"You're a 'high-risk' customer": A qualitative study of women's experiences of receiving information from health professionals regarding health problems or complications in pregnancy.

Background: Experiencing complications in pregnancy is stressful for women and can impact on fetal and maternal outcomes. Supportive encounters with health professionals can reduce the worry women experience. Further research is needed to understand women's perspectives on communicating with their healthcare providers about their concerns.

Temperature affects susceptibility of intertidal limpets to bird predation.

High temperatures resulting in physiological stress and the reduced ability to resist predation can have life-or-death consequences for an organism. We investigated the effects of temperature on the susceptibility to predation for an ectothermic intertidal mollusc (the owl limpet, ) and its predator (the black oystercatcher, ). The ability of to resist bird predation during low tide is determined by the tenacity of attachment to the rock.

Complications of Antenatal Corticosteroids in Infants Born by Early Term Scheduled Cesarean Section.

Objective: To compare neonatal hypoglycemia and respiratory morbidity rates in pregnancies complicated by diabetes following early term scheduled cesarean section (ETSCS) with and without maternal corticosteroid administration.

Research Design And Methods: In a retrospective cohort study, women with any form of diabetes in pregnancy undergoing ETSCS were included. Primary outcomes were admission rates to the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) for respiratory distress syndrome (RDS)/transient tachypnea of the newborn (TTN) and/or neonatal hypoglycemia.

The extraordinary joint material of an articulated coralline alga. II. Modeling the structural basis of its mechanical properties.

By incorporating joints into their otherwise rigid fronds, erect coralline algae have evolved to be as flexible as other seaweeds, which allows them to thrive - and even dominate space - on wave-washed shores around the globe. However, to provide the required flexibility, the joint tissue of Calliarthron cheilosporioides, a representative articulated coralline alga, relies on an extraordinary tissue that is stronger, more extensible and more fatigue resistant than that of other algae. Here, we used the results from recent experiments to parameterize a conceptual model that links the microscale architecture of cell walls to the adaptive mechanical properties of joint tissue.

The extraordinary joint material of an articulated coralline alga. I. Mechanical characterization of a key adaptation.

Flexibility is key to survival for seaweeds exposed to the extreme hydrodynamic environment of wave-washed rocky shores. This poses a problem for coralline algae, whose calcified cell walls make them rigid. Through the course of evolution, erect coralline algae have solved this problem by incorporating joints (genicula) into their morphology, allowing their fronds to be as flexible as those of uncalcified seaweeds.

Thermal variation, thermal extremes and the physiological performance of individuals.

In this review we consider how small-scale temporal and spatial variation in body temperature, and biochemical/physiological variation among individuals, affect the prediction of organisms' performance in nature. For 'normal' body temperatures - benign temperatures near the species' mean - thermal biology traditionally uses performance curves to describe how physiological capabilities vary with temperature. However, these curves, which are typically measured under static laboratory conditions, can yield incomplete or inaccurate predictions of how organisms respond to natural patterns of temperature variation.

Variation in Nugent score and leukocyte count in fluid collected from different vaginal sites.

Objective: To assess the variability in Nugent score and leukocyte count measured in vaginal secretions collected from 3 vaginal sites.

Methods: Fifty pregnant women at less than 20 weeks of gestation were consecutively recruited at the time of their first prenatal visit. Three vaginal smears were collected from each woman, 1 from the posterior fornix, 1 from the mid-lateral wall, and 1 from the introitus.