This study concerns congenital defects in pigs; umbilical and scrotal hernia, cryptorchidism, kyphosis, splay legs, anal atresia, intersexuality and congenital tremor. The aim was to describe and estimate the prevalence of these defects and estimate the heritability for the most frequent defects, scrotal hernia and cryptorchidism in purebred Swedish Hampshire, Landrace and Yorkshire populations. Furthermore, information and opinions from herdsmen in commercial herds was collected and analysed. A low proportion of congenital defect pigs is of importance both from animal welfare and economic point of view. The accuracy of registration of the presence of defects in the litters has a decisive role for the ability to select against these defects.

The intimate connection between autonomy and decision-making in applied health care, especially in various kinds of consent and refusal has taken center stage in medical ethics since the Salgo decision in 1957. Prior to that time, the physician?s supposedly moral duty to provide appropriate medical care typically surpassed the legal obligation to respect patient?s autonomy. The Salgo decision concluded that physicians have a legal duty to provide facts necessary for the patient to make an informed decision. "The doctor knows best" long ago was replaced with "The doctor proposes; the patient disposes." There is no legal obligation for the patient?s choice to be palatable to anyone, other than that patient himself/herself.

In the beginning of the 1990?s ratite breeding for meat production was introduced in many European countries, including Sweden. The knowledge of ostrich farming and diseases of ratites is increasing internationally but is still often limited among veterinarians. This report consists of a literature study and a summary of pathology findings from ratites submitted for necropsy to the National Veterinary Institute (SVA) in Uppsala, during 1995 to 2001. The purpose is to give a general introduction to ostrich and ratite breeding and to give an overview of the most common diseases. The necropsy data from 1995 to 2001, indicate that many of the diseases are management related rather than caused by infectious agents. Due to cold climate ostrich breeders in Sweden need to supply well designed buildings and good care of the animal.

AbstractBackgroundParkinson?s disease is a chronically not curable progressive disease that leads to different degrees of disability. Controlled studies on how patient education influences subjective health in Parkinson?s disease are lacking.AimThe aim of this study was to examine the influence patient education had on drug requirements and on subjective health status of persons with Parkinson?s disease.MethodologyA short form of Health Survey, SF-12, was used to measure perceived health. SF-12 was administered before and one month after patient education (intervention group; n= 48), and in waiting list control (n= 48).

The aim of the study was to describe what it's like to live with Multiple Sclerosis (MS) and experiences of social support and being received and met by health personnel. The method was a qualitative interview study of descriptive design and was analyzed using qualitative content analysis. Three women and two men (26-75 years) with MS from two municipalitiesin central Sweden participated in the study. The main results showed that the participants felt the disease limited everyday life. The majority described feelings of injustice being affectedby the illness, but they now have a new perspective on life.

Healthy calves are the foundation in order to run a profitable diary production. Being healthy as calf results in a better start in life and good growth is expected to follow. Within dairy production it becomes more common to rear calves in groups and feed them by an automatic milk feeder. The milk feeder enables for the calves in greater extent to ingest milk or milk replacer several times per day and they are also able to perform natural behaviors in greater extent. Group rearing of calves puts higher demands on the animal keepers to localize individual calves in the group pen, showing signs of illness.

Cows are ruminants and they need fibers in their feed and sufficient eating time to function psychologically and physiologically. Many of our cows don?t get enough forage and too much concentrates, which given in the wrong way may cause health and behavior problems. Too much concentrates at once makes the pH in the rumen sink and this may cause decreased fiber utilization since the microbes in the rumen are negatively affected by this. The cow may also get serious problems such as laminitis and abomasal dislocation.

Background: Mental ill-health among adolescents is one of the most increasing public health problems in Sweden. Particularly girls suffer from mental and psychosomatic symptoms. The National Board of Health and Welfare recommend the DISA method as a preventive measure. Problem: Investigations has been done of the DISA method, but further investigations needs to be done. Aim: The aim of the study was partly to investigate how participants in DISA groups in two counties understand the method and its eventual effect and partly how their mood change, to contribute with knowledge to the development of the DISA method.

