The change of stretched penile length and anthropometric data in Korean children aged 0-14 years: Comparative study of last 25 years

There has been a great improvement in height and weight of Korean children owing to economic development over the last 25 years. This study aimed to evaluate the penile length of Korean children today and to compare it with a previous Korean study reported in 1987. The cross-sectional study was conducted with 909 Korean boys aged 0-14 years who had been brought to outpatient clinics of five tertiary hospitals (Busan, Ulsan, and Changwon) between September 2013 and May 2015. The stretched penile length (SPL) was measured and the testicular size was measured using orchidometry (mL). Student's t-test or Mann-Whitney U test was used to compare the result of our study and the study reported in 1987. SPL of Korean children gradually increased from 4.1 ?? 0.8 cm at 0-1 year old to 9.6 ?? 3.0 cm at 13-14 years old, the most rapidly during the age of 13. While body weight and testicular size significantly increased from 1987 in most of age groups, there were no significant changes in SPL although there was in some age groups. Height decreased in the infants < 1 year old and increased in the children > 6 years old. With the great economic development over the last quarter century in Korea, height, body weight, and testicular size of children significantly increased but there was no significant change in SPL except penile growth pattern.ope

The prevalence of stunting, overweight and obesity, and metabolic disease risk in rural South African children.

BACKGROUND: Low- to middle-income countries are undergoing a health transition with non-communicable diseases contributing substantially to disease burden, despite persistence of undernutrition and infectious diseases. This study aimed to investigate the prevalence and patterns of stunting and overweight/obesity, and hence risk for metabolic disease, in a group of children and adolescents in rural South Africa. METHODS: A cross-sectional growth survey was conducted involving 3511 children and adolescents 1-20 years, selected through stratified random sampling from a previously enumerated population living in Agincourt sub-district, Mpumalanga Province, South Africa. Anthropometric measurements including height, weight and waist circumference were taken using standard procedures. Tanner pubertal assessment was conducted among adolescents 9-20 years. Growth z-scores were generated using 2006 WHO standards for children up to five years and 1977 NCHS/WHO reference for older children. Overweight and obesity for those or = 25 and > or = 30 kg/m2 for overweight and obesity respectively were used for those > or = 18 years. Waist circumference cut-offs of > or = 94 cm for males and > or = 80 cm for females and waist-to-height ratio of 0.5 for both sexes were used to determine metabolic disease risk in adolescents. RESULTS: About one in five children aged 1-4 years was stunted; one in three of those aged one year. Concurrently, the prevalence of combined overweight and obesity, almost non-existent in boys, was substantial among adolescent girls, increasing with age and reaching approximately 20-25% in late adolescence. Central obesity was prevalent among adolescent girls, increasing with sexual maturation and reaching a peak of 35% at Tanner Stage 5, indicating increased risk for metabolic disease. CONCLUSIONS: The study highlights that in transitional societies, early stunting and adolescent obesity may co-exist in the same socio-geographic population. It is likely that this profile relates to changes in nutrition and diet, but variation in factors such as infectious disease burden and physical activity patterns, as well as social influences, need to be investigated. As obesity and adult short stature are risk factors for metabolic syndrome and Type 2 diabetes, this combination of early stunting and adolescent obesity may be an explosive combination

Gene Expression in Rat Hearts Following Oral Administration of a Single Hepatotoxic Dose of Acetaminophen

∙ The authors have no financial conflicts of interest. © Copyright: Yonsei University College of Medicine 2012 This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial Licens

Laboratory-based ergometry for swimmers: a narrative review

INTRODUCTION: First widely available dry-land training machines for swimmers were introduced about 40 years ago. They were designed so that swimmers could perform resistance exercise whilst more-closely replicating the movements of swimming, than when using other gymnasium-based resistance training machines. This narrative review categorises and summarises what has been shown by the studies that have utilised laboratory-based ergometry for swimmers. EVIDENCE ACQUISITION: A systematic search was conducted in PubMed, Web of Science, ScienceDirect and Scopus (1970-2018) and relevant publications were included. Publications were grouped into 4 main areas of research: (i) physiological responses to exercise, (ii) functional evaluation of swimmers, (iii) monitoring of training, and (iv) muscular work output of swimmers. EVIDENCE SYNTHESIS: Significant differences were showed between swim bench exercise and real swimming, especially in regard to the muscles involved. The difficulties of accurate reproduction of the movements and coordinated dynamic actions of swimming have not been overcome. Nevertheless, the literature shows that the use of these devices has provided a valuablecontribution to swimming physiology, while overcoming difficulties presented by attempting to make physiological measurements in the water. CONCLUSIONS: In spite of its limitations, laboratory-based ergometry has allowed a valuable contribution to the understanding of the physiology, effects of training and efficiency of swimming

A randomised controlled trial of a community-based healthy lifestyle program for overweight and obese adolescents: the Loozit® study protocol

