African-American Adolescents’ Weight Loss Skills Utilization: Effects on Weight Change in a Sequential Multiple Assignment Randomized Trial

Objective

Successful weight loss interventions for African-Americans adolescents are lacking. Cognitive-behavioral interventions seek to develop weight loss skills (e.g., counting calories, goal setting, managing one's environment). Little is known about how well adolescents implement such skills in their daily lives. Study aims were to (1) examine weight loss skills utilization at midpoint and end of a 6-month cognitive-behavioral/motivational interviewing weight loss sequential multiple assignment randomized trial (SMART), and (2) determine if greater skill utilization predicted weight loss at treatment end and 3 months post-treatment.

Practical Solutions for Pesticide Safety: A Farm and Research Team Participatory Model

Development of the Practical Solutions for Pesticide Safety guide used participatory research strategies to identify and evaluate solutions that reduce pesticide exposures for workers and their families and to disseminate these solutions. Project principles were (1) workplace chemicals belong in the workplace, and (2) pesticide handlers and farm managers are experts, with direct knowledge of production practices. The project’s participatory methods were grounded in self-determination theory. Practical solutions were identified and evaluated based on five criteria: practicality, adaptability, health and safety, novelty, and regulatory compliance. Research activities that had more personal contact provided better outcomes. The Expert Working Group, composed of farm managers and pesticide handlers, was key to the identification of solutions, as were farm site visits. Audience participation, hands-on testing, and orchard field trials were particularly effective in the evaluation of potential solutions. Small work groups in a Regional Advisory Committee provided the best direction and guidance for a “user-friendly” translational document that provided evidence-based practical solutions. The “farmer to farmer” format of the guide was endorsed by both the Expert Working Group and the Regional Advisory Committee. Managers and pesticide handlers wanted to share their solutions in order to “help others stay safe,” and they appreciated attribution in the guide. The guide is now being used in educational programs across the region. The fundamental concept that farmers and farmworkers are innovators and experts in agricultural production was affirmed by this study. The success of this process demonstrates the value of participatory industrial hygiene in agriculture.     

The value of the acoustic analysis of pathological infant cry and breathing noise in everyday practice

During a period of twenty years [1969-1988] the author has observed 614 cases of congenital malformations and noninflammatory diseases of the larynx in infants and young children, Budapest. He summarizes the most characteristic symptoms of laryngeal pathology in infants, and discusses the diagnostic possibilities. Among the latter, spectrographic analyses complemented by auditory evaluation of pathological cry and different breathing noises play an important role. Based on his investigation author differentiates 20 kinds of pathological crying sounds and 4 basic forms of stridor. He describes the acoustic attributes of different pathological sound phenomena and summarizes characteristic voice changes.     

A model for drug release from fast phase inverting injectable solutions.

A model is developed to describe protein release kinetics from injectable, polymer solution depots which undergo rapid phase inversion on injection. The model consists of a polymer-rich phase and a solvent-rich phase, consistent with experimentally observed phase inversion morphology. Equations in the polymer-rich phase are based on diffusion-reaction mass balances for solvent, water and dissolved drug, and the rate of dissolution of dispersed drug particles. Equations in the water-rich phase are also of the diffusion-reaction type. Transport parameters in the polymer-rich phase are coupled to the ternary thermodynamics through friction formalism, and remaining parameters are estimated from literature data, leaving two free parameters: volume fraction of water-rich phase (epsilon) and k, the mass-transfer coefficient for bath-side transfer of the protein. Variations of these parameters lead to predictions of release profiles that vary from a rapid, burst-like behavior followed by a locking-in of the polymer-rich phase, to a uniform, zero-order profile. Comparisons are made to lysozyme release data for three systems: PLGA solutions in N-methlypyrollidinone (NMP), PLA solutions in NMP, and the latter with added Pluronic. Good agreement between model predictions and data is shown; in particular, the transition from rapid release to zero-order kinetics that occurs on addition of Pluronic is illustrated.     

Hand-assisted laparoscopic nephroureterectomy for upper urinary tract transitional cell carcinoma.

OBJECTIVE: We report our experience with hand-assisted laparoscopic nephroureterectomy (HALN) for upper urinary tract transitional cell carcinoma and compare our results with a contemporary series of open nephroureterectomy (ON) performed at our institution. METHODS: Between August 1996 and May 2003, 90 patients underwent nephroureterectomy for upper-tract transitional cell carcinoma (TCC). Thirty-eight patients underwent HALN, while 52 had an ON. End-points of comparison included operative time, estimated blood loss (EBL), intraoperative and postoperative complications, length of hospital stay, pathologic grade and stage of tumor, and tumor recurrence. RESULTS: The mean patient age was 72.3 and 70.6 years in the ON and HALN groups, respectively. Mean operative duration was 243 minutes (ON) and 244 minutes (HALN), with an EBL of 478mL in the open group versus 191 mL in the hand-assisted group (P<0.001). No intraoperative complications occurred, but postoperative complications occurred in 4% and 11% of the ON and HALN groups, respectively (P=0.21). The mean hospital duration was 7.1 days (ON) versus 4.6 days (HALN) (P<0.01). No difference existed in the pathologic grade or stage distribution of urothelial tumors between the 2 groups. The mean follow-up was 51.0 months in the ON group and 31.7 months in the HALN group. Recurrence of urothelial carcinoma occurred in 50% of patients who underwent ON and 40% treated by HALN (P=0.38) at a median interval of 9.1 and 7.7 months, respectively, after surgery. CONCLUSION: Hand-assisted laparoscopic nephroureterectomy is an effective modality for the treatment of upper urinary tract urothelial carcinoma. Patients benefited from less intraoperative blood loss and a shorter hospitalization with an equivalent intermediate-term oncologic outcome compared with that of the open approach.     

Clinical and radiological profile of symptomatic knee osteoarthritis in Malaysia

Aims: To create a clinical and radiological profile of patients with symptomatic osteoarthritis of the knee in Malaysia. Methods: One hundred consecutive patients presenting with symptomatic knee osteoarthritis at a private rheumatology clinic were profiled for demographic and clinical features. Anteroposterior weight‐bearing, skyline and lateral knee X‐rays were taken. Statistical Package for Social Sciences was used for data analysis. Results: Women predominated (93%). Fifty‐eight percent of the patients reported bilateral knee pain. Difficulty in walking, climbing and squatting was high (85%, 97% and 93% respectively). Patients with knee pain had a higher BMI than controls. Radiological abnormality, related to osteoarthritis was present in 97%. Osteophytes were generally tricompartmental while joint space narrowing was less evident in the lateral tibiofemoral joint than in the medial tibiofemoral joint and the patellofemoral joint. Almost half (49%) the patients manifested radiological varus deformity The severity of radiological abnormality increased with age. Although patients with unilateral pain had milder radiological abnormality, it tended to be bilateral. Clinically detectable hip abnormality and nodal osteoarthritis were uncommon, as was radiological chondrocalcinosis. Conclusions: Patients presenting with symptomatic knee osteoarthritis to a rheumatology service had a high degree of disability, radiological abnormality and varus deformity. Radiological abnormalities were essentially bilateral and tricompartmental.