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Biomedical subjects

J G Gostomzyk

Publications and source records attributed to J G Gostomzyk.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed2001

Haemoglobin adducts from aromatic amines in children in relation to area of residence and exposure to environmental tobacco smoke.

OBJECTIVE: The influence of area of residence on haemoglobin (Hb) adducts of 4-aminobiphenyl (4-ABP), o-, m-, p-toluidine and o-anisidine was investigated in children from three different-sized Bavarian cities - Munich, Augsburg and Eichstätt, with 1,300,000, 250,000 and 13,000 inhabitants, respectively--and was compared with that of exposure to environmental tobacco smoke (ETS). METHODS: Blood samples from Munich (n = 34) and Eichstätt (n = 64) were from children attending the Paediatric Clinic of the Technical University of Munich (TUM) or a practice in Eichstätt, respectively. Blood samples (n = 126) together with urine samples (n = 88) were collected from Augsburg children during school medical examination. Personal data including possible sources of ETS exposure were obtained at the interview. Hb adduct levels were analysed by a gas chromatographic method, using mass spectrometry with selected-ion monitoring. Urinary cotinine was determined by radioimmunoassay. RESULTS: 4-ABP Hb adduct levels in children from Munich were 1.5 and 1.2 times higher than those in children from Eichstätt and Augsburg (P < 0.001). Children from Munich also had significantly higher Hb adduct levels of monocyclic aromatic amines than did children from Eichstätt and, except for o-toluidine, children from Augsburg (P < 0.005). Compared with children from Eichstätt, children from Augsburg had higher Hb adduct levels of 4-ABP, o- and m-toluidine (P < 0.01) but not p-toluidine and o-anisidine. In a multivariate analysis, gender, age and body mass index had no consistent influence on Hb adducts. ETS exposure resulted in a slight, nonsignificant increase in 4-ABP Hb adduct levels. In contrast, adduct levels from monocyclic aromatic amines were consistently decreased in ETS-exposed children (significant for o- and m-toluidine, P<0.05). CONCLUSIONS: Hb adducts from aromatic amines in children were strongly influenced by site of residence, whereas ETS exposure did not significantly increase the adduct levels.JECT

Amines↗
PubMed2001

[Reality and social interpretation of health].

The health profile of a human society depends upon its social development and in particular upon current social and cultural conditions. Health can be defined in many ways; both the pathogenetic and the salutogenetic approaches have their merits. Partial aspects of reality are offered for example by attempts to describe health conditions quantitatively by means of health indicators such als life expectancy, mortality, morbidity, incapacity to work, use made of medical services, and the like. The description of health must encompass the entire range of its objective and subjective experience in its somatic, mental and social dimensions. Epidemiological data must always be supplemented by the results of phenomenological observations to obtain a true picture of the experience of reality and the acceptance of the results by the group under observation.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1998

[The present and future of social medicine].

There have been far-reaching structural changes in medicine in recent years, prompting us to review the social medicine from the time it was first officially included in the medical curriculum of instruction and examination of licensed physicians (1970) to the present day. This subdiscipline focuses on the specific interactions between medicine and society on the one hand and on the structures and functions of public health services in an ever-changing society on the other. Diseases and their sequels are considered to occur on a somatopsychosocial plane. Analysis of the close interaction between health and social factors affords a view on the problem of social inequality and disease or its sequels and the way they are attacked or overcome in our society, from the legal claim for assistance to the complementary help offered by a socially oriented structure of medicine. This is the range of operations of sociomedicine, concentrating mainly on prevention and rehabilitation. Epidemiological analysis is one aspect, individual social medical expertising another, both of them being important instruments in affording help within the framework of statutory health insurance allowances (sickness insurance, pension fund, medical care insurance, unemployment insurance and the like). In the future, increasing importance will be attached by reflecting the social consequences of developments in medicine and vice versa. This, in turn, will have an influence on the scientific and social approaches practised by social medicine.

Curriculum↗
PubMed1998

[Social medicine as a paradigm for innovative developments in public health].

The integration of national health authorities into the regional administrative departments in Bavaria at January 1st 1997 offers the chance to a further, demand-oriented development of the tasks of public health service, according to the situation of requirements of state and communes. Each layer of action educes a separate view on problems. National concern of public health care is above all health protection, medical supervision and the composition of special medical estimates. Public health care developed in communal responsibility first and foremost serves provisions for existence of citizens. Looking after national concerns of public health in a figurative sphere of activity, public health care has ist main focus in the fields of health and social issues (health education and assistance, social-compensatory tasks), prevention and health promotion. Today in research and teaching at universities these tasks are represented by social medicine and the public health research associations. They are elaborating the specialized and the orientation-related knowledge. The public health assistance institutions as well as prevention and health promotion obtaining increasing importance in our health service, developments are necessary that enable the public health service in Bavaria to fulfill these communal tasks in the future.

Forecasting↗