Publications by authors named "Vivien Shaw"

Visual representations of complex data are a cornerstone of how scientific information is shared. By taking large quantities of data and creating accessible visualisations that show relationships, patterns, outliers, and conclusions, important research can be communicated effectively to any audience. The nature of animal cognition is heavily debated with no consensus on what constitutes animal intelligence.

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For thousands of years, scientists have studied human anatomy by dissecting bodies. Our knowledge of their findings is limited, however, both by the subsequent loss of many of the oldest texts, and by a tendency toward a Eurocentric perspective in medicine. As a discipline, anatomy tends to be much more familiar with ancient Greek texts than with those from India, China, or Persia.

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Background: We aimed to assess the standing of acupuncture as a clinical tool in the management of trigeminal neuralgia against the current first-line drug treatment (carbamazepine) and the most effective surgery (microvascular decompression (MVD)).

Methods: Data regarding efficacy, side effects and cost were compiled for each of these three modalities from the PubMed and Cochrane Library databases. Patient stress was estimated according to Holmes and Rahe's Social Readjustment Rating Scale (SRRS).

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Anatomical dissection has begun to reveal striking similarities between gross anatomical structures and the system of nomenclature used in traditional Chinese acupuncture. This paper argues that acupuncture point nomenclature is rooted in systematic anatomical investigation of cadaveric specimens, and that acupuncture points and meridians are purposefully named to reflect observable physical form. Two types of evidence are compared: observations of physical structures based on anatomical dissection, and translation and analysis of original Chinese texts.

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We describe an anatomical variation of the right maxillary artery. The variation loops deep, giving off a middle meningeal artery with an extremely short extracranial segment, then bifurcates into unequal branches. The smaller branch passes superficial to the lateral pterygoid head and distributes primarily to the masticatory muscles.

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The objectives of this research are, first, to establish if the extraordinary acupuncture meridian known as Chōng, Penetrating Vessel or Sea of Blood, is in essence a description of certain macroscopic parts of the underlying vascular system and, second, by extension, to show that it is likely that cadaveric dissection would have been used as a tool to arrive at this understanding. Generally accepted scholarly opinion holds that the ancient Chinese rarely used dissection in order to explore the anatomy of the human body, and that the meridians are therefore invisible metaphysical structures corresponding to lines drawn on the body. However, the seminal text, 'The Yellow Emperor's Classic of Internal Medicine', describes using palpation to examine the living and dissection to examine the dead.

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