Monumental times: pasts, presents and futures in the prehistoric construction projects of northern and western Europe

We analyzed time trends in incidence of and mortality from malignant cutaneous melanoma in European populations since 1953. Data were extracted from the EUROCIM database of incidence data from 165 cancer registries. Mortality data were derived from the WHO database. During the 1990s, incidence rates were by far highest in northern and western Europe, whereas mortality was higher in males in eastern and southern Europe. Melanoma rates have been rising steadily, albeit with substantial geographic variation. In northern Europe, a deceleration in these trends occurred recently in persons aged under 70. Joinpoint analyses indicated that changes in these trends took place in the early 1980s. In western Europe, mortality rates have also recently leveled off [estimated annual percentage change (EAPC) from -13.6% (n.s.) to 3.3%], whereas in eastern and southern Europe both incidence and mortality rates are still increasing [incidence EAPCs 2.3-8.9%, mortality EAPCs -1.8% (n.s.) to 7.2%]. Models including the effects of age, period and birth cohort were required to adequately describe the rising incidence trends in most European populations, with a few exceptions. Time trends in mortality were adequately summarized on fitting either an age-cohort model (with the leveling off of rates starting in birth cohorts between 1930 and 1940) or an age-period-cohort model. The most plausible explanations for the deceleration or decline in the incidence and mortality trends in recent years in northern (and to a lesser extent western) Europe are earlier detection and more frequent excision of pigmented lesions and a growing public awareness of the dangers of excessive sunbathing.

We use cross-national, longitudinal data to explore the impact of educational level on changes in health outcomes among Europeans aged over 50. Our analyses are performed separately for Northern, Western and Southern Europe, as these regions broadly represent different welfare state regimes. We find that low education is associated with higher incident events — over a two-year period — of poor health, chronic diseases and disability, but it is less consistently associated with new events of long-standing illness. Net of behavioural risk factors, educational effects are more consistent in Western and Southern Europe than in the Nordic welfare states. In Northern Europe, lower education is associated with less financial and employment disadvantage than in Southern or Western Europe. After controlling for educational differences in these factors, effects of educational level on health deterioration remain significant for most outcomes in Western and Southern Europe, whereas they are weaker and non-significant after adjustment in Northern Europe.

Association of lifelong occupation and educational level with subclinical atherosclerosis in different European regions. Results from the IMPROVE study

This paper examines variability in surface climate and the relationship with two circulation indices using recently produced 200–250 year long European daily and monthly climatic series. Assessments are made of the influence of circulation indices (zonal over western Europe and average pressure over central Europe) on regional temperature, precipitation and drought series for northern and central Europe. Changes in the circulation are shown to be very important during the winter in northern Europe, but only over western and central Europe in summer. Circulation indices in winter, however, only explain up to 25% of surface-climate variability and, except for the British Isles, do not explain any decadal and longer timescale variability in summer. Extreme temperatures and growing-season and frost-season durations and degree-day series are calcu lated for four sites (Central England, Stockholm, Uppsala and St. Petersburg). Degree-day counts are shown to be very strongly correlated (r > 0.9) to average extended summer (‘growing’ season, May to September) and extended winter (‘frost’ season, October to April) temperatures. Durations of the growing and frost seasons are only weakly correlated (r ~ 0.2–0.4) with the appropriate extended seasonal temperatures or degree-day counts. Warmer growing/frost seasons, therefore, need not necessarily be longer/shorter. Counts of extremely warm days in each year are more highly correlated with the growing-season mean temperature than with coldseason temperature. Similarly, counts of extremely cold days in each year are more highly correlated with cold-season temperature than with growing-season temperature. Both the growing-season temperature and the corresponding degree-day counts clearly show warmer temperatures over all series in Fennoscandia before 1860. Over central Europe, and for the Central England temperature series, growing seasons now are of similar warmth to those before 1860. Annually averaged temperatures across the three regions indicate long-term warming which is, however, almost entirely the result of warming during the October to April period.

The carrot fly (Psila rosae) is a major pest of umbelliferous crops, particularly in carrot production. This pest is present in temperate regions of Northern and Western Europe and also in the warm and dry climate of Central and Southern Europe. Currently, control strategies are limited and there may be a bottleneck of pest control solutions in the future. In practice, growers in the Netherlands mainly rely on a commercial, supervised control system which monitors the carrot fly population pressure. Possibilities to control the carrot fly after exceeding an economical threshold are reduced due to a lack of efficient chemical insecticides. Another option is the use of seed treatment to protect the carrots against the larvae developed from the first flight of the carrot flies for 12–14 weeks after sowing. The state of the art of the carrot fly pest and control possibilities are hereby discussed. Bottlenecks in control of carrot flies are highlighted and described.

