Drawing the Boundaries: Exploring gender issues in young children's classifications of work using visual representations

This study examines young children's perceptions of work through a specific example. Reception class children at an inner city school were shown pictures of the same figure washing in four different contexts, ranging from housework to paid employment, in order to examine early classifications and conceptual systems relating to the concept of work and to ascertain whether these were gender related. Individual children varied in the complexity of their ideas, but the majority had not yet began to form hierarchical classifications of work which favour paid employment. There was evidence however that some children were beginning to devalue traditional women's work, suggesting that gender stereotypes are still prevalent amongst this age group, despite efforts by the educational system to counter this.     

conference report: Mental health and intellectual disability: an international perspective

The present paper reports on the inaugural meeting of the Mental Health Special Interest Research Group (SIRG) of the International Association for the Scientific study of Intellectual disability which was held at Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge, UK, in March 1998. The meeting was organized in conjunction with the Ninth Annual SIRG on ageing and intellectual disability. Representatives from North America, several European and Scandinavian countries, Australia, and Israel attended. Two broad themes had been determined prior to the meeting: ‘Improving the detection of mental health problems’ and ‘Research strategies for identifying risk factors for mental health problems’. In the presentations and subsequent discussions, it was apparent that there were extrenely diverse perspectives both across and within the different countries represented. Not only were individuals' experiences very different, but most strikingly, the theoretical frameworks were very diverse. This was partly a function of there being understandable differences in perspectives across disciplines, but at its most marked, there were fundamental differences in the way both intellectual disability and mental health were conceptualized.     

Corporate influence on threshold limit values

Investigations into the historical development of specific Threshold Limit Values (TLVs) for many substances have revealed serious shortcomings in the process followed by the American Conference of Governmental Industrial Hygienists. Unpublished corporate communications were important in developing TLVs for 104 substances; for 15 of these, the TLV documentation was based solely on such information. Efforts to obtain written copies of this unpublished material were mostly unsuccessful. Case studies on the TLV Committee's handling of lead and seven carcinogens illustrate various aspects of corporate influence and interaction with the committee. Corporate representatives listed officially as "consultants" since 1970 were given primary responsibility for developing TLVs on proprietary chemicals of the companies that employed them (Dow, DuPont). It is concluded that an ongoing international effort is needed to develop scientifically based guidelines to replace the TLVs in a climate of openness and without manipulation by vested interests.     

Programming life histories: Effects of maternal and environmental variables upon open-field behavior

Open-field behavior was studied as a function of three classes of variables: maternal characteristics, rearing environment, and sexual experience. Mothers of experimental subjects were either handled or nonhandled in infancy. Subjects were born and reared to weaning either in maternit cages or in Hebb-type free environments and were placed after weaning into either a laboratory cage or free enviroment. Sexual experience consisted either of bearing and raising a litter or no sexual experience. The results confirmed previous findings that offspring of mothers handled in infancy arc significantly less active in the open field than the offspring of nonhandled mothers. The maternal handling variable also interacted significantly with breeding experience: for rats which had not been bred, those raised by nonhandled mothers were more active than those raised by handled mothers; for females with breeding experience the reverse was true. Overall, thosc femalcs which had reared a litter were more active and defecated more than their nonbred littermates.     

Effect of early outdoor experience on the activity of wild and semi-domestic deermice

The gross activity of wild and semi-domestic strains of prairie deermice was measured in two kinds of novel test apparatus (tilt-cage and activity wheel). Differences in strain activity were not obtained in either apparatus. Activity was significantly decreased in both strains by early experience in the field and by rearing wild genotype subjects in large laboratory cages. It was suggested that differential early sensory experience associated with both qualitative and quantitative aspects of the early rearing environment may be responsible for the treatment effect. Whereas no daily changes in activity were noted in the tilt-cages, activity in the wheels was sipnificantly higher on day 1 for all groups. In contrast to recent literature, wheel running activity did not change with total water deprivation.     

