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Biomedical subjects

S Chapman

Publications and source records attributed to S Chapman.

At least 325 records · Page 18Linked to original sources
PubMed1990

Antibody response after hepatitis B immunisation in a group of health care workers.

Hepatitis B immunisation has been offered to staff of Hampstead Health Authority since 1982 and is now offered to all staff with clinical contact. Three doses of 20 micrograms of vaccine are given at zero, one, and six months and the antibody response is measured three months later. Results were analysed to seek for associations with the antibody response. At the time of analysis, 2739 people had started vaccination and 1067 had completed the course and had a measurement of antibody response. Vaccine injections were initially into the buttock and later into the arm; measurement of antibody levels was initially by radioimmunoassay (RIA) and later by enzyme immunoassay (EIA). A positive antibody response was defined as a positive/negative ratio of greater than 10 for RIA or a level of greater than 10 mIU/ml for EIA. Associations between antibody response and other variables were tested by chi 2 and a multiple logistic regression analysis was undertaken to examine the effects of variables in combination. The overall antibody response rate was 95%. Men and women did not respond differently but there were significantly more positive responses with the EIA testing method and a tendency for more positive responses with arm injections. The responders were significantly younger than the non-responders and had significantly lower values of body mass index (wt/ht2).(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

Adult↗
PubMed1990

Discriminant attitudes and beliefs about condoms in young, multi-partner heterosexuals.

Four hundred and eight people aged 15-35 years who reported having more than one sexual partner of the opposite sex in the past year or who thought it likely that they would do so in the next year were surveyed about their sexual behaviour, concern about acquired immunodeficiency syndrome and sexually transmitted diseases and attitudes to condom use. Differences in concerns and attitudes between regular and non- or irregular condom users and between men and women are reported. Three conceptually coherent factors (condom use as positive action; condom use as cue to embarrassment; and condom use as antithetical to good sex) discriminated between users and non-users. Implications for health promotion campaigns designed to promote condom use are discussed.

Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome↗
PubMed1990

Effects of workplace smoking bans on cigarette consumption.

A sample of staff working in the Australian Public Service (n = 2113) were surveyed two to four weeks before a mandated total ban on workplace smoking was introduced, and again five to six months later. Among the 391 smokers on whom complete data were available, the workplace smoking bans were associated with reduced rates of smoking, particularly among heavier smokers where the reduction in consumption was over 25 percent.

Australia↗
PubMed1990

Tobacco excise and declining tobacco consumption: the case of Papua New Guinea.

Excise elasticities of demand for non-cigarette tobacco and cigarettes were calculated for Papua New Guinea for the 14 years 1973-86. Respectively, these were -0.50 and -0.71. This means that 10 percent increases in cigarette and non-cigarette tobacco excise are associated with an estimated 7.1 percent fall in demand for cigarettes and a 5 percent decrease in the demand for tobacco. As tax (excise) elasticities would normally be significantly smaller than price elasticities, these results imply that the consumption of cigarettes and tobacco in Papua New Guinea are more responsive to prices than in the United States and other Western countries. The level of excise is therefore an important and practical instrument for the control of consumption. These elasticities appear to be the first reported for a developing country. It is suggested that if they are indicative of consumer behavior in lower income countries then increasing tobacco and cigarette excise should be considered as an important strategy for the control of smoking in these countries which, because of their large populations, are huge markets for tobacco products and thus major targets for tobacco control measures.

Developing Countries↗
PubMed1990

Why the tobacco industry fears the passive smoking issue.

The tobacco industry has identified the passive smoking issue as the single most important problem confronting its economic future. During the 1980s, the industry has been engaged in an elaborate and expensive international campaign seeking to refute the evidence against passive smoking's effects on health and to position the issue as one essentially concerned with civil liberties and smokers' "rights." There are three main reasons for the industry's concern: first, the passive smoking issue allows a widening of the definition of smoking beyond its discussion as a personal habit, legitimizing it as a social problem; second, successful cases of litigation against employers by workers with histories of chronic exposure to environmental tobacco smoke have created an industrial climate of concern leading to workplace smoking restrictions and bans, and third, the proliferation of smoking restrictions reduces smoking opportunities and thus reduces total cigarette consumption and hence financial returns to the industry. Based on the results of a large Australian study of a workplace smoking ban, an estimated 654.88 million cigarettes with a retail value of $A6,549 thousand would be forgone annually in Australia alone if 50 percent of white-collar worksites were to ban smoking. Finally, the passive smoking issue can be considered a Trojan horse to its less discussed effects: the reduced morbidity and mortality likely to result in smokers from the significant reductions in smoking frequency that occur with the proliferation of smoking restrictions introduced in the name of concern for the health of nonsmokers.

Commerce↗
PubMed1990

Neuroendocrine aspects of cerebral aging.

In their study of the neuroendocrine aspects of cerebral aging the authors review the effect of glucocorticoids, their participation in the mechanisms of neuronal loss and their beneficial and destructive effects. They discuss the treatment strategies for showing the destructive aspects of aging and the effect of acetyl-L-carnitine in rats. They conclude that age-related degeneration of neural tissue is the complex result of multiple factors which synergize to cause neural destruction, including endogenous excitatory amino acids, calcium ions, endogenous proteolytic enzymes, free radicals and circulating glucocorticoids. It is considered that acetyl-L-carnitine may have protective effects in rats.