Claw health has been recorded by claw trimmers at trimming in Sweden since 1996, but data was then captured at each AI association. From 2003 data was captured by central scanning and entered directly to the national cow data base at the Swedish Dairy Association (SDA). This reporting was introduced because SDA wanted to be able to use these records to improve dairy cow claw health by breeding. It is desirable with cows that have healthy claws, because poor claw health can contribute to impaired production and fertility. The claw health report begins with some information about herd, claw trimmer, date et cetera and continues with the part where the claw health is recorded. Here the ID of each cow is filled in and on the same row the conditions for dermatitis, heel horn erosion, sole haemorrhage and sole ulcer are recorded as no lesion (blank), slight lesion (/) or severe lesion (X).

Länsförsäkringar in Värmland, Sweden, had during the year 2003 a total level of 6.1 percent of people on the sick-list, which was higher than average in the business (4,5%) and for salaried employees in the private sector (3,3%). The average age of those put on sick-list was 47 years, whish is four years higher than the average for the whole LF-group. The cost for the total amount of people being on sick-list at LF-company (6,1%) was estimated to 1 500 kkr, according to a calculation model coming from Försäkringskassan. For every percent the sick level could be reduced, the company would save 239 kkr. To map out the state of health of each and every collaborator in LF, the company offered all employees to make a health profile at the company's health service, Clarahälsan AB.

The aim of the present study was to examine smoking behaviour and motivation for smoking cessation in patients at a dental clinic. Another aim was to examine if the patients had been asked by the dental staff regarding their smoking habits.Twenty-two patients from a student clinic and twenty-one patients from a Swedish Public Dental Service Clinic in southern of Sweden participated in the study. Participants consisted of eighteen women and twenty-five men. Data collection was carried out using a questionnaire that was directed at smokers. The questionnaire was answered in connection with the visit to the dental hygienist.The patients smoked between eight and twelve cigarettes per day and had on average smoked between 5 -15 years.

Background: Overweight in children has been an increasing problem in recent years and research show that early intervention is important. The parents? diet- and exercise habits are important to lay the foundation for a healthy lifestyle for their children. Aim: To investigate parents? attitudes towards overweight in children.

The aim of this Master?s thesis is to examine how health information is integrated into knowledge in an everyday health related context on the web. The more specific aim is, from a LIS point of view, to map knowledge related discourses with the focus on pregnancy, in discussion forums on Swedish health related web sites. The following main questions in this paper are: (1) a) What discourses on pregnancy knowledge can be found and b) how are they expressed? (2) What are the functions of the recognised discourses? and (3) what are the relations between the identified discourses? The theoretical and methodological starting-point is discourse theory with the main focus on discursive psychology according to Wetherell?s and Potter?s theoretical and empirical work.

During an investigation of animal welfare in animal production, the focus has for a long time been focused on the absence of stress, suffering and injuries, and positive emotions have not been prioritized. However, in recent years that has been drastically changed. The public interest have increased for buying animal products from animals that have had a decent life, which have led to that play, exploratory behavior and other positive behaviours has come to play a significant role in welfare assessment. The welfare of cattle is difficult to assess since there is currently no ancestors to study, it is thus difficult to determine which behaviors can be regarded as natural and thus positively related, acordingly the welfare of cattle have been forgotten and research on positive emotions of cattle have not been prioritized. The aim of this study was to observe which behavior growing cattle performe, and if there was any differences of which kind of behavior that was observed, if the cattle is keept on slatted floor or on a deep straw bedding. Furthermore, antoher purpose was to investigate if the observed behaviours indicate a positive, negative or natural welfare, and if it is possible to use the observed behaviours in a welfare assessment.

The number of people with another culture isincreasing in Sweden. This change in society bringsconsequences in health care that has not any methodsto manage. The Muslim woman?s meeting with thehealth care is one of those areas. The aim with thisstudy was to describe the nurses meeting with femaleMuslim patient.