Costs and effects of microsurgery versus radiosurgery in treating acoustic neuroma

This study analyses costs and effects of treating acoustic neuroma patients by using microsurgery compared to radiosurgery. Radiosurgery is the stereotactic application of radiotherapy and an innovative medical technology. Cost and effect estimates of conventional treatment were based on a retrospective study in the Netherlands. Similar data for a comparable group of patients in Sweden were collected for radiosurgery, as this treatment option is currently not available in the Netherlands. Fifty-three acoustic neuroma patients who had been operated on the University Hospital Rotterdam between November 1990 and February 1995 were included. This group was compared with 92 acoustic neuroma patients treated with radiosurgery (Gamma Knife. Stockholm, Sweden) in the same period. Data on health care use were collected from patient files. To obtain data on production losses and quality of life, a questionnaire was sent by mail in February 1995. This booklet consisted of the Health and Labour-questionnaire (HLQ), the Short Form-36 (SF36) and the EuroQol. The response rate was 92%. Direct costs for microsurgery amounted to Dfl. 20.072,- and for radiosurgery to Dfl. 14.272,-. Indirect costs were respectively Dfl. 16.400,- and Dfl. 1.020,-. General health rating was better for radiosurgery than for microsurgery. On the whole, differences in clinical outcomes between the two patient groups were small. Assuming a reasonable occupancy rate of the expensive radiosurgery equipment, we demonstrated that for the short term treating patients with acoustic neuroma with an extra-meatal tumour diameter of less than 3 centimeters, radiosurgery is more cost-effective than microsurgery.     

``Cell Shocks'? Not Necessary in Chlorine Cell Rooms

Electrical safety hazards in chlorine electrolytic cell rooms have been thoroughly discussed in previous papers. However, no attempt has ever been made to show the importance of maintaining maximum leakage resistance from the electrolytic cell line to ground. The majority of electrical shocks received by electrolytic cell room personnel are from the energized bus or chlorine cells to ground. As electrolytic cell lines are normally not grounded, the leakage resistance to ground has a definite effect on the severity of the majority of electrical shocks received by personnel. The leakage resistance problem is explained with the use of simple circuit diagrams, and solutions are suggested to eliminate electrical shocks to cell room personnel.     

Zeitschriftenreferate: Allgemeine Bestandteile der Lebensmittel

Ohne Zusammenfassung     

A pilot study of a short cognitive-behavioral group treatment for female recurrent suicide attempters

The SLT2(MPK1) mitogen-activated protein kinase signal transduction pa thway has been implicated in several biological processes in Saccharomyces cerevisiae, including the regulation of cytoskeletal and cell wall structure, polarized cell growth, and response to nutrient availability, hypo-osmotic shock and heat shock. We examined the conditions under which the SLT2 pathway is activated. We found that the SLT2 kinase is tyrosine phosphorylated and activated during periods in which yeast cells are undergoing polarized cell growth, namely during bud formation of vegetative cell division and during projection formation upon treatment with mating pheromone. BCK1(SLK1), a MEK kinase, is required for SLT2 activation in both of these situations. Upstream of BCK1(SLK1), we found that the STE20 kinase was required for SLT2 activation by mating pheromone, but was unnecessary for its activation during the vegetative cell cycle. Finally, SLT2 activation during vegetative growth was partially dependent on CDC28 in that the stimulation of SLT2 tyrosine phosphorylation was significantly reduced directly after a temperature shift in cdc28 ts mutants. Our data are consistent with a role for SLT2 in promoting polarized cell growth.     

Month of birth and schizophrenia in Taiwan: effect of gender, family history and age at onset

Schizophrenic patients have been shown to have a moderate excess of winter births in the areas where seasonal variations in weather are large. In this report, we examined the seasonality of schizophrenic births in Taiwan, which has a subtropical climate. Using nationwide hospitalization data (2429 male and 1320 female schizophrenic patients), we applied the life table method to compare the risk of schizophrenia among 12 cohorts of month-of-birth for males and females, respectively. Differences among the risks of the 12 cohorts were tested using the logrank test. The samples were further stratified by family history and age at onset. There was a significant association between the risk of being admitted as a schizophrenic and month of birth for both males and females. The cohorts born in November and January had the highest risks. After stratification, the association was significant only for non-familial, male, and early onset schizophrenic patients. The results indicate that seasonally varying factors might increase the risk of schizophrenia, especially in those without a family history of the disease. Men are more vulnerable to such factors than women, and the schizophrenics resulting from such insults tend to be early onset.     

Breathing of awake goats during prolonged dysfunction of caudal M ventrolateral medullary neurons

Recent scientific studies have demonstrated the efficacy of various forms of immunotherapy for the treatment of allergic diseases. Traditional subcutaneous immunotherapy, sublingual, oral, and intranasal immunotherapy have been shown to significantly reduce symptoms and favorably modulate the immune response. Outcome studies that use patient response data from standardized surveys represent the next challenge to all practicing allergists.