Salud en Mexico. PLOS Medicine

Characterizing the Epidemiological Transition in Mexico: National and Subnational Burden of Diseases, Injuries, and Risk Factors

Gretchen Stevens1,2,3*, Rodrigo H. Dias2, Kevin J. A. Thomas4, Juan A. Rivera5, Natalie Carvalho2, Simón Barquera5, Kenneth Hill2, Majid Ezzati1,2

1 Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, Massachusetts, United States of America, 2 Harvard Initiative for Global Health, Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States of America, 3 World Health Organization, Geneva, Switzerland, 4 Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania, United States of America, 5 Instituto Nacional de Salud Pública, Cuernavaca, Mexico

Background

Rates of diseases and injuries and the effects of their risk factors can have substantial subnational heterogeneity, especially in middle-income countries like Mexico. Subnational analysis of the burden of diseases, injuries, and risk factors can improve characterization of the epidemiological transition and identify policy priorities.

Methods and Findings

We estimated deaths and loss of healthy life years (measured in disability-adjusted life years [DALYs]) in 2004 from a comprehensive list of diseases and injuries, and 16 major risk factors, by sex and age for Mexico and its states. Data sources included the vital statistics, national censuses, health examination surveys, and published epidemiological studies. Mortality statistics were adjusted for underreporting, misreporting of age at death, and for misclassification and incomparability of cause-of-death assignment. Nationally, noncommunicable diseases caused 75% of total deaths and 68% of total DALYs, with another 14% of deaths and 18% of DALYs caused by undernutrition and communicable, maternal, and perinatal diseases. The leading causes of death were ischemic heart disease, diabetes mellitus, cerebrovascular disease, liver cirrhosis, and road traffic injuries. High body mass index, high blood glucose, and alcohol use were the leading risk factors for disease burden, causing 5.1%, 5.0%, and 7.3% of total burden of disease, respectively. Mexico City had the lowest mortality rates (4.2 per 1,000) and the Southern region the highest (5.0 per 1,000); under-five mortality in the Southern region was nearly twice that of Mexico City. In the Southern region undernutrition and communicable, maternal, and perinatal diseases caused 23% of DALYs; in Chiapas, they caused 29% of DALYs. At the same time, the absolute rates of noncommunicable disease and injury burdens were highest in the Southern region (105 DALYs per 1,000 population versus 97 nationally for noncommunicable diseases; 22 versus 19 for injuries).

Conclusions

Mexico is at an advanced stage in the epidemiologic transition, with the majority of the disease and injury burden from noncommunicable diseases. A unique characteristic of the epidemiological transition in Mexico is that overweight and obesity, high blood glucose, and alcohol use are responsible for larger burden of disease than other noncommunicable disease risks such as tobacco smoking. The Southern region is least advanced in the epidemiological transition and suffers from the largest burden of ill health in all disease and injury groups.

Controles internos RTPCR

Accurate normalization of real-time quantitative RT-PCR data by geometric averaging of multiple internal control genes

Genome Biology 2002, 3:research0034.1-0034.11doi:10.1186/gb-2002-3-7-research0034

Por favor lean este articulo. Todos aquellos que usen o vayan a usar RT PCR se beneficiaran de este. Valdria la pena estandarizar para cada linea celular
http://genomebiology.com/2002/3/7/research/0034

10 reglas para hacer la mejor ciencia

  1. Drop modesty (strive for excellence)
  2. Prepare your mind (luck favors the prepared minds)
  3. Age is important (research strategies should be different depending on your age, although I’m not sure I agree with that one)
  4. Brains are not enough, you also need courage (I assume this means taking risks)
  5. Make the best of your working condition (don’t let your environment limit you, but exploit the advantages you have)
  6. Work hard and effectively (all the successful scientists I know are workaholics)
  7. Believe and doubt your hypothesis at the same time (so be skeptical and accept data for what it is, but don’t give up on ideas before you test them)
  8. Work on the important problems in your field (work on something interesting and relevant, no matter what the current trends are)
  9. Be committed to your problem (because it might take a looong time to solve it)
  10. Leave your door open (interact as much as you can with other people, you never know where the insights might come from)

De PLOS Computational Biology

Lineas contaminadas, incluyendo KB y Hep2

List of contaminated cell lines

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is a list of cell cultures which have been cross-contaminated and overgrown by other cells. A project is currently underway to enumerate and rename contaminated cell lines to avoid errors in research caused by misattribution (Masters, 2002). Estimates based on screening of leukemialymphoma cell lines suggest that about 15% of these cell lines are not representative of what they are usually assumed to be (Drexler et al., 2002).

