scholarly journals Changes in Physical Fitness of Older People During the COVID-19 Pandemic in Germany: Objective Training Data

2021 ◽  
Vol 5 (Supplement_1) ◽  
pp. 460-460
Author(s):  
Jessica Koschate ◽  
Michel Hackbarth ◽  
Sandra Lau ◽  
Tania Zieschang

Abstract The purpose of this study was to analyze objective training data on changes in leg muscle training before and after the COVID-19 lockdown during spring 2020 in Germany. Overall, the training data of 4435 individuals in the age group (AG) 45-64 years (55±5 years, 66% ♀) and of 2853 in the AG 65-95 years (72±6 years, 54% ♀) were exported from chip-controlled exercise circuits. Training weight and number of repetitions performed on the leg extensor were used to calculate a leg score (LS), considering the last three training sessions before the lockdown (baseline) and the first ten individual sessions as well as the averaged sessions for August, September and October after individual training resumption. Based on the baseline LS, three training intensity groups (TG_low, medium, high) were defined, and analyzed for differences (ANOVA). The LS in TG_low remained stable after the lockdown, but increased compared to baseline in both AGs after the first ten sessions (p<0.05). In TG_medium, LS was reduced at the first post training session (p<0.05) and returned to baseline levels at training session eight in the younger and session two in the older adults. In both AGs, LS was reduced in the TG_high (p<0.001), and did not reach baseline levels by October. Hence, the LS of TG_high was identified as being particularly affected by the training interruption, irrespective of age. More individually tailored training recommendations should be made for these individuals to be able to regain their initial training levels and avoid long-term adverse health effects.

Blood ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 126 (23) ◽  
pp. 958-958
Author(s):  
Bunchoo Pongtanakul ◽  
Vip Viprakasit

Background: Clinical efficacy, safety and tolerability of deferasirox (DFX); a once daily oral iron chelator in transfusion dependent thalassemias (TDT) with iron overload can be achieved by appropriate dosage adjustment based on iron burden and ongoing transfusion iron overload. However, even with recommended DFX dosage, at least 40% of our Thai TDT patients did not appropriately respond to DFX. Patients with unresponsiveness to DFX (UR) was defined as (1) having a rising serum ferritin (SF) trend or (2) having a reduction of SF < 30% of baseline levels (BL) at least 3 consecutive mths, with more than two SF measurements >1500 ng/mL; and (3) receiving once daily DFX at an average dosage > 30 mg/kg/day for at least 6 mths. Previously, twice daily dosing (TWD) of DFX was shown to be effective in patients with UR (Pongtanakul B, et al. Blood Cells Mol Dis. 2013) but long term efficacy, safety and tolerability of TWD of DFX is still lacking. Methods: Patients with UR who received TWD of DFX with the same total dose per day > 24 mths were included. CBC, renal function, urine analysis were performed every 3 wks to monitor possible side effect. SF and liver function test were checked every 6 wks. Tolerability and compliance to DFX were evaluated by direct history taking and drug account prescribed. Responsiveness to TWD of DFX (RP) was defined as the patients who showed a decrease of SF or reduction of liver iron concentration (LIC) by MRI > 30% of the BL at 6 or 12 mths. Results: Twenty four TDT patients received TWD of DFX; 4 patients were excluded due to poor compliance and a short follow up period and 4 patients did not meet RP criteria. Sixteen patients were enrolled; 9 male (56%) with a mean (± SD) age of 9.08 ± 3.84 yrs (range 2.1-24.2 yrs). Clinical diagnoses include; Hb E/β thalassemia. (n=12), β thalassemia major (n=3) and Hb Barts hydrops (n=1). Mean follow up time before switching dose were 17.3 ± 7.3 mths. Average SF at BL before DFX and before TWD were 3,039 ± 1,713.7.02 and 3,500 ± 1,403.2 ng/mL, with median % change of SF was +27.58 % (range; -13.4 to +104%). Mean actual DFX dose during 6 mths before switching was 36.3 ± 2.2 mg/kg/day. None had symptoms of gastrointestinal irritation. After TWD, 13 (81.25%) and 16 patients (100%) showed a significant decrease of SF (> 30% of the baseline levels) at 6 and 12 months. Mean SF and median % change of SF at 6 and 12 months after switching were 2,527.56 ± 1,191.80 ng/mL; -29.24 % and 1,695.83 ± 859.16 ng/mL; -53.14%, with statistical significance compared to BL and before switching (p <0.05). Mean transfusion iron load before and after switching were not different (range 0.2-0.4 mg/kg/day). One patient had a SF reduction < 30%, but LIC was significant reduction at 12 months. Nine out of 16 patients were evaluated for LIC; average LIC at BL and at the end of study were reduced from 6.7 to 3.2 mg/g dry wt. None had cardiac T2* < 20 msec. All patients except one tolerated well with DFX at before and after switching (>24 months) with minor adverse events. One patient had severe transaminitis (ALT > 3 times of ULN) but after investigation, this was thought to be result from acute viral hepatitis. This patient could be successfully restarted DFX at the same TWD. Five patients could decrease DFX dosage to < 20 mg/kg/day and switched back to daily dosing (mean dosage was 17.04 mg/kg/day). However, 4 patients, after decreased DFX dosage and switched back to daily dosing; their SF increased and required to increase DFX dosage with TWD to maintain SF. Seven patients continued to receive TWD of DFX with mean dosage was 36.4 mg/kg/day. Mean follow up time after TWD of DFX was 44.1 + 9.8 mths (range 24 - 72 mths). Conclusion: Herein, we show that TWD of DFX effectively reduced iron burden in TDT with iron overload. Safety and tolerability of this dosing are not different from once daily dosing. Most patients could decrease DFX dosage and switched back to once daily dosing when iron burden decreased. However, 25% (4/16) of these patients still required twice daily dosing with higher dosage to maintain optimal body iron levels. Interestingly, 16% (4/24) of our patients who received TWD could not achieve effective iron chelation. This group of patients may represent those who have different pharmacogenetic background that affect directly to efficacy of DFX causing a resistant to iron chelation therapy. This population confirms for improving iron chelation measures by means of a newer iron chelation agent or a combination of DFX with other iron chelation. Disclosures Off Label Use: Twice daily dosing instead of standard daily dosing.


