The motivations behind science denial.

Across the world highly educated, science-literate parents are refusing to have their children vaccinated against contagious diseases. Decades of international, peer-reviewed climate science is being dismissed as institutional conspiracy. Activists troll and harass scientists who come to unfavourable conclusions in pet areas such as genome modification, childhood memory recall, chronic fatigue syndrome and even the hazards of smoking.

Prophylactic endovascular placement of internal iliac occlusion balloon catheters in parturients with placenta accreta: a retrospective case series.

Background: Endovascular occlusion balloon catheters can be placed preoperatively in internal iliac vessels of patients perceived to be at risk of major obstetric haemorrhage during caesarean section. Their safety and efficacy remains undefined, and we report our experience of 14 patients over four years.

Methods: We undertook a chart review of all patients who had undergone prophylactic internal iliac balloon catheters before caesarean section in our institution.

The effect of preoperative beta-blocker therapy on cardiovascular responses to weaning from mechanical ventilation and extubation after coronary artery bypass grafting.

The hemodynamic and electrocardiographic changes during weaning from mechanical ventilation and tracheal extubation were studied in 75 patients after elective coronary artery bypass surgery. Transfer from synchronized intermittent mandatory ventilation to spontaneous respiration through a T-piece was associated with an increase greater than 20% over baseline in systolic (SBP) and diastolic (DBP) blood pressure in 27% of patients, and in heart rate (HR) in 5% of patients. Although baseline SBP, DBP, and HR differed significantly between the patients taking chronic beta-blocker therapy and those not on beta-blockers (P values all < 0.

The influence of arm position and cardiac output on bolus clearance from the arm.

The importance of arm position and cardiac output on the clearance of a bolus injection from the arm was assessed in 63 patients using technetium-99m. Injections were made in the left arm which was either adducted, abducted or adducted with the forearm flexed over the lower chest. The clearance of isotope was assessed by measuring the amount of radioactivity remaining in the arm at 10 s intervals and calculating it as a fraction of the injected dose.

Electrocardiographic changes during cesarean section under regional anesthesia.

To determine electrocardiographic changes and whether myocardial ischemia occurs during cesarean section, electrocardiograms were recorded continuously using Holter monitoring in 25 patients undergoing elective cesarean section under either spinal or epidural anesthesia. In addition, in 13 of the patients, two-dimensional precordial echocardiography was carried out before and during cesarean section. ST segment depression suggestive of myocardial ischemia occurred in 16 patients including 8 of the 13 with echocardiograms.

Effect of adrenaline on extradural anaesthesia, plasma lignocaine concentrations and the feto-placental unit during elective caesarean section.

Extradural anaesthesia was induced with either 2% lignocaine or 2% lignocaine with adrenaline 1:200,000 in 20 patients undergoing elective Caesarean section. With the adrenaline-containing solution, a smaller dose of lignocaine was required to produce an adequate block and the lignocaine concentrations in both mother and neonate were significantly smaller compared with the plain solution. Arterial pressures were less in the adrenaline group, but there was no difference in umbilical flow velocity waveform, fetal heart rate or fetal outcome.