Despite a well-established system of community lands, the current lack of spatial data on community territories impacts how Indigenous peoples and local communities (IPs and LCs) in Europe are included in global discussions about land rights recognition and their critical role in land stewardship. We present an aggregation of spatial data for 41 Mha of recognized IPs and LCs lands in Western and Northern Europe, including data that were not previously included in global datasets. We show that governments recognize IPs and LCs lands through a diversity of tenure systems, which are managed under a variety of governance arrangements, including community, State, and shared governance. IPs and LCs contribute important services to people, underscoring their potential role in the climate and conservation needs of Europe.

The article presents and analyzes the training manual “Hydrography and Water Resources of Europe”, published by the professor Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv V.K. Khilchevskyi in 2023. The first training manual k published in Ukraine on this topic briefly outlines the basics of EU water policy, characterizes rivers, lakes and reservoirs on a regional basis (UN geoscheme – Northern, Western, Southern and Eastern Europe), as well as seas washing the shores of Europe. The problems of global water resources are considered, the ranking of European countries in terms of renewable water resources and the index of water resource exploitation is given. In the context of all directions, questions on Ukraine were considered. In Europe, hydrographic surveys are of great importance for water management. In particular, according to the European Union Water Framework Directive (WFD) adopted in 2000, the hydrographic zoning of countries’ territories is an important step for creating river basin management plans in the implementation of water policy. This approach is used by both EU member states and other European countries that have taken the provisions of the EU WFD as the basis for their activities. Water resources in a broad sense are all the waters of the hydrosphere, including the waters of the oceans and seas, rivers and lakes, groundwater, and glaciers. In practice, both in Europe and in many countries of the world, the concept of “water resources” is interpreted in a narrower sense – these are fresh surface and groundwater that are in water bodies and are used or can be used by humans. Water resources are managed according to the basin principle, but water resources are taken into account within individual countries. For. structuring the presentation of the material in this tutorial, the division of Europe into subregions according to the UN geoscheme was chosen, according to which 4 subregions are distinguished: Northern Europe; Western Europe; Southern Europe; Eastern Europe – a total of 44 countries whose capitals are located in this part of the world. But geopolitically, Europe includes 50 sovereign states. Their territory is within the framework of the general definition of Europe, they have membership in international European organizations. The content of the manual is structured into four parts: I – Physical-geographical and economic-geographical characteristics of Europe; II – EU Environmental and Water Policy; ІІІ – Hydrography; IV – Water resources. The training manual is intended for students enrolled in the educational program “Management and Ecology of Water Resources”, specialty 103 “Earth Sciences”. It can also be useful for students of other educational programs of specialties 103 “Earth Sciences” and 106 “Geography”, which study water resources.

Diabetes prevalence is steadily increasing in Europe. This study aims to compare diabetes prevalence and the existence of related socioeconomic inequalities between 19 European countries. Using data from The European Social Survey (ESS), there were 31,178 participants (53.06% women) aged 25+ years from Austria, Belgium, Czechia, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Lithuania, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. Education level and employment were used as indicators of socioeconomic inequalities. Logistic regression analyses were calculated to predict diabetes by controlling for age and gender. Differences in the effect size of education on diabetes prevalence between countries were then further examined. Overall diabetes prevalence in Europe was reported to be 6.12%, and was higher in participants from Eastern and Southern Europe than in Northern and Western Europe. Additionally, men in Western and Northern Europe had a higher risk of reporting having diabetes compared to women. Employment was identified as a protective factor against diabetes development across all European regions. Moreover, individuals with a tertiary level of education had a lower risk of reporting having diabetes in most European regions except for the Eastern region. Participants with lower education levels and the unemployed ones had a higher chance of reporting having diabetes. This was found across all European regions except for some countries from the Eastern region.

BackgroundIn addition to low patterns of fertility experienced in the last 15 years, lifetime childlessness is increasing in Europe. It is now expected that between 10–20% of women born in...

Status of infection control policies and organisation in European hospitals, 2001: the ARPAC study

Summary. The glass of Gallo‐roman origin and that considered as coming from the several centuries after the disintegration of the Roman empire has much the same composition in examples found in northern and western Europe. The components calcium oxide and alumina (CaO and Al2O3) increase or decrease together. Compositional variation between different samples from this geographic area are not much greater than those at a single site of manufacture. Contamination during the manufacture process is unlikely to account for the CaO and Al2O3 contents in glass from this period according to analyses of glass adhering to crucibles or fusion pots. CaO and Al2O3 were apparently added intentionally to the glass composition. A slight tendency to an increase in these oxides is accompanied by a decrease in Na2O content which might be due to a loss through volatilization during re‐workings. Such a trend is apparent in the eighth to ninth century samples. The remarkably constant composition of glass found in a wide area for objects produced over a long period of time suggests that a limited number of production sites existed for either the raw materials or the confection of raw glass which was fashioned at various other sites.

