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To investigate the association between physical activity (PA) domains and chronic low back pain (LBP) in older adults. A cross-sectional study where sociodemographic, behavioral, and health variables; PA; and presence of chronic LBP were collected. Higher scores of PA defined the "more active" participants. Binary logistic regression was used to test the association between PA domains and chronic LBP. A total of 516 participants were included. The mean age was 71.8 (95% confidence interval, CI, [71.1, 72.5]) years, and 29%, 27%, 25%, and 31% were identified as "more active" in the household, sports, leisure-time, and total PA domains, respectively. "More active" participants in sports (odds ratio = 0.62, 95% CI [0.40, 0.97]), leisure-time (odds ratio = 0.54, 95% CI [0.35, 0.85]) and total (odds ratio = 0.60, 95% CI [0.39, 0.92]) PA domains were less likely to report chronic LBP. High levels of sports, leisure-time, and total PA were inversely associated with chronic LBP. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For the past thirty years, Critical Discourse Studies has been consolidating as a form of linguistically-oriented, critical social research which is characterized by a deep interest in actual social issues and forms of inequality, such as racism, xenophobia, anti-Semitism and sexism, both in terms of the asymmetries between participants in discourse events and their unequal capacity to control how texts are produced, distributed and consumed. In parallel, since its coinage in Kimberlé Crenshaw's African American feminist critique of race and sex discrimination, intersectionality has been increasingly taken up on a global scale by scholars and practitioners alike, becoming a major feminist way of conceptualizing the relation between several forms of discrimination and oppression, to be analysed as simultaneous and multiplicative experiences. This Special Issue aims to enquire into the potential convergence between the critical discursive and intersectional approaches as theory, method and practice for the exploration of the crossroads of inequalities and oppression. This may contribute to the development of a critical research framework that enables the acknowledgment of the profound ways in which discursively, institutionally and/or structurally constructed sociocultural categorizations interact and produce different kinds of societal inequalities and unjust social relations. These, in turn, can be analysed in terms of the mutual and intertwined processes of resistance and transformation that arise out of them. Bringing together diverse contributions with a shared critical discursive and intersectional outlook, this Special Issue hopes to offer new theoretical and methodological insights for thinking through diversity in the light of present and future dynamics of inclusion, exclusion, and inequality. The six contributions operationalize the intersectional approach as theory, method and/or practice and incorporate it with a CDS perspective, providing a flavour of what a critical and intersectional discursive engagement with different and dynamic identity and power configurations on a global scale can achieve. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On June 29, 2019, Carola Rackete docked the rescue ship Sea-Watch 3 on the Sicilian island of Lampedusa, in defiance of a ban imposed by Italy's Interior Minister Matteo Salvini. The migrants rescued by the Sea-Watch 3 had been blocked at sea for the previous two weeks, making it to international headlines and sparking a heated debate around sovereignty and humanitarianism in the face of the European migration crisis. On her arrival, Rackete was arrested for refusing to obey a military vessel and aiding illegal immigration. This paper investigates social media and international news discourses around the Sea-Watch 3 docking, to be regarded as a critical incident capable of catalysing attention and generating a significant media resonance. Results show how both social and traditional media contributed to the proliferation of misogynous attacks against Captain Rackete, at the intersection between right-wing populist discourses of Italian 'sovranism' and European anti-immigrationism. By triangulating the role of the media, intersectional hostility and populist ideology, this paper sheds light on how these three factors feed into each other in the discursive construction of the 'Fortress Europe' of present times. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The proliferation of gender-based violence against women in politics (WIP) is increasingly recognized as a global phenomenon of interest. In particular, the new affordances of the Web 2.0 play a crucial role in the use of language, images, and other symbols to marginalize and exclude women as political actors. This paper illustrates the visual semiotics of misogyny against WIP on social media platforms. Two multimodal strategies are inductively identified and critically explicated as examples of semiotic violence at work: 1) image manipulation and 2) false identity attribution, both characterized by the use of image-based, user-generated content to abuse WIP. Delving into an inductive conceptualization of digital visual misogyny, this paper accounts for the long-standing, sexist and objectifying attention towards women's bodies which now proliferates on the inherently visual digital media platforms. As such, it underscores the relevance of a semiotic and multimodal approach to social media data in order to critically analyze the complex, multimodal discursive events of the Web 2.0. