1,722,023 research outputs found
Integrating the issues of global and public health into the veterinary education curriculum: a European perspective.
No full textVeterinary public health is an essential field in public health activities, based upon veterinary skills, knowledge and resources and which aims to protect and improve human health and welfare. This discipline has evolved through three stages, beginning with the fight against animal diseases, moving on to include meat inspection and control of zoonoses and now encompassing a much broader health sciences education, with the goal of guaranteeing a safe and wholesome food supply, protecting human wellbeing and conserving the environment. Within the veterinary medicine curriculum, veterinary public health has undergone a similar development. At first, it was mainly concerned with slaughterhouse-based courses but in time it included the teaching of such subjects as epidemiology, the control of communicable (zoonotic) diseases and emergency preparedness. Veterinary medical faculties in Europe have adjusted their curricula over the past few years to reflect these changes in the subject and to meet the need for specialisation. It could be said that veterinary public health education has literally moved from the local abattoir to the global community. In this paper, the authors briefly discuss examples of veterinary medicine curricula at different universities. The veterinary public health curriculum of the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Utrecht, is then discussed in detail, as an example of the European perspective on integrating global and public health issues into the veterinary curriculum
Female reproductive health: Species and ligand-specific endometrial differences to hormones and aryl hydrocarbon receptor activation
No full textEndometrial diseases affect up to approximately 10% of women in their reproductive age. Yet, current testing strategies in chemical risk assessment do not adequately address endometrial health, partly because good (animal-free and human relevant) models are lacking. The overall aim of this thesis was to address the species-specific differences between human and rat endometrium, as well as to assess tissue-specific and ligand-specific differences in response to aryl hydrocarbon receptor (AHR) activation. A 3D endometrial model was developed in Chapter 2 using healthy human primary endometrial cells. This endometrial model consists of a bottom layer where an extracellular matrix scaffold encloses endometrial primary stromal cells, and an upper layer of endometrial primary epithelial cells. The endometrial model was subjected to hormones to mimic the proliferative phase and secretory phase of the menstrual cycle. A comparable model was established using primary rat endometrial cells. This chapter showed that hormones modulated the gene expression comparable to the human in vivo situation. Also, differences were observed between responses in the human and rat endometrial models with respect to hormones, as well as AHR ligands TCDD, laquinimod and its primary metabolite DELAQ. In Chapter 3 the interplay between the AHR and estrogen signaling in endometrial tissue was further explored in primary endometrial epithelial cells. Again, we observed the opposing effects of AHR ligands between human and rat endometrial cells. Differential regulation of this receptor between human and rat tissue was also observed with respect to hormonal action. In addition, the inhibitory effect on estrogen signaling upon AHR activation was only observed in the human endometrial cells, and not in the rat endometrial cells. The research in Chapter 2 and Chapter 3 showed that the rat endometrium does not reflect the human situation. We assessed another aspect of human-rat differences within the hormonal regulatory feedback system in Chapter 4. The effect of AHR activation on prolactin secretion from the pituitary in rats was assessed. In Chapter 4, the prolactin regulation was compared between rat primary pituitary cells and two rat pituitary cell lines, GH-3 and RC-4BC. It was observed that these pituitary cell lines do not reflect prolactin regulation in vivo, as they showed different responses to prolactin inhibitor quinpirole and prolactin stimulant thyrotropin-releasing hormone compared to the primary pituitary cells. In addition, it was demonstrated that AHR ligands TCDD and DELAQ, although both activating the AHR, exerted different effects on prolactin gene expression in primary pituitary cells. The activation of AHR ligands were also assessed in endometrial adenocarcinoma (Chapter 5) and breast cancer (Chapter 6) cell lines, to address tissue specific differences of AHR activation. In Chapter 5, it appeared that the resveratrol analogue tetramethoxystilbene (TMS) exerted stronger anti-tumorigenic properties in ECC-1 cells, whereas it did not affect Ishikawa cells. In Chapter 6, we observed anti-tumorigenic properties of the resveratrol analogues in the MCF-7 breast cancer cell line. Moreover, the most potent TMS inhibited the cell cycle of MCF-7 cells, but did not affect the cell cycle of the non-tumorigenic breast epithelial cell line MCF-10A
[Why don’t we choose what makes us happy? Consideration of a veterinary student about a career outside the practice.]
