Author: "Abla M Sibai" - Searchworks@Jio Institute Digital Library Search Results

Your search keyword '"Abla M Sibai"' showing total 187 results

Start Over Author "Abla M Sibai"

187 results on '"Abla M Sibai"'

1. Late-life learning and health: challenges, opportunities, and future directions

Author: Adina Zeki Al Hazzouri, Martine Elbejjani, Maya Abi Chahine, Ritu Sadana, and Abla M Sibai
Subjects: Geriatrics, RC952-954.6, Medicine
Published: 2021
Full Text: View/download PDF

2. COVID-19 and non-communicable diseases in the Eastern Mediterranean Region: the need for a syndemics approach to data reporting and healthcare delivery

Author: Abla M Sibai, Anthony Rizk, Kasturi Sen, Ghiwa Nassereddine, Samia Habli, and Slim Slama
Subjects: Medicine (General), R5-920, Infectious and parasitic diseases, RC109-216
Published: 2021
Full Text: View/download PDF

3. Cardiovascular disease risk profile and management practices in 45 low-income and middle-income countries: A cross-sectional study of nationally representative individual-level survey data.

Author: David Peiris, Arpita Ghosh, Jennifer Manne-Goehler, Lindsay M Jaacks, Michaela Theilmann, Maja E Marcus, Zhaxybay Zhumadilov, Lindiwe Tsabedze, Adil Supiyev, Bahendeka K Silver, Abla M Sibai, Bolormaa Norov, Mary T Mayige, Joao S Martins, Nuno Lunet, Demetre Labadarios, Jutta M A Jorgensen, Corine Houehanou, David Guwatudde, Mongal S Gurung, Albertino Damasceno, Krishna K Aryal, Glennis Andall-Brereton, Kokou Agoudavi, Briar McKenzie, Jacqui Webster, Rifat Atun, Till Bärnighausen, Sebastian Vollmer, Justine I Davies, and Pascal Geldsetzer
Subjects: Medicine
Abstract: BackgroundGlobal cardiovascular disease (CVD) burden is high and rising, especially in low-income and middle-income countries (LMICs). Focussing on 45 LMICs, we aimed to determine (1) the adult population's median 10-year predicted CVD risk, including its variation within countries by socio-demographic characteristics, and (2) the prevalence of self-reported blood pressure (BP) medication use among those with and without an indication for such medication as per World Health Organization (WHO) guidelines.Methods and findingsWe conducted a cross-sectional analysis of nationally representative household surveys from 45 LMICs carried out between 2005 and 2017, with 32 surveys being WHO Stepwise Approach to Surveillance (STEPS) surveys. Country-specific median 10-year CVD risk was calculated using the 2019 WHO CVD Risk Chart Working Group non-laboratory-based equations. BP medication indications were based on the WHO Package of Essential Noncommunicable Disease Interventions guidelines. Regression models examined associations between CVD risk, BP medication use, and socio-demographic characteristics. Our complete case analysis included 600,484 adults from 45 countries. Median 10-year CVD risk (interquartile range [IQR]) for males and females was 2.7% (2.3%-4.2%) and 1.6% (1.3%-2.1%), respectively, with estimates indicating the lowest risk in sub-Saharan Africa and highest in Europe and the Eastern Mediterranean. Higher educational attainment and current employment were associated with lower CVD risk in most countries. Of those indicated for BP medication, the median (IQR) percentage taking medication was 24.2% (15.4%-37.2%) for males and 41.6% (23.9%-53.8%) for females. Conversely, a median (IQR) 47.1% (36.1%-58.6%) of all people taking a BP medication were not indicated for such based on CVD risk status. There was no association between BP medication use and socio-demographic characteristics in most of the 45 study countries. Study limitations include variation in country survey methods, most notably the sample age range and year of data collection, insufficient data to use the laboratory-based CVD risk equations, and an inability to determine past history of a CVD diagnosis.ConclusionsThis study found underuse of guideline-indicated BP medication in people with elevated CVD risk and overuse by people with lower CVD risk. Country-specific targeted policies are needed to help improve the identification and management of those at highest CVD risk.
Published: 2021
Full Text: View/download PDF

4. Association between country preparedness indicators and quality clinical care for cardiovascular disease risk factors in 44 lower- and middle-income countries: A multicountry analysis of survey data.

Author: Justine I Davies, Sumithra Krishnamurthy Reddiar, Lisa R Hirschhorn, Cara Ebert, Maja-Emilia Marcus, Jacqueline A Seiglie, Zhaxybay Zhumadilov, Adil Supiyev, Lela Sturua, Bahendeka K Silver, Abla M Sibai, Sarah Quesnel-Crooks, Bolormaa Norov, Joseph K Mwangi, Omar Mwalim Omar, Roy Wong-McClure, Mary T Mayige, Joao S Martins, Nuno Lunet, Demetre Labadarios, Khem B Karki, Gibson B Kagaruki, Jutta M A Jorgensen, Nahla C Hwalla, Dismand Houinato, Corine Houehanou, David Guwatudde, Mongal S Gurung, Pascal Bovet, Brice W Bicaba, Krishna K Aryal, Mohamed Msaidié, Glennis Andall-Brereton, Garry Brian, Andrew Stokes, Sebastian Vollmer, Till Bärnighausen, Rifat Atun, Pascal Geldsetzer, Jennifer Manne-Goehler, and Lindsay M Jaacks
Subjects: Medicine
Abstract: BackgroundCardiovascular diseases are leading causes of death, globally, and health systems that deliver quality clinical care are needed to manage an increasing number of people with risk factors for these diseases. Indicators of preparedness of countries to manage cardiovascular disease risk factors (CVDRFs) are regularly collected by ministries of health and global health agencies. We aimed to assess whether these indicators are associated with patient receipt of quality clinical care.Methods and findingsWe did a secondary analysis of cross-sectional, nationally representative, individual-patient data from 187,552 people with hypertension (mean age 48.1 years, 53.5% female) living in 43 low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) and 40,795 people with diabetes (mean age 52.2 years, 57.7% female) living in 28 LMICs on progress through cascades of care (condition diagnosed, treated, or controlled) for diabetes or hypertension, to indicate outcomes of provision of quality clinical care. Data were extracted from national-level World Health Organization (WHO) Stepwise Approach to Surveillance (STEPS), or other similar household surveys, conducted between July 2005 and November 2016. We used mixed-effects logistic regression to estimate associations between each quality clinical care outcome and indicators of country development (gross domestic product [GDP] per capita or Human Development Index [HDI]); national capacity for the prevention and control of noncommunicable diseases ('NCD readiness indicators' from surveys done by WHO); health system finance (domestic government expenditure on health [as percentage of GDP], private, and out-of-pocket expenditure on health [both as percentage of current]); and health service readiness (number of physicians, nurses, or hospital beds per 1,000 people) and performance (neonatal mortality rate). All models were adjusted for individual-level predictors including age, sex, and education. In an exploratory analysis, we tested whether national-level data on facility preparedness for diabetes were positively associated with outcomes. Associations were inconsistent between indicators and quality clinical care outcomes. For hypertension, GDP and HDI were both positively associated with each outcome. Of the 33 relationships tested between NCD readiness indicators and outcomes, only two showed a significant positive association: presence of guidelines with being diagnosed (odds ratio [OR], 1.86 [95% CI 1.08-3.21], p = 0.03) and availability of funding with being controlled (OR, 2.26 [95% CI 1.09-4.69], p = 0.03). Hospital beds (OR, 1.14 [95% CI 1.02-1.27], p = 0.02), nurses/midwives (OR, 1.24 [95% CI 1.06-1.44], p = 0.006), and physicians (OR, 1.21 [95% CI 1.11-1.32], p < 0.001) per 1,000 people were positively associated with being diagnosed and, similarly, with being treated; and the number of physicians was additionally associated with being controlled (OR, 1.12 [95% CI 1.01-1.23], p = 0.03). For diabetes, no positive associations were seen between NCD readiness indicators and outcomes. There was no association between country development, health service finance, or health service performance and readiness indicators and any outcome, apart from GDP (OR, 1.70 [95% CI 1.12-2.59], p = 0.01), HDI (OR, 1.21 [95% CI 1.01-1.44], p = 0.04), and number of physicians per 1,000 people (OR, 1.28 [95% CI 1.09-1.51], p = 0.003), which were associated with being diagnosed. Six countries had data on cascades of care and nationwide-level data on facility preparedness. Of the 27 associations tested between facility preparedness indicators and outcomes, the only association that was significant was having metformin available, which was positively associated with treatment (OR, 1.35 [95% CI 1.01-1.81], p = 0.04). The main limitation was use of blood pressure measurement on a single occasion to diagnose hypertension and a single blood glucose measurement to diagnose diabetes.ConclusionIn this study, we observed that indicators of country preparedness to deal with CVDRFs are poor proxies for quality clinical care received by patients for hypertension and diabetes. The major implication is that assessments of countries' preparedness to manage CVDRFs should not rely on proxies; rather, it should involve direct assessment of quality clinical care.
Published: 2020
Full Text: View/download PDF

5. Prevalence and associations of behavioural risk factors with blood lipids profile in Lebanese adults: findings from WHO STEPwise NCD cross-sectional survey

Author: Hani Tamim, Lara Nasreddine, Christelle El Khoury, Nahla Hwalla, Monique Chaaya, Antoine Farhat, Abla M Sibai, and Magali Mansour
Subjects: Medicine
Abstract: Objective To examine associations of behavioural risk factors, namely cigarette smoking, physical activity, dietary intakes and alcohol consumption, with blood lipids profile.Design and participants Data drawn from a cross-sectional study involving participants aged 18 years and over (n=363) from the nationwide WHO STEPwise Nutrition and Non-communicable Disease Risk Factor survey in Lebanon.Measures Demographic characteristics, behaviours and medical history were obtained from participants by questionnaire. Dietary assessment was performed using a 61-item Culture-Specific Food Frequency Questionnaire that measured food intake over the past year. Lipid levels were measured by the analysis of fasting blood samples (serum total cholesterol (TC), triglycerides (TG), very low-density lipoprotein (VLDL), low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C) and high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C)).Results Current cigarette smoking, alcohol consumption and low physical activity were prevalent among 33.3%, 39.7% and 41.6% of the sample, respectively. The contributions of fat and saturated fat to daily energy intake were high, estimated at 36.5% and 11.4%, respectively. Abnormal levels of TC, TG, VLDL, LDL-C and HDL-C were observed for 55.4%, 31.4%, 29.2%, 47.5% and 21.8% of participants, respectively. Adjusting for potential confounders, cigarette smoking was positively associated with higher odds of TG and VLDL (OR=4.27; 95% CI 1.69 to 10.77; and 3.26; 95% CI 1.33 to 8.03, respectively) with a significant dose–response relationship (p value for trend=0.010 and 0.030, respectively). Alcohol drinking and high saturated fat intake (≥10% energy intake) were associated with higher odds of LDL-C (OR=1.68; 95% CI 1.01 to 2.82 and OR= 1.73; 95% CI 1.02 to 2.93). Physical activity did not associate significantly with any blood lipid parameter.Conclusion The demonstrated positive associations between smoking, alcohol drinking and high saturated fat intake with adverse lipoprotein levels lay further evidence for clinical practitioners, public health professionals and dietitians in the development of preventive strategies among subjects with a high risk of cardiovascular diseases in Lebanon and other neighbouring countries with similar epidemiological profile.
Published: 2019
Full Text: View/download PDF

6. Identification of dietary patterns associated with elevated blood pressure among Lebanese men: A comparison of principal component analysis with reduced rank regression and partial least square methods.

Author: Farah Naja, Laila Itani, Nahla Hwalla, Abla M Sibai, and Samer A Kharroubi
Subjects: Medicine, Science
Abstract: BackgroundTo examine the associations of dietary patterns with odds of elevated Blood Pressure (BP) among Lebanese adult males using principal component analysis (PCA), and compare the results to two other data reduction methods, including reduced rank regression (RRR) and partial least-squares (PLS) regression.MethodsData from the National Nutrition and Non-Communicable Disease Risk Factor Survey conducted in Lebanon between years 2008 and 2009 were used. Dietary intake data were collected by a 61-item food frequency questionnaire (FFQ). In addition, anthropometric and blood pressure measurements were obtained following standard techniques. For the purpose of this study, data of males older than 20 years with no history of chronic diseases were selected (n = 673). Elevated BP was indicated if the systolic blood pressure was > = 130mm Hg and/or the diastolic blood pressure > = 85 mm Hg. Dietary patterns were constructed using PCA, PLS and RRR and compared based on the performance to identify plausible patterns associated with elevated BP. For PLS and RR, the response variables were BMI, waist circumference and percent body fat. Multiple logistic regression was used to evaluate the associations between the dietary pattern scores of each method and risk of elevated BP.ResultsThree dietary patterns were identified using PCA: Western, Traditional Lebanese, and Fish and alcohol. Both the Western and the Traditional Lebanese patterns were associated with higher odds of elevated BP in the study population (OR = 1.23, CI 1.03, 1.46; OR = 1.29, CI 1.09, 1.52 respectively). The comparison among the three methods for dietary patterns derivation showed that PLS and RRR derived patterns explained greater variance in the outcome (PCA: 1.2%; PLS: 14.1%; RRR: 15.36%) and were significantly associated with elevated BP, while the PCA dietary patterns were descriptive of the study population's real dietary habits (PCA: 23.6%; PLS: 19.8%; RRR: 11.3%).ConclusionsThe Western and Traditional Lebanese dietary patterns were associated with higher odds of elevated BP among Lebanese males. The findings of this study showed that, compared to PCA, the use of RRR method resulted in more significant associations with the outcome while the PCA-derived patterns were more related to the real habits in the study population.
Published: 2019
Full Text: View/download PDF

7. Does published research on non-communicable disease (NCD) in Arab countries reflect NCD disease burden?

Author: Abla M Sibai, Neil V Singh, Samer Jabbour, Shadi Saleh, Sawsan Abdulrahim, Farah Naja, and Soha Yazbek
Subjects: Medicine, Science
Abstract: To review trends in non-communicable (NCD) research output in the Arab region, in terms of quantity and quality, study design, setting and focus. We also examined differences by time and place, and assessed gaps between research output and NCD burden.A scoping review of a total of 3,776 NCD-related reports published between 2000 and 2013 was conducted for seven Arab countries. Countries were selected to represent diverse socio-economic development levels in the region: Regression analyses were used to assess trends in publications over time and by country. Research gaps were assessed by examining the degree of match between proportionate literature coverage of the four main NCDs (CVD, cancer, DM, and COPD) and cause-specific proportional mortality rates (PMR).The annual number of NCD publications rose nearly 5-fold during the study period, with higher income countries having the higher publication rates (per million populations) and the most rapid increases. The increase in the publication rate was particularly prominent for descriptive observational studies, while interventional studies and systematic reviews remained infrequent (slope coefficients = 13.484 and 0.883, respectively). Gap analysis showed a mismatch between cause-specific PMR burden and NCD research output, with a relative surplus of reports on cancer (pooled estimate +38.3%) and a relative deficit of reports on CVDs (pooled estimate -30.3%).The widening disparity between higher and lower-income countries and the discordance between research output and disease burden call for the need for ongoing collaboration among Arab academic institutions, funding agencies and researchers to guide country-specific and regional research agendas, support and conduct.
Published: 2017
Full Text: View/download PDF

8. Non-communicable diseases research output in the Eastern Mediterranean region: an overview of systematic reviews

Author: Alaa Akkawi, Joanne Khabsa, Aya Noubani, Sarah Jamali, Abla M. Sibai, and Tamara Lotfi
Subjects: Research methodology, Review of reviews, Overview, Systematic reviews, Meta-analysis, Non-communicable diseases, Medicine (General), R5-920
Abstract: Abstract Background Rates of non-communicable diseases (NCDs) are rapidly rising in the Eastern Mediterranean Region (EMR). Systematic reviews satisfy the demand from practitioners and policy makers for prompt comprehensive evidence. The aim of this study is to review trends in NCD systematic reviews research output and quality by time and place, describe design and focus, and examine gaps in knowledge produced. Methods Using the Montori et al. systematic reviews filter, MeSH and keywords were applied to search Medline Ovid, Cochrane Central and Epistemonikos for publications from 1996 until 2015 in the 22 countries of the EMR. The ‘Measurement Tool to Assess Systematic Reviews’, AMSTAR, was used to assess the methodological quality of the papers. Results Our search yielded 2439 papers for abstract and title screening, and 89 papers for full text screening. A total of 39 (43.8%) studies included meta-analysis. Most of the papers were judged as being of low AMSTAR quality (83.2%), and only one paper was judged as being of high AMSTAR quality. Whilst annual number of papers increased over the years, the growth was mainly attributed to an increase in low-quality publications approaching in 2015 over four times the number of medium-quality publications. Reviews were significantly more likely to be characterized by higher AMSTAR scores (±SD) when meta-analysis was performed compared to when meta-analysis was not performed (3.4 ± 1.5 vs 2.6 ± 2.0; p-value = 0.034); and when critical appraisal of the included studies was conducted (4.3 ± 2.3 vs 2.5 ± 1.5; p-value = 0.004). Most of the reviews focused on cancer and diabetes as an outcome (25.8% and 24.7%, respectively), and on smoking, dietary habits and physical activity as exposures (15.7%, 12.4%, 9.0%, respectively). There was a blatant deficit in reviews examining associations between behaviors and physiologic factors, notably metabolic conditions. Conclusions Systematic reviews research in the EMR region are overwhelmingly of low quality, with gaps in the literature for studies on cardiovascular disease and on associations between behavioral factors and intermediary physiologic parameters. This study raises awareness of the need for high-quality evidence guided by locally driven research agenda responsive to emerging needs in countries of the EMR.
Published: 2020
Full Text: View/download PDF

9. Improving health outcomes of people with diabetes: target setting for the WHO Global Diabetes Compact

Author: Edward W Gregg, James Buckley, Mohammed K Ali, Justine Davies, David Flood, Roopa Mehta, Ben Griffiths, Lee-Ling Lim, Jennifer Manne-Goehler, Jonathan Pearson-Stuttard, Nikhil Tandon, Gojka Roglic, Slim Slama, Jonathan E Shaw, Kokou Agoudavi, Krishna K. Aryal, Rifat Atun, Silver Bahendeka, Brice Wilfried Bicaba, Pascal Bovet, Garry Brian, Albertino Damasceno, Justine I. Davies, Maria Dorobantu, Farshad Farzadfar, Pascal Geldsetzer, Mongal Singh Gurung, David Guwatudde, Corine Houehanou, Dismand Houinato, Nahla Hwalla, Lindsay Jaacks, Bahadur Khem Karki, Demetre Labadarios, Nuno Lunet, Maja E. Marcus, Joao Martins, Theodory Mary Mayige, Bolormaa Norov, Sahar Saeedi Moghaddam, Sarah Quesnel-Crooks, Abla M. Sibai, Lela Sturua, Michaela Theilmann, Lindiwe Tsabedze, Sebastian Vollmer, and Zhaxybay Zhumadilov
Subjects: General Medicine
Published: 2023

10. A scoping review of reporting ‘Ethical Research Practices’ in research conducted among refugees and war-affected populations in the Arab world

Author: Jihad Makhoul, Rana F. Chehab, Zahraa Shaito, and Abla M. Sibai
Subjects: Ethics, Research, IRB, Refugees, War-affected populations, Review, Medical philosophy. Medical ethics, R723-726
Abstract: Abstract Background Ethical research conduct is a cornerstone of research practice particularly when research participants include vulnerable populations. This study mapped the extent of reporting ethical research practices in studies conducted among refugees and war-affected populations in the Arab World, and assessed variations by time, country of study, and study characteristics. Methods An electronic search of eight databases resulted in 5668 unique records published between 2000 and 2013. Scoping review yielded 164 eligible articles for analyses. Results Ethical research practices, including obtaining institutional approval, access to the community/research site, and informed consent/assent from the research participants, were reported in 48.2, 54.9, and 53.7% of the publications, respectively. Institutional approval was significantly more likely to be reported when the research was biomedical in nature compared to public health and social (91.7% vs. 54.4 and 32.4%), when the study employed quantitative compared to qualitative or mixed methodologies (61.7% vs. 26.8 and 42.9%), and when the journal required a statement on ethical declarations (57.4% vs. 27.1%). Institutional approval was least likely to be reported in papers that were sole-authored (9.5%), when these did not mention a funding source (29.6%), or when published in national journals (0%). Similar results were obtained for access to the community site and for seeking informed consent/assent from study participants. Conclusions The responsibility of inadequacies in adherence to ethical research conduct in crisis settings is born by a multitude of stakeholders including funding agencies, institutional research boards, researchers and international relief organizations involved in research, as well as journal editors, all of whom need to play a more proactive role for enhancing the practice of ethical research conduct in conflict settings.
Published: 2018
Full Text: View/download PDF

11. Urbanization and Socioeconomic Disparities in Hypertension among Older Adult Women in Sudan

Author: Shahd Osman, Christy Costanian, Nur Beyhan Annan, Fouad M. Fouad, Miran Jaffa, and Abla M. Sibai
Subjects: Infectious and parasitic diseases, RC109-216, Public aspects of medicine, RA1-1270
Abstract: Background: Evidence from the developed world associates higher prevalence of hypertension with lower socioeconomic status (SES). However, patterns of association are not as clear in Africa and other developing countries, with varying levels of socioeconomic development and epidemiological transition. Using wealth and education as indicators, we investigated association between SES and hypertension among older adult women in Sudan and examined whether urbanicity mediates the relationship. Methods: The sample included women aged 50 years and over participating in the nationally representative population-based second Sudan Health Household Survey (SHHS) conducted in 2010. Principal components analysis was used to assign each household with a wealth score based on assets owned. The score was categorized into quintiles from lowest (poorest) to highest (richest). Findings: The sample included a total of 5218 women, median and mean age 55 and 59 years, respectively, with the majority not have any schooling (81.6%). The overall prevalence of reported hypertension was found to be 10.5%. After adjustment for age, marital status, work status and urban/rural location, better wealth and higher education were independently and positively associated with hypertension prevalence rates. However, when stratified by urbanicity, the relationship between wealth and hypertension lost its significance for women in urban areas but maintained it in rural areas, increasing significantly and consistently with each increase in quintile index (adjusted odds ratio, aOR1 = 1.95 95% CI = 1.08–3.52; aOR2 = 5.25, 95% CI = 3.01–9.15; aOR3 = 8.27, 95% CI = 4.78–14.3; and aOR4 = and 11.4, 95% CI = 6.45–20.0; respectively). By contrast, education played a greater role in increasing the odds of hypertension among women in urban locations but not in rural locations (aOR = 2.14, 95% CI = 1.25–7.90 vs. aOR = 0.79, 95% CI = 0.27–2.30, respectively). Conclusions: Our findings of a socioeconomic gradient in the prevalence of hypertension among women, mediated by urbanization, call for targeted interventions from early stages of economic development in Sudan and similar settings of transitioning countries.
Published: 2019
Full Text: View/download PDF

12. Context-led capacity building in time of crisis: fostering non-communicable diseases (NCD) research skills in the Mediterranean Middle East and North Africa

Author: Peter Phillimore, Abla M. Sibai, Anthony Rizk, Wasim Maziak, Belgin Unal, Niveen Abu Rmeileh, Habiba Ben Romdhane, Fouad M. Fouad, Yousef Khader, Kathleen Bennett, Shahaduz Zaman, Awad Mataria, Rula Ghandour, Bülent Kılıç, Nadia Ben Mansour, Ibtihal Fadhil, Martin O’Flaherty, Simon Capewell, and Julia A. Critchley
Subjects: research capacity building, non-communicable diseases, conflict, insecurity, sustainability, mediterranean, middle east, Public aspects of medicine, RA1-1270
Abstract: Background: This paper examines one EC-funded multinational project (RESCAP-MED), with a focus on research capacity building (RCB) concerning non-communicable diseases (NCDs) in the Mediterranean Middle East and North Africa. By the project’s end (2015), the entire region was engulfed in crisis. Objective: Designed before this crisis developed in 2011, the primary purpose of RESCAP-MED was to foster methodological skills needed to conduct multi-disciplinary research on NCDs and their social determinants. RESCAP-MED also sought to consolidate regional networks for future collaboration, and to boost existing regional policy engagement in the region on the NCD challenge. This analysis examines the scope and sustainability of RCB conducted in a context of intensifying political turmoil. Methods: RESCAP-MED linked two sets of activities. The first was a framework for training early- and mid-career researchers through discipline-based and writing workshops, plus short fellowships for sustained mentoring. The second integrated public-facing activities designed to raise the profile of the NCD burden in the region, and its implications for policymakers at national level. Key to this were two conferences to showcase regional research on NCDs, and the development of an e-learning resource (NETPH). Results: Seven discipline-based workshops (with 113 participants) and 6 workshops to develop writing skills (84 participants) were held, with 18 fellowship visits. The 2 symposia in Istanbul and Beirut attracted 280 participants. Yet the developing political crisis tagged each activity with a series of logistical challenges, none of which was initially envisaged. The immediacy of the crisis inevitably deflected from policy attention to the challenges of NCDs. Conclusions: This programme to strengthen research capacity for one priority area of global public health took place as a narrow window of political opportunity was closing. The key lessons concern issues of sustainability and the paramount importance of responsively shaping a context-driven RCB.
Published: 2019
Full Text: View/download PDF

13. Expanding access to newer medicines for people with type 2 diabetes in low-income and middle-income countries: a cost-effectiveness and price target analysis

Author: Corine Houehanou, Kasia J. Lipska, Michaela Theilmann, David Flood, Demetre Labadarios, John Yudkin, Krishna K. Aryal, Sanjay Basu, Till Bärnighausen, Paul Domainico, Justine Davies, Sebastian Vollmer, Colin G. Brown, Maja-Emilia Marcus, Abla M. Sibai, Jennifer Manne-Goehler, Pascal Geldsetzer, Jenna Mezhrahid, Rifat Atun, Mary T Mayige, Sahar Saeedi Moghaddam, Farshad Farzadfar, David Beran, and Jacqueline Seigle
Subjects: Blood Glucose, Heart Failure, business.industry, Cost-Benefit Analysis, Endocrinology, Diabetes and Metabolism, Microsimulation, Insulin Glargine, Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus, Glucagon-Like Peptide-1 Receptor, Endocrinology, Diabetes Mellitus, Type 2, Low and middle income countries, Environmental health, Internal Medicine, Humans, Hypoglycemic Agents, Insulin, Medicine, business, Developing Countries, Sodium-Glucose Transporter 2 Inhibitors
Abstract: For patients with type 2 diabetes in low-income and middle-income countries (LMICs), access to newer antidiabetic drugs (eg, sodium-glucose co-transporter-2 [SGLT2] inhibitors, glucagon-like peptide-1 [GLP-1] receptor agonists, and insulin analogues) could reduce the incidence of diabetes-related complications. We aimed to estimate price targets to pursue in negotiations for inclusion in national formularies given the addition of these novel agents to WHO's Essential Medicines List.We incorporated individual-level, nationally representative survey data (2006-18) from 23 678 people with diabetes in 67 LMICs into a microsimulation of cardiovascular events, heart failure, end-stage renal disease, vision loss, pressure sensation loss, hypoglycaemia requiring medical attention, and drug-specific side-effects. We estimated price targets for incremental costs of switching to newer treatments to achieve cost-effectiveness (ie,3-times gross domestic product per disability-adjusted life-year averted) or to achieve net cost-savings when including costs of averted complications. We compared switching to SGLT2 inhibitors or GLP-1 receptor agonists in place of sulfonylureas, or insulin analogues in place of human insulin, and also compared a glycaemia-agnostic pathways of adding SGLT2 inhibitors or GLP-1 receptor agonists to existing therapies for people with heart disease, heart failure, or kidney disease.To achieve cost-effectiveness, SGLT2 inhibitors would need to have a median price of $224 per person per year (a 17·4% cost reduction; IQR $138-359, population-weighted across countries; mean price $257); GLP-1 receptor agonists $208 per person per year (98·3% reduction; $129-488; $240); and glargine insulin $20 per vial (31·0% reduction; $16-42; $28). To achieve net cost-savings, price targets would need to reduce by a further $9-10 to a median cost for SGLT2 inhibitors of $214 (21·4% reduction; $148-316; $245) and for GLP-1 receptor agonists to $199 per person per year (98·4% reduction; $138-294; $228); but insulin glargine remained around $20 per vial (32·4% reduction; $15-37; $26). Using SGLT2 inhibitors or GLP-1 receptor agonists in a glycaemia-agnostic pathway produced a 92% reduction (SGLT2 inhibitors) and 72% reduction (GLP-1 receptor agonists) in incremental cost-effectiveness ratios.Among novel agents, SGLT2 inhibitors hold particular promise for reducing complications of diabetes and meeting common price targets, particularly when used among people with established cardiovascular or kidney disease. These findings are consistent with the choice to include SGLT2 inhibitors in the WHO Essential Medicines List.Clinton Health Access Initiative.
Published: 2021

14. Validation of the Arabic Severe Respiratory Insufficiency Questionnaire

Author: Rania N. Bzeih, Lilian A. Ghandour, Mohamad F. El-Khatib, Salah Zeineldine, Marwan Alawieh, and Abla M. Sibai
Subjects: Pulmonary and Respiratory Medicine, Cross-Cultural Comparison, Male, medicine.medical_specialty, Psychometrics, medicine.medical_treatment, Health-related quality of life, Nomological network, Home Care Services, Hospital-Based, Respiratory failure, Diseases of the respiratory system, Cronbach's alpha, Quality of life, Germany, Surveys and Questionnaires, Validation, medicine, Outpatient clinic, Humans, Medical history, Translations, Lebanon, Aged, Mechanical ventilation, RC705-779, business.industry, Research, Reproducibility of Results, social sciences, Middle Aged, Respiration, Artificial, Exploratory factor analysis, Home mechanical ventilation, Physical therapy, Quality of Life, population characteristics, Female, business, Respiratory Insufficiency, geographic locations
Abstract: Background/objectives Assessment of Health-Related Quality of Life (HRQL) in patients with chronic respiratory insufficiency requiring Home Mechanical Ventilation (HMV) requires a valid measurement tool. The Severe Respiratory Insufficiency (SRI) questionnaire, originally developed in German, has been translated into different languages and tested in different contexts, but has so far not been in use in Arabic-speaking populations. The objective of this study is to validate the Arabic version of the SRI questionnaire in a sample of Arabic-speaking patients from Lebanon. Methods Following forward/backward translations, the finalized Arabic version was administered to 149 patients (53 males–96 females, age 69.80 ± 10 years) receiving HMV. Patients were recruited from outpatient clinics and visited at home. The Arabic SRI and the 36-Item Short-Form Health Survey (SF-36) were administered, in addition to questions on sociodemographics and medical history. Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) was used to explore dimensionality; internal consistency reliability of the unidimensional scale and its subscales was assessed using Cronbach’s alpha. External nomological validity was examined by assessing the correlation between the SRI and SF-36 scores. Results The 49-item Arabic SRI scale showed a high internal consistency reliability (Cronbach alpha for the total scale was 0.897 and ranged between 0.73 and 0.87 for all subscales). Correlations between the SF-36-Mental Health Component MHC and SF-36-Physical Health Component with SRI-Summary Scale were 0.57 and 0.66, respectively, with higher correlations observed between the SF-36 and specific sub-scales such as the Physical Functioning and the Social Functioning subscales [r = 0.81 and r = 0.74 (P Conclusion and recommendations The Arabic SRI is a reliable and valid tool for assessing HRQL in patients with chronic respiratory insufficiency receiving home mechanical ventilation.
Published: 2021

15. The Influence of Female Reproductive Factors on Longevity: A Systematized Narrative Review of Epidemiological Studies

Author: Christy Costanian, Raymond Farah, Ray Salameh, Brad A. Meisner, Sola Aoun Bahous, and Abla M. Sibai
Subjects: Geriatrics and Gerontology
Abstract: Purpose: This systematized review presents a synthesis of epidemiological studies that examine the association between female reproductive factors and longevity indicators. Methods: A comprehensive literature search was conducted using four bibliographic databases: OVID Medline, Web of Science, PubMed, and Google Scholar, including English language articles published until March 2022. Results from the search strategy yielded 306 articles, 37 of which were included for review based on eligibility criteria. Results were identified within the following nine themes: endogenous androgens and estrogens, age at first childbirth, age at last childbirth, parity, reproductive lifespan, menopause-related factors, hormone therapy use, age at menarche, and offspring gender. Results: Evidence that links reproductive factors and long lifespan is limited. Several female reproductive factors are shown to be significantly associated with longevity, yet findings remain inconclusive. The most consistent association was between parity (fertility and fecundity) and increased female lifespan. Age at first birth and parity were consistently associated with increased longevity. Associations between age at menarche and menopause, premature menopause, reproductive lifespan, offspring gender and longevity are inconclusive. Conclusion: There is not enough evidence to consider sex a longevity predictor. To understand the mechanisms that predict longevity outcomes, it is imperative to consider sex-specific within-population differences.
Published: 2022

16. Osteoporotic hip and vertebral fractures in the Arab region: a systematic review

Author: Abla M. Sibai, T Mahmoud, G. El-Hajj Fuleihan, R El Eid, Lokman I. Meho, Sara Ajjour, Maya Barake, Jessica Atieh, and Marlene Chakhtoura
Subjects: 0301 basic medicine, medicine.medical_specialty, education.field_of_study, Pediatrics, business.industry, Endocrinology, Diabetes and Metabolism, Incidence (epidemiology), Population, 030209 endocrinology & metabolism, Retrospective cohort study, medicine.disease, Rheumatology, Menopause, 03 medical and health sciences, 0302 clinical medicine, Pill, Internal medicine, Orthopedic surgery, Epidemiology, Medicine, 030101 anatomy & morphology, business, education
Abstract: Asia is projected to account for the largest proportion of the rising burden of osteoporotic fractures worldwide. Data from the Middle East is scarce. We performed a systematic review on the epidemiology of vertebral and hip osteoporotic fractures in 22 Arab League countries, using Scopus, PubMed, and Embase. We identified 67 relevant publications, 28 on hip and 39 on vertebral fractures. The mean age of patients was 70-74 years, female to male ratio 1.2:2.1. Age-standardized incidence rates, to the UN 2010 population, were 236 to 290/100,000 for women from Kuwait and Lebanon, lower in Morocco. Risk factors for hip fractures included lower BMD or BMI, taller stature, anxiolytics, and sleeping pills. Most patients were not tested nor treated. Mortality derived from retrospective studies ranged between 10 and 20% at 1 year, and between 25 and 30% at 2-3 years. Among 39 studies on vertebral fractures, 18 described prevalence of morphometric fractures. Excluding grade 1 fractures, 13.3-20.2% of women, mean age 58-74 years, had prevalent vertebral fractures, as did 10-14% of men, mean age 62-74 years. Risk factors included age, gender, smoking, multiparity, years since menopause, low BMD, bone markers, high sclerostin, low IgF1, hypovitaminosis D, abdominal aortic calcification score, and VDR polymorphisms. Vertebral fracture incidence in women from Saudi Arabia, mean age 61, was 6.2% at 5 years, including grade 1 fractures. Prospective population-based fracture registries, prevalence studies, predictive models, fracture outcomes, and fracture liaison services from Arab countries are still lacking today. They are the pillars to closing the care gap of this morbid disease.
Published: 2021