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>There is a need to develop sustainable and clinically effective weight management interventions that are suitable for delivery in community settings where the vast majority of overweight and obese adolescents should be treated. This study aims to evaluate the effect of additional therapeutic contact as an adjunct to the Loozit^®group program – a community-based, lifestyle intervention for overweight and lower grade obesity in adolescents. The additional therapeutic contact is provided via telephone coaching and either mobile phone Short Message Service or electronic mail, or both.</p> <p>Methods and design</p> <p>The study design is a two-arm randomised controlled trial that aims to recruit 168 overweight and obese 13–16 year olds (Body Mass Index z-score 1.0 to 2.5) in Sydney, Australia. Adolescents with secondary causes of obesity or significant medical illness are excluded. Participants are recruited via schools, media coverage, health professionals and several community organisations. Study arm one receives the Loozit^®group weight management program (G). Study arm two receives the same Loozit^®group weight management program plus additional therapeutic contact (G+ATC). The 'G' intervention consists of two phases. Phase 1 involves seven weekly group sessions held separately for adolescents and their parents. This is followed by phase 2 that involves a further seven group sessions held regularly, for adolescents only, until two years follow-up. Additional therapeutic contact is provided to adolescents in the 'G+ATC' study arm approximately once per fortnight during phase 2 only. Outcome measurements are assessed at 2, 12 and 24 months post-baseline and include: BMI z-score, waist z-score, metabolic profile indicators, physical activity, sedentary behaviour, eating patterns, and psychosocial well-being.</p> <p>Discussion</p> <p>The Loozit^®study is the first randomised controlled trial of a community-based adolescent weight management intervention to incorporate additional therapeutic contact via a combination of telephone coaching, mobile phone Short Message Service, and electronic mail. If shown to be successful, the Loozit^®group weight management program with additional therapeutic contact has the potential to be readily translatable to a range of health care settings.</p> <p>Trial registration</p> <p>The protocol for this study is registered with the Australian Clinical Trials Registry (ACTRNO12606000175572).</p

Total smoking bans in psychiatric inpatient services: a survey of perceived benefits, barriers and support among staff

Background: The introduction of total smoking bans represents an important step in addressing the smoking and physical health of people with mental illness. Despite evidence indicating the importance of staff support in the successful implementation of smoking bans, limited research has examined levels of staff support prior to the implementation of a ban in psychiatric settings, or factors that are associated with such support. This study aimed to examine the views of psychiatric inpatient hospital staff regarding the perceived benefits of and barriers to implementation of a successful total smoking ban in mental health services. Secondly, to examine the level of support among clinical and non-clinical staff for a total smoking ban. Thirdly, to examine the association between the benefits and barriers perceived by clinicians and their support for a total smoking ban in their unit. Methods: Cross-sectional survey of both clinical and non-clinical staff in a large inpatient psychiatric hospital immediately prior to the implementation of a total smoking ban. Results: Of the 300 staff, 183 (61%) responded. Seventy-three (41%) of total respondents were clinical staff, and 110 (92%) were non-clinical staff. More than two-thirds of staff agreed that a smoking ban would improve their work environment and conditions, help staff to stop smoking and improve patients' physical health. The most prevalent clinician perceived barriers to a successful total smoking ban related to fear of patient aggression (89%) and patient non-compliance (72%). Two thirds (67%) of all staff indicated support for a total smoking ban in mental health facilities generally, and a majority (54%) of clinical staff expressed support for a ban within their unit. Clinical staff who believed a smoking ban would help patients to stop smoking were more likely to support a smoking ban in their unit. Conclusions: There is a clear need to more effectively communicate to staff the evidence that consistently applied smoking bans do not increase patient aggression. There is also a need to communicate the benefits of smoking bans in aiding the delivery of smoking cessation care, and the benefits of both smoking bans and such care in aiding patients to stop smoking

A characterization of Smyth complete quasi-metric spaces via Caristi's fixed point theorem

