Search results for "Confounding factor"
showing 10 items of 27 documents
Minimum effective dose for antidepressants - an obligatory requirement for antidepressant drug evaluation?
1996
Extensive clinical trials are required for registration and approval of new antidepressants in most countries including the requirement that a minimal effective dose should be determined. The rationale for this requirement is to avoid the use of unnecessarily high doses. The implication is that for every antidepressant, a dose exists that serves as a threshold, below which all doses are not effective or are clearly less effective in treating a major depressive episode. Dose titration and fixed dose studies are used to determine the minimal effective dose, but both strategies have limitations and often do not allow definite establishment of a clear-cut minimal effective dose. The effort of e…
Mobility difficulties and physical activity as predictors of mortality and loss of independence in the community-living older population.
2000
OBJECTIVE: In older people, mobility impairments and physical inactivity are risk factors for further disability and death. We studied the interaction of physical activity and mobility impairment as a predictor of dependence and mortality. DESIGN: A population-based, prospective study. The data were collected in structured interviews in the year 1988 and 8 years later in the year 1996 as part of the Evergreen Project. PARTICIPANTS: Subjects were 1109 independently living, at baseline 65- to 84-year-old people in the city of Jyvaskyla, in central Finland. METHODS: Participants were ranked into four groups: (1) Intact mobility and physically active (Mobile-Active), (2) Intact mobility and sed…
Association Between Fibrosis Stage and Outcomes of Patients With Nonalcoholic Fatty Liver Disease: A Systematic Review and Meta -Analysis
2020
Background & Aims:\ud Biopsy-confirmed liver fibrosis is a prognostic factor for patients with nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD). We performed a systematic review to quantify the prognostic value of fibrosis stage in patients with NAFLD and the subgroup of patients with nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) and to assess the evidence that change in fibrosis stage is a surrogate endpoint.\ud \ud Methods:\ud We searched the MEDLINE, Embase, Cochrane Library, and trial registry databases through August 2018 for prospective or retrospective cohort studies of liver-related clinical events and outcomes in adults with NAFLD or NASH. We collected data on mortality (all cause and liver rela…
High dose inhalation interleukin-2 therapy for lung metastases in patients with malignant melanoma.
2000
BACKGROUND The lungs are a frequent site of metastasis in patients with melanoma, and this may cause respiratory problems in the terminal phase of the illness. Inhalation interleukin (IL)-2 therapy to the lung has been piloted and appears to be well tolerated. METHODS Twenty-seven patients were treated with single agent dacarbazine and concurrent high dose inhalation IL-2 36 million IU per day). The patients previously had progressed on chemotherapy, predominately dacarbazine-based regimens. Patients included those with American Joint Committee on Cancer Stage IV melanoma, predominately those with lung metastases, but patients with extrapulmonary metastases also were allowed on the study. R…
Assessment of radiofrequency exposure from cellular telephone daily use in an epidemiological study: German Validation study of the international cas…
2004
The objective of the study is to validate self-reported cellular phone use information by comparing it with the cumulative emitted power and duration of calls measured by software-modified cellular phones (SMP). The information was obtained using a questionnaire developed for the international case-control study on the risk of the use of mobile phones in tumours of the brain or salivary gland (INTERPHONE-study).The study was conducted in Bielefeld, Germany. Volunteers were asked to use SMPs instead of their own cellular phones for a period of 1 month. The SMP recorded the power emitted by the mobile phone handset during each base station contact. Information on cellular phone use for the sa…
Perceived age as a predictor of old age mortality: a 13-year prospective study
2005
Objectives To examine whether in older people perceived age is associated with risk of total mortality independent of chronological age. Design Prospective population-based study (Evergreen project) with mortality surveillance for 13 years after the baseline. Setting Face-to-face interview among community-dwelling residents of the city of Jyvaskyla, Finland. Subjects 395 men and 770 women aged 65-84 years at baseline. Measures Perceived physical age and perceived mental age were rated either as younger, the same or older in comparison with subject's chronological age. Death dates were received from the official register of the province of Central Finland. Confounders used were chronological…
Microsporidia parasites disrupt the responses to cadmium exposure in a gammarid.
2011
7 pages; International audience; Microsporidia parasites are commonly found in amphipods, where they are often asymptomatic, vertically-transmitted and have several effects on host sexuality and behaviour. As amphipods are often used as models in ecotoxicological studies, we investigated the effect of microsporidian infections on energy reserves and defence capacities of Gammarus roeseli under cadmium stress. Only females were infected by two microsporidia parasites: Dictyocoela roeselum or Dictyocoela muelleri. In physiological conditions, microsporidia had no major effect on energy reserves and defence capacities of G. roeseli, while under cadmium exposure, energy reserves and antioxidant…
Leukemia and Non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma in Childhood and Exposure to Pesticides: Results of a Register-based Case-Control Study in Germany
2001
Previous studies have suggested an association between exposure to pesticides and different types of childhood cancer. This paper presents results from a population-based case-control interview study of parents of children less than 15 years of age, which was conducted in the states of West Germany from 1993 to 1997. Cases were 1,184 children with leukemia, 234 with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, and 940 with a solid tumor; 2,588 controls were also included. Parental occupational exposures were found to be related to childhood cancer regardless of the time period of exposure and the type of cancer. This finding might partially be explained by different recall of past exposures by the parents of ca…
Paracetamol and antibiotics in childhood and subsequent development of wheezing/asthma: association or causation?
2011
Background Several studies found an association between early administration of paracetamol and antibiotics and development of wheezing. This could be due to confounding: wheeze and asthmatic symptoms in early childhood are difficult to distinguish from respiratory tract infections that are widely treated with these drugs; in case of persistence of symptoms up to school age, this could explain the observed relationship. Methods We investigated the association between paracetamol and antibiotics use in the first year of life and wheezing phenotypes, i.e. wheezing starting in different time periods (early, persistent and late-onset) in the SIDRIA-2 study, a cross-sectional survey of 16,933 ch…
Estimating adjusted NNT measures in logistic regression analysis
2007
The number needed to treat (NNT) is a popular measure to describe the absolute effect of a new treatment compared with a standard treatment or placebo in clinical trials with binary outcome. For use of NNT measures in epidemiology to compare exposed and unexposed subjects, the terms 'number needed to be exposed' (NNE) and 'exposure impact number' (EIN) have been proposed. Additionally, in the framework of logistic regression a method was derived to perform point and interval estimation of NNT measures with adjustment for confounding by using the adjusted odds ratio (OR approach). In this paper, a new method is proposed which is based upon the average risk difference over the observed confou…