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Energy efficient renovation of the existing housing stock is imperative to reduce building energy consumption since the building sector in Europe accounts for an estimated 40% of the energy used from all sectors and more than 80% of the buildings today will still exist in 2020. Following Europe’s energy objectives, the paper investigates, based on the European Union Directives, the current energy refurbishment rates and examines the future energy performance of the Cyprus housing stock, in order to determine if they are adequate in achieving the Europe energy targets. The research focuses on pilot houses in Cyprus, which include dwellings from all typologies as classified, according to the IEE project EPISCOPE. The houses were monitored and based on the collected data and the performed simulations, their current and future energy performance are presented in the form of Energy Performance Indicators (EPIs). From the study, it is observed that with the current trends the national climate protection energy targets are unattainable. This is mainly due to the inadequate rate and depth of energy refurbishment of the existing housing stock and the ineptness of the Directives to address effectively the reduction of the cooling energy needs in the new constructions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction:Epidemiological studies show a positive relationship between physical activity and cartilage volume, suggesting that exercise may protect against osteoarthritis. Cross-sectional experimental studies, however, have failed to show significant differences in knee cartilage morphology between athletes and nonathletic controls. The aim of the study was to test the hypothesis that knee cartilage morphology, specifically regional cartilage thickness and global subchondral bone area, is modified in sedentary, untrained adult women who increased their physical fitness during a 3-month supervised exercise intervention. Materials and Methods: Thirty-eight untrained women, aged 45–55 years, were randomly assigned to: endurance training (n = 18), strength training (n = 15) and autogenic training (control group, n = 5). Patellar and femorotibial knee cartilage morphology was determined before and after the 3-month supervised training intervention, using magnetic resonance imaging and state-of-the-art image analysis. Results: Whereas the endurance training group showed a significant increase in cardiorespiratory fitness and the strength training group a significant increase in the maximal voluntary isometric contraction force of the leg, this study did not show significant differences in knee cartilage thickness and volume, subchondral bone area or regional cartilage thickness between baseline and follow-up acquisitions within any intervention group. Discussion:This randomized longitudinal study provides no evidence that a 3-month exercise intervention in untrained middle-aged women can significantly alter knee joint morphology. Longitudinal evidence supporting that a training program, successful in increasing physical fitness, can also induce functional adaptation of articular tissues and may protect against knee osteoarthritis, remains to be presented. Copyright © 2010 S. Karger AG, Basel [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An editorial is presented on the importance of using people-first language in addressing weight bias and stigma in childhood overweight and obesity. Topics include the negative consequences of weight bias and stigma on children's health and well-being; and the adoption and enforcement of people-first language policies in academic research, healthcare settings, media, and public discourse surrounding childhood obesity.

The problem of the automatic determination of the first and second ventilatory thresholds (VT1 and VT2) from cardiopulmonary exercise test (CPET) still leads to controversy. The reliability of the gold standard methodology (i.e. expert visual inspection) feeds into the debate and several authors call for more objective automatic methods to be used in the clinical practice. In this study, we present a framework based on a collaborative approach, where a web-application was used to crowd-source a large number (1245) of CPET data of individuals with different aerobic fitness. The resulting database was used to train and test an artificial intelligence (i.e. a convolutional neural network) algorithm. This automatic classifier is currently implemented in another web-application and was used to detect the ventilatory thresholds in the available CPET. A total of 206 CPET were used to evaluate the accuracy of the estimations against the expert opinions. The neural network was able to detect the ventilatory thresholds with an average mean absolute error of 178 (198) mlO2/min (11.1%, r = 0.97) and 144 (149) mlO2/min (6.1%, r = 0.99), for VT1 and VT2 respectively. The performance of the neural network in detecting VT1 deteriorated in case of individuals with poor aerobic fitness. Our results suggest the potential for a collective intelligence system to outperform isolated experts in ventilatory thresholds detection. However, the inclusion of a larger number of VT1 examples certified by a community of experts will be likely needed before the abilities of this collective intelligence can be translated into the clinical use of CPET. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this study was to examine the incidence and mechanisms of acute injuries in the sport of fistball. No scientific studies on injury characteristics have yet been conducted in this traditional sport game. The study was conducted prospectively over the course of 12 months. During a total of 40.308 h of sport-specific exposure, 240 players reported 492 injuries, representing an overall injury rate of 12.2 injuries/1000 h of exposure. Most injuries were classified as bagatelle injuries (67.8%). The majority of the injuries were located in the knee (23.5%) followed by the elbow (11.9%) and the hip (11.5%). Ankle injuries resulted in the longest impairment from sports participation. The most common types of injury were abrasions (38.2%), contusions (21.1%), distortions (7.5%) and muscle strains (6.9%). Wrong or insufficient equipment (15.0%) was the most commonly mentioned causes of injury. The data indicate that the injury risk in fistball is rather high; however, the sport should not be considered a high-risk sport because most of the injuries are slight and do not prevent the players from training or competition. Injury prevention strategies should include the development of fistball-specific protective equipment with focus on the knee and elbow joint. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Bariatric surgery is the most effective treatment to reduce weight permanently which is essential to avoid, to improve or even to cure life-threatening comorbidities. Little is known about changes of the psychological etiology and risk factors. Methods: The present study concentrated on psychological variables which are considered to cause or promote obesity. The changes of symptoms were measured by the AD-EVA test inventory. A total of 60 patients (24 male/36 female, age 18-71 years) were tested prior to gastric bypass or gastric banding (body mass index BMI M=44.95, SD=6.91) and postoperatively (BMI M=33.92, SD=7.23). Results: Following surgery the variables addiction (t=11.15, p<0.01) and binge eating disorder (t=2.13, p<0.05) showed significant changes across all patients and therefore confirmed a positive effect but restrained eating and bulimia remained unmodified after surgery. There were significant differences between the two bariatric methods (p<0.01). Discussion: A precise interdisciplinary evaluation is a prerequisite for deciding between gastric banding and the bypass technique as well as to define the need for preoperative and postoperative psychotherapy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Quantitative data on muscle volume (MV) are important for estimating maximal muscle power. The objective of this study was to determine the correlation between anatomical cross-sectional areas (ACSAs) and the MV in thigh muscles (extensors, flexors, adductors, and sartorius) in perimenopausal women, and to identify at which proximal-to-distal level a single-slice ACSA measurement with magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) displays the highest correlation in each of these. Axial MRIs of the thigh were acquired in 41 perimenopausal women aged 50.8 +/- 3.2 years. Segmentation of the extensors, flexors, adductors, and the sartorius was performed between the femoral neck (0%) and the distal end of the intermediate vastus (100%). MVs were determined by numerical integration, and the ACSA was calculated from three-dimensional reconstructions at 10% intervals from proximal to distal. The extensors contributed 50%, the flexors 19%, the adductors 28%, and the sartorius 3% of the total thigh MV. Maximal correlations between ACSA and MV were observed at the 20-40% proximal-to-distal level in the extensors (R (2) = 0.73), at 30% in the adductors (R (2) = 0.82), and at 70% in the flexors (R (2) = 0.72) and sartorius (R (2) = 0.85), respectively. ACSA at 50% displayed the highest overall correlations (R (2) >or= 0.69) with MV for all muscle groups. Single-slice ACSAs from MRI displayed high correlations with MVs. Although the (proximal to distal) measurement locations with the highest correlation varied between the muscle groups, a single slice at the 50% location achieved the best compromise in terms of correlation between ACSA and MV across extensors, flexors, adductors and the sartorius. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]