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes the concept of digital mirroring to explore and contextualise post-Arab Spring digital feminism in the Levant within a critical discourse framework. Digital mirroring illustrates the way in which contemporary Arab feminist groups articulate their digital presence orienting toward the vertical dimension of their sociopolitical contexts and toward the horizontal dimension characterised by the digital practices of other feminist movements in the region. We observed this phenomenon through the analysis of a multimodal corpus of Facebook and Instagram posts published by thirty-two institutionalised and non-institutionalised feminist groups in Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, and Syria between 2011 and 2019. The analysis of the linguistic and the visual strategies of MENA feminist groups is grounded in contemporary sociolinguistic studies on Arabic diglossia and multimodality. Findings reveal the complex interplay of digital self-representation, local resistance, and transregional networking of Levantine women. We argue that a simultaneous analysis of the vertical and the horizontal contextual dimensions of digital mirroring is necessary to comprehend social media discursive strategies and their transregional breadth as a central component of contemporary Arab feminism and emancipatory discourses at large. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As the population ages, the prevalence of chronic musculoskeletal conditions, such as low back pain (LBP), increases. Sarcopenia, defined an age related loss of skeletal muscle mass, is a prevalent condition in the older population contributes significantly to functional decline, disability, frailty, and falls. The coexistence of both conditions may negatively impact the functional decline of the older adults, which may require a specific therapeutic approach to deal with both conditions. However, the first step is to investigate the prevalence of probable sarcopenia among older adults with chronic LBP and whether older adults with both conditions are more clinically disabled than older adults with chronic LBP without probable sarcopenia. The aims of this study were to determine the prevalence of probable sarcopenia among older adults with chronic LBP seeking physical therapy care in a primary care setting and to investigate whether older adults with chronic LBP and probable sarcopenia present with higher pain and disability than those with chronic LBP and no probable sarcopenia. This is a cross-sectional study design. We recruited older adults (age ≥60) living in Belo Horizonte, Brazil, reporting LBP for more than 3 months, seeking physical therapy care in a basic health unit (i.e. primary care setting) from the Brazilian National Healthcare System. Data collected included age, sex, pain intensity (0-10 scale), disability (i.e., Roland Morris disability questionnaire) and probable sarcopenia (i.e. algorithm from the European Working Group on Sarcopenia in Older People – EWGSOP2). To compare pain and disability levels in older adults with chronic LBP with and without probable sarcopenia, we calculate the mean difference (MD) and its confidence interval (CI). A total of 156 participants (73%women), mean age of 69.5 ± 6.2 years, mean pain intensity of 7.1 ± 2.3 points, and mean disability of 12.7 ± 5.5 points. The prevalence of probable sarcopenia was 31.40%. Patients with chronic LBP and probable sarcopenia reported higher mean pain intensity (MD=1.63; 95%CI: 0.89, 2.37) and disability (MD=5.38; 95%CI: 3.69, 7.07) than those with no probable sarcopenia. Nearly a third of older adults with chronic LBP seeking physical therapy care were classified as having probable sarcopenia. These patients reported higher pain and disability than patients with chronic LBP with no probable sarcopenia. In clinical practice, an approach to screening cases in older adults with chronic LBP and probable sarcopenia may help to identify more severe and disabling cases of low back pain. Future studies should investigate the prognostic value of sarcopenia in older adults with LBP. It may be possible that future therapeutic approaches should be developed and tested to treat older adults with both conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Chronic low back pain (LBP) is a prevalent condition in older adults, being identified as a cause of disability in this population. Despite ir validity and reliability, the functional capacity tests are not often administered in patients with LBP but provide useful information related to mobility. A measurement property of the functional capacity tests that has not been investigated extensively in the LBP field is the resiveness, such as the capacity to detect changes during the intervention. To determine the responsiveness of three functional capacity tests, the Timed Up and Go test, the 4-meter Walk test, the 5 times Sit to Stand test, and to compare with the responsiveness of the Roland Morris Disability Questionnaire (RMDQ) in older adults with chronic LBP undergoing an 8-week intervention. This is a responsiveness study with measurement before and after an 8-week intervention. It was prospectively registered at the Brazilian Registry of Clinical Trials (RBR-9prhzng). Patients with nonspecific LBP (age ≥60) were recruited. The functional capacity tests and the RMDQ were administered at baseline and after 8 weeks. The intervention followed the recommendations from clinical practice guidelines for the management of nonspecific LBP: The responsiveness was determined by calculating the effect size (ES), correlation analysis, and the analysis of the Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) Curve to calculate the area under the curve (AUC). 