Patterns of Avoiding Nutrition Mistakes in Metropolitan Adolescents Are Associated with Sex, Nutrition Knowledge, Physical Activity, and Family Environment.

A comprehensive approach to the identification of the relationship between behaviors limiting nutrition mistakes, nutrition knowledge, and physical activity in the context of the family environment has not yet been widely explored. We aim to identify patterns of avoiding nutrition mistakes in high school students from Warsaw, Poland, and to assess their associations with nutrition knowledge (NK), physical activity (PA), body mass index (BMI), demographic, and family environment characteristics. A cross-sectional study involving 616 high school students, aged 16-19, was conducted. The data were collected by distributing questionnaires. The k-means method was used for cluster analysis, and logistic regression was used to assess the adherence to identified patterns. We identified three patterns: Prudent Ones (45%), Inconsequent (39%), and Rebels (16%). About 70% of adolescents had insufficient NK. The adherence to the Rebels pattern was lower by 85 % in girls, by 68% in students with younger siblings, and was about 4.0-times higher in children of mothers with primary education, 2.4 times higher in students with insufficient NK, and 1.9-times higher in students living in a family with more than 4 persons. The groups of adolescents with feature characteristics of the Rebels and Inconsequent are possible targets for intervention and require further in-depth research to explain their lack of attempts to avoid nutrition mistakes. The results clearly indicate the necessity of including metropolitan teenage boys in effective nutritional education for the rationalization of their dietary behavior.

α-Tocopherol Protects the Heart, Muscles, and Testes from Lipid Peroxidation in Growing Male Rats Subjected to Physical Efforts.

The effect of α-tocopherol supplementation on adaptation to training is still equivocal. The aim of the study was to determine the effect of training and α-tocopherol supplementation on α-tocopherol and thiobarbituric acid reactive substance (TBARS) concentration in the rat liver, heart, muscles, and testes. Male Wistar rats (n = 32) were divided into four groups (nonsupplemented, not trained-C; nonsupplemented, trained-CT; supplemented, not trained-E; supplemented and trained-ET). During the 14-day experimental period, 2 mg/d of vitamin E as α-tocopherol acetate was administered to the animals (groups E and ET). Rats in the training group (CT and ET) were subjected to 15 minutes of treadmill running each day. The α-tocopherol levels in rat tissues were assessed using high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC). Lipid peroxides were determined by TBARS spectrophotometric method. α-Tocopherol had a significant impact on α-tocopherol concentration in all tissues. Training increased the α-tocopherol concentration in the heart and muscles but reduced it in the liver. Training also caused increased lipid peroxidation in the muscles, heart, and testes; but a higher α-tocopherol content in tissues reduced the TBARS level. The main finding of the study is that impaired α-tocopherol status and its adequate intake is needed to maintain optimal status to prevent damage to the skeletal and cardiac muscles as well as the testes in growing individuals.

Optimisation of ANN topology for predicting the rehydrated apple cubes colour change using RSM and GA.

In this study, an efficient optimisation method by combining response surface methodology (RSM) and genetic algorithm (GA) is introduced to find the optimal topology of artificial neural networks (ANNs) for predicting colour changes in rehydrated apple cubes. A multi-layered feed-forward backpropagation ANN model of algorithms was developed to correlate one output (colour change) to four input variables (drying air temperature, drying air velocity, temperature of distilled water and rehydration time). A predictive model for ANN topology in terms of the best mean squared error (MSE) performance on validation samples was created using RSM. RSM model was integrated with an effective GA to find the optimum topology of ANN. The optimum ANN had minimum MSE when the number of hidden neurons, learning rate, momentum constant, number of epochs and number of training runs were 13, 0.33, 0.89, 3869 and 3, respectively. MSE of optimal ANN topology on validation samples was 0.0072095. It turned out that the optimal ANN topology can be considered as more precise for predicting colour change in the rehydrated apple cubes. Mean absolute error and regression coefficient (R) of the optimal ANN topology were determined as 0.0259 and 0.96475 for training, 0.0399 and 0.95243 for testing and 0.0264 and 0.95151 for validation data sets. The results of the testing model on new samples showed excellent agreement between the actual and predicted data with coefficient of determination R2 = 0.97.

Assessment of the Surgical Treatment Results in Patients with Colorectal Cancer in a District Hospital Versus Treatment Results in a Highly Specialized Center.

UNLABELLED: In Poland there there are about 15-16 thousand cases of colon cancer per year. The health care system allows the treatment of patients with colorectal cancer in highly specialized hospitals, oncology centers and district hospitals. The results of treatment within different reference level differ. The aim of the study was to evaluate the results of surgical treatment of patients with colorectal cancer at a district hospitals compared with the results of highly specialized center. MATERIAL AND METHODS: A retrospective study. The material consisted of 171 consecutively operated patients diagnosed with colorectal cancer treated in the Department of Surgery, District Hospital in Wolomin. The control group consisted of 200 patients treated surgically at the Department of General and Colorectal Surgery, University Hospital in Lódz. In both centers, the patients were operated on by surgeons with experience in operations on the large bowel. The demographic data, information on the type of indication (elective vs emergent), and the severity of the disease by AJCC / TNM scale were collected. In the district hospital there were patients with more advanced disease (p <0.001), older (p = 0.0001), and often operated under emergent indication (p = 0.0001). The telephone survey collected data on survival or the date of death of the patient and set the percentage of five-year survival. RESULTS: The proportion of five-year survival in the study group and control group was respectively 46% and 71% (p <0.0001). The percentage of five-year survival among patients undergoing elective procedure in both centers were respectively for Wolomin and Lódz 58% and 73% (p = 0.008). The proportion of 5-year survival among "younger" patients (<70) was respectively in Wolomin and Lódz 64% and 81% (p = 0.004) for "older" patients with (> 70) 50% and 60% (p = 0.6747) Conclusions. Overall results of surgical treatment of patients with colorectal cancer in the district hospital are inferior to treatment results in a highly specialized center. The population treated in the district hospital is statistically significantly different in comparison to patients treated in highly specialized center. The following differences were captured: severity of the disease, age and type of indication (elective vs emergent). The diffrences has an influence on the outcomes. The five years survival for patients > 70 years undergoing elective procedure is not statistically different between the district hospital and highly specialized center.

Neck sweat gland cancer hemorrhage. Case study.

BACKGROUND: This paper reports a case of an 87-year-old female patient who was admitted for an emergency operation due to massive hemorrhage of an ulceration localized on a huge neck tumor. Post-interventional diagnosis indicated hidradenocarcinoma. Hidradenocarcinoma is a rare skin neoplasm. It can coincide with adenoma, may develop through its malignant transformation or develop as a malignant tumor from the beginning. It may be found in all dermal localizations. It may develop metastases or appear in the diffuse form. MATERIAL AND METHODS: Surgical excision of the tumor was performed obtaining a surgical margin, completed with excision of local lymph nodes and multiple layer suturing. Due to lack of the patient's consent, she has not been qualified for adjuvant therapy. RESULTS: Control examination 6 and 12 months later showed no signs of local recurrence or lymph node metastasis. CONCLUSION: Surgical excision of apocrine hidradenocarcinoma with a surgical margin could present a good therapeutic effect in spite of lack of adjuvant therapy.