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This study aimed to determine the relationship between health literacy and ecological footprint which is an indicator of sustainability and environmental impact and to examine the factors that may affect them. It was found that 20.3% of individuals have inadequate, 43.7% problematic, 26.1% sufficient and 10.0% excellent health literacy levels. There were differences in age, education level and BMI classification according to Ecological Footprint Awareness Scale score quartiles and health literacy levels (p < 0.05). It was determined that age and Turkey Health Literacy Scale score had effect on ecological footprint awareness. Individuals with a high level of health literacy have a high awareness of their ecological footprint. The increase in people's health literacy levels and ecological footprint awareness with age can be interpreted as the increase in people's education and knowledge levels and their awareness levels against the protection of nature and the environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study aims to determine the relationship between adult colorectal cancer screening behaviors and health literacy levels. This cross-sectional study aims to determine the relationship between adult colorectal cancer screening behaviors and health literacy levels. Of the participants, only a small proportion had undergone this screening (9.3%). Having an intestinal disease (OR = 23) and having a relative with colorectal cancer (OR = 8) had the highest effect on colorectal screening. There were significant differences between the colorectal screening groups concerning most THLS-32 subgroup scores, including the THLS-32 total score. Health literacy affects colorectal cancer screening rates. Primary care workers, especially community health nurses, are in an ideal position to increase health literacy and thereby increase cancer screening rates. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Eğirdir Lake is the fourth largest lake in Turkey and located in Isparta province. It is one of the most important water sources in Göller District. Eğirdir Lake supplies water to the Eğirdir basin and most of the agricultural lands were irrigated through Eğirdir Lake and it is also used as drinking water in adjacent provinces. Evaluating the gross-alpha and gross-beta activity concentrations can be accepted as the first step of determining the natural radioactivity level of water. The aim of this study is to investigate the natural radioactivity level of Eğirdir Lake surface water by measuring gross-alpha and gross-beta activity concentrations. Study was conducted in two different seasons, in order to evaluate the seasonal effect on results. Seasonal average activity concentrations of gross-alpha and gross-beta varied in a range of 0.0125–0.0345 Bq/L and 0.0750–0.1 Bq/L, respectively. Mean activity concentrations of gross-alpha and gross-beta for seasonal averages were 0.0215 ± 0.0057 Bq/L and 0.0833 ± 0.008 Bq/L, respectively. From the measured activities, annual effective dose and excess lifetime cancer risk (ELCR) were calculated. The obtained ELCR results varied in the range of 0.0157%–0.0202% with arithmetic mean of 0.0173%. In addition to that, statistical analyses were carried out in order to investigate the significances of the results. Resultant values exhibited that gross-alpha and gross-beta activities were found to be lower than suggested limits of WHO screening procedure. These results indicated that water consumption-related annual effective dose due to internal irradiation is less than 0.1 mSv/year and the water of Eğirdir Lake is of low risk to use as drinking water and also for multiple purposes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Considering their central role as stakeholders at destination, local people's views and active participation in decision-making and implementation processes are important for the sustainability of tourism activities in the area. Therefore, it is of great importance to determine the local people's attitudes towards sustainable tourism and development. Goal of the current study is to reveal the importance and perceived performance of the local people towards sustainable tourism, in line with the sustainable tourism principles determined by the World Tourism Organization. In order to examine importance that local people give to these principles and perceived performance of their application, Importance-Performance Analysis (IPA) method was applied. Data was collected from 389 locals in Demre District of Antalya city in Turkey with the survey technique. According to the findings of IPA, local people reported high levels of importance to all sustainable tourism principles. On the other hand, perceived performance of local people towards application of all the principles, except "protection of biological diversity", shows low levels. Unique contribution of the current study is in providing the perspective on how local people evaluate sustainable tourism principles and emphasizes the awareness of important and perceived performance differences when it comes to sustainable tourism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The dominant excellence frameworks suggest that the attitudes of the stakeholders, especially the employees towards the organization are one of the fundamental indicators of excellence in the workplace. The current study propounds a three-dimensional structure of internal corporate governance (ICG) and examines the effects of ICG dimensions on work engagement, job satisfaction, and affective commitment through the hypotheses. Confirmatory factor analyses are conducted for validating the theoretical constructs on the self-reported data that is from 224 hotel-employees. To examine the effects of ICG on hotel employees, five multiple regression models are developed. The results reveal that the effects of ICG on work-related attitudes are significant. Three ICG dimensions have joint effects on the affective commitment of hotel employees. Responsibility and transparency of ICG jointly predict the vigor and dedication. The fairness of ICG predicts the absorption dimension of work engagement. Fairness and responsibility have joint significant effects on the job satisfaction of the hotel employees. The results provide implications for researchers and senior managers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the influence of ownership structure on corporate governance practices of Turkish companies listed in Borsa Istanbul Corporate Governance Index (XKURY). It proposes a context-specific ownership structure (founding families, state ownership, foreign ownership from both developed and emerging markets, and institutional investors), and publicly available corporate governance scores as indicators for corporate governance practices. The results of fixed effects panel regression analyses show that state ownership has a negative influence on weighted and non-weighted average corporate governance scores, as mainly determined by shareholder protection and board of directors-related practices during 2010–2017. The evidence regarding the other ownership categories is not sufficient over alternative estimations. Overall, the study provides a critical assessment of the role of ownership in shaping the corporate governance practices of XKURY companies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Determination of service quality measures that have the greatest impact on overall satisfaction of a system has many advantages both in favor