Comparing barriers and enablers of women's health leadership in India with East Africa and North America.

Background: Women are estimated to hold between 70 and 75% of global health positions worldwide yet persistent inequities in power and leadership remain. There is little information on specific enablers and barriers that women working in public health face in India and how those compare with other regions.

Methods: We collected and analyzed information from women working in public health in India and East Africa (Kenya, Rwanda, and Uganda) and in global health (Canada and United States), to understand and document the specific enablers and barriers women face in India, compared with other regions.

Determining the Impact of an Alarm Management Program on Alarm Fatigue among ICU and Telemetry RNs: An Evidence Based Research Project.

This evidence-based research project provides an appraisal of current research on how an alarm management program impacts alarm fatigue among registered nurses (RNs) in both intensive care units (ICUs) and telemetry units. Alarm fatigue is a major problem recognized by both the American Association of Critical-Care Nurses (AACN) and the Joint Commission. RNs are the primary caretakers of critically ill patients in ICUs and telemetry units and therefore are at the greatest risk for alarm fatigue.

Practical steps to digital organism models, from laboratory model species to 'Crops in silico.

A recent initiative named 'Crops in silico' proposes that multi-scale models 'have the potential to fill in missing mechanistic details and generate new hypotheses to prioritize directed engineering efforts' in plant science, particularly directed to crop species. To that end, the group called for 'a paradigm shift in plant modelling, from largely isolated efforts to a connected community'. 'Wet' (experimental) research has been especially productive in plant science, since the adoption of Arabidopsis thaliana as a laboratory model species allowed the emergence of an Arabidopsis research community.

A high-level language for rule-based modelling.

Rule-based languages such as Kappa excel in their support for handling the combinatorial complexities prevalent in many biological systems, including signalling pathways. But Kappa provides little structure for organising rules, and large models can therefore be hard to read and maintain. This paper introduces a high-level, modular extension of Kappa called LBS-κ.

[The method of replacement of defects in impression fractures of calcaneus. Porous NiTi or autotransplant?].

An experience with treatment of 149 patients with severe injuries of the ankle joint operated using constructions of titanium-nickelide and autotransplant from the iliac crest is presented. Porous NiTi being bio-inert to organism tissues, having high through porosity, the formation of consolidation of the fracture develops more rapidly. Application of porous NiTi allowed the period of disablement to be on an average 20 days shorter and long-term results to be reliably better.

Pesticide/environmental exposures and Parkinson's disease in East Texas.

Epidemiological evidence suggests that pesticides and other environmental exposures may have a role in the etiology of idiopathic Parkinson's disease (PD). However, there is little human data on risk associated with specific pesticide products, including organic pesticides such as rotenone with PD. Using a case-control design, this study examined self-reports of exposure to pesticide products, organic pesticides such as rotenone, and other occupational and environmental exposures on the risk of PD in an East Texas population.

Evidence in support of a feedback-sensitive central timekeeper for an over-learned repetitive motor behavior (pencil shading).

Purpose: To demonstrate the presence of a CNS timekeeper for an over-learned repetitive voluntary movement (pencil shading), and to learn if the timekeeper is influenced by changes in sensory feedback.

Methods: Self-paced pencil shading; fast, maximally-fast, and slow hand waving, as well as enhanced physiologic tremor (EPT) were recorded on 3 separate occasions with a surface-mounted accelerometer placed on the hand in 9 normal volunteers. Variation in inter-trial peak frequency was calculated.

[Referrals to an emergency department--are there differences between self-referrals and referrals from general practitioners?].

The Israeli health system has been undergoing major changes in recent years. Considerations of cost containment have led sick funds to open new out-of-hours services in the community to reduce visits to hospital emergency departments. Referred and self-referred visits to our emergency department during a 1-month period were studied.

Dystonia as a presenting feature of the 3243 mitochondrial DNA mutation.

A variety of neurologic phenotypes have been described in patients with mitochondrial disorders. We report a 32-year-old man in whom dystonia was the salient and presenting feature of a mitochondrial DNA mutation. He presented at age 23 with writer's cramp and progressed over 5 years to exhibit dystonia in facial muscles and lower limbs.

The cutaneous silent period is mediated by spinal inhibitory reflex.

High-intensity cutaneous stimuli inhibit tonically firing motor neurons resulting in a silent period (CSP) in EMG activity. To determine the central nervous system (CNS) circuitry of this inhibitory reflex, soleus H reflexes evoked by tibial nerve stimuli were conditioned by high-intensity sural stimuli in 5 normal men and 5 men with complete, traumatic cervical myelopathy. The sural-tibial interstimulus interval (ISI) was varied between 0 and 200 ms.

Electromyography: do the diagnostic ends justify the means?

Background: Physicians are sometimes reluctant to refer patients for electrodiagnostic studies (electromyography with nerve conduction studies [EMG/NCS]) believing the test is too painful and of little benefit.

Methods: We performed two separate surveys on 126 and 100 consecutive patients referred to our laboratory to determine if EMG/NCS was beneficial to the referring physician and to compare the level of anxiety experienced by patients before the study with the pain actually experienced during the study.

Results: The electrodiagnosis was discordant from the referring diagnosis in 39% of the patients with an abnormal EMG/NCS.

[The replacement of resection defects of the bones by combined endoprostheses].

The authors possess the experience of 32 operations in patients with various pathology. In 74% being operated good functional results are received during observation period from 3 months to 4 years.

The bone scan in primary care: diagnostic pitfalls.

Skeletal scintigraphy (bone scanning) is a useful adjunct in the diagnosis of disease states, such as osteomyelitis, and in the evaluation of occult fractures. Certain conditions can alter the appearance of bone scans, such as age of the patient, prior use of antibiotics, concomitant diseases, and disruption of the vascular supply. Three patients whose clinical problems highlight diagnostic problems with bone scans are discussed.

[Bactericidal and bacteriostatic properties of Acryloxide copolymer in articular endoprosthesis].

Based upon bacteriological investigations the authors have proved bacteriostatic and sometimes bactericidal effects of the polymer material "Acryloxide". Endoprostheses made of it do not require sterilization which was demonstrated in operations of endoprosthesis of joints on 225 patients.

[Clinical and experimental bases for the use of Acryloxide in restorative surgery of the joints].

Experimental and clinical investigations showed good prospects of further studies of deformation characteristics of Akryloxide, particularly the elasticity module to judge of the degree of biological destruction of the plastics and possible prognosis of working efficiency of the polymer in individual endoprosthesis of joints.

Behçet's syndrome complicated by cutaneous leukocytoclastic vasculitis. Response to prednisone and chlorambucil.

Traditionally described as a triad consisting of recurrent aphthous stomatitis, genital ulcerations, and uveitis, Behçet's syndrome is now recognized as a multisystem disease with protean manifestations. We studied a patient with chronic recurrent migratory superficial thrombophlebitis and marked cutaneous hyperreactivity (pathergy) who developed leukocytoclastic vasculitis with recalcitrant leg ulcerations nine years after the onset of his illness. Although he was treated with topical and systemic antibiotics for presumed bacterial superinfection, cutaneous ulcerations continued to develop and enlarge; only after prednisone therapy was begun was there a dramatic response with complete resolution.

Hereditary angioedema and coronary arteritis.

A 30-year-old white male with hereditary angioedema developed substernal chest pain with multiple arterial stenoses at coronary angiography. Histopathologic studies of the fibromembranous thickening removed from the left coronary artery at the time of the revascularization procedure revealed an inflammatory lesion compatible with an arteritis. The significance of this association in the spectrum of immunologically-mediated disorders in hereditary angioedema is discussed.