Subjects presented at ASHP Midyear Clinical Meetings, 1967-90

The subject matter and trends of presentations made at ASHP Midyear Clinical Meetings (MCMs) were studied. A computerized database of information from MCM and Annual Meeting (AM) program and abstract books was created. The data were analyzed to determine the distribution of MCM presentations by subject and by author for the period 1967 to 1990, determine if there were differences in subjects covered between MCMs and AMs, explore the proposition that there has been duplication of material in MCM presentations, and evaluate the frequency with which MCM presentations have been published in ASHP journals. The total number of presentations made at MCMs from 1967 through 1990 was 8180, while the total for the AMs was 1547 for the two periods (1962-71 and 1985-90) studied. The most common keywords in titles were "pharmacy," "drug," "patient," "hospital," and "service." All International Pharmaceutical Abstracts subject categories and two other categories were represented; presentations in the institutional pharmacy practice category were the most frequent, while pharmacognosy-related presentations were least frequent. The overwhelming number of authors made only one presentation and were listed as the first author. The subjects of presentations were similar between AMs and MCMs. A tendency toward duplication of material was found. Of the 8180 MCM presentations, at least 1005 were published in an ASHP journal. Between 1967 and 1990, presentations at MCMs covered a wide range of subjects but were sometimes duplicative or not on the cutting edge.     

Interpretation time of serial chest CT examinations with stacked-metaphor workstation versus film alternator

PURPOSE: Interpretation time of serial staging chest CT cases, which each contained current and previous examinations, with a simple prototype workstation called filmstack was experimentally compared with interpretation time with a film alternator. MATERIALS AND METHODS: The filmstack displayed a "stack" of sections for each examination; user controls allowed rapid selection of preset attenuation windows and both synchronized and unsynchronized scrolling. Eight radiologists were timed as they used the filmstack and the film alternator to interpret four ergonomically complex serial CT cases. RESULTS: All reports dictated on the basis of findings with filmstack and film were of acceptable clinical accuracy. The time to examine a case with filmstack was significantly faster than the time with film, including the time to load and unload the alternator (99% confidence [P = .01]). There was no statistically significant difference in interpretation time between filmstack and prehung film. CONCLUSION: Use of a low-cost stacked CT workstation with a single 1,024 x 1,024 monitor is an effective means of interpreting cases that require comparison of multiple CT examinations.     

Anaplastic large cell lymphoma Hodgkin's-like: a randomized trial of ABVD versus MACOP-B with and without radiation therapy

During the last few years, morphological, immunohistochemical, and genetic findings have placed anaplastic large cell lymphoma (ALCL) as a distinct clinicopathologic entity, and several reports have focused on the existence of different subtypes of the tumor. Particular attention has been paid to the ALCL-Hodgkin's-like (HL) subtype, which seems to be on the border between Hodgkin's disease (HD) and high-grade non-Hodgkin's lymphoma (HG-NHL). From September 1994 to July 1997, during the course of an Italian multicentric trial, 40 ALCL-HLs were randomized to receive as front-line chemotherapy MACOP-B (methotrexate with leucovorin, doxorubicin, cyclophosphamide, vincristine, prednisone, and bleomycin-a third-generation HG-NHL regimen) or ABVD (doxorubicin, bleomycin, vinblastine, and dacarbazine-a scheme specific for HD). All patients with bulky disease in the mediastinum at diagnosis underwent local radiotherapy after the chemotherapeutic program. Complete response (CR) was achieved in 17 of the 19 (90%) patients who were treated with MACOP-B, and in 19 of the 21 (91%) patients who were administered ABVD. The probability of relapse-free survival, projected at 32 months, was 94% for the MACOP-B subset and 91% for the ABVD subset. The majority of patients with mediastinal bulky disease obtained CR (evaluated with 67Ga single photon emission computed tomography [SPECT]) after their radiotherapy. The present study suggests that ALCL-HL, in line with its borderline status, responds in an equivalent way to third-generation chemotherapy for HG-NHL and to conventional HD treatment in terms of both CR and relapse-free survival rates. However, as to the latter, a longer follow-up period may be needed before stating the absolute equivalence of the two regimens used.     

