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Aims To identify socioeconomic status and gender inequalities in long and short-term Medical Nutrition Therapy among Israeli adult patients with diabetes. Methods An analysis of data was performed on 90,900 patients over the age of 18 who were registered as patients with diabetes mellitus in Maccabi Healthcare Service Register which is the second largest health maintenance organization in Israel. Socioeconomic Rank for each patient was determined from the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics by geographical area of residence. Medical Nutrition Therapy was defined by the number of visits with registered dietitians. Short-term therapy was defined as one visit and long term therapy as two or more visits during the previous two years. Newly diagnosed patients were compared with veteran patients. Results Only 25.8% of the patients with diabetes received nutrition therapy during the previous two years. Newly diagnosed patients received therapy more frequently than veterans. We found that long term therapy was positively dependent on socioeconomic rank. Women under the age of seventy five had a higher chance of receiving therapy compared to men. Conclusions A nationwide nutritional counseling service is available and accessible to all patients with diabetes. However, the patients with higher socioeconomic rank have a higher rate of persistence with long-term nutritional therapy.

Previous reports demonstrated an association between psoriasis and other diseases including heart failure and diabetes mellitus.Our aim was to describe the association between psoriasis, diabetes mellitus, and atherosclerosis in Israel.A cross-sectional study was performed utilizing the database of Maccabi Healthcare Services (MHS), a large health provider organization in Israel. Case patients were defined as subjects who were diagnosed with psoriasis. Patients with diabetes and atherosclerosis were identified by using the MHS diabetes and cardiovascular registries, respectively. The control group included MHS enrollees without psoriasis. The proportion of diabetes and atherosclerosis among case and control groups was compared. Chi-square tests were used to compare categorical parameters. Logistic regression models were used for multivariate analyses.The study included 46,095 patients with psoriasis (case patients) and 1,579,037 subjects without psoriasis (control patients). The age-adjusted proportion of diabetes was significantly higher in psoriasis patients as compared with the control group (odds ratio [OR] 1.27, 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.1-1.48). The age-adjusted proportion of atherosclerosis was significantly higher in psoriasis patients as compared with the control group (OR 1.28, 95% CI 1.04-1.59). In patients with psoriasis, a multivariate logistic regression model demonstrated an association between diabetes and the multiple use of very potent topical steroids (P.05) or use of systemic medication for psoriasis (methotrexate, cyclosporine or acitretin) (P.001). A similar model demonstrated an association between atherosclerosis and the use of phototherapy (P.001).Our study was based on a computerized database. The diagnosis of psoriasis was based on digitally transmitted data. Therefore overestimation (false-positive cases) and underestimation (false-negative cases) of psoriasis patients may exist, thereby being a source for information bias. A second limitation is selection bias that may occur due to the possibility that reporting of both psoriasis and associated illnesses is higher in individuals who are seeking medical care. A third limitation concerns the causal effect between occurrence of psoriasis and atherosclerosis or diabetes. The dataset of MHS records diagnoses only from 1997 and does not record the date of disease onset.Our study supports previous reports for an association between psoriasis and atherosclerosis and psoriasis and diabetes. Further study is needed to support this observation.

The GABA(A) receptor is an important target for a variety of general anesthetics (Franks and Lieb, 1994) and for benzodiazepines such as diazepam. Specific point mutations in the GABA(A) receptor selectively abolish regulation by benzodiazepines (Rudolph et al., 1999; McKernan et al., 2000) and by anesthetic ethers (Mihic et al., 1997; Krasowski et al., 1998; Koltchine et al., 1999), suggesting the existence of discrete binding sites on the GABA(A) receptor for these drugs. Using anesthetics of different molecular size (isoflurane > halothane > chloroform) together with complementary mutagenesis of specific amino acid side chains, we estimate the volume of a proposed anesthetic binding site as between 250 and 370 A(3). The results of the "cutoff" analysis suggest a common site of action for the anesthetics isoflurane, halothane, and chloroform on the GABA(A) receptor. Moreover, the data support a crucial role for Leu232, Ser270, and Ala291 in the alpha subunit in defining the boundaries of an amphipathic cavity, which can accommodate a variety of small general anesthetic molecules.