Contaminated cell lines have been extensively used in research without knowledge of their true character. For example, most if not all research on the “endothelium” ECV-304 or the “megakaryocyte” DAMI cell lines has in reality been conducted on bladder carcinoma and erythroleukemia cells, respectively. Thus, all research on endothelium- or megakaryocyte-specific functions utilizing these cell lines has turned out to be worthless, except as a warning example.

There are two principal ways a cell line can become contaminated: cell cultures are often exchanged between research groups; if, during handling, a sample gets contaminated and then passed on, subsequent exchanges of cells will lead to the contaminating population being established, although parts of the supposed cell line are still genuine. More serious is contamination at the source: during establishment of the original cell line, some contaminating cells are accidentally introduced into the cultures, where they in time outgrow the desired cells. The initial testing, in this case, still suggested that the cell line is genuine and novel, but in reality, it has disappeared soon after being established and all samples of such cell lines are actually the contaminant cells. It requires lengthy research to determine the precise point where cell lines have become contaminated.

Revision cultivo 3D

Para los que esten interesados. Esta es una revision del cultivo 3D (como los esferoides). Queremos utilizar lo mas posible este tipo de cultivo y aqui podran leer los beneficios

clipped from www.nature.com

Nature Reviews Molecular Cell Biology 8, 839-845 (October 2007) | doi:10.1038/nrm2236

EssayThe third dimension bridges the gap between cell culture and live tissue

We believe that 3D cultures will have a strong impact on drug screening and will also decrease the use of laboratory animals, for example, in the context of toxicity assays.

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Mortalidad por clase social

Este es un articulo interesante. Existe una correlacion entre la clase social de los padres y la mortalidad de los hijos despues de los 60 años, independientemente de la vida que hayan llevado.
Es decir, los hijos de padres de clase socioeconomica mas baja tienen mayor mortalidad, independientemente de si luego cambian de clase social, son adoptados, etc. La discusion es de si esta es genetico (lo cual seria catastrofico) o tiene que ver con el ambiente uterino.

link

Does Gender Matter?- Barres, Nature, 2006

Does Gender Matter?
A Commentary by Ben A. Barres, NAture Vol 442, pg 133, 13th July 2006

Prof. Barres should be commended for a frank, honest and, at times, personal reflection on the notion that women are not advancing in science because of innate inability. The sentiment that women make bad scientists because of a lack of aptitude has been publicized several times lately most famously by Harvard University president Larry Summers, in an essay by Peter Lawrence and the work of Simon Baron-Cohen.
Men are allegedly better equipped to do science because of their abilities to systematize, analyze and be more forgetful of others. Women empathise and are communicative and caring by comparison. This view is disputed in this article, and an alternative set of hypotheses proposed.
Barres proposes that women are not advancing in science because of discrimination. This discrimination is intrinsic within society and occurs at every level for women. It includes girls being told that competitive sports make them too masculine, that girls don’t do science, and also involves women’s achievements being less recognized than men’s. For example, one study found that women applying for research grants needed to be 2.5 times more productive than men in order to be considered equally competent. It is also noted (and rightfully so) that women are as guilty of discriminating against other women as men are.
Lets take action then, and start ending this discrimination. Barres suggests a series of steps:-
1. Make academic and scientific institutions have more diverse leadership.
2. Run fair job searches, based on merit on an even playing field.
3. Speak out. End discrimination by speaking out against prejudice and being responsible for your own actions. Support those who do speak out.
4. Enhance fairness in any competitive scenarios. Awards, grant competitions, promotion competitions must be conducted fairly and by a diverse committee.
5. Teach young scientists the skills they need to thrive – self confidence, a strong sense of fairness, being a presence in a room, giving great presentations and dealing with academics.
Science may be a ‘popularity contest’ but if we all get together we can do something about it.

¿Qué opinan?