Information resources yesterday and today

The author discusses the most important sources of information from the historical aspect as well as with regard to the present time. She characterizes briefly the best known information centres, primary and secondary sources of information and their different types. In the conclusion of the article the author mentions modern sources of information which benefit from modern technology (multimedial means, Internet) and she outlines also the future development in the 21st century.     

“Stinol” yesterday, today, and tomorrow

In July of this year, the subsidiary of the NLMK—the “STINOL” Refrigerator Plant—produced its four-millionth refrigerator, thus cementing its reputation as a successful and dynamically growing company. Novolipetsk Metallurgical Combine. Translated from Metallurg, No. 10, p. 50, October, 1999.     

Chemotherapy for tuberculosis; yesterday, today, and tomorrow--basic and clinical studies

The discovery of streptomycin in 1944 had given rise to great flowering of chemotherapy for tuberculosis. The times which triple treatment of SM.PAS.INH after the temporal time of SM.PAS had been standard regimens on initial treatment had continued for more than twenty years. The shortening of duration for chemotherapy had become possible by the introduction of RFP, and the duration had reduced to one fourth compared with that of the regimens till then by the addition of PZA for two months at the beginning of treatment on the initial treatment cases. In this paper, historical aspects of early and present-day chemotherapy of tuberculosis and the reports of main studies have been summarized, and pharmacokinetics of INH, action of antituberculous drugs in short-course chemotherapy, MDR-TB and biological response modifiers for treatment of tuberculosis, etc. has been reviewed. It is urgently awaited that more new drugs without cross resistance to previous drugs will be developed for the more shortening of the duration and the improvement of the treatment for MDR-TB.     

Interviews on a special topic: The profession of metallurgist yesterday,today, and tomorrow

Zaporozh'e. Translated from Metallurg, No. 1, pp. 7–9, January, 1992.     

The scientific trends and tasks in occupational physiology today

Evaluating a human during occupational activities, occupational physiology should put emphasis on two principal and cooperated directions. Those are aimed to minimize occupational risk, preservation of working capacity, long occupational life and human health. The first direction is associated with theoretic and practical work on differential diagnosis of various functional systems: regulation of working strain, fatigue and tension. Work in this direction helps to solve such practical problems as rehabilitation and assessment of human resources, evaluation of occupational stress, design of automated monitoring systems, etc. The second direction covers hygienic regulation of occupational factors. Their intensity and duration should be assessed with consideration of age, personality and other traits of a worker. In addition, combined action of existing hazards and the new ones should be considered in formation of regulatory technology documents.     

Present trends in the pathogenesis, diagnosis and therapy of vasovagal syncope

Vasovagal syncope is the most frequent cause of syncopal conditions. In its pathogenesis autonomic nervous, neurohumoral, cerebrovascular and other mechanisms participate. The gold standard in the diagnosis of vasovagal syncope is in recent years the head up tilt test. In treatment pharmacotherapy, cardiac pacing or their combination can be used.     

Current trends in onychomycosis therapy: a literature review

Problems with the use of griseofulvin and ketoconazole in the treatment of onychomycosis have led to studies of three new oral antifungal drugs to treat this disease: fluconazole, itraconazole, and terbinafine. These drugs have been superior in relation to a high rate of cure, shorter duration of treatment, minimal adverse effects, and prolonged duration of remission. Although both fluconazole and itraconazole are structurally related to ketoconazole, their triazole ring is more site-specific than the imidazole ring of ketoconazole, which makes these newer drugs less likely to cause liver toxicity. Terbinafine belongs to a new class of compounds called the allylamines, which are fungicidal rather than fungistatic. Terbinafine has become the first line of therapy in Europe and Canada for onychomycosis, and it has recently been approved in the United States in oral form. Itraconazole and fluconazole are available in the United States, but fluconazole is not yet approved for treatment of onychomycosis.     

Intestinal angiodysplasia: diagnosis and therapy

On the basis of two personal cases of angiodysplasia authors describe this rare pathology and its relative diagnostic difficulties. On the grounds of their experience and the international literature on this pathology, authors considered the angiography as the selected method for the diagnosis of intestinal angiodysplasia, and they consider surgical therapy as the best curative method for this pathology.