ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND: Epidemiological studies on viral hepatitis (VH) using new technologies raise ethical issues especially concerning community-based studies on seroprevalence (CSS), sentinel surveillance-based studies (SBS) the use of blood-bank registers (BBR) and serum stocks (SS). METHODS: Positive (PA) and negative (NA) aspects of these different designs are discussed, pointing to alternatives, according to Resolution CNS n masculine 196/96. RESULTS: Priority for research is justified by VH magnitude, severity, and vulnerability, and need for development of diagnosis/therapy protocols and prevention/control strategies. With respect to CSS, PA was identified as: subject autonomy; adequate samples and as NA: costs override benefits, and availability of information from other sources. In relation to SBS, PA are: VH monitoring has lower operational costs than CSS; absence of additional injuries to subject; while NA is: relative restriction of representativeness. For BBR, PA is: the low cost of monitoring of HBV/HCV in blood donors and with no additional risk. PA has limited representativeness. SS studies present as PA: benefits higher than risks/costs; possibility of identification of new morbidity and offering of adequate diagnosis and treatment. NA is: biological material and research data can be used for other researches. CONCLUSION: The choice of study designs must take into account arguments for ethical investigation and consensus on the use of new technology.
Subject(s)
Biomedical Research/ethics , Ethics, Research , Hepatitis, Viral, Human/epidemiology , Humans , Seroepidemiologic StudiesABSTRACT
This issue features facsimiles of Regimento proueytoso contra ha pestenença and Modus curandi cum balsamo, based on the original texts housed in the Biblioteca Pública de Evora and the Biblioteca Nacional de Portugal, respectively. Semi-diplomatic editions of both facsimiles--with transliterations into modern characters--have also been provided. These are followed by translations, in the case of Regimento from old to modern Portuguese and in the case of Modus curandi from Latin to modern-day Portuguese. This text explains the criteria used in preparing the semi-diplomatic versions and in modernizing the text of Regimento.
Subject(s)
Publishing , Textbooks as Topic/history , History, 16th Century , PortugalABSTRACT
Regimento proueytoso contra ha pestenença and Modus curandi cum balsamo are probably the first texts addressing the prevention and treatment of diseases to be printed in Portugal. Their authorship and historical context are discussed elsewhere in this journal. Here we would like to raise some questions concerning the 'medical discourse' found in the texts and compare these with others from the eighteenth century. The authors chosen for the sake of comparison are two Portuguese--Luiz Gomes Ferreyra and João Curvo Semmedo--and one Englishman, John Huxham, author of An Essay on Fevers, which includes a lengthy discussion of smallpox, Europe's eighteenth-century 'plague'. It is our belief that these works, written in the early days of 'scientific medicine', represent a bridge between medieval/Renaissance texts and current medical compendia. They allow us to raise questions about the therapeutic indications and diagnostic criteria found in the documents.
Subject(s)
Balsams/history , Phytotherapy/history , Plague/history , Textbooks as Topic/history , History, 16th Century , History, 18th Century , History, 19th Century , History, 20th Century , History, Medieval , PortugalABSTRACT
The main goal of the following glossary is to work as a support to the reading of Regimento proueytoso contra ha pestenença. For this reason it includes every word in the text. However, since it may interest one concerned with the history of Portuguese, the glossary was supplied with additional information on orthography and on the original form of the words.
Subject(s)
Terminology as Topic , Textbooks as Topic/history , History, 16th Century , Language , PortugalABSTRACT
OBJECTIVE: To assess school teachers' level of knowledge on prevention of viral hepatitis (VH). MATERIAL AND METHODS: A cross-sectional study was conducted in three cities of Brazil, from August to November of 1999. The sample was composed of 360 subjects: 334 women and 26 men, 81 (22.5%) from Belém, 123 (34.2%) from Natal and 156 (43.3%) from Rio de Janeiro. Cultural differences in knowledge were identified using a questionnaire to classify, according to semantic content, categories of transmission and preventive practices. Responses were scored as right or wrong. Data were tabulated and analyzed using EPIINFO 6.04 and open answers were classified according to semantic content. Comparison of the answer frequencies between cities was done through the chi-square test. RESULTS: Transmission category (TC) (n = 837 answers) and prevention category (PC) (n = 771 answers) "food- and waterborne" transmission items were the most frequently mentioned (40%). For TC, "food- and waterborne" answers were followed by "bloodborne" (16%), "inadequate knowledge" (9%), "possible causes of hepatic disease" (9%), and "sexual transmission" (7%) answers. For PC items, "food- and waterborne" answers were followed by "general aspects of prevention" (13%), "immunization" (9%), "quality of health services" (8%) and "sexual prevention" (5%) items. "Right" scores for transmission mechanisms and prevention practices varied from zero to 80%. CONCLUSIONS: Study findings suggest that investments should be made to disseminate appropriate knowledge on VH prevention, mainly addressing sexual transmission and intravenous drug use.
Subject(s)
Health Education/methods , Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice , Hepatitis, Viral, Human/prevention & control , Hepatitis, Viral, Human/transmission , Adolescent , Adult , Brazil , Cross-Sectional Studies , Female , Humans , Male , Middle Aged , Preventive Medicine/methods , Surveys and QuestionnairesABSTRACT
Paleopathology is the study of disease, physiological disruptions and impairment in the past. After two centuries of mainly descriptive studies, efforts are being made towards better methodological approaches to the study of diseases in human populations of ancient times whose remains are recovered by archaeology. Paleoepidemiology can be defined as an interdisciplinary area that aims to develop more suitable epidemiological methods, and to apply those in current use, to the study of disease determinants in human populations in the past. In spite of the limits of funerary or other archaeological series of human remains, paleoepidemiology tries to reconstruct past conditions of disease and health in those populations and its relation to lifestyle and environment. Although considering the limits of studying populations of deceased, most of them represented exclusively by bones and teeth, the frequency of lesions and other biological signs of interest to investigations on health, and their relative distribution in the skeletal remains by age and sex, can be calculated, and interpreted according to the ecological and cultural information available in each case. Building better models for bone pathology and bone epidemiology, besides a more complex theoretical frame for paleoepidemiological studies is a big job for the future that will need the incorporation of methods and technology from many areas, including the tools of molecular biology.
