Impact of student choice on academic performance: cross-sectional and longitudinal observations of a student cohort.

Background: Student choice plays a prominent role in the undergraduate curriculum in many contemporary medical schools. A key unanswered question relates to its impact on academic performance.

Methods: We studied 301 students who were in years 2 and 3 of their medical studies in 2005/06.

Thyroid testing in pregnant women with thyroid dysfunction in Tayside, Scotland: the thyroid epidemiology, audit and research study (TEARS).

Objective: To investigate the rate of thyroid testing during pregnancy.

Design: Population-based, retrospective record-linkage study.

Setting: Health care data on pregnant women in Tayside, Scotland.

The role of modifiable pre-pregnancy risk factors in preventing adverse fetal outcomes among women with type 1 and type 2 diabetes.

We investigated the fetal outcomes of pregnancy in women with pre-existing diabetes in relation to pre-pregnancy risk factors using a community-based cohort of women in Tayside, Scotland. There were 211 pregnancies in 132 women with insulin-requiring type 1 and 2 diabetes between January 1993 and December 2005. Adverse fetal outcome was classified as spontaneous miscarriage, termination for medical reasons, stillbirth, neonatal death, or congenital malformation and occurred in 61 (29%) pregnancies.

Evidence for multiple circulating factors in preeclampsia.

Objective: The purpose of this study was to enrich vasoactive factors that are present in the plasma of women with preeclampsia by the application of sequential fractionation and determination of the activity of each fraction in a bioassay.

Study Design: Pooled plasma from women with preeclampsia (n = 23) and matched control subjects (n = 23) was subjected to fractionation with ultrafiltration, targeted immunodepletion, or size exclusion chromatography. Myometrial arteries that were isolated from healthy cesarean section biopsy specimens (n = 28) were incubated with plasma fractions (2%, volume/volume), and their endothelial function was assessed by wire myography.

Poor glycated haemoglobin control and adverse pregnancy outcomes in type 1 and type 2 diabetes mellitus: systematic review of observational studies.

Background: Glycaemic control in women with diabetes is critical to satisfactory pregnancy outcome. A systematic review of two randomised trials concluded that there was no clear evidence of benefit from very tight versus tight glycaemic control for pregnant women with diabetes.

Methods: A systematic review of observational studies addressing miscarriage, congenital malformations and perinatal mortality among pregnant women with type 1 and type 2 diabetes was carried out.

MMP-2 levels are elevated in the plasma of women who subsequently develop preeclampsia.

Objective: To determine levels of matrix metalloproteinase (MMP)-2 and MMP-9, and the tissue inhibitors of metalloproteinases (TIMP)-1 and TIMP-2 in the plasma of women destined to develop preeclampsia prior to the onset of clinical disease.

Study Design: Plasma samples were taken from women whose pregnancies were subsequently complicated by preeclampsia and from normal pregnant women at 22 and 26 weeks and at delivery or diagnosis. Following equal protein loading, MMP-2 and 9 and TIMP-1 and 2 were quantified using zymography and Western blot analysis, respectively.

Transient hypothyroxinemia in preterm infants: the role of cord sera thyroid hormone levels adjusted for prenatal and intrapartum factors.

Context: Transient hypothyroxinemia is common in infants less than 30 wk gestation and is associated with neurodevelopmental deficits; it has no consensus definition. We previously suggested that appropriate ranges for postnatal serum T4 values are at least cord levels corrected to an equivalent gestational age if the fetuses had remained in utero.

Objective: The study objective is to investigate the contribution of prenatal and intrapartum factors (n = 27) to the variations in cord levels of iodothyronines, T4-binding globulin, and TSH, and to provide an appropriate definition of transient hypothyroxinemia.

Characteristics of doctors and nurses as perceived by students entering medical school: implications for shared teaching.

Introduction: Debate continues with respect to when to introduce interprofessional education for maximal potential benefit. One perspective is that interprofessional education should be introduced early in the undergraduate curriculum before students develop stereotyped impressions of other professional groups. However, it may be that students at entry to medical school have already developed these stereotypical impressions.

Triploid pregnancy detected incidentally by Down's syndrome screening.

Maternal serum screening for Down's syndrome and trisomy 18 identifies pregnancies with a greater risk of these abnormalities, which are then followed-up by karyotyping of cells collected either by amniocentesis or by chorionic villus sampling. These techniques complement ultrasonography, which gives accurate gestational dating as well as identifying structural abnormalities. Other chromosomal abnormalities are sometimes detected by virtue of atypical maternal screening results.