of passengers and managers. Service quality of a transportation system mostly found by evaluation of passengers attitudes. Especially for managers, it is very important to have knowledge about the expectations and perceptions of passengers that they provide service. In this study, two well-known methods, Servqual and Impact Score Technique (IST) are used to determine the service quality of High Speed Rail System of Turkey operated between Eskişehir and Ankara. Then, the results were compared and an analysis was conducted focusing on the differences that have arisen because of the approaches of the methods. The data collected from 900 passengers of High Speed Rail System (HSRS) were used in the analysis. For Servqual, the expectations and perceptions of passengers were taken into account, while in IST, the ratio of passengers having experienced a problem about the relevant attribute and their perceptions are used. The results show that in IST, the outstanding problematic areas are ranked according to problem experiencing rates; while in Servqual, ranking is mostly shaped by perceptions of passengers. In both methods, the featuring attributes of the system are found to be almost common. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This empirical study deepens our understating of support for sustainable tourism development (SSTD) from the perspectives of various community groups in Pamukkale, a world natural and cultural heritage inscribed on the UNESCO list. A quota sampling technique was used to survey the views of three communities: business, farmers, and the government. Occurrences of contrarian cases were checking using cross-tabulation analyses. Complexity theory and fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA), as an innovative approach, were applied to develop and test a configurational model for predicting both high and low SSTD scores for three community groups. The fsQCA results revealed that causal recipes for achieving pro-tourism behaviour are not simply mirror opposites of the conditions leading to anti-tourism behaviour. The complex configurational models indicating high/low SSTD were unique to each community group, indicating that a specified strategy must be developed for community-based tourism management. The evidence-of-fit validity of the measurement model and the predictive validity of the configurational model were provided. Support for the fsQCA results in the key tenets of complexity theory confirms that this theory explained the heterogeneity and complex interactions of SSTD antecedents well. The study outcomes provide a guideline for managing conditions to both increase SSTD and hinder SSTD negation for various community groups. The limitations and implications for further research are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Abdominal tuberculosis, the sixth commonest extrapulmanory tuberculosis, is easily misdiagnosed due to nonspecific gastrointestinal symptoms. The diagnosis is highly dependent on clinician’s suspicion of the disease; therefore to increase awareness we retrospectively reviewed clinical features of eight children in a four year-period. Methods: The medical records of children with abdominal TB were retrospectively reviewed. The diagnosis of abdominal TB was defined as Mycobacterium tuberculosis infection of gastrointestinal tract along with peritoneal or solid organ involvement. Results: There were six girls and two boys with a mean age of 13.6 ± 2.8 years (range, 7 - 16 years). Abdominal pain and weight loss were common complaints in all patients (100%) at presentation; fever was present in four (50%) patients and abdominal distension in two (25%) patients. Mean duration of symptoms before diagnosis was 2.5 ± 1 months. Laparotomy performed in six patients, and the peritoneum was the most common infection site (in 5 patients). Chest X-rays of 7 patients indicated lung involvement. The most common abdominal computed tomography and ultrasonography finding was ascites. Bowel wall thickening was recorded in 2 patients and ileal thickening in 1 patient. Inguinal lymphadenopathy and multiple mesenteric lymphadenitis were present as single cases. Conclusions: The abdominal tuberculosis should be suspected in children with ongoing abdominal pain, fever, and abdominal distension, laparoscopy or laparotomy could be useful in the differential diagnosis and utilizing imaging techniques, invasive methods with clinical suspicion may prevent delay of the diagnosis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim The objective of this study was to evaluate the effects of lozenges containing L. reuteri as an adjuvant treatment to initial periodontal therapy for chronic periodontitis patients and to detect the level of L. reuteri colonization in the periodontal pockets of treated patients. Material and Methods A total of 40 patients were selected and randomly divided into two groups. Each patient had at least two teeth with one approximal site each with a probing depth ( PD) of 5-7 mm and gingival index ( GI) of ≥2 in each quadrant. Group I received scaling and root planing ( SRP) plus L. reuteri-containing lozenges, and Group II received SRP plus placebo. The plaque index ( PI), GI, bleeding on probing (BoP), PD and relative attachment level were measured. Microbiological sampling was performed at baseline and on days 21, 90, 180 and 360 and were analysed by culturing. The Bonferroni-corrected paired sample t-test, Bonferroni-corrected Wilcoxon signed rank test and paired sample t-test were used to evaluate intra-group differences. The Bonferroni-corrected Student's t-test and the Mann-Whitney U-tests were used to evaluate inter-group differences. Results After treatment, the measured PI, GI, BoP and PD were significantly ( p < 0.05) lower in Group I compared with Group II at all time points. Similar observations were made for the total viable cell counts and the proportions of obligate anaerobes with the exception of day 360. In Group I, significantly fewer patients required surgery on ≥3 sites. Conclusion L. reuteri-containing lozenges may be a useful adjuvant agent to slow re-colonization and improve clinical outcomes of chronic periodontitis. Further studies are required to clarify the optimal dose of the lozenges. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: There is not a wide agreement upon rate of conversion disorder within Turkish population. The aim of this study was to determine the prevalence of conversion disorder with pseudoneurological symptoms or deficits and related risk factors in a city.Method: In total, 1,086 people, aged 15-65 years old, were selected from the city of Manisa, Turkey to take part in the study. We applied sociodemographic and health information questionnaires and the Composite International Diagnostic Interview (CIDI) Somatization Subscales to the samples.Results: The likelihood that an individual might have conversion disorder with pseudoneurological symptoms or deficits was found to be 5.6% (n = 61). The prevalence of conversion disorder with pseudoneurological symptoms or deficits was significantly higher among women (p < 0.0001), 15-24 year old women (p = 0.011) and 25-34 year old women (p = 0.003), people who live as squatters (p = 0.03), those with a history of psychiatric disorder (p < 0.0001) and those having a mother with a psychiatric disorder (p = 0.04).Conclusion: This study has shown the conversion disorder with pseudoneurological symptoms or deficits is inadequately frequent in the population. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]