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Biomedical subjects

A Storesund

Publications and source records attributed to A Storesund.

9 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed2001

[Environmental health and industrial pollution in the 1890s].

BACKGROUND: Pollution from industry assumed new dimensions when large-scale industry and mining were established in Norway towards the end of the nineteenth century. The present article discusses how the local health administration responded to the first extensive industrial pollution of air and water. MATERIAL AND METHODS: Two chemical factories producing wood pulp and one abandoned nickel mine are studied by means of information from court records and municipal archives. RESULTS: New forms of large quantity pollutants and their great spreading capacity were not anticipated in the Health Act of 1860. The legislation at the time had ambiguous points which made it difficult to apply in cases of industrial pollution. One major problem was reliable documentation of adverse health effects. INTERPRETATION: Neither central nor local medical authorities had adequate competence to exert the professional influence required. In spite of this, local health commissions acted with considerable authority in the early 1890s. Within a few years, however, the health aspects were down-played because of the strong economic and political interests behind the new industries. The principal difficulties emerging in the 1890s with industrial pollution eventually lasted for nearly one hundred years.

Chemical Industry↗
PubMed2000

[Smallpox in Telemark in the last part of the 19th century].

Was vaccination the only cause of the decline of smallpox in Norway during the 19th century? This regional study focuses on the history of the disease in Telemark county with special emphasis on the last, extensive epidemic in 1868. In addition to vaccination, other possible causal relations are discussed. In Telemark, smallpox seems to have been relatively mild in the 19th century with the exception of the epidemics at the end of the 1830s and in 1868. In 1868 the disease spread along the main transportation routes northward through the western part and eastward through the more densely populated districts along the coast. The importance of vaccination is apparent from the fact that the municipalities with the lowest annual percentage of newborns vaccinated were most heavily struck by the epidemic. Despite vaccination procedures, both adults and unvaccinated children were groups at risk. Local initiatives--especially isolation and revaccination--largely prevented or restricted outbreaks of smallpox. It seems that the efforts of the district medical officers and local health administrators after 1860 were of decisive importance for the decline in smallpox cases in the period in question.

Adult↗
PubMed1999

[Health commissions' activities in five rural municipalities in Telemark between 1861-1900].

It has been assumed that local health administrations in rural areas in the second half of the nineteenth century functioned in a rather passive and ineffective way. The present study focuses on the activity of the health commissions in the municipalities of Vinje, Seljord, Hitterdal, Gjerpen and Bamble. In the 1860s og 1870s, few meetings were held. Lack of interest and communication problems between doctors (who chaired the commissions) and the municipal councils were pointed out as causes. In commission meetings, the doctors used most of the time to give information on the present health situation in the area and on general medical issues. After 1885 the activity in the commissions gradually increased. New legislation and health regulations gave the health commissions a more important role in public health administration. In Hitterdal and Seljord the health commissions contributed actively to fighting the diphteria epidemics in the late 1880s. With urbanization and industrialisation in lower Telemark, environmental health issues took on added importance for the health commissions of Gjerpen and Bamble. The problems were much more effectively dealt with in Bamble than in Gjerpen, possible because of differences in the organisation of the commissions and in the workload for the doctors who chaired them.

Community Health Services↗
PubMed1999

[Health Commission's activity and public health work in Skien and Langesund 1861-1900].

The role played by the health commissions in preventive health work in a major and a minor urban community in Telemark, Skien and Langesund respectively, is analysed by means of a classification method applicable to cases and decisions referred to in the proceedings of the health commissions. Increasingly, health commissions had to rely on their own initiative under the leadership of the district medical officer. After 1890, the decisions reached by the health commissions were increasingly recommendations to local authorities. Sanitation and waste processing were the principal problems. Regular house-to-house inspections in Langesund appear to have become effective, while the problems in Skien presumably were too great to permit similar improvements there. Even though practical work of preventing the spread of epidemic diseases had to remain the doctors' responsibility, the health commissions were active in providing the necessary resources. However, the commissions did not play a leading role in developing improved drinking water supplies or other major issues essential to health. Neither did they engage to any considerable extent in the distribution of public health information. On the other hand, the commissions acted as a controlling authority in cases brought before them, thus fulfilling the intentions of the Health Act of 1860.

Communicable Disease Control↗
PubMed1975

Ultrastructural evidence for a direct connection between the myocardial granules and the sarcoplasmic reticulum in the cardiac ventricle of Myxine glutinosa (L.).

The occurrence of structural connections between myocardial granules and tubular elements of the sarcoplasmic reticulum in the cardiac ventricle of the Atlantic hagfish is described. The core substance of the myocardial granules is shown to be uranophilic and in this respect similar to the granular cores within the lumen of the sarcoplasmic reticulum. After application of CaCl2-containing fixatives, the ultrastructure of the core substance of these organelles resembles that described for calcium-containing structures in vertebrate glial cells. Incidences of uranophilic core substance in the extracellular space suggest a secretory function of the myocardial granules. Possible implications of the sarcoplasmic reticulum and the myocardial granules in storage, intracellular transport, and secretion of bound calcium are discussed.

Animals↗