OBJECTIVES: By the end of the 2000s, the economic situation in many European countries started to deteriorate, generating financial uncertainty, social insecurity and worse health status. The aim of the present study was to investigate how the recent financial crisis has affected the lifestyle health determinants and behaviours of older adults living in the Mediterranean islands. METHODS: From 2005 to 2015, a population-based, multi-stage convenience sampling method was used to voluntarily enrol 2749 older adults (50% men) from 20 Mediterranean islands and the rural area of the Mani peninsula. Lifestyle status was evaluated as the cumulative score of four components (range, 0 to 6), that is, smoking habits, diet quality (MedDietScore), depression status (Geriatric Depression Scale) and physical activity. RESULTS: Older Mediterranean people enrolled in the study from 2009 onwards showed social isolation and increased smoking, were more prone to depressive symptoms, and adopted less healthy dietary habits, as compared to their counterparts participating earlier in the study (p<0.05), irrespective of age, gender, several clinical characteristics, or socioeconomic status of the participants (an almost 50% adjusted increase in the lifestyle score from before 2009 to after 2009, p<0.001). CONCLUSIONS: A shift towards less healthy behaviours was noticeable after the economic crisis had commenced. Public health interventions should focus on older adults, particularly of lower socioeconomic levels, in order to effectively reduce the burden of cardiometabolic disease at the population level.
Adult* ; Depression ; Food Habits ; Humans ; Life Style* ; Mediterranean Islands ; Mediterranean Region* ; Methods ; Motor Activity ; Public Health ; Smoke ; Smoking ; Social Class ; Social Isolation ; Uncertainty

Brucellosis ; diagnosis ; therapy ; Female ; Humans ; Malta ; Middle Aged ; Spondylitis ; diagnosis ; therapy

BACKGROUND: The prevalence of allergic conditions is increasing in most countries. One possible explanation may be childhood nutrition. OBJECTIVE: The aim of the study was to investigate the relationship between consumption of pre-specified types of food in school-aged children and presence of respiratory and allergic symptoms. METHODS: A total of 191 students aged 9–11 years were recruited from 5 schools to geographically cover all of Malta. Data was collected between October 2011 and February 2012. This was part of a bigger study which included clinical and environmental tests besides standardized health questionnaires. For the purposes of this part of the study only the health questionnaires were used. These standardized health questionnaires based on the International Study of Asthma and Allergies in Childhood (ISAAC) were used to identify the presence of respiratory and allergic symptoms and to identify the types of foods and the frequency of consumption of various types of foods. RESULTS: We found that milk, meat, butter, olive oil, and yoghurt consumption had a negative association with allergic symptoms in children, whilst fish consumption had a detrimental effect. These relationships remained significant after correction for paternal level of education. CONCLUSION: The study highlights the fact that nutrition in early childhood may have a significant effect on the risk of allergic conditions. Our results, taken together with data in the literature, suggest that different types of fish might have had different effects. This is probably related to their different fatty acid constitution thus warranting further studies.
Asthma ; Butter ; Child ; Constitution and Bylaws ; Education ; Humans ; Hypersensitivity ; Malta ; Meat ; Milk ; Olive Oil ; Prevalence ; Yogurt

BACKGROUND: Workplace bulling is a pervasive phenomenon with negative consequences for the health of victims and the productivity of organizations. The aim of this study was to measure the prevalence and forms of workplace bullying among employees working at the public health-care sector of Cyprus using the Greek version of Leymann Inventory of Psychological Terror (LIPT) instrument. METHODS: A translation process was followed from the French to the Greek version of LIPT questionnaire. Test–retest reliability expressed by Pearson's correlation coefficient was 0.98 indicating excellent reproducibility. Internal consistency reliability assessed by Cronbachα coefficient was 0.87 suggesting high reliability. LIPT instrument was distributed among 403 employees working at the primary health-care setting and at the largest public hospital of Cyprus with response rate of 73.4%. RESULTS: Women comprised the majority of participants (71.4%). Mean age was 43.3 years. Prevalence of workplace bulling according to Leymann's definition was 5.9%. Most common forms of bullying were“Being continuously interrupted” (17.2%) and “continuously being given new work assignments” (13.5%). Women were significantly more often exposed to at least one mobbing behavior than men within the previous year(49% vs. 35.7%, p=0.038), whereas nurses were significantly exposed to at least one mobbing behavior as compared to physicians (53.3% vs. 31.4%, p=0.004). CONCLUSION: This was the first study that examined the prevalence of workplace bullying in the public health-care sector by elaborating the Greek version of LIPT instrument. Results showed that workplace bullying is a common and complex phenomenon among health-care organizations.
Bullying* ; Cyprus* ; Efficiency ; Female ; Hospitals, Public ; Humans ; Male ; Prevalence*

