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Biomedical subjects

A Luther

Publications and source records attributed to A Luther.

17 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed2001

Presidential perspectives 2001: nursing issues in the 21st century.

It has been said of 20th century nursing that "despite the changes, new technology, the growth as well as the setbacks, at the close of the century, the essence of nursing [had] not changed" (Schorr, 1999). What is the essence of nursing? I believe that it is best summed up in one word-service. This was the moral vision held by Florence Nightingale over a century ago: that nurses and nursing would demonstrate an unparalleled commitment to serving humanity. This great tradition of humanitarian service undergirds our profession today as we face the complexities, the challenges, and the opportunities of nursing in the 21st century. It is now up to us to go forward and create the future we want for ourselves, for our colleagues, for our profession, and for our patients.

Forecasting↗
PubMed2000

Recurrent aggressive angiomyxoma of the urinary bladder. Case report and review of the literature.

Aggressive angiomyxoma is a rare neoplasm which predominantly involves the female pelvis and perineum. Forty-four cases have been reported in the world literature, including 10 cases in men. To the best of our knowledge, the first case of recurrent aggressive angiomyxoma of the urinary bladder is presented here. Operative management, radiologic features and pathological findings are discussed.

Adult↗
PubMed1998

Surface-promoted replication and exponential amplification of DNA analogues.

Self-replicating chemical systems have been designed and studied to identify the minimal requirements for molecular replication, to translate the principle into synthetic supramolecular systems and to derive a better understanding of the scope and limitations of self-organization processes that are believed to be relevant to the origin of life on Earth. Current implementations make use of oligonucleotide analogues, peptides, and other molecules as templates and are based either on autocatalytic, cross-catalytic, or collectively catalytic pathways for template formation. A common problem of these systems is product inhibition, leading to parabolic instead of exponential amplification. The latter is the dynamic prerequisite for selection in the darwinian sense. We here describe an iterative, stepwise procedure for chemical replication which permits an exponential increase in the concentration of oligonucleotide analogues. The procedure employs the surface of a solid support and is called SPREAD (surface-promoted replication and exponential amplification of DNA analogues). Copies are synthesized from precursor fragments by chemical ligation on immobilized templates, and then liberated and immobilized to become new templates. The process is repeated iteratively. The role of the support is to separate complementary templates which would form stable duplexes in solution. SPREAD combines the advantages of solid-phase chemistry with chemical replication, and can be further developed for the non-enzymatic and enzymatic amplification of RNA, peptides and other templates as well as for studies of in vitro evolution and competition in artificial chemical systems. Similar processes may also have played a role in the origin of life on Earth, because the earliest replication systems may have proliferated by spreading on mineral surfaces.

Chromatography, High Pressure Liquid↗
PubMed1998

Reliability of stroke patients' reports on rehabilitation services received.

OBJECTIVE: To compare stroke patients' reports with service providers' reports on the rehabilitation services patients receive. SETTING: Community, predominantly urban. SUBJECTS: Ninety-three stroke patients who had not been admitted to hospital. METHOD: Between August 1994 and August 1996, 54 general practitioner practices in Nottingham (population 344 200) were requested to notify the Nottingham Community Stroke Project of all cases of stroke. Patients were visited one month after stroke and asked to report on whether they had received any hospital, social, community or voluntary services. Some departments were contacted and asked if the patients were known to them and whether they had been seen. RESULTS: Patients reported having little contact with hospital or social services. Comparison of patients' reports with that of the appropriate service department showed poor agreement for community care assistants (kappa = 0.18), fair agreement for social workers (kappa = 0.59), speech therapy (kappa = 0.48), hospital outpatient appointments (kappa = 0.55) and admissions to hospital (kappa = 0.48) and good agreement for social services occupational therapists (kappa = 0.64). CONCLUSION: Stroke patients' and service providers' reports on rehabilitation services may not always agree. Care should be taken when interpreting information on service provision.

Aged↗
PubMed1998

Rehabilitation needs of community stroke patients.

