Outreach to older adults: matching programs to specific needs.

Mental health services for older adults benefit from an outreach approach that makes both clients and providers aware of the availability and usefulness of a range of programs to address various problems. Coordination of multiple systems of care is usually required to provide the necessary complement of services needed by older adults.     

Assessment of quality of life in children with peanut allergy

Children with a peanut allergy (PA) are faced with food and social restrictions due to the potentially life-threatening nature of their disease, for which there is no cure or treatment. This inevitably impacts upon their quality of life (QoL). QoL of 20 children with PA and 20 children with insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus (IDDM) was measured using two disease-specific QoL questionnaires (higher scores correspond to a poorer QoL). One questionnaire was designed by us and the other was adapted from the Vespid Allergy QoL questionnaire. We gave subjects cameras to record how their QoL is affected over a 24-h period. Response rates for both questionnaires were 100%. Mean ages were 9.0 and 10.4 years for PA and IDDM subjects, respectively. Children with a PA reported a poorer quality of life than children with IDDM: mean scores were 54.85 for PA subjects and 46.40 for diabetics (p = 0.004) in questionnaire 1 and 54.30 and 34.50 (p≤0.001) in questionnaire 2. PA children reported more fear of an adverse event and more anxiety about eating, especially when eating away from home. Photographs fell into seven common categories: food, management, environment, away from home, physical activities, restaurant and people. Most photographs related to food and management issues and revealed difficulties for both groups regarding food restrictions. PA subjects felt more threatened by potential hazards within their environment, felt more restricted by their PA regarding physical activities, and worried more about being away from home. However, they felt safe when carrying epinephrine kits and were positive about eating at familiar restaurants. The QoL in children with PA is more impaired than in children with IDDM. Their anxiety may be considered useful in some situations, promoting better adherence to allergen avoidance advice and rescue plans.     

Long-term cognitive deficits in patients after surgery on aneurysms of the anterior communicating artery.

The long term recovery of a series of 27 patients who had undergone rupture and repair of an aneurysm of the anterior communicating artery was assessed using a number of neuropsychological measures. Testing took place 12 to 84 months post surgery. On the basis of the results from tests of intellect, memory, and conceptual learning, three subgroups of patients were identified: those with persuasive cognitive defects, those with evidence of residual frontal lobe damage and those who showed no evidence of dysfunction. The occurrence of cerebral vasospasm was the most consistent predictor of long term cognitive deficit.     

Endothelial and smooth muscle properties of coronary and mesenteric resistance arteries in spontaneously hypertensive rats compared to WKY rats

Summary— To investigate if the functional alterations observed in resistance arteries of spontaneously hypertensive rats (SHRs) were also present at the coronary level, in vitro experiments were performed in mesenteric resistance arteries (MRA) and in right (RIC) and left interventricular coronary (LIC) arteries taken from 15–25-week-old SHR and age-matched Wistar Kyoto rats WKYs. Using a passive extension protocol, internal diameters corresponding to 100 mmHg intraluminal pressure (D₁₀₀) were determined and vessels were set up to a normalized internal diameter (0.9 D₁₀₀). SHR mesenteric resistance arteries had a significantly smaller diameter compared to WKY arteries, whereas both types of SHR coronary arteries had a greater diameter compared to those of WKY rats. In arteries in the absence of contracting agonist, nitro-L-arginine (NOLA, 100 μM) induced a progressive rise in basal tone, which could be reversed by subsequent addition of L-arginine (100 μM) but not D-arginine (100 μM). When expressed as percent of maximal contractions induced by agonists (noradrenaline, NA [10 μM] in MRA; serotonin, 5-HT [10 μM], in RIC and LIC), these contractions were significantly stronger in WKY compared to SHR coronary and mesenteric resistance arteries. In NA-precontracted MRA and 5HT-precontracted coronary arteries in the presence of indomethacin (10 μM), the magnitude of acetylcholine-induced maximal relaxations (expressed as percent of maximal contractions induced by agonists) was greater in WKY compared to SHR arteries. After a 30-min incubation period, NOLA (100 μM) completely inhibited relaxations induced by acetylcholine (0.01–10 μM) in all types of precontracted arteries. Subsequent additions of sodium nitroprusside, (SNP, 10 μM) induced complete relaxations in all preparations. These results show that a basal release of NO or NO-like compound by endothelial cells is present in isolated mesenteric resistance and coronary arteries of WKY rats and SHRs. The contribution of endothelium-derived relaxing factor-nitric oxide (EDRF-NO) to arterial tone was lower in MRA compared to coronary arteries in both strains and in SHR compared to WKY arteries. In the SHR preparations, the impaired relaxation induced by acetylcholine appeared to be due to a functional alteration of the endothelium in the presence of normal reactivity of the smooth muscle cells.     

Microalbuminuria in diabetes: relationships between urinary albumin excretion and diabetes-related variables

A single observer reviewed 842 of the 917 known diabetic patients registered with 40 GPs in the Poole area. Fifty-nine per cent (493) of those reviewed submitted a timed overnight urine collection to measure albumin excretion rate (AER) and overnight albumin/creatinine ratio (ON-Alb/Creat); 43 samples were excluded because of urinary tract infection and/or proteinuria. A random urine sample was obtained in 607 diabetic patients to measure the random albumin/creatinine ratio (R-Alb/Creat); 68 specimens were excluded because of infection and/or proteinuria, and in a further 10 samples urinary creatinine was not measured. Stepwise multiple regression analyses found significant associations with the following variables: for AER, blood glucose (p = 0.001), smoking category (p = 0.002), sex (p = 0.034), and systolic blood pressure (p = 0.035); for R-Alb/Creat, blood glucose (p = 0.001), retinopathy (p = 0.004), systolic blood pressure (p = 0.004), diastolic blood pressure (p = 0.015), coronary artery disease (p = 0.02), sex (p = 0.034), and vibration sense (p = 0.038). Interestingly, glycosylated haemoglobin was not a significant determinant of albuminuria in either analysis.     

Configurational changes within the dermis of meshed split skin grafts: a histological study

By placing a series of vertical cuts through the skin graft, the meshing process increases the area of exposed dermis. This extra dermis contains the cut ends of vessels derived from the subpapillary plexus. Histological examination has shown that each of the skin bridges within the mesh changes shape so that these vessels come to open on to the undersurface of the graft, where they are advantageously placed to participate in revascularisation of the graft.     

Developing a Peer Review Process for Web-based Curricula

The World Wide Web creates new challenges and opportunities for medical educators. Prominent among these are the lack of consistent standards by which to evaluate web-based educational tools. We present the instrument that was used to review web-based innovations in medical education submissions to the 2003 Society of General Internal Medicine (SGIM) national meeting, and discuss the process used by the SGIM web-based clinical curriculum interest group to develop the instrument. The 5 highest-ranked submissions are summarized with commentary from the reviewers.