Evaluating the quality of remote sensing products for agricultural index insurance.

Agricultural index insurance contracts increasingly use remote sensing data to estimate losses and determine indemnity payouts. Index insurance contracts inevitably make errors, failing to detect losses that occur and issuing payments when no losses occur. The quality of these contracts and the indices on which they are based, need to be evaluated to assess their fitness as insurance, and to provide a guide to choosing the index that best protects the insured.

Osmoreceptors do not exhibit a sex-dependent modulation of forearm skin blood flow and sweating.

Studies show that increases in plasma osmolality result in a delayed onset threshold of thermoeffector responses. However, it remains unclear if there are sex-related differences in the osmotically induced changes in both sweating and cutaneous vascular conductance (CVC). Nine young men and nine young women were passively heated (water-perfused suit) to 1.

Is whole-body thermoregulatory function impaired in type 1 diabetes mellitus?

Unlabelled: During periods of extreme heat individuals with diabetes have greater rates of heat-related morbidity and mortality compared to their non-diabetic counterparts. The reason for this discrepancy is currently unknown. Furthermore, there is a lack of information about whether or not individuals with type 1 diabetes are at a thermoregulatory disadvantage during strenuous physical activity especially when performed in the heat.

The constant flow ventricular infusion test: a simple and useful study in the diagnosis of third ventriculostomy failure.

Object: The evaluation of third ventriculostomy function in hydrocephalic patients is challenging. The utility of the constant flow infusion test in predicting response to shunt insertion in normal-pressure hydrocephalus, as well as in identifying shunt malfunction, has been previously demonstrated. The object of this study was to evaluate its usefulness in determining whether a revision CSF diversion procedure was indicated in patients presenting with recurring symptoms and persisting ventriculomegaly after endoscopic third ventriculostomy (ETV).

Spontaneous third ventriculostomy: definition by endoscopy and cerebrospinal fluid dynamics.

Chronic obstructive hydrocephalus is known to cause ventricular diverticula and, rarely, spontaneous ventriculostomy. The authors present the case of a patient in whom a spontaneous third ventriculostomy was identified with long-standing hydrocephalus secondary to aqueductal stenosis. To their knowledge, this is the first report in which a spontaneous stoma in the floor of the third ventricle was evaluated using endoscopy and cerebrospinal fluid dynamics studies.

The economic impacts of premature adult mortality: panel data evidence from KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa.

Measuring the household level economic impacts of AIDS-related deaths is of particular salience in South Africa, a country struggling with a legacy of poverty and economic inequality in the midst of an HIV epidemic. Household panel data that span more than a decade permit us to resolve many of the statistical problems that make it difficult to determine these impacts. After allowing for the impact of demographic adjustments and other coping strategies, we found evidence that these impacts are quite different across different types of households, and that the largest and most persistent effects were in the middle ranges of the South African income distribution, that is, households just above the poverty line.

Three sisters with Chiari I malformation with and without associated syringomyelia.

Two daughters of non-consanguineous Ashkenazi Jewish parentage presented with occipital headaches in the second decade of life. Each had a symptomatic Chiari I malformation (CMI) and a large cervicothoracic syrinx. A third sister was diagnosed as having CMI without syrinx after MR screening of first-degree relatives.