Urinary stress incontinence. Comparison of the Raz technique and the Bologna technique. Analysis of a series of 188 patients

OBJECTIVE: Our purpose was to evaluate and compare the perioperative morbidity and the long-term results of the Raz colposuspension and the Bologna operation for the treatment of stress urinary incontinence in women. STUDY DESIGN: Data of 188 women who underwent either a Bologna operation (group 1) or a Raz colposuspension (group 2) for the treatment of stress urinary incontinence between January 1, 1987 and December 1, 1995 were analysed retrospectively regarding history, preoperative evaluation, associated surgical procedures, complications and cure and failure rate. POPULATION AND METHODS: 80 patients were treated with the Bologna operation and 108 with the Raz colposuspension. Patients with prior anti-incontinence surgery, and patients with a preoperative diagnosis of urge incontinence were excluded from the study. Success was defined both subjectively (complete absence of complaint of stress urinary incontinence) and objectively (no evidence of loss of urine on cough provocation during physical examination). Survival curves were generated in each group for time to event data: "time to recurrent stress incontinence" and compared by the logrank test. A multivariate analysis using a Cox proportional hazards regression model was performed to indentify possible outcome predictors. RESULTS: The success rate of group 1 was significantly higher than that of group 2 (p = 0.00001). The median of success was 51 months in group 1 and 21 months in group 2 (p = 0.00001). The incidence of intraoperative complications in each group (inadvertent cystostomy, hemorrhage) did not differ. The multivariate analyses using the Cox regression model showed that the most highly correlated variable with the surgical cure rate was the type of surgical anti-incontinence procedure adopted: Bologna or Raz (p = 0.00001) CONCLUSION: In our hands, the Bologna operation has a higher cure rate than the Raz colposuspension. For us, when treating patients with stress urinary incontinence by the vaginal route, the Bologna operation is indicated when sufficient anterior vaginal tissue is available to create vaginal bands.     

The Cartwright Report ten years on: the obligations and rights of health consumers and providers

It is ten years since the Cartwright report was published, three years since the code of health and disability services consumers' rights was promulgated and two years since the code came into force which makes it due for review next year. This paper reviews the issues identified by Cartwright and the effect that her investigation into the "Unfortunate Experiment" has had on the provision of health services. Issues of clinical freedom, peer supervision and informed consent are discussed in relation to the Health and Disability Commissioner Act, the Privacy Act and concepts of partnership in health care. Some comments on the present state of the relationships between consumers and providers in the health system are included.     

Properties of whole saliva and dental plaque in relation to 40-month consumption of chewing gums containing xylitol, sorbitol of sucrose

The concern with nursing research in the future work of nurse graduates. Expectations from the viewpoint of the nurse researcher. Keeping in mind the concerns which occupy nurse researchers now and in the future, expectations are raised of the graduates of degree programmes in nursing science which are now also being established in the Federal Republic of Germany. This takes into account the structurally determined areas of self determined action in new fields of professional practice. Nurse graduates will be seen as "change agents" in their future areas of work and will have three essential aspects of involvement with nursing research: 1. they themselves will conduct research 2. they will receive, put into practice and transmit results of nursing research 3. they will initiate and commission nursing research projects. According to the broad topics of nursing research, requirements for nurses to act as professionals in their new working fields are formulated referring to the given structural conditions in Germany.     

Contact type dependency of texture classification in a whiskered mobile robot

Actuated artificial whiskers modeled on rat macrovibrissae can provide effective tactile sensor systems for autonomous robots. This article focuses on texture classification using artificial whiskers and addresses a limitation of previous studies, namely, their use of whisker deflection signals obtained under relatively constrained experimental conditions. Here we consider the classification of signals obtained from a whiskered robot required to explore different surface textures from a range of orientations and distances. This procedure resulted in a variety of deflection signals for any given texture. Using a standard Gaussian classifier we show, using both hand-picked features and ones derived from studies of rat vibrissal processing, that a robust rough-smooth discrimination is achievable without any knowledge of how the whisker interacts with the investigated object. On the other hand, finer discriminations appear to require knowledge of the target’s relative position and/or of the manner in which the whisker contact its surface. Electronic Supplementary Material  The online version of this article () contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

3D‐vision based detection,localization, and sizing of broccoli heads in the field

This paper describes a 3D vision system for robotic harvesting of broccoli using low‐cost RGB‐D sensors, which was developed and evaluated using sensory data collected under real‐world field conditions in both the UK and Spain. The presented method addresses the tasks of detecting mature broccoli heads in the field and providing their 3D locations relative to the vehicle. The paper evaluates different 3D features, machine learning, and temporal filtering methods for detection of broccoli heads. Our experiments show that a combination of Viewpoint Feature Histograms, Support Vector Machine classifier, and a temporal filter to track the detected heads results in a system that detects broccoli heads with high precision. We also show that the temporal filtering can be used to generate a 3D map of the broccoli head positions in the field. Additionally, we present methods for automatically estimating the size of the broccoli heads, to determine when a head is ready for harvest. All of the methods were evaluated using ground‐truth data from both the UK and Spain, which we also make available to the research community for subsequent algorithm development and result comparison. Cross‐validation of the system trained on the UK dataset on the Spanish dataset, and vice versa, indicated good generalization capabilities of the system, confirming the strong potential of low‐cost 3D imaging for commercial broccoli harvesting.