Barriers to social services for HIV-infected urban migrators

Anecdotal accounts suggest that residency requirements often lead to denial of services at a time when HIV positive migrators are most in need of these services. However, this suspicion has never been empirically tested. Using needs assessment data collected for Harris County, Texas, this article examines eligibility and knowledge barriers faced by HIV positive recent migrators into Harris County. Results indicated that migration into the county was a significant predictor of failure to receive government-administered basic services such as food services but was not a significant predictor of failure to receive community based organization (CBO)-administered "specialized" services targeted specifically to HIV positive individuals. Results also indicated that migration was associated with knowledge barriers for all types of services.     

Rare and atypical manifestations of infectious endocarditis

Along with typical clinical symptoms in present-day infectious endocarditis atypical picture may arise: impairment of CNS and cardiac muscle with psychosis, arrhythmia, defective cerebral circulation, heart failure. In the absence of typical manifestations diagnosis of infectious endocarditis presents difficulties.     

Role of the polyclinic examination room in detecting breast cancer and precancer

The authors review their 5-year experience with the work of the women's diagnostic department for recognition of cancer and precancer of the mammary gland. The efficacy of the activities of this diagnostic department is believed to be determined by two main factors: 1) proper organization of its activity and 2) its close contacts with an oncologist of the polyclinic.     

Aperiodic Fourier modal method in contrast-field formulation for simulation of scattering from finite structures

This paper extends the area of application of the Fourier modal method (FMM) from periodic structures to aperiodic ones, in particular for plane-wave illumination at arbitrary angles. This is achieved by placing perfectly matched layers at the lateral sides of the computational domain and reformulating the governing equations in terms of a contrast field that does not contain the incoming field. As a result of the reformulation, the homogeneous system of second-order ordinary differential equations from the original FMM becomes non-homogeneous. Its solution is derived analytically and used in the established FMM framework. The technique is demonstrated on a simple problem of planar scattering of TE-polarized light by a single rectangular line.     

Activities of thyroid hormones and related compounds in an in vitro thymocyte assay

Prior studies have demonstrated that the thyroid hormones L-triiodothyronine and L-thyroxine stimulate the rapid uptake of 1-amino-cyclopentane-1-carboxylic acid into isolated rat thymocytes. In the present study the effects of several groups of thyroid hormones and structurally related compounds were investigated to determine the structure-function relations required for stimulation of this membrane process. Particular attention was given to (a) analogues with modifications at the oxygen bridge, the phenolic hydroxyl group, and the group at the 3' position of the outer ring, and (b) the steric orientation of the thyroid hormones. The following were found to be important for maximal activity: (a) the L-isomer configuration, (b) the presence of a 4'-hydroxyl group, (c) the presence of one substituent in both the inner and outer rings (3 and 3' positions), (d) the distal orientation of the 3' substituent in the outer ring of L-triiodothyronine, and (e) the lipophilic character of the 3' substituent. Of lesser importance was the presence of halogen atoms, or an oxygen atom in the ether position. Since these structure-function relations seen in thymocytes parallel in many respects those relations seen in whole-animal studies, it is believed that thymocytes will be a useful tool for further studies of thyroid hormones and their analogues.