1,720,971 research outputs found
The new 24/4 oral contraceptive pill
No full text"It is our experience, as it was our aim, that as a result of child-spacing, and adequate care of mothers, death rates would be reduced. It is now a fact that as a result of birth control, the survival rate among mothers and children is higher. There is less suffering for all groups" (Margaret Sanger, 1947). -- The above quotation came from Margaret Sanger, then President of the American Society of Family Planning, who had the vision that family planning would holistically be beneficial to society. In fact in 1951, Margaret Sanger through her ardent supporter, Katherine Dexter McCormick, collected a total of $150,000 (a substantial amount for the time) so as to fund research on oral contraception. With this funding Dr Gregory Pincus commenced preclinical trials suppressing ovulation in rabbits. Within a decade Dr Carl Djerassi was able to produce the first oral contraceptive pill which was initially tested in Puerto Rico and Haiti.peer-reviewe
Clinical practice guideline on induction of labour and antenatal surveillance of the post-dates pregnancy
Get PDFThomas Denman in 1756, at a meeting in London, suggested that induction of labour may be a useful treatment for cephalo-pelvic disproportion which was at the time, a common cause of maternal and foetal mortality. By 1788 induction of labour was met by general approval by the British Obstetric establishment. Thirty years later Rigby the Younger hailed induction of labour “as perhaps the greatest
improvement in operative midwifery since the invention and gradual improvement of the forceps”.
(Hibbard 2000). Note must be taken of the discretion this latter statement portrays, a reflection of
erudite Obstetric caution.
Obstetric caution is also required in modern day Induction of Labour whereby the rates of this obstetric
intervention have increased substantially over the past twenty years. In the U.S. induction of labour,
increased from 9.5 percent in 1990 to 22.1 percent in 2004. Similarly in 2004 and 2005, one in every five
deliveries in the UK was induced (NICE CG70).peer-reviewe
Psychotropic treatment in patients undergoing gynaecological procedures
Get PDFBackground: Around 27% of the adult population in Europe has at some point suffered from a mental disorder in the past year. Patients with psychiatric illness have different needs and require specific medication review prior to surgery in view of the risks from anesthesia, the direct and indirect effects of psychotropics, risk of withdrawal symptoms, and risk of psychiatric recurrence or relapse. Gynaecological patients, particularly those going through the menopausal transition phase have an associated risk of psychiatric conditions especially mood disorders.
This audit is set to determine the link between psychotropic drug use and patients seen at gynaecological pre-operative assessment clinic, the most encountered diagnosis, how this relates to age together with analysis of most common drugs used to treat these patients. --
Methods: Data of 123 patients from 24 weekly pre-operative assessment clinics was collected. The number of patients listed in each clinic was documented together with the patient’s age. Patients on psychotropic medication were analysed to note diagnoses of each case and treatment used. --
Results: 21.1% of patients suffered from a mental health illness requiring psychotropic medication. Their average age was that of 51 years. The most common diagnosis was depression, summing up to 9.8% of all patients, followed by anxiety at 6.5%. --
Conclusion: Depression and anxiety are leading mental health illnesses both in this cohort and the general population. Such patients have lower pain threshold which affects their recovery. Some psychotropics have severe interactions with anaesthetic thus need to be stopped prior to surgery after evaluation of risks such as drug withdrawal and deterioration in mental health.peer-reviewe
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Get PDFThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Incidence and case-fatality ratio of COVID-19 infection in relation to tobacco smoking, access to healthcare, poverty, and population demographics in the USA
Get PDFBackground: Tobacco smoking has been shown to increase the severity of COVID-19 infection and the risk for intra-tracheal ventilation in smokers. Tobacco
smoking exposes the user and nearby individuals to very high concentrations of particulate matter in a short period of time. Genes coding for SARS-CoV-2 have
been found adherent to particulate matter which has been linked to COVID-19 related mortality PM2.5. The aim of the study was to observe the incidence of
SARS-CoV-2 infection rates in the USA, comparing States differentiated by the degree of smoking bans, exploring a possible link between tobacco smoke-related
particulate matter and SARS-CoV-2 transmission.Methodology: Two groups of USA States, differentiated by the degree of smoking legislative restrictions, had a number of variables compared. Variables related to
COVID-19 were obtained from the John Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Centre between the 20th and the 26th September 2020. The degree of smoking bans and
the percentage of the smoking population in the USA States were obtained from the websites of the Nonsmokers Rights Foundation and the Centres of Disease
Control database respectively. Population characteristics were obtained from databases concerning USA demographics.Results: The incidence of COVID-19 infection in the States with limited bans on tobacco smoking was 2046/100,000 (sd+/-827) while the infection incidence
in States with more restrictive rulings on tobacco smoking was 1660/100,000 (sd+/-686) (p<0.038). The population percentage of smokers in States with minor
limitations to smoking was 18.3% (sd+/-3.28), while States with greater smoking restrictions had a smoking population percentage of 15.2% (sd+/-2.68) (p<0.0006).
