Defensive medicine and the influence of litigation on doctors.

The term defensive medicine is used to describe the behavior of healthcare providers motivated by fear of litigation due to malpractice. It includes both avoidance behavior when the physician is unwilling to perform high risk procedures, as well as excessive ordering of extra tests and procedures. This leads to unnecessary diagnostic and therapeutic interventions which may be invasive and costly.

Mechanoreceptive sensillum fields at the tarsal tip of insect legs.

Groups of mechanoreceptive sensilla form small sensory fields on the ventral rim of the most distal tarsomeres in insects. Within these fields two or three sensilla are located closely together. Anterior and posterior fields are found in all three pairs of legs with only a few exceptions.

Cribellate thread production in spiders: Complex processing of nano-fibres into a functional capture thread.

Spider silk production has been studied intensively in the last years. However, capture threads of cribellate spiders employ an until now often unnoticed alternative of thread production. This thread in general is highly interesting, as it not only involves a controlled arrangement of three types of threads with one being nano-scale fibres (cribellate fibres), but also a special comb-like structure on the metatarsus of the fourth leg (calamistrum) for its production.

[Comparison of ultrasonic and computer tomography examinations of the intracranial space in early childhood].

Comparison of ultrasound (US) and computer tomography (CT) examinations of intracranial pathology in early childhood yielded results speaking in favor of CT examination both in the light of overall precision and completeness of the information provided. The distress involved in the examination of generally seriously threatened children (anesthesia, radiation, transport) on the other hand, advocates US examination as the method of choice, particularly due to its noninvasiveness, the possibility to follow up the dynamics of the process in a series of examinations, its cost effectivity, mobility, threedimensional imaging ability, as well as the possibility to assess conditions that can be affected by treatment in early childhood.

[Results of treatment of infantile hydrocephalus (a group of 64 children)].

The authors present a report on 64 children operated between January 1, 1982 and December 31, 1986 on account of infantile hydrocephalus. As the primary operation in the great majority of children ventriculo-atrial drainage with a valve according to Spitz- Holter (60 times) was indicated, in exceptional cases ventriculo-mastoidostomy according to Nosik without a valve (four times). Thirty-eight patients (59%) had to be re-operated, some repeatedly on account of different disorders of the system.

[The significance of monitoring intracranial disorders of the CNS using 2-dimensional ultrasonography--the image in neonates].

The authors emphasize the importance of the long-term follow up of intracranial disorders of the CNS by two-dimensional ultrasonic B-visualization in early infancy. They demonstrate the practical results on examinations of four patients with different types of intracranial lesions where "monitoring" by the B-visualization made it possible to follow up the fate of the non-operated focus and in operated patients to visualize the outcome or failure of neurosurgical intervention. The authors prefer ultrasonic examination in early infancy to other neuroradiological methods, in particular because it is unpretentious, simple, safe and the results are easily interpreted.