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The article presents abstracts on medical topics which include clinical presentation of constipation in children with cerebral palsy, construct validity of the Infant Motor Profile (IMP) and the association between 2D:4D fetal testosterone marker and multidimensional attention in children with attention-deficit-hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).

The debate over whether the medical profession should accommodate its members' conscientious objections (COs) has raged on in the bioethics literature and on legislative floors for decades. Unfortunately, participants on all sides of the debate fail to distinguish among different types of CO, a failure that obstructs the view of which cases warrant accommodation and why. In this paper, we identify one type of CO that warrants consideration for accommodation, called Nature of Medicine COs (NoMCOs). NoMCOs involve the refusal of physicians to perform actions they reasonably judge to be contrary to the nature of medicine and their professional obligations. We argue that accommodating NoMCOs can be justified based on the profession's need to preserve reformability. Importantly, this previously underdeveloped position evades some of the concerns commonly raised by opponents of CO accommodations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Lists titles of articles related to medicine that will be published in 'Traffic' periodical.

Aims Newly graduated doctors write a large proportion of prescriptions in UK hospitals but recent studies have shown that they frequently make prescribing errors. The prescribing safety assessment (PSA) has been developed as an assessment of competence in relation to prescribing and supervising the use of medicines. This report describes the delivery of the PSA to all UK final-year medical students in 2016 (PSA2016). Methods The PSA is a 2-hour online assessment comprising eight sections which cover various aspects of prescribing defined within the outcomes of undergraduate education identified by the UK General Medical Council. Students sat one of four PSA 'papers', which had been standard-set using a modified Angoff process. Results A total of 7343 final-year medical students in all 31 UK medical schools sat the PSA. The overall pass rate was 95% with the pass rates for the individual papers ranging from 93 to 97%. The PSA was re-sat by 261 students who had failed and 80% of those candidates passed. The internal consistency (Cronbach's alpha) of the four papers ranged from 0.74 to 0.77 (standard error of measurement 4.13-4.24%). There was a statistically significant variation in performance between medical school cohorts (F = 32.6, P < 0.001) and a strongly positive correlation in performance for individual schools between PSA2015 and PSA2016 ( r = 0.79, 95% CI 0.61-0.90; P < 0.01). Conclusions PSA2016 demonstrated the feasibility of delivering a standardized national prescribing assessment online. The vast majority of UK final-year medical students were able to meet a prespecified standard of prescribing competence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the last decade, there have been several publications highlighting the need for consistent terminology in breastfeeding research. Standard terms and definitions are essential for the comparison and interpretation of scientific studies that, in turn, support evidence‐based education, consistency of health care, and breastfeeding policy. Inconsistent advice is commonly reported by mothers to contribute to early weaning. A standard language is the fundamental starting point required for the provision of consistent advice. LactaPedia (www.lactapedia.com) is a comprehensive lactation glossary of over 500 terms and definitions created during the development of LactaMap (www.lactamap.com), an online lactation care support system. This paper describes the development of LactaPedia, a website that is accessible free of charge to anyone with access to the Internet. Multiple methodological frameworks were incorporated in LactaPedia's development in order to meet the needs of a glossary to support both consistent health care and scientific research. The resulting LactaPedia methodology is a six‐stage process that was developed inductively and includes framework to guide vetting and extension of its content using public feedback via discussion forums. The discussion forums support ongoing usability and refinement of the glossary. The development of LactaPedia provides a fundamental first step towards improving breastfeeding outcomes that are currently well below World Health Organisation recommendations globally. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents abstracts of medical studies whose full versions can be found at www.blackwellpublishing.com/dmcn including one regarding the relationship between gross motor capacity and daily-life mobility in children with cerebral palsy (CP), a longitudinal study of participation trajectories in children with and without developmental coordination disorders (DCD), and the impact of early-life androgens on infant brain development.