17. Differences in Dietary Intakes among Lebanese Adults over a Decade: Results from Two National Surveys 1997–2008/2009

Author: Lara Nasreddine, Jennifer J. Ayoub, Fatima Hachem, Jiana Tabbara, Abla M. Sibai, Nahla Hwalla, and Farah Naja
Subjects: nutrition transition, Eastern Mediterranean region, adults, dietary intakes, nutrition surveys, Lebanon, Nutrition. Foods and food supply, TX341-641
Abstract: Amidst the ongoing societal and economic shifts in the Eastern Mediterranean region (EMR), this study aims at investigating temporal trends in food consumption and nutrient intakes among Lebanese adults, by age and sex. Data were derived from two national cross-sectional surveys conducted in Lebanon during two time periods (1997; 2008/2009). In both surveys, dietary assessment was based on 24-h recalls. The results, expressed as % energy intake (%EI), revealed a significant decrease (p < 0.001) in the consumption of bread, fruits, fresh fruit juices, milk and eggs, whereas the consumption of added fats and oils, poultry, cereals and cereal-based products, chips and salty crackers, sweetened milk and hot beverages increased over time (p < 0.001). A significant increase in dietary energy (kcal/day) and fat intake (%EI) was observed, coupled with decreases in carbohydrate intake (%EI) and dietary density of vitamin A and vitamin C (per 1000 kcal) (p < 0.001). These changes were noted in both genders and across age groups, albeit there were some disparities between groups. In conclusion, based on national nutrition surveys, this study is the first to characterize the nutrition transition in a middle-income country of the EMR, shedding light on priority areas for nutrition policies and interventions.
Published: 2019
Full Text: View/download PDF

18. Prevalence and Correlates of Hypertension Unawareness among Lebanese Adults: The Need to Target Those 'Left Behind'

Author: Fatima Ghaddar, Nahla Hwalla, Lama Hammad, Rania A. Tohme, Abla M. Sibai, and Tamar Kabakian-Khasholian
Subjects: education.field_of_study, Article Subject, business.industry, Confounding, Population, Disease, 030204 cardiovascular system & hematology, Left behind, 03 medical and health sciences, 0302 clinical medicine, Blood pressure, RC666-701, Health care, Internal Medicine, Diseases of the circulatory (Cardiovascular) system, Medicine, 030212 general & internal medicine, Family history, Risk factor, business, education, Demography
Abstract: Introduction. Hypertension unawareness is context-specific, and our understanding of factors associated with it has implications on primary healthcare practices locally and contributes to achieving cardiovascular disease (CVD) targets, globally. In this study, we examine the prevalence and correlates of hypertension unawareness among adult Lebanese population. Methods. The study sample included a nationally representative sample of 2214 adults ≥25 years of age from the Noncommunicable Disease (NCD) Risk Factor WHO-STEPS cross-sectional survey conducted in Lebanon. In the first step, hypertension was assessed based on reported morbidity using face-to-face interviews, and in the second step, based on blood pressure (BP) measurement. We defined hypertension prevalence as systolic/diastolic blood pressure ≥140/90 mmHg and/or ongoing treatment for hypertension. Hypertension unawareness was described as lack of prior knowledge of hypertensive status. Those responding negatively to the face-to-face interview question “whether they had ever been told by a health worker that they have hypertension” were labelled as “apparently healthy.” Results. Overall prevalence of hypertension was 30.7%. A total of 369 subjects were unaware of their condition, representing 51.8% of all hypertensives and 15.9% of the apparently healthy. Multivariable analysis controlling for a number of confounders showed that, among apparently healthy participants, insurance coverage and contact with healthcare services were not associated with higher likelihood for hypertension awareness. Among all hypertensives, hypertension unawareness was significantly higher in the young, those with BMI
Published: 2021

19. Tobacco Research in the Eastern Mediterranean Region: A Scoping Review of Published Studies from Seven Countries

Author: Joanne Khabsa, Saif M Borgan, Randah R. Hamadeh, and Abla M. Sibai
Subjects: 030505 public health, Health (social science), Priority setting, Clinical study design, media_common.quotation_subject, Confounding, Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health, Outcome measures, Scarcity, 03 medical and health sciences, Eastern mediterranean, 0302 clinical medicine, Geography, Scale (social sciences), Environmental health, Waterpipe Tobacco, 030212 general & internal medicine, 0305 other medical science, media_common
Abstract: While surveillance on a global scale has been showing a decline in tobacco smoking in the past decade, rates in the Eastern Mediterranean Region (EMR) remained stable with some countries showing rising trends. This study aimed to analyze the landscape of tobacco research in the EMR, present data on publication trends, and identify research gaps and opportunities to guide future tobacco research in the region. We conducted a scoping review of tobacco research in seven countries from January 2000 to December 2013. Three hundred and forty eight studies were identified, the majority of which were published in international journals and in English language. There was an increase in publications over time, with a significant positive linear trend (p = 0.03). Descriptive cross-sectional and case–control studies were the most common study designs (67.0%), and only 8% were longitudinal studies. Papers that reported, in part or solely, on waterpipe tobacco smoking (WTS) constituted 25.6% of the total publication pool. Tobacco consumption was treated as an exposure variable in half of the papers and mostly in relation to cancer and cardiovascular diseases, as an outcome measure in 37.7%, and as a confounding variable in 14.7% of the papers. Studies that examined associations of tobacco with other behaviors (5.3%) were lacking. The scarcity of high-evidence tobacco research in the EMR, together with the relatively deficient data on WTS and associations with other factors warrant the need for discussions on research priority setting and guidance on funding allocations in the region.
Published: 2020

20. Non-communicable diseases research output in the Eastern Mediterranean region: an overview of systematic reviews

Author: Sarah Jamali, Joanne Khabsa, Abla M. Sibai, Tamara Lotfi, Alaa Akkawi, and Aya Noubani
Subjects: Research Report, Research methodology, Epidemiology, media_common.quotation_subject, Overview, MEDLINE, Research agenda, Eastern Mediterranean region, Health Informatics, Disease, 030204 cardiovascular system & hematology, 03 medical and health sciences, 0302 clinical medicine, Environmental health, Diabetes Mellitus, Medicine, Humans, Quality (business), 030212 general & internal medicine, Non-communicable diseases, Noncommunicable Diseases, media_common, lcsh:R5-920, business.industry, Mediterranean Region, Physiologic Factors, Systematic reviews, 3. Good health, Critical appraisal, Eastern mediterranean, Meta-analysis, Systematic review, business, Review of reviews, lcsh:Medicine (General), Research Article, Systematic Reviews as Topic
Abstract: Background Rates of non-communicable diseases (NCDs) are rapidly rising in the Eastern Mediterranean Region (EMR). Systematic reviews satisfy the demand from practitioners and policy makers for prompt comprehensive evidence. The aim of this study is to review trends in NCD systematic reviews research output and quality by time and place, describe design and focus, and examine gaps in knowledge produced. Methods Using the Montori et al. systematic reviews filter, MeSH and keywords were applied to search Medline Ovid, Cochrane Central and Epistemonikos for publications from 1996 until 2015 in the 22 countries of the EMR. The ‘Measurement Tool to Assess Systematic Reviews’, AMSTAR, was used to assess the methodological quality of the papers. Results Our search yielded 2439 papers for abstract and title screening, and 89 papers for full text screening. A total of 39 (43.8%) studies included meta-analysis. Most of the papers were judged as being of low AMSTAR quality (83.2%), and only one paper was judged as being of high AMSTAR quality. Whilst annual number of papers increased over the years, the growth was mainly attributed to an increase in low-quality publications approaching in 2015 over four times the number of medium-quality publications. Reviews were significantly more likely to be characterized by higher AMSTAR scores (±SD) when meta-analysis was performed compared to when meta-analysis was not performed (3.4 ± 1.5 vs 2.6 ± 2.0; p-value = 0.034); and when critical appraisal of the included studies was conducted (4.3 ± 2.3 vs 2.5 ± 1.5; p-value = 0.004). Most of the reviews focused on cancer and diabetes as an outcome (25.8% and 24.7%, respectively), and on smoking, dietary habits and physical activity as exposures (15.7%, 12.4%, 9.0%, respectively). There was a blatant deficit in reviews examining associations between behaviors and physiologic factors, notably metabolic conditions. Conclusions Systematic reviews research in the EMR region are overwhelmingly of low quality, with gaps in the literature for studies on cardiovascular disease and on associations between behavioral factors and intermediary physiologic parameters. This study raises awareness of the need for high-quality evidence guided by locally driven research agenda responsive to emerging needs in countries of the EMR.
Published: 2020

21. The Association of Socioeconomic Status With Hypertension in 76 Low- and Middle-Income Countries

Author: Tabea K. Kirschbaum, Nikkil Sudharsanan, Jennifer Manne-Goehler, Jan-Walter De Neve, Julia M. Lemp, Michaela Theilmann, Maja E. Marcus, Cara Ebert, Simiao Chen, Moein Yoosefi, Abla M. Sibai, Mahtab Rouhifard, Sahar Saeedi Moghaddam, Mary T. Mayige, Joao S. Martins, Nuno Lunet, Jutta M.A. Jorgensen, Corine Houehanou, Farshad Farzadfar, Albertino Damasceno, Pascal Bovet, Silver K. Bahendeka, Krishna K. Aryal, Glennis Andall-Brereton, Justine I. Davies, Rifat Atun, Sebastian Vollmer, Till Bärnighausen, Lindsay M. Jaacks, and Pascal Geldsetzer
Subjects: Adult, Male, Cross-Sectional Studies, Social Class, Socioeconomic Factors, Hypertension, Income, Prevalence, Humans, Female, Cardiology and Cardiovascular Medicine, Developing Countries
Abstract: Effective equity-focused health policy for hypertension in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) requires an understanding of the condition's current socioeconomic gradients and how these are likely to change in the future as countries develop economically.This cross-sectional study aimed to determine how hypertension prevalence in LMICs varies by individuals' education and household wealth, and how these socioeconomic gradients in hypertension prevalence are associated with a country's gross domestic product (GDP) per capita.We pooled nationally representative household survey data from 76 LMICs. We disaggregated hypertension prevalence by education and household wealth quintile, and used regression analyses to adjust for age and sex.We included 1,211,386 participants in the analysis. Pooling across all countries, hypertension prevalence tended to be similar between education groups and household wealth quintiles. The only world region with a clear positive association of hypertension with education or household wealth quintile was Southeast Asia. Countries with a lower GDP per capita had, on average, a more positive association of hypertension with education and household wealth quintile than countries with a higher GDP per capita, especially in rural areas and among men.Differences in hypertension prevalence between socioeconomic groups were generally small, with even the least educated and least wealthy groups having a substantial hypertension prevalence. Our cross-sectional interaction analyses of GDP per capita with the socioeconomic gradients of hypertension suggest that hypertension may increasingly affect adults in the lowest socioeconomic groups as LMICs develop economically.
Published: 2022

22. Anthropometric Cutoffs for Increased Cardiometabolic Risk Among Lebanese Adults: A Cross-Sectional Study

Author: Lara Nasreddine, Abla M. Sibai, Samer A. Kharroubi, Marie Claire Chamieh, Farah Naja, Nahla Hwalla, and Nivine Bachir
Subjects: Adult, Male, Cross-sectional study, Endocrinology, Diabetes and Metabolism, 030209 endocrinology & metabolism, 030204 cardiovascular system & hematology, Body Mass Index, Young Adult, 03 medical and health sciences, 0302 clinical medicine, Reference Values, Risk Factors, Environmental health, Internal Medicine, medicine, Humans, Body Weights and Measures, Obesity, Lebanon, Aged, Metabolic Syndrome, Cardiometabolic risk, Waist-Height Ratio, Waist-Hip Ratio, business.industry, Middle Aged, Anthropometry, medicine.disease, Cross-Sectional Studies, Increased risk, Cardiovascular Diseases, Female, Waist Circumference, Metabolic syndrome, business, Body mass index
Abstract: Background: Obesity is associated with increased risk for metabolic syndrome (MetS). Anthropometric cutoffs derived for Caucasians may not be applicable to identify obesity in Middle Easte...
Published: 2019

23. Heterogeneous contributions of change in population distribution of body mass index to change in obesity and underweight

