1,720,962 research outputs found

    Vitamin D and health status in elderly.

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    Recently, vitamin D has aroused considerable interest for several reasons. Many epidemiological studies have shown a widespread deficiency of vitamin D at all ages, and the recent finding that many organs and tissues have vitamin D receptors has fostered the clinical and biological relevance of vitamin D. Elderly people are at high risk for vitamin D deficiency if their life style entails few outdoor activities, their skin is thick and they exhibit impairment of renal function. In the elderly, vitamin D deficiency is very important because it can affect the function of many organs such as the muscle–skeletal, cardio-vascular systems and kidney, and may be involved in various diseases and pathological conditions includine type II diabetes, cancer and cognitive decline. In the present review, the most relevant features of vitamin D are described as well as the clinical consequences of hypovitaminosis D in the elderly. Finally, the role of an adeguate oral supplementation in the geriatric population is stressed. Biomarkers currently available show that vitamin D deficiency is a major public health problem in any part of the world, which requires urgent attention. Symposium: Vitamin D and Health in the 21st Century–update [1

    Self-rated socio-economic status, social, physical and leisure activities and risk for malnutrition in late life: a cross-sectional population-based study

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    Abstract: Objectives: Our goal was to evaluate the proportion of community-dwelling elderly people at risk for malnutrition and the effect of different socioeconomic status (SES) indicators as well as social, physical and leisure activities in late life on the risk for malnutrition. Design: A cross-sectional population-based study. Setting: A sub-urban area in Northern Italy. Participants: 698 community-dwelling older persons. Measurements: The nutritional status of participants was assessed through the Mini Nutritional Assessment- Short Form (MNA-SF). SES was defined by means of early-life education, longest occupation, and late-life financial conditions. The following indicators were also evaluated: social contacts, and performing mental, physical and leisure activities during late-life. Chronic diseases, functional, cognitive and affective status were considered as potential confounders when examining the risk for malnutrition by logistic regression models. Results: 8% of the participants (average age 75.6 years, 408 women) were at risk for malnutrition (MNA-SF ≤ 11). Low education, poor financial condition, and lack of physical and leisure activities showed a crude association with risk for malnutrition. Multi-adjusted logistic regression models showed that only low education (OR=2.9; 95% CI=1.2-6.8) and lack of physical activity (OR=4.4;95%CI=2.0-9.7) were independently associated with the risk for malnutrition. Conclusions: Low education and lack of physical activity in late-life may affect the risk for malnutrition in the elderly. Further studies are needed to clarify the cause-effect relationship between lack of physical activity and malnutrition

    Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis

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    The 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
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