Incidence clinique des psychotraumatismes dans la consultation externe d’un service de psychiatrie

The authors aimed at evaluating the impact of psychotraumas in psychiatric outpatients. One hundred forty psychiatric outpatients were consecutively included, without distinction of their current pathology. They filled in an inventory of potentially traumatic experiences, a psychological dissociative experiences scale, a somatoform dissociative experiences questionnaire, and underwent a structured interview for diagnosis of posttraumatic stress disorder (according to the DSM-IV). One hundred subjects related psychological trauma, and 76 patients suffered from posttraumatic stress disorder. Dissociative disorders are found significantly correlated with traumatic experience and to posttraumatic stress disorder. The traumatic impact is found more substantial as the number of events was elevated. This study confirms the elevated prevalence of the psychological traumas and psychotraumatic aftermaths in outpatients of a department of psychiatry, independently from the mental disorder.     

Duration of the speech disfluencies of beginning stutterers

This study compared the duration of within-word disfluencies and the number of repeated units per instance of sound/syllable and whole-word repetitions of beginning stutterers to those produced by age- and sex-matched nonstuttering children. Subjects were 10 stuttering children [9 males and 1 female; mean age 4:1 (years:months); age range 3:2-5:1), and 10 nonstuttering children (9 males and 1 female; mean age 4:0; age range: 2:10-5:1). Mothers of the stuttering children reported that their children had been stuttering for 1 year or less. One 300-word conversational speech sample from each of the stuttering and nonstuttering children was analyzed for (a) mean duration of sound/syllable repetition and sound prolongation, (b) mean number of repeated units per instance of sound/syllable and whole-word repetition, and (c) various related measures of the frequency of all between- and within-word speech disfluencies. There were no significant between-group differences for either the duration of acoustically measured sound/syllable repetitions and sound prolongations or the number of repeated units per instance of sound/syllable and whole-word repetition. Unlike frequency and type of speech disfluency produced, average duration of within-word disfluencies and number of repeated units per repetition do not differentiate the disfluent speech of beginning stutterers and their nonstuttering peers. Additional analyses support findings from previous perceptual work that type and frequency of speech disfluency, not duration, are the principal characteristics listeners use in distinguishing these two talker groups.     

How to assess fetal metabolic acidosis from cord samples.

The degree of metabolic acidosis at birth has been calculated in cord artery and vein samples from 21 term fetuses with cord artery pH less than 7.20. The aim of the study was to compare base deficit values calculated from either Siggaard-Andersen alignment nomogram (BD blood) or the Acid-Base chart (BD extra cellular fluid, BDecf). BDblood was found to be consistently higher in the cord artery as compared with BDecf, 13.2 +/- 3.5 and 9.9 +/- 2.9 mmol/l (Mean +/- SD), respectively. A significant correlation was found between cord artery PCO2 and BDblood whereas BDecf appeared unaffected by PCO2. In cases with cord entanglement BDecf a-v differences were increased to 3.4 +/- 2.3 mmol/l as compared with the small a-v difference noted in acidotic cases without cord entanglement, 1.1 +/- 1.25 mmol/l. It is speculated that with acutely emerging, intermittent asphyxia due to cord compression, a cord artery and vein difference in metabolic acidosis may exist and where the vein captures the basal level and the artery the acute changes. It is concluded that BDecf in both cord artery and vein add valuable information on the mechanisms behind metabolic acidosis.     

Fetal growth in hypertensive women]

The Authors examine the correlation between hypertensive disorders of pregnancy and fetal growth. The results of a study of 342 pregnancies, confirm a significant correlation between hypertension and fetal growth retardation. These findings, so evident in moderate and severe hypertension, have also been confirmed in cases of mild hypertension. The medical treatment also in the pregnancies with mild hypertension, and a larger utilisation of operative deliveries, determined a decrease in perinatal mortality and morbidity.     

Sustained eosinophil cationic protein release into tears after a single high-dose conjunctival allergen challenge

Background The appearance of eosinophils is a hallmark sign of the allergic late-phase response (LPR). Eosinophil cationic protein (ECP), a readily measurable product released from activated eosinophils, has so far not been evaluated in the ocular LPR. Objective Two sets of trials were performed in order to investigate changes of local and systemic eosinophil activity and their possible link with symptoms and hyper-reactivity in the allergic LPR in the eye. Methods In the first experiment, ECP was analysed in tears and serum and the clinical reaction was evaluated during a 72-h time–course after a single, high-dose allergen challenge out of season in one eye of 15 pollen-sensitized volunteers. In a second experiment, the hypothesis of an increased clinical response to an allergen challenge in an eye that had been provoked with allergen 48h previously was tested in nine sensitized individuals. Results In the first experiment, symptoms at 10 min and 2, 4, 6, 8 and 24 h significantly exceeded base line scores of the challenged eyes. Tear ECP was significantly elevated in challenged eyes compared to contralateral eyes at 6, 8 and 24 h. In addition, symptoms and ECP release correlated significantly at the 24-h evaluation. Serum ECP remained unchanged throughout the study period. In the second experiment, conjunctival hyperreactivity 48h after an allergen challenge was not confirmed. Conclusion ECP secretion occurs in the experimental ocular LPR and is in part associated with the magnitude of the clinical reaction, which suggests a truly pathogenic role of the activated eosinophil in pollen-induced allergic conjunctivitis.     

Effect of maternal and infant covariates on sibship correlation in birth weight

Birth weight on 12,644 singleton infants from 6,196 sibships born in Maryland between 1980 and 1984 were used to estimate the effects of nine maternal and infant covariates on the sibship correlation in birth weight. Assuming a homogeneous correlation across all families, the estimated intraclass correlation was 0.4664 (+/- 0.0099). This high sibship correlation makes it possible to predict, with reasonable accuracy, the birth weight of a child given information on previous sibs, as well as covariates on the mother and/or infant pertinent to a given pregnancy. The reduction in variance associated with incorporating information on the nine covariates used here was approximately equal to that obtained by conditioning on a single previous sib. Testing for heterogeneity in correlation among different groups of families showed that a crude measure of parity (first live birth vs. other), time between births, mother's marital status, and maternal age at the birth of the last child significantly influenced the sibship correlation in birth weight.