Background: The prevalence of childhood obesity has risen dramatically in past several decades. Hormonal and genetic factor are rarely the cause of childhood obesity. Because obese children may suffer life long physical and emotional consequences, this imperative to discuss prevention with parents during wellchild examinations. The obesity–related cardiovascular and lipid profiles are determine...

During autumn 1992, we observed two unrelated family outbreaks of Chlamydia pneumoniae infection. Family A consisted of grandmother (aged 77 yrs), father (aged 41 yrs), mother (aged 38 yrs), daughter (aged 10 yrs), and two sons (aged 6 yrs and 3 months, respectively). The grandmother and daughter suffered from pneumonia, father from pharyngitis and bronchitis and the older son from mild bronchi...

The aim of the present study was to measure age-specific prevalence of airflow obstruction in Switzerland in smokers and never-smokers using pulmonary function tests and respiratory symptoms from 6,126 subjects participating in the Swiss Cohort Study on Air Pollution and Lung Diseases in Adults. The lower limit of normal of the forced expiratory volume in 1 s/forced vital capacity ratio was use...

BACKGROUND Diabetic nephropathy is a growing clinical problem, and the cause for >40% of incident ESRD cases. Unfortunately, few modifiable risk factors are known. The objective is to examine if albuminuria and history of diabetic nephropathy (DN) in a sibling are associated with early DN progression or mortality. METHODS In this longitudinal study of adults >18 yrs with diabetes monitored fo...

BACKGROUND Obesity is a risk factor for knee arthritis. Total knee arthroplasty is the definitive surgical treatment of this disease. Therefore, a high percentage of subjects treated are overweight. Since 2000 in the Emilia-Romagna Region the Register of Orthopedic Prosthetic Implantology, RIPO, has recorded data of all the primary and revision operations performed on the knee; height and weigh...

Chronic, nonproductive cough and cough associated with the use of angiotensin converting enzyme inhibitors, are more frequently observed in females as compared to males. To examine the influence of sex, age, height, weight and pulmonary function on airway cough sensitivity, cough threshold to inhaled capsaicin, an index of the airway cough sensitivity, was measured in 160 nonsmoking, nonatopic ...

BACKGROUND Albuminuria is long recognised as a sign of renal disease in diabetes. In type 1 diabetes, renal disease occurs after a longer duration of diabetic state. In type 2 diabetes, it is more variable. OBJECTIVE To determine the prevalence and any risk factors of albuminuria in short-term (< or = 2 yrs) type 2 diabetes. DESIGN Cross sectional, descriptive study. Microalbuminuria was as...

tality, but no significant survival difference was found between phenotypes 1, 3 and 4. Because subjects belonging to various phenotypes had marked differences in age at inclusion (median age 58–73 yrs) and because the observation period was relatively short, we hypothesised that age of death would be different among the phenotypes. Indeed, median (interquartile range) age of death was: 62 (58–...

Lymphoid interstitial pneumonia (LIP) is rare and its clinical course incompletely described. The aim of this study was to examine the clinical features, associations and prognosis of surgical lung biopsy-proven LIP. The study group consisted of 15 subjects encountered over a 14-yr period. The majority of subjects were females (n = 11) and the mean age was 47 yrs (range 17-78 yrs). Underlying s...