The Effectiveness of Individualized Morphosyntactic Target Identification and Explicit Intervention Using the SHAPE CODING System for Children With Developmental Language Disorder and the Impact of Within-Session Dosage.

Purpose: We investigated the effectiveness of a highly individualized morphosyntactic intervention using the SHAPE CODING™ system delivered at different dosages.

Method: Eight children with developmental language disorder aged 8;0-10;10 (years;months) received 10 hr of explicit individualized intervention for morphosyntax delivered in 30-min individual sessions once per week for 20 weeks. Following at least four baseline probe tests, two grammatical targets per session received explicit instruction until they reached criterion (90%), when the next target was introduced.

Defining the Assessment and Treatment Competencies to Deliver Low-Intensity Cognitive Behavior Therapy: A Multi-Center Validation Study.

Despite the vastly increased dissemination of the low-intensity (LI) version of cognitive behavior therapy (CBT) for the treatment of anxiety and depression, no valid and reliable indices of the LI-CBT clinical competencies currently exist. This research therefore sought to develop and evaluate two measures: the low-intensity assessment competency scale (LIAC) and the low-intensity treatment competency scale (LITC). Inductive and deductive methods were used to construct the competency scales and detailed rating manuals were prepared.

Understanding differing outcomes from semantic and phonological interventions with children with word-finding difficulties: A group and case series study.

Developmental Language Disorder occurs in up to 10% of children and many of these children have difficulty retrieving words in their receptive vocabulary. Such word-finding difficulties (WFD) can impact social development and educational outcomes. This research aims to develop the evidence-base for supporting children with WFD and inform the design and analysis of intervention studies.

Adding web-based behavioural support to exercise referral schemes for inactive adults with chronic health conditions: the e-coachER RCT.

Background: There is modest evidence that exercise referral schemes increase physical activity in inactive individuals with chronic health conditions. There is a need to identify additional ways to improve the effects of exercise referral schemes on long-term physical activity.

Objectives: To determine if adding the e-coachER intervention to exercise referral schemes is more clinically effective and cost-effective in increasing physical activity after 1 year than usual exercise referral schemes.

Impact of primary care exercise referral schemes on the health of patients with obesity.

Primary care exercise referral schemes (ERSs) are a potentially useful setting to promote physical activity (PA). It is not established, however, whether interventions to increase PA, such as ERSs, have differing health outcomes according to the participants' body mass index (BMI). This paper summarizes evidence for the impact of primary care ERSs on the health of people with obesity and reports findings of a reanalysis of the EMPOWER study, providing the first data to report differential outcomes of ERSs by BMI category.

Intervention for children with word-finding difficulties: a parallel group randomised control trial.

Purpose: The study investigated the outcome of a word-web intervention for children diagnosed with word-finding difficulties (WFDs).

Method: Twenty children age 6-8 years with WFDs confirmed by a discrepancy between comprehension and production on the Test of Word Finding-2, were randomly assigned to intervention (n = 11) and waiting control (n = 9) groups. The intervention group had six sessions of intervention which used word-webs and targeted children's meta-cognitive awareness and word-retrieval.

No evidence for production of intrathecal immunoglobulin G against Acinetobacter or Pseudomonas in multiple sclerosis.

The production of oligoclonal, polyspecific immunoglobulin G is characteristic of multiple sclerosis (MS), yet no pathogen has been identified as an infectious agent. Recent studies have proposed Acinetobactercalcoaceticus and Pseudomonas aeruginosa as candidate organisms, on the basis of a sequence homology between a bacterial enzyme and bovine myelin basic protein. To investigate this, we looked for specific, high-affinity immunoglobulin G against these pathogensin paired serum and cerebrospinal fluid from MS patients compared to other neurological diseases.

Acinetobacter immune responses in multiple sclerosis: etiopathogenetic role and its possible use as a diagnostic marker.

Multiple sclerosis (MS) is the most common cause of neurologic disability among young people. The etiology of MS is controversial, but immune responses are considered to somehow be involved. The diagnosis of MS depends on a combination of various clinical and laboratory features, but apart from some myelin-neuronal autoantibody profiles or oligoclonal bands in the cerebrospinal fluid no other serologic diagnostic test or marker has yet been discovered.

Cytotoxicity responses to peptide antigens in rheumatoid arthritis and ankylosing spondylitis.

Objective: To measure levels of IgG antibodies against structurally related synthetic peptides of HLA-DRB1*0404, type XI collagen, and Proteus mirabilis in patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and HLA-B*2705 and Klebsiella pneumoniae in patients with ankylosing spondylitis (AS), and to determine whether sera from RA and AS patients are cytotoxic for sheep red blood cells (SRBC) coated with HLA-DRB1*0404, type XI collagen, or HLA-B*2705.

Methods: Sera from 51 patients with RA, 34 with AS, and 38 healthy controls were tested against synthetic EQRRAA, ESRRAL, LRREI, and IRRET peptides by ELISA. Sera from patients and controls were also tested for reactivity in complement mediated cytotoxicity with SRBC coated with EQRRAA and HLA-B*2705, LRREI peptides.