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Biomedical subjects

D W Kaufman

Publications and source records attributed to D W Kaufman.

At least 91 records · Page 5Linked to original sources
PubMed1982

Breast cancer and alcoholic-beverage consumption.

The relation between breast cancer and alcoholic-beverage consumption was evaluated in a case-control study of 1152 women with breast cancer and two groups of control women-519 with endometrial or ovarian cancer, and 2702 with non-malignant disorders. The relative-risk estimate of breast cancer, with allowance for all potential distorting factors, for women who had ever drunk alcoholic beverages relative to those who had never drunk was 1.4 (95% confidence interval, 1.0-2.0) when the comparison group was the group with endometrial or ovarian cancer and 1.9 (1.5-2.4) when the controls who had non-malignant disorders were the comparison group. The association was evident for beer, wine, and spirits. The association was not explained by any of the major known risk factors for breast cancer, but we had no information on dietary factors. The findings support the hypothesis that alcohol consumption, or related dietary factors, increases the risk of breast cancer.

Adult↗
PubMed1982

Aspirin and myocardial infarction in young women.

To assess whether aspirin reduces the risk of a first myocardial infarction (MI) in young women, we evaluated data from a case-control study among women less than 50 years of age without a prior MI: 48 of 551 cases of MI and 67 of 896 hospital controls had taken aspirin regularly for at least 12 weeks immediately before admission. The relative risk estimate was 0.8 upon allowance for confounding factors but it was not statistically significant (95 per cent confidence interval, 0.5-1.4). These data alone do not provide evidence of protection by aspirin against a first infarction in young women.

Adult↗
PubMed1981

Risk of myocardial infarction in relation to current and discontinued use of oral contraceptives.

In a hospital-based case-control study, we evaluated the rate of myocardial infarction in relation to discontinued as well as current use of oral contraceptives. We compared 556 women with infarction, 25 to 49 years old, with 2036 age-matched control subjects. For current users, the rate-ratio estimate was 3.5 (95 per cent confidence limits, 2.2 to 5.5). For past users 40 to 49 years of age, the magnitude of the rate ratio was related to the duration of use: for total durations of past use of less than five years, five to nine years, and 10 or more years, respectively, the rate-ratio estimates (with 95 per cent confidence limits) were 1.0 (0.8 and 1.4), 1.6 (1.1 and 2.5), and 2.5 (1.5 and 4.1). This trend was statistically significant (P less than 0.01). The findings suggest that an effect on the risk of myocardial infarction persists after the discontinuation of long-term use of oral contraceptives.

Adult↗
PubMed1981

Case-control studies on the acute effects of coffee upon the risk of myocardial infarction: problems in the selection of a hospital control series.

In the course of evaluating the acute effect of caffeine-containing coffee on the risk of myocardial infarction (MI) among women 30-49 years of age, this study noted appreciable differences in coffee consumption among hospital patients admitted for illnesses not known to be related to coffee use. Among these potential controls, the coffee consumption of patients who had been compelled to hospital by conditions having an acute onset, such as fractures ("acute condition controls") was compared with that of patients admitted for chronic disorders ("chronic condition controls"). The proportion of drinkers of caffeine-containing coffee among 980 acute condition controls (65%) was significantly greater than that among 5835 chronic condition controls (58%) (p less than 0.01); by contrast, the proportion of drinkers of decaffeinated coffee was significantly greater among chronic condition controls (22%) than among acute condition controls (18%) (p less than 0.01). With regard to caffeine-containing coffee, other findings were that the frequency of drinking decreased with increasing contact with medical care in the year before admission; that patients who changed their consumption after discharge tended to give up coffee; and that the proportion of drinkers was greater among women in the community than among the hospital patients. These results suggest that relatively long-standing illness influences against drinking caffeine-containing coffee among women 30-49 years of age. They also suggest that there is an opportunity for overestimation of the relative risk of MI among coffee drinkers in hospital-based studies that use chronic condition controls.

Acute Disease↗
PubMed1981

Alcoholic beverages and myocardial infarction in young women.

Moderate alcohol consumption has been associated with a reduction in the risk of myocardial infarction (MI) in men. To evaluate this relation in young women, we studied 513 patients with first infarctions and 918 hospital controls, all of whom were less than 50 years of age. The estimated relative risk of MI for current drinkers, after allowance for potential confounding factors, was 0.7 (95 per cent confidence interval. 0.5 - 1.0), and the apparent reduction in risk was strongest for women drank wine. There was no evidence of an effect among ex-drinkers.

