Training-related enhancement in the control of motor output in elderly humans.

The increase in motor unit force that occurs with aging has been hypothesized to cause a decline in the ability to maintain a constant submaximal force. To test this hypothesis, young and elderly subjects performed a 12-wk strength-training program that was intended to increase motor unit force. The training program caused similar increases (%initial) in the training load (137.

Developing and empowering quality teams.

The authors' radiology department recently found that assorted problems had accumulated over time into a long to-do list. Mr. Keen and Ms.

Health care reform: how hospitals, physicians should prepare.

As the momentum behind health care reform continues to build, hospitals should take specific steps to prepare for each likely scenario. The authors speculate about what form health care reform will take, discuss the strategic implications of each scenario and suggest steps hospitals should take, including an analysis of hospital/physician integration, marketing, services and efficiency.

Factors driving costs must figure into reform.

Employers and employees seeing their health plan premium costs rise faster than physician and hospital costs is one indication that the U.S. healthcare system is in a state of crisis.

III A Disaster for Whom?: Local Interests and International Donors During Famine Among the Dinka of Sudan.

The 1985-88 famine amongst the Dinka is described and shown to have been rooted in the long term exploitation of the south by northern Sudanese and international interests. This process of exploitation served, and continues to serve, important functions for particular groups. Some of the ways in which the 1985-88 famine was functional - for the central government, the army and merchants - are outlined and the implications for relief operations considered.

Weight, length, and head circumference curves for boys and girls of between 20 and 42 weeks' gestation.

The value of available growth curves for preterm infants is limited because they exclude infants of less than 28 weeks' gestation. We describe growth curves for weight, length, and head circumference for boys and girls of between 20 and 42 weeks' gestation.

Understanding economic modeling aids in decision making.

With the problems some hospitals are facing in raising capital, the importance of careful economic analyses increases. Four economic models, the demand model, economic feasibility model, economic impact model, and econometric model, can all be used by the healthcare industry to perform a thorough analysis. By doing economic analyses, hospitals will be able to more effectively allocate scarce financial resources and identify potential returns and risks associated with investments.

Oral 6-mercaptopurine in childhood leukemia: parent drug pharmacokinetics and active metabolite concentrations.

6-Mercaptopurine (6MP) pharmacokinetics and red blood cell 6-thioguanine nucleotide (TGN) concentrations were studied in 19 children receiving remission maintenance treatment for lymphoblastic leukemia. There was a high interpatient variation in all the pharmacokinetic parameters measured. The pharmacokinetic parameters measured in two children who subsequently had relapses were within the 95% confidence limits of the 17 other children.

The effect of parainfluenza virus type 3 and Pasteurella haemolytica on oxygen-dependent and oxygen-independent bactericidal mechanisms of ovine pulmonary phagocytic cells.

Groups of caesarean-derived, colostrum-deprived lambs were inoculated by the intratracheal route with Pasteurella haemolytica, either alone or 4 or 6 days after the inoculation of parainfluenza virus type 3 (PI3). Other groups were inoculated with PI3 followed by veal infusion broth, or with uninfected cell culture fluid followed by veal infusion broth (controls). All lambs were killed 24 h after the second inoculation.

Birthweight between 14 and 42 weeks' gestation.

Data representing fetal weight gain between 14 and 42 weeks' gestation are presented; firstly to provide suitable curves enabling the growth of the very immature infant to be monitored and secondly to examine the influence of the improved techniques of paediatric and obstetric assessment developed since the publication of previous studies. Data have been collected from the 57 866 livebirths in Sheffield between 1976 and 1984 and from therapeutically terminated and spontaneously aborted fetuses over the same period. It seems that preterm livebirths do not form a different population with respect to weight from the fetus still in utero, at least until the beginning of the third trimester.

A comparison of nuclear magnetic resonance and intravenous xeroangiography with conventional arteriography in popliteal artery imaging.

Twenty-nine patients with peripheral vascular disease had the popliteal artery segment assessed by xeroangiography and nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) scanning. The result of each test was compared with conventional contrast arteriography. Nuclear magnetic resonance and xeroangiography correctly predicted popliteal artery patency in 97% and 100% of limbs, respectively, and occlusion was correctly predicted in 44% and 63% of limbs.

Evidence of two temperate episodes in late Pleistocene deposits at Marsworth, UK.

In the British Quaternary, two post-Cromerian interglacials, the Hoxnian and the Ipswichian, are recognized. Evidence of additional interglacials in this interval is widely accepted in the oceanic record of Quaternary events, and the possibility that at least one additional interglacial of this age is represented in Britain has been discussed. However, in the absence of datable interglacial deposits which are seen to overlie one another, the issue has remained controversial.

The role of test procedure in linguistic integration studies.

The effects of type of recognition test procedure were studied in a Bransford and Franks (1971) integration paradigm. Subjects received a two-alternative forced-choice recognition test or a modified "forced-choice" test in which all the sentences for each idea set were presented at once and the "old" sentences had to be identified. Contrary to the usual Bransford and Franks results, in which a yes-no, one-sentence-at-a-time recognition procedure is employed, the ability to discriminate "old" sentences from "new" sentences was clearly observed.