ABSTRACT
OBJECTIVES: The Children Using Hearing Devices Quality of Life Questionnaire (CuHDQOL) is a new parent-administered hearing-specific questionnaire for children fitted with hearing devices. The aim of this study was to assess outcomes for hearing-impaired children in Singapore using this measure, as well as to examine its applicability for use in a clinical setting. MATERIALS AND METHODS: The CuHDQOL has 26 items, uses a recall period of 1 month, and is divided into three sections: parental perspectives and expectations (eight items), impact on the family (eight items) and hearing-related quality of life (QOL) of the child (10 items). Responses are made on a 5-point Likert scale, and transformed to a score from 0-100. Twenty-two parents of children with hearing aids and 14 parents of children with cochlear implants completed the CuHDQOL. RESULTS: The mean total CuHDQOL scores was 62/100 for the children using hearing aids and 53/100 for children with cochlear implants. Scores for the children using hearing aids were higher across all subscales, with a linear regression showing this to be significant for the parental perspectives and expectations subscale (B=-10.58, P=0.041). Analyses of Variance showed that both the 'Parent Perspective and Expectations' and the 'Hearing-related QOL' subscales were significantly higher than the 'Impact on Family' subscale for both groups (P≤0.003). CONCLUSIONS: The CuHDQOL was found to be a simple, efficient questionnaire that could easily be incorporated into clinical practice to provide a more holistic evaluation of a child's outcomes post intervention, and/or to monitor their progress over time.
Subject(s)
Cochlear Implants , Hearing Aids , Parents , Quality of Life , Child, Preschool , Hearing Loss/therapy , Humans , Infant , Linear Models , Singapore , Surveys and QuestionnairesABSTRACT
The Minnan and Hakka people groups, the so-called "Taiwanese", are the descendants of early settlers from the southeast coast of China during the last few centuries. Genetically they showed affinities to southern Asian populations, as determined by phylogenetic trees and correspondence analysis calculated from HLA allele frequencies. This corresponds historically with the fact that they are the descendants of the southeast coastal indigenous population (Yueh) of China and should therefore not be considered as descendants of "pure" northern Han Chinese. A33-B58-DRB1*03 (A33-Cw10-B58-DRB1*03-DQB1*02), the most common HLA haplotype among "Taiwanese", with a haplotype frequency of 6.3%, has also been found to be the most common haplotype among Thai-Chinese and Singapore Chinese, two other populations also originating from the southeast coast of China. These observations suggests that this haplotype is the most well-conserved ancient haplotype of the Yueh.
Subject(s)
Asian People/genetics , HLA Antigens/genetics , Alleles , Female , Gene Frequency , HLA-A Antigens/genetics , HLA-B Antigens/genetics , HLA-C Antigens/genetics , HLA-DQ Antigens/genetics , HLA-DQ beta-Chains , HLA-DR Antigens/genetics , HLA-DRB1 Chains , Haplotypes , Histocompatibility Testing , Humans , Male , Phylogeny , TaiwanABSTRACT
Phosphoglucomutase-1 (PGM1) phenotyping of 1,128 Chinese blood donors was performed by thin-layer isoelectric focusing on agarose. The PGM1 gene frequencies were: 1A, 0.6005; 1B, 0.1500; 2A, 0.1510; 2B, 0.0973, and rare variants, 0.0058. The rare variants found in this series were PGM1 W21, W2, W3, W6 and W9 (or W10) with PGM1 W21 being the most common variant among Chinese with a phenotype frequency of 0.8%.
Subject(s)
Phosphoglucomutase/genetics , Polymorphism, Genetic , Alleles , Asian People/genetics , Erythrocytes/enzymology , Gene Frequency , Humans , Isoelectric Focusing , Phenotype , Phosphoglucomutase/blood , TaiwanABSTRACT
Phosphoglucomutase 1 (PGM1) phenotyping was performed in 1,128 Chinese blood donors by thin-layer isoelectric focusing on agarose. The PGM1 gene frequencies were as follows: 1A, 0.6005; 1B, 0.1500; 2A, 0.1510, 2B, 0.0973; variants, 0.0058, with W21, 0.0040. The variants found in this series were PGM1 W21, W2, W3, W6 and W9 (or W10) with PGM1 W21 being the most common variant among Chinese, having a phenotype frequency of 0.8%.
Subject(s)
Erythrocytes/enzymology , Gene Frequency/genetics , Genetic Variation/genetics , Phosphoglucomutase/genetics , China/ethnology , Female , Humans , Isoelectric Focusing , Male , Phenotype , Phosphoglucomutase/isolation & purification , TaiwanABSTRACT
A rich diversity of ancient sea urchin lineages survives to the present. These include several advanced orders as well as the cidaroids, which represent the group ancestral to all other sea urchins. Here we show that all advanced groups of sea urchins examined possess in their eggs a class of maternal messenger RNA (mRNA) encoded by the evolutionarily highly conserved alpha-subtype histone genes. The maternal histone mRNAs are unique in their time of accumulation in oogenesis, their localization in the egg nucleus and their delayed timing of translation after fertilization. Cidaroid sea urchins as well as other echinoderm classes, such as starfish and sea cucumbers, possess the genes but do not have maternal alpha-subtype histone mRNAs in their eggs. Thus, although all the echinoderms examined transcribe alpha-subtype histone genes during embryogenesis, the expression of these genes as maternal mRNAs is confined to advanced sea urchins. The fossil record allows us to pinpoint the evolution of this mode of expression of alpha-histone genes to the time of the splitting of advanced sea urchin lineages from the ancestral cidaroids in a radiation which occurred in a relatively brief interval of time approximately 190-200 Myr ago. The origin of a unique gene regulatory mechanism can thus be correlated with a set of macroevolutionary events.