Author: Maryam Sharafkhah, Emanuel Zitt, Majid Ezzati, Luxia Zhang, Young-Ho Khang, Ellina Rakhimova, Kairit Mikkel, Tiina Vlasoff, Eruke E. Egbagbe, Sidsel Graff-Iversen, Ilona Nenko, Magdalena Klimek, Mathilde Savy, Sanjib Kumar Sharma, Alfonso Siani, Luís Lopes, Vanina Bongard, Gregor Jurak, Jacqueline F. Price, Christina-Paulina Lambrinou, Maria Lc Iurilli, Rainford J. Wilks, Bontha V. Babu, Fereidoun Azizi, Harunobu Nakamura, Marialaura Bonaccio, Angela Döring, Zhenyu Zhang, Naser Ahmadi, Jolanta Słowikowska-Hilczer, Ana Paula Carlos Cândido, Clive Osmond, Thirunavukkarasu Sathish, Robert J. Adams, Themistoklis Tzotzas, Reina Engle-Stone, Atul Trivedi, Shoichiro Tsugane, Niels Møller, Jorge Bezerra, Dénes Molnár, Muhammad Fadhli Mohd Yusoff, Badreya Al-Lahou, J. Jaime Miranda, Bahram Mohajer, Sigmund A. Anderssen, Lital Keinan Boker, Eero Kajantie, Martin Gulliford, Maties Torrent, Sumit Bharadwaj, Toshiharu Ninomiya, Zbigniew Gaciong, Nayu Ikeda, Li Juan Wu, Adrian Richter, Licia Iacoviello, Marc J. Gunter, Wenbin Wei, Norsyamlina Che Abdul Rahim, Eman Aly, Ambady Ramachandran, Nils Lehmann, Soile E. Puhakka, Giovanni Veronesi, Hongsheng Bi, Eiji Oda, Jia Li Duan, Per Tynelius, José María Huerta, Janne Schurmann Tolstrup, Rodrigo M. Carrillo-Larco, Rosangela Fernandes Lucena Batista, Victoria E Soto-Rojas, Hanno Ulmer, Shukri F. Mohamed, Anthony Kafatos, Suyeon Park, Mohsen Ibrahim, Hamed Pouraram, Bin Zhou, May Soe Aung, Lars Bo Andersen, Erfan Ghasemi, René Charles Sylva, Himanshu K. Chaturvedi, Luc Dauchet, Ahmad Ali Zainuddin, Angela Chetrit, Dan Zhu, Valérie Deschamps, Ko Ko Zaw, Peter Vollenweider, Tomas Vega, Yves Martin-Prével, Mahfuzar Rahman, Dorja Vočanec, Roman Topor-Madry, Vinay Nangia, Herculina S. Kruger, Asher Fawwad, Emily Sonestedt, Elena Pahomova, Aleksander Giwercman, Elżbieta Dziankowska-Zaborszczyk, Cecilia Björkelund, Tatjana Hejgaard, Maria Puiu, Maria Benedetta Donati, Andrew Wong, Carlos P. Boissonnet, Santosh K. Bhargava, Patrick Kolsteren, Dermot O'Reilly, Bahareh Kheiri, Wolfgang Kratzer, Susanne R. de Rooij, H. Bas Bueno-de-Mesquita, Günther Fink, José R. Banegas, Michele Monroy-Valle, Drude Molbo, Mahmudur Rahman, Hynek Pikhart, Rafael N. Pichardo, Massimo Salvetti, Hui Cai, Sarah Filippi, Georg Posch, Hung-Kwan So, Yonghua Hu, Katsuyasu Kouda, Joana Carvalho, Gailute Bernotiene, Hannu Uusitalo, Thein Thein Htay, Felix Kaducu, Maigeng Zhou, Lars Ängquist, Thi Tuyet-Hanh Tran, Charles Lunogelo, Michel Joffres, Sabina Zambon, Ronald D. Gregor, Vayia Rarra, Seyed Mohammad Hashemi-Shahri, Loreto Santa Marina, Galina Obreja, Rudolf Kaaks, Aya Mostafa, Maria do Carmo Franco, Beata Gurzkowska, Chien-Jen Chen, Marie Moitry, Nizal Sarrafzadegan, Xiangjun Wang, Diego Giulliano Destro Christofaro, Imperia Brajkovich, Fangfang Chen, Francesco Panza, Ling Yang, Holly E. Syddall, Cecily Kelleher, Michael Tornaritis, Ningli Wang, Lutgarde Thijs, Marjolein Visser, Angelika Schaffrath Rosario, María José Tormo, Jostein Steene-Johannessen, Norbert Amougou, Emmanuella Magriplis, Mar Alvarez-Pedrerol, Jingli Gao, Stig E. Bojesen, Giuseppe Grosso, Seongjun Ha, Lauren Lissner, Mikhail Benet, Anastasia Markaki, Sanjay Rampal, Antônio Augusto Moura da Silva, Maria Lorenza Muiesan, Angelique Chan, Yvonne T. van der Schouw, Annamari Lundqvist, Philippe Amouyel, Kristyna Zejglicova, Charalambos Hadjigeorgiou, João Breda, Jørgen Meisfjord, Fatima Zahra Laamiri, Carl Lachat, Kai-Uwe Saum, Vilma Irazola, Leng Huat Foo, Óscar Lopes, Dickman Gareta, Flavio Nervi, Imre Janszky, Ruzena Kubinova, Terho Lehtimäki, Mario V. Capanzana, Moyses Szklo, Ramfis Nieto-Martínez, Viswanathan Mohan, Shuohua Chen, Arvind Pandey, Luigi Palmieri, Roya Kelishadi, Srinivasan Kannan, Jie Mi, Robert Beaglehole, Liliana Dacica, Jyrki K. Virtanen, Mohan Deepa, Peter Ueda, Isti Ilmiati Fujiati, Hermann Pohlabeln, Morten Sodemann, Jytte Halkjær, Zbigniew Kułaga, Sophie Visvikis-Siest, Farshad Farzadfar, Mohsen Azimi-Nezhad, Henry Völzke, Karolina Milkowska, Zahra Mohammadi, Belgin Ünal, Magda Gasull, George S. Stergiou, Marshall K. Tulloch-Reid, Seppo Koskinen, James E. Bennett, Marcela González-Gross, Virginija Dulskiene, Idris Guessous, Assembekov Batyrbek, Kamarul Imran Musa, Jeannette Lee, Josep Redon, Bihungum Bista, Luisa M Macieira, Johan Sundström, Andres Metspalu, Lariane M Ono, Flora A. Ukoli, Salar Rahimikazerooni, Andrea Gualtieri, Trevor S. Ferguson, Félicité Tchibindat, Eliza Cinteza, Ha Tp Do, Tajana Zeljkovic Vrkic, Tuyen D Le, Alison J. Hayes, Abdul Basit, Chandini Nekkantti, Teresa Norat, Eunice Ugel, Gulmira Aitmurzaeva, Mariachiara Di Cesare, Abdul Hamid Zargar, Vincenzo Solfrizzi, Garry L. Jennings, Aline Meirhaeghe, Kaare Christensen, Päivi Mäki, Xu Lin, Ali Esmaeili, Joanna Baran, Aneta Grajda, Renata Cifkova, Alexandre C. Pereira, Martin Bobak, Iuliia A Rusakova, Keiu Nelis, Damian K Francis, Guansheng Ma, Axel C. Carlsson, Alejandro Diaz, Alireza Ansari-Moghaddam, N Capkova, Zumin Shi, Maria Turley, Imelda A. Agdeppa, Helena I. S. Nogueira, Marcia Scazufca, Katharina Maruszczak, Natascia Rinaldo, Paulo A. Lotufo, Nuno Lunet, Thor Aspelund, Caroline H.D. Fall, Antonio Cabrera de León, Ahmad Faudzi Yusoff, Holger Theobald, Beatriz D'Agord Schaan, Pedro Marques-Vidal, William A. Neal, Mihai Gafencu, Tandi E. Matsha, Ana B. Crujeiras, Ahmad Reza Dorosty, Alain Morejon, Weili Yan, Dominique Hange, Bekbolat Zholdin, Frédéric Gottrand, Jorge Mota, Jana Námešná, Stevo Popovic, Louise Eriksen, Line Lund Kårhus, Cihangir Erem, Juergen Breckenkamp, Mathilde Kersting, Yi Song, Martin McKee, Aleksandra Gomula, Rafaela Rosário, Enzo Manzato, S. Goya Wannamethee, Sounnia Mediene Benchekor, Azim Nejatizadeh, Krishna Kumar Aryal, Juan P. González-Rivas, Vedrana Sember, Stephen T. McGarvey, Jukka T. Salonen, Patrick Pasquet, Patricia Varona-Pérez, Amelia C. Crampin, Ramin Heshmat, Violeta Iotova, Juvenal Soares Dias-da-Costa, Oye Gureje, Aletta E. Schutte, João Luiz Bastos, Anelise Reis Gaya, Konrad Jamrozik, Dalia Luksiene, Amina Barkat, Maria Paula Santos, José Camolas, Azli Baharudin, Diego Vanuzzo, Doris Stöckl, Rosalynn Siantar, Jouko Saramies, Albertino Damasceno, Davood Khalili, Simona Bo, Martina Müller-Nurasyid, Dominique Cottel, Markku Peltonen, Fikru Tullu, Ana Isabel Rito, Angélica Ochoa-Avilés, Annette J. Dobson, Christopher T. Cowell, Charumathi Sabanayagam, Rildo de Souza Wanderley Júnior, Oanh T. H. Trinh, Farahnaz Joukar, Mostafa K. Mohamed, Mostafa Qorbani, Jeongseon Kim, Helmut Schröder, Machi Suka, Natasja M. van Schoor, Jussi Kauhanen, Teresa Haugsgjerd, Goodarz Danaei, M. Fernanda Lima-Costa, Yong Tao, Elisabetta L. Romeo, Grazyna Jasienska, Victor Guillermo Sequera, Kazem Mohammad, Yanina Zócalo, Fernanda Cunha Soares, Jianfeng Wu, Mohammad Esmaeel Motlagh, María Elena Díaz-Sánchez, Monika Zuziak, Eldridge Ferrer, Anette Varbo, Leila Beltrami Moreira, Jeremy M. Jacobs, Kenneth James, Elena Sacchini, Pascal Bovet, Mahboubeh Parsaeian, Tania Lopez, Ya Xing Wang, Wojciech Drygas, Jody C Miller, Svetlana A. Shalnova, Maria Elisa Zapata, Chung T Nguyen, Nimmathota Arlappa, Edwige Landais, Thorkild I. A. Sørensen, Jeannette Klimont, Amirabbas Momenan, Erik J. Timmermans, Mari-Liis Tammesoo, Jost B. Jonas, Stefania Toselli, Maria Teresa Anselmo Olinto, Bahman Cheraghian, Kouamelan Doua, Esteban Carmuega, Marjeta Mišigoj-Duraković, Bo Werner, M. Arfan Ikram, Breige A. McNulty, Christa Meisinger, Clara Homs, Namuna Shrestha, Alina Kerimkulova, Youcef Laid, Claes Ohlsson, Alicia Matijasevich, Alison J Price, Ala'a Alkerwi, Kristine H. Allin, Lorenza Pilotto, Mohannad Al Nsour, Ingunn Holden Bergh, Marianna Noale, Heba Fouad, Vilnis Dzerve, Novie O. Younger-Coleman, Peter Willeit, Andrea R. V. R. Horimoto, Freda Pitakaka, Habiba Ben Romdhane, Savvas C. Savva, Rajeev Gupta, Jennifer Servais, Cristina Padez, Sarah P. Garnett, Maria del Cristo Rodriguez-Perez, Michala Lustigová, Tien Yin Wong, Rosa Haghshenas, Jonathan Giovannelli, Christina Howitt, Marleen E. Hendriks, Fadia AlBuhairan, Huashuai Chen, Gretchen A Stevens, Luís B. Sardinha, David Goltzman, Jenny M. Kindblom, Karina Mary de Paiva, Yousef Khader, Eric Monterrubio-Flores, Rajendra Pradeepa, Yi-Ting Lin, Martin Neovius, Juan Francisco Miquel, Ellis Owusu-Dabo, Anil Poudyal, Marzieh Katibeh, Tanja Stocks, Veronica Mocanu, Ulla Roggenbuck, Robespierre Ribeiro, Gabriele Eiben, Mary Simon, Christine Cameron, Hamid Hakimi, Kamel Ajlouni, Jakub Stokwiszewski, Iulia Jurca Simina, Pietro Amedeo Modesti, Frederick C. W. Wu, Peter Kristensen, Charles Mondo, Felix Gutzwiller, Mariana Sbaraini, Martijn Huisman, Betina H. Thuesen, Queenie Chan, Antonisamy Belavendra, Artur Mazur, Ulf Ekelund, Laura A. Rodríguez-Villamizar, Marcos André Moura-dos-Santos, Jean Ferrières, Farhad Zamani, Shina Avi, Yves Kameli, Luis Paulo Gomes Mascarenhas, Aluísio J D Barros, Thomas Meinertz Dantoft, Hossein Poustchi, Farid Najafi, Giovanni de Gaetano, Azaliia M Tuliakova, Vera Lanska, Tint Swe Latt, Matthias Bopp, Abbas Rezaianzadeh, Rod Jackson, Johan Van der Heyden, Reecha Sofat, Koen Van Herck, Allan G. Hill, Con Burns, Emanuela Pettenuzzo, Ming-Dong Wang, Stela McLachlan, Ulrike Gehring, Ranko Stevanovic, Nagalla Balakrishna, Lekhraj Rampal, Marjolijn C. E. Bragt, Saeid Eslami, Napoleón Pérez-Farinós, G. K. Mini, Viktoria Anna Kovacs, Rosemarie Martin, Nahla Hwalla, Wei Zheng, Hoang Van Minh, Edward D Janus, Laetitia Huiart, Farhad Pourfarzi, Sudha Ramachandra Rao, Fred Paccaud, Marcia Makdisse, Aye Aye Sein, Enrique Gutiérrez-González, Yang Yang, Anneke Blokstra, Henrike Galenkamp, Jaume Marrugat, Nazan Yardim, Wan Nazaimoon Wan Mohamud, Jesús Ibarluzea, Julio Zuñiga Cisneros, Laura Lauria, Argyro Karakosta, Dragana P Jovic, Jun Hata, Elio Riboli, Piotr Bandosz, Xun Tang, Parvina Mukhtorova, Jean Dallongeville, Jean-Bernard Ruidavets, Anne Tjønneland, Guillermo Frontera, Rahul Malhotra, Thomas Ferrao, Aleksandra Piwońska, Dusan Grafnetter, Mette Rasmussen, Daniel Weghuber, Sherali Rakhmatulloev, Martine Vrijheid, Johann Willeit, Motahareh Kheradmand, Małgorzata Mossakowska, Lechaba Tshepo, Dongfeng Gu, Hyeon Chang Kim, Vilmundur Gudnason, Maria Forsner, Peter Bjerregaard, Leon A. Simons, Rachael McLean, Japhet Killewo, Ramón Suárez-Medina, Y Nikitin, Eng Joo Tan, Jean Claude Mbanya, Aroor Bhagyalaxmi, Renata Kuciene, Kairat Davletov, Jose Eugenio Lozano, Afshin Ostovar, Niloofar Peykari, Guy De Backer, Soheir H Ahmed, Nicholas J. Wareham, Sai Yin Ho, Constanta Huidumac Petrescu, Maria Hassapidou, Iris Pigeot, Myriam Galfo, Susana Cararo Confortin, Blanca Sandra Ruiz-Betancourt, W. M. Monique Verschuren, Catterina Ferreccio, Fabio Galvano, Leila Houti, Daniel Bia, Annika Rosengren, Marcin Rutkowski, Biruta Velika, Joana Araújo, Fernando Rigo, Angela Spinelli, Scott B. McLean, Shirin Djalalinia, Marie Kunešová, Boban Mugoša, Sania Nishtar, Mangesh S. Pednekar, Shahla AlDhukair, Helle-Mai Loit, Antonis Zampelas, Altan Onat, Maciej Banach, Shohreh Naderimagham, Hajer Aounallah-Skhiri, Maja Bæksgaard Jørgensen, Yin Guo, Ewelina Czenczek-Lewandowska, Parasmani Dasgupta, Elvis Oa Wambiya, Inge Huybrechts, Raimund Erbel, Jari Jokelainen, Ana P. Ortiz, Stefan Kiechl, Emmanuel Cohen, Caleb Ochimana, Shynar Abdrakhmanova, Laura Censi, Iqbal Bata, Geetha R Menon, Snehalatha Chamukuttan, Pedro Plans-Rubio, Domenico Palli, Ana Azevedo, Slawomir Koziel, Benoît Salanave, Parinaz Mehdipour, Shu Ti Chiou, Lela Sturua, Lubica Ticha, Felipe Vogt Cureau, Jin Soo Moon, Ming-Hui Zhao, Urho M. Kujala, Nathalie Michels, Ertugrul Celikcan, Jaakko Tuomilehto, Judith Benedics, Tobias F. Rinke de Wit, Agnès Le Port, Reza Homayounfar, Andrea Rodriguez-Martinez, Tai Hing Lam, Yn-Tz Sung, Jürgen König, Kodavanti Mallikharjuna Rao, Hazzaa M. Al-Hazzaa, Karen Morgan, Bogdan Wojtyniak, Cynthia M. Pérez, Ilse Khouw, Manoli Garcia-de-la-Hera, Dong Wook Shin, Genc Burazeri, Ausra Petrauskiene, Charles Sossa Jérome, Kenisha Russell Jonsson, José Boggia, Daniela Galeone, Alice Bonilla-Vargas, Han Cg Kemper, Rahman Shiri, Stefaan Demarest, Else Karin Grøholt, San-Lin You, Adelheid Weber, Juha Auvinen, Aida Pilav, Sibel Gogen, Suzanne N Morin, Wan Mohamad Wan Bebakar, Viviane Cunha Cardoso, Kavumpurathu Raman Thankappan, Hana Zamrazilová, Frank Claessens, Karien Stronks, Helen Gonçalves, Tahir Aris, Luis Revilla, Sérgio Viana Peixoto, Zhamilya Battakova, Jing Liu, Eliza Markidou Ioannidou, Leticia Hernandez Cadena, Priscilla Duboz, Sandjaja, Tiina Laatikainen, Rafel Ramos, Sareh Eghtesad, Judith Simons, Orn Olafsson, E. Shyong Tai, Louise A. Baur, Nihal Thomas, Aung Soe Htet, Bente Sparboe-Nilsen, Paul Elliott, Soon-Woo Park, Angel R. Gonzalez, Ying-Wei Wang, Rob M. van Dam, Ryutaro Ohtsuka, Ludmila Sevcikova, Suhaila Abdul Ghaffar, Lynell V Maniego, Fariborz Mansour-Ghanaei, Maria Dorobantu, Giovanni Viegi, Xiaoguang Yang, Honor Bixby, Prakash C. Gupta, Ofra Kalter-Leibovici, Eugene Sobngwi, Ričardas Radišauskas, Jurate Medzioniene, Roy A Wong-McClure, Kim F. Michaelsen, Antonia Trichopoulou, Tania Tello, Francesco Branca, Johanna Gunnlaugsdottir, Els Clays, Wei-Yen Lim, Suzanne C. Ho, Toomas Veidebaum, Rebecca Goldsmith, Margot González-León, Matthias Nauck, Alibek Mereke, Marta Buoncristiano, Jakob Tarp, Rosalba Rojas-Martínez, Maya Tanrygulyyeva, Reza Malekzadeh, Abdonas Tamosiunas, Dimitrios Poulimeneas, Pedro Ordunez, Isabelle Herter-Aeberli, Khanh Le Nguyen Bao, Anne Juolevi, Vassilis Zafiropulos, Emanuela Gualdi-Russo, Jordi Sunyer, Manu Raj, Chaoqiang Jiang, Sofia Malyutina, Efthymios Kapantais, Maria Lazo-Porras, Maung Maung Than Htike, Michael Hobbs, Ranjit Mohan Anjana, Merike Liivak, Johan G. Eriksson, Margarita Samoutian, Andreia N. Pizarro, Mohammed Rasoul Tarawneh, Jean Woo, Kaspar Staub, Maria Teresa Menzano, Mojtaba Farjam, Adroaldo Cesar Araujo Gaya, Mohammad El-khateeb, Zulfiqar A Bhutta, Mukharram M. Bikbov, Hsien-Ho Lin, Oscar Noboa, Thomas Waldhör, Garry Brian, Simona Costanzo, Frank Tanser, Nor Azwany Yaacob, Michelle Cilia, Ivo Rakovac, Bill Stavreski, Ioannis Pagkalos, Ivan Pećin, Carlo M. Barbagallo, Abla M. Sibai, Yuna He, Matsuda Fumihiko, Bharathi Viswanathan, Ali Reza Safarpour, Wei Cheng Lo, Abdullatif Husseini, Jiang He, Liv Elin Torheim, Nipa Rojroongwasinkul, Aicha Soumare, Astrid Petersmann, Tomasz Grodzicki, Davide Noto, Panayiotis K. Yiallouros, Kelias P. Msyamboza, William R. Tebar, Yingfeng Zheng, Eha Nurk, Bhawesh Koirala, Ana Jelakovic, Suhad Bahijri, Freja B Kampmann, Qi Sheng You, Marika Ferrari, María-Elena González-Villalpando, Aline Wagner, Olfa Saidi, Anwar Batieha, Eduardo Capuano, Coimbatore Subramaniam Shanthirani, Dong Wook Kim, Albina A Fakhretdinova, Tom Wilsgaard, Maria Avdicova, Moesijanti Soekatri, Chiara Donfrancesco, Salim Mohanna, Paola Russo, Uruwan Yamborisut, Rafael dos Santos Henrique, Martin Nankap, Allan Linneberg, Khairil Si-Ramlee, Kirsten Mehlig, Christina Mavrogianni, Raluca Pop, Lèlita Santos, Graziella Bruno, Valentina Peterkova, Iná S. Santos, Georg Lappas, Alberto Palloni, Malay K. Mridha, Andrzej Pajak, Marta García-Solano, Stefaan De Henauw, Daniel Ferrante, Rute Santos, Anders Grøntved, Lucjan Szponar, Mihaela Vladulescu, Chien-An Sun, Jan A. Staessen, Paula Duarte de Oliveira, Norazizah Ibrahim Wong, Maria Nordendahl, Elaine M. Dennison, Jeonghee Lee, Diego Salmerón, Ida Maria Schmidt, Gao Pei, Noushin Mohammadifard, Igor Spiroski, Fernando Rodríguez-Artalejo, Xu Ma, Elin Pettersen Sørgjerd, Valéria Regecová, Cláudia S. Minderico, Johanna A. Otero, Jamila Abubakar Garba, Vesselka Duleva, Rui Ornelas, Ilpo Huhtaniemi, Cesar G. Victora, Lijuan Liu, Rody G. Sy, Mahmood Moosazadeh, Ali Ahmadi, Antonio Pedro Graça, Natalia Nowak-Szczepanska, Miao Li Chee, Michael Sjöström, Charles Agyemang, Shiqi Zhen, Xiu-Hua Guo, Pawel Kurjata, Jardena J. Puder, Mehrdad Azmin, Neil Murphy, Kaosar Afsana, Alireza Sadjadi, Johanna M. Geleijnse, Prashant Mathur, Elysée Claude Bika Lele, Raphael Mendes Ritti-Dias, Yannis Manios, Majid Shirani, Rosemary B. Duda, Liis Nelis, Jurate Klumbiene, Zhengming Chen, Wichai Aekplakorn, Alun Evans, Andrzej Wiecek, Lars Lind, Denise Eldemire-Shearer, Bernardo L. Horta, Macia Enguerran, Seyed Rasoul Zakavi, Daniel Fernández-Bergés, Kumiko Ohara, Ursula Kiechl-Kohlendorfer, Hermann Brenner, Przemyslaw Slusarczyk, Espen Bjertness, Jutta Stieber, Augusto Di Castelnuovo, Joel G. R. Roy, Aryeh D. Stein, Ruth Frikke-Schmidt, Vera Musil, Amaneh Shayanrad, Marcel Goldberg, Ramon O. Jimenez, Mohammad Reza Fattahi, Jolanda Hyska, Amir Houshang Mehrparvar, Elin Kolle, Mohamed Bamoshmoosh, Michelle Holdsworth, Felipe F. Casanueva, Børge G. Nordestgaard, Niels Wedderkopp, Eva Corpeleijn, Elias F. Gudmundsson, Antonio Mistretta, Daniel Lemogoum, Larissa Pruner Marques, Slavica Sović, Olli T. Raitakari, Marco Aurélio Peres, Alexandra Cucu, Gregorio Varela-Moreiras, Janine Clarke, Andrea Gazzinelli, Mieczysław Litwin, Sara Schramm, Xenophon Theodoridis, Harshpal Singh Sachdev, Mohammad Reza Mirjalili, Dimitrios Papandreou, Peter T. Katzmarzyk, Benjamin Acosta-Cazares, Ben Schöttker, Prabhdeep Kaur, Norlaila Mustafa, Shariq Rashid Masoodi, Sadaf G. Sepanlou, Adolfo Rubinstein, Francis Delpeuch, Julianne Williams, Abbas Dehghan, Leanne M. Riley, Heloisa Bettiol, Gabriele Nagel, Ellisiv B. Mathiesen, Ekaterina Stoyanova, Alisha N. Wade, Zhamyila Usupova, Arnaud Chiolero, Oonagh Markey, Jacqueline Ramke, Elena Bogova, Niveen M E Abu-Rmeileh, Nguyen D Nguyen, Tomasz Zdrojewski, Marjo-Riitta Järvelin, Jose Sanchez-Abanto, Rômulo Araújo Fernandes, Lourdes Ribas-Barba, Nalan Uysal, Mohamad Hasnan Ahmad, Krista Fischer, Maria Wany Louzada Strufaldi, Ramiro Guerrero, Farnam Mohebi, Tran Quoc Bao, Flávio Danni Fuchs, Salim Berkinbayev, Enisa Kujundzic, Sari Voutilainen, Farzad Hadaegh, Robert Lundqvist, Saeid Safiri, Iraj Mohebbi, George Luiz Lins Machado-Coelho, Annette Peters, Gonzalo Valdivia, Magdalena Korzycka, Rajiv T Erasmus, Masanori Iwasaki, Charmaine A. Duante, Sheikh Mohammed Shariful Islam, Quang Ngoc La, Ricky Eddie, Petra Rust, Daniela Rodrigues, Dirk De Bacquer, Karen Sparrenberger, Agneta Sjöberg, Thet Thet Mu, Katarzyna Dereń, Cora L. Craig, Jorge Motta, Janina Petkeviciene, Boyd Swinburn, Paibul Suriyawongpaisal, Visnja Djordjic, Ramón Alberto Rascón-Pacheco, Pradeep Joshi, Daan Kromhout, Marius B. Bjertness, Stefano Marventano, Juel Jarani, Alireza Khosravi, Eva Martos, David De Ridder, Lizzy M. Brewster, Nico Dragano, Liam Smeeth, Kenji Shibuya, Emma Ruiz Moreno, Hashem Jaddou, Grzegorz Sobek, Dimitrios Trichopoulos, Marvin Cervantes-Loaiza, Abu Am Hanif, Elaine M. Murtagh, Carlos A. Aguilar-Salinas, Graziella D'Arrigo, Kyungwon Oh, Heiner Boeing, Regina Heidinger-Felso, André Luiz Sena Guimarães, Balkish M. Naidu, Avula Laxmaiah, Ana M. B. Menezes, Marie Eliasen, Francesco Pistelli, Yuan He, Dusko Bjelica, José A. Casajús, Guang Ning, Lutgart Braeckman, Dirk Vanderschueren, Jochanan Stessman, Ivana Radic, Yi Zeng, Hans Concin, Damaskini Valvi, Sari Hantunen, Catherine Kyobutungi, Diego Augusto Santos Silva, Wenhua Zhao, Sok King Ong, Anne W. Taylor, Iraj Nabipour, Justyna Godos, Cyrus Cooper, Mattias Johansson, Samuel C. Dumith, Magdalena Muc, Sabine Schipf, Idowu O Senbanjo, Jim Mann, Rajaa Al-Raddadi, Yih Chung Tham, Kay-Tee Khaw, Joseph Cacciottolo, Ana Henriques, Sahar Saeedi Moghaddam, Reza Mohammadpourhodki, Bernhard O. Boehm, Songhomitra Panda-Jonas, Iveta Pudule, Elisabete Ramos, Lacramioara Aurelia Brinduse, Paul H. Lee, Terence W O'Neill, Javad Aghazadeh-Attari, Margus Punab, Bojan Jelaković, Camilla T. Damsgaard, Takafumi Ishida, Ekaterina Chikova-Iscener, Mirjam M. Heinen, Tazeen H. Jafar, Semánová Csilla, Constance Schultsz, Santiago F. Gomez, Raija Korpelainen, Edward W. Gregg, Laura Gutierrez, Pierre Traissac, Victor M. Herrera, Aristides M. Machado-Rodrigues, Fatemeh Malekzadeh, Shouling Wu, Jennifer L. Baker, Clicerio González-Villalpando, Eleonora d'Orsi, Irene G. M. van Valkengoed, Anna Fijałkowska, Wen-Harn Pan, Gregor Starc, Meghnath Dhimal, Murat Topbaş, George Moschonis, Robert Eggertsen, Abdullah Alkandari, Quang Ngoc Nguyen, Janette Walton, Elnaz Faramarzi, Saeed Dastgiri, Lien Braeckevelt, Nasheeta Peer, Radka Taxová Braunerová, Mohamed M. Ali, Steiner Krokstad, Harald Geiger, Morteza Shamshirgaran, Lela Shengelia, María Ángeles Dal Re Saavedra, Silvana Donoso, Khem Bahadur Karki, Timothy J. Key, Maria G. Grammatikopoulou, Susana Vale, Felix K. Assah, Juan A Rivera, Peter H. Whincup, Oana-Florentina Gheorghe-Fronea, Cassiano Ricardo Rech, Paul Ferdinand M. Reganit, Rachakulla Hari Kumar, Jaakko Mursu, Luis A. Moreno, Glen Gironella, Jelena Kos, Tilema Cama, Haakon E. Meyer, Jun Ma, Raphael E. Arku, Ziad Abdeen, Dianna J. Magliano, Jitendra Jonnagaddala, Konstantinos Gkiouras, Paola Nardone, Alberto Barceló, Tomi-Pekka Tuomainen, Francesco Gianfagna, Stefania Maggi, Mohammad Hossein Somi, Behrooz Hamzeh, Miquel Porta, Vesna Jureša, Alexander D. Deev, David Faeh, Antonio Bernabe-Ortiz, Sirkka Keinänen-Kiukaanniemi, Ian Hambleton, Stefan Savin, Andre Pascal Kengne, R. Krishna Kumar, Kurt Widhalm, Marco M Ferrario, Parisa Amiri, Anjani Kumar Jha, Thamara Hubler Figueiró, Jana Kratenova, Claudia M. Hormiga, Maria Tsigga, Zivka Dika, Indrapal I. Meshram, Ei Ei K. Nang, Ian Rouse, Rusidah Selamat, Paul Korrovits, Grethe S. Tell, Julie Taylor, Anabela Mota-Pinto, Paolo Vineis, Kotsedi D Monyeki, Khuong Quynh Long, Frank J Rühli, Shelly R. McFarlane, Sara Santos Sanz, Edyta Łuszczki, Maria G. Stathopoulou, Tara Coppinger, Karin De Ridder, Lucie Viet, Anna Bugge, Mehdi Yaseri, Safiah Md Yusof, Sandra C. Fuchs, Muhammad Islam, Irfan Nuhoglu, Rui Providência, Bernard Maire, Leandra Abarca-Gómez, Sinead Brophy, Maria Ruiz-Castell, Daniela Pierannunzio, Cristina Taddei, Gowri Mahasampath, Gustavo Velasquez-Melendez, Hanna Tolonen, Sudhir Kowlessur, Bagher Larijani, Laura Torres-Collado, Susi Kriemler, Ali Akbar Shayesteh, Cynthia Robitaille, Jorge Escobedo-de la Peña, Yufang Bi, Chinh Nguyen Huu, Line Tang Møllehave, Vincent Jr DeGennaro, Noor Ani Ahmad, Anar Dushpanova, Agustinus Soemantri, Susana Sans, Ionela Pascanu, Gwenaëlle Le Coroller, Inger Ariansen, Kodanda R Kanala, Gert B. M. Mensink, Abhijit Sen, Sergej M. Ostojic, Hanan F. Abdul Rahim, Hélène Delisle, Francisco J. Félix-Redondo, Yadlapalli S. Kusuma, Michael Knoflach, Moein Yoosefi, Tanja G. M. Vrijkotte, Wolfgang Ahrens, Osvaldo Santos, Bethlehem D. Solomon, Erik Lykke Mortensen, Nikhil D. Patel, Reynaldo Martorell, Ching-Yu Cheng, Stine Schramm, Hana Shimizu-Furusawa, Jacek Jóźwiak, Radwan Qasrawi, Herman Borghs, Zhanna Kalmatayeva, Heidi Klakk, Akram Pourshams, Naomi S. Levitt, Son Thai Pham, Simona Giampaoli, Dong Zhao, Indah Suci Widyahening, Merete Osler, Paula Margozzini, Silvia Bel-Serrat, Dora Romaguera, Monira Alarouj, Winsome R. Parnell, Marloes Cardol, Giota Touloumi, Janice Luisa Lukrafka, Adela Chirita-Emandi, Maryam Kavousi, Sanja Musić Milanović, Jean-Michel Gaspoz, Jalila El Ati, Sauli Herrala, Liang Xu, Pilar Guallar-Castillón, Bee Koon Poh, Luis Serra-Majem, Jonathan E. Shaw, Belong Cho, Daphne Mirkopoulou, Salvador Villalpando, Yuki Fujita, Tiffany K. Gill, Nish Chaturvedi, Erkin M. Mirrakhimov, Günay Can, Mark Woodward, Esther Lopez-Garcia, Mauro Virgílio Gomes de Barros, Ahmed A. Madar, Shoaib Afzal, Melanie J. Cowan, Gareth Stratton, Eduardo Salazar Martinez, Sameer Narake, Norie Sawada, Deepak Amarapurkar, Deepa Weerasekera, Diana A. Santos, Marjeta Majer, Herman Schargrodsky, Bruna Gonçalves Cordeiro da Silva, Ebrahim Eftekhar, Jesús Vioque, Marisa K. Sophiea, Teresa Shamah-Levy, María Dolores Chirlaque, Mohd Azahadi Omar, Stefan Söderberg, Isabel O. Oliveira, Joanne Katz, Xingwang Ye, Christophe Tzourio, Marie Zins, Aneta Weres, Ulrich Keil, Haiquan Xu, Akihiro Yoshihara, Rachel Dankner, Gabriella Gruden, Maroje Sorić, Hanspeter Stamm, Kim Overvad, Yanping Li, Carsten Oliver Schmidt, Christa L. Lilly, Veikko Salomaa, Gilad Twig, Senthil K Vasan, Qian Wang, Liufu Cui, Andrzej Galbarczyk, Sylvain Sebert, Wilma M. Hopman, Karl-Heinz Jöckel, Ari Voutilainen, Peter Schnohr, Jerzy Chudek, Katia Vergetti Bloch, Vincenzo Capuano, Jyh Eiin Wong, Torben Jørgensen, Anja Schienkiewitz, Nader Saki, Carolina Tarqui-Mamani, Maria Cecília Formoso Assunção, Kazi M. Jamil, Juraci Almeida Cesar, Pedro J Ortiz, Delphine De Smedt, Luciana Zaccagni, Lynne M. Boddy, Jie Hao, David Alejandro González-Chica, Romana Roccaldo, Sara Magnacca, Peter Stehle, Victoria Farrugia Sant'Angelo, Gry Skodje, Maryam Keramati, Tabara Yasuharu, Ali Ghanbari, Gyulli M. Kazakbaeva, Takuro Furusawa, Felicia Cañete, Kari Kuulasmaa, Justina Vaitkeviciute, (NCD-RisC), NCD Risk Factor Collaboration, Imperial College London, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Middlesex University [London], Organisation Mondiale de la Santé / World Health Organization Office (OMS / WHO), Montpellier Interdisciplinary center on Sustainable Agri-food systems (Social and nutritional sciences) (UMR MoISA), Centre de Coopération Internationale en Recherche Agronomique pour le Développement (Cirad)-Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD)-Centre International de Hautes Etudes Agronomiques Méditerranéennes - Institut Agronomique Méditerranéen de Montpellier (CIHEAM-IAMM), Centre International de Hautes Études Agronomiques Méditerranéennes (CIHEAM)-Centre International de Hautes Études Agronomiques Méditerranéennes (CIHEAM)-Institut national d’études supérieures agronomiques de Montpellier (Montpellier SupAgro), Institut national d'enseignement supérieur pour l'agriculture, l'alimentation et l'environnement (Institut Agro)-Institut national d'enseignement supérieur pour l'agriculture, l'alimentation et l'environnement (Institut Agro)-Institut National de Recherche pour l’Agriculture, l’Alimentation et l’Environnement (INRAE), Bordeaux population health (BPH), Université de Bordeaux (UB)-Institut de Santé Publique, d'Épidémiologie et de Développement (ISPED)-Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale (INSERM), Interactions Gène-Environnement en Physiopathologie Cardio-Vasculaire (IGE-PCV), Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale (INSERM)-Université de Lorraine (UL), Wellcome TrustEuropean Commission, Clinical Developmental Psychology, APH - Mental Health, Sociology, The Social Context of Aging (SoCA), Nutrition and Health, Iurilli, Maria LC [0000-0003-0409-1635], Zhou, Bin [0000-0002-1741-8628], Ezzati, Majid [0000-0002-2109-8081], Apollo - University of Cambridge Repository, Epidemiology and Data Science, APH - Aging & Later Life, APH - Societal Participation & Health, Public and occupational health, APH - Health Behaviors & Chronic Diseases, VU University medical center, APH - Personalized Medicine, AGEM - Endocrinology, metabolism and nutrition, ACS - Diabetes & metabolism, APH - Global Health, ARD - Amsterdam Reproduction and Development, Adult Psychiatry, Global Health, APH - Quality of Care, APH - Methodology, ACS - Atherosclerosis & ischemic syndromes, Gómez Santos, Santiago Felipe, NCD Risk Factor Collaboration (NCD-RisC), Faculdade de Desporto, Faculdade de Ciências da Nutrição e Alimentação, Faculdade de Medicina, Tampere University, Clinical Medicine, Department of Clinical Chemistry, Eye Centre, Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health, Middlesex University, World Health Organization, Ministry of Health, University of Lausanne, Eduardo Mondlane University, Victor Babes University of Medicine and Pharmacy Timisoara, University of Sydney, Health and Nutrition, University of Auckland, Seoul National University, ICMR - National Institute of Nutrition, Capital Medical University Beijing An Zhen Hospital, Universidad Peruana Cayetano Heredia, University Tunis El Manar, University of Oulu, University of Zagreb, University of Ljubljana, Caja Costarricense de Seguro Social, Al-Quds University, National Center of Public Healthcare, Qatar University, Birzeit University, Usmanu Danfodiyo University Teaching Hospital, Instituto Mexicano del Seguro Social, Flinders University, Mahidol University, BRAC James P Grant School of Public Health, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen University Hospital, Food and Nutrition Research Institute, Urmia University of Medical Sciences, Instituto Nacional de Ciencias Médicas y Nutrición, University of Amsterdam, Shahrekord University of Medical Sciences, Non-Communicable Diseases Research Center, University of Oslo, University of Bremen, Republican Center for Health Promotion, Endocrinology and Genetics, Princess Nourah bint Abdulrahman University, Kuwait Institute for Scientific Research, King Abdulaziz University, Dasman Diabetes Institute, Aldara Hospital and Medical Center, King Abdullah International Medical Research Center, Luxembourg Institute of Health, Bispebjerg and Frederiksberg Hospital, Barcelona Institute for Global Health CIBERESP, World Health Organization Regional Office for the Eastern Mediterranean, Bombay Hospital and Medical Research Centre, Research Center for Social Determinants of Health, UMR CNRS-MNHN 7206 Eco-anthropologie, University of Lille, Lille University Hospital, Western Norway University of Applied Sciences, Norwegian School of Sport Sciences, Madras Diabetes Research Foundation, Zahedan University of Medical Sciences, National Institute of Public Health, Institute of Public Health of the University of Porto, Norwegian Institute of Public Health, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Abt Associates, University of Iceland, University of Yaoundé1, Federal University of Pelotas, University of Medicine 1, Oulu University Hospital, Banska Bystrica Regional Authority of Public Health, Tel- Aviv University, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, University of Porto Medical School, Neyshabur University of Medical Sciences, Research Institute for Endocrine Sciences, Non- Communicable Diseases Research Center, Indian Council of Medical Research, University of Science and Technology, Medical University of Lodz, Medical University of Gdansk, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid CIBERESP, University of Rzeszów, University of Palermo, Pan American Health Organization, Mohammed V University de Rabat, University of Pernambuco, Baqai Institute of Diabetology and Endocrinology, Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina (UFSC), Dalhousie University, Jordan University of Science and Technology, Federal University of Maranhao, Al-Farabi Kazakh National University, University College Dublin, Christian Medical College, Care and Consumer Protection, Cafam University Foundation, Kazakh National Medical University, Lithuanian University of Health Sciences, University of Saõ Paulo, B J Medical College, Chirayu Medical College, Sunder Lal Jain Hospital, The Hospital for Sick Children, Aga Khan University, Shandong University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Jiao-Tong University School of Medicine, Universidad de la República, Institute of Medical Research and Medicinal Plant Studies, Ufa Eye Research Institute, Nepal Health Research Council, University of Montenegro, University of Southern Denmark, University of Gothenburg, Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ), National Institute for Public Health and the Environment, University of Turin, University College London, Liverpool John Moores University, Nanyang Technological University Singapore, German Institute of Human Nutrition, Endocrinology Research Centre, Centro de Educación Médica e Investigaciones Clínicas, IRCCS Neuromed, Toulouse University School of Medicine, University of Zurich, University Hospital KU Leuven, Flemish Agency for Care and Health, Ghent University, FrieslandCampina, Universidad Central de Venezuela, Bielefeld University, World Health Organization Regional Office for Europe, German Cancer Research Center, The Fred Hollows Foundation, University of Medicine and Pharmacy Bucharest, Swansea University, University College Copenhagen, Institute of Public Health, Munster Technological University, Universidad de La Laguna, University of Malta, Vanderbilt University, Canadian Fitness and Lifestyle Research Institute, Hospital Santa Maria, Istanbul University - Cerrahpasa, Universidade Federal de Juiz de Fora, Ministry of Public Health, Gaetano Fucito Hospital, University of Groningen, Karolinska Institutet, Centro de Estudios sobre Nutrición Infantil, University of Porto, University of Zaragoza, Santiago de Compostela University, Council for Agricultural Research and Economics, Federal University of Rio Grande, India Diabetes Research Foundation, Duke-NUS Medical School, ICMR - National Institute of Medical Statistics, Singapore Eye Research Institute, Academia Sinica, Capital Institute of Pediatrics, Duke University, Kailuan General Hospital, University of Oxford, Ahvaz Jundishapur University of Medical Sciences, The Gertner Institute for Epidemiology and Health Policy Research, National Centre of Public Health and Analyses, University of Fribourg, Ministry of Health and Welfare, CIBER Epidemiología y Salud Pública, Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP), Medical University of Silesia, Charles University, Thomayer Hospital, Primary Health Care, Carol Davila University of Medicine and Pharmacy, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Statistics Canada, UMR CNRS- MNHN 7206 Eco-anthropologie, Agency for Preventive and Social Medicine, University of Southampton, Institut Pasteur de Lille, Malawi Epidemiology and Intervention Research Unit, CIBEROBN, University of Debrecen, University of Medicine and Pharmacy Carol Davila, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul, National Research Council, Eftimie Murgu University Resita, Spanish Agency for Food Safety and Nutrition, Indian Statistical Institute, Tabriz Health Services Management Research Center, Geneva University Hospitals, Sciensano, University Medical Centers, National Research Centre for Preventive Medicine, Innovating Health International, University of Montreal, French National Research Institute for Sustainable Development, French Public Health Agency, Mediterranea Cardiocentro, Universidade do Vale do Rio dos Sinos, Epidemiology and Microbiology, National Council of Scientific and Technical Research, Ministry of Health and Medical Education, University of Novi Sad, National Institute of Nutrition, University of Queensland, Istituto Superiore di Sanita`, Universidad de Cuenca, Helmholtz Zentrum München, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Ministere de la Santéet de l’Hygiene Publique, University Hospital Düsseldorf, National Institute of Cardiology, Medical University of Lod, Beijing Center for Disease Prevention and Control, UMI 3189 ESS, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Harvard Medical School, Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna, University of Latvia, Ministry of Health and Medical Services, Hormozgan University of Medical Sciences, University of Benin, University of Skövde, National Institute of Nutrition and Food Technology, The University of the West Indies, University of California Davis, University of Stellenbosch, University of Duisburg- Essen, Karadeniz Technical University, University of Helsinki, Mashhad University of Medical Sciences, Rafsanjan University of Medical Sciences, Queen’s University of Belfast, Tabriz University of Medical Sciences, Fasa University of Medical Sciences, Shiraz University of Medical Sciences, Baqai Medical University, Centro de Salud Villanueva Norte, Hospital Don Benito-Villanueva de la Serena, University of Insubria, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Institute of Mother and Child, Swiss Tropical and Public Health Institute, University of Basel, University of Tartu, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Umeå University, Federal University of Saõ Paulo, Hospital Universitario Son Espases, Hospital de Clinicas de Porto Alegre, Universitas Sumatera Utara, Kindai University, Kyoto University, Medical University of Warsaw, Jagiellonian University Medical College, Ministero della Salute DG Prevenzione Sanitaria, University of Catania, CIBER en Epidemiología y Salud Pública, Africa Health Research Institute, Geneva University Medical School, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais (UFMG), Utrecht University, Wageningen University, University of Adelaide, Lund University, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Institut National de la Santéet de la Recherche Médicale, Paris University, McGill University, Gasol Foundation, University of Lleida, PASs Hirszfeld Institute of Immunology and Experimental Therapy, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, St Anne’s University Hospital, Centro de Estudios en Diabetes A.C, Universidad Autónoma de Santo Domingo, Institute for Clinical and Experimental Medicine, Children’s Memorial Health Institute, National Center of Cardiovascular Diseases, University of Ferrara, Authority Sanitaria San Marino, Icelandic Heart Association, Universidad Icesi, State University of Montes Claros, King’s College London, International Agency for Research on Cancer, Capital Medical University, Capital Medical University Beijing Tongren Hospital, Healis-Sekhsaria Institute for Public Health, Eternal Heart Care Centre and Research Institute, University of Ibadan, Institute for Clinical Effectiveness and Health Policy, National Health Insurance Service, Prevention of Metabolic Disorders Research Center, Research and Education Institute of Child Health, Danish Cancer Society Research Center, Kermanshah University of Medical Sciences, University of Eastern Finland, Beijing Institute of Ophthalmology, International Hellenic University, Kyushu University, University of Bergen, Tulane University, National Research Institute for Health and Family Planning, Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, University of Pécs, Danish Health Authority, Joep Lange Institute, Universidade Federal de Pernambuco (UFPE), Universidad Autónoma de Bucaramanga, ETH Zurich, Chronic Diseases Research Center, University of Hong Kong, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, University of Western Australia, University Ramon Llull, Kingston Health Sciences Centre, Fundación Oftalmológica de Santander, University Oran 1, Ministry of Health and Sports, Peking University, VU University Medical Center, American University of Beirut, Cairo University, Erasmus Medical Center Rotterdam, Medical University Varna, The University of Tokyo, Deakin University, Tokyo Metropolitan Institute of Gerontology, Hadassah University Medical Center, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, University of Melbourne, Sports University of Tirana, University Hospital Center Zagreb, University of Zagreb School of Medicine, Heart Foundation, Guangzhou 12th Hospital, Universidad Eugenio Maria de Hostos, University of Duisburg-Essen, Simon Fraser University, Institute of Molecular and Clinical Ophthalmology Basel, University of New South Wales, World Health Organization Country Office, Guilan University of Medical Sciences, University of Opole, Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare, Gulu University, University of Crete, Sri Venkateswara University, Sree Chitra Tirunal Institute for Medical Sciences and Technology, Hellenic Medical Association for Obesity, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Maharajgunj Medical Campus, Aarhus University, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Pennington Biomedical Research Center, National Institute of Epidemiology, University of Münster, Israel Center for Disease Control, Research Institute for Primordial Prevention of Non- communicable Disease, Amsterdam UMC Public Health Research Institute, South African Medical Research Council, Kyrgyz State Medical Academy, Research Institute of Child Nutrition, Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, University of Cambridge, Mazandaran University of Medical Sciences, Hypertension Research Center, Medical University of Innsbruck, VASCage, Muhimbili University of Health and Allied Sciences, Yonsei University College of Medicine, National Cancer Center, Sahlgrenska University Hospital, University College South Denmark, Statistics Austria, B P Koirala Institute of Health Sciences, University of Vienna, Oulu Deaconess Institute Foundation, Tartu University Clinics, Kansai Medical University, Hungarian School Sport Federation, Ministry of Health and Quality of Life, University Hospital Ulm, North-West University, University of Jyväskylä, Amrita Institute of Medical Sciences, Institute of Endocrinology, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, African Population and Health Research Center, Hanoi University of Public Health, Hassan First University of Settat, Harokopio University, Sahlgrenska Academy, Endocrinology and Metabolism Research Center, University of Public Health, International Food Policy Research Institute, National University of Singapore, Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Tampere University Hospital, University of Douala, University of Cape Town, National Institute for Health Development, West Virginia University, Oswaldo Cruz Foundation Rene Rachou Research Institute, National Taiwan University, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Uppsala University, Taipei Medical University, Sports Medical Center of Minho, Universidad San Martín de Porres, Consejería de Sanidad Junta de Castilla y León, Universidade Federal de Ciências da Saúde de Porto Alegre, Norrbotten County Council, Ilembula Lutheran Hospital, Universidade Federal de Ouro Preto, University of Coimbra, Coimbra University Hospital Center, Institute of Neuroscience of the National Research Council, Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute, Agricultural University of Athens, Hospital Israelita Albert Einstein, SB RAS Federal Research Center Institute of Cytology and Genetics, University of Otago, University of Padua, Hellenic Mediterranean University, Loughborough University, Lausanne University Hospital, Escola Nacional de Saúde Pública Sergio Arouca, CIBERCV, Institut Hospital del Mar d’Investigacions Mediques, Mary Immaculate College, Emory University, Hungarian Society of Sports Medicine, Paracelsus Medical University, Universidade Estadual do Centro-Oeste, Sher-i-Kashmir Institute of Medical Sciences, UiT The Arctic University of Norway, ICMR - National Centre for Disease Informatics and Research, Cape Peninsula University of Technology, Brown University, London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, University of Edinburgh, Shahid Sadoughi University of Medical Sciences, Robert Koch Institute, Universidade de Lisboa, Women’s Social and Health Studies Foundation, Democritus University, Grigore T Popa University of Medicine and Pharmacy, Universita` degli Studi di Firenze, Ain Shams University, Isfahan Cardiovascular Research Center, University of Strasbourg, Strasbourg University Hospital, Mulago Hospital, University of San Carlos of Guatemala, University of Limpopo, University of Medical Sciences of Cienfuegos, Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, La Trobe University, International Institute of Molecular and Cell Biology, Instituto Conmemorativo Gorgas de Estudios de la Salud, University of Brescia, Ministry of Health and Social Protection, University of Limerick, Croatian Institute of Public Health, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, Bushehr University of Medical Sciences, Ulm University, Kobe University, Suraj Eye Institute, UNICEF, University Medicine Greifswald, National Institute of Hygiene and Epidemiology, University of Medicine and Pharmacy at Ho Chi Minh City, Hanoi Medical University, LifeDoc Health, Heartfile, Eastern Mediterranean Public Health Network, University of Manchester, State University of Medicine and Pharmacy, Tachikawa General Hospital, Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Japan Wildlife Research Center, Istanbul University, Universidade Federal do Paraná (UFPR), University of Madeira, University of Puerto Rico, Center for Clinical Research and Prevention, MRC Lifecourse Epidemiology Unit, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, UniSanté, Prevention and Clinical Network, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Ruprecht-Karls-University of Heidelberg, IRCCS Ente Ospedaliero Specializzato in Gastroenterologia S. de Bellis, Zayed University, Catholic University of Daegu, Science and Technology of Târgu Mures, Jivandeep Hospital, Healis- Sekhsaria Institute for Public Health, National Dental Care Centre Singapore, Universidad de Málaga, University Hospital of Varese, Vietnam National Heart Institute, Clínica de Medicina Avanzada Dr. Abel González, Leibniz Institute for Prevention Research and Epidemiology - BIPS, University of Sarajevo, Cardiovascular Prevention Centre Udine, Pisa University Hospital, Public Health Agency of Catalonia, Ardabil University of Medical Sciences, Centre for Disease Prevention and Control, Alborz University of Medical Sciences, Pure Earth, Institute of Epidemiology Disease Control and Research, University of Turku, Institut Universitari d’Investigacióen AtencióPrima` ria Jordi Gol, Universiti Putra Malaysia, University of Malaya, Sotiria Hospital, University of Valencia, University of the Philippines, Slovak Academy of Sciences, Nutrition Research Foundation, Minas Gerais State Secretariat for Health, CS S. Agustín Ibsalut, Amsterdam Institute for Global Health and Development, National Institute of Health Doutor Ricardo Jorge, Universidade Nove de Julho, Public Health Agency of Canada, Canarian Health Service, Universidad Industrial de Santander, Associazione Calabrese di Epatologia, University of Minho, Fiji National University, Spanish Nutrition Foundation, Public Health Agency of Sweden, Institute of Food Sciences of the National Research Council, Sitaram Bhartia Institute of Science and Research, Kindergarten of Avlonari, National Institute of Health, Catalan Department of Health, Biodonostia Health Research Institute, Instituto de Saúde Ambiental, South Karelia Social and Health Care District, McMaster University, University of Saõ Paulo Clinics Hospital, Hospital Italiano de Buenos Aires, Rigshospitalet, Academic Medical Center of University of Amsterdam, The George Institute for Global Health, Center for Oral Health Services and Research Mid-Norway, Lagos State University College of Medicine, University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Comenius University, National Center for Disease Control and Public Health, Nippon Medical School, Sungkyunkwan University, Finnish Institute of Occupational Health, Public Health Promotion and Development Organization, St Vincent’s Hospital, Nes Municipality, Health Polytechnic Jakarta II Institute, Diponegoro University, University of Bari, Institut Régional de SantéPublique, University of Bordeaux, Oslo Metropolitan University, Ss. Cyril and Methodius University, University of Leuven, Lamprecht und Stamm Sozialforschung und Beratung AG, Bonn University, National Institute of Public Health - National Institute of Hygiene, Kalina Malina Kindergarten, The Jikei University School of Medicine, Fu Jen Catholic University, National Statistical Office, Scientific Research Institute of Maternal and Child Health, University of Lincoln, Central University of Kerala, Amsterdam Public Health Research Institute, Health Service of Murcia, Institut d’Investigacio Sanitaria Illes Balears, University of Bologna, Hellenic Health Foundation, Government Medical College, Sefako Makgatho Health Science University, Addis Ababa University, Universidad Centro-Occidental Lisandro Alvarado, Meharry Medical College, Dokuz Eylul University, University of Tampere Tays Eye Center, Sabiha Gokcen Ilkokulu, Polytechnic Institute of Porto, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, Universidad CEU San Pablo, University Miguel Hernandez, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Sunflower Nursery School, North Karelia Center for Public Health, University of the Witwatersrand, Medical University of Vienna, Cork Institute of Technology, Institute for Medical Research, Xinjiang Medical University, Shanghai Educational Development Co. Ltd, Orebro University, University of London, Universitas Indonesia, Institute of Food and Nutrition Development of Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, Children’s Hospital of Fudan University, University of Cyprus, Niigata University, International Medical University, Iran University of Medical Sciences, Center for Diabetes and Endocrine Care, Peking University First Hospital, Jiangsu Provincial Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Sun Yat-sen University, West Kazakhstan Medical University, Inner Mongolia Medical University, University of Ghana, Maria Lc Iurilli , Bin Zhou , James E Bennett , Rodrigo M Carrillo-Larco , Marisa K Sophiea , Andrea Rodriguez-Martinez , Honor Bixby , Bethlehem D Solomon , Cristina Taddei , Goodarz Danaei , Mariachiara Di Cesare , Gretchen A Stevens , Leanne M Riley , Stefan Savin , Melanie J Cowan , Pascal Bovet , Albertino Damasceno , Adela Chirita-Emandi , Alison J Hayes , Nayu Ikeda , Rod T Jackson , Young-Ho Khang , Avula Laxmaiah , Jing Liu , J Jaime Miranda , Olfa Saidi , Sylvain Sebert , Maroje Sorić , Gregor Starc , Edward W Gregg , Leandra Abarca-Gómez , Ziad A Abdeen , Shynar Abdrakhmanova , Suhaila Abdul Ghaffar , Hanan F Abdul Rahim , Niveen M Abu-Rmeileh , Jamila Abubakar Garba , Benjamin Acosta-Cazares , Robert J Adams , Wichai Aekplakorn , Kaosar Afsana , Shoaib Afzal , Imelda A Agdeppa , Javad Aghazadeh-Attari , Carlos A Aguilar-Salinas , Charles Agyemang , Mohamad Hasnan Ahmad , Noor Ani Ahmad , Ali Ahmadi , Naser Ahmadi , Soheir H Ahmed , Wolfgang Ahrens , Gulmira Aitmurzaeva , Kamel Ajlouni , Hazzaa M Al-Hazzaa , Badreya Al-Lahou , Rajaa Al-Raddadi , Monira Alarouj , Fadia AlBuhairan , Shahla AlDhukair , Mohamed M Ali , Abdullah Alkandari , Ala'a Alkerwi , Kristine Allin , Mar Alvarez-Pedrerol , Eman Aly , Deepak N Amarapurkar , Parisa Amiri , Norbert Amougou , Philippe Amouyel , Lars Bo Andersen , Sigmund A Anderssen , Lars Ängquist , Ranjit Mohan Anjana , Alireza Ansari-Moghaddam , Hajer Aounallah-Skhiri , Joana Araújo , Inger Ariansen , Tahir Aris , Raphael E Arku , Nimmathota Arlappa , Krishna K Aryal , Thor Aspelund , Felix K Assah , Maria Cecília F Assunção , May Soe Aung , Juha Auvinen , Mária Avdicová , Shina Avi , Ana Azevedo , Mohsen Azimi-Nezhad , Fereidoun Azizi , Mehrdad Azmin , Bontha V Babu , Maja Bæksgaard Jørgensen , Azli Baharudin , Suhad Bahijri , Jennifer L Baker , Nagalla Balakrishna , Mohamed Bamoshmoosh , Maciej Banach , Piotr Bandosz , José R Banegas , Joanna Baran , Barbagallo CM, Alberto Barceló , Amina Barkat , Aluisio Jd Barros , Mauro Virgílio Gomes Barros , Abdul Basit , Joao Luiz D Bastos , Iqbal Bata , Anwar M Batieha , Rosangela L Batista , Zhamilya Battakova , Assembekov Batyrbek , Louise A Baur , Robert Beaglehole , Silvia Bel-Serrat , Antonisamy Belavendra , Habiba Ben Romdhane , Judith Benedics , Mikhail Benet , Ingunn Holden Bergh , Salim Berkinbayev , Antonio Bernabe-Ortiz , Gailute Bernotiene , Heloísa Bettiol , Jorge Bezerra , Aroor Bhagyalaxmi , Sumit Bharadwaj , Santosh K Bhargava , Zulfiqar A Bhutta , Hongsheng Bi , Yufang Bi , Daniel Bia , Elysée Claude Bika Lele, Mukharram M Bikbov , Bihungum Bista , Dusko J Bjelica , Peter Bjerregaard , Espen Bjertness , Marius B Bjertness , Cecilia Björkelund , Katia V Bloch , Anneke Blokstra , Simona Bo , Martin Bobak , Lynne M Boddy , Bernhard O Boehm , Heiner Boeing , Jose G Boggia , Elena Bogova , Carlos P Boissonnet , Stig E Bojesen , Marialaura Bonaccio , Vanina Bongard , Alice Bonilla-Vargas , Matthias Bopp , Herman Borghs , Lien Braeckevelt , Lutgart Braeckman , Marjolijn Ce Bragt , Imperia Brajkovich , Francesco Branca , Juergen Breckenkamp , João Breda , Hermann Brenner , Lizzy M Brewster , Garry R Brian , Lacramioara Brinduse , Sinead Brophy , Graziella Bruno , H Bas Bueno-de-Mesquita , Anna Bugge , Marta Buoncristiano , Genc Burazeri , Con Burns , Antonio Cabrera de León , Joseph Cacciottolo , Hui Cai , Tilema Cama , Christine Cameron , José Camolas , Günay Can , Ana Paula C Cândido , Felicia Cañete , Mario V Capanzana , Nadežda Capková , Eduardo Capuano , Vincenzo Capuano , Marloes Cardol , Viviane C Cardoso , Axel C Carlsson , Esteban Carmuega , Joana Carvalho , José A Casajús , Felipe F Casanueva , Ertugrul Celikcan , Laura Censi , Marvin Cervantes-Loaiza , Juraci A Cesar , Snehalatha Chamukuttan , Angelique W Chan , Queenie Chan , Himanshu K Chaturvedi , Nish Chaturvedi , Norsyamlina Che Abdul Rahim , Miao Li Chee , Chien-Jen Chen , Fangfang Chen , Huashuai Chen , Shuohua Chen , Zhengming Chen , Ching-Yu Cheng , Bahman Cheraghian , Angela Chetrit , Ekaterina Chikova-Iscener , Arnaud Chiolero , Shu-Ti Chiou , María-Dolores Chirlaque , Belong Cho , Kaare Christensen , Diego G Christofaro , Jerzy Chudek , Renata Cifkova , Michelle Cilia , Eliza Cinteza , Frank Claessens , Janine Clarke , Els Clays , Emmanuel Cohen , Hans Concin , Susana C Confortin , Cyrus Cooper , Tara C Coppinger , Eva Corpeleijn , Simona Costanzo , Dominique Cottel , Chris Cowell , Cora L Craig , Amelia C Crampin , Ana B Crujeiras , Semánová Csilla , Alexandra M Cucu , Liufu Cui , Felipe V Cureau , Ewelina Czenczek-Lewandowska , Graziella D'Arrigo , Eleonora d'Orsi , Liliana Dacica , María Ángeles Dal Re Saavedra , Jean Dallongeville , Camilla T Damsgaard , Rachel Dankner , Thomas M Dantoft , Parasmani Dasgupta , Saeed Dastgiri , Luc Dauchet , Kairat Davletov , Guy De Backer , Dirk De Bacquer , Giovanni de Gaetano , Stefaan De Henauw , Paula Duarte de Oliveira , David De Ridder , Karin De Ridder , Susanne R de Rooij , Delphine De Smedt , Mohan Deepa , Alexander D Deev , Vincent Jr DeGennaro , Abbas Dehghan , Hélène Delisle , Francis Delpeuch , Stefaan Demarest , Elaine Dennison , Katarzyna Dereń , Valérie Deschamps , Meghnath Dhimal , Augusto F Di Castelnuovo , Juvenal Soares Dias-da-Costa , María Elena Díaz-Sánchez , Alejandro Diaz , Zivka Dika , Shirin Djalalinia , Visnja Djordjic , Ha Tp Do , Annette J Dobson , Maria Benedetta Donati , Chiara Donfrancesco , Silvana P Donoso , Angela Döring , Maria Dorobantu , Ahmad Reza Dorosty , Kouamelan Doua , Nico Dragano , Wojciech Drygas , Jia Li Duan , Charmaine A Duante , Priscilla Duboz , Rosemary B Duda , Vesselka Duleva , Virginija Dulskiene , Samuel C Dumith , Anar Dushpanova , Vilnis Dzerve , Elzbieta Dziankowska-Zaborszczyk , Ricky Eddie , Ebrahim Eftekhar , Eruke E Egbagbe , Robert Eggertsen , Sareh Eghtesad , Gabriele Eiben , Ulf Ekelund , Mohammad El-Khateeb , Jalila El Ati , Denise Eldemire-Shearer , Marie Eliasen , Paul Elliott , Reina Engle-Stone , Macia Enguerran , Rajiv T Erasmus , Raimund Erbel , Cihangir Erem , Louise Eriksen , Johan G Eriksson , Jorge Escobedo-de la Peña , Saeid Eslami , Ali Esmaeili , Alun Evans , David Faeh , Albina A Fakhretdinova , Caroline H Fall , Elnaz Faramarzi , Mojtaba Farjam , Victoria Farrugia Sant'Angelo , Farshad Farzadfar , Mohammad Reza Fattahi , Asher Fawwad , Francisco J Felix-Redondo , Trevor S Ferguson , Romulo A Fernandes , Daniel Fernández-Bergés , Daniel Ferrante , Thomas Ferrao , Marika Ferrari , Marco M Ferrario , Catterina Ferreccio , Eldridge Ferrer , Jean Ferrieres , Thamara Hubler Figueiró , Anna Fijalkowska , Günther Fink , Krista Fischer , Leng Huat Foo , Maria Forsner , Heba M Fouad , Damian K Francis , Maria do Carmo Franco , Ruth Frikke-Schmidt , Guillermo Frontera , Flavio D Fuchs , Sandra C Fuchs , Isti I Fujiati , Yuki Fujita , Matsuda Fumihiko , Takuro Furusawa , Zbigniew Gaciong , Mihai Gafencu , Andrzej Galbarczyk , Henrike Galenkamp , Daniela Galeone , Myriam Galfo , Fabio Galvano , Jingli Gao , Manoli Garcia-de-la-Hera , Marta García-Solano , Dickman Gareta , Sarah P Garnett , Jean-Michel Gaspoz , Magda Gasull , Adroaldo Cesar Araujo Gaya , Anelise Reis Gaya , Andrea Gazzinelli , Ulrike Gehring , Harald Geiger , Johanna M Geleijnse , Ali Ghanbari , Erfan Ghasemi , Oana-Florentina Gheorghe-Fronea , Simona Giampaoli , Francesco Gianfagna , Tiffany K Gill , Jonathan Giovannelli , Glen Gironella , Aleksander Giwercman , Konstantinos Gkiouras , Justyna Godos , Sibel Gogen , Marcel Goldberg , Rebecca A Goldsmith , David Goltzman , Santiago F Gómez , Aleksandra Gomula , Bruna Goncalves Cordeiro da Silva , Helen Gonçalves , David A Gonzalez-Chica , Marcela Gonzalez-Gross , Margot González-Leon , Juan P González-Rivas , Clicerio González-Villalpando , María-Elena González-Villalpando , Angel R Gonzalez , Frederic Gottrand , Antonio Pedro Graça , Sidsel Graff-Iversen , Dušan Grafnetter , Aneta Grajda , Maria G Grammatikopoulou , Ronald D Gregor , Tomasz Grodzicki , Else Karin Grøholt , Anders Grøntved , Giuseppe Grosso , Gabriella Gruden , Dongfeng Gu , Emanuela Gualdi-Russo , Pilar Guallar-Castillón , Andrea Gualtieri , Elias F Gudmundsson , Vilmundur Gudnason , Ramiro Guerrero , Idris Guessous , Andre L Guimaraes , Martin C Gulliford , Johanna Gunnlaugsdottir , Marc J Gunter , Xiu-Hua Guo , Yin Guo , Prakash C Gupta , Rajeev Gupta , Oye Gureje , Beata Gurzkowska , Enrique Gutiérrez-González , Laura Gutierrez , Felix Gutzwiller , Seongjun Ha , Farzad Hadaegh , Charalambos A Hadjigeorgiou , Rosa Haghshenas , Hamid Hakimi , Jytte Halkjær , Ian R Hambleton , Behrooz Hamzeh , Dominique Hange , Abu Am Hanif , Sari Hantunen , Jie Hao , Rachakulla Hari Kumar , Seyed Mohammad Hashemi-Shahri , Maria Hassapidou , Jun Hata , Teresa Haugsgjerd , Jiang He , Yuan He , Yuna He , Regina Heidinger-Felso , Mirjam Heinen , Tatjana Hejgaard , Marleen Elisabeth Hendriks , Rafael Dos Santos Henrique , Ana Henriques , Leticia Hernandez Cadena , Sauli Herrala , Victor M Herrera , Isabelle Herter-Aeberli , Ramin Heshmat , Allan G Hill , Sai Yin Ho , Suzanne C Ho , Michael Hobbs , Michelle Holdsworth , Reza Homayounfar , Clara Homs , Wilma M Hopman , Andrea Rvr Horimoto , Claudia M Hormiga , Bernardo L Horta , Leila Houti , Christina Howitt , Thein Thein Htay , Aung Soe Htet , Maung Maung Than Htike , Yonghua Hu , José María Huerta , Ilpo Tapani Huhtaniemi , Laetitia Huiart , Constanta Huidumac Petrescu , Martijn Huisman , Abdullatif Husseini , Chinh Nguyen Huu , Inge Huybrechts , Nahla Hwalla , Jolanda Hyska , Licia Iacoviello , Jesús M Ibarluzea , Mohsen M Ibrahim , Norazizah Ibrahim Wong , M Arfan Ikram , Violeta Iotova , Vilma E Irazola , Takafumi Ishida , Muhammad Islam , Sheikh Mohammed Shariful Islam , Masanori Iwasaki , Jeremy M Jacobs , Hashem Y Jaddou , Tazeen Jafar , Kenneth James , Kazi M Jamil , Konrad Jamrozik , Imre Janszky , Edward Janus , Juel Jarani , Marjo-Riitta Jarvelin , Grazyna Jasienska , Ana Jelakovic , Bojan Jelakovic , Garry Jennings , Anjani Kumar Jha , Chao Qiang Jiang , Ramon O Jimenez , Karl-Heinz Jöckel , Michel Joffres , Mattias Johansson , Jari J Jokelainen , Jost B Jonas , Jitendra Jonnagaddala , Torben Jørgensen , Pradeep Joshi , Farahnaz Joukar , Dragana P Jovic , Jacek J Jóźwiak , Anne Juolevi , Gregor Jurak , Iulia Jurca Simina , Vesna Juresa , Rudolf Kaaks , Felix O Kaducu , Anthony Kafatos , Eero O Kajantie , Zhanna Kalmatayeva , Ofra Kalter-Leibovici , Yves Kameli , Freja B Kampmann , Kodanda R Kanala , Srinivasan Kannan , Efthymios Kapantais , Argyro Karakosta , Line L Kårhus , Khem B Karki , Marzieh Katibeh , Joanne Katz , Peter T Katzmarzyk , Jussi Kauhanen , Prabhdeep Kaur , Maryam Kavousi , Gyulli M Kazakbaeva , Ulrich Keil , Lital Keinan Boker , Sirkka Keinänen-Kiukaanniemi , Roya Kelishadi , Cecily Kelleher , Han Cg Kemper , Andre P Kengne , Maryam Keramati , Alina Kerimkulova , Mathilde Kersting , Timothy Key , Yousef Saleh Khader , Davood Khalili , Kay-Tee Khaw , Bahareh Kheiri , Motahareh Kheradmand , Alireza Khosravi , Ilse Msl Khouw , Ursula Kiechl-Kohlendorfer , Stefan Kiechl , Japhet Killewo , Dong Wook Kim , Hyeon Chang Kim , Jeongseon Kim , Jenny M Kindblom , Heidi Klakk , Magdalena Klimek , Jeannette Klimont , Jurate Klumbiene , Michael Knoflach , Bhawesh Koirala , Elin Kolle , Patrick Kolsteren , Jürgen König , Raija Korpelainen , Paul Korrovits , Magdalena Korzycka , Jelena Kos , Seppo Koskinen , Katsuyasu Kouda , Viktoria A Kovacs , Sudhir Kowlessur , Slawomir Koziel , Jana Kratenova , Wolfgang Kratzer , Susi Kriemler , Peter Lund Kristensen , Steinar Krokstad , Daan Kromhout , Herculina S Kruger , Ruzena Kubinova , Renata Kuciene , Urho M Kujala , Enisa Kujundzic , Zbigniew Kulaga , R Krishna Kumar , Marie Kunešová , Pawel Kurjata , Yadlapalli S Kusuma , Kari Kuulasmaa , Catherine Kyobutungi , Quang Ngoc La , Fatima Zahra Laamiri , Tiina Laatikainen , Carl Lachat , Youcef Laid , Tai Hing Lam , Christina-Paulina Lambrinou , Edwige Landais , Vera Lanska , Georg Lappas , Bagher Larijani , Tint Swe Latt , Laura Lauria , Maria Lazo-Porras , Gwenaëlle Le Coroller , Khanh Le Nguyen Bao , Agnès Le Port , Tuyen D Le , Jeannette Lee , Jeonghee Lee , Paul H Lee , Nils Lehmann , Terho Lehtimäki , Daniel Lemogoum , Naomi S Levitt , Yanping Li , Merike Liivak , Christa L Lilly , Wei-Yen Lim , M Fernanda Lima-Costa , Hsien-Ho Lin , Xu Lin , Yi-Ting Lin , Lars Lind , Allan Linneberg , Lauren Lissner , Mieczyslaw Litwin , Lijuan Liu , Wei-Cheng Lo , Helle-Mai Loit , Khuong Quynh Long , Luis Lopes , Oscar Lopes , Esther Lopez-Garcia , Tania Lopez , Paulo A Lotufo , José Eugenio Lozano , Janice L Lukrafka , Dalia Luksiene , Annamari Lundqvist , Robert Lundqvist , Nuno Lunet , Charles Lunogelo , Michala Lustigová , Edyta Łuszczki , Guansheng Ma , Jun Ma , Xu Ma , George Ll Machado-Coelho , Aristides M Machado-Rodrigues , Luisa M Macieira , Ahmed A Madar , Stefania Maggi , Dianna J Magliano , Sara Magnacca , Emmanuella Magriplis , Gowri Mahasampath , Bernard Maire , Marjeta Majer , Marcia Makdisse , Päivi Mäki , Fatemeh Malekzadeh , Reza Malekzadeh , Rahul Malhotra , Kodavanti Mallikharjuna Rao , Sofia K Malyutina , Lynell V Maniego , Yannis Manios , Jim I Mann , Fariborz Mansour-Ghanaei , Enzo Manzato , Paula Margozzini , Anastasia Markaki , Oonagh Markey , Eliza Markidou Ioannidou , Pedro Marques-Vidal , Larissa Pruner Marques , Jaume Marrugat , Yves Martin-Prevel , Rosemarie Martin , Reynaldo Martorell , Eva Martos , Katharina Maruszczak , Stefano Marventano , Luis P Mascarenhas , Shariq R Masoodi , Ellisiv B Mathiesen , Prashant Mathur , Alicia Matijasevich , Tandi E Matsha , Christina Mavrogianni , Artur Mazur , Jean Claude N Mbanya , Shelly R McFarlane , Stephen T McGarvey , Martin McKee , Stela McLachlan , Rachael M McLean , Scott B McLean , Breige A McNulty , Sounnia Mediene Benchekor , Jurate Medzioniene , Parinaz Mehdipour , Kirsten Mehlig , Amir Houshang Mehrparvar , Aline Meirhaeghe , Jørgen Meisfjord , Christa Meisinger , Ana Maria B Menezes , Geetha R Menon , Gert Bm Mensink , Maria Teresa Menzano , Alibek Mereke , Indrapal I Meshram , Andres Metspalu , Haakon E Meyer , Jie Mi , Kim F Michaelsen , Nathalie Michels , Kairit Mikkel , Karolina Milkowska , Jody C Miller , Cláudia S Minderico , G K Mini , Juan Francisco Miquel , Mohammad Reza Mirjalili , Daphne Mirkopoulou , Erkin Mirrakhimov , Marjeta Mišigoj-Durakovic , Antonio Mistretta , Veronica Mocanu , Pietro A Modesti , Sahar Saeedi Moghaddam , Bahram Mohajer , Mostafa K Mohamed , Shukri F Mohamed , Kazem Mohammad , Zahra Mohammadi , Noushin Mohammadifard , Reza Mohammadpourhodki , Viswanathan Mohan , Salim Mohanna , Muhammad Fadhli Mohd Yusoff , Iraj Mohebbi , Farnam Mohebi , Marie Moitry , Drude Molbo , Line T Møllehave , Niels C Møller , Dénes Molnár , Amirabbas Momenan , Charles K Mondo , Michele Monroy-Valle , Eric Monterrubio-Flores , Kotsedi Daniel K Monyeki , Jin Soo Moon , Mahmood Moosazadeh , Leila B Moreira , Alain Morejon , Luis A Moreno , Karen Morgan , Suzanne N Morin , Erik Lykke Mortensen , George Moschonis , Malgorzata Mossakowska , Aya Mostafa , Anabela Mota-Pinto , Jorge Mota , Mohammad Esmaeel Motlagh , Jorge Motta , Marcos André Moura-Dos-Santos , Malay K Mridha , Kelias P Msyamboza , Thet Thet Mu , Magdalena Muc , Boban Mugoša , Maria L Muiesan , Parvina Mukhtorova , Martina Müller-Nurasyid , Neil Murphy , Jaakko Mursu , Elaine M Murtagh , Kamarul Imran Musa , Sanja Music Milanovic , Vera Musil , Norlaila Mustafa , Iraj Nabipour , Shohreh Naderimagham , Gabriele Nagel , Balkish M Naidu , Farid Najafi , Harunobu Nakamura , Jana Námešná , Ei Ei K Nang , Vinay B Nangia , Martin Nankap , Sameer Narake , Paola Nardone , Matthias Nauck , William A Neal , Azim Nejatizadeh , Chandini Nekkantti , Keiu Nelis , Liis Nelis , Ilona Nenko , Martin Neovius , Flavio Nervi , Chung T Nguyen , Nguyen D Nguyen , Quang Ngoc Nguyen , Ramfis E Nieto-Martínez , Yury P Nikitin , Guang Ning , Toshiharu Ninomiya , Sania Nishtar , Marianna Noale , Oscar A Noboa , Helena Nogueira , Teresa Norat , Maria Nordendahl , Børge G Nordestgaard , Davide Noto , Natalia Nowak-Szczepanska , Mohannad Al Nsour , Irfan Nuhoglu , Eha Nurk , Terence W O'Neill , Dermot O'Reilly , Galina Obreja , Caleb Ochimana , Angélica M Ochoa-Avilés , Eiji Oda , Kyungwon Oh , Kumiko Ohara , Claes Ohlsson , Ryutaro Ohtsuka , Örn Olafsson , Maria Teresa A Olinto , Isabel O Oliveira , Mohd Azahadi Omar , Altan Onat , Sok King Ong , Lariane M Ono , Pedro Ordunez , Rui Ornelas , Ana P Ortiz , Pedro J Ortiz , Merete Osler , Clive Osmond , Sergej M Ostojic , Afshin Ostovar , Johanna A Otero , Kim Overvad , Ellis Owusu-Dabo , Fred Michel Paccaud , Cristina Padez , Ioannis Pagkalos , Elena Pahomova , Karina Mary de Paiva , Andrzej Pajak , Domenico Palli , Alberto Palloni , Luigi Palmieri , Wen-Harn Pan , Songhomitra Panda-Jonas , Arvind Pandey , Francesco Panza , Dimitrios Papandreou , Soon-Woo Park , Suyeon Park , Winsome R Parnell , Mahboubeh Parsaeian , Ionela M Pascanu , Patrick Pasquet , Nikhil D Patel , Ivan Pecin , Mangesh S Pednekar , Nasheeta Peer , Gao Pei , Sergio Viana Peixoto , Markku Peltonen , Alexandre C Pereira , Marco A Peres , Napoleón Pérez-Farinós , Cynthia M Pérez , Valentina Peterkova , Annette Peters , Astrid Petersmann , Janina Petkeviciene , Ausra Petrauskiene , Emanuela Pettenuzzo , Niloofar Peykari , Son Thai Pham , Rafael N Pichardo , Daniela Pierannunzio , Iris Pigeot , Hynek Pikhart , Aida Pilav , Lorenza Pilotto , Francesco Pistelli , Freda Pitakaka , Aleksandra Piwonska , Andreia N Pizarro , Pedro Plans-Rubió , Bee Koon Poh , Hermann Pohlabeln , Raluca M Pop , Stevo R Popovic , Miquel Porta , Georg Posch , Anil Poudyal , Dimitrios Poulimeneas , Hamed Pouraram , Farhad Pourfarzi , Akram Pourshams , Hossein Poustchi , Rajendra Pradeepa , Alison J Price , Jacqueline F Price , Rui Providencia , Jardena J Puder , Iveta Pudule , Soile E Puhakka , Maria Puiu , Margus Punab , Radwan F Qasrawi , Mostafa Qorbani , Tran Quoc Bao , Ivana Radic , Ricardas Radisauskas , Salar Rahimikazerooni , Mahfuzar Rahman , Mahmudur Rahman , Olli Raitakari , Manu Raj , Ellina Rakhimova , Sherali Rakhmatulloev , Ivo Rakovac , Sudha Ramachandra Rao , Ambady Ramachandran , Jacqueline Ramke , Elisabete Ramos , Rafel Ramos , Lekhraj Rampal , Sanjay Rampal , Vayia Rarra , Ramon A Rascon-Pacheco , Mette Rasmussen , Cassiano Ricardo Rech , Josep Redon , Paul Ferdinand M Reganit , Valéria Regecová , Luis Revilla , Abbas Rezaianzadeh , Lourdes Ribas-Barba , Robespierre Ribeiro , Elio Riboli , Adrian Richter , Fernando Rigo , Natascia Rinaldo , Tobias F Rinke de Wit , Ana Rito , Raphael M Ritti-Dias , Juan A Rivera , Cynthia Robitaille , Romana Roccaldo , Daniela Rodrigues , Fernando Rodríguez-Artalejo , María Del Cristo Rodriguez-Perez , Laura A Rodríguez-Villamizar , Ulla Roggenbuck , Rosalba Rojas-Martinez , Nipa Rojroongwasinkul , Dora Romaguera , Elisabetta L Romeo , Rafaela V Rosario , Annika Rosengren , Ian Rouse , Joel Gr Roy , Adolfo Rubinstein , Frank J Rühli , Jean-Bernard Ruidavets , Blanca Sandra Ruiz-Betancourt , Maria Ruiz-Castell , Emma Ruiz Moreno , Iuliia A Rusakova , Kenisha Russell Jonsson , Paola Russo , Petra Rust , Marcin Rutkowski , Charumathi Sabanayagam , Elena Sacchini , Harshpal S Sachdev , Alireza Sadjadi , Ali Reza Safarpour , Saeid Safiri , Nader Saki , Benoit Salanave , Eduardo Salazar Martinez , Diego Salmerón , Veikko Salomaa , Jukka T Salonen , Massimo Salvetti , Margarita Samoutian , Jose Sánchez-Abanto , Sandjaja , Susana Sans , Loreto Santa Marina , Diana A Santos , Ina S Santos , Lèlita C Santos , Maria Paula Santos , Osvaldo Santos , Rute Santos , Sara Santos Sanz , Jouko L Saramies , Luis B Sardinha , Nizal Sarrafzadegan , Thirunavukkarasu Sathish , Kai-Uwe Saum , Savvas Savva , Mathilde Savy , Norie Sawada , Mariana Sbaraini , Marcia Scazufca , Beatriz D Schaan , Angelika Schaffrath Rosario , Herman Schargrodsky , Anja Schienkiewitz , Sabine Schipf , Carsten O Schmidt , Ida Maria Schmidt , Peter Schnohr , Ben Schöttker , Sara Schramm , Stine Schramm , Helmut Schröder , Constance Schultsz , Aletta E Schutte , Aye Aye Sein , Rusidah Selamat , Vedrana Sember , Abhijit Sen , Idowu O Senbanjo , Sadaf G Sepanlou , Victor Sequera , Luis Serra-Majem , Jennifer Servais , Ludmila Ševcíková , Svetlana A Shalnova , Teresa Shamah-Levy , Morteza Shamshirgaran , Coimbatore Subramaniam Shanthirani , Maryam Sharafkhah , Sanjib K Sharma , Jonathan E Shaw , Amaneh Shayanrad , Ali Akbar Shayesteh , Lela Shengelia , Zumin Shi , Kenji Shibuya , Hana Shimizu-Furusawa , Dong Wook Shin , Majid Shirani , Rahman Shiri , Namuna Shrestha , Khairil Si-Ramlee , Alfonso Siani , Rosalynn Siantar , Abla M Sibai , Antonio M Silva , Diego Augusto Santos Silva , Mary Simon , Judith Simons , Leon A Simons , Agneta Sjöberg , Michael Sjöström , Gry Skodje , Jolanta Slowikowska-Hilczer , Przemyslaw Slusarczyk , Liam Smeeth , Hung-Kwan So , Fernanda Cunha Soares , Grzegorz Sobek , Eugène Sobngwi , Morten Sodemann , Stefan Söderberg , Moesijanti Ye Soekatri , Agustinus Soemantri , Reecha Sofat , Vincenzo Solfrizzi , Mohammad Hossein Somi , Emily Sonestedt , Yi Song , Thorkild Ia Sørensen , Elin P Sørgjerd , Charles Sossa Jérome , Victoria E Soto-Rojas , Aïcha Soumaré , Slavica Sovic , Bente Sparboe-Nilsen , Karen Sparrenberger , Angela Spinelli , Igor Spiroski , Jan A Staessen , Hanspeter Stamm , Maria G Stathopoulou , Kaspar Staub , Bill Stavreski , Jostein Steene-Johannessen , Peter Stehle , Aryeh D Stein , George S Stergiou , Jochanan Stessman , Ranko Stevanovic , Jutta Stieber , Doris Stöckl , Tanja Stocks , Jakub Stokwiszewski , Ekaterina Stoyanova , Gareth Stratton , Karien Stronks , Maria Wany Strufaldi , Lela Sturua , Ramón Suárez-Medina , Machi Suka , Chien-An Sun , Johan Sundström , Yn-Tz Sung , Jordi Sunyer , Paibul Suriyawongpaisal , Boyd A Swinburn , Rody G Sy , Holly E Syddall , René Charles Sylva , Moyses Szklo , Lucjan Szponar , E Shyong Tai , Mari-Liis Tammesoo , Abdonas Tamosiunas , Eng Joo Tan , Xun Tang , Maya Tanrygulyyeva , Frank Tanser , Yong Tao , Mohammed Rasoul Tarawneh , Jakob Tarp , Carolina B Tarqui-Mamani , Radka Taxová Braunerová , Anne Taylor , Julie Taylor , Félicité Tchibindat , William R Tebar , Grethe S Tell , Tania Tello , Yih Chung Tham , K R Thankappan , Holger Theobald , Xenophon Theodoridis , Lutgarde Thijs , Nihal Thomas , Betina H Thuesen , Lubica Tichá , Erik J Timmermans , Anne Tjonneland , Hanna K Tolonen , Janne S Tolstrup , Murat Topbas , Roman Topór-Madry , Liv Elin Torheim , María José Tormo , Michael J Tornaritis , Maties Torrent , Laura Torres-Collado , Stefania Toselli , Giota Touloumi , Pierre Traissac , Thi Tuyet-Hanh Tran , Dimitrios Trichopoulos , Antonia Trichopoulou , Oanh Th Trinh , Atul Trivedi , Lechaba Tshepo , Maria Tsigga , Shoichiro Tsugane , Azaliia M Tuliakova , Marshall K Tulloch-Reid , Fikru Tullu , Tomi-Pekka Tuomainen , Jaakko Tuomilehto , Maria L Turley , Gilad Twig , Per Tynelius , Themistoklis Tzotzas , Christophe Tzourio , Peter Ueda , Eunice Ugel , Flora Am Ukoli , Hanno Ulmer , Belgin Unal , Zhamyila Usupova , Hannu Mt Uusitalo , Nalan Uysal , Justina Vaitkeviciute , Gonzalo Valdivia , Susana Vale , Damaskini Valvi , Rob M van Dam , Johan Van der Heyden , Yvonne T van der Schouw , Koen Van Herck , Hoang Van Minh , Natasja M Van Schoor , Irene Gm van Valkengoed , Dirk Vanderschueren , Diego Vanuzzo , Anette Varbo , Gregorio Varela-Moreiras , Patricia Varona-Pérez , Senthil K Vasan , Tomas Vega , Toomas Veidebaum , Gustavo Velasquez-Melendez , Biruta Velika , Giovanni Veronesi , Wm Monique Verschuren , Cesar G Victora , Giovanni Viegi , Lucie Viet , Salvador Villalpando , Paolo Vineis , Jesus Vioque , Jyrki K Virtanen , Marjolein Visser , Sophie Visvikis-Siest , Bharathi Viswanathan , Mihaela Vladulescu , Tiina Vlasoff , Dorja Vocanec , Peter Vollenweider , Henry Völzke , Ari Voutilainen , Sari Voutilainen , Martine Vrijheid , Tanja Gm Vrijkotte , Alisha N Wade , Aline Wagner , Thomas Waldhör , Janette Walton , Elvis Oa Wambiya , Wan Mohamad Wan Bebakar , Wan Nazaimoon Wan Mohamud , Rildo de Souza Wanderley Júnior , Ming-Dong Wang , Ningli Wang , Qian Wang , Xiangjun Wang , Ya Xing Wang , Ying-Wei Wang , S Goya Wannamethee , Nicholas Wareham , Adelheid Weber , Niels Wedderkopp , Deepa Weerasekera , Daniel Weghuber , Wenbin Wei , Aneta Weres , Bo Werner , Peter H Whincup , Kurt Widhalm , Indah S Widyahening , Andrzej Wiecek , Rainford J Wilks , Johann Willeit , Peter Willeit , Julianne Williams , Tom Wilsgaard , Bogdan Wojtyniak , Roy A Wong-McClure , Andrew Wong , Jyh Eiin Wong , Tien Yin Wong , Jean Woo , Mark Woodward , Frederick C Wu , Jianfeng Wu , Li Juan Wu , Shouling Wu , Haiquan Xu , Liang Xu , Nor Azwany Yaacob , Uruwan Yamborisut , Weili Yan , Ling Yang , Xiaoguang Yang , Yang Yang , Nazan Yardim , Mehdi Yaseri , Tabara Yasuharu , Xingwang Ye , Panayiotis K Yiallouros , Moein Yoosefi , Akihiro Yoshihara , Qi Sheng You , San-Lin You , Novie O Younger-Coleman , Safiah Md Yusof , Ahmad Faudzi Yusoff , Luciana Zaccagni , Vassilis Zafiropulos , Ahmad A Zainuddin , Seyed Rasoul Zakavi , Farhad Zamani , Sabina Zambon , Antonis Zampelas , Hana Zamrazilová , Maria Elisa Zapata , Abdul Hamid Zargar , Ko Ko Zaw , Tomasz Zdrojewski , Kristyna Zejglicova , Tajana Zeljkovic Vrkic , Yi Zeng , Luxia Zhang , Zhen-Yu Zhang , Dong Zhao , Ming-Hui Zhao , Wenhua Zhao , Shiqi Zhen , Wei Zheng , Yingfeng Zheng , Bekbolat Zholdin , Maigeng Zhou , Dan Zhu , Marie Zins , Emanuel Zitt , Yanina Zocalo , Julio Zuñiga Cisneros , Monika Zuziak , Majid Ezzati , Sarah Filippi, Epidemiology, Iurilli, Maria LC, Zhou, Bin, Bennett, James E, Carrillo-Larco, Rodrigo M, Sophiea, Marisa K, Rodriguez-Martinez, Andrea, Bixby, Honor, Solomon, Bethlehem D, Taddei, Cristina, Danaei, Goodarz, Di Cesare, Mariachiara, Stevens, Gretchen A, Riley, Leanne M, Savin, Stefan, Cowan, Melanie J, Bovet, Pascal, Damasceno, Albertino, Chirita-Emandi, Adela, Hayes, Alison J, Ikeda, Nayu, Jackson, Rod T, Khang, Young-Ho, Laxmaiah, Avula, Liu, Jing, Miranda, J Jaime, Saidi, Olfa, Sebert, Sylvain, Sorić, Maroje, Starc, Gregor, Gregg, Edward W, Abarca-Gómez, Leandra, Abdeen, Ziad A, Abdrakhmanova, Shynar, Ghaffar, Suhaila Abdul, Rahim, Hanan F Abdul, Abu-Rmeileh, Niveen M, Garba, Jamila Abubakar, Acosta-Cazares, Benjamin, Adams, Robert J, Aekplakorn, Wichai, Afsana, Kaosar, Afzal, Shoaib, Agdeppa, Imelda A, Aghazadeh-Attari, Javad, Aguilar-Salinas, Carlos A, Agyemang, Charle, Ahmad, Mohamad Hasnan, Ahmad, Noor Ani, Ahmadi, Ali, Ahmadi, Naser, Ahmed, Soheir H, Ahrens, Wolfgang, Aitmurzaeva, Gulmira, Ajlouni, Kamel, Al-Hazzaa, Hazzaa M, Al-Lahou, Badreya, Al-Raddadi, Rajaa, Alarouj, Monira, AlBuhairan, Fadia, AlDhukair, Shahla, Ali, Mohamed M, Alkandari, Abdullah, Alkerwi, Ala'a, Allin, Kristine, Alvarez-Pedrerol, Mar, Aly, Eman, Amarapurkar, Deepak N, Amiri, Parisa, Amougou, Norbert, Amouyel, Philippe, Bo Andersen, Lar, Anderssen, Sigmund A, Ängquist, Lar, Anjana, Ranjit Mohan, Ansari-Moghaddam, Alireza, Aounallah-Skhiri, Hajer, Araújo, Joana, Ariansen, Inger, Aris, Tahir, Arku, Raphael E, Arlappa, Nimmathota, Aryal, Krishna K, Aspelund, Thor, Assah, Felix K, Assunção, Maria Cecília F, Aung, May Soe, Auvinen, Juha, Avdicová, Mária, Avi, Shina, Azevedo, Ana, Azimi-Nezhad, Mohsen, Azizi, Fereidoun, Azmin, Mehrdad, Babu, Bontha V, Jørgensen, Maja Bæksgaard, Baharudin, Azli, Bahijri, Suhad, Baker, Jennifer L, Balakrishna, Nagalla, Bamoshmoosh, Mohamed, Banach, Maciej, Bandosz, Piotr, Banegas, José R, Baran, Joanna, Barbagallo, Carlo M, Barceló, Alberto, Barkat, Amina, Barros, Aluisio JD, Barros, Mauro Virgílio Gome, Basit, Abdul, Bastos, Joao Luiz D, Bata, Iqbal, Batieha, Anwar M, Batista, Rosangela L, Battakova, Zhamilya, Batyrbek, Assembekov, Baur, Louise A, Beaglehole, Robert, Bel-Serrat, Silvia, Belavendra, Antonisamy, Romdhane, Habiba Ben, Benedics, Judith, Benet, Mikhail, Bergh, Ingunn Holden, Berkinbayev, Salim, Bernabe-Ortiz, Antonio, Bernotiene, Gailute, Bettiol, Heloísa, Bezerra, Jorge, Bhagyalaxmi, Aroor, Bharadwaj, Sumit, Bhargava, Santosh K, Bhutta, Zulfiqar A, Bi, Hongsheng, Bi, Yufang, Bia, Daniel, Lele, Elysée Claude Bika, Bikbov, Mukharram M, Bista, Bihungum, Bjelica, Dusko J, Bjerregaard, Peter, Bjertness, Espen, Bjertness, Marius B, Björkelund, Cecilia, Bloch, Katia V, Blokstra, Anneke, Bo, Simona, Bobak, Martin, Boddy, Lynne M, Boehm, Bernhard O, Boeing, Heiner, Boggia, Jose G, Bogova, Elena, Boissonnet, Carlos P, Bojesen, Stig E, Bonaccio, Marialaura, Bongard, Vanina, Bonilla-Vargas, Alice, Bopp, Matthia, Borghs, Herman, Braeckevelt, Lien, Braeckman, Lutgart, Bragt, Marjolijn CE, Brajkovich, Imperia, Branca, Francesco, Breckenkamp, Juergen, Breda, João, Brenner, Hermann, Brewster, Lizzy M, Brian, Garry R, Brinduse, Lacramioara, Brophy, Sinead, Bruno, Graziella, Bueno-de-Mesquita, H Ba, Bugge, Anna, Buoncristiano, Marta, Burazeri, Genc, Burns, Con, de León, Antonio Cabrera, Cacciottolo, Joseph, Cai, Hui, Cama, Tilema, Cameron, Christine, Camolas, José, Can, Günay, Cândido, Ana Paula C, Cañete, Felicia, Capanzana, Mario V, Capková, Nadežda, Capuano, Eduardo, Capuano, Vincenzo, Cardol, Marloe, Cardoso, Viviane C, Carlsson, Axel C, Carmuega, Esteban, Carvalho, Joana, Casajús, José A, Casanueva, Felipe F, Celikcan, Ertugrul, Censi, Laura, Cervantes-Loaiza, Marvin, Cesar, Juraci A, Chamukuttan, Snehalatha, Chan, Angelique W, Chan, Queenie, Chaturvedi, Himanshu K, Chaturvedi, Nish, Rahim, Norsyamlina Che Abdul, Li Chee, Miao, Chen, Chien-Jen, Chen, Fangfang, Chen, Huashuai, Chen, Shuohua, Chen, Zhengming, Cheng, Ching-Yu, Cheraghian, Bahman, Chetrit, Angela, Chikova-Iscener, Ekaterina, Chiolero, Arnaud, Chiou, Shu-Ti, Chirlaque, María-Dolore, Cho, Belong, Christensen, Kaare, Christofaro, Diego G, Chudek, Jerzy, Cifkova, Renata, Cilia, Michelle, Cinteza, Eliza, Claessens, Frank, Clarke, Janine, Clays, El, Cohen, Emmanuel, Concin, Han, Confortin, Susana C, Cooper, Cyru, Coppinger, Tara C, Corpeleijn, Eva, Costanzo, Simona, Cottel, Dominique, Cowell, Chri, Craig, Cora L, Crampin, Amelia C, Crujeiras, Ana B, Csilla, Semánová, Cucu, Alexandra M, Cui, Liufu, Cureau, Felipe V, Czenczek-Lewandowska, Ewelina, D'Arrigo, Graziella, d'Orsi, Eleonora, Dacica, Liliana, Re Saavedra, María Ángeles Dal, Dallongeville, Jean, Damsgaard, Camilla T, Dankner, Rachel, Dantoft, Thomas M, Dasgupta, Parasmani, Dastgiri, Saeed, Dauchet, Luc, Davletov, Kairat, De Backer, Guy, De Bacquer, Dirk, de Gaetano, Giovanni, De Henauw, Stefaan, de Oliveira, Paula Duarte, De Ridder, David, De Ridder, Karin, de Rooij, Susanne R, De Smedt, Delphine, Deepa, Mohan, Deev, Alexander D, Jr DeGennaro, Vincent, Dehghan, Abba, Delisle, Hélène, Delpeuch, Franci, Demarest, Stefaan, Dennison, Elaine, Dereń, Katarzyna, Deschamps, Valérie, Dhimal, Meghnath, Di Castelnuovo, Augusto F, Dias-da-Costa, Juvenal Soare, Díaz-Sánchez, María Elena, Diaz, Alejandro, Dika, Zivka, Djalalinia, Shirin, Djordjic, Visnja, Do, Ha TP, Dobson, Annette J, Donati, Maria Benedetta, Donfrancesco, Chiara, Donoso, Silvana P, Döring, Angela, Dorobantu, Maria, Dorosty, Ahmad Reza, Doua, Kouamelan, Dragano, Nico, Drygas, Wojciech, Li Duan, Jia, Duante, Charmaine A, Duboz, Priscilla, Duda, Rosemary B, Duleva, Vesselka, Dulskiene, Virginija, Dumith, Samuel C, Dushpanova, Anar, Dzerve, Vilni, Dziankowska-Zaborszczyk, Elzbieta, Eddie, Ricky, Eftekhar, Ebrahim, Egbagbe, Eruke E, Eggertsen, Robert, Eghtesad, Sareh, Eiben, Gabriele, Ekelund, Ulf, El-Khateeb, Mohammad, El Ati, Jalila, Eldemire-Shearer, Denise, Eliasen, Marie, Elliott, Paul, Engle-Stone, Reina, Enguerran, Macia, Erasmus, Rajiv T, Erbel, Raimund, Erem, Cihangir, Eriksen, Louise, Eriksson, Johan G, la Peña, Jorge Escobedo-de, Eslami, Saeid, Esmaeili, Ali, Evans, Alun, Faeh, David, Fakhretdinova, Albina A, Fall, Caroline H, Faramarzi, Elnaz, Farjam, Mojtaba, Sant'Angelo, Victoria Farrugia, Farzadfar, Farshad, Fattahi, Mohammad Reza, Fawwad, Asher, Felix-Redondo, Francisco J, Ferguson, Trevor S, Fernandes, Romulo A, Fernández-Bergés, Daniel, Ferrante, Daniel, Ferrao, Thoma, Ferrari, Marika, Ferrario, Marco M, Ferreccio, Catterina, Ferrer, Eldridge, Ferrieres, Jean, Figueiró, Thamara Hubler, Fijalkowska, Anna, Fink, Günther, Fischer, Krista, Foo, Leng Huat, Forsner, Maria, Fouad, Heba M, Francis, Damian K, do Carmo Franco, Maria, Frikke-Schmidt, Ruth, Frontera, Guillermo, Fuchs, Flavio D, Fuchs, Sandra C, Fujiati, Isti I, Fujita, Yuki, Fumihiko, Matsuda, Furusawa, Takuro, Gaciong, Zbigniew, Gafencu, Mihai, Galbarczyk, Andrzej, Galenkamp, Henrike, Galeone, Daniela, Galfo, Myriam, Galvano, Fabio, Gao, Jingli, Garcia-de-la-Hera, Manoli, García-Solano, Marta, Gareta, Dickman, Garnett, Sarah P, Gaspoz, Jean-Michel, Gasull, Magda, Gaya, Adroaldo Cesar Araujo, Gaya, Anelise Rei, Gazzinelli, Andrea, Gehring, Ulrike, Geiger, Harald, Geleijnse, Johanna M, Ghanbari, Ali, Ghasemi, Erfan, Gheorghe-Fronea, Oana-Florentina, Giampaoli, Simona, Gianfagna, Francesco, Gill, Tiffany K, Giovannelli, Jonathan, Gironella, Glen, Giwercman, Aleksander, Gkiouras, Konstantino, Godos, Justyna, Gogen, Sibel, Goldberg, Marcel, Goldsmith, Rebecca A, Goltzman, David, Gómez, Santiago F, Gomula, Aleksandra, da Silva, Bruna Goncalves Cordeiro, Gonçalves, Helen, Gonzalez-Chica, David A, Gonzalez-Gross, Marcela, González-Leon, Margot, González-Rivas, Juan P, González-Villalpando, Clicerio, González-Villalpando, María-Elena, Gonzalez, Angel R, Gottrand, Frederic, Graça, Antonio Pedro, Graff-Iversen, Sidsel, Grafnetter, Dušan, Grajda, Aneta, Grammatikopoulou, Maria G, Gregor, Ronald D, Grodzicki, Tomasz, Grøholt, Else Karin, Grøntved, Ander, Grosso, Giuseppe, Gruden, Gabriella, Gu, Dongfeng, Gualdi-Russo, Emanuela, Guallar-Castillón, Pilar, Gualtieri, Andrea, Gudmundsson, Elias F, Gudnason, Vilmundur, Guerrero, Ramiro, Guessous, Idri, Guimaraes, Andre L, Gulliford, Martin C, Gunnlaugsdottir, Johanna, Gunter, Marc J, Guo, Xiu-Hua, Guo, Yin, Gupta, Prakash C, Gupta, Rajeev, Gureje, Oye, Gurzkowska, Beata, Gutiérrez-González, Enrique, Gutierrez, Laura, Gutzwiller, Felix, Ha, Seongjun, Hadaegh, Farzad, Hadjigeorgiou, Charalambos A, Haghshenas, Rosa, Hakimi, Hamid, Halkjær, Jytte, Hambleton, Ian R, Hamzeh, Behrooz, Hange, Dominique, Hanif, Abu AM, Hantunen, Sari, Hao, Jie, Kumar, Rachakulla Hari, Hashemi-Shahri, Seyed Mohammad, Hassapidou, Maria, Hata, Jun, Haugsgjerd, Teresa, He, Jiang, He, Yuan, He, Yuna, Heidinger-Felso, Regina, Heinen, Mirjam, Hejgaard, Tatjana, Hendriks, Marleen Elisabeth, dos Santos Henrique, Rafael, Henriques, Ana, Cadena, Leticia Hernandez, Herrala, Sauli, Herrera, Victor M, Herter-Aeberli, Isabelle, Heshmat, Ramin, Hill, Allan G, Ho, Sai Yin, Ho, Suzanne C, Hobbs, Michael, Holdsworth, Michelle, Homayounfar, Reza, Homs, Clara, Hopman, Wilma M, Horimoto, Andrea RVR, Hormiga, Claudia M, Horta, Bernardo L, Houti, Leila, Howitt, Christina, Htay, Thein Thein, Htet, Aung Soe, Htike, Maung Maung Than, Hu, Yonghua, Huerta, José María, Huhtaniemi, Ilpo Tapani, Huiart, Laetitia, Petrescu, Constanta Huidumac, Huisman, Martijn, Husseini, Abdullatif, Huu, Chinh Nguyen, Huybrechts, Inge, Hwalla, Nahla, Hyska, Jolanda, Iacoviello, Licia, Ibarluzea, Jesús M, Ibrahim, Mohsen M, Wong, Norazizah Ibrahim, Ikram, M Arfan, Iotova, Violeta, Irazola, Vilma E, Ishida, Takafumi, Islam, Muhammad, Islam, Sheikh Mohammed Shariful, Iwasaki, Masanori, Jacobs, Jeremy M, Jaddou, Hashem Y, Jafar, Tazeen, James, Kenneth, Jamil, Kazi M, Jamrozik, Konrad, Janszky, Imre, Janus, Edward, Jarani, Juel, Jarvelin, Marjo-Riitta, Jasienska, Grazyna, Jelakovic, Ana, Jelakovic, Bojan, Jennings, Garry, Jha, Anjani Kumar, Jiang, Chao Qiang, Jimenez, Ramon O, Jöckel, Karl-Heinz, Joffres, Michel, Johansson, Mattia, Jokelainen, Jari J, Jonas, Jost B, Jonnagaddala, Jitendra, Jørgensen, Torben, Joshi, Pradeep, Joukar, Farahnaz, Jovic, Dragana P, Jóźwiak, Jacek J, Juolevi, Anne, Jurak, Gregor, Simina, Iulia Jurca, Juresa, Vesna, Kaaks, Rudolf, Kaducu, Felix O, Kafatos, Anthony, Kajantie, Eero O, Kalmatayeva, Zhanna, Kalter-Leibovici, Ofra, Kameli, Yve, Kampmann, Freja B, Kanala, Kodanda R, Kannan, Srinivasan, Kapantais, Efthymio, Karakosta, Argyro, Kårhus, Line L, Karki, Khem B, Katibeh, Marzieh, Katz, Joanne, Katzmarzyk, Peter T, Kauhanen, Jussi, Kaur, Prabhdeep, Kavousi, Maryam, Kazakbaeva, Gyulli M, Keil, Ulrich, Boker, Lital Keinan, Keinänen-Kiukaanniemi, Sirkka, Kelishadi, Roya, Kelleher, Cecily, Kemper, Han CG, Kengne, Andre P, Keramati, Maryam, Kerimkulova, Alina, Kersting, Mathilde, Key, Timothy, Khader, Yousef Saleh, Khalili, Davood, Khaw, Kay-Tee, Kheiri, Bahareh, Kheradmand, Motahareh, Khosravi, Alireza, Khouw, Ilse MSL, Kiechl-Kohlendorfer, Ursula, Kiechl, Stefan, Killewo, Japhet, Kim, Dong Wook, Kim, Hyeon Chang, Kim, Jeongseon, Kindblom, Jenny M, Klakk, Heidi, Klimek, Magdalena, Klimont, Jeannette, Klumbiene, Jurate, Knoflach, Michael, Koirala, Bhawesh, Kolle, Elin, Kolsteren, Patrick, König, Jürgen, Korpelainen, Raija, Korrovits, Paul, Korzycka, Magdalena, Kos, Jelena, Koskinen, Seppo, Kouda, Katsuyasu, Kovacs, Viktoria A, Kowlessur, Sudhir, Koziel, Slawomir, Kratenova, Jana, Kratzer, Wolfgang, Kriemler, Susi, Kristensen, Peter Lund, Krokstad, Steiner, Kromhout, Daan, Kruger, Herculina S, Kubinova, Ruzena, Kuciene, Renata, Kujala, Urho M, Kujundzic, Enisa, Kulaga, Zbigniew, Kumar, R Krishna, Kunešová, Marie, Kurjata, Pawel, Kusuma, Yadlapalli S, Kuulasmaa, Kari, Kyobutungi, Catherine, La, Quang Ngoc, Laamiri, Fatima Zahra, Laatikainen, Tiina, Lachat, Carl, Laid, Youcef, Lam, Tai Hing, Lambrinou, Christina-Paulina, Landais, Edwige, Lanska, Vera, Lappas, Georg, Larijani, Bagher, Latt, Tint Swe, Lauria, Laura, Lazo-Porras, Maria, Le Coroller, Gwenaëlle, Le Nguyen Bao, Khanh, Le Port, Agnè, Le, Tuyen D, Lee, Jeannette, Lee, Jeonghee, Lee, Paul H, Lehmann, Nil, Lehtimäki, Terho, Lemogoum, Daniel, Levitt, Naomi S, Li, Yanping, Liivak, Merike, Lilly, Christa L, Lim, Wei-Yen, Lima-Costa, M Fernanda, Lin, Hsien-Ho, Lin, Xu, Lin, Yi-Ting, Lind, Lar, Linneberg, Allan, Lissner, Lauren, Litwin, Mieczyslaw, Liu, Lijuan, Lo, Wei-Cheng, Loit, Helle-Mai, Long, Khuong Quynh, Lopes, Lui, Lopes, Oscar, Lopez-Garcia, Esther, Lopez, Tania, Lotufo, Paulo A, Lozano, José Eugenio, Lukrafka, Janice L, Luksiene, Dalia, Lundqvist, Annamari, Lundqvist, Robert, Lunet, Nuno, Lunogelo, Charle, Lustigová, Michala, Łuszczki, Edyta, Ma, Guansheng, Ma, Jun, Ma, Xu, Machado-Coelho, George LL, Machado-Rodrigues, Aristides M, Macieira, Luisa M, Madar, Ahmed A, Maggi, Stefania, Magliano, Dianna J, Magnacca, Sara, Magriplis, Emmanuella, Mahasampath, Gowri, Maire, Bernard, Majer, Marjeta, Makdisse, Marcia, Mäki, Päivi, Malekzadeh, Fatemeh, Malekzadeh, Reza, Malhotra, Rahul, Rao, Kodavanti Mallikharjuna, Malyutina, Sofia K, Maniego, Lynell V, Manios, Yanni, Mann, Jim I, Mansour-Ghanaei, Fariborz, Manzato, Enzo, Margozzini, Paula, Markaki, Anastasia, Markey, Oonagh, Ioannidou, Eliza Markidou, Marques-Vidal, Pedro, Marques, Larissa Pruner, Marrugat, Jaume, Martin-Prevel, Yve, Martin, Rosemarie, Martorell, Reynaldo, Martos, Eva, Maruszczak, Katharina, Marventano, Stefano, Mascarenhas, Luis P, Masoodi, Shariq R, Mathiesen, Ellisiv B, Mathur, Prashant, Matijasevich, Alicia, Matsha, Tandi E, Mavrogianni, Christina, Mazur, Artur, Mbanya, Jean Claude N, McFarlane, Shelly R, McGarvey, Stephen T, McKee, Martin, McLachlan, Stela, McLean, Rachael M, McLean, Scott B, McNulty, Breige A, Benchekor, Sounnia Mediene, Medzioniene, Jurate, Mehdipour, Parinaz, Mehlig, Kirsten, Mehrparvar, Amir Houshang, Meirhaeghe, Aline, Meisfjord, Jørgen, Meisinger, Christa, Menezes, Ana Maria B, Menon, Geetha R, Mensink, Gert BM, Menzano, Maria Teresa, Mereke, Alibek, Meshram, Indrapal I, Metspalu, Andre, Meyer, Haakon E, Mi, Jie, Michaelsen, Kim F, Michels, Nathalie, Mikkel, Kairit, Milkowska, Karolina, Miller, Jody C, Minderico, Cláudia S, Mini, GK, Miquel, Juan Francisco, Mirjalili, Mohammad Reza, Mirkopoulou, Daphne, Mirrakhimov, Erkin, Mišigoj-Durakovic, Marjeta, Mistretta, Antonio, Mocanu, Veronica, Modesti, Pietro A, Moghaddam, Sahar Saeedi, Mohajer, Bahram, Mohamed, Mostafa K, Mohamed, Shukri F, Mohammad, Kazem, Mohammadi, Zahra, Mohammadifard, Noushin, Mohammadpourhodki, Reza, Mohan, Viswanathan, Mohanna, Salim, Yusoff, Muhammad Fadhli Mohd, Mohebbi, Iraj, Mohebi, Farnam, Moitry, Marie, Molbo, Drude, Møllehave, Line T, Møller, Niels C, Molnár, Déne, Momenan, Amirabba, Mondo, Charles K, Monroy-Valle, Michele, Monterrubio-Flores, Eric, Monyeki, Kotsedi Daniel K, Moon, Jin Soo, Moosazadeh, Mahmood, Moreira, Leila B, Morejon, Alain, Moreno, Luis A, Morgan, Karen, Morin, Suzanne N, Mortensen, Erik Lykke, Moschonis, George, Mossakowska, Malgorzata, Mostafa, Aya, Mota-Pinto, Anabela, Mota, Jorge, Motlagh, Mohammad Esmaeel, Motta, Jorge, Moura-dos-Santos, Marcos André, Mridha, Malay K, Msyamboza, Kelias P, Mu, Thet Thet, Muc, Magdalena, Mugoša, Boban, Muiesan, Maria L, Mukhtorova, Parvina, Müller-Nurasyid, Martina, Murphy, Neil, Mursu, Jaakko, Murtagh, Elaine M, Musa, Kamarul Imran, Milanovic, Sanja Music, Musil, Vera, Mustafa, Norlaila, Nabipour, Iraj, Naderimagham, Shohreh, Nagel, Gabriele, Naidu, Balkish M, Najafi, Farid, Nakamura, Harunobu, Námešná, Jana, Ei K Nang, Ei, Nangia, Vinay B, Nankap, Martin, Narake, Sameer, Nardone, Paola, Nauck, Matthia, Neal, William A, Nejatizadeh, Azim, Nekkantti, Chandini, Nelis, Keiu, Nelis, Lii, Nenko, Ilona, Neovius, Martin, Nervi, Flavio, Nguyen, Chung T, Nguyen, Nguyen D, Nguyen, Quang Ngoc, Nieto-Martínez, Ramfis E, Nikitin, Yury P, Ning, Guang, Ninomiya, Toshiharu, Nishtar, Sania, Noale, Marianna, Noboa, Oscar A, Nogueira, Helena, Norat, Teresa, Nordendahl, Maria, Nordestgaard, Børge G, Noto, Davide, Nowak-Szczepanska, Natalia, Al Nsour, Mohannad, Nuhoglu, Irfan, Nurk, Eha, O'Neill, Terence W, O'Reilly, Dermot, Obreja, Galina, Ochimana, Caleb, Ochoa-Avilés, Angélica M, Oda, Eiji, Oh, Kyungwon, Ohara, Kumiko, Ohlsson, Clae, Ohtsuka, Ryutaro, Olafsson, Örn, Olinto, Maria Teresa A, Oliveira, Isabel O, Omar, Mohd Azahadi, Onat, Altan, Ong, Sok King, Ono, Lariane M, Ordunez, Pedro, Ornelas, Rui, Ortiz, Ana P, Ortiz, Pedro J, Osler, Merete, Osmond, Clive, Ostojic, Sergej M, Ostovar, Afshin, Otero, Johanna A, Overvad, Kim, Owusu-Dabo, Elli, Paccaud, Fred Michel, Padez, Cristina, Pagkalos, Ioanni, Pahomova, Elena, de Paiva, Karina Mary, Pajak, Andrzej, Palli, Domenico, Palloni, Alberto, Palmieri, Luigi, Pan, Wen-Harn, Panda-Jonas, Songhomitra, Pandey, Arvind, Panza, Francesco, Papandreou, Dimitrio, Park, Soon-Woo, Park, Suyeon, Parnell, Winsome R, Parsaeian, Mahboubeh, Pascanu, Ionela M, Pasquet, Patrick, Patel, Nikhil D, Pecin, Ivan, Pednekar, Mangesh S, Peer, Nasheeta, Pei, Gao, Peixoto, Sergio Viana, Peltonen, Markku, Pereira, Alexandre C, Peres, Marco A, Pérez-Farinós, Napoleón, Pérez, Cynthia M, Peterkova, Valentina, Peters, Annette, Petersmann, Astrid, Petkeviciene, Janina, Petrauskiene, Ausra, Pettenuzzo, Emanuela, Peykari, Niloofar, Pham, Son Thai, Pichardo, Rafael N, Pierannunzio, Daniela, Pigeot, Iri, Pikhart, Hynek, Pilav, Aida, Pilotto, Lorenza, Pistelli, Francesco, Pitakaka, Freda, Piwonska, Aleksandra, Pizarro, Andreia N, Plans-Rubió, Pedro, Poh, Bee Koon, Pohlabeln, Hermann, Pop, Raluca M, Popovic, Stevo R, Porta, Miquel, Posch, Georg, Poudyal, Anil, Poulimeneas, Dimitrio, Pouraram, Hamed, Pourfarzi, Farhad, Pourshams, Akram, Poustchi, Hossein, Pradeepa, Rajendra, Price, Alison J, Price, Jacqueline F, Providencia, Rui, Puder, Jardena J, Pudule, Iveta, Puhakka, Soile E, Puiu, Maria, Punab, Margu, Qasrawi, Radwan F, Qorbani, Mostafa, Bao, Tran Quoc, Radic, Ivana, Radisauskas, Ricarda, Rahimikazerooni, Salar, Rahman, Mahfuzar, Rahman, Mahmudur, Raitakari, Olli, Raj, Manu, Rakhimova, Ellina, Rakhmatulloev, Sherali, Rakovac, Ivo, Rao, Sudha Ramachandra, Ramachandran, Ambady, Ramke, Jacqueline, Ramos, Elisabete, Ramos, Rafel, Rampal, Lekhraj, Rampal, Sanjay, Rarra, Vayia, Rascon-Pacheco, Ramon A, Rasmussen, Mette, Rech, Cassiano Ricardo, Redon, Josep, Reganit, Paul Ferdinand M, Regecová, Valéria, Revilla, Lui, Rezaianzadeh, Abba, Ribas-Barba, Lourde, Ribeiro, Robespierre, Riboli, Elio, Richter, Adrian, Rigo, Fernando, Rinaldo, Natascia, de Wit, Tobias F Rinke, Rito, Ana, Ritti-Dias, Raphael M, Rivera, Juan A, Robitaille, Cynthia, Roccaldo, Romana, Rodrigues, Daniela, Rodríguez-Artalejo, Fernando, del Cristo Rodriguez-Perez, María, Rodríguez-Villamizar, Laura A, Roggenbuck, Ulla, Rojas-Martinez, Rosalba, Rojroongwasinkul, Nipa, Romaguera, Dora, Romeo, Elisabetta L, Rosario, Rafaela V, Rosengren, Annika, Rouse, Ian, Roy, Joel GR, Rubinstein, Adolfo, Rühli, Frank J, Ruidavets, Jean-Bernard, Ruiz-Betancourt, Blanca Sandra, Ruiz-Castell, Maria, Moreno, Emma Ruiz, Rusakova, Iuliia A, Jonsson, Kenisha Russell, Russo, Paola, Rust, Petra, Rutkowski, Marcin, Sabanayagam, Charumathi, Sacchini, Elena, Sachdev, Harshpal S, Sadjadi, Alireza, Safarpour, Ali Reza, Safiri, Saeid, Saki, Nader, Salanave, Benoit, Martinez, Eduardo Salazar, Salmerón, Diego, Salomaa, Veikko, Salonen, Jukka T, Salvetti, Massimo, Samoutian, Margarita, Sánchez-Abanto, Jose, Sandjaja, null, Sans, Susana, Marina, Loreto Santa, Santos, Diana A, Santos, Ina S, Santos, Lèlita C, Santos, Maria Paula, Santos, Osvaldo, Santos, Rute, Sanz, Sara Santo, Saramies, Jouko L, Sardinha, Luis B, Sarrafzadegan, Nizal, Sathish, Thirunavukkarasu, Saum, Kai-Uwe, Savva, Savva, Savy, Mathilde, Sawada, Norie, Sbaraini, Mariana, Scazufca, Marcia, Schaan, Beatriz D, Rosario, Angelika Schaffrath, Schargrodsky, Herman, Schienkiewitz, Anja, Schipf, Sabine, Schmidt, Carsten O, Schmidt, Ida Maria, Schnohr, Peter, Schöttker, Ben, Schramm, Sara, Schramm, Stine, Schröder, Helmut, Schultsz, Constance, Schutte, Aletta E, Sein, Aye Aye, Selamat, Rusidah, Sember, Vedrana, Sen, Abhijit, Senbanjo, Idowu O, Sepanlou, Sadaf G, Sequera, Victor, Serra-Majem, Lui, Servais, Jennifer, Ševcíková, Ludmila, Shalnova, Svetlana A, Shamah-Levy, Teresa, Shamshirgaran, Morteza, Shanthirani, Coimbatore Subramaniam, Sharafkhah, Maryam, Sharma, Sanjib K, Shaw, Jonathan E, Shayanrad, Amaneh, Shayesteh, Ali Akbar, Shengelia, Lela, Shi, Zumin, Shibuya, Kenji, Shimizu-Furusawa, Hana, Shin, Dong Wook, Shirani, Majid, Shiri, Rahman, Shrestha, Namuna, Si-Ramlee, Khairil, Siani, Alfonso, Siantar, Rosalynn, Sibai, Abla M, Silva, Antonio M, Silva, Diego Augusto Santo, Simon, Mary, Simons, Judith, Simons, Leon A, Sjöberg, Agneta, Sjöström, Michael, Skodje, Gry, Slowikowska-Hilczer, Jolanta, Slusarczyk, Przemyslaw, Smeeth, Liam, So, Hung-Kwan, Soares, Fernanda Cunha, Sobek, Grzegorz, Sobngwi, Eugène, Sodemann, Morten, Söderberg, Stefan, Soekatri, Moesijanti YE, Soemantri, Agustinu, Sofat, Reecha, Solfrizzi, Vincenzo, Somi, Mohammad Hossein, Sonestedt, Emily, Song, Yi, Sørensen, Thorkild IA, Sørgjerd, Elin P, Jérome, Charles Sossa, Soto-Rojas, Victoria E, Soumaré, Aïcha, Sovic, Slavica, Sparboe-Nilsen, Bente, Sparrenberger, Karen, Spinelli, Angela, Spiroski, Igor, Staessen, Jan A, Stamm, Hanspeter, Stathopoulou, Maria G, Staub, Kaspar, Stavreski, Bill, Steene-Johannessen, Jostein, Stehle, Peter, Stein, Aryeh D, Stergiou, George S, Stessman, Jochanan, Stevanovic, Ranko, Stieber, Jutta, Stöckl, Dori, Stocks, Tanja, Stokwiszewski, Jakub, Stoyanova, Ekaterina, Stratton, Gareth, Stronks, Karien, Strufaldi, Maria Wany, Sturua, Lela, Suárez-Medina, Ramón, Suka, Machi, Sun, Chien-An, Sundström, Johan, Sung, Yn-Tz, Sunyer, Jordi, Suriyawongpaisal, Paibul, Swinburn, Boyd A, Sy, Rody G, Syddall, Holly E, Sylva, René Charle, Szklo, Moyse, Szponar, Lucjan, Tai, E Shyong, Tammesoo, Mari-Lii, Tamosiunas, Abdona, Tan, Eng Joo, Tang, Xun, Tanrygulyyeva, Maya, Tanser, Frank, Tao, Yong, Tarawneh, Mohammed Rasoul, Tarp, Jakob, Tarqui-Mamani, Carolina B, Braunerová, Radka Taxová, Taylor, Anne, Taylor, Julie, Tchibindat, Félicité, Tebar, William R, Tell, Grethe S, Tello, Tania, Tham, Yih Chung, Thankappan, KR, Theobald, Holger, Theodoridis, Xenophon, Thijs, Lutgarde, Thomas, Nihal, Thuesen, Betina H, Tichá, Lubica, Timmermans, Erik J, Tjonneland, Anne, Tolonen, Hanna K, Tolstrup, Janne S, Topbas, Murat, Topór-Madry, Roman, Torheim, Liv Elin, Tormo, María José, Tornaritis, Michael J, Torrent, Matie, Torres-Collado, Laura, Toselli, Stefania, Touloumi, Giota, Traissac, Pierre, Tran, Thi Tuyet-Hanh, Trichopoulos, Dimitrio, Trichopoulou, Antonia, Trinh, Oanh TH, Trivedi, Atul, Tshepo, Lechaba, Tsigga, Maria, Tsugane, Shoichiro, Tuliakova, Azaliia M, Tulloch-Reid, Marshall K, Tullu, Fikru, Tuomainen, Tomi-Pekka, Tuomilehto, Jaakko, Turley, Maria L, Twig, Gilad, Tynelius, Per, Tzotzas, Themistokli, Tzourio, Christophe, Ueda, Peter, Ugel, Eunice, Ukoli, Flora AM, Ulmer, Hanno, Unal, Belgin, Usupova, Zhamyila, Uusitalo, Hannu MT, Uysal, Nalan, Vaitkeviciute, Justina, Valdivia, Gonzalo, Vale, Susana, Valvi, Damaskini, van Dam, Rob M, Van der Heyden, Johan, van der Schouw, Yvonne T, Van Herck, Koen, Van Minh, Hoang, Van Schoor, Natasja M, van Valkengoed, Irene GM, Vanderschueren, Dirk, Vanuzzo, Diego, Varbo, Anette, Varela-Moreiras, Gregorio, Varona-Pérez, Patricia, Vasan, Senthil K, Vega, Toma, Veidebaum, Tooma, Velasquez-Melendez, Gustavo, Velika, Biruta, Veronesi, Giovanni, Verschuren, WM Monique, Victora, Cesar G, Viegi, Giovanni, Viet, Lucie, Villalpando, Salvador, Vineis, Paolo, Vioque, Jesu, Virtanen, Jyrki K, Visser, Marjolein, Visvikis-Siest, Sophie, Viswanathan, Bharathi, Vladulescu, Mihaela, Vlasoff, Tiina, Vocanec, Dorja, Vollenweider, Peter, Völzke, Henry, Voutilainen, Ari, Voutilainen, Sari, Vrijheid, Martine, Vrijkotte, Tanja GM, Wade, Alisha N, Wagner, Aline, Waldhör, Thoma, Walton, Janette, Wambiya, Elvis OA, Bebakar, Wan Mohamad Wan, Mohamud, Wan Nazaimoon Wan, de Souza Wanderley Júnior, Rildo, Wang, Ming-Dong, Wang, Ningli, Wang, Qian, Wang, Xiangjun, Wang, Ya Xing, Wang, Ying-Wei, Wannamethee, S Goya, Wareham, Nichola, Weber, Adelheid, Wedderkopp, Niel, Weerasekera, Deepa, Weghuber, Daniel, Wei, Wenbin, Weres, Aneta, Werner, Bo, Whincup, Peter H, Widhalm, Kurt, Widyahening, Indah S, Wiecek, Andrzej, Wilks, Rainford J, Willeit, Johann, Willeit, Peter, Williams, Julianne, Wilsgaard, Tom, Wojtyniak, Bogdan, Wong-McClure, Roy A, Wong, Andrew, Wong, Jyh Eiin, Wong, Tien Yin, Woo, Jean, Woodward, Mark, Wu, Frederick C, Wu, Jianfeng, Wu, Li Juan, Wu, Shouling, Xu, Haiquan, Xu, Liang, Yaacob, Nor Azwany, Yamborisut, Uruwan, Yan, Weili, Yang, Ling, Yang, Xiaoguang, Yang, Yang, Yardim, Nazan, Yaseri, Mehdi, Yasuharu, Tabara, Ye, Xingwang, Yiallouros, Panayiotis K, Yoosefi, Moein, Yoshihara, Akihiro, You, Qi Sheng, You, San-Lin, Younger-Coleman, Novie O, Md Yusof, Safiah, Yusoff, Ahmad Faudzi, Zaccagni, Luciana, Zafiropulos, Vassili, Zainuddin, Ahmad A, Zakavi, Seyed Rasoul, Zamani, Farhad, Zambon, Sabina, Zampelas, Antoni, Zamrazilová, Hana, Zapata, Maria Elisa, Zargar, Abdul Hamid, Ko Zaw, Ko, Zdrojewski, Tomasz, Zejglicova, Kristyna, Vrkic, Tajana Zeljkovic, Zeng, Yi, Zhang, Luxia, Zhang, Zhen-Yu, Zhao, Dong, Zhao, Ming-Hui, Zhao, Wenhua, Zhen, Shiqi, Zheng, Wei, Zheng, Yingfeng, Zholdin, Bekbolat, Zhou, Maigeng, Zhu, Dan, Zins, Marie, Zitt, Emanuel, Zocalo, Yanina, Cisneros, Julio Zuñiga, Zuziak, Monika, Ezzati, Majid, Filippi, Sarah, Cohortes épidémiologiques en population (CONSTANCES), Université de Versailles Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines (UVSQ)-Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale (INSERM)-Université Paris-Saclay-Université Paris Cité (UPCité), Université Paris Cité (UPCité), Centre International de Hautes Études Agronomiques Méditerranéennes (CIHEAM)-Centre International de Hautes Études Agronomiques Méditerranéennes (CIHEAM)-Institut National de Recherche pour l’Agriculture, l’Alimentation et l’Environnement (INRAE)-Institut Agro - Montpellier SupAgro, and Institut national d'enseignement supérieur pour l'agriculture, l'alimentation et l'environnement (Institut Agro)-Institut national d'enseignement supérieur pour l'agriculture, l'alimentation et l'environnement (Institut Agro)
Subjects: Population -- Health aspects, Leanness, Baixo peso/Underweight, none, Double burden, alipainoisuus, tulotaso, global health, systematic analysis, Sedentary behaviors, RC1200, Prospective associations, 0302 clinical medicine, underweight, nälänhätä, Biology (General), skin and connective tissue diseases, Children, ComputingMilieux_MISCELLANEOUS, Body mass index, Human Nutrition & Health, education.field_of_study, Humane Voeding & Gezondheid, ylipaino, General Medicine, kansainvälinen vertailu, 3. Good health, World health, Medicine, A100 Pre-clinical Medicine, Population distribution, medicine.medical_specialty, QH301-705.5, Science, Socio-culturale, Nursing, Social sciences, General Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology, 03 medical and health sciences, Thinness, SDG 3 - Good Health and Well-being, BMI, epidemiology, obesity, None, Humans, Obesidade/Obesity, SDG 2 - Zero Hunger, education, VLAG, US adults, Omvårdnad, body mass index, malnutrition, obesity, underweight, nutritional and metabolic diseases, medicine.disease, terveellisyys, Obesity, Faculdade de Ciências Sociais, Body Mass Index, Prevalence, Risk Factors, General Biochemistry, WIAS, lihavuus, RA, Demography, N.A, double burden, Settore MED/09 - Medicina Interna, alueelliset erot, Nutrition and Disease, Animal Nutrition, [SDV]Life Sciences [q-bio], Medizin, 030204 cardiovascular system & hematology, 0601 Biochemistry and Cell Biology, Change distribution of body mass index, RA0421, Voeding en Ziekte, Epidemiology, Medicine and Health Sciences, Global health, Índice de massa corporal/Body Mass Index, 030212 general & internal medicine, Underweight, painoindeksi, 2. Zero hunger, General Neuroscience, aliravitsemus, elintarvikkeet, health, Public Health, Global Health, Social Medicine and Epidemiology, Diervoeding, 3142 Public health care science, environmental and occupational health, purl.org/pe-repo/ocde/ford#3.01.03 [https], Chinese adults, pooled analysis, medicine.symptom, Diet quality, B120 Physiology, Research Article, trends, purl.org/pe-repo/ocde/ford#1.06.03 [https], prevalence, Population, Mothers, Genetics and Molecular Biology, 3121 Internal medicine, medicine, Life Science, ddc:610, 3125 Otorhinolaryngology, ophthalmology, kehonkoostumus, Nutrition, Australian adults, General Immunology and Microbiology, purl.org/pe-repo/ocde/ford#3.01.04 [https], Ciências sociais, Folkhälsovetenskap, global hälsa, socialmedicin och epidemiologi, Malnutrition, Epidemiology and Global Health, sense organs, Estilos de Vida e Impacto na Saúde
Abstract: From 1985 to 2016, the prevalence of underweight decreased, and that of obesity and severe obesity increased, in most regions, with significant variation in the magnitude of these changes across regions. We investigated how much change in mean body mass index (BMI) explains changes in the prevalence of underweight, obesity, and severe obesity in different regions using data from 2896 population-based studies with 187 million participants. Changes in the prevalence of underweight and total obesity, and to a lesser extent severe obesity, are largely driven by shifts in the distribution of BMI, with smaller contributions from changes in the shape of the distribution. In East and Southeast Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, the underweight tail of the BMI distribution was left behind as the distribution shifted. There is a need for policies that address all forms of malnutrition by making healthy foods accessible and affordable, while restricting unhealthy foods through fiscal and regulatory restrictions., Wellcome Trust, Medical Research Council, peer-reviewed
Published: 2021

