scholarly journals Aging Across the Lifespan: Rethinking the David Barker Hypothesis

2021 ◽  
Vol 5 (Supplement_1) ◽  
pp. 32-32
Author(s):  
Luigi Ferrucci

Abstract For many years, the scope of geriatric medicine has been the care of older persons affected by multiple disease with the aim of improving their functional status and optimize quality of life. As our knowledge of the mechanisms of aging grows rapidly, it is becoming clear that accomplishing this scope requires taking a life-course perspective. Research have failed to establish a clear-cut distinction between normal aging and pathology leading to the hypothesis that aging is at the root of chronic diseases, and difference in health can be ascribed to different aging rates. Research in model organisms, suggest that aging can be modified with consequent changes on healthspan and longevity. Interventions that modulate aging may ultimately prevent most-age-associated diseases and their consequences. From this perspective, geriatric medicine is the leading and most promising branch of biomedical science. Challenges remain: first, demonstrating that certain interventions slow down the aging rate requires the valid measure of aging, and while many tools were developed, “epigenetic clocks” being the most promising, the underline mechanism that drive their changes with aging and validity in clinical applications are unclear. We do not know whether variability in the rate of biological aging assessed in old age are already detectable in younger individuals and person-specific rates remain constant during life. In 1986, David Barker stated the hypothesis that the period of gestation, characterized by a strong epigenetic imprinting, affects health and wellbeing across life, perhaps by setting the aging rate. Perhaps pediatric and geriatric medicine are more connected than previously believed.

Author(s):  
Patricia Nayna Schwerdtle ◽  
Kate Baernighausen ◽  
Sayeda Karim ◽  
Tauheed Syed Raihan ◽  
Samiya Selim ◽  
...  

Background: Climate change influences patterns of human mobility and health outcomes. While much of the climate change and migration discourse is invested in quantitative predictions and debates about whether migration is adaptive or maladaptive, less attention has been paid to the voices of the people moving in the context of climate change with a focus on their health and wellbeing. This qualitative research aims to amplify the voices of migrants themselves to add nuance to dominant migration narratives and to shed light on the real-life challenges migrants face in meeting their health needs in the context of climate change. Methods: We conducted 58 semi-structured in-depth interviews with migrants purposefully selected for having moved from rural Bhola, southern Bangladesh to an urban slum in Dhaka, Bangladesh. Transcripts were analysed using thematic analysis under the philosophical underpinnings of phenomenology. Coding was conducted using NVivo Pro 12. Findings: We identified two overarching themes in the thematic analysis: Firstly, we identified the theme “A risk exchange: Exchanging climate change and health risks at origin and destination”. Rather than describing a “net positive” or “net negative” outcome in terms of migration in the context of climate change, migrants described an exchange of hazards, exposures, and vulnerabilities at origin with those at destination, which challenged their capacity to adapt. This theme included several sub-themes—income and employment factors, changing food environment, shelter and water sanitation and hygiene (WaSH) conditions, and social capital. The second overarching theme was “A changing health and healthcare environment”. This theme also included several sub-themes—changing physical and mental health status and a changing healthcare environment encompassing quality of care and barriers to accessing healthcare. Migrants described physical and mental health concerns and connected these experiences with their new environment. These two overarching themes were prevalent across the dataset, although each participant experienced and expressed them uniquely. Conclusion: Migrants who move in the context of climate change face a range of diverse health risks at the origin, en route, and at the destination. Migrating individuals, households, and communities undertake a risk exchange when they decide to move, which has diverse positive and negative consequences for their health and wellbeing. Along with changing health determinants is a changing healthcare environment where migrants face different choices, barriers, and quality of care. A more migrant-centric perspective as described in this paper could strengthen migration, climate, and health governance. Policymakers, urban planners, city corporations, and health practitioners should integrate the risk exchange into practice and policies.


2021 ◽  
pp. 1-21
Author(s):  
Davide Vittori

Abstract Scholars have long debated whether populism harms or improves the quality of democracy. This article contributes to this debate by focusing on the impact of populist parties in government. In particular, it inquires: (1) whether populists in government are more likely than non-populists to negatively affect the quality of democracies; (2) whether the role of populists in government matters; and (3) which type of populism is expected to negatively affect the quality of liberal-democratic regimes. The results find strong evidence that the role of populists in government affects several qualities of democracy. While robust, the findings related to (2) are less clear-cut than those pertaining to (1). Finally, regardless of their role in government, different types of populism have different impacts on the qualities of democracy. The results show that exclusionary populist parties in government tend to have more of a negative impact than other forms of populism.


Author(s):  
Charlotte Beaudart ◽  
◽  
Jürgen M. Bauer ◽  
Francesco Landi ◽  
Olivier Bruyère ◽  
...  

