BackgroundBurnout syndrome is an important health problem that affects many professionals and must be addressed globally, with both organizational measures and personal interventions. Burnout of health professionals can be prevented in order to avoid personal, familial, and social consequences, as well as repercussions for patients.Methods/designThis work describes a protocol for a controlled, pragmatic, randomized clinical trial in 2 parallel groups: intervention and control. All health professionals from 7 health care centers will form the intervention group, and all health professionals from 7 different health care centers will form the control group. The intervention group will receive 16 hours of training at their work place. The Maslach's burnout inventory, the Cuestionario de Desgaste Profesional Médico or the Cuestionario de Desgaste Profesional de Enfermería, and the 28-item Goldberg's General Health Questionnaire, validated for our setting, will be used as measurement tools. Change in the average scores from the Maslach's burnout inventory emotional exhaustion scale will be compared between the intervention and control groups, measured as intention-to-treat, and the intervention will be considered effective if a minimum decrease of 20% is achieved.DiscussionDue to the deleterious consequences of burnout syndrome for people suffering from it and for the organization where they work, it is necessary to evaluate the effectiveness of certain interventions for its prevention. Organizational measures are important for preventing burnout syndrome, but so is providing professionals with coping strategies, as this group intervention intends to do.Trial registrationClinicalTrials.gov processed this record on June 10, 2013. ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT01870154.

En este artículo presentamos parte de los resultados de una investigación más amplia cuyo principal objetivo es indagar sobre las estrategias y representaciones que utilizan alumnos de quinto de educación primaria cuando abordan una tarea de generalización basada en un ejemplo genérico. Recogimos información en el aula habitual de un grupo de 20 alumnos del citado curso, mediante una tarea escrita constituida por diez cuestiones que involucran relaciones funcionales entre dos variables. En este artículo mostramos el análisis y resultados de las respuestas a cuatro de esas cuestiones. Destacamos la diversidad de representaciones utilizadas, el uso de diferentes patrones como estrategia más frecuente, y las evidencias obtenidas de la capacidad de generalización de los escolares de quinto de educación primaria.

Our aim was to analyze the psychometric properties of the Mini-Mental State Examination-37 using the Rasch Model (RM) in order to identify the cognitive domains that optimize detection of dementia in the Spanish population. All participants (n = 3955) were part of the NEDICES (Neurological Disorders in Central Spain) cohort study designed to detect dementia in persons aged 65 years and older. Clinical diagnosis of dementia (n = 178) was established by consensus of expert neurologists according to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV) criteria. Results indicate that the items on the MMSE-37 have a good fit with the assumptions of the RM. None of the items on the MMSE-37 exhibits differential item functioning in relation to the groups. The items that assess orientation, attention, and language (repetition and comprehension) are those that best enable us to discriminate between the group with dementia and the group without dementia. The implications of the education and other sociodemographic characteristics of the population are discussed.

The estimated prevalence of dementia is similar to that found in population-based studies. Analysing consumption of specific dementia drugs can be a reliable and inexpensive means of updating prevalence data periodically and helping rationalise healthcare resources.

Milk and dairy (M&D) is a longstanding human food with widespread use. Many studies showed the preventive capacity of M&D in several human health disorders, but its utility in others is under discussion. Aging has been associated to elderly cognitive decline including dementia-Alzheimer syndrome (Dem-AD). The absence of a therapy to impede or postpone Dem-AD determines the need for its prevention, including nutritional factors. To evaluate the preventive capacity of M&D consumption in elderly Dem-AD we performed a systematic review in the main biomedical databases and information resources, but we present this study as a narrative review to discuss better the complexity of this subject. The elderly Dem-AD has a long pre-symptomatic period and the M&D intake has a widespread use. These determinants and the quality flaws of published studies impeach us to answer whether M&D consumption is preventive for Dem-AD. Moreover, two long Japanese cohorts suggest that M&D intake could prevent Dem-AD. Prospective cohorts beginning in midlife (or early life) could answer this question in the future.

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BackgroundThe Neurological Disorders in Central Spain, second survey (NEDICES-2) is a population-based, closed-cohort study that will include over 8000 subjects aged ≥55 years. It will also include a biobank.ObjectiveThe objective of this study was to evaluate all major aspects of the NEDICES-2 (methods, database, screening instruments, and questionnaires, as well as interexpert rating of the neurological diagnoses) in each one of the planned areas (all of them in central Spain) and to test the possibility of obtaining biological samples from each participant.MethodsA selection of patients and participants of the planned NEDICES-2 underwent face-to-face interviews including a comprehensive questionnaire on demographics, current medications, medical conditions, and lifestyle habits. Biological samples (blood, saliva, urine, and hair) were also obtained. Furthermore, every participant was examined by a neurologist.ResultsIn this pilot study, 567 study participants were enrolled (196 from hospitals and 371 from primary care physician lists). Of these 567, 310 completed all study procedures (questionnaires and the neurological evaluation). The study was time-consuming for several primary care physicians. Hence, a few primary care physicians from some areas refused to participate, which led to a reconfiguration of study areas. In addition, the central biobank needed to be supplemented by the biobanks of local Spanish National Health System hospitals.ConclusionsPopulation-based epidemiological surveys, such as the NEDICES-2, require a pilot study to evaluate the feasibility of all aspects of a future field study (population selection, methods and instruments to be used, neurological diagnosis agreement, and data collection).