Toxocariasis is a parasitic zoonosis with worldwide distribution that affects both cats and dogs. Necropsy of 114 stray cats from Shiraz revealed that 106 (92.9%) stray cats were infected at least with one of the intestinal helminth species. The overall infection rates in stray cats infected with cestoda and nematoda were 105(99.1%) and 101(95.3%) respectively. The detected cestodes were Joyeuxiella pasqualei (34.3%), Dipylidium caninum (49.5%), Taenia taeniaeformis (12.3%), Spirometra sp. (3.8%) and the detected nematodes were Physaloptera sp. (44.6%), Toxocara cati (42.6%) and Toxascaris leonina (12.9%). The study revealed that T. cati was one of the most frequently detected intestinal helminths, which is an important source of zoonotic helminths.
helminthic ; Toxocara cati ; Statistical Prevalence ; Iran ; parasitic

A cross sectional study to determine the prevalence of hearing loss and hearing impairment was conducted on 286 male subjects from a rural area. The sample was chosen by using a simple random sampling method. Prevalence of symptoms of tinnitus, ear disease, ear drum perforation and infection of external auditory meatus was 19.0 per cent, 6.7 per cent, 3.5 per cent and 0.4 per cent respectively. Air conduction audiometry tests showed the prevalences of hearing impairment of the left, right and both ears (aged 15-30 years) were 5.9%, 8.8% and 0% respectively. The prevalence of hearing loss increased with age. The higher frequencies (> 4KHz) appeared to be more affected than the lower frequencies.
cent ; Hearing Loss, Partial ; Deafness ; Statistical Prevalence ; Prevalence aspects

OBJECTIVES: Kyung Hee-Frankfurter Beschwerde-Fragebogen(K-FBF) is a representative subjective symptom measuring tool of schizophrenic patients. We performed psychopathology measurements using K-FBF, Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale(PANSS) and Symptom Checklist-90-Revised(SCL-90-R) in patients with schizophrenia and then compared the results of these three examinations one another, in order to examine which psychopathologic aspects K-FBF might reflect and to measure the possibility whether this instrument reflect the negative symptoms or cognitive impairments, which are difficult to measure by conventional objective instruments measuring psychopathology. METHODS: All 66 patients satisfying DSM-IV criteria for schizophrenia, were approached. Their education level was more than high school and they were not in the acute stage of schizophrenia. They performed K-FBF and SCL-90-R, and at the same day, they were interviewed by one of both psychiatirsts using PANSS. We examined the patterns of K-FBF response and performed facor analysis about 10 subscales. We examined the correlation between K-FBF and age, sex and insight. Also, we performed correlation analysis among the K-FBF, PANSS and SCL-90-R. RESULTS: As for K-FBF, with increasing age, the number of positive response items and the symptom severity were decreased. Even when controlling prevalence period as control variable, the correlation remained unchanged. Performing factor analysis to the K-FBF subscales, we created 2 factors, ie summation subscales. We named those recognized distress(RD) and perceptual alteration(PA) each. Using K-FBF standardized total scores as controlling variable, we performed partial correlation between PA and PANSS negative symptom scale. The result was PA and PANSS have statistically significant correlation. This correspons with the view that Huber's basic symptoms are reflecting subjective approach of negative symptoms of schizophrenia. While K-FBF standardized total scores and PANSS total scores had statistically strong correlations, SCL-90-R total scores and PANSS total scores had statistically significant, but very mild correlations. So, we had the judgement that the correlations among the psychopathology measurement tools are more influenced by the rater than the contents of tools. CONCLUSION: We concluded that Huber's basic symptoms, measured by K-FBF, reflect more negative symptoms of schizophrenia than other symptoms. And K-FBF has more correlation with the PANSS, objective psychopathology measuring tool, than the SCL-90-R, self-report quetionnaire. But, more studies using patients with another disease stages and another demographic variables are needed in order to generalize the results of this study.
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders ; Education ; Humans ; Prevalence ; Psychopathology* ; Schizophrenia*

BACKGROUND: Many studies evaluating the performance of in vitro diagnostic kits have been criticized for the lack of reliability. To attain reliability those evaluation studies should be preceded by sample size calculation ensuring statistical power. This study was intended to develop a web-based system to estimate the sample size, which was often neglected because it would require expert knowledge in statistics. METHODS: For sample size calculation, we extracted essential parameters from the performance studies on the 3rd generation anti-hepatitis C virus (HCV) kits reported in the literature. We developed a system with PHP web-script language and MySQL. The statistical models used in this system were as follows; one sample without power consideration (model 1), one sample with power consideration (model 2), and two samples with power consideration (model 3). RESULTS: Among the articles published between 1989 and 2005, 13 articles that evaluated the performance of anti-HCV kits were identified by searching with Medical Subject Headings (MeSH). The diagnostic sensitivity was 83-100% with a median of 145 samples (range; 12-1,091) and the specificity was 97-100% with a median of 1,025 samples (range; 33-4,381). The estimated sample size would be 280 in the model 1, 817 in the model 2, and 1,510 in the model 3, when we set 2% prevalence of HCV infection, 95% sensitivity of a conventional kit, 97% sensitivity of a new kit , 95% significance level (two-sided test), 2% allowable error, and 80% power. CONCLUSIONS: Our study indicates that an insufficient sample size is still a problem in performance evaluation. Our system should be helpful in increasing the reliability of performance evaluation by providing an appropriate sample size.
Medical Subject Headings ; Models, Statistical ; Prevalence ; Sample Size* ; Sensitivity and Specificity

