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We report our experience with an embolization technique that allows safe, controllable exclusion of pulmonary arteriovenous malformations using detachable coils, a single venous access site, coaxial catheter guidance, and 1 or 2 microcatheters. This technique is particularly useful when treating central lesions with a short feeding artery and when high flow increases the risk of coil migration and nontarget embolization. It affords precise placement and repositioning of coils prior to detachment. The technique facilitates safe and successful endovascular closure of these challenging lesions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The horizontal plan of Veszprém city clearly reflects its development path: it is the gradually developing ring of fortress-based settlements that emphasized the dominant role of the fortress in the settlement structure of the medieval town. During the development of the ground plan in the later ages, the fortress continued to play a central role. However, the involvement of the surrounding hills of nearly the same height into the settlement structure resulted in a new system in the further development of the town. Today the settlement's development is of urban nature, with a significant vertical arrangement but with a less significant degree of horizontal unbrokenness. Nearly all development types typical of Hungarian provincial towns will occur but the proportions among the individual types reflect the town's characteristics arising from its development through history. The town centre is of three-fold articulation and is becoming of a „city-like" nature. Three sub-centres have developed along the by-pass. The industrial zones of the settlement are of significant size and have been renewed. Urban green areas are of a significant scale thanks to the high degree of forest coverage. Of all dwelling areas, it is the internal dwelling zone that surrounds, like a belt, the city-centre and is much larger than the broken-up external dwelling zone. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The paper describes the design and construction of a bridge across a pond and a local road on the road I/35 Bílý Kostel - Hradek nad Nisou. The bridge comprises 5 spans with lenghts of 40,00 + 3 x 50,00 + 40,00 m. Total length of the bridge is 247 m. The substructure of the bridge consists of concrete abutments and four intermediate concrete piers. Abutment foundations are supported on bored piles and intermediate pillars on spread foundations. Two pillar foundations have been constructed on the lake bed which required sheet pile cofferdam. The superstructure was manufactured by sections in a dedicated area and launched using the incremental launching method. The continuous steel-concrete composite superstructure was designed as a twin steel plate girder with steel bracings and a top flange connected to a composite concrete haunch slab. Plate girders both of which rest upon a set of pot bearings are 2,5 m high and 7,0 m apart. The fabrication yard was stationary and located behind the abutment. A lightweight nose was fitted to the cantilever end of the superstructure to reduce the cantilever deformations during launching. The bridge supports were equipped with special teflon sliding bearings and friction was recorded at each jacking operation. Temporary support was incorporated between the abutment and the pier. The reinforced concrete composite haunch slab was cast on travelling formwork primarily at the midspans and subsequently above the piers. The construction was accomplished rapidly without any complications in the difficult access terrain. This proved the chosen steel concrete composite superstructure tangible, especially for the case of segmental launching construction. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Background:Although many low-penetrant genetic risk factors for breast cancer have been discovered, knowledge about the effect of multiple risk alleles is limited, especially in women <50 years. We therefore investigated the association between multiple risk alleles and breast cancer risk as well as individual effects according to age-approximated pre- and post-menopausal status.Methods:Ten previously described breast cancer-associated single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) were analysed in a joint European biobank-based study comprising 3584 breast cancer cases and 5063 cancer-free controls. Genotyping was performed using MALDI-TOF mass spectrometry, and odds ratios were estimated using logistic regression.Results:Significant associations with breast cancer were confirmed for 7 of the 10 SNPs. Analysis of the joint effect of the original 10 as well as the statistically significant 7 SNPs (rs2981582, rs3803662, rs889312, rs13387042, rs13281615, rs3817198 and rs981782) found a highly significant trend for increasing breast cancer risk with increasing number of risk alleles (P-trend 5.6 × 10−20 and 1.5 × 10−25, respectively). Odds ratio for breast cancer of 1.84 (95% confidence interval (CI): 1.59-2.14; 10 SNPs) and 2.12 (95% CI: 1.80-2.50; 7 SNPs) was seen for the maximum vs the minimum number of risk alleles. Additionally, one of the examined SNPs (rs981782 in HCN1) had a protective effect that was significantly stronger in premenopausal women (P-value: 7.9 × 10−4).Conclusion:The strongly increasing risk seen when combining many low-penetrant risk alleles supports the polygenic inheritance model of breast cancer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An essay is presented on the social influence of Swedish settlers in the U.S. and the genealogical history of the Olson family from Varmland, Sweden. Information is offered on topics such as the immigrant experiences of settler Andrew Olson, daily life in Negaunee, Michigan, and employment in the wholesale grocery business.

