Sociodemographic gradients in breast and cervical cancer screening in Korea: the Korean National Cancer Screening Survey (KNCSS) 2005-2009

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Cancer screening rates in Korea for five cancer types have increased steadily since 2002. With regard to the life-time cancer screening rates in 2009 according to cancer sites, the second highest was breast cancer (78.1%) and the third highest was cervical cancer (76.1%). Despite overall increases in the screening rate, disparities in breast and cervical cancer screening, based on sociodemographic characteristics, still exist.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Data from 4,139 women aged 40 to74 years from the 2005 to 2009 Korea National Cancer Screening Survey were used to analyze the relationship between sociodemographic characteristics and receiving mammograms and Pap smears. The main outcome measures were ever having had a mammogram and ever having had a Pap smear. Using these items of information, we classified women into those who had had both types of screening, only one screening type, and neither screening type. We used logistic regression to investigate relationships between screening history and sociodemographic characteristics of the women.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Being married, having a higher education, a rural residence, and private health insurance were significantly associated with higher rates of breast and cervical cancer screening after adjusting for age and sociodemographic factors. Household income was not significantly associated with mammograms or Pap smears after adjusting for age and sociodemographic factors.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Disparities in breast and cervical cancer screening associated with low sociodemographic status persist in Korea.</p

26S Proteasome Activity Is Down-Regulated in Lung Cancer Stem-Like Cells Propagated In Vitro

Cancer stem cells (CSCs) are a small subset of cancer cells capable of self-renewal and tumor maintenance. Eradicating cancer stem cells, the root of tumor origin and recurrence, has emerged as one promising approach to improve lung cancer survival. Cancer stem cells are reported to reside in the side population (SP) of cultured lung cancer cells. We report here the coexistence of a distinct population of non-SP (NSP) cells that have equivalent self-renewal capacity compared to SP cells in a lung tumor sphere assay. Compared with the corresponding cells in monolayer cultures, lung tumor spheres, formed from human non-small cell lung carcinoma cell lines A549 or H1299, showed marked morphologic differences and increased expression of the stem cell markers CD133 and OCT3/4. Lung tumor spheres also exhibited increased tumorigenic potential as only 10,000 lung tumor sphere cells were required to produce xenografts tumors in nude mice, whereas the same number of monolayer cells failed to induce tumors. We also demonstrate that lung tumor spheres showed decreased 26S proteasome activity compared to monolayer. By using the ZsGreen–cODC (C-terminal sequence that directs degradation of Ornithine Decarboxylase) reporter assay in NSCLC cell lines, only less than 1% monolayer cultures were ZsGreen positive indicating low 26S proteasome, whereas lung tumor sphere showed increased numbers of ZsGreen-positive cells, suggesting the enrichment of CSCs in sphere cultures

Heart Rate Variability Characteristics in Sedentary Postmenopausal Women Following Six Months of Exercise Training: The DREW Study

Article on heart rate variability characteristics in sedentary postmenopausal women following six months of exercise training

Interactive Voice Response and web-based questionnaires for population-based infectious disease reporting

International audienceThe authors aimed to evaluate the web and an Interactive Voice Response (IVR) phone service as vehicles in population-based infectious disease surveillance. Fourteen thousand subjects were randomly selected from the Swedish population register and asked to prospectively report all respiratory tract infections, including Influenza-like Illness (ILI--clinical symptoms indicative of influenza but no laboratory confirmation), immediately as they occurred during a 36-week period starting October 2007. Participants were classified as belonging to the web or IVR group based on their choice of technology for initial registration. In all, 1,297 individuals registered via IVR while 2,044 chose the web. The latter were more often young and well-educated than those registered via IVR. Overall, 52% of the participants reported at least one infection episode. The risk of an infectious disease report was 14% (95% CI: 6, 22%) higher in the web group than in the IVR group. For ILI the excess was 27% (95% CI: 11, 47%). After adjustments for socio-demographic factors, statistically non-significant excesses of 1 and 8% remained, indicating trivial differences potentially attributable to the two reporting techniques. With attention to confounding, it should be possible to combine the web and IVR for simple reporting of infectious disease symptoms

Social Relationships and Mortality Risk: A Meta-analytic Review

In a meta-analysis, Julianne Holt-Lunstad and colleagues find that individuals' social relationships have as much influence on mortality risk as other well-established risk factors for mortality, such as smoking

Is occupation a good predictor of self-rated health in China?

China's rapidly changing economic landscape has led to widening social inequalities. Occupational status in terms of occupational type and prestige may reflect these socio-structural shifts of social position and be more predictive of self-rated health status than income and education, which may only reflect more gradual acquisitions of social status over time. The goals of this study were to understand the role of occupational status in predicting self-rated health, which is well known to be associated with long-term mortality, as well as compare the occupational status to the other major socioeconomic indicators of income and education.Data from the 2010 baseline surveys of the China Family Panel Studies, which utilized multi-stage probability sampling with implicit stratification was used. Logistic regression was used to examine the relationship of various socioeconomic indicators (i.e. occupational status, income, and education) with self-rated health as the primary outcome of interest. A series of models considered the associations of occupational category or occupational prestige with self-rated health.The final sample consisted of 14,367 employed adults aged 18-60, which was nationally representative of working adults in China. We found that occupation was not a major predictor of self-rated health in China when age, ethnicity, location, marital status, physical and mental health status were controlled for, with the exception of women working in lower grade management and professional jobs (OR = 1.82, 95% CI: 1.03-3.22). In comparison, income followed by education exhibited greater association with self-rated health. The highest income group had the least probability to report poor health (In men: OR = 0.30, 95% CI: 0.21-0.43. In women: OR = 0.44, 95% CI: 0.26-0.73). People educated with junior high school had better self-rated health than those with primary and below education level (In men: OR = 0.62, 95% CI: 0.50-0.75. In women: OR = 0.53, 95% CI: 0.42-0.68). Income, education and occupation were correlated with each other.Within the context of rapid societal changes in China, income and its implications for greater healthcare access and benefits had the greatest association with self-rated health followed by education. Occupational status was not associated. Occupational categories and prestige should be better adapted to reflect China's unique sociopolitical and historical context