Previous maternal experience potentiates the effect of parturition on oxytocin receptor mRNA expression in the paraventricular nucleus

In sheep, central oxytocin release at parturition induces maternal behaviour which is thought to be mediated by changes in the expression of central oxytocin receptors. The distribution, effects of parturition, previous maternal experience and hormonal status on the distribution of an oxytocin receptor was investigated using immunocytochemistry and in situ hybridization. In ewes with no previous maternal experience, parturition induced significant increases in oxytocin receptor mRNA expression in the anterior olfactory nucleus, medial preoptic area, ventromedial hypothalamus, lateral septum, medial amygdala, bed nucleus of the stria terminalis and diagonal band of Broca. In maternally experienced ewes, parturition induced additional increases in two areas, the paraventricular nucleus and the Islands of Calleja. The changes in progesterone and oestrogen that occur during late pregnancy and parturition appear to contribute to increases in expression in the anterior olfactory nucleus, Islands of Calleja, medial preoptic area, ventromedial hypothalamus, bed nucleus of the stria terminalis and diagonal band of Broca, but not in the paraventricular nucleus, lateral septum and medial amygdala. These results demonstrate that progesterone and oestrogen priming enhance oxytocin receptor mRNA expression in a number of regions in the olfactory system, hypothalamus and limbic brain. These effects appear to be independent of maternal experience. Parturition increases oxytocin receptor mRNA expression in all the areas influenced by hormonal priming and the lateral septum, medial amygdala and paraventricular nucleus. Maternal experience also enhances expression of oxytocin receptor mRNA in the paraventricular nucleus and the Islands of Calleja. Because the paraventricular nucleus is the main source of oxytocin release in the brain, this upgrading of autoreceptors as a result of maternal experience may serve to enhance release of this peptide in projection sites regulating maternal behaviour.     

Interobserver variation in the assessment of pelvic organ prolapse

The aim of this study was to determine the interobserver agreement of two grading systems for pelvic organ prolapse: the vaginal profile and the International Continence Society (ICS) draft proposal. Forty-nine consecutive women referred for evaluation of urinary incontinence and/or pelvic organ prolapse were studied. Patients were first examined by a physician and a nurse clinician using the vaginal profile, followed by an examination according to the technique described in the ICS draft proposal for standardization of terminology (1994). statistic and Pearson's correlation coefficient were used to determine interobserver variability for the ICS system by overall stage, by stage-specific comparison, and by specific anatomic location. The vaginal profile was evaluated by obtaining a for overall degree of prolapse, stage-specific comparison and by anatomic area. The for the ICS stage was 0.79 (P<0.001), and the for the vaginal profile by area of greatest prolapse was 0.68 (P<0.001), indicating substantial interobserver agreement for both systems. The ICS system was noted to have substantial interobserver agreement by a stage-specific comparison. All anatomic locations of the ICS staging system were found to correlate significantly, and a high degree of interobserver precision was found. The vaginal profile also showed significant interobserver agreement by overall degree of prolapse, by specific degree of prolapse, and by anatomic area. It was concluded that both the proposed ICS staging system and the traditional vaginal profile show significant interobserver agreement both by overall stage, stage-specific analysis and specific location. The registered nurse examination correlated well with the physican examination, indicating that the most important factor in obtaining reproducible results may be definition and close attention to examination technique.EDITORIAL COMMENT: There has recently been a great deal of interest in the anatomy and physiology of the pelvic floor and the various investigative techniques to define its function. The lack of a standardized and reproducible system to describe pelvic organ prolapse through the hiatus of the pelvic floor has hampered research into its pathophysiology and treatment. The authors applied a validated statistic and Pearson's correlation coefficient to convincingly measure interobserver reliability for the ICS system and indicated an index of trend between points on the ICS scale as well.     

国际疾病分类（ICD）教学的相关问题探讨

国际疾病分类编码是一门重要的医学信息综合性课程,为了提高其教学质量,首先应培养学生的学习的兴趣和主动性;二是在教学过程中,充分与医学基础知识有机地结合的教学方式是提高教学质量重要方法;三是实习和见习是提高学生编码技术的重要步骤。     

德国柏林Pflgewerk养老机构学习见闻分享

2019年9—12月,笔者参与了苏州大学与德国柏林Pflgewerk养老机构针对失能老年人居家照护课程研发与智慧化养老的交流项目,在学习与交流期间,德国完善的居家照护体系,先进适老辅具的研发与运用,系统规范的照护员培训课程,浓厚的人文关怀气氛与多学科团队合作的安宁疗护中心令笔者印象深刻。本文结合学习交流活动的亲身经历,...