Japanese Journal of Hygiene最新文献

Objectives: To access medical specialists by health specialists working in the regional health field, the possibility of utilizing the voice approach for dissociative identity disorder (DID) patients as a health assessment for medical access (HAMA) was investigated. The first step is to investigate whether the plural personae in a single DID patient can be discriminated by voice analysis.

Methods: Voices of DID patients including these with different personae were extracted from YouTube and were analysed using the software PRAAT with basic frequency, oral factors, chin factors and tongue factors. In addition, RAKUGO story teller voices made artificially and dramatically were analysed in the same manner. Quantitive and qualitative analysis method were carried out and nested logistic regression and a nested generalized linear model was developed.

Results: The voice from different personae in one DID patient could be visually and easily distinquished using basic frequency curve, cluster analysis and factor analysis. In the canonical analysis, only Roy's maximum root was <0.01. In the nested generalized linear model, the model using a standard deviation (SD) indicator fit best and some other possibilities are shown here.

Conclusions: In DID patients, the short transition time among plural personae could guide to the risky situation such as suicide. So if the voice approach can show the time threshold of changes between the different personae, it would be useful as an Access Assessment in the form of a simple HAMA.

The deficiency or excess intake of trace elements, including zinc, copper, selenium and iodine, has often been reported. Zinc deficiency is often observed in infants fed breast milk with low zinc concentration, individuals administered chelating medicines, athletes and patients with diabetes mellitus, hepatic cirrhosis or nephrosis syndrome. Menkes disease is associated with severe copper deficiency, and there is no effective treatment. Deficiencies of selenium and iodine are observed in patients who receive special formulas of milk and enteral formula with low selenium and iodine concentrations, respectively. In contrast, neonatal transient hypothyroidism due to excess intake of iodine in pregnant women has also reported in Japan. It is expected that collaborative studies by researchers and clinicians will contribute to clarify the detail mechanism, diagnosis and treatment of these abnormalities.

X-chromosome inactivation (XCI) occurs during the gestation period to compensate for the dosage of X-linked genes in female mammals. Xist RNA is a long noncoding RNA with a global epigenetic function and is indispensable for XCI from the initiation to establishment and maintenance phases. The X chromosome contains over 1,000 genes that are essential for proper development, especially that of the brain, immune system, metabolism and reproductive functions. We found that exposure to bisphenol A or folate deficiency during the fetal period changes the expressions of Xist, Tsix (the antisense repressor of Xist), and many X chromosome linked genes widely in newborn mice. This finding suggests that this X-chromosome mediated effect is considered one of the mechanisms of various problems encountered in the fetal environment. The Developmental Origins of Health and Disease (DOHaD) hypothesis states that nutrition and other environmental stimuli during critical periods affect developmental pathways with epigenetics and induce metabolism and chronic disease susceptibility. The XCI process has some similarities to this hypothesis and it may become one of the approaches to reveal the DOHaD mechanisms.

In this paper, we examine the trend in Japan towards nonregular employment and its effects on marriage, childbirth, and childcare from the viewpoint of a decreasing societal birthrate. Although the decision to marry includes personal values and preferences, socioeconomic status factors such as income and employment type are also associated with the determinants of marriage. Nonregular employment workers have a lower rate and motivation for marriage than regular workers. Thus, socioeconomic disparity caused by employment needs to be minimized through governmental measures and policies. Nonregular employment is increasing among younger generations, and for them, maternity and childcare leave are especially vital. Employee insurance coverage should be expanded to function as a form of income security during these leaves of absence, such that nonregular workers are also covered. During the childcare period, which lasts more than 10 years, it is necessary to cover childrearing costs and also the time required to spend with children. If a single working parent is involved in childcare alone, there is the burden of both work and childcare. Additionally, long work hours can also impact workers that are not involved in childcare. This is a dilemma: a stable and regular employment is often necessary to achieve a higher education; however, it is difficult for nonregular employees to take care of and prepare children for higher education owing to limited financial means. Properly designed measures and policies are necessary to break this chain. Importantly, considerations about life and work are important for all workers, including nonregular workers, who are especially affected in terms of marriage, childbirth, and childcare.

