Fetal fibronectin test for threatened preterm delivery 48h after admission: Cost-effectiveness study.

Objective: The aim of this work was to assess the cost-effectiveness of the fetal fibronectin (fFN) test at 48 h after admission for threatened preterm delivery to promote early discharge.

Study Design: Before-and-after study to calculate the incremental cost-effectiveness ratio (ICER). Patients were enrolled 48 h after admission in a tertiary care centre for threatened preterm delivery between 24 and 34 weeks.

[When should the nephrologist be called in the emergency room?].

Nephrology emergencies are not the most frequent in the emergency room but they often generate some diagnostic and therapeutic problems. Most common renal emergencies are due most often to acute renal failure whatever the cause, electrolytes disturbances, hypertensive crisis and less frequently intoxications or acute decompensation of chronic kidney diseases. The goal of this paper is to review some of these clinical situations both in the diagnostic and therapeutic perspective but essentially to discuss when the nephrologist should be called in the emergency room so that the coordination of care is optimal for the patients.

Unusual presentation of severe intrahepatic cholestasis of pregnancy leading to fetal death.

Background: We report an unusual presentation of intrahepatic cholestasis of pregnancy complicated by fetal death and associated with homozygous bile salt export pump polymorphism.

Case: A secundigravida presented at 31 weeks of pregnancy with discrete pruritus and highly elevated bile acid levels (223 micromol/L) suggestive of intrahepatic cholestasis of pregnancy, despite normal serum aminotransferase levels. She had a 6-year history of ulcerative colitis, and her previous pregnancy (3 years before) had been uneventful.

Clinicians' defences: An empirical study.

Objective: Clinicians' defence mechanisms are strategies used to manage the stress and the negative affects emerging during a therapy session. The first objective of the study is to adapt the defence mechanisms rating scales (DMRS), originally created by Perry for assessing patient defences, in order to evaluate clinician defences. The second objective is to explore the type of defence mechanisms used by clinicians in oncology.

Psychodynamic aspects of communication skills training: a pilot study.

Goals Of Work: Communication between patients and oncology clinicians is a key element of cancer care. Emotionally charged consultations may trigger clinicians' defense mechanisms, protecting them from painful emotions. Defense mechanisms, however, may also hamper the recognition of patients' suffering.

Clinical significance and patients' perceived change in four sessions of brief psychodynamic intervention: characteristics of early responders.

This study investigated Tingey, Lambert, Burlingame, and Hansen's (1996) extension of Jacobson, Follette and Revenstorf's (1984) proposal for assessing clinical significance. Seventy (N=70) outpatients with/without Cluster C personality disorders treated with a brief psychodynamic intervention (BDI) were included in the study. Results showed that 33% of patients demonstrated clinically significant change on the Global Severity Index.