Legal abortion

We discuss from an analytical point of view the mechanism of pre-pattern formation in a diffusion governed morphogenetic field. The model here considered is a normalized form of one of the models, proposed by Gierer and Meinhardt, based on the general principle of lateral inhibition. The results, obtained in the framework of bifurcation theory, shows that there is a spontaneous formation of a gradient both for activator and inhibitor concentrations if the ratio between the mean squares of the diffusion ranges of inhibitor and activator is greater than a well defined critical value.     

Neosporosis-associated bovine abortion in Pennsylvania

Neospora caninum was found in fetal tissues of 34 of 688 cases of bovine abortion submitted to the Pennsylvania Animal Diagnostic Laboratory System during the period from May 1994 to November 1996. The aborted fetuses ranged in gestational age from 3 to 8 months. Microscopic lesions consisted primarily of encephalitis and myocarditis. A labeled (strept) avidin-biotin staining procedure using anti-N. caninum polyclonal rabbit serum revealed N. caninum organisms within the fetal brain (27 of 27), heart (10 of 13), placenta (5 of 6), kidney (2 of 2), liver (1 of 4) and skeletal muscle (1 of 1).     

Husbands' involvement in abortion in Vietnam

This study analyzes the involvement of men in abortion in Vietnam, where induced abortion is legal and abortion rates are among the highest in the world. Twenty men were interviewed in 1996 about the role they played in their wives' abortions and about their feelings and ethical views concerning the procedure. The results showed that both husbands and wives considered the husband to be the main decisionmaker regarding family size, which included the decision to have an abortion, but that, in fact, some women had undergone an abortion without consulting their husbands in advance. Parents and in-laws were usually not consulted; the couples thought they might object to the decision on moral grounds. Respondents' ethical perspectives on abortion are discussed. When faced with an unwanted pregnancy, the husbands adopted an ethics of care and responsibility toward family and children, although some felt that abortion was immoral. The study highlights the importance of understanding husbands' perspectives on their responsibilities and rights in reproductive decisionmaking and their ethical and other concerns related to abortion.     

Neosporosis and bovine abortion in Scotland

Serum samples were collected over a two-year period from aborting cows and their fetuses from throughout Scotland; 465 maternal sera were examined using an immunofluorescent antibody test for IgG antibody to Neospora caninum and 547 fetal sera were examined for IgM and IgG antibody to the parasite; 355 of the maternal sera were paired with their respective fetal samples. The maternal titres ranged from 1/8 to 1/16,384, with 59 per cent (275) having titres of 1/128 or 1/256. Of the 547 fetal sera, 9.9 per cent had IgM titres equal to or greater than 1/64, 11.2 per cent had IgG titres equal to or greater than 1/64 and 15.9 per cent had IgM and/or IgG titres equal to or greater than 1/64. It is concluded that a fetal IgM or IgG titre of 1/64 or more is evidence of fetal exposure to N caninum but that the examination of maternal sera is less reliable on an individual basis, although valuable for indicating the degree of infection in a herd. Although fetal seropositivity does not necessarily provide proof that N caninum was the cause of death in a given case, the observation that 15.9 per cent of aborted fetuses had antibody to the parasite shows that vertical transmission from dam to fetus is relatively common and may be an important cause of fetal loss in cattle in Scotland.     

Sex guilt in abortion patients.

Mosher's Forced-Choice Sex Guilt Inventory was administered to 45 clients of a university problem pregnancy counseling service who were planning to have abortions and to 47 sexually active nonpregnant university coeds. Sex guilt was found to be significantly higher for abortion Ss than for nonpregnant Ss. It was also found that for each type of contraceptive, abortion Ss had higher sex guilt than nonabortion Ss. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Vaccination against chlamydial genital tract infection after immunization with dendritic cells pulsed ex vivo with nonviable Chlamydiae

Chlamydia trachomatis, an obligate intracellular bacterial pathogen of mucosal surfaces, is a major cause of preventable blindness and sexually transmitted diseases for which vaccines are badly needed. Despite considerable effort, antichlamydial vaccines have proven to be elusive using conventional immunization strategies. We report the use of murine bone marrow-derived dendritic cells (DC) pulsed ex vivo with killed chlamydiae as a novel approach to vaccination against chlamydial infection. Our results show that DC efficiently phagocytose chlamydiae, secrete IL-12 p40, and present chlamydial antigen(s) to infection sensitized CD4(+) T cells. Mice immunized intravenously with chlamydial-pulsed DC produce protective immunity against chlamydial infection of the female genital tract equal to that obtained after infection with live organisms. Immunized mice shed approximately 3 logs fewer infectious chlamydiae and are protected from genital tract inflammatory and obstructive disease. Protective immunity is correlated with a chlamydial-specific Th1-biased response that closely mimics the immune response produced after chlamydial infection. Thus, ex vivo antigen-pulsed DC represent a powerful tool for the study of protective immunity to chlamydial mucosal infection and for the identification of chlamydial protective antigens through reconstitution experiments. Moreover, these findings might impact the design of vaccine strategies against other medically important sexually transmitted diseases for which vaccines are sought but which have proven difficult to develop.     

Conditions of induced abortion in France

In France, each woman will have an average of one unintended pregnancy in her life and she'll decide to abort once out of two. 21 years after the vote of the law which authorized the abortion, according to certains conditions, the abortion rate decreases slightly. The socioeconomics characteristics of women requesting an abortion are very similar to those found in 1976. The medical and psychological complications are very low. The law is applied except that some difficulties persist: to recruit professionals becomes more difficult, inadequate solutions of public hospitals, inappropriate and not always comprehensive towards the clients, no possibility to choose the methods. The law is limited for the minors, the foreigners and the pregnancies up to 10 weeks which increases the social inegalities. It is a major public health concern to make abortion as safe as possible because it gives accessibility to choose freely motherhood which is the best way for safe pregnancy, birth and parent and child relationship.     

