A simple asthma prediction tool for preschool children with wheeze or cough.

Background: Many preschool children have wheeze or cough, but only some have asthma later. Existing prediction tools are difficult to apply in clinical practice or exhibit methodological weaknesses.

Objective: We sought to develop a simple and robust tool for predicting asthma at school age in preschool children with wheeze or cough.

Is computer-assisted telephone triage safe? A prospective surveillance study in walk-in patients with non-life-threatening medical conditions.

Background: Patients often establish initial contact with healthcare institutions by telephone. During this process they are frequently medically triaged.

Purpose: To investigate the safety of computer-assisted telephone triage for walk-in patients with non-life-threatening medical conditions at an emergency unit of a Swiss university hospital.

Increased densities of monocarboxylate transport protein MCT1 after chronic administration of nicotine in rat brain.

Chronic administration of nicotine is followed by a general stimulation of brain metabolism that results in a distinct increase of glucose transport protein densities for Glut1 and Glu3, and local cerebral glucose utilization (LCGU). This increase of LCGU might be paralleled by an enhanced production of lactate. Therefore, the question arose as to whether chronic nicotine infusion is accompanied by increased local densities of monocarboxylate transporter MCT1 in the brain.

Increased densities of monocarboxylate transporter MCT1 after chronic hyperglycemia in rat brain.

The brain is capable of taking up monocarboxylates as energy substrates. Under physiological conditions, plasma levels of monocarboxylates are very low and glucose is the primary energy substrate in brain metabolism. However, given conditions such as hyperglycemia and ketosis, levels of circulating monocarboxylates such as lactate and pyruvate are elevated.

Hemoximetry as the "gold standard"? Error assessment based on differences among identical blood gas analyzer devices of five manufacturers.

Background: The calibration and testing procedures of a pulse oximeter with arterial blood samples from healthy subjects are based on reference values from the hemoximeter. There are no tests to identify the accuracy of the reference devices. Because of this limitation and since the true values of oxygen saturation (sO2 in %) in blood samples were not known, we used the differences between two identical devices, A and B, for error assessment.