Does Internet Use Affect Medical Decisions among Older Adults in China? Evidence from CHARLS

Background: The rapid growth of the elderly population poses a huge challenge for people to access medical services. The key to get rid of the dilemma is for patients to go firstly to primary medical institutions. Existing studies have identified numerous factors that can affect patients’ health institution choice. However, we currently know little about the role of Internet use in the patients’ medical decisions. The objective of this study is to explore health-seeking behavior and institution choice under the background of the Internet era from the perspective of older adults, and to analyze whether the Internet could guide patients to the appropriate medical institution so as to accomplish hierarchical treatment. Methods: The dataset comprises 9416 people aged 45 or above from the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Survey (CHARLS), which, through multistage cluster sampling, was conducted in 2011, 2013, and 2015. Logistic regression, PSM, and FE model are used to estimate the influence of Internet use on the health care decision-making behavior. Results: Internet use has a significant positive impact on the self-treatment of common diseases (β = 0.05, p < 0.05). In terms of medical institution choices, those who use Internet are more inclined to choose top-level hospitals than community health service institutions to treat common diseases (β = 0.06, p < 0.01). Conclusions: The Internet has lowered the obstacles to learning about common ailments, resulting in a substitution impact of self-treatment for hospital care. However, Internet use may aggravate older adults’ perception of the risk of disease, which exacerbates the tendency of going to higher-level medical institutions for medical treatment. The finding of the study is useful for further rational planning and utilization of the Internet in order to guide patients to appropriate medical institution, which helps to improve the efficiency of the overall medical and health services.

Indigestible Foreign Bodies in the Rumen-reticulum of Cattle Slaughtered at Batna Slaughterhouse, Algeria: A Postmortem Study

Background: To determine the prevalence of indigestible foreign bodies in rumen-reticulum of cattle. Identify the types and the common diseases associated with their occurrence. 289 cattle were examined at Batna (Algeria) municipal abattoir. Methods: About 289 cattle were examined immediately after slaughtering to determine the presence or absence of the foreign bodies in their rumen-reticulum and different lesions were recorded. Result: From total of 289 cattle examined 151 (52.24%) were found positive for various types of foreign bodies in their rumen and/or reticulum. From each 56 (19.37%) and 95 (52.24%) were positive for vulnerable bodies and non-vulnerable foreign bodies respectively. The types of foreign bodies detected were: wire segments, needles, nails, hair clips, coins, corks, ropes, cloth, pebbles, sand, glass pieces, trichobezoar, plastic bags. The plastics were the most common found in 61 (23.92%) males and 34 (79.06%) females. The most common lesions in rumen of cattle with Foreign bodies were traumatic reticuloperitonitis, perirecticular abscess, esophageal obstruction, non penetrating reticulum and/or ruminal foreign bodies were respectively 3.79%, 12.65%, 1.26% and 82.27%. The study revealed that the plastics in rumen my play an important role in the pathologenesis of cattle.

Changes in mortality trends amongst common diseases during the COVID-19 pandemic in Sweden

Objective: It has been found that COVID-19 increases deaths within common diseases in countries that have implemented strict lockdowns. In order to elucidate the proper national response to a pandemic, the mortality rates within COVID-19 and various diseases need to be studied in countries whose pandemic response differ. Sweden represents a country with lax pandemic restrictions, and we aimed to study the effects of COVID-19 on historical mortality rates within common diseases during 2020. Methods: Regression models and moving averages were used to predict expected premature mortality per the ICD-10 during 2020 using historical data sets. Predicted values were then compared to recorded premature mortality to identify changes in mortality trends. Results: Seasonal increased mortality was found within neurological diseases. Infectious diseases, tumours and cardiac disease mortality rates decreased compared to expected outcome. Conclusions: Changes in mortality trends were observed for several common diseases during the COVID-19 pandemic. Neurological and cardiac conditions, infections and tumours are examples of diseases that were heavily affected by the pandemic. The indirect effects of COVID-19 on certain patient populations should be considered when determining pandemic impact.

Lymphatic self-massage for enhancing immunity during a pandemic

The article is devoted to the problem of improving immunity during the COVID-19 pandemic and the related effect of lymphatic self-massage.The article analyzes the general concepts of the lymphatic system and its functions, as well as lymphatic self-massage and its effect on cardiovascular and lymphatic systems.It is noted that the lymph flow stimulation through movements activates and normalizes the most important body functions. Using Skype, the authors surveyed medical students about knowledge on benefits and techniques of lymphatic selfmassage.Further, a master class was held on the technique of lymphatic self-massage. The authors studied the awareness of students about the benefits of lymphatic selfmassage, revealed a tendency to chronic diseases and assessed the benefits after the procedure.Based on the data obtained, it was revealed that viral infections, namely COVID-19, provoke one of the most common diseases — autoimmune thyroiditis. So, 64% of the respondents noted about it.Using lymphatic self-massage, the manifestations of this pathology decreases, the facial muscles relax and the blood and lymph outflow improves.Thus, there is an undoubted benefit of lymphatic self-massage for the prevention of diseases with immune involvement, including COVID-19.

Sporadic, late-onset, and multistage diseases

Somatic mutations can cause cancer and have recently been linked with a range of non-malignant diseases. Multistage models can characterise how mutations lead to cancer, and may also be applicable to these other diseases. Here we found the incidence of over 60% of common diseases in UK Biobank were consistent with a multistage model with an ordered sequence of stages, as approximated by a Weibull distribution, with the log of incidence linearly related to the log of age and the slope often interpreted as the number of stages. A model where the stages can occur in any order was also explored, as was stratification by smoking and diabetes status. Most importantly, we find that many diseases are low risk when young but then become inevitable in old age, but many other diseases do not, being more sporadic with a modest and modifiable risk that slowly increases with age.

Polygenic adaptation is not a major driver of disparities in disease mortality across global populations

Background and objectives: Health disparities are due to a range of socioeconomic and biological causes, and many common diseases have a genetic basis. Divergent evolutionary histories cause allele frequencies at disease-associated loci to differ across global populations. To what extent are differences in disease risks due to natural selection? Methodology: Examining a panel of nine global populations, we identified which of the 20 most common causes of death have the largest health disparities. Polygenic risk scores were computed and compared for 11 common diseases for the same nine populations. We then used PolyGraph to test whether differences in disease risk can be attributed to polygenic adaptation. Finally, we compared human development index statistics and polygenic risk scores to mortality rates for each population. Results: Among common causes of death, HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis exhibited the greatest disparities in mortality rates. Focusing on common polygenic diseases, we found that genetic predictions of disease risk varied across global populations (including elevated risks of lung cancer in Europeans). However, polygenic adaptation tests largely yielded negative results when applied to common diseases. Our analyses revealed that natural selection was not a major cause of differences in disease risks across global populations. We also found that correlations between mortality rates and human development index statistics were stronger than correlations between mortality rates and polygenic predictions of disease risks. Conclusions and implications: Although evolutionary history contributes to differences in disease risks, health disparities are largely due to socioeconomic and other environmental factors.

Extensive Myocardial Infarction complicated with Stroke as First Presentation of HIV in A young Sudanese Male: Case Report

HIV can be associated with cardiovascular complications. We highlight unusual presentation of HIV patient with MI and stroke. 30 year old HIV male presented with MI complicated by stroke. Recovered within 5 days with anti-ischemic and diuretics. Screening tests for unusual presentations prevent fatal complications of common diseases.