A PC-based free text retrieval system for health care providers

The purpose of this paper is to describe the design and development of the Clinical Practice Library of Medicine (CPLM). CPLM is an investigational project aimed at providing health care practitioners with critical in-depth information similar to that obtained from a medical reference library or consultant. When used in conjunction with the physician's knowledge, CPLM can provide valuable diagnostic prompting information to assist in rapidly reaching a suitable diagnosis for timely administration of appropriate treatment. This system may also be used to assist paramedical professionals working in remote areas where other expert medical assistance may not be available.     

The remucosalizing alar cartilage flap: a reconstructive option for repairing nasal septal perforations

The objective of this study is to assess the results of repairing septal perforations with a vascularized pedicled alar cartilage island flap. Using the external rhinoplasty approach, a vascularized flap of alar cartilage, harvested as a cephalic trim and pedicled on the ascending columellar branches of the superior labial artery was raised. Bilateral mucoperichondrial septal flaps were elevated and the alar flap was transposed and secured within the defect and bilaterally overlaid with temporalis fascia. Silastic sheets were placed and remained in situ until the grafts were revascularized from the peripheries of the defect as well as centrally from the alar flap. The revascularized temporalis fascia acted as a scaffold for nasal remucosalization. The alar flap also increased the long-term structural robustness of the repair. Between 1999 and 2003, 14 patients with septal perforations ranging from 10 to 31 mm underwent septal reconstruction using this technique. There were nine males and five females. The flap was successfully raised in all cases and long-term closure was maintained in 12 patients (86%). The alar cartilage flap is an effective technique for repairing septal perforations in selected patients. It provides vascularized tissue which nourishes the grafts during remucosalization, and a cartilaginous framework, which affords long-term structural support to the repair. It also obviates the need to transpose nasal mucosa and create a secondary defect. The rhinoplasty approach furthermore permits additional nasal deformities to be corrected at the same time. Presented at the British Association of Plastic Surgeons Summer Scientific Meeting, Sheffield, UK (12 July 2006).     

重症肌无力病人实施规范化健康教育的临床研究

[目的]探讨重症肌无力病人规范化健康教育的效果。[方法3将88例重症肌无力住院病人随机分为两组，规范化健康教育组46例．和传统健康教育组42例，分别实施规范化健康教育和传统的健康教育，并进行效果评价。[结果]出院2个月后规范化健康教育组在生理职能、一般健康状态、社会功能、情感职能、精神状态方面评分明显高于传统健康教育组，两组比较有统计学意义。[结论]规范化健康教育能提高重症肌无力病人自我管理和自我调护的能力，有效达到预防疾病复发、提高生存质量的目的。     

Partial purification and osteoinductive activity of swine bone morphogenetic protein.

Bone morphogenetic protein (BMP) was isolated from the bone matrix of swine and partially purified by means of differential precipitation and molecular sieve chromatography. The molecular weight of BMP estimated by SDS-gel electrophoresis was 19,000 dalton. Bioassay by implanting two milligrams of BMP fraction into thigh muscles of mice resulted in bone formation in 100% of the experimental animals.

     

The retinae of Prototherian mammals possess neuronal types that are characteristic of non-mammalian retinae

This study has shown that the retinae of Prototherian (egg-laying) mammals possess two neuronal types that are present in non-mammalian retinae, but absent or morphologically different in the retinae of Eutherian (placental) mammals. First, endogenous serotonin-like immunoreactivity has been localized in a population of presumptive amacrine cells in the platypus retina, the first such report in a mammalian retina. Second, the protein kinase C-immunoreactive (PKC-IR) bipolar cells in the echidna retina appear similar to the PKC-IR bipolars in the chicken retina, in that their dendrites give rise to a Landolt's club and their axons are multistratified. By contrast, the PKC-IR rod bipolar cells in the rabbit and in the brushtail possum, a Metatherian (marsupial) mammal, have no Landolt's clubs and their axons form terminal lobes in the innermost stratum of the inner plexiform layer.