Nationwide stature estimation from armspan measurements in Albanian youngsters / Estimación de estatura a nivel nacional a partir de mediciones de envergadura en jóvenes albaneses

The purpose of this research is to examine stature in both Albanian sexes as well as its association with arm span, as an alternative to estimating stature. A total of 445 individuals (266 boys and 179 girls) participated in this research. The anthropometric measurements were taken according to the protocol of ISAK. The relationships between stature and arm span were determined using simple correlation coefficients at a 95 % confidence interval. Then a linear regression analysis was carried out to examine extent to which arm span can reliably predict stature. Results displayed that Albanian boys are 176.57±7.36 cm tall and have an arm span of 179.98±9.41 cm, while Albanian girls are 166.84±9.28 cm tall and have an arm span of 167.53±10.34 cm. The results have shown that both sexes made Albanians a tall nation but not even close to their male compatriots from Kosovo that are almost 3 centimeters taller, while the results in female population are opposite. Moreover, the arm span reliably predicts stature in both sexes, which confirms a high R-square (%) for the boys (73.4) as well as for the girls (78.8).

El objetivo de esta investigación fue examinar la estatura en individuos de ambos sexos albaneses, además de su asociación con la extensión del brazo, como una alternativa a la estimación de la estatura. Un total de 445 individuos (266 niños y 179 niñas) participaron en esta investigación. Las medidas antropométricas se tomaron de acuerdo con el protocolo de ISAK. Las relaciones entre la estatura y el brazo se determinaron utilizando coeficientes de correlación simples en un intervalo de confianza del 95 %. Luego se realizó un análisis de regresión lineal para examinar en qué medida el brazo puede predecir de manera confiable la estatura. Los resultados muestran que los niños albaneses miden 176,57 ± 7,36 cm de alto y tienen una medida del brazo de 179,98 ± 9,41 cm, mientras que las niñas albanesas miden 166,84 ± 9,28 cm de alto y tienen una medida del brazo de 167,53 ± 10,34 cm. Los resultados han demostrado una altura importante en ambos sexos de la población albanesa. Sin embargo, se observó que respecto de la altura los varones de Kosovo miden casi 3 centímetros más, mientras que en la población femenina se observó lo contrario. Además, la extensión del brazo predice de manera confiable la estatura en ambos sexos, lo que confirma un alto Rcuadrado (%) para los varones (73,4) y para las mujeres (78,8).

Assessing the relationship between multimorbidity and depression in older men and women: the International Mobility in Aging Study (IMIAS).

Objectives: Our study aims to assess whether multimorbidity is an independent risk factor for the development of depression in older adults living in Canada, Brazil, Colombia, and Albania and examines differences in incidence of depression regarding social and psychosocial characteristics.Methods: The longitudinal International Mobility Aging Study (IMIAS) collected information from adults between 65-74 years old. Depression was defined by a 16 or higher score assessed by the Centre for Epidemiological Studies Depression (CES-D) Scale. Multimorbidity was defined as having two or more chronic conditions, which were self-reported by participants using a list of eight physical chronic conditions. Poisson regression was performed to estimate the relative risk of depression in older adults with multimorbidity compared to those living with 0-1 chronic conditions, adjusting for sex, age, education, number of doctor visits, degree of assistance needed, social support, and smoking status. The analysis was stratified by study region (Canada; Latin America; Albania).Results: Crude and adjusted models showed no statistically significant associations between multimorbidity and the incidence of depression in any of the study regions, confirmed by sensitivity analyses. However, the incidence of depression varied across study region, confirmed by the intra-class correlation coefficient which indicated that 13% of variations in depression incidence were due to geographic differences.Conclusion: Multimorbidity does not appear to increase the risk of developing depression in older adults between 65-74. Higher rates of depression in Latin America and Albania (compared to Canada) may be attributed to lifecourse exposures to social and economic adversity in these regions.