118 older adults with chronic LBP were recruited. The RMDQ was the most responsiveness measure, followed by the Sit to Stand test. The ES for the RMDQ was large (ES= -0,74; 95%IC: -0,56; -0,92), whereas the 5 Times Sit to Stand test presented a small effect (EF= -0,45, 95%CI: - 0,26; -0,64). The Timed UP and Go test and the 4-meter Walk test small ESs (ES< 0,25). The 5 Times Sit to Stand test was the only one to show a fair correlation (0,25 < r <0,50) with RMDQ. The ROC analysis, only the RMDQ showed AUC values above the cut-off point of 0,70. The RMDQ was responsive to an 8-week lumbar stabilization program in older adults with chronic LBP. The 5 Times Sit to Stand test was the most responsive but presented limitations with regard to the capacity to discriminate patients who recovered from those who did not recover. A possible explanation for the lack of responsiveness foto the tests may be due to the nature of the intervention, which was not focused on increasing ability and balance, components that are necessarily assessed by functional capacity tests. Functional capacity tests are widely used to assess mobility and balance in older adults. Only the 5 Times Sit to Stand test was considered to able to detect changes in older adults who underwent an 8-week intervention program. The RMDQ was more responsive than any of the functional capacity tests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract Background One third to two thirds of people with schizophrenia have persistent psychotic symptoms despite clozapine treatment. Under real-world circumstances, the need to provide effective therapeutic interventions to patients who do not have an optimal response to clozapine has been cited as the most common reason for simultaneously prescribing a second antipsychotic drug in combination treatment strategies. In a clinical area where the pressing need of providing therapeutic answers has progressively increased the occurrence of antipsychotic polypharmacy, despite the lack of robust evidence of its efficacy, we sought to implement a pre-planned protocol where two alternative therapeutic answers are systematically provided and evaluated within the context of a pragmatic, multicentre, independent randomised study. Methods/Design The principal clinical question to be answered by the present project is the relative efficacy and tolerability of combination treatment with clozapine plus aripiprazole compared with combination treatment with clozapine plus haloperidol in patients with an incomplete response to treatment with clozapine over an appropriate period of time. This project is a prospective, multicentre, randomized, parallel-group, superiority trial that follow patients over a period of 12 months. Withdrawal from allocated treatment within 3 months is the primary outcome. Discussion The implementation of the protocol presented here shows that it is possible to create a network of community psychiatric services that accept the idea of using their everyday clinical practice to produce randomised knowledge. The employed pragmatic attitude allowed to randomly allocate more than 100 individuals, which means that this study is the largest antipsychotic combination trial conducted so far in Western countries. We expect that the current project, by generating evidence on whether it is clinically useful to combine clozapine with aripiprazole rather than with haloperidol, provides physicians with a solid evidence base to be directly applied in the routine care of patients with schizophrenia. Trial Registration Clincaltrials.gov Identifier: NCT00395915

Media play a pivotal role in the unequal representation of women in politics and as a result, they represent a crucial research site when triangulating gender, politics and violence. Gender-based violence has been explored from a traditional perspective on political violence, showing how the phenomenon differentially affects men and women (see [19]) as well as from perspectives more firmly grounded in gender and politics, where it is commonly labelled "Violence Against Women In Politics" (VAWIP) ([41], [42]; [43], [44]). Like most phenomena in the realm of politics, digital forms of violence and abuse against political actors are also profoundly gendered: statistics show that they affect women in politics disproportionately in comparison to their male counterparts ([2]) and they now represent one the most prevalent forms of violence against women in politics, with 6 MPs and parliamentary staff out of 10 being targeted across Europe ([31]). Among scholars and practitioners alike, gender-based violence against political actors is increasingly recognized as a global phenomenon of interest, to be problematized and theorized vis-à-vis traditional definitions of "violence in politics" or "violence against politicians" ([44]). [Extracted from the article]