This paper places 'Islam and bioethics' within the framework of 'religion and science' discourse. It thus may be seen as a complement to the paper by Henk ten Have () with which this thematic section in Zygon: Journal of Religion and Science opens, which places 'Islam and bioethics' in the context of contemporary bioethics. It turns out that in Zygon there have been more submitted articles on Islam and bioethics than on any other Islam-related topic. This may be a consequence of the global nature of the bioethical issues, driven by advancement in science and technology, which allows for conversation across cultural and religious boundaries even when the normative references and argumentative methods are tradition-specific. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A challenge has recently been levelled against the legal and/or moral legitimacy of some advance directives. It has been argued that in certain cases an advance directive carries no weight in a decision on whether to withhold treatment, since the individual in the debilitating state is not the same person as the person who created the advance directive. In the first section of this paper, I examine two formulations of the argument against the moral legitimacy of the advance directives under review. The second section reviews, and criticizes, an objection to such arguments. In the penultimate section, possible models supporting the viability of the advance directives are considered. The final section makes good on an obligation incurred by the title of the paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Provides instructions to authors of the "British Journal of Pharmacology." Classification of the contributions accepted by the journal into full papers, Review Articles and Commentaries; Directions for papers which describe experiments on animals that do not fall clearly within the current laws governing animal experimentation in Great Britain; Ways of submitting the manuscripts.