No full textBovine and equine forensic DNA analysis
No full textAnimal forensic DNA analysis is being used for human criminal investigations (e.g traces from cats and dogs), wildlife management, breeding and food safety. The most common DNA markers used for such forensic casework are short tandem repeats (STR). Rules and guidelines concerning quality assurance (QA) and quality control (QC) have been well established for human forensic STR DNA testing, which is most crucial in order to be able to defend the results from forensic DNA analysis in court. However, for several animal species the current laboratory practices do not meet those rules and guidelines. Consequently, QA and QC in animal genetic forensic analysis are important for laboratories, authorities, suspects, victims, the legal justice system and also for public health. In this thesis forensic STR-based DNA analysis in cattle and horse is further improved and harmonized by standardizing the commonly used STR assays for forensic purposes. The conversion tables of the ISAG to the repeat-based nomenclature system, published in this thesis, allow an unambiguous nomenclature, thereby increasing the forensic usefulness of existing datasets. By carrying out large-scale population studies, the quality and statistical power of these marker sets have been assessed. We elaborate on the general considerations that apply to the validation of forensic analysis of human and animal STR markers and in this context, evaluate our contribution to the validation of cattle and horse forensic typing. We discuss how the same data allow a reconstruction of the phylogeny of breeds, survey the state-of-the-art of forensic analysis for other animal species and finally describe the future prospects of DNA forensic analysis. Although STR is still the favourite type of marker for both human and animal forensic identity and parentage testing, there is an increasing interest in the forensic use of single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) typing. The use of autosomal SNPs in forensic genetic casework has been widely discussed. Although much effort has been done to implement human SNPs for forensic parentage and identity testing further optimization is still required. In human it is not likely that forensic SNP typing will replace STRs, but used rather as an alternative for challenging samples that defy STR analysis. We envisage that in the near future STRs will remain the favourite type of marker for animal forensic DNA typing. However, other current or future non-forensic applications will require more modern approaches as high-throughput SNP genotyping and genomic sequencing. Ideally, the recommendations concerning forensic genetic investigations are identical for human and non-human DNA, respectively. Thanks to the rapid progress, as described in this thesis for cattle and horse, this is being realized
Man and pigs: sharing the same C. difficile
No full textClostridium difficile is an anaerobic spore forming gram-positive bacterium. Infection with C. difficile may lead in humans to symptomless carriership, but may also lead to diarrhea varying in severity from mild to life-threatening pseudomembraneous colitis. C. difficile spores can survive for long periods of time in the environment and are resistant to extreme temperatures, drought, radiation, and chemicals including disinfectants. C. difficile was considered a classical nosocomial pathogen, with a risk group consisting of elderly patients with comorbidities, treated with antimicrobials. However, since the beginning of the 21th century C. difficile infection (CDI) is increasing in incidence and severity, and is also reported in younger patients, not receiving antimicrobials, and in patients in the community. Ribotype 078 is associated with this change in epidemiology and has increased in prevalence, to the 3rd most common isolated type in human patients in Europe. The finding of the same 078 ribotype in diarrheal piglets led to the concern that interspecies transmission could occur. The goal of this PhD research was to investigate the risk of transmission of C. difficile from pigs to humans. C. difficile was commonly found in fecal samples of neonatal piglets with diarrhea. The use of a more sensitive detection method for the bacterium resulted in isolating C. difficile in fecal samples of almost all piglets, regardless their disease status. With this method, samples from sows, piglets and the environment were investigated to determine how piglets become infected with C. difficile. Since C. difficile was found in all piglets within 48 hours after birth, while all sows became positive within 113 hours after parturition, contamination of the environment with C. difficile is the most logical source for infection. Indeed, C. difficile was present in environmental samples in the farm. C. difficile was also found in the air of the farrowing ward. Follow-up research on all pig wards at the same pig farm revealed a widespread dissemination of C. difficile. Furthermore, C. difficile was present in air samples 20 meter outside the farm. Consumption of pork meat is considered a possible infection route, because C. difficile was found in retail pork samples. To determine if the source could be slaughter pigs colonized with the bacterium, rectal samples of slaughter pigs were taken at the abattoir. A prevalence of around 10% was found. However, whether C. difficile can subsequently contaminate the carcass depends on the slaughter hygiene. Human and pig C.difficile ribotype 078 seem to be genetically related because a comparison of C. difficile isolates from humans with CDI and piglets with diarrhea revealed a high similarity in antimicrobial susceptibility patterns. Samples from farmers, employees, family members and the pigs at the same farms were investigated for the presence of C. difficile. Colonization rates of C. difficile in pig farmers and their employees were higher then the colonization rates described in healthy adults. C. difficile isolates from pig farmers and their pigs are highly similar, which indicates that working with pigs is an occupational risk for colonization with C. difficile
Challenges of quantitative microbial risk assessment at EU level.
No full textQuantitative microbial risk assessment (QMRA) aims to model the fate of pathogenic micro-organisms along the food chain and the associated health risks. More importantly, it allows the a priori estimation of the impact on public health of interventions in the food chain. The European Food Safety Authority is increasingly asked to provide scientific advice to the European Commission based on QMRA. Its application at the European level poses some unique challenges, both of a scientific and of an organizational nature. On the other hand, collaboration at the European level will lead to more effective use of limited expertise and resources
Serum total antioxidant statuses of survivors and nonsurvivors after acute paraquat poisoning.
No full textDutch distribution zones of stable iodine tablets based on atmospheric dispersion modelling of accidental releases from nuclear power plants.
No full textRapid administration of stable iodine is essential for the saturation and subsequent protection of the thyroid gland against the potential harm caused by radioiodines. This paper proposes the Dutch risk analysis that uses an atmospheric dispersion model to calculate the size of the zones around nuclear power plants where radiological thyroid doses for children might be sufficiently high to warrant iodine administration. Dose calculations for possible releases from the nuclear power plants of Borssele (The Netherlands), Doel (Belgium) and Emsland (Germany) are based on two scenarios in combination with a 1-y set of authentic, high-resolution meteorological data. The dimensions of the circular zones were defined for each nuclear power plant. In these zones, with a radius up to 50 km, distribution of stable iodine tablets is advised
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