24. North–South inequities in research collaboration in humanitarian and conflict contexts

Author: Anthony Rizk, Jocelyn DeJong, Adam Coutts, Lokman I. Meho, Adel Daoud, Richard Sullivan, Bayard Roberts, Fouad M. Fouad, Abla M. Sibai, and Ghinwa Monzer
Subjects: Refugees, Syria, International Cooperation, MEDLINE, General Medicine, Criminology, Altruism (biology), Altruism, Middle East, Socioeconomic Factors, Political science, Humans, Social Behavior, Developing Countries
Published: 2019

25. Cardiovascular disease research in the Arab world: a scoping review from seven Arab countries (2000–2018)

Author: Rula Ghandour, Abla M. Sibai, Abdullatif Husseini, and Niveen M E Abu-Rmeileh
Subjects: medicine.medical_specialty, Biomedical Research, Population, Disease, 03 medical and health sciences, 0302 clinical medicine, Environmental health, Epidemiology, medicine, Humans, 030212 general & internal medicine, Family history, education, Productivity, Randomized Controlled Trials as Topic, education.field_of_study, Impact factor, Arab World, 030503 health policy & services, Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health, General Medicine, Geography, Cardiovascular Diseases, Observational study, Implementation research, 0305 other medical science
Abstract: Objectives The objective of this study is to map cardiovascular disease (CVD) research productivity in Arab countries and identify gaps and opportunities that would inform future research agenda. Study design This is a scoping review. Methods A review of research output between January 2000 and December 2018 in seven Arab countries, selected to represent various economies and epidemiological transitions, was conducted. Data on quantity and quality, study design, setting and focus were extracted and analysed for trends by time and place. Results Over the study period, a total of 794 articles were published, with an average of 7.3 publications per million population. While time trends showed a 6-fold increase in the number of publications over the study period, a decreasing trend in mean journal impact factor was noted (from 2.3 in 2000 to 1.5 in 2018). Most studies (71%) were observational, 56% were conducted in medical facilities (hospitals or clinics) and most of the experimental studies (10%) were based in laboratory settings. Behavioural risk factors were addressed in 52% of the studies, and there was a dearth of studies examining associations with diet, physical inactivity or family history. Conclusions Findings from this review indicate gaps in robust methods and pertinent themes in CVD research in the Arab region. Greater attention should be paid to high-quality evidence and implementation research. Also, there is a need for a more targeted CVD research agenda that is responsive to local and regional health burden and needs.
Published: 2019

26. The state of hypertension care in 44 low-income and middle-income countries: a cross-sectional study of nationally representative individual-level data from 1·1 million adults

Author: Chea Stanford Wesseh, Demetre Labadarios, David Guwatudde, Dismand Houinato, Lindsay M. Jaacks, Jutta Mari Adelin Jorgensen, Brice Wilfried Bicaba, Lela Sturua, Kokou Agoudavi, Roy A Wong-McClure, Glennis Andall-Brereton, Mary T Mayige, Mohamed Msaidie, Nuno Lunet, Corine Houehanou, Till Bärnighausen, Nahla Hwalla, Sebastian Vollmer, Lindiwe Tsabedze, Gladwell Gathecha, Rifat Atun, Sarah Quesnel-Crooks, Zhaxybay Zhumadilov, Mongal Singh Gurung, Maja E Marcus, Andrew Stokes, Albertino Damasceno, Gibson B. Kagaruki, Kibachio Joseph Muiruri Mwangi, Jennifer Manne-Goehler, Bolormaa Norov, Maria Dorobantu, Silver Bahendeka, Pascal Geldsetzer, Cara Ebert, Abla M. Sibai, Justine Davies, Krishna Kumar Aryal, Adil Supiyev, Omar Mwalim, Joao S Martins, Khem Bahadur Karki, and Pascal Bovet
Subjects: education.field_of_study, business.industry, Cross-sectional study, Population, 1. No poverty, Psychological intervention, General Medicine, 030204 cardiovascular system & hematology, 3. Good health, 03 medical and health sciences, 0302 clinical medicine, Blood pressure, Meta-analysis, Global health, Per capita, Medicine, 030212 general & internal medicine, 10. No inequality, business, education, Disease burden, Demography
Abstract: Summary Background Evidence from nationally representative studies in low-income and middle-income countries (LMICs) on where in the hypertension care continuum patients are lost to care is sparse. This information, however, is essential for effective targeting of interventions by health services and monitoring progress in improving hypertension care. We aimed to determine the cascade of hypertension care in 44 LMICs—and its variation between countries and population groups—by dividing the progression in the care process, from need of care to successful treatment, into discrete stages and measuring the losses at each stage. Methods In this cross-sectional study, we pooled individual-level population-based data from 44 LMICs. We first searched for nationally representative datasets from the WHO Stepwise Approach to Surveillance (STEPS) from 2005 or later. If a STEPS dataset was not available for a LMIC (or we could not gain access to it), we conducted a systematic search for survey datasets; the inclusion criteria in these searches were that the survey was done in 2005 or later, was nationally representative for at least three 10-year age groups older than 15 years, included measured blood pressure data, and contained data on at least two hypertension care cascade steps. Hypertension was defined as a systolic blood pressure of at least 140 mm Hg, diastolic blood pressure of at least 90 mm Hg, or reported use of medication for hypertension. Among those with hypertension, we calculated the proportion of individuals who had ever had their blood pressure measured; had been diagnosed with hypertension; had been treated for hypertension; and had achieved control of their hypertension. We weighted countries proportionally to their population size when determining this hypertension care cascade at the global and regional level. We disaggregated the hypertension care cascade by age, sex, education, household wealth quintile, body-mass index, smoking status, country, and region. We used linear regression to predict, separately for each cascade step, a country's performance based on gross domestic product (GDP) per capita, allowing us to identify countries whose performance fell outside of the 95% prediction interval. Findings Our pooled dataset included 1 100 507 participants, of whom 192 441 (17·5%) had hypertension. Among those with hypertension, 73·6% of participants (95% CI 72·9–74·3) had ever had their blood pressure measured, 39·2% of participants (38·2–40·3) had been diagnosed with hypertension, 29·9% of participants (28·6–31·3) received treatment, and 10·3% of participants (9·6–11·0) achieved control of their hypertension. Countries in Latin America and the Caribbean generally achieved the best performance relative to their predicted performance based on GDP per capita, whereas countries in sub-Saharan Africa performed worst. Bangladesh, Brazil, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Kyrgyzstan, and Peru performed significantly better on all care cascade steps than predicted based on GDP per capita. Being a woman, older, more educated, wealthier, and not being a current smoker were all positively associated with attaining each of the four steps of the care cascade. Interpretation Our study provides important evidence for the design and targeting of health policies and service interventions for hypertension in LMICs. We show at what steps and for whom there are gaps in the hypertension care process in each of the 44 countries in our study. We also identified countries in each world region that perform better than expected from their economic development, which can direct policy makers to important policy lessons. Given the high disease burden caused by hypertension in LMICs, nationally representative hypertension care cascades, as constructed in this study, are an important measure of progress towards achieving universal health coverage. Funding Harvard McLennan Family Fund, Alexander von Humboldt Foundation.
Published: 2019

27. Consumption of Fruits and Vegetables Among Individuals 15 Years and Older in 28 Low- and Middle-Income Countries

Author: Jacqui Webster, Joao S Martins, Dismand Houinato, Lindsay M. Jaacks, Andrew Stokes, Abla M. Sibai, Rifat Atun, Jennifer Manne-Goehler, Brice Wilfried Bicaba, Mongal Singh Gurung, Sebastian Vollmer, Bolormaa Norov, Pascal Geldsetzer, Krishna Kumar Aryal, Sarah M. Frank, Demetre Labadarios, Roy Wong McClure, Adil Supiyev, Briar McKenzie, Corine Houehanou, Glennis Andall-Brereton, Gibson B. Kagaruki, Zhaxybay Zhumadilov, Mary T Mayige, Till Bärnighausen, and Khem Bahadur Karki
Subjects: Adult, Male, Adolescent, Food prices, Prevalence, Psychological intervention, Medicine (miscellaneous), Developing country, Young Adult, 03 medical and health sciences, symbols.namesake, 0302 clinical medicine, Environmental health, Vegetables, Humans, 030212 general & internal medicine, Poisson regression, Developing Countries, 2. Zero hunger, 030505 public health, Nutrition and Dietetics, Developed Countries, 1. No poverty, Middle Aged, Educational attainment, Diet, 3. Good health, Fruit, Relative risk, symbols, Female, 0305 other medical science, Developed country
Abstract: BACKGROUND The WHO recommends 400 g/d of fruits and vegetables (the equivalent of ∼5 servings/d) for the prevention of noncommunicable diseases (NCDs). However, there is limited evidence regarding individual-level correlates of meeting these recommendations in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). In order to target policies and interventions aimed at improving intake, global monitoring of fruit and vegetable consumption by socio-demographic subpopulations is required. OBJECTIVES The aims of this study were to 1) assess the proportion of individuals meeting the WHO recommendation and 2) evaluate socio-demographic predictors (age, sex, and educational attainment) of meeting the WHO recommendation. METHODS Data were collected from 193,606 individuals aged ≥15 y in 28 LMICs between 2005 and 2016. The prevalence of meeting the WHO recommendation took into account the complex survey designs, and countries were weighted according to their World Bank population estimates in 2015. Poisson regression was used to estimate associations with socio-demographic characteristics. RESULTS The proportion (95% CI) of individuals aged ≥15 y who met the WHO recommendation was 18.0% (16.6-19.4%). Mean intake of fruits was 1.15 (1.10-1.20) servings per day and for vegetables, 2.46 (2.40-2.51) servings/d. The proportion of individuals meeting the recommendation increased with increasing country gross domestic product (GDP) class (P
Published: 2019

28. Waist circumference cutoff points for predicting metabolic abnormalities in Lebanese adults

Author: Rouham Yamout, Souha Fares, Walid Ammar, Moubadda Assi, Abla M. Sibai, and Jiana Tabbara
Subjects: medicine.medical_specialty, Waist, business.industry, Internal medicine, medicine, Cardiology, Cutoff, General Medicine, Circumference, business
Published: 2019

29. Prevalence, Awareness, and Control of Hypertension in Greater Beirut Area, Lebanon

Author: Abla M. Sibai, Lara Nasreddine, Aya Noubani, Hani Tamim, and Hussain Isma'eel
Subjects: lcsh:Diseases of the circulatory (Cardiovascular) system, education.field_of_study, medicine.medical_specialty, Article Subject, business.industry, Public health, Population, Disease, 030204 cardiovascular system & hematology, Prehypertension, 03 medical and health sciences, 0302 clinical medicine, Blood pressure, lcsh:RC666-701, Internal Medicine, Income level, Medicine, Marital status, cardiovascular diseases, 030212 general & internal medicine, Risk factor, business, education, Research Article, Demography
Abstract: Background.Hypertension (HTN) has been identified as the leading risk factor for mortality and the third cause of disability worldwide. Lebanon has witnessed a threefold increase in the prevalence of HTN in the past decade. The timely exploration and detection of the factors contributing to a higher prevalence of the disease among the Lebanese population is fundamental. The objectives of this study were to assess the prevalence, awareness, and control rates of HTN in Greater Beirut Area in Lebanon and to identify their respective predictors.Methods. A representative sample of 501 participants aged 18-79 years residing in Greater Beirut Area was examined. Data collection form was filled up, through interviews, physical exams, and lab tests. The analysis was done for three defined outcomes: blood pressure status (normotensive, prehypertension, and hypertension), unaware HTN, and uncontrolled HTN. These were compared for the various associated predictors.Results.The sample consisted of 64.3% women and mean age 45.4 ± 15 years and the subjects were predominantly from low educational income levels. The results showed that 36.4% of the study participants were hypertensive, 25.3% were prehypertensive, and 38.2% had optimal blood pressure, while the awareness rate was 65.4% and control rate was 61%. The independent predictors of HTN were age, gender, marital status, T2D, body fat, triglyceride (positive correlates), and income level (negative correlate). Moreover, unawareness of HTN was common among older age, men, single participants, and the obese. We could not identify any factor related to uncontrolled HTN.Conclusion.The trend in the prevalence of HTN in Greater Beirut Area is found to be consistent and relatively high, yet there was an observed improvement in the awareness and control of the disease. Public health measures on a national level are urgently needed to curb the increasing prevalence of HTN, achieve primary prevention, and better control the disease.
Published: 2018

30. Cardiovascular disease risk profile and management practices in 45 low-income and middle-income countries: A cross-sectional study of nationally representative individual-level survey data

Author: Bahendeka K Silver, Pascal Geldsetzer, Krishna Kumar Aryal, Lindiwe Tsabedze, Sebastian Vollmer, Rifat Atun, Nuno Lunet, Joao S Martins, Kokou Agoudavi, Arpita Ghosh, Briar McKenzie, Corine Houehanou, Zhaxybay Zhumadilov, Glennis Andall-Brereton, Jutta M Adelin Jorgensen, Abla M. Sibai, David Peiris, Mongal Singh Gurung, Maja-Emilia Marcus, Albertino Damasceno, Michaela Theilmann, Mary T Mayige, Bolormaa Norov, Lindsay M. Jaacks, Jacqui Webster, Demetre Labadarios, David Guwatudde, Till Bärnighausen, Adil Supiyev, Jennifer Manne-Goehler, and Justine Davies
Subjects: Male, Cross-sectional study, Epidemiology, Economics, Psychological intervention, Social Sciences, Blood Pressure, Disease, 030204 cardiovascular system & hematology, Cardiovascular Medicine, Economic Geography, Global Health, Vascular Medicine, Survey methodology, 0302 clinical medicine, Medical Conditions, Interquartile range, Medicine and Health Sciences, Medicine, Public and Occupational Health, 030212 general & internal medicine, Geography, Regression analysis, General Medicine, Middle Aged, 3. Good health, Cardiovascular Diseases, Low and Middle Income Countries, Female, Research Article, Employment, Adult, Risk, Cardiology, Risk Assessment, 03 medical and health sciences, Environmental health, Humans, Developing Countries, Poverty, Antihypertensive Agents, Aged, business.industry, Cardiovascular Disease Risk, Educational attainment, Cross-Sectional Studies, Medical Risk Factors, Labor Economics, Earth Sciences, Survey data collection, Self Report, business
Abstract: Background Global cardiovascular disease (CVD) burden is high and rising, especially in low-income and middle-income countries (LMICs). Focussing on 45 LMICs, we aimed to determine (1) the adult population’s median 10-year predicted CVD risk, including its variation within countries by socio-demographic characteristics, and (2) the prevalence of self-reported blood pressure (BP) medication use among those with and without an indication for such medication as per World Health Organization (WHO) guidelines. Methods and findings We conducted a cross-sectional analysis of nationally representative household surveys from 45 LMICs carried out between 2005 and 2017, with 32 surveys being WHO Stepwise Approach to Surveillance (STEPS) surveys. Country-specific median 10-year CVD risk was calculated using the 2019 WHO CVD Risk Chart Working Group non-laboratory-based equations. BP medication indications were based on the WHO Package of Essential Noncommunicable Disease Interventions guidelines. Regression models examined associations between CVD risk, BP medication use, and socio-demographic characteristics. Our complete case analysis included 600,484 adults from 45 countries. Median 10-year CVD risk (interquartile range [IQR]) for males and females was 2.7% (2.3%–4.2%) and 1.6% (1.3%–2.1%), respectively, with estimates indicating the lowest risk in sub-Saharan Africa and highest in Europe and the Eastern Mediterranean. Higher educational attainment and current employment were associated with lower CVD risk in most countries. Of those indicated for BP medication, the median (IQR) percentage taking medication was 24.2% (15.4%–37.2%) for males and 41.6% (23.9%–53.8%) for females. Conversely, a median (IQR) 47.1% (36.1%–58.6%) of all people taking a BP medication were not indicated for such based on CVD risk status. There was no association between BP medication use and socio-demographic characteristics in most of the 45 study countries. Study limitations include variation in country survey methods, most notably the sample age range and year of data collection, insufficient data to use the laboratory-based CVD risk equations, and an inability to determine past history of a CVD diagnosis. Conclusions This study found underuse of guideline-indicated BP medication in people with elevated CVD risk and overuse by people with lower CVD risk. Country-specific targeted policies are needed to help improve the identification and management of those at highest CVD risk., Author summary Why was this study done? CVD burden in low-income and middle-income countries (LMICs) is high and rising. CVD risk estimation using validated risk prediction equations is recommended in most guidelines; however, there are few population-representative analyses of CVD risk and its association with socio-demographic characteristics. Despite guidelines recommending using CVD risk estimates as an essential first step in guiding management practices, the extent to which risk-based approaches are being implemented in LMICs is not well characterised. What did the researchers do and find? We analysed population-representative survey data from 45 LMICs to determine country-specific levels of CVD risk, associations between socio-demographic factors and levels of CVD risk, and adherence to WHO guidelines on use of blood pressure medication. We found high variation in CVD risk profiles, with higher levels of risk in the Europe and the Eastern Mediterranean region and lower levels of risk in sub-Saharan Africa, as well as an inverse association between CVD risk and higher education and employment in most countries. We found an underuse of medicines in people at elevated CVD risk across all countries (only 24.2% of males and 41.6% of females at high CVD risk are taking guideline-recommended BP medication) and an overuse of medicines in people at lower levels of CVD risk, with 47% of all BP medication being used by people at low CVD risk without a guideline indication for use. What do these findings mean? There is large variation in CVD risk across LMICs, and an inverse association between CVD risk and higher education and employment in most countries. There is an overuse of medicines in people at lower levels of CVD risk and an underuse of medicines in people at elevated CVD risk across all countries. The large heterogeneity of the findings in this study reflects varying country contexts. Country-specific targeted policies are needed to improve the identification and management of those at highest CVD risk.
Published: 2021

31. Late-life learning and health: challenges, opportunities, and future directions

Author: Ritu Sadana, Maya Abi Chahine, Adina Zeki Al Hazzouri, Abla M. Sibai, and Martine Elbejjani
Subjects: Psychiatry and Mental health, Health (social science), Geriatrics, Comment, RC952-954.6, Medicine, Learning, Geriatrics and Gerontology, Family Practice, Psychology, Forecasting
Published: 2021

32. Psychometric properties of the Arabic-validated Severe Respiratory Insufficiency Questionnaire for the assessment of Health-Related Quality of Life in patients on home mechanical ventilation

Author: Lilian A. Ghandour, Abla M. Sibai, Salah Zeineldine, Rania N. Bzeih, Mohamad El Khatib, and Marwan Alawieh
Subjects: Mechanical ventilation, Health related quality of life, medicine.medical_specialty, Arabic, business.industry, medicine.medical_treatment, social sciences, language.human_language, medicine, language, Physical therapy, In patient, Respiratory system, business
Abstract: Background/objectives:Assessment of Health-Related Quality of Life (HRQL) in patients with chronic respiratory insufficiency requiring Home Mechanical Ventilation (HMV) needs a valid measurement tool. The Severe Respiratory Insufficiency (SRI) questionnaire, originally developed in German, has been translated into different languages and tested in different contexts, except in Arabic-speaking populations of Arab world. The objective of this study is to validate the Arabic version of the SRI questionnaire from its original German version.Methods:Forward/backward translations between German and Arabic were conducted. The final Arabic version was administered to 149 patients (53 males - 96 females, age 69.8±10 years) receiving HMV recruited from outpatient clinics. Patients were scheduled for a home visit during which the Arabic SRI and the 36-Item Short-Form Health Survey (SF-36) questionnaires were administered; data on sociodemographic and medical history were also collected. Dimensionality internal construct validity were assessed using exploratory factor analysis; internal consistency of the unidimensional scale and its subscales was also assessed using Cronbach’s alpha. External nomological validity was tested by assessing correlation between the SRI and SF-36 questionnaires.Results:PCA scree plot indicated the presence of only one factor that explained 63% of the total variability. The Cronbach alpha for the total scale was 0.897 (ranged between 0.73 and 0.87 for all subscales). Correlation between the SRI and SF-36 was highest amongst comparable subscales yielding r=0.81 and r=0.74 (P < 0.01).Conclusion & Recommendations:The Arabic SRI is a reliable and valid tool for assessing HRQL in patients with chronic respiratory insufficiency receiving home mechanical ventilation.
Published: 2021

33. COVID-19 in the Middle East and North Africa region: an urgent call for reliable, disaggregated and openly shared data

Author: Ghina R. Mumtaz, Sasha Abdallah Fahme, Abla M. Sibai, Anthony Rizk, Sarah Wehbe, and Jocelyn DeJong
Subjects: Male, medicine.medical_specialty, Databases, Factual, Information Dissemination, Context (language use), lcsh:Infectious and parasitic diseases, Middle East, 03 medical and health sciences, Politics, 0302 clinical medicine, Africa, Northern, Pandemic, Epidemiology, medicine, Humans, lcsh:RC109-216, 030212 general & internal medicine, Socioeconomics, lcsh:R5-920, 030503 health policy & services, Public health, Health Policy, public health, Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health, COVID-19, Unrest, Geography, Commentary, Female, epidemiology, lcsh:Medicine (General), 0305 other medical science, health systems evaluation
Abstract: Summary box As of December 2020, Arab countries of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region have reported more than 3.2 million confirmed cases of SARS-CoV-2 and 55 000 deaths from COVID-19.1 The Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation noted a threefold increase in the number of deaths in the region between September and December 2020, with COVID-19 projected to become the fourth leading cause of death by early 2021.2 Yet significant discrepancies in both indicators and quality of data reported across the MENA region limit our understanding of the scope and the implications of the pandemic in the Arab context. The MENA region is distinctly conflict-affected and displacement-affected, which may foster unique vulnerabilities to SARS-CoV-2 transmission and illness severity. Low testing rates, limited data on excess mortality and poor vital registration systems, which are further weakened in the context of chronic political unrest, all contribute to consistent under-reporting in the region. In order to develop a timely and context-informed response to the pandemic and more recently to the vaccination statistics, publicly available and disaggregated data …
Published: 2021
Full Text: View/download PDF

34. Injury Morbidity and Mortality Among Older Adults and Elderly in the Eastern Mediterranean Region (EMR): Findings from the Global Burden of Disease 1990-2019

Author: Samar Hajj, Sarah H. Farran, Abla M. Sibai, Randah R. Hamadeh, Rahimi Vafa, Rajaa Al-Raddadi, Farideh Sadeghian, Zahra Ghods, Wael Alhajyaseeh, Niveen M. Abu Rmeileh, Ali Mokdad, and GBD Collarborators Group
Subjects: History, Polymers and Plastics, Business and International Management, Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering
Published: 2021

35. Author response: Heterogeneous contributions of change in population distribution of body mass index to change in obesity and underweight

