The correlation of ADMA with proinflammatory, liver injury and cancer biomarkers in patients with liver dysfunction.

Background And Aim: Asymmetric dimethylarginine (ADMA) is an enzyme involved in vascular tone, blood pressure, and platelet activation. Serum ADMA levels are increased in liver diseases such as liver cirrhosis, hepatitis, and acute liver failure. The aim of our study was to assess the correlation of ADMA with proinflammatory, liver injury, and cancer biomarkers in patients with liver dysfunction of various etiologies.

Rapid-progressing progressive multifocal leukoencephalopathy in two patients newly diagnosed with HIV: case series and review of literature.

The JC Polyomavirus (JCPyV) is a virus of global distribution and is usually kept under control by the immune system. In patients with AIDS, a latent JCPyV infection can reactivate and develop into progressive multifocal leukoencephalopathy (PML). Around half of the patients with PML die within 2 years since the diagnosis, yet in rare cases, the disease advances significantly quicker and seems to be insusceptible to any medical actions.

[Reporting of work-related mental health].

Along with the structural changes of the economy, the psychological well-being of employees becomes increasingly important for their performance. The reporting of mental well-being at the organizational level is an essential precondition for occupational health interventions. This article deals with the mental health of employees from ten different companies.

[The impact of social and institutional characteristics on the appropriateness of invasive cardiologic procedures].

Background And Purpose: Germany has the highest per capita rate of invasive cardiologic procedures in Europe. An aim of the SULEIKA study was to present a clearer picture of this important area of health care.

Methods: Clinical data along with social characteristics of patients were acquired by means of questionnaires.

Evaluation of a community-level health policy intervention.

In this article an evaluation approach towards an innovative community-level health policy intervention in Germany is presented. The aim of the intervention was basically to establish new structures of health planning and co-ordination at the community level in order to improve health monitoring and health care as well as health promotion. To realise this aim Round Tables, Working Groups and Project Offices were implemented in the communities.

[Evaluation of outpatient rehabilitation: goals, conceptual framework and study design of a health and pension insurance joint research project].

In Germany the statutory health and pension insurance schemes are the main providers of medical rehabilitation, the majority of rehabilitation measures being given in an inpatient setting. Over the last few years, the health and pension insurance schemes have strengthened the extension of outpatient rehabilitation, and have funded a comprehensive evaluation study in this context. In this evaluation study outpatient rehabilitation in centres with different conceptual backgrounds is compared with inpatient rehabilitation in rehab clinics, indications considered being cardiology and orthopaedics.

[Evaluation of health policy intervention on the community level--the "Neighborhood Coordination of Health and Social Care" Model Project in North Rhine-Westphalia].

Between October 1995 and December 1998 the pilot project 'Local Coordination of Health and Social Care' was conducted in 28 communities of the state of North Rhine-Westphalia. The project has been evaluated by two university research teams. The aim of the project was basically to establish new structures of health planning and coordination at the community level, in order to improve health reporting and health care as well as health promotion.

[Definition and requirements of health].

Health is conceptualized as an ability to cope. Health is dependent on how well the personal and the social system are adapted to each other. The person-environment interaction itself is shaped by culture and social structure and their consequences for the living and working conditions.

[The challenge of the health sciences to nursing].

Health science, a challenge to nurses! We live in an age of old people who are chronically ill and in need of nursing care. Modern medicine's reply to the panorama of sickness and demography is to renew attempts to conquer the somatic progression with technology and chemistry. Will nursing be sucked into these developments or will it tackle new duties, arising, for example, in health promotion and rehabilitation? There are also problems of reshaping the health-care systems.

Function of human epididymal spermatozoa.

Human epididymal spermatozoa taken from caput, corpus, and cauda were investigated to determine their fertilizing capacity (22 epididymides from 11 patients who had undergone orchidectomy because of prostatic cancer). The following functions, which have been reported to correlate positively with the fertilization rate, were determined: motility and progressive motility, chromatin condensation (assessed by aniline blue staining), acrosin activity, and induction of acrosome reaction by low temperature. In addition, stimulation of motility by pentoxifylline and phosphatidylcholine was examined.

Disturbances of sperm flagella due to failure of epididymal maturation and their possible relationship to phospholipids.

A recent classification of alterations of midpiece and flagellum describes the phenomenon of abnormal staining behaviour of human sperm flagella during Papanicolaou and Shorr staining. In these techniques, human sperm tails normally stain red; however, if epididymal function is disturbed, the flagella appear bluish, while they are devoid of other recognizable defects. Such spermatozoa were shown to be immotile, the motility disturbance being referred to as epididymal dysfunction.

Effecting institutional change.

The paper deals with the need for institutional change and behaviour change in the medical care and social security system of the Federal Republic of Germany. The data reported are from the Oldenburg Longitudinal Study (OLS), in which a thousand males suffering from a first myocardial infarction have been surveyed with mailed questionnaires five times in five years. In this study, special emphasis has been given to the influence of social support from the spouse, the medical care system, and workmates on the coping process.

[Social support and community health care].

Concepts of health have changed considerably over the last decades. Of particular interest is the relations between social support and health, between the social context of the individual, the social network of his family, friends, neighbours and workplace on one side, and health on the other side. The importance of social support is illustrated with data from the "Oldenburg Longitudinal Study (OLS)".

[Long-term anxiety and depression following myocardial infarct].

Data from the 5-year Oldenburg Longitudinal Study were used for investigating the causes of differences in psychological well-being in a national sample of 1000 cardiac patients. In a subsample of 400 married patients, for whom data from the spouse were available, exogenous influences, cognitive mediators, and two measures of psychological distress were linked up in models explaining/predicting the level of anxiety and depression. A major hypothesis was the salience of the illness-related cognitions of the patient as a determinant of long-term behavior and mood state.

Marriage and the psychological consequences of a heart attack: a longitudinal study of adaptation to chronic illness after 3 years.

As part of a larger study on recovery from myocardial infarction in a national sample of male cardiac patients, data was collected on slightly under 400 men and their wives over a 5-year period. This longitudinal data set was used to investigate the role of patient health cognitions and marital factors on long-term psychological response to the illness. Negative appraisals of threat and loss due to cardiac impairment/disability were found to be the best predictor of anxiety and depression at 3-4 years after hospitalisation.