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Background: Young women's attendance at cervical screening in the UK is continuing to fall, and the incidence of invasive cervical cancer is rising. Objectives: We assessed the preferences of non‐attending young women for alternative ways of delivering cervical screening. Design: Postal discrete choice experiment (DCE) conducted during the STRATEGIC study of interventions for increasing cervical screening uptake. Attributes included action required to arrange a test, location of the test, availability of a nurse navigator and cost to the National Health Service. Setting and participants: Non‐attending young women in two UK regions. Main outcome measures: Responses were analysed using a mixed multinomial logit model. A predictive analysis identified the most preferable strategy compared to current screening. Preferences from the DCE were compared with observed behaviours during the STRATEGIC trial. Results: The DCE response rate was 5.5% (222/4000), and 94% of respondents agreed screening is important. Preference heterogeneity existed around attributes with strong evidence for test location. Relative to current screening, unsolicited self‐sampling kits for home use appeared most preferable. The STRATEGIC trial showed this same intervention to be most effective although many women who received it and were screened, attended for conventional cytology instead. Conclusions: The DCE and trial identified the unsolicited self‐sampling kit as the most preferred/effective intervention. The DCE suggested that the decision of some women receiving the kit in the trial to attend for conventional cytology may be due to anxieties around home testing coupled with a knowledge that ignoring the kit could potentially have life‐changing consequences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background and aims Metabolic syndrome has been reported to have adverse effects on cognition although the results are conflicting. We investigated the association between metabolic syndrome and cognitive function in a population sample of middle-aged and older European men and whether any observed association could be explained by lifestyle or other confounding factors. Methods A total of 3369 men in the 40- to 79-year age group were recruited from population registers in eight centres for participation in the European Male Ageing Study. The subjects completed a questionnaire instrument and several cognitive function tests including the Rey-Osterrieth Complex Figure test, the Camden Topographical Recognition Memory test and the Digit Symbol Substitution Test. Metabolic syndrome data were assessed at an invited visit and metabolic syndrome was defined by the National Cholesterol Education Program's Adult Treatment Panel-III criteria. Associations between cognitive performance and metabolic syndrome were explored using linear regression. Results Complete cognitive and metabolic syndrome data from 3152 subjects were included in the analysis, of whom 1007 (32%) fulfilled criteria for metabolic syndrome. After adjustment for putative health and lifestyle confounders, no significant associations were found between any of the cognitive function scores and metabolic syndrome or between cognitive performance and high-sensitivity C-reactive protein. Analysis of the individual metabolic syndrome factors, however, revealed an inverse association between the level of glucose and cognitive performance. Conclusions Metabolic syndrome was not associated with cognitive impairment in this population. Of the individual components of the syndrome, diabetes was associated with poorer performances in memory, executive functions and processing speed, associations that warrant further investigation. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]