Abstract Background and aims To assess experts’ preference for sarcopenia outcomes. Methods A discrete-choice experiment was conducted among 37 experts (medical doctors and researchers) from different countries around the world. In the survey, they were repetitively asked to choose which one of two hypothetical patients suffering from sarcopenia deserves the most a treatment. The two hypothetical patients differed in five pre-selected sarcopenia outcomes: quality of life, mobility, domestic activities, fatigue and falls. A mixed logit panel model was used to estimate the relative importance of each attribute. Results All sarcopenia outcomes were shown to be significant, and thus, important for experts. Overall, the most important sarcopenia outcome was falls (27%) followed by domestic activities and mobility (24%), quality of life (15%) and fatigue (10%). Discussion and conclusion Compared to patient’s preferences, experts considered falls as a more important outcome of sarcopenia, while the outcomes fatigue and difficulties in domestic activities were considered as less important.


2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Loretta G. Platts ◽  
Gopalakrishnan Netuveli ◽  
Elizabeth Webb ◽  
Marie Zins ◽  
Marcel Goldberg ◽  
...  

Objective: To investigate variations in quality of life at older ages, we take a life course perspective to analyse long-term effects of physical working conditions upon quality of life after retirement. In doing so, we study to what extent these associations are explained by individuals’ health at older ages. Method: We use administrative data and self-administered questionnaire responses from the French GAZEL cohort. Quality of life was assessed with CASP-19 in 2009 and related to three types of physical working conditions during previous working life: (1) ergonomic strain, (2) physical danger and (3) exposures to chemicals. Health was assessed in 2007 with the SF-36 Health Survey. Multiple regressions were calculated in retired men only, controlling for important confounders including social position. Results: In contrast to men, few women were exposed to strenuous and dangerous working conditions in this cohort and were not included in subsequent analyses. Negative effects on retired men's quality of life were found for the physical occupational exposures of ergonomic strain and physical danger, but not for chemical exposures. Effects were attenuated after the introduction of physical and mental health to the models, indicating an indirect effect of physical working conditions upon quality of life via health. Conclusion: Adverse physical working conditions have long-term consequences for health and quality of life at older ages. Improvements to physical working conditions may improve individuals’ quality of life over the long term.


2020 ◽  
Vol 2 (135) ◽  
pp. 11-32
Author(s):  
Hayder Sadeq Naser ◽  
Ali Badeen Mohammed

The issue of identifying metaphors is not clear-cut in most religious texts (Charteris-Black, 2005). For metaphors that are dealt with by religious texts such as human life as a journey or as a game, a prayer as a flowing river, the living martyrs (the living dead), a taste of death, the journey of the dead and “die, yet shall he live” are mostly spiritual matters for which academic appraisal is essential (Lakoff & Johnson, 1980; Gibbs, 2008). That is, the quality of the explanations that are presented by such metaphors need an intensive investigation, because these are the key function of metaphor in religious texts. Moreover, metaphors in sacred texts may be misjudged due to: the absence of the image in the target language and the different symbolic meanings of metaphor in the source text. Therefore, we aim to tackle such a problem via analysing the different forms and functions of metaphors in selected Qur’anic and Biblical verses. To operate such metaphorical analysis, a two-dimensional model is adapted from two different discourse analysts: aI-Sakaaki (2000) and Lakoff & Johnson (1980). The study reveals how the persuasive power of metaphor in the Qur’anic and Biblical verses related are regulated around the diversity of ontological, structural and orientational forms, and how every correlation between two domains of metaphors can shape its functions.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (9) ◽  
pp. 118
Author(s):  
Sherry-Anne Muscat ◽  
Geralyn Dorothy Wright ◽  
Kristy Bergeron ◽  
Kevin W. Morin ◽  
Courtenay Richards Crouch ◽  
...  

Ketamine therapy with culturally attuned trauma-informed psychotherapy in a collaborative cross-cultural partnership may provide a critical step in the operationalization and optimization of treatment effectiveness in diverse populations and may provide a foundation for an improved quality of life for Indigenous people. Decolonizing Indigenous health and wellbeing is long overdue, requiring an equal partnership between government and Indigenous communities, built upon an aboriginal culture holistic foundation of balance of mind, body, social and spiritual realms, and within the context of historical and lived experiences of colonialism. Culturally attuned trauma-informed psychotherapy paired with ketamine—a fast-acting antidepressant that typically takes effect within 4 hours, even in cases of acute suicidality—may be uniquely qualified to integrate into an Indigenous based health system, since ketamine’s therapeutic effects engage multiple neuropsychological, physiological, biological, and behavioral systems damaged by intergenerational complex developmental trauma. Ketamine holds the potential to serve as a core treatment modality around which culturally engaged treatment approaches might be organized since its brief alteration of normal waking consciousness is already a familiar and intrinsic element of healing culture in many Indigenous societies. There is great need and desire in Indigenous communities for respectful and sacred partnership in fostering more effective mental health outcomes and improved quality of life.