Impacts of wind power generation facilities on neighborhood residents, animals, plants, water environment and landscape are a concern. Therefore, in 2010, wind turbine facilities were targeted to be covered by the environmental impact assessment law, which was enacted in 1999, and was amended with the environmental impact statement procedure in 2013. A guidance level of noise produced by wind turbines in quiet residential areas was set in 2017. In the environmental impact statement procedure at the planning stage of targeted projects, the trust of precedent users should be obtained and consensus building should be implemented. Projects of wind turbine facilities are accepted in accordance with the environmental impact assessment law using the new guidance noise level and the procedure of the environmental impact statement.

Although the birthrate greatly declined from the 1960s to the mid-1970s amongst many developed countries, the downturn has steadily been reversed by promoting women's rights and reviewing family policies in some European countries such as Sweden and France. The current total fertility rate in Sweden or France is approximately around 1.9 children per woman. The favorable state can be partly explained by the active family policies of these countries. The government of Sweden has implemented a wide range of measures including tax allowances, childcare services, and other subsidies, as well as an18 month parental leave to be shared between mothers and fathers. The government of France has expanded childcare and provided incentives by increasing childcare/family benefits with each subsequent child.In Japan, the fertility rate has changed from a downward trend to an upward trend, but only very slightly over the last decade. The legislative systems and enforcement remain totally inadequate to maintain stable a fertility rate. The Japanese government should try to change the social security/labor policies into more active and generous ones, with enhancement of economic support and promotion of work-life balance. Other attempts including removing barriers to encourage the youth to start a family are needed to overcome declining birth rates in Japan.

Almost all patients requiring care for a combination of sexual, physiological, and psychological trauma, suffer from psychological or mental illness. Mental symptoms are well known to be associated with the violence very well and assailants have a violence dependency but it is not a well known mental disease. Changing of roles between being an assailant and being a victim is observed in half of the patients. In patients with trauma, hyperarousal and apathy appears simultaneously, and avoidance symptoms, intrusion symptoms, and crashed sleep, dissociation are also recognized. In addition, symptoms of orality are observed in patients requiring trauma care. However, hyperarousal, disturbance of sleep, and suicidal ideation improve quickly and the symptoms of a pair of a mother-child pair are well correlated. In organic non-temporary hyper psychogenic diseases (physiological diseases and surgery, and so on), non-organic psychogenic diseases (psychiatric diseases), and diseases on the border line between organic and non-organic diseases (psychosomatic diseases and may be unknown to non-medical professionals knowledge of such characteristic symptoms) is important information for health and medical care in the regional comprehensive care setting.

Relatively high doses of psychostimulants induce neurotoxicity on the dopaminergic system and self-injurious behavior (SIB) in rodents. However the underlying neuronal mechanisms of SIB remains unclear. Dopamine receptor antagonists, N-methyl-D-aspartic acid (NMDA) receptor antagonists, Nitric Oxide Synthase (NOS) inhibitors and free radical scavengers significantly attenuate methamphetamine-induced SIB. These findings indicate that activation of dopamine as well as NMDA receptors followed by radical formation and oxidative stress, especially when mediated by NOS activation, is associated with methamphetamine-induced SIB. On the other hand, an increase in the incidence of polydrug abuse is a major problem worldwide. Coadministered methamphetamine and morphine induced lethality in more than 80% in mice, accompanied by an increase in the number of poly (ADP-ribose) polymerase (PARP)-immunoreactive cells in the heart, kidney and liver. The lethal effect and the increase in the incidence of rupture or PARP-immunoreactive cells induced by the coadministration of methamphetamine and morphine were significantly attenuated by pretreatment with a phospholipase A2 inhibitor or a radical scavenger, or by cooling of body from 30 to 90 min after drug administration. These results suggest that free radicals play an important role in the increased lethality induced by the coadministration of methamphetamine and morphine. Therefore, free radical scavengers and cooling are beneficial for preventing death that is induced by the coadministration of methamphetamine and morphine. These findings may help us better understand for masochistic behavior, which is a clinical phenomenon on SIB, as well as polydrug-abuse-induced acute toxicity.