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Biomedical subjects

B Minty

Publications and source records attributed to B Minty.

13 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed2001

Is clinic prevalence of ICD-10 hyperkinesis underestimated? Impact of increasing awareness by a questionnaire screen in an UK clinic.

Hyperactivity is common, but its diagnosis is still controversial, with two contending approaches: ADHD from DSM IV and hyperkinesis from ICD-10. The concept of ADHD predicts higher rates, but its use may lead to overmedication. Hyperkinesis usefully indicates medication, but clinics using it may detect many fewer cases, raising the possibility of underdiagnosis. It has never been shown whether this lower rate results from hyperkinesis' criteria, or to the differing methods used to detect hyperactivity in those centres that prefer it. We report a mirror study, examining rates of all types of hyperkinesis before and after the introduction of a preliminary screen (not originally intended to detect hyperkinesis). Its introduction resulted in an increase of detected hyperkinesis from 2% to 25% of the clinic sample with no change in diagnostic criteria. This was independent of any other change in the sample or clinic staff. We conclude that insensitive assessment may be responsible for low rates of diagnosis of ICD-10 hyperkinesis in secondary care clinics.

Affective Symptoms↗
PubMed2000

Development of an automated method for determining oil in water by direct aqueous supercritical fluid extraction coupled on-line with infrared spectroscopy.

A direct aqueous supercritical fluid extraction (SFE) system was developed which can be directly interfaced to an infrared spectrometer for the determination of oil in water. The technique is designed to provide an environmentally clean, automated alternative to established IR methods for oil in water analysis which require the use of restricted organic solvents. The SFE-FTIR method involves minimum sample handling stages, with on-line analysis of a 500 ml water sample being complete within 15 min. Method accuracy for determining water samples spiked with gasoline, white spirit, kerosene, diesel or engine oil was 81-100% with precision (RSD) ranging from 3 to 17%. An independent evaluation determined a 2 ppm limit of quantification for diesel in industrial effluents. The results of a comparative study involving an established IR method and the SFE-FTIR method indicate that oil levels calculated using an accepted equation which includes coefficients derived from reference hydrocarbon standards may result in significant errors. A new approach permitted the derivation of quantification coefficients for the SFE-FTIR analyses which provided improved results. In situations where the identity of the oil to be analysed is known, a rapid off-line SFE-FTIR system calibration procedure was developed and successfully applied to various oils. An optional in-line silica gel clean-up procedure incorporated within the SFE-FTIR system enables the same water sample to be analysed for total oil content including vegetable oils and selectively for petroleum oil content within a total of 20 min. At the end of an analysis the SFE system is cleaned using an in situ 3 min clean cycle.

Journal Article↗
PubMed1998

Editorial to special section of Journal of Adolescence.

It is appropriate that this Special Section in Journal of Adolescence should focus on the needs of adolescents within the care system. The year 1998 marks the fiftieth anniversary of the passing of the Children Act (1948), which established the modern structure of services in England and Wales for children and adolescents deprived of adequate parenting in their own homes. Anniversaries are an opportunity for reflection. Are our current services an improvement on the past? In learning new lessons have we possibly lost sight of things we knew better, and did better, previously?

Adolescent↗
PubMed1998

Parental health attitudes, illnesses and supports and the referral of children to medical specialists.

Parental illness and maternal health beliefs in the parents of a group of 40 children referred to a paediatric neurology service because of headaches were compared with illness histories and health beliefs in the parents of a matched group of 40 children presenting to the same service with recognized structural pathology, mainly epilepsy. The study focused on the mother's perceptions of her own health (current and past), on life events, social supports and on her beliefs about her own health and the validity of medical reassurance. Significant differences between the two groups were found in relation to: (a) the greater amount of illness experienced by both parents in the index group (i.e. parents of children with headaches), particularly the mothers, both as children and as adults; (b) the greater amount of illness present in the families of the index group in the 3 years prior to being seen by the neurologist; (c) the greater number of index mothers who had experienced the loss of their own mothers caused by death; (d) the greater tendency of the index mothers to express feelings of loneliness; (e) the greater proportion of index mothers who, in response to the Whiteley Attitudes to Health Questionnaire, expressed both (i) concern about serious disease in themselves, and (ii) reluctance to accept medical reassurance; (f) on the other hand, significantly more 'comparison mothers' complained of currently suffering 'many different symptoms'.

Adult↗
PubMed1992

Daisybank 1983-1989. An audit of a residential home preparing adolescents for permanent placements.

This paper describes the evaluation of a small children's home, Daisybank, set up to prepare adolescents, who had been in care for several years, to live in permanent placements. The home seemed largely to fail in this explicit task, but appear to succeed in helping a majority of its residents make substantial progress in coming to terms with their deprived and disrupted lives. It provided them with genuine care and commitment, which they acknowledged and appreciated. We believe that the success of the home needs to be judged by these criteria, since for young people in mid- to late adolescence the search for new permanent parental homes probably conflicted with other psychosocial tasks relating to adolescence. On the other hand, Daisybank seemed unable adequately to resolve the problems of a subgroup of adolescent males with serious conduct problems who were responsible for the not infrequent physical abuse of several female staff.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1986

Mortality and lung histopathology after inhalation lung injury. The effect of corticosteroids.