2020 ◽  
pp. 194855062097153
Author(s):  
Mario Wenzel ◽  
Doris Staab ◽  
Zarah Rowland ◽  
Manon A. van Scheppingen

The transition to parenthood is accompanied by declined self-esteem levels, which may be explained by parents’ relationship satisfaction. However, prior research examined self-esteem only shortly before and after childbirth and had no or only unmatched childless respondents as a control group, limiting the possibility to examine long-term adaptive processes and the causal interpretation of the associations. Thus, we used panel data (10 years, 4,075 individuals, and 16,122 observations) to compare self-esteem and relationship satisfaction trajectories of parents with matched childless respondents using propensity score matching. We found a quadratic trajectory for parents’ self-esteem, which declined and increased before birth and declined and returned to baseline levels after birth. In contrast, matched childless respondents’ self-esteem decreased linearly before childbirth and then recovered. The quadratic postpartum process in parents was significantly associated with reduced relationship satisfaction. Thus, a fulfilling relationship may help to maintain the positive effects of childbirth on self-esteem in parents.


2009 ◽  
Vol 34 (6) ◽  
pp. 1098-1107 ◽  
Author(s):  
Louise Croft ◽  
Jonathan D. Bartlett ◽  
Don P.M. MacLaren ◽  
Thomas Reilly ◽  
Louise Evans ◽  
...  

This aims of this study were to investigate the effects of carbohydrate availability during endurance training on the plasma interleukin (IL)-6, IL-8, and tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-α response to a subsequent acute bout of high-intensity interval exercise. Three groups of recreationally active males performed 6 weeks of high-intensity interval running. Groups 1 (LOW+GLU) and 2 (LOW+PLA) trained twice per day, 2 days per week, and consumed a 6.4% glucose or placebo solution, respectively, before every second training session and at regular intervals throughout exercise. Group 3 (NORM) trained once per day, 4 days per week, and consumed no beverage during training. Each group performed 50 min of high-intensity interval running at the same absolute workloads before and after training. Muscle glycogen utilization in the gastrocnemius muscle during acute exercise was reduced (p < 0.05) in all groups following training, although this was not affected by training condition. Plasma IL-6 concentration increased (p < 0.05) after acute exercise in all groups before and after training. Furthermore, the magnitude of increase was reduced (p < 0.05) following training. This training-induced attenuation in plasma IL-6 increase was similar among groups. Plasma IL-8 concentration increased (p < 0.05) after acute exercise in all groups, although the magnitude of increase was not affected (p > 0.05) by training. Acute exercise did not increase (p > 0.05) plasma TNF-α when undertaken before or after training. Data demonstrate that the exercise-induced increase in plasma IL-6 concentration in response to customary exercise is attenuated by previous exercise training, and that this attenuation appears to occur independent of carbohydrate availability during training.


2020 ◽  
Vol 25 (4) ◽  
pp. 323-330
Author(s):  
E. S. Ovcharenko ◽  
V. V. Erichev ◽  
S. I. Risovannij ◽  
T. V. Aksenova ◽  
S. V. Melekhov ◽  
...  