Author(s):  
James Darby-Taylor ◽  
Fernando Luís-Ferreira ◽  
João Sarraipa ◽  
Ricardo Jardim-Goncalves

Abstract The quality of care provided to citizens by professionals and institutions depends on the quality and availability of information. Early commencement of treatment and medication, and the decisions on how to proceed, depend a lot on patients’ data in the different modalities available. It is also important to notice that large pools of data help inform health and wellbeing parameters for the largest possible community. To make that possible it is necessary both to have the best hospital practices but also to get consent and collaboration from patients. In order to accomplish such a goal, it is necessary to use practices, which adhere to legal constraints and are transparent while handling data and also to transmit those practices and protocols to professionals and patients. The present document aims to provide a framework envisaging the seamless application of the clinical procedures, following legal guidance and making the process known, secure and trustworthy. It aims to contribute to clinical practice, and clinical research, thereby contributing to big data analysis by ensuring trust and best clinical data handling.


2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 22-35
Author(s):  
Eduardo Nicolás Bonne Falcón ◽  
Niurka Tellez Rodríguez

Las crecientes demandas que se producen de forma natural y otras por política de los órganos decisores en función de alcanzar la satisfacción de las crecientes necesidades de la población, imponen más y más exigencias a todas las organizaciones de la estructura de la sociedad. Las contextualizaciones obligan a los gestores a proyectar las alternativas más efectivas para asumir las exigencias de los cambios, sean esos de índole organizacional, estructural, funcional, u otro. El Tablero Estratégico para el Cambio (TEC), es una herramienta para la transformación y el desarrollo, para la actuación colectiva, simple por áreas y de acciones personales bien orientadas, las que necesitan de escribirse y de constituirse en un documento orientador de las transformaciones. En las organizaciones, donde son diversas, convergentes, simples y complejas las acciones a cumplir, sí es muy importante tenerla bien escritas, bien definidas y bien orientadas hacia los objetivos colectivos. Palabras clave: Visión integral para el cambio desde el Tablero Estratégico, movilidad de la organización institucional promovido desde el tablero estratégico, la conquista de la efectividad una misión para mejorar la calidad de vida. ABSTRACT The increasing requests that are  produced spontaneously and another one for policy of the organs decision makers in terms of attaining the satisfaction of the increasing needs of the population, they force more and more on requirements all of the organizations of the structure of the society. All country, with his natural resources and his social and productive infrastructures, with his roads of interior commerces and exteriors, affected his administrative and entrepreneurial institution is forced in the position of constant way to contextualizar for the various universal crises that today they coexist. The Strategic Chessboard for the Change, a tool for transformation and development, for the collective, simple acting for areas and actions in personam well guided, they are in need of writing to each other and of getting constituted in a guiding document of transformations. In the organizations, where actions are various, convergent, simple and complex to do one's job, definitely you are very important to have it good written, clear-cut and very guided toward the collective objectives. Keywords: Integral vision for the change from the Strategic Board, mobility of the institutional organization promoted from the strategic board, the conquest of the effectiveness a mission to improve the quality of life.


Author(s):  
Ludmila Meciarova ◽  
Silvia Vilcekova ◽  
Eva Kridlova Burdova ◽  
Ilija Zoran Apostoloski ◽  
Danica Kosicanova

Decent quality of indoor air is important for health and wellbeing of building users. We live, work and study in indoors of various types of buildings. Often people are exposed to pollutants at higher concentrations than these that occur out-doors. Continual investigation of indoor air quality is needed for ensuring comfort and healthy environment. Measuring and analysis of occurrence of physical, chemical and biological factors is the first step for suggestion of optimization measures. Inside school buildings there are often inadequate indoor climate conditions such as thermal comfort parame-ters or ventilation. The aim of this study was determination of indoor environmental quality in selected offices in the building of elementary school in Slovakia. The values of operative temperature were not within the optimum range of values for the warm period of the year in one of the monitored offices. The intensity of illumination was lower in the two offices. Low levels of particulate matters were measured except the one office where permissible value was exceeded by 7.6%.


Author(s):  
Gökmen Arslan

Internet use enhances one's quality of life; yet, excessive use may lead to various problems for their healthy development and wellbeing. Understanding the risk and protective factors in internet addiction has importance to promote individuals' positive development and wellbeing. Therefore, the purpose of the present chapter is to explore the role of psychological maltreatment in the development of the internet addiction. Psychological maltreatment is a significant public health problems associated with a range of short and long–term undesirable mental health and wellbeing outcomes in childhood to adulthood. Considering the outcomes supporting the significant role of child maltreatment on the development of internet addiction, it is clear that maltreated individuals are at–risk to develop internet addiction, and psychological maltreatment, as a risk factor, has a crucial role in the development of internet addiction. However, evidences here are relatively limited, and there is need further research investigated long–term impacts of psychological maltreatment on internet addiction.


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