An animal model was used to study the effects of early administration of intramuscular corticosteroids on mortality and lung histopathology induced by a component of smoke. Thirty-six rabbits (mean weight, 2.7 kg) were exposed to acrolein vapor for 15 min; 30 min later the animals were divided into 3 treatment groups. One group received saline placebo intramuscularly at 12-h intervals, a second group was treated intramuscularly with 100 mg methylprednisolone at 12-h intervals, and a third group was treated with a single 100-mg dose of methylprednisolone followed by doses of saline at 12-h intervals. The animals were studied for a 72-h period. There was a significantly lower mortality in the 2 steroid-treated groups than in the nontreated group. A scoring system was developed for evaluating observed histologic changes in the lung. No correlation was seen between survival and histologic score or between score and treatment. High scores for particular histologic features did not explain mortality nor did they predominate in untreated animals; "vascular congestion" was found to be greater in the steroid-treated group. The beneficial effects of steroids in reducing mortality after inhalation of a common smoke constituent was not associated with any evidence of attenuation of lung damage.

Acrolein↗
PubMed1980

The effect of nitrous oxide inactivation of vitamin B12 on rat hepatic folate. Implications for the methylfolate-trap hypothesis.

Rats exposed to N20 show a decrease in liver folate to about 25% of the initial value after 10 days. There is a transient increase in the amount of 5-methylterrahydropteroylpolyglutamate in the first 24 h, but thereafter the content decreases. The level of 5-methyltetrahydropterolymonoglutamate declines without any transitory increase. The transient accumulation of 5-methyltetrahydropteroylpolyglutamate is due to failure of methionine synthetase. Thereafter the decrease in the amount of methylfolate makes it improbable that trapping of methylfolate is the explanation for failure of folate metabolism in vitamin B12 deficiency.

Animals↗
PubMed1980

Inactivation of methionine synthase by nitrous oxide.

Exposure of rats to a 50% N2O/oxygen mixture led to a rapid loss of methionine synthase activity in both liver and brain. This enzyme has vitamin B12 as a cofactor. There was impaired conversion of deoxyuridine to deoxythymidine by bone marrow cells and this defect followed loss of methionine synthase activity. There was no homocystinuria. Withdrawal of N2O was followed by a relatively slow recovery of methionine synthase activity over four days. The inactivation of vitamin B12 by N2O promises to be a valuable tool in the study of vitamin B12 metabolism.

5-Methyltetrahydrofolate-Homocysteine S-Methyltran↗
PubMed1979

Alveolar-capillary membrane permeability. Correlation with functional, radiographic, and postmortem changes after fluid aspiration.

An index of permeability of the alveolar-capillary membrane was derived from the relative extraction from the lung into arterial blood of 2 tracers, 125I-antipyrine and 51Cr-ethylenediaminetetraacetate. The effect on this index of aspirating 2 ml of isotonic saline, distilled water, or 10(-1) M hydrochloric acid per kg of body weight was studied in 3 groups of rabbits. The severity and time course of changes in the permeability index were correlated with changes in lung mechanics, gas exchange, serial chest roentgenograms, ratio of extravascular lung water to dry weight, and histologic findings. Aspiration of saline produced no change in the permeability index; aspiration of water produced a large mean +/- SEM increase in the index, from a baseline of 0.025 +/- 0.002 to 1,050 +/- 0.054 (P less than 0.001), but this value returned to baseline 15 min later. After hydrochloric acid, the permeability index increased from a baseline of 0.027 +/- 0.003 to 1.068 +/- 0.098 (P less than 0.005), with no evidence of resolution after 60 min. Changes in lung mechanics, gas exchange, and roentgenograms were smallest after aspiration of distilled water and greatest after aspiration of hydrochloric acid. The functional changes after aspiration of water and saline recovered at a rate proportional to the known clearance rates of these liquids from the lung. The changes after hydrochloric acid either showed no tendency toward recovery or, in the case of the roentgenograms, worsened with time. There were no detectable histologic abnormalities or an increase in the ratio of extravascular lung water to dry weight after aspiration of water or saline, but there were extensive histologic abnormalities and a 70 per cent increase in lung water after acid. The increase in the permeability index after aspiration of water was too transient to exert a deleterious effect. In contrast, the persistence of the increase in the permeability index after hydrochloric acid was associated with persistent functional changes attributable to the considerable increase in lung water.

Animals↗
PubMed1978

Selective inactivation of vitamin B12 in rats by nitrous oxide.

Exposure of rats to nitrous oxide rapidly inactivated the cytosol enzyme, methionine synthetase, but the mitochondrial enzyme, methylmalonyl CoA mutase, seemed to be unaffected, although both enzymes require vitamin B12.

5-Methyltetrahydrofolate-Homocysteine S-Methyltran↗