This article analyses the role of local political forces and strategies in Jordan vis-à-vis the global agenda of poverty reduction. It argues that the development of poverty reduction policy, a new field of political intervention in Jordan since the 1990's, signifies the increased relevance of the global concept of poverty alleviation, which aims to target the poorest of the poor, helping them to help themselves. This global concept is being translated into the local political context, where it is articulated within the established Jordanian model of the paternalistic provider state. The emerging forms of social policy reflect the efforts of various groups who aim to have their strategies inscribed into the state's apparatuses, as well as attempts from above to integrate politically relevant groups in symbolic and material terms and control those (socio-)political groups regarded as a potential risk to political stability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

OBJECTIVES: To estimate the interval cancer incidence, its determinants and the episode sensitivity in the Norrbotten Mammography Screening Programme (NMSP). SETTING: Since 1989, women aged 40-74 years (n = 55,000) have been invited to biennial screening by the NMSP, Norrbotten county, Sweden. METHODS: Data on 1047 invasive breast cancers from six screening rounds of the NMSP (1989-2002) were collected. We estimated the invasive interval cancer rates, rate ratios and the episode sensitivity using the detection and incidence methods. A linear Poisson-model was used to analyse association between interval cancer incidence and sensitivity. RESULTS: 768 screen-detected and 279 interval cancer cases were identified. The rate ratio of interval cancer decreased with age. The 50-59 year age group showed the highest rate ratio (RR = 0.52, 95% CI 0.41-0.65) and the 70-74 year age group the lowest (RR = 0.23, 95% CI 0.15-0.36). The rate ratios for the early (0-12 months) and late (13-24 months) interval cancers were similar (RR = 0.18, 95% CI 0.15-0.22 and 0.20, 95% CI 0.17-0.24). There was a significantly lower interval cancer incidence in the prevalence round as compared with the incidence rounds. According to the detection method the episode sensitivity increased with age from 57% in the age group 40-49 years to 84% in the age group 70-74 years. The corresponding figures for the incidence method were 50% and 77%, respectively. CONCLUSION: Our study showed an interval cancer incidence of 38% and the episode sensitivity of 62-73%, depending on the method of calculation. Our results are of clinically acceptable level and concert with the reference values of the European guidelines. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The strong correlation between smoking and exposure to oncogenic human papillomaviruses (HPVs) has made it difficult to verify the independent role of smoking in cervical carcinogenesis. Thus, the authors evaluated this role. Five large Nordic serum banks containing samples from more than 1,000,000 subjects were linked with nationwide cancer registries (1973-2003). Serum samples were retrieved from 588 women who developed invasive cervical cancer and 2,861 matched controls. The samples were analyzed for cotinine (a biomarker of tobacco exposure) and antibodies to HPV types 16 and 18, herpes simplex virus type 2, and Chlamydia trachomatis. Smoking was associated with the risk of squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) among HPV16- and/or HPV18-seropositive heavy smokers (odds ratio=2.7, 95% confidence interval: 1.7, 4.3). A similar risk of SCC (odds ratio=3.2, 95% confidence interval: 2.6, 4.0) was found in heavy smokers after adjustment for HPV16/18 antibodies. The point estimates increased with increasing age at diagnosis and increasing cotinine level. This study confirms that smoking is an independent risk factor for cervical cancer/SCC in women infected with oncogenic HPVs. These findings emphasize the importance of cervical cancer prevention among women exposed to tobacco smoke. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

INTRODUCTION: Earlier studies suggest that histology has no prognostic significance in patients with invasive ovarian tumors. Studies about the effect of family history on survival have given conflicting results, which we try to clarify in this study. As an additional question, we examined whether family members share survival experience. METHODS: We used the nation-wide Swedish Family-Cancer Database to estimate hazard ratios (HRs) for cause-specific and overall survival in ovarian cancer patients by histology and family history. HRs show the probability of death in the study group compared to the reference group. RESULTS: A total of 6,049 ovarian cancer patients with specific histologies were retrieved from our Database from years 1993 to 1999. Compared to women with epithelial ovarian cancer, women