Adult↗
PubMed1980

Inheritance and expression of Esterase-1 allozymes in Peromyscus leucopus.

We analyzed inheritance of 5 Es-1 alleles in P leucopus and found them to be co-dominant and segregating from a single autosomal locus, thereby verifying assumptions of Mendelian inheritance implicit in field data. We also described an allele that is 'silent' in hemolysate, but is active in liver extract.

Animals↗
PubMed1980

Use of thyroid supplements in relation to the risk of breast cancer.

We conducted a case-control study to determine whether the use of thyroid supplements increases the risk of breast cancer. We compared 659 women with breast cancer and 1,719 control subjects. The rates of use of thyroid supplements were 9.1% and 8.7%, respectively (age-standardized rate ratio, 1.0; 95% confidence interval, 0.7 to 1.3). There was no evidence of an association when women known to be at increased risk for breast cancer (eg, nulliparae) were examined, even when thyroid supplements were taken for more than 15 years. Overall, there were no grounds to suggest that the long-term use of thyroid supplements increases the risk of breast cancer.

Adult↗
PubMed1980

Thiazides and acute cholecystitis.

An association between acute cholecystitis and the use of thiazide-containing drugs was observed during routine screening of data from a case-control drug-surveillance program. Evaluation of this relation among 419 patients with acute cholecystitis and 1676 control patients yielded a relative risk estimate of 2.0 for subjects who had used thiazides in the month before admission, as compared with subjects who had never used these drugs (95 per cent confidence interval, 1.4 to 2.7). There was a significant trend of increasing relative risk with increasing duration of use (P < 0.01), and the estimate for subjects who had used thiazides for five or more years was 2.9. The association was not explained by confounding due to the indications for thiazide use, such as hypertension, or other factors, such as obesity or the use of other drugs. No single epidemiologic study can eliminate chance or bias as an explanation for an association; the relation found here should be regarded as a hypothesis that requires independent confirmation.

Acute Disease↗
PubMed1980

Recent and past use of conjugated estrogens in relation to adenocarcinoma of the endometrium.

It has been suggested that the reported association between estrogen use and endometrial cancer may have been biased because estrogens provoke uterine bleeding in women with otherwise asymptomatic disease. To evaluate this hypothesis we compared 149 patients with endometrial cancer and 402 control subjects with other conditions with reference to the time when they had last used conjugated estrogens. In women who had last used conjugated estrogens two or more years previously and who had taken them for at least five years, the rate-ratio estimate was 3.3 (95 per cent confidence interval, 1.4 to 8.0) relative to women who had never used them. Uterine bleeding, and hence the diagnosis of otherwise asymptomatic cancer, cannot be attributed to estrogen use that ceased in the distant past. Our results suggest that such use has a residual effect on the risk of endometrial cancer; this effect is not accounted for by biased selection of cases according to estrogen use.

Adenocarcinoma↗
PubMed1980

Intrauterine contraceptive device use and pelvic inflammatory disease.

We examined the relationship between use of IUD's and PID, based on 44 women who were admitted to hospitals with first episodes of PID and 259 hospital control subjects. All the women used either IUD's or oral contraceptives. The age-adjusted relative risk for those using IUD's at the time of admission was 6.5 (95% confidence interval, 3.2 to 13.0). The association remained when several variables, and particularly parity, were taken into account. There was a suggestion that users who had had an IUD in place for at least 5 years had a higher risk of PID than did users of shorter duration. The data also suggest that copper-containing IUD's may be safer than other devices.

Adult↗
PubMed1980

Cigarette smoking in relation to the risk of myocardial infarction in young women. Modifying influence of age and predisposing factors.

We evaluated the relation between myocardial infarction (MI) and cigarette smoking in women 30 to 49 years of age. Among 318 women who had survived recent first infarctions and 1272 age-matched controls, the proportions of cigarette smokers were 83% and 54%, respectively (p < 0.001). The estimated relative risk rose progressively with amount smoked: compared with women who had never smoked, the estimate was 1.8 for smokers of less than 15 cigarettes per day and 6.9 for smokers of 35 or more cigarettes per day. At each level of smoking, the relative increase in risk was greater at younger ages and among those not apparently predisposed from other factors. Although MI is a rare disease in young women, our data indicate that the risks faced by those who smoke heavily are appreciable.