BACKGROUNDS: Many Korean epidemiologic studies reported lower prevalence rates of depression than those of Western countries. For the low prevalence, it is explained that there's something wrong in the direct application of diagnostic criteria of depression to Korean culture, i.e. categorical fallacy, or it may be truly low-prevalent. We will analyze diagnostic criteria for depression defined by Western. METHODS: Six thousand and two hundred seventy-five community dwelling subjects, aged 18-64 years were interviewed by using Korean version of Composite International Diagnostic Interview (K-CIDI). Diagnostic criteria for depression defined by DSM-IV were analyzed using the item response theory. RESULTS: We could not find any fallacies of diagnostic criteria for depression defined by DSM-IV when assessing depre-ssion among Koreans. Fatigue, concentration difficulties, and sleep disturbance appeared more frequently in mild depression, while psychomotor change, death/suicide, and worthlessness/guilt did not appear until severe depression. CONCLUSION: The diagnostic criteria for depression defined by DSM-IV are appropriate for the Koreans. There are different responding levels, i.e. threshold, of depressive criteria according to severities of depression. Koreans with depression are more likely to complain of appetite change, but less of worthless or guilty feelings than Western people.
Appetite ; Depression* ; Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders ; Fatigue ; Korea* ; Prevalence

OBJECTIVETo compare design-based and model-based methods in descriptive analysis of complex sample.

METHODSA total of 1 000 samples were selected and a multistage random sampling design was used in the analysis of the 2010 China chronic disease and risk factors surveillance. For each simulated sample, cases with probability proportional age were randomly deleted so that sample age structure was deviated systematically from that of the target population. Mean systolic blood pressure (SBP) and prevalence of raised blood pressure, as well as their 95% confidence intervals (95%CI) were determined using design-based and model-based methods (routine method and multi-level model). For estimators generated from those 3 methods, mean squared error(MSE) was computed to evaluate their validity. To compare performance of statistical inference of these methods, the probability of 95%CI covering the true parameter(mean SBP and raised blood pressure prevalence of the population) was used.

RESULTSMSE of mean estimator for routine method, design-based analysis and multilevel model was 6.41, 1.38, and 5.86, respectively; and the probability of 95%CI covering the true parameter was 24.7%, 97.5% and 84.3%, respectively. The routine method and multi-level model probably led to an increased probability of type I error in statistical inference. MSE of prevalence estimator was 4.80 for design-based method, which was far lower than those for routine method (20.9) and multilevel model (17.2). Probability of 95%CI covering the true prevalence for routine method was only 29.4%, and 86.4% for multilevel model, both of which were lower than that for design-based method (97.3%).

CONCLUSIONCompared to routine method and multi-level model, design-based method had the best performance both in point estimation and confidence interval construction. Design-based method should be the first choice when doing statistical description of complex samples with a systematically biased sample structure.

OBJECTIVES: With the spread of new cultivation methods of strawberries, working conditions have been changed in recent years. Strawberry growers have also been advanced in age. And now, the need to take new measures against physiological fatigue in strawberry growers has become pressing. We investigated the relationship between physiological fatigue and risk factors among middle-aged strawberry growers due to a paucity of such epidemiological studies. DESIGN: Cross-sectional study. Questionnaires were mailed to strawberry growers. SETTING: A rural district in southern part of Japan. SUBJECTS: A total of 1,113 healthy strawberry growers (681 men and 432 women) who were 40—69 years of age. RESULTS: Prevalence of low back pain was the highest (74.0% of males and 73.8% of females), followed by shoulder stiffness and/or pain (49.6% of males and 60.4% of females), and eyestrain (45.2% of males and 50.9% of females). After adjustment of age, working hours, and sleeping hours using a logistic regression analysis, low back pain had the strongest association with agricultural-chemicals spraying among males (odds ratio 2.0; 95% confidence interval 1.4 to 2.8), but there was no significantly association among females. Shoulder stiffness and/or pain had the strongest association with removing old leaves among males (odds ratio 1.5; 95% confidence interval 1.1 to 2.2), and with agricultural-chemicals spraying among females (odds ratio 1.6; 95% confidence interval 1.1 to 2.4). Eyestrain had the strongest association with strawberry sorting among males (odds ratio 2.7; 95% confidence interval 1.9 to 3.8) and with strawberry harvesting among females (odds ratio 3.2; 95% confidence interval 2.0 to 5.1). CONCLUSON: Although the main physiological fatigue among males and females were similar in prevalence, related risk factors differed, and thus the results suggest that it is necessary to take measures against physiological fatigue in consideration of sex difference in the case of middled-aged strawberry growers.
Fatigue <1> ; Relationship by association ; Risk Factors ; Strawberry ; Statistical Prevalence

