bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Atrophic dermatofibroma accompanied by aneurysmatic characteristics
Authors: Curcó N , Pagerols X , García M , Tarroch X , Vives P 
Published: January 2006

AbstractA 40‐year‐old man presented a painful haemorrhagic plaque on his chest in the same location where a nodular lesion had been presented for many years. After 2 months, the plaque was replaced by a depressed lesion. The lesion diagnosed as an anetoderma was excised and the biopsy showed an atrophic dermatofibroma accompanied by aneurysmatic characteristics.
Desloratadine 5 mg once daily improves the quality of life of patients with chronic idiopathic urticaria
Authors: Lachapelle JM , Decroix J , Henrijean A , Roquet‐Gravy PP , De Swerdt A , Boonen H , Lecuyer M , Suys E , Speelman G , Vastesaeger N 
Published: January 2006

AbstractBackground  Chronic urticaria is known to debilitate a person's quality of life via sleep disruption, itching lesions, fatigue, social isolation, energy loss and emotional/sexual difficulties. Once‐daily desloratadine significantly improved the signs and symptoms of CIU.Objective  Assess the effect of desloratadine 5 mg once daily on the quality of life of patients suffering of chronic idiopathic urticaria (CIU).Study population  One‐hundred twenty‐one consecutive patients with CIU present for at least 6 weeks prior to inclusion and with a current flare of at least 3 weeks, were included in the study in 24 Belgian centres.Results  The mean dermatology life quality index (DLQI) significantly decreased from baseline to day 7 and further to day 42. Sixty per cent and 77% of patients had a clinically significant change (i.e. a decrease of at least 2 points) at day 7 or day 42, respectively, as compared with that of day 0. Change in pruritus and size of the hives significantly correlated with the change in the score of the quality of life. One‐third of patients experienced complete relief whereas in 1 of 10 patients no effect was experienced.Conclusions  Desloratadine significantly improves the quality of life of patients with chronic idiopathic urticaria as reflected by the dermatology life quality index (DLQI).
Towards a typology of specific language impairment
Authors: Van Weerdenburg Marjolijn , Verhoeven Ludo , Van Balkom Hans 
Published: January 2006

Background: The population of children with specific language impairments (SLI) is heterogeneous. The present study was conducted to examine this heterogeneity more closely, by identifying and describing subgroups within the population of children with SLI in the Netherlands.Method: A broad battery of language tests and language‐related cognitive tests were administered to 147 six‐year‐old and 136 eight‐year‐old children with SLI.Results: Factor analyses revealed 4 factors indicating 4 distinctive linguistic domains for both age samples: 1) lexical‐semantic abilities, 2) auditory conceptualization, 3) verbal sequential memory and 4) speech production. These empirical findings were further validated by the positive correlations found between the language factors and the judgments of teachers and speech therapists. Finally, a cluster analysis revealed 4 distinct clusters of SLI children for each sample with specific language profiles based on the 4 factors. Results were nearly the same for both age samples.Conclusions: The language problems that emerged from the two samples of children with SLI could be described as falling into four types. Based on these language types, four subgroups of children with SLI could be distinguished, each with a specific profile. Some subgroups had severe problems on one specific type of language problem; others had severe problems in more than one type of language problem when compared to the other subgroups of the same age sample. The different profiles may indicate that a more dynamic approach is needed in intervention, considering the presence of both compensating and restricting factors within each child with SLI.
Practitioner Review: Use of antiepileptic drugs in children
Authors: Guerrini Renzo , Parmeggiani Lucio 
Published: January 2006