We examine the bibliometric profile ofTropical Medicine and International Healthusing the subjects of the articles published and the geographical distribution of the authors. The most common subject areas of papers published during 1996–2003 are highlighted, and the most cited papers indicated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Health communication research and guidelines often recommend that medical terminology be avoided when communicating with patients due to their limited understanding of medical terms. However, growing numbers of e ‐ patients use the Internet to equip themselves with specialized biomedical knowledge that is couched in medical terms, which they then share on participatory media, such as online patient forums. Objective: Given possible discrepancies between preconceptions about the kind of language that patients can understand and the terms they may actually know and use, the purpose of this paper was to investigate medical terminology used by patients in online patient forums. Design: Using data from online patient–patient communication where patients communicate with each other without expert moderation or intervention, we coded two data samples from two online patient forums dedicated to thyroid issues. Results: Previous definitions of medical terms (dichotomized into technical and semi ‐ technical) proved too rudimentary to encapsulate the types of medical terms the patients used. Therefore, using an inductive approach, we developed an analytical framework consisting of five categories of medical terms: dictionary ‐ defined medical terms, co ‐ text ‐ defined medical terms, medical initialisms, medication brand names and colloquial technical terms. The patients in our data set used many medical terms from all of these categories. Discussion and conclusions: Our findings suggest the value of a situated, condition ‐ specific approach to health literacy that recognizes the vertical kind of knowledge that patients with chronic diseases may have. We make cautious recommendations for clinical practice, arguing for an adaptive approach to medical terminology use with patients. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Comorbidity is a well-established and documented phenomenon in mental disorders and medicine with heuristic value. The concept of comorbidity remains however poorly defined and lacks a comprehensive and coherent theoretical framework. There is a need to develop coherent methodological strategies in order to promote a fuller understanding of the implications of comorbidity and to exploit its potential value with regard to etiopathogenic and therapeutic issues. This position paper makes recommendations of improved methodological standards and procedures and discusses a range of options that can provide incremental information that is likely to improve therapeutic outcomes. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ABSTRACT The ongoing 'enhancement' debate pits critics of new self-shaping technologies against enthusiasts. One important thread of that debate concerns medicalization, the process whereby 'non-medical' problems become framed as 'medical' problems. In this paper I consider the charge of medicalization, which critics often level at new forms of technological self-shaping, and explain how that charge can illuminate - and obfuscate. Then, more briefly, I examine the charge of pharmacological Calvinism, which enthusiasts, in their support of technological self-shaping, often level at critics. And I suggest how that charge, too, can illuminate and obfuscate. Exploring the broad charge of medicalization and the narrower counter charge of pharmacological Calvinism leads me to conclude that, as satisfying as it can be to level one of those charges at our intellectual opponents, and as tempting as it is to lie down and rest with our favorite insight, we need to gather the energy to have a conversation about the difference between good and bad forms of medicalization. Specifically, I suggest that if we consider the 'medicalization of love,' we can see why critics of and enthusiasts about technological self-shaping should want (and in some cases have already begun) to distinguish between good and bad forms of such medicalization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Evolutionary medicine seeks to understand whether and to what extent aspects of human disease are adaptations for coping with infections or injuries, or the consequence of mismatches between modern and ancestral environments. Ecological immunology by comparison focuses largely on how organisms balance investments in immune defences against other traits (e.g., cognitive and reproductive functions) to maximize fitness. Here we address the potential benefit of merging these two young disciplines by reviewing the biomedical literature involving variation at the human apolipoprotein epsilon (apoE) locus. Allelic variants at this locus are differentially susceptible to certain parasites [e.g. herpes-simplex virus-1 (HSV-1) and Chlamydia pneumoniae], as well as Alzheimer's and coronary artery disease, although susceptibility is impacted by environmental factors such as exercise and diet. ApoE variants also exhibit extensive physiological differences, particularly in immune and cognitive traits. Considered altogether, we suggest that apoe-associated diseases are maladaptive plastic responses to conditions in modern environments, and predict that allelic variation at the apoE locus arose as both a consequence of genetic accommodation of historically adaptive environmental responses and because of the particular susceptibility of lipid transport molecules as infection pathways for certain parasites. The goal of this paper is not to support unequivocally this hypothesis because relevant data remain scarce. We intend instead to provide a framework whereby existing hypotheses, which tend to emphasize faulty signalling via one allele (apoE4), can be evaluated through ecologically-informed experiments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The cost of a future exploitation of a decision support system plays a key role. The paper deals with the problem of feature value acquisition cost for such systems. We present a modification of a cost-sensitive learning method for decision-tree induction with fixed attribute acquisition cost limit. Properties of the concept are established during computer experiments conducted on chosen benchmark databases from the UCI Machine Learning Repository and a real medical decision task. The results of experiments confirm that, for some decision problems, our proposition allows us to obtain a classifier with the same quality as a classifier obtained without cost limit but its exploitation is cheaper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background Hyaluronic acid (HA) preparations are the most commonly used injectable fillers in esthetic medicine. In contrast to other injectable fillers with hyaluronidase, there is a tool available to reduce unwanted depots of this filler. Aims The aim of this paper is to give an overview on the present literature and in addition to give some recommendations for use based on the experience of the authors. Methods The overview is based on a literature search. Results There is some evidence from two smaller clinical trials that hyaluronidase will effectively decrease injected depots of HA. It has further been shown from case series and case reports that this reduction is clinically relevant. There is less evidence that hyaluronidase is also helpful in adverse reactions to HA-based fillers. Conclusions The reports suggest that the treatment is safe. However, adverse reactions to hyaluronidase such as allergic reactions have been reported. Patient should be informed about that before treatment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In ‘Benefit, Disability and the Non-Identity Problem’, Hallvard Lillehammer uses the case of a couple who chose to have deaf children to argue against the view that impartial perspectives can provide an exhaustive account of the rightness and wrongness of particular reproductive choices. His conclusion is that the traditional approach to the non-identity problem leads to erroneous conclusions about the morality of creating disabled children. This paper will show that Lillehammer underestimates the power of impartial perspectives and exaggerates the ethical force of partial perspectives, which in turn commits him to providing weak justifications for the choice made by the couple in his example case. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents several abstracts of papers that were presented at proceedings of the British Pharmalogical Society Clinical Pharmacology Section including one on clinical pharmacists, one on supplementary prescription, and another on endothelial ischaemia-reperfusion injury.

The article discusses the tools and expertise of clinical pharmacology that are relevant to translational medicine. Tools which include pharmacogenomics, new methods, and biomarkers are adapted from the paper "On the Waterfront - The Breadth and Depth of Clinical Pharmacology" published in a 2004 issue of the "British Journal of Clinical Pharmacology".

