BACKGROUND Epidemiological studies evaluating the association between sunscreens use and malignant melanoma risk have produced inconsistent results. Thus, we conducted a meta-analysis to summarize the evidence from epidemiological studies of sunscreens use with the risk of malignant melanoma. METHODS Pertinent studies were identified by a search in PubMed and Web of Knowledge up to October 20...

Few studies have examined the cancer incidence trends in the state of Texas, and no study has ever been conducted to compare the temporal trends of breast and colorectal cancer incidence in Texas with those of the National Cancer Institute's Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results (SEER) in the United States. This study aimed to conduct a parallel comparison between the Texas Cancer Registry...

OBJECTIVE Sleep problems are common among patients with fibromyalgia (FM). However, it is not known whether poor sleep is a contributing factor in FM or a consequence of the illness. The aim of the current study was to prospectively investigate the association between self-reported sleep problems and risk of FM among adult women. METHODS We longitudinally studied 12,350 women who did not have...

The difference between the disease rates of two groups, one exposed and one not exposed to a suspected aetiological factor, is a useful measure of the risk associated with the factor. This measure is of most interest when the association is considered causal, and has been termed the attributable risk (MacMahon and Pugh, 1970). Expressed as a percentage of the total disease rate in a group (the ...

OBJECTIVE To investigate trends in health inequality among children and young people between 1999 and 2009, using outcomes consistent with the current NHS reforms. DESIGN/DATA Secondary analysis of participants aged 0-24 in the Health Surveys for England (HSE) undertaken in 1999, 2004, 2006 and 2009. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES Changes in the absolute and relative risks of four health outcomes by...

BACKGROUND Previous studies have proposed a simple product-based estimator for calculating exposure-specific risks (ESR), but the methodology has not been rigorously evaluated. The goal of our study was to evaluate the existing methodology for calculating the ESR, propose an improved point estimator, and propose variance estimates that will allow the calculation of confidence intervals (CIs). ...

Before we are able to communicate evidence and evidence results to patients we must first be familiar with the common ways by which results may be presented to our patients. We describe five approaches (relative risk, risk reduction, odds ratio, absolute risk difference and number needed to treat) of transforming the results of an orthopaedic study for communication with patients.

BACKGROUND Several observational studies have investigated the association between fish consumption and the risk of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), however, the results were inconsistent. Hence, we performed a meta-analysis of observational studies to evaluate the effect of fish consumption on HCC risk. METHODS A systematic search was performed using the Pubmed, Embase, and Cochrane Library C...

Findings from observational studies have suggested a possible relation between Ca and breast cancer risk. However, the results of these studies are inconclusive, and the dose-response relationship between Ca intake and risk of breast cancer remains to be determined. A meta-analysis of prospective studies was conducted to address these issues. PubMed and Embase databases were searched for releva...

BACKGROUND This paper studies the effect of mosquito abundance and malaria incidence in the last 3 weeks, and their interaction, on the hazard of time to malaria in a previously studied cohort of children in Ethiopia. METHODS We model the mosquito abundance and time to malaria data jointly in a Bayesian framework. RESULTS We found that the interaction of mosquito abundance and incidence pla...