Background: The aim in treating epilepsy is to minimise or control seizures with full respect of quality‐of‐life issues, especially of cognitive functions. Optimal treatment first demands a correct recognition of the major type of seizures, followed by a correct diagnosis of the type of epilepsy or of the specific syndrome.Methods: Review of data from literature and personal clinical experience in treating children with epilepsy.Results: After summarising the general aspects on the diagnosis and treatment of the main forms of childhood epilepsy, we review key issues about management of seizure disorders, including when to start treatment, how to proceed when the first treatment fails, and how to set the targets of treatment. A special section is devoted to the new concept of epileptic encephalopathy and to the influence of ‘interictal’ EEG abnormalities on cognition, behaviour, and motor abilities in children, providing some suggestions on why and how to treat these conditions. A second section approaches the choice of treatment according to the specific syndromes including infantile spasms, focal epilepsies, syndromes with typical absence seizures, the myoclonic epilepsies and the Lennox–Gastaut syndrome.Conclusions: Antiepileptic drugs (AEDs) can efficiently control seizures in most children. However, the specificity of AEDs is relatively limited, although continuing research is leading to a better understanding of the relationship between pathogenesis and the mechanism(s) and site(s) of drug action.
A randomised controlled trial to determine the effectiveness of an early psychological intervention with children involved in road traffic accidents
Authors: Stallard Paul , Velleman Richard , Salter Emma , Howse Imogen , Yule William , Taylor Gordon 
Published: January 2006

Objective:  To determine whether an early intervention using a psychological debriefing format is effective in preventing psychological distress in child road traffic accident survivors.Design:  Randomised controlled trial.Setting:  Accident and Emergency Department, Royal United Hospital, Bath.Subjects:  158 children aged 7–18. Follow‐up assessment completed eight months post accident with 132 (70/82 of the experimental group and 62/76 in the control group).Main outcome measures:  Self‐completed measures of psychological distress; fulfilment of diagnostic criteria for post‐traumatic stress disorder.Results:  Children in both groups demonstrated considerable improvements at follow‐up. The early intervention did not result in any additional significant gains.Conclusions:  Although children in this study made significant improvements it is unclear whether these are better or worse than natural recovery rates. The specific intervention did not result in additional gains although the structured assessment provided for both groups may have been helpful in reducing subsequent pathology.
Autistic features in a total population of 7–9‐year‐old children assessed by the ASSQ (Autism Spectrum Screening Questionnaire)
Authors: Posserud Maj‐Britt , Lundervold Astri J. , Gillberg Christopher 
Published: January 2006

Background:  The prevalence of autism is reported to be on the rise worldwide. Change of diagnostic criteria and a broadening of the concept of autism have been mentioned as contributing factors. Further studies of general populations are needed. The present study assessed the distribution of autistic features in a total population of children 7–9 years of age, and explored the impact of age, gender, informant, and participation bias on symptom report.Methods:  Teacher and parent forms of the Autism Spectrum Screening Questionnaire (ASSQ) were used in the ‘Bergen Child Study’, a total population study of 9430 children aged 7–9 years. Completed teacher forms were returned for 97% and parent forms for 71% of the children. High‐scorers were defined according to the ASSQ validation study by Ehlers, Gillberg, and Wing (1999).Results:  The distribution of ASSQ scores was found to be almost continuous. Of the children with both a teacher and a parent form, 2.1% were defined as high‐scorers. Children without parent informed consent (i.e., anonymous children) obtained significantly higher teacher scores than those who had questionnaires completed by both parent and teacher. Adjusting prevalence for the anonymous children, the prevalence of high‐scorers was 2.7% of the total population. Age did not affect symptom scores. Boys scored higher and parents reported more symptoms, particularly in girls. Agreement between informants was low to moderate.Conclusions:  Autism symptoms are not uncommon in the general population of children. Our findings are consistent with the concept of autism as a spectrum. Non‐responders had a higher load of autism symptoms than identified children, indicating that reports on the prevalence of autism in a responder group underestimate true prevalence. Large differences across informants suggested the need to gather information both from families and from schools when screening for autism spectrum disorders.
Phonology and handedness in primary school: predictions of the right shift theory
Authors: Smythe Pamela , Annett Marian 
Published: January 2006

Background:  The right shift (RS) theory of handedness suggests that poor phonology may occur in the general population as a risk associated with absence of an agent of left cerebral speech, the hypothesised RS + gene. The theory predicts that poor phonology is associated with reduced bias to right‐handedness.Methods:  A representative cohort of primary school children was assessed on tests of phonology, nonverbal ability, literacy, and handedness. There were three types of analysis; for discrete variables, poor phonology and left hand preference; for continuous variables, phonology factor scores and hand skill; for ‘cases’ of specifically poor phonology.Results:  Reduced bias to dextrality was found in those with poor phonology for all types of analysis. Trends were similar for both sexes but stronger in males than females. Poor phonology was associated with a raised proportion of left‐handed brothers. There was a strong association between poor phonology and poor literacy, but not all those with specifically poor phonology were poor readers or spellers. Among children with poor phonology but not poor for other variables, some 23–31% were left‐handed writers.Conclusions:  Poor phonological processing is associated with reduced bias to the right hand, consistent with absence of an agent of left hemisphere advantage.
Children's subjective emotional reactivity to affective pictures: gender differences and their antisocial correlates in an unselected sample of 7–11‐year‐olds
Authors: Sharp Carla , Van Goozen Stephanie , Goodyer Ian 
Published: January 2006