Advice in the abortion decision.

Examined several aspects of the abortion decision beyond demographic data, particularly the number and kinds of contacts-for-advice made by women confronted with the decision. Ss were 224 therapeutic abortion patients aged 13-41 yrs, 71 obstetrics patients aged 15-35 yrs, and 201 nonhospitalized control Ss aged 16 to over 27 yrs. Ss were asked to report the number of contacts-for-advice they had made when forming decisions to have a therapeutic abortion, to carry a pregnancy to term, or to engage in a significant behavior that did not involve a pregnancy. All Ss were asked to report the difficulty they had in making their respective decisions and the satisfaction they felt with their decisions. As predicted, the abortion group differed strongly from both other groups on most questions. Abortion patient contacts-for-advice also differed from those reported by N. H. Lee's (1969) Ss, but in a direction opposite the predicted one: Lee's reported contacts-for-advice were more numerous than those in the present study. Differences are discussed in light of current social feelings toward abortion and conditions which may have influenced the amount of information upon which Ss had to base their decisions. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Marital status and abortion

OBJECTIVES: This article examines the marital status of women who obtained abortions between 1974 and 1994, with particular attention to those who were married or in common-law relationships. DATA SOURCES: The data come from Statistics Canada's publications on abortions, in-patient hospital morbidity data, and reports from the United States. ANALYTICAL TECHNIQUES: Crude and age-standardized abortion rates from 1974 to 1994 were calculated by marital status. MAIN RESULTS: While abortion rates were highest for single women, those who were married (including common-law and separated) accounted for over one-quarter of all abortions performed in 1994. Since 1974, the age-standardized abortion rate per 1,000 married women aged 15 to 44 almost doubled from 6.6 to 11.2. For most of these women, it was their first abortion, and the majority had taken at least one pregnancy to term.     

The physicians and abortion

The position of physicians regarding induced abortion in Mexico deserves closer attention. The attitudes of physicians towards induced abortion have been a subject of study in different countries. It has been observed that such attitudes depend on ethical, religious, legal, political, or medical factors. In those countries where abortion is not penalized, physicians sustain different positions regarding this issue. The experiences of some countries indicate that the institutional provision of abortion services is a controversial and politically serious matter, and that offering or denying them generally depends to a great extent on the physician's discretion. In contexts like Mexico, where abortion is penalized, legal and other restrictions do not prevent many physicians from practicing it in a concealed way, generally for profit. On the other hand, even though abortion is recognized as an important social and public health problem, and laws regulate the conditions for its legal practice, the majority of medical professionals and health institutions maintain a conservative and reserved position on this matter. The professional training of physicians and the legal status of induced abortion as a criminal practice, are central elements in their attitudes towards this problem.     

Vitamins C and E in spontaneous abortion

A balance method for the measurement of digestible and metabolizable energy in rats is described. Experimentally determined metabolizable energies of 2 diets for rats were closer to those values for metabolizable energy calculated from tabulated values for pigs rather than chickens. Some drawbacks in the use of tables of energy values to predict the energy of diets are discussed.     

Lipid metabolism in women with threatened abortion

The study group consisted of 130 subjects: 50 healthy nonpregnant, 35 healthy women in the I trimester of gestation (gestational age 6-15 weeks) and 45 patients with symptoms of threatened abortion (the same gestational age). In the latter group pain and bleeding ceased after hormonal treatment and spasmolytic drugs. Serum blood concentration of following compounds were determined: total lipids, LDL fraction, total cholesterol, phospholipids, triglycerides, HDL and LDL cholesterol fractions. Threatened abortion had changed lipids profile; diminished concentrations of LDL fraction, total cholesterol, LDL cholesterol fraction and phospholipids were observed. Levels of total lipids, phospholipids and triglycerides++ in blood serum of healthy pregnant women in the I trimester of gestation were higher than in nonpregnant women.     

Uteroplacental vascular involvement in recurrent spontaneous abortion

In the present study, we assessed the ability of increasing doses of intranasal calcitonin to suppress urinary deoxypyridinoline cross-link (DPD), a specific biochemical marker of bone resorption, in early postmenopausal women. Subjects consisted of 30 healthy Thai women within 5 years of postmenopause, randomly assigned to 50, 100, or 200 IU of intranasal calcitonin 5 days/week for 3 months. Calcium supplementation by calcium carbonate capsules at 750 mg of elemental calcium per day was given to all subjects. Twenty four-hour urine for DPD and creatinine assays was collected at baseline, 1 month, and 3 months after treatment. All DPD values were corrected with urinary creatinine before analyses. Data were expressed as mean +/- SEM. DPD decreased significantly 1 month after intranasal calcitonin treatment (P < 0.01). However, at 3 months, DPD increased when compared with the values at 1 month (P < 0.01), suggesting that there may be a reduction in the suppression of bone resorption after prolonged calcitonin therapy. Using a stepwise multiple regression model to address whether dosage and DPD at baseline influence the response to intranasal calcitonin, it was found that DPD suppression after intranasal calcitonin was not related to dosage but was strongly associated with baseline DPD (P < 0.0001). Suppression of bone resorption in early postmenopausal women by intranasal calcitonin is determined more by the state of bone turnover at baseline than the dosage of calcitonin.