Aging↗
PubMed1989

Staff members' acceptance of the introduction of workplace smoking bans in the Australian public service.

The acceptability to employees of workplace smoking bans is an important factor in their introduction and in subsequent compliance. This study describes the acceptance by affected staff members before the ban on smoking in Australian public-service premises. Four thousand, two hundred and fifteen (79% of those who were approached) public servants were surveyed from areas of six departments across three states. Twenty-five per cent of the sample were current smokers. Support for the bans was strong, with 76% of the sample approving over all. Approval among smokers was less, with 40% of smokers approving, compared with 82% of ex-smokers and 90% of "never" smokers. Thus, the results show a generally favourable attitudinal milieu among employees who were facing an impending ban on smoking, and far-from-unanimous opposition from smokers. Among smokers, acceptance of the bans was predictable from the attitudes towards smoking acceptance of the bans was predictable from the attitudes towards smoking in general, and from the perceived impact of the bans on smokers. The existence of restrictions on smoking at the time of the survey was associated with slightly higher levels of approval of the impending total ban, especially when the restrictions were not seen as being imposed on the respondents by others.

Attitude↗
PubMed1989

Sexual practices and "beats": AIDS-related sexual practices in a sample of homosexual and bisexual men in the western area of Sydney.

One hundred and seventy-six men who had engaged in sexual activity with other men in the past six months were interviewed, in the western area of Sydney, about their sexual activities and knowledge as related to the acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS). Comparisons were made between men who had frequented "beats" (public toilets, parks or isolated roads where men meet for homosexual encounters) in the past six months, and those who did not use beats. One-quarter of those men who frequented beats reported beats as their only venue for meeting men for sexual contact, while other men reported them as one of many venues that they used to meet men. Although all interviewed men were engaging in sexual activities with men, 12 men described themselves as heterosexual, and 12% of those men who used beats, and 7% of the beat non-users, were married or in de-facto relationships. In comparing those who used beats with the beat non-users, 64% of beat users had engaged in sexual practices with between six and 50 different partners in the past six months compared with 8% of beat non-users. Beat users also were more likely to engage in unprotected anal intercourse with causal partners. Nineteen men claimed to be HIV-seropositive for the human immunodeficiency virus, with 11 of these men still engaging in high-risk sexual activities. The implications for AIDS education are discussed.

Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome↗
PubMed1989

A potential source for the transmission of the human immunodeficiency virus into the heterosexual population: bisexual men who frequent "beats".

Fifty-four actively bisexual men with recent sexual experiences with both men and women were interviewed as part of a wider study of 176 homosexual men, many of whom frequented "beats" (public toilets, parks and isolated roads where men meet for homosexual encounters). Forty-six per cent of the bisexual men were engaging in unsafe sexual practices with at least one man and one woman. Three of these men knew that they were seropositive for the human immunodeficiency virus, with two of these men engaging in unsafe sexual practices with some of their partners. Fewer than one-quarter of the bisexual men identified with or participated actively in aspects of organized, overt "gay" culture. So-called "closeted" bisexual men are suggested to be a major, but neglected, target for educational efforts against the acquired immunodeficiency syndrome.

Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome↗
PubMed1989

A new type of lethal short-limbed dwarfism.

Details are presented of a most unusual osteo-chondrodysplasia which presents with lethal neonatal short-limbed dwarfism, defective ossification and nodular calcification within cartilage. The features resemble one case previously described in the literature. We wish to present a new type of lethal short-limbed dwarfism which has presented in one family. Three affected infants have been born to unaffected parents who are first cousins. The third affected infant is reported in detail and the radiological signs of all three sibs are summarised in Table 1. There are also two healthy children, a boy and a girl, born at term.

Female↗
PubMed1989

Calcification of an aneurysm of the vein of Galen.

A 3.5 month old boy was diagnosed as having hydrocephalus secondary to an aneurysm of the vein of Galen. Cerebral angiography 2 1/2 years later showed the aneurysm to be completely occluded and CT demonstrated it to be thrombosed and completely calcified. Complete calcification of an aneurysm of the vein of Galen has only been described on two previous occasions and never in a child this young.

Calcinosis↗
PubMed1989

The limitations of econometric analysis in cigarette advertising studies.

Econometric analysis of the relationship between advertising and smoking has assumed a position of prominence in debate between public health and tobacco industry interests. Econometric methods are intrinsically limited in their ability to address the essential qualitative nature of advertising because they are obliged to assign arbitrary quantitative values to a medium where such assignation is highly debatable. The same problems occur when econometric methods attempt to assign values to other qualitative variables like health education campaigns and changing cultural factors relevant to smoking. Rather than commencing with the question 'what does advertising to do people', an alternative research paradigm which asks 'what do people do with advertising' should underpin research into advertising 'effects'.

Advertising↗
PubMed1989

Dysphagia due to oesophageal web.

An 8 year old boy developed a recurrent sensation of food sticking in his throat during meal times. Barium swallow examination showed an anterior oesophageal web at the level of C5. Symptoms disappeared after pharyngoscopy and dilatation of the web.

Child↗