Benedito Galvão Benze

Variations in dynamic knee valgus and gluteus medius onset timing in non-athletic females related to hormonal changes during the menstrual cycle ☆

It has been suggested that activities of daily living could contribute to the occurrence of ACL injury in females. Currently, no studies have focused on the lower extremity behavior of a non-athletic population to compare or understand the lower extremity adeptness towards daily movements that mimic athletic tasks. Our hypothesis was that increased knee valgus angles would occur during the late follicular phase of the menstrual cycle accompanied by different onset timing of the gluteus medius muscle. In a controlled laboratory study, 23 non-athletic collegiate females participated and 15 subjects comprised the final sample for statistical analysis. Subjects performed a single leg drop landing maneuver while 3-D knee kinematics and gluteus medius muscle onset timing were assessed throughout three distinct phases of the menstrual cycle, confirmed by blood hormone analysis. In general, knee valgus angles were significantly less in the luteal phase compared to both follicular phases (p<0.005), while differences were not observed for gluteus medius onset timing (p=0.936). As a decreased knee joint valgus angle was observed during the luteal phase, it was hypothesized that the hormone progesterone could significantly influence knee kinematics during a dynamic task. However, such influence was not observed for gluteus medius EMG onset timing as a significant correlation between gluteus medius onset timing and knee valgus angle could not be determined.

Relação entre alterações climáticas e fatores determinantes da mortalidade de idosos no município de São Carlos (SP) em um período de dez anos

The aim of this study was to identify the correlation between the number of deaths of elderly people and climate change in the district of Sao Carlos (SP) over a period of 10 years (1997-2006). Records of deaths were obtained from DATASUS for people aged over 60 who died between 1997 and 2006 in Sao Carlos. The average monthly maximum and minimum temperature data and relative air humidity in Sao Carlos were provided by the National Institute of Meteorology. The mortality coefficient of the district was calculated by gender and age and the resulting data were analyzed using t test, one-way ANOVA, the Bonferroni test and the Pearson correlation coefficient test. There were 8,304 deaths which predominantly occurred among males aged over 80, and diseases of the circulatory system were the main cause of death. There was a positive correlation between mortality by infectious disease and minimum humidity, and a negative correlation between mortality by infectious diseases and minimum temperatures, between mortality caused by respiratory disease and minimum humidity, between mortality caused by endocrine disease and minimum and maximum temperature. Thereby, it was possible to conclude that there was a correlation between climate change and mortality among elderly individuals in Sao Carlos.

Comparação do equilíbrio corporal de mulheres a partir da meia-idade obesas e não-obesas

Este e um estudo comparativo do efeito da obesidade no equilibrio estatico e dinâmico de mulheres a partir da meia-idade. A amostra foi composta por mulheres acima de 50 anos (n=80), distribuidas segundo o indice de massa corporal em grupo nao-obeso (n=45) e obeso (n=35), com medias de idade equivalentes. Foram avaliadas quanto a gordura corporal por bioimpedância e quanto ao equilibrio pelos testes de apoio unipodal (TAU) e de velocidade maxima de andar (VMA). Os dados foram tratados estatisticamente. No TAU em ambos os membros inferiores o grupo nao-obeso permaneceu por mais tempo na posicao - 25,6 segundos (s) no membro direito e 24,9 s no esquerdo - do que o grupo obeso (19,0 s no direito e 17,5 s no esquerdo, p<0,01). No VMA o grupo obeso apresentou marcha mais lenta e velocidade media menor quando comparado ao grupo nao obeso (p<0,027). No grupo nao-obeso, verificaram-se correlacoes moderadas entre a gordura corporal e o equilibrio estatico e dinâmico; no grupo obeso nao foram encontradas correlacoes entre a a gordura corporal e a maioria das variaveis de equilibrio. Os resultados evidenciam que a obesidade contribui para o pior desempenho no equilibrio de mulheres de meia-idade e idosas.

A DISTRIBUTION FOR THE SERVICE MODEL

In this paper, we propose a distribution that describes a specific system. The system has a heavy traffic, a fast service and the service rate depends on state of the system. This distribution we call the Maximum-Conway-Maxwell-Poisson-exponential distribution, denoted by MAXCOMPE distribution. The MAXCOMPE distribution is obtained by compound distributions in which we use the zero truncated Conway-Maxwell-Poisson distribution and the exponential distribution. This distribution has adjustment mechanism in order to re-establish the equilibrium of the system when the traffic flow increases and that is described by variations of the pressure parameter. Because of this, the MAXCOMPE distribution contains sub-models, such as, the Maximum-geometric-exponential distribution, the Maximum-Poisson-exponential distribution and the Maximum-Bernoulli-exponential distribution. The properties of the proposed distribution are discussed, including formal proof of its density function and explicit algebraic formulas for their reliability function and moments. The parameter estimation is based on the usual maximum likelihood method. Simulated and real data are shown to illustrate the applicability of the model.