We obtain a quasi-metric generalization of Caristi's fixed point theorem for a kind of complete quasi-metric spaces. With the help of a suitable modification of its proof, we deduce a characterization of Smyth complete quasi-metric spaces which provides a quasi-metric generalization of the well-known characterization of metric completeness due to Kirk. Some illustrative examples are also given. As an application, we deduce a procedure which allows to easily show the existence of solution for the recurrence equation of certain algorithms.The authors are grateful to the reviewers for several suggestions which have allowed to improve the first version of the paper. This research is supported by the Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness of Spain, Grant MTM2012-37894-C02-01.Romaguera Bonilla, S.; Tirado Peláez, P. (2015). A characterization of Smyth complete quasi-metric spaces via Caristi's fixed point theorem. Fixed Point Theory and Applications. 2015:183. https://doi.org/10.1186/s13663-015-0431-1S2015:183Cobzaş, S: Functional Analysis in Asymmetric Normed Spaces. Springer, Basel (2013)Künzi, HPA: Nonsymmetric distances and their associated topologies: about the origins of basic ideas in the area of asymmetric topology. In: Aull, CE, Lowen, R (eds.) Handbook of the History of General Topology, vol. 3, pp. 853-968. Kluwer Academic, Dordrecht (2001)Reilly, IL, Subrhamanyam, PV, Vamanamurthy, MK: Cauchy sequences in quasi-pseudo-metric spaces. Monatshefte Math. 93, 127-140 (1982)Künzi, HPA, Schellekens, MP: On the Yoneda completion of a quasi-metric spaces. Theor. Comput. Sci. 278, 159-194 (2002)Romaguera, S, Valero, O: Domain theoretic characterisations of quasi-metric completeness in terms of formal balls. Math. Struct. Comput. Sci. 20, 453-472 (2010)Künzi, HPA: Nonsymmetric topology. In: Proc. Szekszárd Conf. Bolyai Society of Math. Studies, vol. 4, pp. 303-338 (1993)García-Raffi, LM, Romaguera, S, Schellekens, MP: Applications of the complexity space to the general probabilistic divide and conquer algorithms. J. Math. Anal. Appl. 348, 346-355 (2008)Stoltenberg, RA: Some properties of quasi-uniform spaces. Proc. Lond. Math. Soc. 17, 226-240 (1967)Caristi, J: Fixed point theorems for mappings satisfying inwardness conditions. Trans. Am. Math. Soc. 215, 241-251 (1976)Kirk, WA: Caristi’s fixed point theorem and metric convexity. Colloq. Math. 36, 81-86 (1976)Abdeljawad, T, Karapınar, E: Quasi-cone metric spaces and generalizations of Caristi Kirk’s theorem. Fixed Point Theory Appl. 2009, Article ID 574387 (2009)Acar, O, Altun, I: Some generalizations of Caristi type fixed point theorem on partial metric spaces. Filomat 26(4), 833-837 (2012)Acar, O, Altun, I, Romaguera, S: Caristi’s type mappings on complete partial metric spaces. Fixed Point Theory 14, 3-10 (2013)Aydi, H, Karapınar, E, Kumam, P: A note on ‘Modified proof of Caristi’s fixed point theorem on partial metric spaces, Journal of Inequalities and Applications 2013, 2013:210’. J. Inequal. Appl. 2013, 355 (2013)Cobzaş, S: Completeness in quasi-metric spaces and Ekeland variational principle. Topol. Appl. 158, 1073-1084 (2011)Hadžić, O, Pap, E: Fixed Point Theory in Probabilistic Metric Spaces. Kluwer Academic, Dordrecht (2001)Karapınar, E: Generalizations of Caristi Kirk’s theorem on partial metric spaces. Fixed Point Theory Appl. 2011, 4 (2011)Romaguera, S: A Kirk type characterization of completeness for partial metric spaces. Fixed Point Theory Appl. 2010, Article ID 493298 (2010)Park, S: On generalizations of the Ekeland-type variational principles. Nonlinear Anal. TMA 39, 881-889 (2000)Du, W-S, Karapınar, E: A note on Caristi type cyclic maps: related results and applications. Fixed Point Theory Appl. 2013, 344 (2013)Ali-Akbari, M, Honari, B, Pourmahdian, M, Rezaii, MM: The space of formal balls and models of quasi-metric spaces. Math. Struct. Comput. Sci. 19, 337-355 (2009)Romaguera, S, Schellekens, M: Quasi-metric properties of complexity spaces. Topol. Appl. 98, 311-322 (1999)Brøndsted, A: On a lemma of Bishop and Phelps. Pac. J. Math. 55, 335-341 (1974)Brøndsted, A: Fixed points and partial order. Proc. Am. Math. Soc. 60, 365-366 (1976)Smyth, MB: Quasi-uniformities: reconciling domains with metric spaces. In: Main, M, Melton, A, Mislove, M, Schmidt, D (eds.) Mathematical Foundations of Programming Language Semantics, 3rd Workshop, Tulane, 1987. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol. 298, pp. 236-253. Springer, Berlin (1988)Cull, P, Flahive, M, Robson, R: Difference Equations: From Rabbits to Chaos. Springer, New York (2005)Schellekens, M: The Smyth completion: a common foundation for denotational semantics and complexity analysis. Electron. Notes Theor. Comput. Sci. 1, 535-556 (1995)García-Raffi, LM, Romaguera, S, Sánchez-Pérez, EA: Sequence spaces and asymmetric norms in the theory of computational complexity. Math. Comput. Model. 49, 1852-1868 (2009)Rodríguez-López, J, Schellekens, MP, Valero, O: An extension of the dual complexity space and an application to computer science. Topol. Appl. 156, 3052-3061 (2009)Romaguera, S, Schellekens, MP, Valero, O: The complexity space of partial functions: a connection between complexity analysis and denotational semantics. Int. J. Comput. Math. 88, 1819-1829 (2011