Overweight and obesity place children and adolescents at increased risk of significant health problems, both during their early life and adult life. A crosssectional study was carried out to determine the prevalence of overweight among secondary school students aged 13-17 years in the Klang district and to determine the association between overweight and age, sex, ethnicity, religion and blood pressure. Random cluster proportionate to size sampling technique was used to select the respondents. Weight was recorded using TANITA model HD-309 and height was measured using SECA Body meter Model 208. A mercury sphygmomanometer was used to measure blood pressure manually. Statistical analysis was carried out using SPSS version 13. Out of the 3,333 respondents, 11.4% were found to be at risk of overweight and 8.2% were overweight. The prevalence of overweight was significantly higher in the males (10.6%) as compared to females (6.0%). Prevalence of overweight was highest in Malays (10.7%) followed by the Indians (7.1%) and the Chinese (5.9%). Prevalence of ‘risk of overweight’ was highest in the Indians (13.7%) followed by Chinese (12.0%) and Malays (9.8%). There was a moderate direct significant relationship between overweight and systolic blood pressure (r=0.5, r2=0.25, p<0.001) and also diastolic blood pressure (r=0.42, r2=0.18, p<0.001). The relationship between BMI and overweight was very weak (r=0.11, r2=0.01 and df=3331, p<0.001). In conclusion the prevalence of overweight among the secondary school students is high and there is a need for a comprehensive integrated population-based intervention program.
Obesity ; secondary school student ; seconds ; Statistical Prevalence ; Blood Pressure

OBJECTIVE: This study aimed to investigate the prevalence of metabolic syndrome, associated factors in schizophrenia patients and whether metabolic syndrome have an effect on health related quality of life (QoL) and body image. METHODS: 81 subjects were included in this study, who were diagnosed as schizophrenia defined by DSM-IV criteria and admitted in neuropsychiatric department, Wonkwang University Hospital. For each subject, anthropometric index and laboratory parameters were measured. Metabolic syndrome defined by National Cholesterol Education Program-Adult Treatment Panel III. The subjects were evaluated health related QoL with Short-Form 36 Health Survey-Korean (SF-36-K), and were evaluated body image with Body Image Scale. RESULTS: Of patients, 24.7% had metabolic syndrome. Metabolic syndrome was associated with long duration of illness. The patients with metabolic syndrome showed poorer QoL, especially role physical and bodily pain in SF-36-K. Also, the patients with metabolic syndrome had negative body image, especially body feature, compared to the patients without metabolic syndrome. CONCLUSION: This study suggests that metabolic syndrome is common among patients with chronic schizophrenia. Also It may lead to lowering of QoL and deterioration of body image. So clinicians should be cautious to aware the increased risk for the metabolic syndrome and intervene actively to prevent and treat metabolic morbidity among chronic patients with schizophrenia.
Body Image ; Cholesterol ; Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders ; Humans ; Prevalence ; Quality of Life ; Schizophrenia

OBJECTIVES: To identify prevalence of dementia and it's subtypes in patients with Hansen's disease in a sanatorium of Korea. METHODS: The study employs a two-stage design for case identification. One hundred-six patients with Hansen's disease aged 65 and over participated in the study. The Korean Version of the Consortium to Establish a Registry for Alzheimer's disease (CERAD-K) assessment packet was administered to One hundred-two patients with Hansen's disease. Dementia was defined using the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition diagnostic features of dementia. RESULTS: The prevalence was 15.1% in Hansen's sanatorium. The prevalence of Alzheimer's and vascular dementia were 10.4% and 4.7%. The age-adjusted prevalence rate for dementia was 11.9%. The rate of patients with dementia was 12.73% in males and 17.65% in females. CONCLSION: The prevalence of dementia in Hansen's disease sanatorium of Korea appears to be similar with those reported in previous study. Our result suggests that Hansen's disease was unrelated to prevalence of dementia, and also that the dementia is major neuropsychiatric disease in patient with Hansen's disease.
Alzheimer Disease ; Dementia* ; Dementia, Vascular ; Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders ; Female ; Humans ; Korea* ; Leprosy* ; Male ; Prevalence*