A number of philosophers have argued that alcoholics should receive lower priority for liver transplantations because they are morally responsible for their medical conditions. In this paper, I argue that this conclusion is false. Moral responsibility should not be used as a criterion for the allocation of medical resources. The reason I advance goes further than the technical problem of assessing moral responsibility. The deeper problem is that using moral responsibility as an allocation criterion undermines the functioning of medicine. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, the effect of superoxide dismutase (SOD) in treating certain types of oral diseases is evaluated with a fuzzy relation composition method and a fuzzy integral method. Evaluation results demonstrate that SOD is effective in treating oral diseases. It is found also that SOD and SOD-containing complex enzyme are proven treatments for certain types of oral diseases. The effects of some applications are compared and discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective The publication of information about the performance of health-care providers is regarded as central to promoting greater accountability and empowering patients to exercise choice. The evidence suggests that the public is not very interested in accessing or using current sources of information. This study aimed to explore the information needs of patients in the context of UK primary care and to develop an information source about general practice services, designed to be usable by and useful to patients. Design An action research study making use of data from formal and informal interviews, focus groups, participant observation and document review. Setting The geographical areas covered by two Primary Care Trusts in the north of England and two Local Health Boards in south Wales. Participants A partnership between 103 members of the public, general practice staff from 19 practices, NHS managers from four Primary Care Organizations and the research team. Results The public would like to know more about the quality and range of general practice services but current sources of information do not meet their needs. The public do not like league tables comparing the performance of practices and only a small number of people want to use comparative information to choose between practices. They seem to be more interested in the context and availability of services and the willingness of practices to improve, than in the practice's absolute or relative performance. They want to be clear about the source of the information so that they can make personal judgements about its veracity. Information is most likely to be useful if it adheres to the basic principles of cognitive science in terms of its structure, content and presentation format. Using these findings, paper and electronic prototype versions of a guide to general practice services have been developed. Conclusions In order to maximize the potential use of performance information by the public it is necessary to move beyond provider-led and professionally constructed approaches to information provision and ensure that the public is actively involved in the development of information sources. Such involvement produces a different kind of information to that currently available to the public. The findings of this study have important implications for policy. Most importantly, it seems that the traditional consumerist model underlying a policy of making comparative performance information available to the public to enable them to exercise choice between primary care providers may not be appropriate. An alternative model of information provision, which recognizes the public's commitment to their practice and is integrated with ‘soft’ sources of knowledge is more likely to engage and be of use to the public. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the past 50 years, there have been considerable changes both in how medical anthropologists view their relationship to topical public health and in how tropical public health professionals view the role of anthropologists. In particular, in recent decades critical currents have emerged from an anthropology of medicine, calling for an examination of biomedicine and its conceptualisation of public health. There are parallel debates in public health about a narrow disease-focused or broader socio-cultural approach to improving population health. Based on a review of the literature and a qualitative study of the views of public health professionals and anthropologists working in tropical public health, the data presented in this paper suggest that public health professionals remain unaware of many of the contributions anthropology could make to tropical public health theory and practice. However, the objectives of a critical social science are not dissimilar to those of the broader concept of public health. We suggest that there are grounds for optimism. For those of us concerned not just with disease but also with inequities in health, the challenge is to work towards a critical tropical public health which draws as much from social science as from biomedicine, in theory and practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nordic ophthalmologists and vision scientists are active in many fields of eye research. This is most evident at the biannual Nordic Congress of Ophthalmology, most recently held in Malmö in June 2004. The authors here review some of the research in vision and ophthalmology presented at this meeting or published recently by Nordic scientists. This paper does not represent a comprehensive review of all Nordic research in the field, but attempts to give an overview of some of the activities underway in eye research in this part of the world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We draw on a systematic review of research on two-way communication between patients and health practitioners about medicines in order to determine the extent to which concordance is, or is not, being put into practice. Six electronic databases were searched using the following categories of search terms: health care professionals, patients/consumers, medicine-taking/prescribing and communication. Articles were also identified from handsearches of journals, article reference lists and the Concordance website. Studies published between 1991 and 2000 were included. Studies were not excluded on the basis of design, methods or language employed. Abstracts of identified articles were assessed by at least two reviewers and the full articles were assessed by one reviewer and checked by at least one other reviewer. Data on the design, analysis and relevant findings were extracted. A total of 11 801 abstracts were reviewed and 470 full articles were retrieved. Of the 134 articles subsequently included, 116 were descriptive studies. All but 10 of the papers were written in English. There were mixed findings about the extent to which patients feel that their beliefs, experience and preferences about medicines can be shared. Doctors tend to dominate discussions in consultations, although patient participation is associated with positive outcomes. Health care professionals’ behaviour can impede as well as enhance patient involvement. There is little research that examines fundamental issues for concordance such as whether an exchange of views takes place. It is possible that interventions are needed to facilitate the development of concordance in practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Capture-mark-recapture (CMR) estimates assume no misidentificafion of individuals captured and are extremely sensitive to identification errors. A large body of published literature has demonstrated that non-invasively derived genetic tags are error-prone, and the potential biases associated with these errors are large. We provided methods to reduce and evaluate these errors. Paetkau (2004, this issue), in his comments concerning our paper, argues that no formal, statistical error testing is necessary and that good laboratory practices are sufficient to remove all error. However, he provides only anecdotal evidence that this is the case. Given the presence of a variety of errors in genetic tags and the potential for large biases associated with these errors, we argue that scientific norms require formal tests to demonstrate tile absence of errors. The primary purpose of our study was to provide such tests in a manner that is not cost-prohibitive. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we study the statistical interpretation of forensic DNA mixtures with related contributors in subdivided populations. Compact general formulae for match probabilities are obtained for two situations: a relative of one tested person is an unknown contributor of a DNA mixture; and two related unknowns are contributors. The effect of kinship and population structure is illustrated using a real case example. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Clinicians and policy makers the world over are embracing evidence-based medicine (EBM). The promise of EBM is to use summaries of research evidence to determine which healthcare interventions are effective and which are not, so that patients may benefit from effective interventions and be protected from useless or harmful ones. EBM provides an ostensibly rational and objective means of deciding whether or not an intervention should be provided on the basis of its effectiveness, in theory leading to fair and effective healthcare for all. In this paper I closely examine these claims from the perspective of healthcare for women, using relevant examples. I argue that the current processes of evidence-based medicine contain a number of biases against women. These biases occur in the production of the research that informs evidence-based medicine, in the methods used to analyse and synthesise the evidence, and in the application of EBM through the use of guidelines. Finally, the biomedical model of health that underpins most of the medical research used by EBM ignores the social and political context which contributes so much to the ill-health of women. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Wilson's disease (WD), an autosomal recessive copper transport disorder, usually presents with symptoms involving the liver or central nervous system. The disease is caused by a large number of mutations in the ATP7B gene comprising 21 expressed exons. Some of the mutations appear to be population specific, whereas others are found in probands from a variety of different ethnic backgrounds. This paper presents the results of screening of the ATPTB gene by means of the direct sequencing of all exons in the gene in 39 Han and one Hui ethnic Chinese patients. Nineteen novel mutations were revealed along with nine others that have been previously described; 57.5% of the mutations were located in exons 8, 13, and 12. In particular, the Arg778Leu mutation in exon 8 was found in 55% of these Chinese patients in at least one allele. Five patients were homozygotes and 17 patients were heterozygotes for Arg778Leu. The detection rate on direct sequencing of the polymerase chain reaction products of all exons of the ATP7B gene in 40 unrelated patients was 83.8% of alleles. Seventeen polymorphisms were also identified in patients and healthy controls. We first reported the presence of ATP7B mutations in Chinese Hui ethnic patients and summarize our results here along with the previously reported findings. A significant correlation between gcnotype and phenotype was not found in 37 homozygotes and 52 heterozygotes for Arg778Leu. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This is the second of two papers which review issues concerning complementary medicines. The first reviewed the extent of use of complementary medicines, and issues related to the regulation and pharmaceutical quality of these products; the second considers evidence for the efficacy of several well-known complementary medicines, and discusses complementary-medicines pharmacovigilance. The term complementary medicines describes a range of pharmaceutical-type preparations, including herbal medicines, homoeopathic remedies, essential oils and dietary supplements, which mainly sit outside conventional medicine. The use of complementary medicines is a popular healthcare approach in the UK, and there are signs that the use of such products is continuing to increase. Patients and the public use complementary medicines for health maintenance, for the treatment or prevention of minor ailments, and also for serious, chronic illnesses. There is a growing body of evidence from randomized controlled trials and systematic reviews to support the efficacy of certain herbal extracts and dietary supplements in particular conditions. However, many other preparations remain untested. Strictly speaking, evidence of efficacy (and safety) for herbal medicines should be considered to be extract specific. Pharmacovigilance for complementary medicines is in its infancy. Data are lacking in several areas relevant to safety. Standard pharmacovigilance tools have additional limitations when applied to investigating safety concerns with complementary medicines. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is proposed that beauty can be external or internal or both. External or physical beauty is immediately visible. Internal or inner beauty is not always immediately visible. Ideally both types of beauty are connected and spring from one another.The opposite situation, in which only one exists while the other is suppressed, is exemplified in this paper, using a tale from 19th century Croatian literature as a model. The main character is Tena. Initially physically beautiful, she is later disfigured by smallpox. Consequently her psyche metamorphoses through illness, distress and destitution, and she discovers an inner self that allows her full personality to develop. The story of Tena illustrates how love based only on outer appearance may end in unhappiness. Perhaps true love depends more on soul than surface.Endless quests for external beauty are part of medical practice today more then ever before. Skin is the paradigm of this. The dermatologist needs many clinical skills, including an understanding of psychology, when addressing skin-related problems– appearance-related problems in particular. Sometimes the humanities (e.g. literature, poetry, etc.), may help broaden our perspective of such a complex phenomenon as beauty. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Facilitating patient choice is an important element in respecting the autonomy of patients. Evidence-based medicine has the potential to contribute to this process by the provision of high quality research-based information, for use by patients and clinicians. In this paper, I analyse the processes of evidence-based medicine in order to identify the ways in which patient choice is affected by decisions made in the development and use of evidence-based guidelines. I argue that despite the potential contribution, the current methods and techniques of guideline production limit rather than facilitate patient choice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