Background:  Differential responses in terms of gender and antisocial behaviour in emotional reactivity to affective pictures using the International Affective Picture System (IAPS) have been demonstrated in adult and adolescent samples. Moreover, a quadratic relationship between the arousal (intensity) and valence (degree of unpleasantness) has been suggested. The picture perception methodology has rarely been applied to middle school‐aged children. We examined the subjective ratings of emotional reactivity in children for: i) the relationship between arousal and valence, ii) gender differences, and iii) its association with measures of antisocial behaviour.Method:  Twenty‐seven IAPS pictures were selected to cover a wide range of affective content and were individually administered to a non‐referred community sample of 659 7–11‐year‐old children using a paper‐and‐pencil version. Concurrent symptoms of conduct disorder, oppositional defiance and psychopathy were collected from multiple sources (teacher‐, parent‐ and self‐report).Results:  A quadratic relationship between arousal and valence, similar to that previously reported in adults, was demonstrated. A gender difference was found for valence ratings, with girls rating aversive pictures more unpleasant than boys. No gender differences for arousal ratings were found. A significant difference was found between groups scoring above and below cut‐off scores on measures of antisocial behaviour. Children above cut‐off reported lower arousal to unpleasant pictures, but higher arousal to pleasant pictures.Conclusions:  We confirmed that a paper‐and‐pencil version of the IAPS for evaluating emotion response to affectively valent and arousing stimuli can be used in school settings and that comparable gender differences in emotional reactivity can be found in children. The differential emotional reactivity of children above cut‐off on measures of antisocial behaviour suggested these symptoms to be associated with a combination of increased reward and decreased punishment sensitivity.
The Obsessive Compulsive Scale of the Child Behavior Checklist predicts obsessive‐compulsive disorder: a receiver operating characteristic curve analysis
Authors: Hudziak James J. , Althoff Robert R. , Stanger Catherine , van Beijsterveldt C.E.M. , Nelson Elliot C. , Hanna Gregory L. , Boomsma Dorret I. , Todd Richard D. 
Published: January 2006

Background:  The purpose of this study was to determine a score on the Obsessive Compulsive Scale (OCS) from the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL) to screen for obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) in children and to rigorously test the specificity and sensitivity of a single cutpoint.Methods:  A receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis was applied to data from 61 patients with clinically determined OCD, 64 clinical controls and 73 general population controls to determine the best sum score on the CBCL‐OCS to predict confirmed OCD in children. Using the ROC‐determined cutoff, this score was applied to a national sample of CBCL data from 2460 singleton children ages 4–18 and to 20,016 children ages 7–18 from three large general population twin samples to determine the estimated prevalence in the general population.Results:  Using a CBCL‐OCS score of 5 demonstrated an area under the curve (AUC) of .88 with high sensitivity (92%) and moderate specificity (67%) compared to clinical controls. Compared to the general population controls, the AUC was .96 with high sensitivity (92%) and specificity (89%). In the twin samples, the number of participants with CBCL‐OCS scores above this cutpoint was 2.3–7.1%.Conclusions:  These findings suggest that the OCS of the CBCL may provide a highly effective way to screen for childhood OCD, and that the prevalence of childhood OCD may have been underestimated, thus prompting the need for further research into screening children for this condition.
Newcomers' learning of midwifery practice in a labour ward: a socio‐cultural perspective
Authors: Blåka Gunnhild 
Published: January 2006