Electronic health records and data exchange in the WHO European region: A subregional analysis of achievements, challenges, and prospects

To explore preferences in the management of patients with newly diagnosed high-risk prostate cancer (PCa) among urologists in Europe through a web-based survey. A web-based survey was conducted between 15 August and 15 September 2013 by members of the Prostate Cancer Working Group of the Young Academic Urologists Working Party of the European Association of Urology (EAU). A specific, 29-item multiple-choice questionnaire covering the whole spectrum of diagnosis, staging and treatment of high-risk PCa was e-mailed to all urologists included in the mailing list of EAU members. Europe was divided into four geographical regions: Central-Eastern Europe (CEE), Northern Europe (NE), Southern Europe (SE) and Western Europe (WE). Descriptive statistics were used. Differences among sample segments were obtained from a z-test compared with the total sample. Of the 12,850 invited EAU members, 585 urologists practising in Europe completed the survey. High-risk PCa was defined as serum PSA ≥20 ng/mL or clinical stage ≥ T3 or biopsy Gleason score ≥ 8 by 67% of responders, without significant geographical variations. The preferred single-imaging examinations for staging were bone scan (74%, 81% in WE and 70% in SE; P = 0.02 for both), magnetic resonance imaging (53%, 72% in WE and 40% in SE; P = 0.02 and P = 0.01, respectively) and computed tomography (45%, 60% in SE and 23% in WE; P = 0.01 for both). Pre-treatment predictive tools were routinely used by 62% of the urologists, without significant geographical variations. The preferred treatment was radical prostatectomy as the initial step of a multiple-treatment approach (60%, 40% in NE and 70% in CEE; P = 0.02 and P < 0.01, respectively), followed by external beam radiation therapy with androgen deprivation therapy (29%, 45% in NE and 20% in CEE; P = 0.01 and P = 0.02, respectively), and radical prostatectomy as monotherapy (4%, 7% in WE; P = 0.04). When surgery was performed, the open retropubic approach was the most popular (58%, 74% in CEE, 37% in NE; P < 0.01 for both). Pelvic lymph node dissection was performed by 96% of urologists, equally split between a standard and extended template. There was no consensus on the definition of disease recurrence after primary treatment, and much heterogeneity in the administration of adjuvant and salvage treatments. With the limitation of a low response rate, the present study is the first survey evaluating preferences in the management of high-risk PCa among urologists in Europe. Although the definition of high-risk PCa was fairly uniform, wide variations in patterns of primary and adjuvant/salvage treatments were observed. These differences might translate into variations in quality of care with a possible impact on ultimate oncological outcome.

The public perception of dermatology has been poorly investigated in Europe. To determine the general public's perception of dermatologists in Europe. This multinational, cross-sectional study was conducted within the framework of the EADV population-based survey on the 'Burden of skin diseases in Europe'. Data were collected using a web-based online survey on a representative sample of the general populations aged 18 years or more of 27 European countries. Proportional quota sampling with replacement design was used for each country. A total of 44,689 adult participants responded to the questionnaire, of whom 18,004 visited a dermatologist in the preceding 3 years. The dermatologist was the second most often visited specialist among all medical specialties, with 69.7%, 72.1%, 42.1% and 78.1% of participants in Western Europe (WE), Eastern Europe (EE), Northern Europe (NE) and Southern Europe (SE), respectively, having consulted a dermatologist over the past 24 months. Most participants across all regions agreed that the dermatologist was the first healthcare provider for chronic skin diseases (61.9% in WE, 69.8% in EE, 45.7% in NE and 60.4% in SE) and for skin cancers (65.5% in WE, 67.6% in EE, 42.4% in NE and 63.0% in SE). The five most common reasons for visiting a dermatologist among all participants were: naevi check-up or skin cancer screening (20.2%), chronic skin diseases (16.5%), acute skin diseases (12.4%), cosmetic advice or procedure (10.2%), hyperpigmentation or congenital lesions (9.1%) and hair or nail disorder (7.7%). Most participants (84.6% in WE, 82.5% in EE, 78.3% in NE and 82.8% in SE) were very swatisfied/somewhat satisfied with the service provided. Our study findings underscore the central role of dermatologists in skin health and highlights them as valued and trusted care providers across Europe. Understanding the perceived position of the dermatologist is the first step in improving health policy development and implementation. Notably, access to a dermatologist was lowest in NE, probably reflecting differences in healthcare organizational structures or possibly cultural differences in healthcare seeking behaviour.

Monitoring the long-range transport effects on urban PM10 levels using 3D clusters of backward trajectories