Significant correlations were noted between the percentage of the states’ population which was below the poverty line and access to Healthcare. Population
density correlated significantly with the case-fatality ratio (R=0.66 p<0.0001).Conclusion: States in the USA with high levels of tobacco smoking and limited regulation had significantly higher rates of COVID-19 infection incidences than
States with greater smoking restrictions. The State population percentage living in poverty, and access to healthcare were significantly different between both
groups of States. Densely populated USA States with partial bans on tobacco smoking, with elevated percentages of the population living in poverty and with
limited access to healthcare had high incidences of COVID-19 rates during the time period assessed.peer-reviewe
The emergence of ten SARS-CoV-2 variants and airborne PM2.5
Get PDFBackground: The atmospheric pollutant PM2.5 has been implicated in the pathogenesis of COVID-19. Some of the variants of SARS-CoV-2 possess the attributes
of increased transmissibility and immune escape and appear to have been naturally selected to promulgate the pandemic. Variants of SARS-CoV-2 resulted due
to a number of persistent SARS-CoV-2 mutations found in widely disparate and distant regions. This paper examines a possible association between airborne
pollutant PM2.5 and the emergence of ten SARS-CoV-2 variants.Methods: The daily mean levels of PM2.5 of a number of cities, where SARS-CoV-2 variants were detected, were obtained from the World Air Quality Index (WAQI).
The mean daily PM2.5 levels were evaluated just before the occurrence of the first cluster of PM2.5 peaks’ atmospheric concentration, till after the emergence of the
SARS- CoV-2 variants. Where available the daily number of new cases of COVID-19 diagnosed was matched to the PM2.5 levels.Results: There appears to be a common pattern of PM2.5 in most of the regions prior to the emergence of the SARS-CoV-2 variants. An initial cluster of PM2.5 peaks
was noted on average 50 days prior to the emergence of the variants and another group of smaller peaks in PM2.5 were noted just before or contemporaneous with
the emergence of the SARS-CoV-2 variants. In the regions where the quantity of daily new cases was available, a number of significant correlations were obtained
between PM2.5 levels and the number of new cases of SARS-CoV-2 variants.Conclusion: In most regions two clusters of PM2.5 peaks were noted prior to the emergence of SARS-CoV-2 variants. The first cluster of PM2.5 peaks may suggest
that anthropogenic activity was increased possibly reflecting augmented human to human contact. Due to elevated levels of PM2.5, a consequent propagation of
the respiratory ACE-2 receptor (port of viral entry into the cell) ensued. Coronavirus- laden PM2.5 may have induced intra-host mutagenesis in the SARS-CoV-2
genome, contemporaneously diminishing pulmonary immunity. With the second cluster of PM2.5 peaks, this airborne pollutant may have also acted as a viral vector.
The above findings suggest that antecedent peaks in PM2.5 prior to SARS-CoV-2 variants’ emergence not only contributed to transmission, but also impacted the
immediate viral environs which may have led to SARS-CoV-2’s natural selection.peer-reviewe
Variations on the Author
Get PDF“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Get PDFWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Get PDFWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
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