Author: Zahra Mohammadi, Abdul Basit, Helena I. S. Nogueira, Soile E. Puhakka, Hongsheng Bi, Ari Voutilainen, Davood Khalili, Bin Zhou, Dermot O'Reilly, Natascia Rinaldo, Paulo A. Lotufo, Bahareh Kheiri, Thein Thein Htay, Simona Giampaoli, Goodarz Danaei, M. Fernanda Lima-Costa, Simona Bo, Peter Schnohr, Jerzy Chudek, Francesco Panza, Ling Yang, Katia Vergetti Bloch, Vincenzo Capuano, Holly E. Syddall, Dong Zhao, Indah Suci Widyahening, Maria Lorenza Muiesan, Leng Huat Foo, Mohsen Azimi-Nezhad, Merete Osler, Laura Torres-Collado, Manu Raj, Adroaldo Cesar Araujo Gaya, Susi Kriemler, Ali Akbar Shayesteh, Aneta Grajda, Anette Varbo, Kazem Mohammad, Leila Beltrami Moreira, Shu Ti Chiou, Iuliia A Rusakova, Jyh Eiin Wong, Torben Jørgensen, Lela Sturua, Lubica Ticha, Hamid Hakimi, Hazzaa M. Al-Hazzaa, Yanina Zócalo, Freda Pitakaka, Savvas C. Savva, Rajeev Gupta, Jennifer Servais, Marie Kunešová, Johanna M. Geleijnse, Elysée Claude Bika Lele, Yannis Manios, Jorge Escobedo-de la Peña, Yufang Bi, Chinh Nguyen Huu, Sibel Gogen, Viviane Cunha Cardoso, Kristine H. Allin, Ana Azevedo, Line Tang Møllehave, Vincent Jr DeGennaro, Novie O. Younger-Coleman, Gretchen A Stevens, Dickman Gareta, Holger Theobald, Anja Schienkiewitz, Bekbolat Zholdin, Janice Luisa Lukrafka, Adela Chirita-Emandi, Ulla Roggenbuck, Kenisha Russell Jonsson, Robespierre Ribeiro, Gabriele Eiben, Eero Kajantie, Sounnia Mediene Benchekor, Fariborz Mansour-Ghanaei, Mary Simon, Prakash C. Gupta, Mohammad Esmaeel Motlagh, Emanuela Gualdi-Russo, María Elena Díaz-Sánchez, Pilar Guallar-Castillón, Bee Koon Poh, Cristina Padez, Azaliia M Tuliakova, Sarah P. Garnett, William R. Tebar, Yingfeng Zheng, Suhad Bahijri, Christina Mavrogianni, Mihaela Vladulescu, Jan A. Staessen, Paula Duarte de Oliveira, Rui Ornelas, Michael Sjöström, Charles Agyemang, Slawomir Koziel, Shohreh Naderimagham, Jari Jokelainen, Stephen T. McGarvey, Patrick Pasquet, Farnam Mohebi, Nader Saki, Aida Pilav, Azim Nejatizadeh, Marianna Noale, Habiba Ben Romdhane, Luís B. Sardinha, Laura Lauria, Jun Hata, Kodanda R Kanala, Gert B. M. Mensink, Nils Lehmann, Elio Riboli, Carolina Tarqui-Mamani, Rodrigo M. Carrillo-Larco, Rosangela Fernandes Lucena Batista, Victoria E Soto-Rojas, Luis Serra-Majem, Martina Müller-Nurasyid, Felipe Vogt Cureau, Lekhraj Rampal, Zhamilya Battakova, Ludmila Sevcikova, Suhaila Abdul Ghaffar, Fikru Tullu, Aung Soe Htet, Angel R. Gonzalez, Annette J. Dobson, Kavumpurathu Raman Thankappan, Hélène Delisle, Francisco J. Félix-Redondo, Ramón Suárez-Medina, Annika Rosengren, Sania Nishtar, Tanja G. M. Vrijkotte, Wolfgang Ahrens, Osvaldo Santos, Maria Cecília Formoso Assunção, Kazi M. Jamil, Stefano Marventano, Wenbin Wei, Norsyamlina Che Abdul Rahim, Shukri F. Mohamed, Bente Sparboe-Nilsen, Soon-Woo Park, Ana Isabel Rito, David Goltzman, W. M. Monique Verschuren, Catterina Ferreccio, Marta Buoncristiano, Ramón Alberto Rascón-Pacheco, Pradeep Joshi, Edward D Janus, Laetitia Huiart, Ala'a Alkerwi, Lorenza Pilotto, Mohannad Al Nsour, Daan Kromhout, Marius B. Bjertness, Oanh T. H. Trinh, Nico Dragano, Angélica Ochoa-Avilés, Ingunn Holden Bergh, Yuki Fujita, Juraci Almeida Cesar, Hajer Aounallah-Skhiri, Maria Dorobantu, Jordi Sunyer, Wolfgang Kratzer, Susanne R. de Rooij, Drude Molbo, Rebecca Goldsmith, Jean Woo, Mohammad El-khateeb, Tiffany K. Gill, Nish Chaturvedi, Benjamin Acosta-Cazares, Erik Lykke Mortensen, Nikhil D. Patel, Francesco Pistelli, Yuan He, Ivana Radic, Yi Zeng, Ilse Khouw, Reynaldo Martorell, Ching-Yu Cheng, Stine Schramm, Hana Shimizu-Furusawa, Jacek Jóźwiak, Radwan Qasrawi, Isti Ilmiati Fujiati, Charles Sossa Jérome, Ben Schöttker, Mikhail Benet, Anastasia Markaki, Christopher T. Cowell, Bharathi Viswanathan, Renata Kuciene, Jose Eugenio Lozano, Pedro J Ortiz, Delphine De Smedt, Elaine M. Murtagh, Kamel Ajlouni, Carlos A. Aguilar-Salinas, Graziella D'Arrigo, Xiangjun Wang, Lars Lind, Macia Enguerran, Marjeta Mišigoj-Duraković, Bo Werner, Jean-Michel Gaspoz, Kyungwon Oh, Seyed Rasoul Zakavi, Daniel Fernández-Bergés, Felix Kaducu, Ramon O. Jimenez, Jonathan E. Shaw, Nipa Rojroongwasinkul, Aicha Soumare, Astrid Petersmann, Tomasz Grodzicki, Parvina Mukhtorova, Eha Nurk, Bhawesh Koirala, Óscar Lopes, Ana Jelakovic, Karolina Milkowska, Magda Gasull, Regina Heidinger-Felso, Marcela González-Gross, Belong Cho, Daphne Mirkopoulou, Salvador Villalpando, Tran Quoc Bao, José Boggia, Daniela Galeone, Josep Redon, Matthias Bopp, Abbas Rezaianzadeh, Dusko Bjelica, Amir Houshang Mehrparvar, Felipe F. Casanueva, Khairil Si-Ramlee, Soheir H Ahmed, Maria Nordendahl, Luciana Zaccagni, Mahboubeh Parsaeian, Rod Jackson, Jorge Motta, Keiu Nelis, Fernando Rigo, Andrzej Pajak, Christa Meisinger, Clara Homs, Namuna Shrestha, Mar Alvarez-Pedrerol, Xun Tang, Johann Willeit, Motahareh Kheradmand, Jean Dallongeville, Jean-Bernard Ruidavets, Anne Tjønneland, Diana A. Santos, Lynne M. Boddy, Jie Hao, David Alejandro González-Chica, Elin Kolle, Jingli Gao, Małgorzata Mossakowska, Isabel O. Oliveira, Giuseppe Grosso, Seongjun Ha, Olfa Saidi, Albina A Fakhretdinova, Oye Gureje, Raluca Pop, Iulia Jurca Simina, Nuno Lunet, Maria Forsner, Peter Bjerregaard, Rachael McLean, Antonio Cabrera de León, Guy De Backer, José A. Casajús, Guang Ning, Emmanuella Magriplis, Laura Censi, Graziella Bruno, Valentina Peterkova, Angelique Chan, Yvonne T. van der Schouw, Charalambos Hadjigeorgiou, Anjani Kumar Jha, Toomas Veidebaum, Thamara Hubler Figueiró, Jana Kratenova, Michelle Cilia, Ivo Rakovac, Bill Stavreski, Ya Xing Wang, Oscar Noboa, Romana Roccaldo, Sara Magnacca, Johan Sundström, Peter Stehle, Tania Lopez, Francis Delpeuch, Julianne Williams, Ellisiv B. Mathiesen, Leanne M. Riley, Claudia M. Hormiga, Joanne Katz, Ekaterina Stoyanova, Heloisa Bettiol, Gabriele Nagel, Alireza Khosravi, Lars Bo Andersen, João Breda, Jørgen Meisfjord, Ahmad Faudzi Yusoff, Marjeta Majer, Robert Beaglehole, Caleb Ochimana, Shynar Abdrakhmanova, George S. Stergiou, Blanca Sandra Ruiz-Betancourt, Leon A. Simons, Eng Joo Tan, Victoria Farrugia Sant'Angelo, Gry Skodje, Maryam Keramati, Liv Elin Torheim, Seppo Koskinen, Assembekov Batyrbek, Jaakko Tuomilehto, Marjo-Riitta Järvelin, Ming-Hui Zhao, Krista Fischer, Tobias F. Rinke de Wit, Agnès Le Port, Reza Homayounfar, James E. Bennett, Yuna He, Matsuda Fumihiko, Qi Sheng You, Angela Spinelli, Scott B. McLean, Shirin Djalalinia, Thet Thet Mu, Yves Martin-Prével, Rafael N. Pichardo, Gailute Bernotiene, Pietro Amedeo Modesti, Frederick C. W. Wu, Chandini Nekkantti, Daniela Rodrigues, Tandi E. Matsha, Mihai Gafencu, Xingwang Ye, Salar Rahimikazerooni, Trevor S. Ferguson, Christophe Tzourio, Marie Zins, Fernando Rodríguez-Artalejo, Xu Ma, Elin Pettersen Sørgjerd, Lourdes Ribas-Barba, Nalan Uysal, Salim Berkinbayev, Enisa Kujundzic, Sari Voutilainen, Iraj Mohebbi, Heiner Boeing, Jorge Mota, Jana Námešná, Maria Tsigga, Zivka Dika, Gulmira Aitmurzaeva, Xu Lin, Valéria Regecová, Herman Schargrodsky, Stevo Popovic, Amelia C. Crampin, Hannu Uusitalo, André Luiz Sena Guimarães, Ali Esmaeili, Catherine Kyobutungi, Virginija Dulskiene, Diego Augusto Santos Silva, David De Ridder, Lizzy M. Brewster, Hashem Jaddou, Eunice Ugel, José Camolas, Azli Baharudin, Idris Guessous, Sok King Ong, Tabara Yasuharu, Ali Ghanbari, Anne W. Taylor, Iraj Nabipour, Justyna Godos, Cyrus Cooper, Bruna Gonçalves Cordeiro da Silva, Gonzalo Valdivia, Gyulli M. Kazakbaeva, Takuro Furusawa, Pawel Kurjata, Diego Vanuzzo, Marvin Cervantes-Loaiza, Karen Morgan, Mostafa Qorbani, Rute Santos, Marika Ferrari, Diego Salmerón, Ida Maria Schmidt, Gao Pei, Abu Am Hanif, Balkish M. Naidu, Maria Wany Louzada Strufaldi, Moesijanti Soekatri, Marcia Scazufca, Katharina Maruszczak, Jacqueline Ramke, Elvis Oa Wambiya, Kairit Mikkel, Napoleón Pérez-Farinós, Natalia Nowak-Szczepanska, Miao Li Chee, Jose Sanchez-Abanto, Rajaa Al-Raddadi, Michel Joffres, Vayia Rarra, Ningli Wang, Charmaine A. Duante, Sheikh Mohammed Shariful Islam, Manoli Garcia-de-la-Hera, Weili Yan, Dong Wook Shin, Rômulo Araújo Fernandes, Ilona Nenko, Sanjib Kumar Sharma, Alfonso Siani, Indrapal I. Meshram, Imelda A. Agdeppa, Ei Ei K. Nang, Ian Rouse, Avula Laxmaiah, Ana M. B. Menezes, Yih Chung Tham, Ebrahim Eftekhar, María José Tormo, Felicia Cañete, Marie Eliasen, Lutgart Braeckman, Dirk Vanderschueren, Genc Burazeri, Kari Kuulasmaa, Jesús Vioque, Marisa K. Sophiea, Agneta Sjöberg, Katarzyna Dereń, Albertino Damasceno, Jochanan Stessman, Stig E. Bojesen, Aline Meirhaeghe, Else Karin Grøholt, Flávio Danni Fuchs, Robert Lundqvist, Frédéric Gottrand, Jeongseon Kim, Helmut Schröder, Joanna Baran, Karina Mary de Paiva, Yousef Khader, Eric Monterrubio-Flores, Aneta Weres, Hans Concin, Damaskini Valvi, Sari Hantunen, Machi Suka, Elena Sacchini, Norbert Amougou, Ursula Kiechl-Kohlendorfer, Edwige Landais, Viktoria Anna Kovacs, Rosemarie Martin, Kenneth James, Amaneh Shayanrad, Grethe S. Tell, Norazizah Ibrahim Wong, Vedrana Sember, Anelise Reis Gaya, Konrad Jamrozik, Thorkild I. A. Sørensen, Martin Neovius, Urho M. Kujala, Nathalie Michels, Marcel Goldberg, Alexandra Cucu, Liliana Dacica, Adelheid Weber, Hermann Pohlabeln, Sandjaja, Jukka T. Salonen, Patricia Varona-Pérez, Tiina Laatikainen, Jolanta Słowikowska-Hilczer, Ana Paula Carlos Cândido, Julie Taylor, Anabela Mota-Pinto, Cora L. Craig, Teresa Shamah-Levy, María Dolores Chirlaque, Mohd Azahadi Omar, Dominique Cottel, Charumathi Sabanayagam, Andrea Gazzinelli, Mieczysław Litwin, Sadaf G. Sepanlou, Adolfo Rubinstein, Abbas Dehghan, Rildo de Souza Wanderley Júnior, Wenhua Zhao, Aleksandra Piwońska, Yong Tao, Bontha V. Babu, Marc J. Gunter, Harunobu Nakamura, Wojciech Drygas, Eiji Oda, Jia Li Duan, Stefan Söderberg, Anthony Kafatos, Lynell V Maniego, Els Clays, Wei-Yen Lim, Marshall K. Tulloch-Reid, Mariachiara Di Cesare, Mattias Johansson, Simona Costanzo, Margot González-León, Matthias Nauck, Henry Völzke, George Luiz Lins Machado-Coelho, Annette Peters, Rajiv T Erasmus, Juan Francisco Miquel, Andrea Gualtieri, Abdul Hamid Zargar, Kaare Christensen, Peter Willeit, Tanja Stocks, Christine Cameron, Samuel C. Dumith, Janina Petkeviciene, Boyd Swinburn, Magdalena Muc, Sabine Schipf, Tajana Zeljkovic Vrkic, Martin Bobak, Damian K Francis, Veronica Mocanu, Karien Stronks, Antonisamy Belavendra, Artur Mazur, Nagalla Balakrishna, Jardena J. Puder, Mehrdad Azmin, Shelly R. McFarlane, Sara Santos Sanz, Yang Yang, Anneke Blokstra, Rafel Ramos, Ertugrul Celikcan, Jody C Miller, Jesús Ibarluzea, Svetlana A. Shalnova, Maria Elisa Zapata, Guansheng Ma, Fereidoun Azizi, Beatriz D'Agord Schaan, Pedro Marques-Vidal, William A. Neal, Ana B. Crujeiras, Zhenyu Zhang, Naser Ahmadi, Abdullatif Husseini, Alun Evans, Jiang He, Edyta Łuszczki, Maria G. Stathopoulou, Alibek Mereke, Mari-Liis Tammesoo, Axel C. Carlsson, Helen Gonçalves, Idowu O Senbanjo, Jim Mann, Rajendra Pradeepa, Juel Jarani, Eva Martos, Eugene Sobngwi, Themistoklis Tzotzas, Vassilis Zafiropulos, Reina Engle-Stone, Atul Trivedi, Hui Cai, Sarah Filippi, Georg Posch, Galina Obreja, Cecily Kelleher, Sareh Eghtesad, Chung T Nguyen, Kay-Tee Khaw, Joseph Cacciottolo, Ana Henriques, Yi-Ting Lin, Anil Poudyal, Liam Smeeth, Kenji Shibuya, Emma Ruiz Moreno, Annamari Lundqvist, Thor Aspelund, Caroline H.D. Fall, Philippe Amouyel, Kristyna Zejglicova, Argyro Karakosta, Piotr Bandosz, Juvenal Soares Dias-da-Costa, Maria Lazo-Porras, Maung Maung Than Htike, Dalia Luksiene, Jutta Stieber, Augusto Di Castelnuovo, Aryeh D. Stein, Lechaba Tshepo, Judith Benedics, Aletta E. Schutte, Jürgen König, Magdalena Korzycka, Grzegorz Sobek, Dimitrios Trichopoulos, Tai Hing Lam, Yn-Tz Sung, Masanori Iwasaki, Elias F. Gudmundsson, Antonio Mistretta, Daniel Lemogoum, Nimmathota Arlappa, Isabelle Herter-Aeberli, Khanh Le Nguyen Bao, Shoichiro Tsugane, Kaosar Afsana, Alireza Sadjadi, Myriam Galfo, Jean Claude Mbanya, Bernardo L. Horta, Marleen E. Hendriks, M. Arfan Ikram, Fadia AlBuhairan, Huashuai Chen, Marzieh Katibeh, Sidsel Graff-Iversen, Sahar Saeedi Moghaddam, Larissa Pruner Marques, Louise Eriksen, Aleksandra Gomula, Ricky Eddie, Maciej Banach, Jost B. Jonas, Andrea R. V. R. Horimoto, Slavica Sović, Charles Mondo, Felix Gutzwiller, Mariana Sbaraini, Aye Aye Sein, Henrike Galenkamp, Jaume Marrugat, Nazan Yardim, Cecilia Björkelund, Luigi Palmieri, Roya Kelishadi, Jie Mi, Nahla Hwalla, Jing Liu, Davide Noto, Panayiotis K. Yiallouros, Kelias P. Msyamboza, Judith Simons, Sofia Malyutina, Michele Monroy-Valle, Andres Metspalu, Lariane M Ono, Rafaela Rosário, Flora A. Ukoli, Efthymios Kapantais, Enzo Manzato, S. Goya Wannamethee, Alison J Price, Gregorio Varela-Moreiras, Ali Reza Safarpour, Erfan Ghasemi, Janine Clarke, René Charles Sylva, Wan Nazaimoon Wan Mohamud, Zhamyila Usupova, Chaoqiang Jiang, Julio Zuñiga Cisneros, Freja B Kampmann, Wei Cheng Lo, Reza Mohammadpourhodki, Kaspar Staub, Mojtaba Farjam, Vincenzo Solfrizzi, Garry L. Jennings, Fabio Galvano, Monika Zuziak, Karin De Ridder, Lucie Viet, Anna Bugge, Mehdi Yaseri, Safiah Md Yusof, Sandra C. Fuchs, Emmanuel Cohen, Snehalatha Chamukuttan, Maria Ruiz-Castell, Karen Sparrenberger, Pedro Plans-Rubio, Wei Zheng, Eldridge Ferrer, Martijn Huisman, Maria Hassapidou, Iris Pigeot, Jakub Stokwiszewski, Domenico Palli, Ewelina Czenczek-Lewandowska, Ramiro Guerrero, Farzad Hadaegh, Han Cg Kemper, Saeid Safiri, Ivan Pećin, Arnaud Chiolero, Niels Møller, Jorge Bezerra, Ulrike Gehring, Iná S. Santos, Dénes Molnár, Muhammad Fadhli Mohd Yusoff, Marie Moitry, Nizal Sarrafzadegan, Jacqueline F. Price, Ranko Stevanovic, Sai Yin Ho, Georg Lappas, Alberto Palloni, Malay K. Mridha, Elaine M. Dennison, Jeonghee Lee, Saeid Eslami, Rahman Shiri, Japhet Killewo, Juergen Breckenkamp, Mathilde Kersting, Y Nikitin, Iqbal Bata, Geetha R Menon, Maria Avdicova, Sanjay Rampal, Antônio Augusto Moura da Silva, Kirsten Mehlig, Chien-An Sun, Ramin Heshmat, Violeta Iotova, Stefaan Demarest, Mette Rasmussen, Dirk De Bacquer, San-Lin You, Suzanne N Morin, Martin Gulliford, Maties Torrent, Luc Dauchet, Fred Paccaud, Paibul Suriyawongpaisal, Sherali Rakhmatulloev, Hyeon Chang Kim, Markku Peltonen, Ruth Frikke-Schmidt, Vera Musil, Ahmad Ali Zainuddin, Angela Chetrit, Dan Zhu, Gowri Mahasampath, Ulrich Keil, Sérgio Viana Peixoto, Haiquan Xu, Helle-Mai Loit, Valérie Deschamps, Ilpo Huhtaniemi, Lijuan Liu, Marialaura Bonaccio, Altan Onat, Rody G. Sy, José María Huerta, Ko Ko Zaw, Akihiro Yoshihara, Peter Ueda, Belgin Ünal, Rachel Dankner, Andrzej Wiecek, Eman Aly, Ruzena Kubinova, Justina Vaitkeviciute, Hanna Tolonen, Priscilla Duboz, Orn Olafsson, Yin Guo, Chiara Donfrancesco, Salim Mohanna, Dusan Grafnetter, Daniel Weghuber, Ali Ahmadi, Rosemary B. Duda, E. Shyong Tai, Louise A. Baur, Nihal Thomas, Prabhdeep Kaur, Norlaila Mustafa, Shariq Rashid Masoodi, Liis Nelis, Badreya Al-Lahou, J. Jaime Miranda, Lèlita Santos, Aroor Bhagyalaxmi, Mohamed Bamoshmoosh, Børge G. Nordestgaard, Jeannette Lee, Ahmad Reza Dorosty, Alain Morejon, Ying-Wei Wang, Jakob Tarp, Rosalba Rojas-Martínez, Luxia Zhang, Bahram Mohajer, Maja Bæksgaard Jørgensen, Jurate Klumbiene, Zhengming Chen, Ambady Ramachandran, Andrea Rodriguez-Martinez, Alisha N. Wade, Suyeon Park, Janne Schurmann Tolstrup, Lucjan Szponar, Krishna Kumar Aryal, Tahir Aris, Mahfuzar Rahman, Dorja Vočanec, Juan P. González-Rivas, Rob M. van Dam, Daniel Bia, Oonagh Markey, Ryutaro Ohtsuka, Kumiko Ohara, Ričardas Radišauskas, Jurate Medzioniene, Tiina Vlasoff, Tania Tello, Suzanne C. Ho, Kodavanti Mallikharjuna Rao, May Soe Aung, Vesselka Duleva, Michael Hobbs, Lutgarde Thijs, Marjolein Visser, Parasmani Dasgupta, Inge Huybrechts, Raimund Erbel, Alice Bonilla-Vargas, Hermann Brenner, Mohammad Reza Fattahi, Jolanda Hyska, Roman Topor-Madry, Ranjit Mohan Anjana, Merike Liivak, Eruke E. Egbagbe, Mathilde Savy, Herculina S. Kruger, Neil Murphy, Vinay Nangia, Cesar G. Victora, Mostafa K. Mohamed, H. Bas Bueno-de-Mesquita, Gabriella Gruden, Marcos André Moura-dos-Santos, Mohammed Rasoul Tarawneh, Maria Teresa Menzano, Francesco Branca, Abdonas Tamosiunas, Elena Bogova, Niveen M E Abu-Rmeileh, Maroje Sorić, Aleksander Giwercman, Elżbieta Dziankowska-Zaborszczyk, Tatjana Hejgaard, Yves Kameli, Margarita Samoutian, Andreia N. Pizarro, Jin Soo Moon, Frank Claessens, Zulfiqar A Bhutta, Frank Tanser, Nor Azwany Yaacob, Vanina Bongard, Gregor Jurak, Johan G. Eriksson, Christina-Paulina Lambrinou, Hanspeter Stamm, Kim Overvad, Yanping Li, Carsten Oliver Schmidt, Thomas Meinertz Dantoft, Wichai Aekplakorn, Anwar Batieha, Eduardo Capuano, Teresa Haugsgjerd, Jeremy M. Jacobs, Paola Russo, Nguyen D Nguyen, Luis Revilla, Hossein Poustchi, Farid Najafi, Giovanni de Gaetano, Wan Mohamad Wan Bebakar, Paul Elliott, Denise Eldemire-Shearer, Angela Döring, Giovanni Viegi, Xiaoguang Yang, María-Elena González-Villalpando, Maria Puiu, Maria Benedetta Donati, Andrew Wong, Tomasz Zdrojewski, Carlos P. Boissonnet, Mohamad Hasnan Ahmad, Mahmudur Rahman, Günther Fink, Marcia Makdisse, Dragana P Jovic, Aline Wagner, Coimbatore Subramaniam Shanthirani, Pascal Bovet, Dong Wook Kim, Tom Wilsgaard, Anders Grøntved, Thirunavukkarasu Sathish, Antonia Trichopoulou, Noushin Mohammadifard, Igor Spiroski, Natasja M. van Schoor, Cláudia S. Minderico, Betina H. Thuesen, Queenie Chan, Ulf Ekelund, Laura A. Rodríguez-Villamizar, Line Lund Kårhus, Cihangir Erem, Amina Barkat, Maria Paula Santos, Fernanda Cunha Soares, Constanta Huidumac Petrescu, Allan G. Hill, Honor Bixby, Benoît Salanave, Joana Carvalho, Maigeng Zhou, Ofra Kalter-Leibovici, Roy A Wong-McClure, Kim F. Michaelsen, Doris Stöckl, Rosalynn Siantar, Jouko Saramies, José R. Banegas, Quang Ngoc La, Uruwan Yamborisut, Parinaz Mehdipour, Farhad Pourfarzi, Sudha Ramachandra Rao, Katsuyasu Kouda, Chien-Jen Chen, Rafael dos Santos Henrique, Martin Nankap, Allan Linneberg, Ronald D. Gregor, Rudolf Kaaks, Maria do Carmo Franco, Marta García-Solano, Beata Gurzkowska, Bahman Cheraghian, Stefaan De Henauw, Daniel Ferrante, Johanna A. Otero, Jamila Abubakar Garba, Antonio Pedro Graça, Sumit Bharadwaj, Shiqi Zhen, Xiu-Hua Guo, Prashant Mathur, Raphael Mendes Ritti-Dias, Kouamelan Doua, Esteban Carmuega, Majid Shirani, Przemyslaw Slusarczyk, Petra Rust, Visnja Djordjic, Farahnaz Joukar, Johanna Gunnlaugsdottir, Leila Houti, Nayu Ikeda, Imperia Brajkovich, Amirabbas Momenan, Erik J. Timmermans, Marcin Rutkowski, Biruta Velika, Joana Araújo, Jostein Steene-Johannessen, Christa L. Lilly, Per Tynelius, Michael Tornaritis, Anne Juolevi, Fatima Zahra Laamiri, Carl Lachat, Kai-Uwe Saum, Espen Bjertness, Ana P. Ortiz, Joel G. R. Roy, Himanshu K. Chaturvedi, Michelle Holdsworth, Niels Wedderkopp, Johan Van der Heyden, Mukharram M. Bikbov, Hsien-Ho Lin, Eva Corpeleijn, Harshpal Singh Sachdev, Mohammad Reza Mirjalili, Maria del Cristo Rodriguez-Perez, Michala Lustigová, Tuyen D Le, Teresa Norat, Hana Zamrazilová, Garry Brian, Tien Yin Wong, Rosa Haghshenas, Clive Osmond, Diego Giulliano Destro Christofaro, Mahmood Moosazadeh, Vilma Irazola, Olli T. Raitakari, Marco Aurélio Peres, Terho Lehtimäki, Shuohua Chen, Dimitrios Papandreou, Robert J. Adams, Sigmund A. Anderssen, Peter T. Katzmarzyk, Luisa M Macieira, Félicité Tchibindat, Lital Keinan Boker, Toshiharu Ninomiya, Morten Sodemann, Jytte Halkjær, Zbigniew Kułaga, Sophie Visvikis-Siest, Farshad Farzadfar, N Capkova, Zumin Shi, Maria Turley, Zbigniew Gaciong, Giovanni Veronesi, Martin McKee, Veikko Salomaa, Gilad Twig, Elisabetta L. Romeo, Peter Kristensen, Grazyna Jasienska, Victor Guillermo Sequera, Mario V. Capanzana, Con Burns, Emanuela Pettenuzzo, Ming-Dong Wang, Jonathan Giovannelli, Stela McLachlan, Ellis Owusu-Dabo, Stefania Toselli, Maria Teresa Anselmo Olinto, Senthil K Vasan, Sara Schramm, Xenophon Theodoridis, Moyses Szklo, Ramfis Nieto-Martínez, Viswanathan Mohan, Guillermo Frontera, Rahul Malhotra, Thomas Ferrao, Dongfeng Gu, Tomas Vega, Hynek Pikhart, Päivi Mäki, Heba Fouad, Vilnis Dzerve, Christina Howitt, Seyed Mohammad Hashemi-Shahri, Jenny M. Kindblom, Marjolijn C. E. Bragt, G. K. Mini, Qian Wang, Liufu Cui, Andrzej Galbarczyk, Sylvain Sebert, Vilmundur Gudnason, Loreto Santa Marina, Kairat Davletov, Afshin Ostovar, Niloofar Peykari, Nicholas J. Wareham, Wilma M. Hopman, Karl-Heinz Jöckel, Jussi Kauhanen, Breige A. McNulty, Alina Kerimkulova, Youcef Laid, Claes Ohlsson, Stefan Kiechl, Alicia Matijasevich, Boban Mugoša, Srinivasan Kannan, Jyrki K. Virtanen, Mohan Deepa, Mangesh S. Pednekar, Shahla AlDhukair, Cynthia M. Pérez, Vera Lanska, Tint Swe Latt, Dominique Hange, João Luiz Bastos, Eliza Markidou Ioannidou, Leticia Hernandez Cadena, Maya Tanrygulyyeva, Reza Malekzadeh, Dimitrios Poulimeneas, Pedro Ordunez, Thomas Waldhör, Ioannis Pagkalos, Carlo M. Barbagallo, Abla M. Sibai, Peter Vollenweider, Asher Fawwad, Emily Sonestedt, Elena Pahomova, Santosh K. Bhargava, Patrick Kolsteren, Aya Mostafa, Fangfang Chen, Flavio Nervi, Imre Janszky, Arvind Pandey, Renata Cifkova, Alexandre C. Pereira, Alejandro Diaz, Alireza Ansari-Moghaddam, Rachakulla Hari Kumar, Jaakko Mursu, Luis A. Moreno, Glen Gironella, Jelena Kos, Tilema Cama, Haakon E. Meyer, Jun Ma, Raphael E. Arku, Ziad Abdeen, Rusidah Selamat, Dianna J. Magliano, Jitendra Jonnagaddala, Konstantinos Gkiouras, Paul Korrovits, Paola Nardone, Paolo Vineis, Kotsedi D Monyeki, Khuong Quynh Long, Alberto Barceló, Camilla T. Damsgaard, Constance Schultsz, Frank J Rühli, Santiago F. Gomez, Tara Coppinger, Muhammad Islam, Pierre Traissac, Eleonora d'Orsi, Irfan Nuhoglu, Rui Providência, Bernard Maire, Leandra Abarca-Gómez, Sinead Brophy, Daniela Pierannunzio, Cristina Taddei, Wen-Harn Pan, Gregor Starc, Abdullah Alkandari, Saeed Dastgiri, Lien Braeckevelt, Gustavo Velasquez-Melendez, Sudhir Kowlessur, Bagher Larijani, Cynthia Robitaille, Mohamed M. Ali, Steiner Krokstad, Noor Ani Ahmad, Anar Dushpanova, Agustinus Soemantri, Susana Sans, Ionela Pascanu, Gwenaëlle Le Coroller, Inger Ariansen, Abhijit Sen, Sergej M. Ostojic, Silvana Donoso, Felix K. Assah, Juan A Rivera, Peter H. Whincup, Oana-Florentina Gheorghe-Fronea, Hanan F. Abdul Rahim, Yadlapalli S. Kusuma, Michael Knoflach, Moein Yoosefi, Cassiano Ricardo Rech, Paul Ferdinand M. Reganit, Tomi-Pekka Tuomainen, Francesco Gianfagna, Stefania Maggi, Mohammad Hossein Somi, Behrooz Hamzeh, Bethlehem D. Solomon, Herman Borghs, Zhanna Kalmatayeva, Heidi Klakk, Akram Pourshams, Naomi S. Levitt, Miquel Porta, Vesna Jureša, Alexander D. Deev, Son Thai Pham, Paula Margozzini, Silvia Bel-Serrat, Dora Romaguera, Monira Alarouj, Winsome R. Parnell, Marloes Cardol, David Faeh, Antonio Bernabe-Ortiz, Giota Touloumi, Maryam Kavousi, Sanja Musić Milanović, Jalila El Ati, Sauli Herrala, Liang Xu, Sirkka Keinänen-Kiukaanniemi, Ian Hambleton, Stefan Savin, Andre Pascal Kengne, R. Krishna Kumar, Kurt Widhalm, Marco M Ferrario, Parisa Amiri, Yi Song, Jianfeng Wu, Jeannette Klimont, Jean Ferrières, Farhad Zamani, Shina Avi, Luis Paulo Gomes Mascarenhas, Aluísio J D Barros, Reecha Sofat, Koen Van Herck, Hoang Van Minh, Enrique Gutiérrez-González, Martine Vrijheid, Susana Cararo Confortin, Antonis Zampelas, Bogdan Wojtyniak, Ausra Petrauskiene, Juha Auvinen, Maryam Sharafkhah, Emanuel Zitt, Majid Ezzati, Young-Ho Khang, Ellina Rakhimova, Magdalena Klimek, Luís Lopes, Erkin M. Mirrakhimov, Maria Lc Iurilli, Günay Can, Mark Woodward, Esther Lopez-Garcia, Mauro Virgílio Gomes de Barros, Ahmed A. Madar, Rainford J. Wilks, Shoaib Afzal, Melanie J. Cowan, Gareth Stratton, Eduardo Salazar Martinez, Sameer Narake, Norie Sawada, Li Juan Wu, Adrian Richter, Licia Iacoviello, Hanno Ulmer, Deepak Amarapurkar, Mohsen Ibrahim, Hamed Pouraram, Massimo Salvetti, Hung-Kwan So, Yonghua Hu, Lars Ängquist, Thi Tuyet-Hanh Tran, Charles Lunogelo, Sabina Zambon, Angelika Schaffrath Rosario, Lauren Lissner, Kamarul Imran Musa, Deepa Weerasekera, Bihungum Bista, Takafumi Ishida, Ekaterina Chikova-Iscener, Mirjam M. Heinen, Tazeen H. Jafar, Semánová Csilla, Raija Korpelainen, Edward W. Gregg, Laura Gutierrez, Victor M. Herrera, Aristides M. Machado-Rodrigues, Fatemeh Malekzadeh, Shouling Wu, Jennifer L. Baker, Clicerio González-Villalpando, Irene G. M. van Valkengoed, Anna Fijałkowska, Meghnath Dhimal, Murat Topbaş, George Moschonis, Robert Eggertsen, Quang Ngoc Nguyen, Janette Walton, Elnaz Faramarzi, Nasheeta Peer, Radka Taxová Braunerová, Harald Geiger, Morteza Shamshirgaran, Lela Shengelia, María Ángeles Dal Re Saavedra, Khem Bahadur Karki, Timothy J. Key, Maria G. Grammatikopoulou, Susana Vale, Bernhard O. Boehm, Songhomitra Panda-Jonas, Iveta Pudule, Elisabete Ramos, Lacramioara Aurelia Brinduse, Paul H. Lee, Terence W O'Neill, Javad Aghazadeh-Attari, Margus Punab, Bojan Jelaković, Eliza Cinteza, Ha Tp Do, and Alison J. Hayes
Subjects: education.field_of_study, business.industry, Population, Distribution (economics), medicine.disease, Obesity, Geography, medicine, Underweight, medicine.symptom, education, business, Body mass index, Demography
Published: 2020

