1,721,331 research outputs found
Adoption of a Short-Term (4-Week) Vegan Diet as Part of ‘Veganuary’ Significantly Reduces Saturated Fatty Acid (SFA), Cholesterol, B12, and Iodine Intake in Omnivorous Individuals—An Observational Study
Full text linkGlobal veganism campaigns like ‘Veganuary’ have gained popularity. We conducted an observational study to assess the impact of a 4-week vegan diet during ‘Veganuary’ on nutrient intake, status, knowledge, and motivations for veganism. Data were collected before and after ‘Veganuary’, using Food Frequency Questionnaires (FFQs) to estimate dietary intake. Micronutrient knowledge and motivation were assessed through questionnaires. A total of 154 UK adults aged 18–60 years (2019: n81; 2020: n73) participated. Groups were vegetarians and omnivores committed to a 4-week vegan diet during ‘Veganuary’. Control groups were vegans and omnivores who did not transition. Short-term vegan diets significantly decreased intake of iodine, B12, cholesterol, and saturated fatty acids (SFAs) in omnivores. Micronutrient knowledge was low, and motivation for veganism varied. Short-term vegan diets reduce macro- and micronutrient intake in omnivores. Veganuary participants could benefit from nutritional guidance or supplementation. Attention is required for UK micronutrient intake and knowledge. Motivations for vegan pledges may influence diets, warranting further research
Understanding the link between physical capability markers, sarcopenia and frailty and adverse health outcomes
Full text linkAlthough chronological age is the main determinant of ageing, physical and social environment factors play a crucial role in healthy ageing, even in earlier stages of life. Physical and biological limitations are not, necessarily, restricted to older ages. Therefore, considering the predicted rapid increase in the number of older people worldwide along with its individual and societal burden, research into healthy ageing – including middle-aged and older individuals – is a priority.
Physical capability is the ability to perform the basic and instrumental activities of daily living. As the decline in physical function occurs progressively with age, the study of this process should start earlier in life and not only during older age. Low levels of physical capability markers (such as grip strength, muscle mass and physical performance [gait speed]) are strong predictors of future health, including premature mortality, cardiovascular and neurodegenerative diseases in middle-aged and old-aged populations. With age, the decline in physical function could occur in more than one marker. Consequently, the study of combined physical capability markers and their clinical combinations ‘sarcopenia’ and ‘frailty’ needs to be further explored using prospective data with common and non-common adverse health outcomes.
Considering the associations of physical capability, sarcopenia, and frailty with adverse health outcomes are not fully understood (both investigated in isolation and as the combined effect), the main aim of this thesis was to determine the associations between measures of physical capability, sarcopenia, and frailty and a range of health outcomes, including mortality, cardiovascular (CVD) and respiratory diseases.
To achieve this general aim, seven papers were completed and included in this thesis. Since the overall prevalence of frailty was already estimated using different classifications, the first paper included in this thesis systematically reports and summarises the overall prevalence of sarcopenia (and severe sarcopenia) using different global classifications. Using 6 main classifications, I estimated that the overall prevalence of sarcopenia ranges from 10% to 27% according to the classification used while the prevalence of severe sarcopenia ranges to 2 to 9%. Then, data from the UK Biobank study was used to investigate the association between the exposures and health outcomes. UK Biobank is a general cohort study that recruited over 500,000 participants between 2006 and 2010. Participants aged 37-73 years attended one of the 22 assessment research centres across Scotland, England and Wales at baseline.
Using the UK Biobank data, the other six studies were carried out. Across these manuscripts, the associations between different exposures - combinations of sarcopenia, frailty, and individual physical capabilities – and adverse outcomes were determined in each manuscript included: incident and mortality for CVD, respiratory diseases, osteoporosis, cancer, COVID-19, dementia as well as all-cause mortality.
In terms of individuals physical capability markers, the strongest association was identified between slow gait speed and incident COPD and respiratory disease as well as all-cause, respiratory and CVD. For incident osteoporosis instead, low muscle mass, followed by slow gait speed, were associated with a higher risk in both sexes. Regarding combinations of physical capability markers, slow gait speed plus low muscle mass, followed for severe sarcopenia, demonstrated the strongest association with incident respiratory disease and all-cause mortality. In terms of osteoporosis, pre-sarcopenic men and sarcopenic women showed a stronger association with incident osteoporosis. The study of the combination between frailty and sarcopenia categories identified that the highest CVD and respiratory risk was identified among frail and sarcopenic individuals. In addition, individuals with more than one clinical condition (frailty, sarcopenia, cachexia, and malnutrition) had almost five times higher risk of dying than those with none (hazard ratio (HR): 4.96 [95% CI: 2.73 to 9.01]). Finally, when frailty was investigated in isolation, I demonstrated that, independently of the frailty classification used, those with pre-frail or frail had a higher risk of severe covid-19. Moreover, pre-frail and frail individuals had an increased risk of all-cause dementia independently of confounder factors such as morbidity (HR pre-frail: 1.21 [95% CI: 1.04 to 1.42] and HR frail: 1.98 [95% CI: 1.47 to 2.67]).
Therefore, this thesis demonstrated that individuals with lower physical capability, sarcopenia and/or frailty had a higher risk of adverse health outcomes, including: incidence and mortality for osteoporosis, CVD, respiratory disease, cancer, COVID-19, dementia, and all-cause mortality. These associations remained even after adjustment for a large range of potential confounders and existed both in middle-aged and older adult sub-groups.
Considering that the age-related decline in physical capability markers, and therefore sarcopenia and frailty, could be delay and prevented, health interventions to improve physical capability that may reduce the risk of these outcomes are more urgent than ever
Association between Poor Oral Health and Frailty in Middle-Aged and Older Individuals: A Cross-Sectional National Study
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Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Full text linkWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Full text linkWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
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