About 50 human chemokines and nearly 20 receptors have been identified and characterized in little more than a decade since the discovery of interleukin 8 (IL-8), the first chemotactic cytokine. Research in this field has dramatically changed our understanding of leucocyte traffic in inflammation and immunity. This paper has been written for scientists and practitioners in the field of medicine. It reviews in concise and intelligible form information that I consider useful for understanding the role of chemokines in human pathophysiology. The main areas covered are: (i) the basics of chemokine structures, mode of action, activities and selectivity; (ii) newer aspects of the broad involvement of chemokines in the regulation of immune defence and the housekeeping of the immune system; (iii) the role of chemokines in pathology as illustrated by animal models and studies of human diseases; and (iv) novel therapeutic approaches for a variety of inflammatory conditions, which are based on modulation of chemokine activity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Presents abstracts of several medical research papers on the heart and brain. `Intracardial haemodynamics disturbance in patients with ardioembolic stroke,' by O. Dubenko; `Impairment of cardiac activity during epileptic seizures: a relation to sudden death in epilepsy?,' by O. Mameli et al; `Clinical and prognostic significance of arrhythmogenesis factors at patients with myocardial infarction, evaluation of possibility of their correction,' by E. Gulaeva et al.

The body is socially constructed; and in this paper we explore the various and ever-changing constructions of the body, and thus of the embodied self, from the Greeks to the present. The one word, body, may therefore signify very different realities and perceptions of reality; and we consider briefly how and why these meanings changed. Plato believed the body was a 'tomb', Paul said it was the 'temple' of the Holy Spirit, the Stoic philosopher Epictetus taught that it was a 'corpse'. Christians believed, and believe, that the body is not only physical, but also spiritual and mystical, and many believed it was an allegory of church, state and family. Some said it was cosmic: one with the planets and the constellations. Descartes wrote that the body is a 'machine', and this definition has underpinned biomedicine to this day; but Sartre said that the body is the self. In sum, the body has no intrinsic meaning. Populations create their own meanings, and thus their own bodies; but how they create, and then change them, and why, reflects the social body. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Professions such as medicine are in the midst of profound change. This paper explores how recent stratifying forces within the medical profession relate to the trend toward salaried employment for physicians. Specifically, growing segments of female, black and Hispanic, and lower and middle class doctors are focused upon in the analysis. Several important structural forces related to managed care and the nature of medical work are discussed and examined as well. The results suggests that it is useful to consider factors internal to professions in explaining large-scale professional change. This does not mean forgetting about the role played by structure in this change. Instead, it supports incorporating stratification perspectives into studies of professionals and of considering micro levels of analysis which acknowledge and investigate the effects of intraprofessional diversity [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For years, economists have debated the extent to which organized medicine has benefited from medical licensing restrictions. This debate has been hampered by the lack of a viable alternative hypothesis. This paper provides an alternative hypothesis and suggests an empirical test which focuses on the relationship between licensure restrictions and the level of consumption of physician services across states. The evidence suggests that in the mid-1960s the interests of organized medicine dominated those of consumers in influencing the medical regulatory supply process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents an index to research papers of the August 1981 issue of the journal Immunology.

