Bmc Public Health
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UK hospitals are required to monitor the health promotion services they provide for patients. We compared the use of audit and patient questionnaires as appropriate tools for monitoring whether patients are screened for modifiable risk factors (smoking, alcohol use, obesity, diet, and physical activity), whether staff correctly identify risk factor presence and deliver health promotion when a risk factor is identified. ⋯ A direct comparison of data gathered in the audit and patient questionnaires provides a comprehensive picture of health promotion practice within hospitals. Poor screening agreement is likely to be due to errors in patients' recall of screening activities. Audit is therefore the preferred method for evaluating screening of risk factors, but further insight into screening practice can be gained by using the questionnaire in conjunction with audit. If a patient does not recognise that they received health promotion, then this is tantamount to not receiving it, we therefore recommend that the patient questionnaire is the preferred method for monitoring health promotion delivered. For monitoring the accuracy of risk factor identification either method is appropriate as long as the hospital uses validated screening tools for identifying alcohol misuse, diet, and physical activity.
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Consumption of cigarettes and alcoholic beverages creates serious health consequences for individuals and overwhelming financial burdens for governments around the world. In Asia, a third stimulant--betel nuts--increases this burden exponentially. For example, individuals who simultaneously smoke, chew betel nuts and drink alcohol are approximately 123 times more likely to develop oral, pharyngeal and laryngeal cancer than are those who do not. To discourage consumption of cigarettes, the government of Taiwan has imposed three taxes over the last two decades. It now wishes to lower consumption of betel nuts. To assist in this effort, our study poses two questions: 1) Will the imposition of an NT$10 Health Tax on cigarettes effectively reduce cigarette consumption? and 2) Will this cigarette tax also reduce consumption of alcoholic beverages and betel nuts? To answer these questions, we analyze the effect of the NT$10 tax on overall cigarette consumption as well as the cross price elasticities of cigarettes, betel nuts, and alcoholic beverages. ⋯ The assessment of a health tax on cigarettes as a smoking control policy tool yields a win-win outcome for both government and consumers because it not only reduces cigarette consumption, but it also reduces betel nut and alcoholic beverage consumption due to a synergistic relationship. Revenues generated by the tax can be used to fund city and county smoking control programs as well as to meet the health insurance system's current financial shortfall.
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Smear-negative pulmonary tuberculosis (SNPTB) accounts for 30% of Pulmonary Tuberculosis (PTB) cases reported annually in developing nations. Polymerase chain reaction (PCR) may provide an alternative for the rapid detection of Mycobacterium tuberculosis (MTB); however little data are available regarding the clinical utility of PCR in SNPTB, in a setting with a high burden of TB/HIV co-infection. ⋯ PCR dot-blot associated with a high clinical suspicion may provide an important contribution to the diagnosis of SNPTB mainly in patients that have not been previously treated attended at a TB/HIV reference hospital.
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In the last decades, there have been no studies carried out in Lithuania on the quality of life of breast cancer patients. The aim of the present study was to evaluate changes in the quality of life of Lithuanian women with the early stage of breast cancer nine months after surgery and its dependence on surgical strategy, adjuvant chemotherapy and the social and demographic status of the patients. ⋯ Nine months after surgery, the study revealed a worsening of the overall quality of life in both groups of patients--those who had undergone mastectomy and BCT. The quality of life became considerably worse in the mastectomy plus chemotherapy group. Marital status was found to exert the most considerable influence on the women's quality of life in comparison with other social and demographic factors.