with borderline epithelial tumors had the best survival (HR 0.02 and 0.14 for cause-specific and overall survival). Good survival was also noted for patients with sex cord-stromal tumors and germ cell tumors. Among specific subtypes of epithelial ovarian cancers, good survival was noted for women with clear cell and endometrioid carcinomas and mucinous cystadenocarcinoma. The study covered 80 mother-daughter pairs with a family history. Patients with a family history had a poorer survival than sporadic cases in both maternal and offspring generations. When the survival was analyzed according to the probands' length of survival, there was a non-significant concordance of prognosis. CONCLUSION: Our data showed that histology and family history are prognostic factors for ovarian tumors. Patients with a family history had a more aggressive course than the sporadic cases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

OBJECTIVES: To study the effectiveness of service screening with mammography in Northern Sweden. SETTING: Two counties which invited women aged 40-74 years to service screening with mammography were compared with two counties where service screening started 5-7 years later. There were 109,000 and 77,000 women in the study and control counties, respectively. METHODS: Cohorts in the study group were defined to include only breast cancer cases diagnosed after their first invitation to screening. Two outcome measures for breast cancer mortality were used; excess mortality and underlying cause of death (UCD). Detection mode was used to estimate the efficacy of screening for those women who actually attended screening. The cohorts were followed for 11 years. RESULTS: The relative rate (RR) of breast cancer death as excess mortality and UCD for women aged 40-74 years invited to screening, compared with women not yet invited, was 0.70 (95% confidence interval [CI] 0.56-0.87) and 0.74 (95% CI 0.62-0.88), respectively. The largest effect was seen in women aged 40-49 years (RR = 0.64 and RR = 0.62 for excess mortality and UCD, respectively). RR in age 40-74 years for women actually screened was 0.65 (95% CI 0.51-0.84) and 0.70 (95% CI 0.57-0.86) for excess mortality and UCD, respectively. The number of women needed to screen to save one life was 912 after 11 years of follow-up. CONCLUSIONS: This study confirms previous findings in the earlier follow-up and indicates a long-term reduction of breast cancer mortality by 26-30%. The efficacy among those who actually attended screening was about 5% larger. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary: Background and aims: Dietary habits founded early in life might influence development of welfare diseases. The aim was to analyse food choice, socio-economic characteristics and health by questionnaires in healthy 4-year olds. Methods: Two hundred and thirty children were invited and 79% completed all questionnaires. Anthropometry was measured in 131 subjects. Results: The sample was characteristic for Swedish children except that more parents had university education. Most children attended pre-school; 52% >30h/week. Almost all had been breast-fed until a mean age of 5 months. Fifteen per cent were overweight and 2% obese according to the IOTF cut-offs. A, D vitamin supplementation was not given to a third. Full fat dairy products, minced meat and sausages predominated, and only a fourth was served fat fish. Olive or rape seed oil was consumed regularly by 40% and a third consumed “junk food” regularly. Maternal immigrant status influenced the food choice. Conclusion: In a Swedish urban community of 4-year olds, 17% were overweight or obese. The intake of vegetables, oils and “junk food” seemed to have increased, while the intake of dairy products, fruit, meat and fish seemed to be similar to earlier studies. Food choice was influenced by maternal origin. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Rye bran contains a high content not only of dietary fibre, but also of plant lignans and other bioactive compounds in the so-called dietary fibre complex. Blood concentrations of lignans such as enterolactone have been used as biomarkers of intake of lignan-rich plant food. At present,evidence from studies in human subjects does not warrant the conclusion that rye, whole grains orphyto-oestrogens protect against cancer. Some studies, however, have pointed in that direction,especially in relation to cancers of the upper digestive tract. A number of prospective epidemiological studies have clearly shown a protective effect of wholegrain cereals against myocardial infarctions. A corresponding protective effect against diabetes and ischaemic stroke(brain infarct) has also been demonstrated. It seems reasonable to assume that these protective effects are associated with one or more factors in the dietary fibre complex. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]