Improving patient-centered communication: Results of a randomized controlled trial.

Objective: Patient-centered communication is a key element for improving the quality of care in terms of therapeutic relationship, patient participation, and treatment process. Postgraduate trainings provide an essential way of promoting patient centeredness on the job where learning opportunities are often limited by time, patient volume, and economic pressure. In the present study, changes in patient centeredness during clinical routines of postgraduate physicians (internal medicine) after a three-day communication training were assessed.

[Ethic rounds in intensive care. Possible instrument for a clinical-ethical assessment in intensive care units].

Ethical problems, such as medical end-of-life decisions or withdrawing life-sustaining treatment are viewed as an essential task in intensive care units. This article presents the ethics rounds as an instrument for evaluation of ethical problems in intensive care medicine units. The benchmarks of ethical reflection during the ethics rounds are considerations of ethical theory of principle-oriented medical ethics.

[CT morphology of fractured thoraco-lumbar vertebrae after transpedicular spongiosaplasty and use of internal fixator].

Purpose: An analysis of the CT morphology of fractured thoraco-lumbar vertebrae after treatment with internal fixation and transpedicular spongiosaplasty (SP).

Material And Method: 30 patients were examined following trauma and surgery after about 12 and 30 months by means of CT. The following were evaluated: width of the spinal canal; height of the vertebra and intervertebral space; degree of kyphosis; position, size and appearance of the SP and of the vertebral body.

[Local therapy of pityriasis versicolor with 3 imidazole derivatives--results of a therapeutic study. Studies of the rate of recurrence].

In a clinical study from October 1985 to July 1987, we tested the efficacy of 3 different imidazole compounds in 112 male patients suffering from pityriasis versicolor. The diagnosis was made according to clinical criteria and confirmed by microscopical investigation. Our results prove the necessity of daily treatment over a period of at least 2 weeks.