36. Analysis of attained height and diabetes among 554,122 adults across 25 low- and middle-income countries

Author: Khem Bahadur Karki, Pascal Geldsetzer, Michaela Theilmann, Nahla Hwalla, Cara Ebert, Demetre Labadarios, Jacqueline A. Seiglie, Till Bärnighausen, Abla M. Sibai, Felix Teufel, Maja-Emilia Marcus, Gibson B. Kagaruki, Sankaran Subramanian, Corine Houehanou, Lindsay M. Jaacks, Mohamed Msaidie, Jennifer Manne-Goehler, Justine Davies, Sebastian Vollmer, Joao S Martins, David Guwatudde, Andreas Deckert, Glennis Andall-Brereton, Jan-Walter De Neve, Rifat Atun, Mongal Singh Gurung, Bolormaa Norov, Kokou Agoudavi, Chea Stanford Wesseh, Lindiwe Tsabedze, Gladwell Gathecha, Lela Sturua, Omar Karlsson, and Viola Koncz
Subjects: Adult, Male, medicine.medical_specialty, Diabetes risk, Endocrinology, Diabetes and Metabolism, Population, 030209 endocrinology & metabolism, Type 2 diabetes, Logistic regression, 03 medical and health sciences, 0302 clinical medicine, Diabetes mellitus, Epidemiology, Prevalence, Internal Medicine, Humans, Medicine, 030212 general & internal medicine, Epidemiology/Health Services Research, education, Developing Countries, Poverty, Advanced and Specialized Nursing, education.field_of_study, business.industry, Odds ratio, Middle Aged, Anthropometry, medicine.disease, Body Height, 3. Good health, Cross-Sectional Studies, Diabetes Mellitus, Type 2, Socioeconomic Factors, Income, Female, business, Demography
Abstract: OBJECTIVE The prevalence of type 2 diabetes is rising rapidly in low-income and middle-income countries (LMICs), but the factors driving this rapid increase are not well understood. Adult height, in particular shorter height, has been suggested to contribute to the pathophysiology and epidemiology of diabetes and may inform how adverse environmental conditions in early life affect diabetes risk. We therefore systematically analyzed the association of adult height and diabetes across LMICs, where such conditions are prominent. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS We pooled individual-level data from nationally representative surveys in LMICs that included anthropometric measurements and diabetes biomarkers. We calculated odds ratios (ORs) for the relationship between attained adult height and diabetes using multilevel mixed-effects logistic regression models. We estimated ORs for the pooled sample, major world regions, and individual countries, in addition to stratifying all analyses by sex. We examined heterogeneity by individual-level characteristics. RESULTS Our sample included 554,122 individuals across 25 population-based surveys. Average height was 161.7 cm (95% CI 161.2–162.3), and the crude prevalence of diabetes was 7.5% (95% CI 6.9–8.2). We found no relationship between adult height and diabetes across LMICs globally or in most world regions. When stratifying our sample by country and sex, we found an inverse association between adult height and diabetes in 5% of analyses (2 out of 50). Results were robust to alternative model specifications. CONCLUSIONS Adult height is not associated with diabetes across LMICs. Environmental factors in early life reflected in attained adult height likely differ from those predisposing individuals for diabetes.
Published: 2020

37. Tobacco Research in the Eastern Mediterranean Region: A Scoping Review of Published Studies from Seven Countries

Author: Randah R, Hamadeh, Saif M, Borgan, Joanne, Khabsa, and Abla M, Sibai
Subjects: Tobacco Use, Cross-Sectional Studies, Mediterranean Region, Case-Control Studies, Smoking, Prevalence, Humans, Smoking Cessation, Tobacco Smoke Pollution, Tobacco Products, Tobacco Use Disorder
Abstract: While surveillance on a global scale has been showing a decline in tobacco smoking in the past decade, rates in the Eastern Mediterranean Region (EMR) remained stable with some countries showing rising trends. This study aimed to analyze the landscape of tobacco research in the EMR, present data on publication trends, and identify research gaps and opportunities to guide future tobacco research in the region. We conducted a scoping review of tobacco research in seven countries from January 2000 to December 2013. Three hundred and forty eight studies were identified, the majority of which were published in international journals and in English language. There was an increase in publications over time, with a significant positive linear trend (p = 0.03). Descriptive cross-sectional and case-control studies were the most common study designs (67.0%), and only 8% were longitudinal studies. Papers that reported, in part or solely, on waterpipe tobacco smoking (WTS) constituted 25.6% of the total publication pool. Tobacco consumption was treated as an exposure variable in half of the papers and mostly in relation to cancer and cardiovascular diseases, as an outcome measure in 37.7%, and as a confounding variable in 14.7% of the papers. Studies that examined associations of tobacco with other behaviors (5.3%) were lacking. The scarcity of high-evidence tobacco research in the EMR, together with the relatively deficient data on WTS and associations with other factors warrant the need for discussions on research priority setting and guidance on funding allocations in the region.
Published: 2020

38. Sex disparities in dietary intake across the lifespan: the case of Lebanon

Author: Nahla Hwalla, Abla M. Sibai, Lara Nasreddine, Jennifer J Ayoub, Marie Claire Chamieh, and Farah Naja
Subjects: Adult, Male, Adolescent, Saturated fat, Longevity, Psychological intervention, Nutritional Status, Medicine (miscellaneous), lcsh:TX341-641, Clinical nutrition, Food group, Young Adult, Sex Factors, Nutrient, Sex-based differences, Environmental health, Nutrition transition, Humans, Medicine, Micronutrients, Food consumption patterns, Lebanon, Child, lcsh:RC620-627, Nutrition, Nutrition and Dietetics, business.industry, Research, Age Factors, Middle Aged, Nutrition Surveys, Micronutrient, Diet Records, Diet, lcsh:Nutritional diseases. Deficiency diseases, Cross-Sectional Studies, Food groups, Life course approach, Female, Macronutrients, Dietary intakes, Energy Intake, business, lcsh:Nutrition. Foods and food supply
Abstract: BackgroundLittle is known about sex-based dietary differences in middle-income countries, particularly those undergoing the nutrition transition. This study aims at examining sex disparities in energy and macronutrients’ intakes, food consumption patterns, and micronutrients’ adequacy in Lebanon, while adopting a life course approach.MethodsData were derived from a national cross-sectional survey conducted in Lebanon in 2008/2009. The study sample consisted of 3636 subjects: 956 children and adolescents aged 6–19.9 years; 2239 adults aged 20–59.9 years and 441 older adults aged above 60 years. At the households, trained nutritionists conducted face-to-face interviews with participants to complete a sociodemographic questionnaire and one 24-h diet recall. Food items were categorized into 25 food groups. The Nutritionist Pro software was used for the analysis of dietary intake data and the estimation of energy, macronutrients’, and micronutrients’ intakes.ResultsIn all age groups, males had significantly higher energy intakes, while females had significantly higher fiber intakes. In addition, in adolescents aged 12–19.9 years, females had higher fat intakes as compared to males (37.02 ± 0.6% vs 35.03 ± 0.61%), and in adults aged 20–59.9 years, females had significantly higher total fat (37.73 ± 0.33% vs 36.45 ± 0.38%) and saturated fat intakes (11.24 ± 0.15% vs 10.45 ± 0.18%). These differences in macronutrient intakes were not observed in younger children nor in older adults. Sex-based differences in food groups’ intakes were also observed: men and boys had significantly higher intakes of red and processed meat, bread, fast food, soft drinks, and alcohol, while girls and women had higher intakes of fruits, vegetables, milk, and sweets. In all age groups, females had lower micronutrient intakes compared to males, including calcium, iron, and zinc.ConclusionsThis study identified sex-specific priorities that ought to be tackled by context-specific interventions to promote healthier diets in Lebanon. The fact that sex-based differences in nutrient intakes and food consumption patterns were the most noticeable in the adolescent and adult years, hence women’s reproductive years call for concerted efforts to improve nutrition for women and girls as this would lay the foundation not only for their future education, productivity, and economic empowerment, but also for the health of future generations.
Published: 2020

39. Healthcare Financing Arrangements and Service Provision for Syrian Refugees in Lebanon

Author: Ghina R. Mumtaz, Alia H. Sabra, Catherine Pitt, Abla M. Sibai, Jocelyn DeJong, Sandra Mounier-Jack, Neha S. Singh, and Antonia Dingle
Subjects: education.field_of_study, Economic growth, business.industry, Service provision, media_common.quotation_subject, Refugee, Population, Public sector, Psychological intervention, Private sector, Cash, business, education, Reproductive health, media_common
Abstract: By September 2018, Lebanon hosted an estimated 1.5 million displaced Syrians. This chapter analyses healthcare financing and service provision for them, with a focus on women, children and adolescents. We reviewed the literature on health financing and provision of health services to Syrian refugees in Lebanon and conducted an original analysis of aid to Lebanon from 2002 to 2016. The Syrian refugee population in Lebanon has placed a critical strain on the country’s economy and public services, including the health system. Aid to the humanitarian and health sectors comprised 28% ($3.2 billion) of aid to Lebanon between 2002 and 2016. Displaced Syrians in Lebanon accessing health services faced high out-of-pocket expenditures within a system dominated by private sector provision. Cash-based interventions were increasingly used to deliver aid to displaced Syrians, with subsidised private sector and free public sector primary health services. This left a significant gap in the provision of secondary and tertiary care, adding to the financial burden on refugees. Given these funding cuts, the financing and delivery of essential services to refugees in Lebanon remains precarious. This adds to existing pressures on Lebanon’s health system and challenges faced by vulnerable populations in accessing essential services.
Published: 2020

40. Ageing and health in the Arab region: Challenges, opportunities and the way forward

Author: Anthony Rizk, Aline Semaan, Abla M. Sibai, and Jiana Tabbara
Subjects: medicine.medical_specialty, Economic growth, Public health, Research, Arab Region, General Medicine, 030204 cardiovascular system & hematology, Homecare, 03 medical and health sciences, Ageing, 0302 clinical medicine, lcsh:HB848-3697, Non-communicable Disease, Health, medicine, Caregiving, lcsh:Demography. Population. Vital events, 030212 general & internal medicine
Abstract: In many countries of the Arab region, the demographic transition is already underway with a decrease in fertility and mortality and a rise in the proportion of older adults. Longer life expectancies and higher burden of non-communicable disease co-morbidities bring new health and social concerns to families, societies and governments. In a number of countries in the Arab region, this is compounded with political turmoil, forced displacement, dynamic migration flows and economic and social instability that deplete family cohesion and exhaust societal resources. Such challenges require systematic changes to healthcare and social services delivery. Amidst a number of strategies for interventions that aim at maximizing health and well-being in old age, we focus in this paper on three fundamental approaches that are largely lacking in the Arab region: an integrated and holistic model of healthcare, policies and programmes that incentivize ageing in place and homecare, and knowledge production addressing local concerns and priorities.
Published: 2017

41. A Narrative Review on the Relationship between Female Reproductive Factors and Longevity

Author: Raymond Farah, Abla M. Sibai, Christy Costanian, and Sola Aoun Bahous
Subjects: Health (social science), media_common.quotation_subject, Longevity, Reproductive Factors, Health Professions (miscellaneous), Abstracts, Biology of Aging, Narrative review, AcademicSubjects/SOC02600, Life-span and Life-course Studies, Psychology, Session 10160 (Late Breaking Poster), Demography, media_common
Abstract: This review presents findings on the role of female reproductive factors on longevity.A comprehensive systematic literature search was conducted using four electronic databases: OVID Medline, Web of Science, PubMed and Google Scholar from inception until May 2020 and restricted to English language articles that tackle the relationship between reproductive factors and longevity in its various definitions. Our search yielded a total of 306 articles. After screening based on the eligibility criteria,37 articles were included for review. The majority of studies were prospective and conducted in Western populations. The most consistent findings were between parity and increased longevity. The role of ages at menarche and menopause, premature menopause, as well as reproductive lifespan on longevity were not conclusive. Whether gender of offspring is related to maternal longevity is yet to be fully elucidated.Variations in findings are in the majority due to differentials in the definition of longevity as an outcome. Further longitudinal studies based in developing countries are needed to examine reproductive factors related to longevity.
Published: 2020

42. COVID-19 and non-communicable diseases in the Eastern Mediterranean Region: the need for a syndemics approach to data reporting and healthcare delivery

Author: Samia Habli, Anthony Rizk, Kasturi Sen, Ghiwa Nassereddine, Abla M. Sibai, and Slim Slama
Subjects: Medicine (General), Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), Humanitarian crisis, Population, Infectious and parasitic diseases, RC109-216, syndemics: Eastern Mediterranean Region, 03 medical and health sciences, R5-920, 0302 clinical medicine, Syndemic, Pandemic, Per capita, Humans, 030212 general & internal medicine, Data reporting, Noncommunicable Diseases, Socioeconomics, education, non-communicable diseases (NCDs), education.field_of_study, Mediterranean Region, SARS-CoV-2, 030503 health policy & services, Health Policy, Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health, COVID-19, Eastern mediterranean, Geography, Research Design, Commentary, 0305 other medical science, Delivery of Health Care
Abstract: Summary box As of 30 April 2021, the Eastern Mediterranean Region (EMR), home to nearly 700 million people across 22 diverse countries, has reported 9 109 162 confirmed cases of COVID-19 and 182 654 cumulative deaths since the beginning of the pandemic.1 Pandemic response in the EMR is complicated by compromised healthcare systems, prolonged conflicts and humanitarian crisis, and suboptimal reporting and transparency in many countries of the region.2 Consequently, COVID-19 incidence rates have been uneven, fluctuating from less than 1000 confirmed cases per million population in Sudan, Syria, Somalia and Yemen to more than 40 000 confirmed cases per million population in Lebanon, Qatar and Bahrain. Up to this point in the pandemic, the five countries hardest hit with cumulative COVID-19 deaths per capita have been Lebanon, Iran, Tunisia, Palestine and Jordan and with the highest overall cumulative deaths have been …
Published: 2021

43. Adolescents' self-perceived and actual weight: Which plays a dominant role in weight loss behaviour in Lebanon?

Author: Sarah Assaad, Nahla Hwalla, Lara Nasreddine, Sirine Anouti, Abla M. Sibai, and Farah Naja
Subjects: Male, Pediatrics, medicine.medical_specialty, Adolescent, Health Behavior, 030209 endocrinology & metabolism, Weight Perception, Overweight, Logistic regression, Body Mass Index, 03 medical and health sciences, 0302 clinical medicine, Weight loss, Weight Loss, Weight management, Body Image, Developmental and Educational Psychology, medicine, Humans, 030212 general & internal medicine, Lebanon, business.industry, Body Weight, Confounding, Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health, Odds ratio, Self Concept, Adolescent Behavior, Pediatrics, Perinatology and Child Health, Female, medicine.symptom, business, Body mass index, Demography
Abstract: Background The decision to lose weight among adolescents is complex and is guided by a number of body-related factors. This study examined the extent of agreement between actual weight, measured as body mass index, and self-perceived weight and assessed their relative importance in weight loss behaviour among Lebanese adolescents. Methods Data on 278 adolescents aged 13-17 years were drawn from the nationwide Nutrition and Non-Communicable Disease Risk Factor Survey (Lebanon, 2009). Binary multivariable logistic regressions were conducted to test associations with "effort to lose weight" as the outcome variable, controlling for a number of potential confounders. Results Close to 36% reported trying to lose weight. Around 21% and 13% were overweight and obese, respectively, and 40% and 10% perceived their weight as slightly high and very high, respectively. Inaccurate perceivers, those underestimating or overestimating their weight, constituted 39%, with overall percent agreement between actual and self-perceived weight being 60.8% (kappa statistic = 0.319, 95% CI [0.242, 0.396]). About a third of the overweight adolescents (30.5%) and more than half of the obese (56.8%) underestimated their weight. In the multivariable analysis, self-perceived weight was statistically significant and a stronger predictor of weight loss effort than body mass index (adjusted odds ratios = 14.42 and 6.42 for slightly high and very high perceived weight, respectively, compared to odds ratios = 1.47 and 2.31 for overweight and obese adolescents, respectively). Conclusion Health professionals need to consider self-perceived weight in conjunction with actual weight in their pursuit of weight management goals and in planning prevention programmes that guide weight loss behaviours for adolescents.
Published: 2017

44. Health Service Access and Utilization among Syrian Refugees and Affected Host Communities in Lebanon

Author: Shannon Doocy, Fouad M. Fouad, Baptiste Hanquart, Abla M. Sibai, Lara Chlela, Lhas Study Team, Michael Woodman, and Emily Lyles
Subjects: Syrian refugees, business.industry, 030503 health policy & services, Refugee, Geography, Planning and Development, 03 medical and health sciences, Health services, 0302 clinical medicine, Political Science and International Relations, Medicine, 030212 general & internal medicine, 0305 other medical science, business, Socioeconomics, Host (network)
Published: 2017

45. Cancer Research in the Arab World : A review of publications from seven countries between 2000–2013

Author: Abla M. Sibai, Saif M. Borgan, and Randah R. Hamadeh
Subjects: Gerontology, Biomedical Research, Tobacco use, Physical activity, lcsh:Medicine, Review, Sudan, chronic diseases, 03 medical and health sciences, 0302 clinical medicine, Age groups, Neoplasms, Humans, Medicine, cancer, 030212 general & internal medicine, Social determinants of health, Palestine, Lebanon, publications, arab world, research, business.industry, National library, Arab World, lcsh:R, Cancer, General Medicine, medicine.disease, Morocco, Systematic review, Kuwait, Bibliometrics, 030220 oncology & carcinogenesis, Bahrain, Iraq, Cancer research, business
Abstract: This review aimed to examine trends in cancer research in the Arab world and identify existing research gaps. A search of the MEDLINE® database (National Library of Medicine, Bethesda, Maryland, USA) was undertaken for all cancer-related publications published between January 2000 and December 2013 from seven countries, including Bahrain, Kuwait, Iraq, Lebanon, Morocco, Palestine and Sudan. A total of 1,773 articles were identified, with a significant increase in yearly publications over time (P
Published: 2017

46. Association between country preparedness indicators and quality clinical care for cardiovascular disease risk factors in 44 lower- and middle-income countries: A multicountry analysis of survey data

Author: David Guwatudde, Glennis Andall-Brereton, Rifat Atun, Dismand Houinato, Nuno Lunet, Pascal Bovet, Joao S Martins, Jutta Mari Adelin Jorgensen, Roy A Wong-McClure, Gibson B. Kagaruki, Demetre Labadarios, Garry Brian, Joseph Kibachio Mwangi, Jacqueline A. Seiglie, Lindsay M. Jaacks, Justine Davies, Till Bärnighausen, Sumithra Krishnamurthy Reddiar, Khem Bahadur Karki, Nahla Hwalla, Krishna Kumar Aryal, Adil Supiyev, Omar Mwalim Omar, Zhaxybay Zhumadilov, Cara Ebert, Andrew Stokes, Brice Wilfried Bicaba, Mohamed Msaidie, Sebastian Vollmer, Jennifer Manne-Goehler, Pascal Geldsetzer, Abla M. Sibai, Mary T Mayige, Sarah Quesnel-Crooks, Maja E Marcus, Corine Houehanou, Lisa R. Hirschhorn, Bahendeka K Silver, Mongal Singh Gurung, Bolormaa Norov, Lela Sturua, and Instituto de Saúde Pública da Universidade do Porto
Subjects: Economics, Social Sciences, Blood Pressure, 030204 cardiovascular system & hematology, Logistic regression, Global Health, Vascular Medicine, 0302 clinical medicine, Endocrinology, Medical Conditions, Risk Factors, Surveys and Questionnaires, Per capita, Global health, Medicine and Health Sciences, Public and Occupational Health, 030212 general & internal medicine, 10. No inequality, 1. No poverty, General Medicine, 3. Good health, Cardiovascular Diseases, Preparedness, Hypertension, Income, Medicine, Research Article, Endocrine Disorders, 03 medical and health sciences, Health Economics, Diagnostic Medicine, Diabetes mellitus, Environmental health, medicine, Diabetes Mellitus, Humans, Human Development Index, Noncommunicable Diseases, Developing Countries, Poverty, Quality of Health Care, Health economics, Health Care Policy, business.industry, Health Services Administration and Management, Odds ratio, medicine.disease, Health Care, Cross-Sectional Studies, Metabolic Disorders, Diabetes Diagnosis and Management, business
Abstract: Background Cardiovascular diseases are leading causes of death, globally, and health systems that deliver quality clinical care are needed to manage an increasing number of people with risk factors for these diseases. Indicators of preparedness of countries to manage cardiovascular disease risk factors (CVDRFs) are regularly collected by ministries of health and global health agencies. We aimed to assess whether these indicators are associated with patient receipt of quality clinical care. Methods and findings We did a secondary analysis of cross-sectional, nationally representative, individual-patient data from 187,552 people with hypertension (mean age 48.1 years, 53.5% female) living in 43 low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) and 40,795 people with diabetes (mean age 52.2 years, 57.7% female) living in 28 LMICs on progress through cascades of care (condition diagnosed, treated, or controlled) for diabetes or hypertension, to indicate outcomes of provision of quality clinical care. Data were extracted from national-level World Health Organization (WHO) Stepwise Approach to Surveillance (STEPS), or other similar household surveys, conducted between July 2005 and November 2016. We used mixed-effects logistic regression to estimate associations between each quality clinical care outcome and indicators of country development (gross domestic product [GDP] per capita or Human Development Index [HDI]); national capacity for the prevention and control of noncommunicable diseases (‘NCD readiness indicators’ from surveys done by WHO); health system finance (domestic government expenditure on health [as percentage of GDP], private, and out-of-pocket expenditure on health [both as percentage of current]); and health service readiness (number of physicians, nurses, or hospital beds per 1,000 people) and performance (neonatal mortality rate). All models were adjusted for individual-level predictors including age, sex, and education. In an exploratory analysis, we tested whether national-level data on facility preparedness for diabetes were positively associated with outcomes. Associations were inconsistent between indicators and quality clinical care outcomes. For hypertension, GDP and HDI were both positively associated with each outcome. Of the 33 relationships tested between NCD readiness indicators and outcomes, only two showed a significant positive association: presence of guidelines with being diagnosed (odds ratio [OR], 1.86 [95% CI 1.08–3.21], p = 0.03) and availability of funding with being controlled (OR, 2.26 [95% CI 1.09–4.69], p = 0.03). Hospital beds (OR, 1.14 [95% CI 1.02–1.27], p = 0.02), nurses/midwives (OR, 1.24 [95% CI 1.06–1.44], p = 0.006), and physicians (OR, 1.21 [95% CI 1.11–1.32], p < 0.001) per 1,000 people were positively associated with being diagnosed and, similarly, with being treated; and the number of physicians was additionally associated with being controlled (OR, 1.12 [95% CI 1.01–1.23], p = 0.03). For diabetes, no positive associations were seen between NCD readiness indicators and outcomes. There was no association between country development, health service finance, or health service performance and readiness indicators and any outcome, apart from GDP (OR, 1.70 [95% CI 1.12–2.59], p = 0.01), HDI (OR, 1.21 [95% CI 1.01–1.44], p = 0.04), and number of physicians per 1,000 people (OR, 1.28 [95% CI 1.09–1.51], p = 0.003), which were associated with being diagnosed. Six countries had data on cascades of care and nationwide-level data on facility preparedness. Of the 27 associations tested between facility preparedness indicators and outcomes, the only association that was significant was having metformin available, which was positively associated with treatment (OR, 1.35 [95% CI 1.01–1.81], p = 0.04). The main limitation was use of blood pressure measurement on a single occasion to diagnose hypertension and a single blood glucose measurement to diagnose diabetes. Conclusion In this study, we observed that indicators of country preparedness to deal with CVDRFs are poor proxies for quality clinical care received by patients for hypertension and diabetes. The major implication is that assessments of countries’ preparedness to manage CVDRFs should not rely on proxies; rather, it should involve direct assessment of quality clinical care., Author summary Why was the study done? Diseases such as high blood pressure and diabetes are becoming increasingly common in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). Treatment for these conditions is simple and cheap. However, without treatment, sufferers are at high risk of adverse consequences, such as heart attacks and strokes. It is important therefore to be able to measure whether patients who need treatment are getting it. Currently, LMICs’ progress towards being able to treat patients with hypertension and diabetes is measured using proxies, for example, whether policies, guidelines, funding, structures, or human resources are in place. What did the researchers find? We measured whether 187,552 people with hypertension living in 43 LMICs and 40,795 people with diabetes living in 28 LMICs had their high blood pressure or diabetes treated well; i.e., they had these conditions diagnosed, treated, or controlled. We found that most proxy measures were not reflective of whether patients had their condition treated well. What do these findings mean? To judge countries’ progress towards ability to treat hypertension and diabetes requires directly assessing whether people with these diseases are getting the treatment that they need. The main limitation of the study was that a one-time measurement of blood pressure or blood glucose was used to define whether participants had high blood pressure or diabetes. To make a concrete clinical diagnosis requires more detailed investigation.
Published: 2019

47. Ethics Reporting Practices in Aging Research From the Arab Region

Author: Anthony Rizk, Jihad Makhoul, Thalia Arawi, Abla M. Sibai, Hamid Yahya Hussain, Stephanie Haddad, and Waleed Al Faisal
Subjects: Economic growth, Aging, Informed Consent, education, 06 humanities and the arts, 0603 philosophy, ethics and religion, Arabs, 03 medical and health sciences, 0302 clinical medicine, Research Design, Political science, Humans, 060301 applied ethics, 030212 general & internal medicine, Geriatrics and Gerontology, Gerontology, Ethics Committees, Research
Abstract: Objectives: This study aims to assess the extent of ethics reporting practices in aging research from Arab countries. Methods: A systematic scoping review of research on aging in 22 Arab countries from seven databases (1994-2013) identified 637 publications warranting institutional ethical approval and 612 publications warranting informed consent. We used multivariable regression analysis to examine variations by time, place, and study characteristics. Results: Only 36.6% of articles reported approval from a Research Ethics Committee and 38.7% reported informed consent. Reporting of ethical research practices increased significantly over time and as research collaborations and journal impact factor increased, and when sampling frame included institutionalized participants. In contrast, failure to report ethical research practices was significantly more common in non-English articles and those that did not report a funding source. Discussion: Despite gains across time, reporting of ethical research practices remains suboptimal in the Arab region. Further guidelines and capacity building are needed.
Published: 2019

48. Differences in Dietary Intakes among Lebanese Adults over a Decade: Results from Two National Surveys 1997–2008/2009

Author: Farah Naja, Lara Nasreddine, Abla M. Sibai, Jennifer J Ayoub, Fatima Hachem, Jiana Tabbara, and Nahla Hwalla
Subjects: Vitamin, Adult, Male, Time Factors, 030309 nutrition & dietetics, Nutritional Status, Eastern Mediterranean region, lcsh:TX341-641, Age and sex, Recommended Dietary Allowances, Diet Surveys, Article, 03 medical and health sciences, chemistry.chemical_compound, Young Adult, 0302 clinical medicine, Nutrient, Sex Factors, Age groups, nutrition transition, Environmental health, Nutrition transition, adults, Medicine, Humans, 030212 general & internal medicine, Lebanon, Carbohydrate intake, 0303 health sciences, Nutrition and Dietetics, Vitamin C, business.industry, Age Factors, food and beverages, dietary intakes, Feeding Behavior, Middle Aged, Diet, nutrition surveys, Eastern mediterranean, Cross-Sectional Studies, chemistry, Female, business, Energy Intake, Nutritive Value, lcsh:Nutrition. Foods and food supply, Food Science
Abstract: Amidst the ongoing societal and economic shifts in the Eastern Mediterranean region (EMR), this study aims at investigating temporal trends in food consumption and nutrient intakes among Lebanese adults, by age and sex. Data were derived from two national cross-sectional surveys conducted in Lebanon during two time periods (1997, 2008/2009). In both surveys, dietary assessment was based on 24-h recalls. The results, expressed as % energy intake (%EI), revealed a significant decrease (p &lt, 0.001) in the consumption of bread, fruits, fresh fruit juices, milk and eggs, whereas the consumption of added fats and oils, poultry, cereals and cereal-based products, chips and salty crackers, sweetened milk and hot beverages increased over time (p &lt, 0.001). A significant increase in dietary energy (kcal/day) and fat intake (%EI) was observed, coupled with decreases in carbohydrate intake (%EI) and dietary density of vitamin A and vitamin C (per 1000 kcal) (p &lt, 0.001). These changes were noted in both genders and across age groups, albeit there were some disparities between groups. In conclusion, based on national nutrition surveys, this study is the first to characterize the nutrition transition in a middle-income country of the EMR, shedding light on priority areas for nutrition policies and interventions.
Published: 2019
Full Text: View/download PDF

49. P800 Prevalence of curable sexually transmitted infections among refugees: global systematic review and meta-analysis

Author: Eman Sharara, Abla M. Sibai, Laith J. Abu-Raddad, Ghina R. Mumtaz, Jocelyn DeJong, and Bayard Roberts
Subjects: medicine.medical_specialty, education.field_of_study, business.industry, Refugee, Population, medicine.disease, medicine.disease_cause, Meta-analysis, Internally displaced person, Epidemiology, medicine, Syphilis, business, education, Chlamydia trachomatis, Demography, Reproductive health
Abstract: Background The world is witnessing one of the worst refugee crises of all times. Disrupted healthcare systems, limited availability and access to services, poverty, and increased exposure to sexual violence among others increase the vulnerability of populations in humanitarian settings to poor sexual/reproductive outcomes, including sexually transmitted infections (STIs). Our objective is to characterize, for the first time, the epidemiology of curable STIs - Chlamydia trachomatis (CT), Neisseria gonorrhoeae (NG), Treponema pallidum (syphilis), and Trichomonas vaginalis (TV) - among refugees and internally displaced populations globally, and to estimate their pooled mean prevalence. Methods We conducted a PRISMA-guided systematic review of literature through PubMed and Embase databases, and of abstracts of international HIV/STI conferences, with no language/time restrictions. Pooled prevalence of current and/or lifetime infection for each STI was estimated using random-effects meta-analyses. Results We identified 37 eligible studies that contributed 103 STI prevalence measures for 935,191 refugees. The majority of studies were for syphilis (65%), whereas CT, NG, and TV accounted for 14%, 18%, and 4% of total measures, respectively. African and South-east Asian refugees were represented the most. Only one study was conducted among Syrian refugees - currently the largest refugee population worldwide. Pooled prevalence of current infection was 1.6% (95% CI: 1.2–2.1%) for syphilis, 0.6% (95% CI: 0.1–1.4%) for NG, 0.5% (95% CI: 0.2–1.0%) for CT, and 29.3% (95% CI: 21.3–38.0%) for TV. The latter included mostly symptomatic populations. Pooled prevalence of lifetime syphilis infection was 3.3% (95I CI: 1.5–5.8%). Conclusion Despite the identified studies, there is a large knowledge gap for these infections in this population. Findings suggest overall comparable prevalence levels to the general population. However, further studies are needed to better understand the recent burden of STIs and the sexual health needs of affected populations in different global settings, to inform screening and treatment policy and programming. Disclosure No significant relationships.
Published: 2019

50. Lessons learned in the provision NCD primary care to Syrian refugee and host communities in Lebanon: the need to 'act locally and think globally'

Author: Martine Najem Kteily, Maguy Ghanem, Rima Afifi, Mia Chartouni, Rana Barazi, and Abla M. Sibai
Subjects: Refugees, Data collection, Primary Health Care, Syria, business.industry, Refugee, Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health, Psychological intervention, General Medicine, Monitoring and evaluation, 030204 cardiovascular system & hematology, 03 medical and health sciences, 0302 clinical medicine, Documentation, Nursing, Diabetes management, Intervention (counseling), Health care, Humans, 030212 general & internal medicine, Lebanon, Psychology, business, Noncommunicable Diseases, Aged
Abstract: Background Prevention and control of non-communicable diseases (NCDs) remain inadequate in resource-scarce countries, particularly in conflict situations. This paper describes a multicomponent intervention for management of hypertension and diabetes among older adult Syrian refugees and the Lebanese host community and reflects on challenges for scaling up NCD integration into primary care in humanitarian situations. Methods Using a mixed method approach, the study focused on monitoring and evaluation of the three components of the intervention: healthcare physical facilities and documentation processes, provider knowledge and guideline-concordant performance, and refugee and host community awareness. Results Findings revealed overall high compliance of healthcare workers with completing data collection forms. Their knowledge of basic aspects of hypertension/diabetes management was adequate, but diagnosis knowledge was low. Patients and healthcare providers voiced satisfaction with the program. Yet, interruptions in medicines’ supplies and lapses in care were perceived by all study groups alike as the most problematic aspect of the program. Conclusions Our intervention program was aligned with internationally agreed-upon practices, yet, our experiences in the field point to the need for more ‘local testing’ of modified interventions within such contexts. This can then inform ‘thinking globally’ on guidelines for the delivery of NCD care in crisis settings.
Published: 2019

Catalog

Books, media, physical & digital resources

See catalog results

Searchworks

Select search scope, currently: Articles Catalog books, media & more in Jio Institute collections Articles journal articles & other e-resources

Search

Search Constraints

Refine your results

Search Limiters

Topic

Publication Year Range

Language

Publication Type

Journal

Database

Publisher

187 results on '"Abla M Sibai"'

Search Results

Catalog

Select search scope, currently: Articles

Catalog

books, media & more in Jio Institute collections

Articles

journal articles & other e-resources