Biomedical subjects
D Jack
Publications and source records attributed to D Jack.
DAFNE--controlling diabetes the German way.
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Virtual reality-enhanced stroke rehabilitation.
A personal computer (PC)-based desktop virtual reality (VR) system was developed for rehabilitating hand function in stroke patients. The system uses two input devices, a CyberGlove and a Rutgers Master II-ND (RMII) force feedback glove, allowing user interaction with a virtual environment. This consists of four rehabilitation routines, each designed to exercise one specific parameter of hand movement: range, speed, fractionation or strength. The use of performance-based target levels is designed to increase patient motivation and individualize exercise difficulty to a patient's current state. Pilot clinical trials have been performed using the above system combined with noncomputer tasks, such as pegboard insertion or tracing of two-dimensional (2-D) patterns. Three chronic stroke patients used this rehabilitation protocol daily for two weeks. Objective measurements showed that each patient showed improvement on most of the hand parameters over the course of the training. Subjective evaluation by the patients was also positive. This technical report focuses on this newly developed technology for VR rehabilitation.
Stiff competition expected in ED market.
At the British Association of Urological Surgeons Annual Meeting, held June 2529, 2001, in Dublin, Ireland, participants gathered to absorb the newest information regarding treatment strategies, as well as the latest procedures and new developments in equipment.
Making advances - but not too quickly and not too many.
The World Congress of Neurology is one of the major international neurology conferences, and this year's meeting, held June 1722, brought almost 5,000 delegates to London from all corners of the globe. At the opening address, President of the World Federation of Neurology James Toole called on neurologists to use the greatly improved means of communication to improve society.
Roche calls for potency guidelines to help HIV drug prescribing.
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A novel quantitative method for 3D measurement of Parkinsonian tremor.
OBJECTIVE: To demonstrate the usefulness of a three dimensional (3D) motion analysis system for the quantitative measurement of tremor in patients with Parkinson's disease (PD). METHODS: Six PD patients with hand tremors were studied using a system that employed 3D electromagnetic position sensors to measure the actual, cumulative displacement of the tremoring finger. Patients were studied in different hand positions and activating conditions before and 30, 60, 90 and 120 min after intake of Pramipexole, a dopamine agonist known to reduce tremor. Tremor amplitude and frequency, before and after drug intake, were compared using Mann-Whitney U test and Wilcoxon rank test, respectively. RESULTS: The motion analysis system allowed discrimination of tremor related events from movement artifact and allowed the calculation of real world movement of the finger tremor despite altered hand positions and orientation. Average 3D tremor frequency ranged from 3.71 to 4.34 Hz. Median tremor amplitude (total distance traveled per 5 s interval) decreased with drug from 4.9 to 1.6 cm for resting tremor, 4.5 to 3.7 cm for postural tremor, 3.4 to 3.3 cm for precision tremor, 10.2 to 3.3 cm for tapping activation and 108.6 to 5.7 cm for counting activation. CONCLUSIONS: Our method of 3D analysis provides a robust, single quantitative measure of tremor amplitude that is intuitive and likely to reflect the functional impact of tremor. This methodology should be useful in comparing tremor across patients and in measuring the efficacy of therapeutic interventions.
TDM: the key to more effective HIV treatment?
At the 5th International Congress on Drug Therapy in HIV Infection, held in Glasgow, Scotland, October 22-26, 2000, the increasingly important role of the clinical pharmacologist was underlined. Now that complicated combination therapy regimens are routine in HIV treatment, therapeutic drug monitoring (TDM) is increasingly necessary to monitor drug levels in blood, potential drug interactions, changes in bioavailability and patient nonadherence. Most of the congress was devoted to the presentation of the latest clinical data on the major drugs and their most important combinations used for HAART, including data on trials with nelfinavir, indinavir, BMS-232632, ritonavir, nevirapine, lamivudine/zidovudine and lopinavir/ritonavir, as well as with dronabinol. The sense of optimism triggered by the advent of HAART in the last few years continues to grow, and this will clearly be encouraged by more efficient approaches to treatment such as the advent of TDM.
The sartans are coming!
The 3(rd) International Symposium on Angiotensin II Antagonism was held in London February 28-March 2, 2000, and was accompanied by a number of company-sponsored symposia discussing "sartan" drugs. The advent of these angiotensin II receptor antagonists in the 1990s was welcomed with much enthusiasm owing to their reduced side effect profiles in comparison with members of other classes of antihypertensive drugs. Losartan and valsartan had previously been combined successfully with hydrochlorothiazide. A new sartan combination--candesartan cilexetil + hydrochlorothiazide--was announced during the meeting and new clinical trial data were presented. There are a number of questions that still need answers with respect to the role of the sartans in areas other than hypertension; help in answering at least some of these questions should be provided soon by the results of several megastudies that are currently under way.
Berlin biomedical campus unifies laboratory and clinic.
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The fine art of medicine.
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54-week results on infliximab attract attention at EULAR. European League against Rheumatism.
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Immunodeficiency and the gut: clues to the role of the immune system in gastrointestinal disease.
Gastrointestinal disease occurs in a high proportion of patients with primary immunodeficiency. While enteric infections are responsible for the gastrointestinal pathology in many individuals, it is now clear that infection alone is not sufficient to explain the gut pathology found in many immunodeficiencies. This article focuses on recent developments in this field and highlights the insights gained in understanding the complex relationship between immunodeficiency and the gut.
Combing the oceans for new therapeutic agents.
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Waxing hot and cold in the surgical arena.
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Sticky situations: surgical adhesions and adhesives.
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Confessions of a journal junkie.
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