Informal care can be better than adequate: Development and evaluation of the Exemplary Care Scale.

Purpose: To evaluate a new measure assessing excellent, or exemplary, informal care--an aspect of caregiving that has received little attention. The Exemplary Care Scale (ECS) was developed on the basis of insights from previous research with items generated by the authors in consultation with a multidisciplinary research team. Design: 310 informal caregivers and 283 of their elderly care recipients completed the ECS and other measures pertaining to quality of care and its presumed correlates. Results: Factor analyses indicated that the ECS consists of 2 factors reflecting provision of exceptional care (Provide) and respect for care recipient autonomy, wishes, and the like (Respect). The ECS factor structure was equivalent among caregivers and care recipients. Both factors were empirically distinct from existing measures of poor quality and adequate care. Each ECS factor was associated with other care-related constructs in predictable ways, implying construct validity. Conclusions: The ECS, in conjunction with existing measures, provides a more comprehensive assessment of the quality-of-care continuum and should prove useful to researchers and practitioners interested in quality of informal care provided to chronically ill or disabled people. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Book review: Cognitive Rehabilitation: An Integrative Neuropsychological Approach.

Review of book McKay Moore Sohlberg and Catherine A. Mateer, Cognitive Rehabilitation: An Integrative Neuropsychological Approach. New York: The Guilford Press, 2001, 512 pp., ISBN 1-57230-613-0. Reviewed by Gail Eskes. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Expressed emotion and familial interaction: A study with agoraphobic and obsessive-compulsive patients and their relatives.

Patients with panic disorder with agoraphobia (n = 40) or obsessive- compulsive disorder (n = 61) participated in a 10-min problem-solving interaction with their primary relative. Relatives were categorized as hostile or nonhostile toward the patient on the basis of a measure of expressed emotion (EE). Observed interactions between patients and their hostile relatives, relative to those of dyads with a nonhostile relative, were marked by higher rates of relatives' criticism and of patients' negativity but not by higher rates of negative reciprocity. Analyses of sequences indicated that the dyads with a hostile relative had a higher rate of sequences in which the relative was first critical and the patient then negative than was the case for dyads with nonhostile relatives. Moreover, hostile relatives were more frequently critical than nonhostile relatives whether patients' preceding behavior was positive, negative, or neutral. The findings are consistent with the stress-vulnerability model of the effect of EE on mental health, in that patients living with a high EE relative appear to be exposed to higher levels of interpersonal stress. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Environmental contaminants and biomarker responses in fish from the Rio Grande and its U.S. tributaries: spatial and temporal trends

We collected, examined, and analyzed 368 fish of seven species from 10 sites on rivers of the Rio Grande Basin (RGB) during late 1997 and early 1998 to document temporal and geographic trends in the concentrations of accumulative contaminants and to assess contaminant effects on the fish. Sites were located on the mainstem of the Rio Grande and on the Arroyo Colorado and Pecos River in Texas (TX), New Mexico (NM), and Colorado. Common carp (Cyprinus carpio) and largemouth bass (Micropterus salmoides) were the targeted species. Fish were examined in the field for internal and external visible gross lesions, selected organs were weighed to compute ponderal and organosomatic indices, and samples of tissues and fluids were obtained and preserved for analysis of fish health and reproductive biomarkers. Whole fish from each station were composited by species and gender and analyzed for organochlorine chemical residues and elemental contaminants using instrumental methods, and for 2,3,7,8-tetrachloro dibenzo-p-dioxin-like activity (TCDD-EQ) using the H4IIE rat hepatoma cell bioassay. Overall, fish from lower RGB stations contained greater concentrations of organochlorine pesticide residues and appeared to be less healthy than those from sites in the central and upper parts of the basin, as indicated by a general gradient of residue concentrations and biomarker responses. A minimal number of altered biomarkers and few or no elevated contaminant concentrations were noted in fish from the upper RGB. The exception was elevated concentrations [up to 0.46 microg/g wet-weight (ww)] of total mercury (Hg) in predatory species from the Rio Grande at Elephant Butte Reservoir, NM, a condition documented in previous studies. Arsenic (As) and selenium (Se) concentrations were greatest in fish from sites in the central RGB; Se concentrations in fish from the Pecos River at Red Bluff Lake, TX and from the Rio Grande at Langtry, TX and Amistad International Reservoir, TX exceeded published fish and wildlife toxicity thresholds. In the lower RGB, residues of p,p'-DDT metabolites (相似文献   

Detection of peroxidase/H2O2-mediated oxidation with enhanced yellow fluorescent protein

The ability to sense oxidative stress in live cells and organisms would have far-reaching implications for biotechnology, drug discovery, and potentially medical imaging. We hypothesized that tyrosine-containing fluorescent proteins could be used as switches for sensing oxidative stress, based on their sensitivity to environmental and structural variations. We therefore tested purified EGFP, EYFP, ECFP, and DsRed proteins against the heme-peroxidase/H(2)O(2) reaction. We found that peroxidase-mediated oxidation resulted in up to 99.5% quenching of EYFP fluorescence (but not that of other fluorescent proteins) in a dose-dependent manner. Western blotting revealed inter- and intramolecular cross-linking. The observed detection limit for hydrogen peroxide was approximately 100 nM, well below the extracellular levels previously reported to occur in mammalian tissue during signaling. Combined expression of EYFP (quenchable) and ECFP or EGFP (nonquenchable) is expected to allow sensitive monitoring of oxidative stress.     

Categorization in 1- to 2-yr-olds.

Showed 150 children (12, 18, and 24 mo old) successive members of one category followed by the simultaneous presentation of a new member of that category and a member of a novel category. Toy objects from each of 6 categories—M's (M-shaped blocks), O's (O-shaped blocks), men, animals, food, and furniture—were presented. Ss habituated to presentations of M's, O's, and men. They also showed greater attention to the novel category stimulus during the choice trial for each category. There were no age differences. Findings suggest that 1- to 2-yr-olds recognize some conventional categories. (14 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)