BACKGROUD: In the previous study, we determined subtypes of Human Immunodeficiency Virus type 1 (HIV-1) in Korean patients by partial sequence analysis. We showed that eighteen of the nineteen sequences of HIV-1 from Korean fell into subtype B and one fell into subtype A. At that study, HIV-1 identified as subtype A showed 40% diversity from reference sequences and presumed to be a variant of subtype A. The aim of present study is to determine the molecuar biological characteristics of HIV-1 previously identified as subtype A. METHODS: Growth curve was determined. SI/NSI phenotype was determined using a cocultivation assay using MT-2 cells. A complete genome sequence was obtained by amplifying overlapping PCR fragments. Cowork was done to identify the subtype of HIV-1 previously identified as variant A from Korea (97KR004), Cyprus (94CY017), Democratic Republic of Congo (97CDKTB48, 97CDKFE4, 97CDKS10, 97CDKP58). Phylogenetic analysis, distance analysis, diversity plot analysis, bootstrap anlysis were done to identify the subtype of these newly characterized strains. RESULTS: We found that 97KR004 was SI phenotype. Complete sequence of 97KR004 was determined (AF286239). Phylogenetic analysis showed that the four newly characterized strains (94CY017, 97CDKTB48, 97CDKFE4, 97CDKS10) were closely related to subtype A. Subtype distance tool showed that these four strains fell to sub-subtype A2. Diversity plot analysis and bootstrap analysis were done to identify subtype of 97KR004. Nine subtype reference strains and 94CY017 strain were used as reference sequences. These analyses confirmed that 97KR004 represented sub-subtype A2/subtype D recombinant. CONCLUSOIN: We showed that 97KR004 fell into newly identified sub-subtype A2.
Coculture Techniques ; Congo ; Cyprus ; Genome ; HIV* ; HIV-1* ; Humans* ; Korea ; Phenotype ; Polymerase Chain Reaction ; Population Characteristics ; Sequence Analysis

OBJECTIVE[corrected] To define if such crucial body composition parameters like body density (Db) and body surface area (BSA) could be considered in the frame of yin-yang concept, i.e., one of the most popular in conventional biomedical science theories of Chinese medicine.

METHODSStandardized Eurofit Pysical Fitness Test Battery reports of 715 junior school children have been evaluated for association of their body composition parameters with corresponding motoric fitness test results. Equations for BSA and Db calculation included height, weight, and skin-fold thickness values of the tests.

RESULTSCorrelative analysis of major physical fitness parameters, obtained from 715 junior school children, demonstrated that participants with high BSA/Db ratio had better yang-featured anaerobic performance, whereas those with low BSA/Db ratio presented with better yin-featured aerobic performance. This result coincided with proposed suggestions to treat BSA as external yang component and Db as internal yin component of body composition. Calculated confidence intervals for BSA/Db ratio ranged between 1.073-1.15, which can be accepted as optimal for junior school children yang/yin ratio of body composition.

CONCLUSIONEasily accessible BSA and Db can provide specialists with useful preliminary information for generating reasonable exercise and nutritional programs.

Anthropometry ; methods ; Body Composition ; physiology ; Body Surface Area ; Child ; Cyprus ; Female ; Humans ; Male ; Physical Fitness ; Yin-Yang

PURPOSE: We sought to evaluate the link between long-term tea intake and prevalence of type 2 diabetes mellitus, in a sample of elderly adults. MATERIALS AND METHODS: During 2005-2007, 300 men and women from Cyprus, 142 from Mitilini, 100 from Samothraki, 114 from Kefalonia, 131 from Crete, 150 from Corfu and 103 from Zakynthos (aged 65 to 100 years) were enrolled. Dietary habits (including tea consumption) were assessed through a food frequency questionnaire. Among various factors, fasting blood glucose was measured and prevalence of (type 2) diabetes mellitus was estimated. RESULTS: 54% of the participants reported that they consume tea at least once a week (mean intake 1.6 +/- 1.1 cup/day). The majority of the participants (98%) reported green or black tea consumption. The participants reported that they consume tea for at least 30 years of their life. After adjusting for various confounders, tea intake was inversely associated with lower blood glucose levels (b +/- SEM per 1 cup: - 5.9 +/- 2.6 mg/dL, p = 0.02). Moreover, multiple logistic regression revealed that moderate tea consumption (1 - 2 cups/day) was associated with 70% (95% CI 41% to 86%) lower odds of having (type 2) diabetes, irrespective of age, sex, body mass, smoking, physical activity status, dietary habits and other clinical characteristics. CONCLUSION: The presented findings suggest that long-term tea intake is associated with reduced levels of fasting blood glucose and lower prevalence of diabetes, in a cohort of elderly people living in Mediterranean islands.
Aged ; Aged, 80 and over ; Cardiovascular Diseases/epidemiology ; Cross-Sectional Studies ; Cyprus/epidemiology ; Diabetes Mellitus, Type 2/*epidemiology ; Diet Records ; Female ; *Food Habits ; Humans ; Logistic Models ; Male ; Prevalence ; Risk Factors ; Sex Distribution ; *Tea