PURPOSE: The aim was to identify stroke patients not admitted to hospital, to assess their disabilities and the rehabilitation provided. METHOD: Stroke patients were notified by General Practitioners, assessed a month after stroke on measures of impairment and disability and the rehabilitation received was recorded. There were 124 patients notified and 93 assessed. RESULTS: Patients showed an average decline of 1.7 on the Barthel Index and 3.6 on the Extended Activities of Daily Living scale from before to after stroke. There were 27% with severe mobility problems and 47% with clinically relevant arm impairment. Many patients had cognitive impairment with only 9% having no deficit. Mood problems were less common with 26% anxious and 13% depressed. Significant stress occurred in 15% of carers. The provision of rehabilitation was low and there was poor correspondence between impairments and services provided. CONCLUSION: There is an unmet potential for rehabilitation in stroke patients not admitted to hospital.

Activities of Daily Living↗
PubMed1998

[Differentiated thyroid gland carcinoma p-T2/T3--extent of lymphadenectomy].

Systematic lymphadenectomy, which is compartment-orientated, from central node dissection to (modified) radical neck dissection, is not controversial in cases with intra-operative macroscopic node involvement. General "prophylactic" dissection, at least of the ipsilateral central compartment, is advocated due to a high incidence of "occult", microscopic positive nodes, and the elevated risk regarding recurrency and survival which is connected to node-positivity, and lowered recurrence rates with systematic lymphadenectomy. Nevertheless, the biological impact of occult positive nodes, as an independent risk-factor, is not yet clear, with important differences between papillary and follicular carcinoma ("marker" or "governor" of the disease?). Enhanced operative morbidity by extensive lymphadenectomy, especially hypoparathyroidism, must be taken into account.

Adenocarcinoma, Follicular↗
PubMed1995

Oxytocin as an antidiuretic hormone. II. Role of V2 vasopressin receptor.

We conducted this study to determine what receptor mediates the effect of oxytocin to increase osmotic water permeability (Pf) in the rat inner medullary collecting duct (IMCD). Reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) experiments demonstrated that mRNA for both the oxytocin receptor and the V2 receptor is present in the rat terminal IMCD. In isolated perfused IMCD segments, we found that the V2 vasopressin receptor antagonist [d(CH2)5(1),D-Ile2,Ile4,Arg8]vasopressin, but not oxytocin receptor antagonists, blocked the hydrosmotic response to 200 pM oxytocin. The selective oxytocin receptor agonist [Thr4,Gly7]oxytocin did not increase water permeability. Oxytocin also increased urea permeability in IMCD segments. Studies in IMCD suspensions showed that oxytocin increases adenosine 3',5'-cyclic monophosphate production in a dose-dependent fashion with a half-maximal (EC50) response at 5.2 nM. The dose-response curves were virtually identical for IMCD suspensions from Sprague-Dawley rats and Brattleboro rats. The oxytocin dose-response curve was displaced to the right of the vasopressin dose-response curve (EC50, 0.44 nM). From these results, we conclude that the V2 receptor mediates the hydrosmotic action of oxytocin in rat IMCD.

Animals↗
PubMed1992

[Pathomorphological and cytogenetic studies of embryonic abortions].

Cytogenetic studies into abortions have shown that in 50 to 60% of all abortion cases the presence of an aneuploid karyotype can be concluded simply from the histological findings obtained from the abortion sample. This has proved to be important not only for elucidation of the cause of abortion. Also, some cytogenetic studies have provided statistically useful information for counselling on the risk of repetition. However, there are also views according to which the risk of recurrence is not even increased in the wake of aneuploid abortion. Including in our investigation were 528 samples received by routine at the Charité Institute of Pathology from the Charité Obstetric Department, between October 1987 and June 1990. Macroscopic findings included 24 intact amniotic sacs with and 34 without embryonic fragments as well as 188 ruptured amniotic sacs. Only decidual particles were found in 249 cases, while no safe macroscopic assessment was possible of 33 samples. Investigation of the embryos proved to be essential to identification of malformations and determination of discrepancies between gestational age and embryonic development. Correlations were also established between age-specific incidence of abortions and age-specific fertility, with the risk of abortion being found to grow beyond the age of 30 years. Histological parameters recorded from 267 samples revealed links to specific chromosomal aberrations, with 136 of them (50%) being defined as chromosomally induced abortions. Seventeen in 34 abortions on which cytogenetic results had been obtained proved to be aneuploid, among them nine aberrations of trisomal karyotype. A triploid karyotype was exhibited by four and a monosomal karyotype by three. Mosaic was recorded in one case.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

Abortion, Spontaneous↗