The author offers insights on the emergence of electronic medical record systems and its impact on medicine. He notes that this system helps physicians and other medical professionals to connect with colleagues throughout the medical center via a shared medical record. He enjoys using this system. But he also notes that this system will never compare with the aesthetics of the old paper chart.

The article presents instructions for contributing authors to the "European Journal of Neurology." Publication papers in neurology and related areas will be considered in five categories including original papers, short communications and book reviews. The journal prefers to receive all manuscript submissions electronically. All papers will be accepted on the understanding that these will not be published elsewhere.

The article reports that the "European Journal of Neurology" will consider for publication papers in neurology and related areas in the following categories: original papers, short reports, reviews, letters to the editor, book reviews and short reports. The articles should be no more than 1500 words and two tables or figures. Letters to the editor should be no more than 500 words. It is to be noted that the journal will normally only accept case reports if they are submitted as letters to the editor.

In this paper, we present a framework for analysing the complex relationship between disease control programmes and basic health care systems. Many of the ideas and concepts presented in this paper were developed by the staff of the Public Health Department of the Antwerp Institute of Tropical Medicine (ITM) over the last 20 years. They are thus the product of the reflection of an entire team. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Presents an advisory for authors in the publication of papers in neurology and related areas in this field. Submission of manuscripts; Presentation of manuscripts; Manuscript acceptance.

Provides instructions for authors on the publication of papers in neurology and related areas in the "European Journal of Neurology". Categories of publications; Submission of manuscripts; Author material archive policy.

Presents instructions for authors who want to publish their papers in the "European Journal of Neurology." List of categories that are to be published in the journal; Submission of manuscripts; Presentation of manuscripts.

An abstract of the conference paper "Fetal malformations features in the fetal medicine unit of the Federal University of Sao Paulo," by C. D. Lopes, A. P. Panigassi and M. Muccia is presented.

The article presents news briefs related to medicine in the U.S. The new U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) Policy states that NIH-funded researchers should submit an e-version of their research manuscripts to the NIH at the time of their paper's acceptance by a journal. The U.S. Department of Health & Human Services inspector general has issued a report reviewing more than 400 financial conflict of interest reports filed with the NIH.

Eliasson et al. are to be warmly congratulated on the publication of their excellent paper ‘The Manual Ability Classification System (MACS) for children with cerebral palsy: scale development and evidence of validity and reliability’ in this issue of Developmental Medicine and Child Neurology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the research in clinical science by Axel Key, a pioneer in medicine. Key's research covered a wide field from basic to clinical science. Among his many contributions are two seminal publications. One basic paper "Studies on the anatomy of the nervous system and the connective tissue. A foundation was established to support the Journal, and to facilitate the dissemination of research results and the interaction between researchers in the field of medicine. The board of the foundation and the editorial board of the journal have decided to honor Key by establishing a symposium series entitled Key Symposia.

Comments on the success of the "European Journal of Neurology." Reasons the European Federation of Neurological Societies created the journal; Readership; Increase in submission of excellent papers.