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Researchers Looking At Climate Change, Culture To Predict Land Abandonment In Russia
Kirsten de Beurs, an assistant geography professor in Virginia Tech"s College of Natural Res, has received a NASA grant to direct a large international land abandonment study in Russia with Grigory Ioffe of Radford University, Geoffrey Henebry of South Dakota State University, and in-country collaborator Tatyana Nefedova.
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Blogs Comment On Supreme Court Pregnancy Leave Ruling, Obama's Notre Dame Speech, Other Topics
The following summarizes selected women"s health-related blog entries. ~ "Peaceful Revolution: Another Blow to Women," Debra Ness, Huffington Post blogs: The Supreme Court"s ruling this week in AT&T Corp. v. Hulteen "dealt a serious and painful blow to working women and the families who rely on their retirement benefits," Ness, president of the National Partnership for Women and Families, writes. The ruling "affects a limited number of people," and it "would be easy to ignore them -- easy, but terribly wrong," Ness continues. "This ruling sends a terrible message about whether discrimination will bring penalties and costs, and whether the courts will address the ongoing effects of prior discrimination," she writes. Ness notes that the ruling "couldn"t come at a worse time," adding, "In today"s grim economic climate, women and their families cannot afford to see their retirement benefits kept lower by discriminatory workplace policies that should have been remedied decades ago." Ness writes that it is "sobering that, at a time when negative stereotypes about pregnant women clearly persist, we have a Supreme Court that doesn"t stand firm for equal rights and equal opportunity." She concludes, "It"s a good reminder of what"s at stake with the Supreme Court nomination President Obama is about to make" (Ness, Huffington Post blogs, 5/21).~ "This Week in Religion and Politics," Sarah Posner, American Prospect"s "The FundamentaList": When "viewed in the context of Obama"s entire faith-based outreach project, the events" surrounding the University of Notre Dame"s commencement ceremony "highlighted how he has embraced traditionalist, conservative religion -- to the detriment of sexual and reproductive justice," Posner writes. President Obama has "focused his outreach efforts" to reduce the need for abortion "on more conservative religious groups" and "claims to honor their position on moral issues," Posner writes. However, "when the dust settles on the Notre Dame controversy, he"ll have to figure out what to do with the policy advice he has sought" from the White House Office on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships, she continues. Posner adds, "How Obama reacts to that advice will demonstrate whether the council is mere window dressing to shore up support from swing constituencies or whether Obama will yield to conservative religious dogma on reproductive-health issues." Meanwhile, Christian conservatives have been "making hay of the findings" of recent Pew and Gallup polls that found more U.S. residents identifying with "pro-life" positions and using the data to argue "that Obama"s position is out of touch with the majority of Americans," Posner writes. However, as bloggers at The Monkey Cage and FiveThirtyEight have pointed out, the polls are not representative of most U.S. residents" views on abortion rights, she writes. "Because of that deception on reproductive rights, it"s more important than ever for the president to lay the moral groundwork for his own position -- not just to recognize the moral qualms of abortion opponents," Posner says (Posner, "The FundamentaList," American Prospect, 5/20).~ "Meghan McCain Preaches What She Practices," Willa Paskin, Slate"s "XX Factor": Meghan McCain -- Sen. John McCain"s (R-Ariz.) daughter -- "acquitted herself quite admirably" on Monday"s episode of Comedy Central"s "The Colbert Report" by "defending her core position" that the Republican Party "needs to appeal to younger voters, and it can only do so by getting liberal on social issues," Paskin writes. On the show, McCain said, "I think it"s not realistic for this generation to be just plain abstinent, I think we need to have sex education with condoms and birth control. ... I would never practice anything I didn"t preach." Paskin also includes a video clip of McCain"s appearance (Paskin, "XX Factor," Slate, 5/19).~ "Skill the Messenger," Cristina Page, Birth Control Watch: Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin"s (R) 18-year-old daughter Bristol -- who was
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The Birth Of A Synapse
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Fragility Fractures And Osteoporosis

Low energy fractures of the proximal humerus indicate osteoporosis and it is important to direct treatment in order to prevent further fractures. Therefore, in this study the authors collected data from 79 patients with fractures of the proximal humerus in order to determine if current guidelines on measurement of bone mineral density at the hip and lumbar spine were adequate to stratify the risk and to guide the treatment of osteoporosis. The World Health Organisation defines osteoporosis by comparing the bone mineral density with that of a gender-matched, healthy young adult reference population. A T-score in women of less than -2.5 at any one of three skeletal sites, the femur, the lumbar spine or the distal radius is the WHO "gold standard" for diagnosing osteoporosis. However, the most common clinical method for assessing the BMD is dual-energy x-ray absorbtiometry of the central skeleton taken at the hip and lumbar spine. Therefore, the authors decided to analyse the sensitivity of these sites and the distal radius in diagnosing osteoporosis in accordance with WHO criteria. The results show that "there is a wide variation in the BMD when measured at different skeletal sites" and that when considering injuries to the upper limb, the BMD measured at the distal radius may represent the risk of osteoporotic humeral fractures better than that measured at the axial skeleton or lower limbs. This is because the distal radius has a large proportion of cancellous bone which is affected to a greater extent by age-related changes in the BMD. Therefore, the authors conclude that "measurement of the BMD at the hip and lumbar spine, if used alone, may underestimate the risk of osteoporosis in the upper limb" and that measurement of the BMD at the radius should not be omitted when osteoporosis is being investigated. Read the full text article. The Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery


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