Adult↗
PubMed1980

Coffee drinking and myocardial infarction in young women.

The effect of consumption of caffeine-containing coffee on the risk of myocardial infarction in women 30-49 years of age was investigated. In this study 487 patients with first infarctions were compared with 980 controls whose admissions were for acute emergencies. Overall and in various subgroups, coffee drinking and myocardial infarction were weakly and not significantly associated: the overall estimated relative risk for women drinking at least five cups daily, compared with women drinking none, was 1.4 after control for all identified potential confounding factors (95% confidence interval, 1.0-1.9). Also, the frequency of coffee drinking was greater among controls, whose admissions were for acute emergencies, than among other patients without myocardial infarction, most of whom had been admitted for chronic conditions. If patients of the latter type tend to avoid coffee, then their inclusion in the control series of previous hospital-based studies may have led to overestimation of the magnitude of the association between coffee and myocardial infarction.

Acute Disease↗
PubMed1980

Factors associated with oral contraceptive use.

We studied factors associated with oral contraceptive (OC) use among 1,855 premenopausal women who were admitted to hospital with conditions unrelated to OC use. Among this group, 15 per cent reported having used OCs within the preceding year and 35 per cent reported having last used them more than a year previously. A higher estrogenic dose (more than 60 micrograms) was reported by past users; the relationship of numerous other variables to past and present OC use is reported.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1980

Cigarette smoking and age at natural menopause.

In a cohort of 656 naturally postmenopausal women who were interviewed at age 60 to 69 years, and was had reached their menopause between the ages of 35 and 59 years, the mean age at menopause declined with increasing number of cigarettes smoked, from 49.4 years of age among women who had never smoked to 47.6 years of age among women who smoked at least 15 cigarettes per day (p less than 0.02). The relationship was not attributable to the onset of menopause inducing women to take up smoking.

Adult↗
PubMed1979

Oral-contraceptive use in relation to myocardial infarction.

The effect of oral-contraceptive use on the risk of myocardial infarction and, in particular, the possible accentuation of that effect by cigarette smoking, was investigated in 234 premenopausal women with a first infarction and 1742 hospital controls. The overall rate ratio estimate of acute myocardial infarction for women who had used oral contraceptives in the preceding month was 4.0 (95% confidence interval, 2.5--6.3). Women who smoked heavily and used oral contraceptives had a point estimate of 39 (lower two-sided 95% confidence limit, 22) compared with those who did neither. This value was appreciably larger than could be accounted for by the separate effects of cigarettes and oral contraceptives, and this suggests a considerable accentuation by cigarette smoking of the effect of oral contraceptive use on myocardial infarction.

Acute Disease↗
PubMed1979

Patterns and determinants of conjugated estrogen use.

In view of the carcinogenic potential and widespread use of conjugated estrogens (CEs), this study evaluated patterns and determinants of oral ambulatory CE use. Among 1273 women 30 to 69 years of age interviewed in Greater-Boston hospitals, there were 161 (13%) ever-users of CEs; 88 (7%) had used the drug within the preceding year. The median duration of use was three years. Prominent determinants of use were age, menopause and history of menopausal symptoms. Physician prescription survey data from an independent source suggest that CE use has been common throughout the United States, and may have declined after the reports linking CEs to endometrial cancer were published in 1975. If CE use indeed increases the risk of endometrial cancer some fivefold, an important public health problem exists.

Adult↗
PubMed1978

Relation of cigarette smoking to myocardial infarction in young women.

To examine the relation between myocardial infarction and cigarette smoking in young women, we investigated the smoking habits of women under the age of 50 who had survived a recent myocardial infarction. They had not been using oral contraceptives, and other identifiable risk factors were excluded. Among 55 such women and 220 control matched for age and area of residence, the proportions of cigarette smokers were 89 per cent and 55 per cent respectively (P less than 0.001). A dose-response relation was evident; among women smoking 35 or more cigarettes per day the rate of myocardial infarction was estimated to be some 20-fold higher than among those who had never smoked. This study demonstrates that cigarette smoking is a risk factor for myocardial infarction in young women who are otherwise apparently healthy.

Adult↗