background: despite the enhancement in health outcomes worldwide, health inequity and inequality is one of the most relevant topics both for health policy and public health. this research was designed to decompose the health inequality of people living in shiraz, south-west iran. methods: data were obtained from a multistage-sample survey conducted in shiraz from april to may 2012, to find dete...

BACKGROUND Utility indices are used in cost-effectiveness analyses as a measure of quality of life reflecting the patient's preference for a given health state on a scale anchored at 0 (corresponding to death) to 1 (perfect health). It is uncertain which utility instruments are most suitable for application in patients with the obstructive sleep apnea syndrome (OSA). OBJECTIVES To compare uti...

While many of the measurement approaches in health inequality measurement assume the existence of a ratio-scale variable, most of the health information available in population surveys is given in the form of categorical variables. Therefore, the well-known inequality indices may not always be readily applicable to measure health inequality as it may result in the arbitrariness of the health co...

OBJECTIVE Initiatives to monitor progress in health interventions like sanitation are increasingly focused on disparities in access. We explored three methodological challenges to monitoring changes in sanitation coverage across socio-economic and demographic determinants: (i) confounding by wealth indices including water and sanitation assets, (ii) use of individual urban and rural settings ve...

In conjunction with association rules for data mining, the connections between testing indices and strong and weak association rules were determined, and new derivative rules were obtained by further reasoning. Association rules were used to analyze correlation and check consistency between indices. This study shows that the judgment obtained by weak association rules or non-association rules i...

BACKGROUND The use of creatine (Cr) as a nutritional supplement to aid athletic performance has gained widespread popularity among athletes. However, concerns have recently been expressed over potentially harmful effects of short and long term Cr supplementation on health. METHODS Forty eight young healthy subjects were randomly allocated to three experimental protocols aimed at elucidating a...

The ability to quantitatively assess ecological health is of great interest to those tasked with monitoring and conserving ecosystems. For decades, biomonitoring research and policies have relied on multimetric health indices of various forms. Although indices are numbers, many are constructed based on qualitative procedures, thus limiting the quantitative rigor of the practical interpretations...

Dental health was evaluated in two populations of raccoons (Procyon lotor) in western Illinois (USA); one was from a rural agricultural area with low human density and the other from a nearby state park heavily used by humans and raccoons. From 1989 through 1993, 300 raccoons were live-trapped in the agricultural area and 246 raccoons were live-trapped in the park. Oral health was assessed usin...

BACKGROUND Osteoporosis is a significant health problem in the developing countries and its prevalence data are important for the estimation of health care burden and policy making. This study aimed to determine the age-related changes in bone health and the prevalence of osteoporosis in males and females aged 50 years or above living in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. METHODS A cross-sectional study...