Relevance. A long-term inflammation in the oral cavity, unreasonable treatment of periodontal patients with antibiotics cause imbalance between certain types of fungal-bacterial associations accompanied by oral dysbiosis and change of local immune status. So, development and application of new comprehensive diagnosis and treatment techniques in periodontal patients, use of products for correction of microbiota and local immunity are a current and a long-term task. Purpose is to optimize the comprehensive treatment protocol of inflammatory periodontal diseases by introducing probiotics and evaluation of oral microbiome and cytokine profile.Materials and methods. 140 patients were examined. Of these 60 patients had chronic generalized plaque-induced gingivitis and 60 patients suffered from moderate chronic generalized periodontitis. Bacterial and fungal microbiome was assessed and the host immune response was evaluated in all patients before and after the treatment. Half of the patients were treated conventionally and the other half were treated according to a modified scheme: probiotic “Bifidumbacterin Forte” was added.Results. A large number of yeast-like fungi Candida and commensal bacteria were detected in periodontal pockets of patients with chronic generalized plaque-induced gingivitis and moderate chronic generalized periodontitis. That correlates with a significant increase of pro-inflammatory cytokines (TNF-α, IL—8), decrease of concentration of INF-γ and increase of antiinflammatory cytokine IL-4.Conclusion. Changes in clinical, microbiological and immunological values during a modified combination therapy with a probiotic and during a conventional treatment demonstrated that effectiveness of treatment of chronic gingivitis and chronic periodontitis increased by 40% and 37% respectively.


2020 ◽  
Vol 54 (5) ◽  
pp. 15-22
Author(s):  
I.M. Larina ◽  
◽  
D.N. Kashirina ◽  
K.S. Kireev ◽  
A.I. Grigoriev ◽  
...  

We performed the first ever comparative analysis of modifications in the proteome, ionogram and some other blood plasma biochemical indices of 18 male cosmonauts (44 ± 6 years of age) before and after maiden or repeated long-term missions to the Russian segment of the International space station (ISS RS). Levels of proteins, substrates and ions as well as chemical components were measured using the LC-MS-based proteomics and routine biochemical techniques. A total of 256 to 281 indices were investigated with the methods of descriptive statistic, regression analysis, and access to bioinformatics resources. It was shown that blood indices recovery from the maiden and repeated missions reflects changes in the body systems and goes at a various speed. The results of measurements made prior to launch and on day 7 after landing are dependent on the number of missions. The bioinformatics techniques showed that after maiden missions both the mediator proteins of alkaline phosphatase (AP) and blood proteins with reliably changing concentrations are associated with the bio-processes including stress, metabolism and DNA reparation, apoptosis, catabolism and proteolysis. During early re-adaptation from repeated missions the AP level was affected by bone remodeling, phosphorylation, angiogenesis and coagulation cascade suggesting a distinct and urgent trigger of the processes of bone structure and mineralization.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ann Nakashima ◽  
Oshin Vartanian ◽  
Shawn G Rhind ◽  
Kristen King ◽  
Catherine Tenn ◽  
...  

ABSTRACT Introduction Recently, there has been increasing concern about the adverse health effects of long-term occupational exposure to low-level blast in military personnel. Occupational blast exposure occurs routinely in garrison through use of armaments and controlled blast detonations. In the current study, we focused on a population of breaching instructors and range staff. Breaching is a tactical technique that is used to gain entry into closed spaces, often through the use of explosives. Materials and Methods Initial measurements of blast overpressure collected during breaching courses found that up to 10% of the blasts for range staff and up to 32% of the blasts for instructors exceeded the recommended 3 psi exposure limit. Using a cross-sectional design, we used tests of balance, ataxia, and hearing to compare a sample of breachers (n = 19) to age-and sex-matched military controls (n = 19). Results There were no significant differences between the two groups on the balance and ataxia tests, although the average scores of both groups were lower than would be expected in a normative population. The prevalence of hearing loss was low in the breacher group (4 of 19), and hearing thresholds were not significantly different from the controls. However, the prevalence of self-reported tinnitus was significantly higher in the breacher group (12 of 19) compared with the controls (4 of 19), and all breachers who were identified as having hearing loss also reported tinnitus. Conclusions Our results suggest that basic tests of balance, ataxia, and hearing on their own were not sensitive to the effects of long-term occupational exposure to low-level blast. Some of the blast exposure levels exceeded limits, and there was a significant association of exposure with tinnitus. Future studies should supplement with additional information including exposure history and functional hearing assessments. These findings should be considered in the design of future acute and longitudinal studies of low-level blast exposure.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Xin Mao ◽  
Jun Kang Chow ◽  
Pin Siang Tan ◽  
Kuan-fu Liu ◽  
Jimmy Wu ◽  
...  

