or =4 ng/mL) from those men without prostate cancer (serum PSA level <1 ng/mL). Mass spectra of blinded sera (N = 266) from a test set derived from men with prostate cancer or men without prostate cancer were matched against the discriminating pattern revealed by the training set.