JAMA : the journal of the American Medical Association
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Postmenopausal estrogen use is associated with increased risk of endometrial and breast cancer, 2 hormone-related cancers. The effect of postmenopausal estrogen use on ovarian cancer is not established. ⋯ In this population, postmenopausal estrogen use for 10 or more years was associated with increased risk of ovarian cancer mortality that persisted up to 29 years after cessation of use.
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Despite a critical presumption of reliability, standards of interpathologist agreement have not been well defined for interpretation of cervical pathology specimens. ⋯ Interpretive variability is substantial for all types of cervical specimens. Histopathology of cervical biopsies is not more reproducible than monolayer cytology, and even the interpretation of LEEP results is variable. Given the degree of irreproducibility that exists among well-trained pathologists, realistic performance expectations should guide use of their interpretations.
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Hospital-based studies have found that increased susceptibility to certain infections is associated with low serum levels of mannose-binding lectin (MBL) due to MBL variant alleles. However, the contribution of MBL insufficiency to incidence of common childhood infections at a population level is unknown. ⋯ These data suggest that genetic factors such as MBL insufficiency play an important role in host defense, particularly during the vulnerable period of childhood from age 6 through 17 months, when the adaptive immune system is immature.