AbstractAutomatic bird detection in ornithological analyses is limited by the accuracy of existing models, due to the lack of training data and the difficulties in extracting the fine-grained features required to distinguish bird species. Here we apply the domain randomization strategy to enhance the accuracy of the deep learning models in bird detection. Trained with virtual birds of sufficient variations in different environments, the model tends to focus on the fine-grained features of birds and achieves higher accuracies. Based on the 100 terabytes of 2-month continuous monitoring data of egrets, our results cover the findings using conventional manual observations, e.g., vertical stratification of egrets according to body size, and also open up opportunities of long-term bird surveys requiring intensive monitoring that is impractical using conventional methods, e.g., the weather influences on egrets, and the relationship of the migration schedules between the great egrets and little egrets.


Water ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (8) ◽  
pp. 1109
Author(s):  
Nobuaki Kimura ◽  
Kei Ishida ◽  
Daichi Baba

Long-term climate change may strongly affect the aquatic environment in mid-latitude water resources. In particular, it can be demonstrated that temporal variations in surface water temperature in a reservoir have strong responses to air temperature. We adopted deep neural networks (DNNs) to understand the long-term relationships between air temperature and surface water temperature, because DNNs can easily deal with nonlinear data, including uncertainties, that are obtained in complicated climate and aquatic systems. In general, DNNs cannot appropriately predict unexperienced data (i.e., out-of-range training data), such as future water temperature. To improve this limitation, our idea is to introduce a transfer learning (TL) approach. The observed data were used to train a DNN-based model. Continuous data (i.e., air temperature) ranging over 150 years to pre-training to climate change, which were obtained from climate models and include a downscaling model, were used to predict past and future surface water temperatures in the reservoir. The results showed that the DNN-based model with the TL approach was able to approximately predict based on the difference between past and future air temperatures. The model suggested that the occurrences in the highest water temperature increased, and the occurrences in the lowest water temperature decreased in the future predictions.


2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (Supplement_1) ◽  
pp. 559-559
Author(s):  
Sara Freed ◽  
Briana Sprague ◽  
Lesley Ross

Abstract Interventions using exercise video games, or exergames, have shown short-term cognitive and physical benefits to older adults, though long-term effects are less promising. Enjoyment of exergames may promote exergame use after the intervention period, though little work has examined older adults’ views of exergames before and after gameplay experience. We invited 20 older adults between 65 and 84 years of age (M=73.30, SD=5.95) to play two Xbox Kinect games, Just Dance and Kinect Sports Rivals, for twenty minutes. In our presentation, we will present qualitative and quantitative findings of this pilot study, including findings that older adults reported that they were not likely to play similar exergames in the future and that they did not find the exergames to be more fun compared to other ways of exercising. We will discuss implications for game design and research relevant to game developers, manufacturers, and researchers. Part of a symposium sponsored by Technology and Aging Interest Group.


Author(s):  
Nuno Batalha ◽  
Jose A. Parraca ◽  
Daniel A. Marinho ◽  
Ana Conceição ◽  
Hugo Louro ◽  
...  

The purpose of this study was to analyze the acute effects of a standardized water training session on the shoulder rotators strength and balance in age group swimmers, in order to understand whether a muscle-strengthening workout immediately after the water training is appropriate. A repeated measures design was implemented with two measurements performed before and after a standardized swim session. 127 participants were assembled in male (n = 72; age: 16.28 ± 1.55 years, height: 174.15 ± 7.89 cm, weight: 63.97 ± 6.51 kg) and female (n = 55; age: 15.29 ± 1.28 years, height: 163.03 ± 7.19 cm, weight: 52.72 ± 5.48 kg) cohorts. The isometric torque of the shoulder internal (IR) and external (ER) rotators, as well as the ER/IR ratios, were assessed using a hand-held dynamometer. Paired sample t-tests and effect sizes (Cohen’s d) were used (p ≤ 0.05). No significant differences were found on the shoulder rotators strength or balance in males after training. Females exhibited unchanged strength values after practice, but there was a considerable decrease in the shoulder rotators balance of the non-dominant limb (p < 0.01 d = 0.366). This indicates that a single practice seems not to affect the shoulders strength and balance of adolescent swimmers, but this can be a gender specific phenomenon. While muscle-strengthening workout after the water session may be appropriate for males, it can be questionable regarding females. Swimming coaches should regularly assess shoulder strength levels in order to individually identify swimmers who may or may not be able to practice muscle strengthening after the water training.


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