AbstractThis article presents a qualitative case study of midwifery students’ learning processes in a Norwegian maternity ward. Midwifery students in their first year of midwifery education were interviewed with regard to their experiences of learning in this context. Both students and their preceptors were observed in different settings on the ward. Taking this community of practice as the privileged locus for learning practical knowledge, the study set out to understand students’ learning processes in this context, and how skilled midwifery was being learned. Three overarching themes emerged: acceptance into the community of practice; engagement in supportive dialogue with a preceptor; and being in different places at the right time. The study provides midwifery educators with some insight into midwifery students’ learning through participation in real‐life situations and performing midwifery actions within formal and informal learning relationships on the ward.
Investment and Financing Constraints: Evidence from the Funding of Corporate Pension Plans
Authors: RAUH JOSHUA D. 
Published: January 2006

ABSTRACTI exploit sharply nonlinear funding rules for defined benefit pension plans in order to identify the dependence of corporate investment on internal financial resources in a large sample. Capital expenditures decline with mandatory contributions to DB pension plans, even when controlling for correlations between the pension funding status itself and the firm's unobserved investment opportunities. The effect is particularly evident among firms that face financing constraints based on observable variables such as credit ratings. Investment also displays strong negative correlations with the part of mandatory contributions resulting solely from unexpected asset market movements.
Favoritism in Mutual Fund Families? Evidence on Strategic Cross‐Fund Subsidization
Authors: GASPAR JOSÉ‐MIGUEL , MASSA MASSIMO , MATOS PEDRO 
Published: January 2006

ABSTRACTWe investigate whether mutual fund families strategically transfer performance across member funds to favor those more likely to increase overall family profits. We find that “high family value” funds (i.e., high fees or high past performers) overperform at the expense of “low value” funds. Such a performance gap is above the one existing between similar funds not affiliated with the same family. Better allocations of underpriced initial public offering deals and opposite trades across member funds partly explain why high value funds overperform. Our findings highlight how the family organization prevalent in the mutual fund industry generates distortions in delegated asset management.
The Limits of Investor Behavior
Authors: LOEWENSTEIN MARK , WILLARD GREGORY A. 
Published: January 2006

ABSTRACTMany models use noise trader risk and corresponding violations of the Law of One Price to explain pricing anomalies, but include a storage technology in perfectly elastic supply or unlimited asset liability. Storage allows aggregate consumption risk to differ from exogenous fundamental risk, but using aggregate consumption as a factor for asset returns can make noise trader risk superfluous. Using (i) limited asset liability and limited storage withdrawals, or (ii) an endogenous locally riskless interest rate eliminates violations of the Law of One Price. Our main results use only budget equations and market clearing, and require virtually no assumptions about behavior.
Competing for Securities Underwriting Mandates: Banking Relationships and Analyst Recommendations
Authors: LJUNGQVIST ALEXANDER , MARSTON FELICIA , WILHELM WILLIAM J. 
Published: January 2006

ABSTRACTWe investigate whether analyst behavior influenced banks' likelihood of winning underwriting mandates for a sample of 16,625 U.S. debt and equity offerings in 1993–2002. We control for the strength of the issuer's investment banking relationships with potential competitors for the mandate, prior lending relationships, and the endogeneity of analyst behavior and the bank's decision to provide analyst coverage. Although analyst behavior was influenced by economic incentives, we find no evidence that aggressive analyst behavior increased their bank's probability of winning an underwriting mandate. The main determinant of the lead‐bank choice is the strength of prior underwriting and lending relationships.
Unspanned Stochastic Volatility: Evidence from Hedging Interest Rate Derivatives
Authors: LI HAITAO , ZHAO FENG 
Published: January 2006

ABSTRACTMost existing dynamic term structure models assume that interest rate derivatives are redundant securities and can be perfectly hedged using solely bonds. We find that the quadratic term structure models have serious difficulties in hedging caps and cap straddles, even though they capture bond yields well. Furthermore, at‐the‐money straddle hedging errors are highly correlated with cap‐implied volatilities and can explain a large fraction of hedging errors of all caps and straddles across moneyness and maturities. Our results strongly suggest the existence of systematic unspanned factors related to stochastic volatility in interest rate derivatives markets.
An Outwardly Rectifying Chloride Channel in Human Atrial Cardiomyocytes
Authors: DEMION MARIE , GUINAMARD ROMAIN , EL CHEMALY ANTOUN , RAHMATI MOHAMMAD , BOIS PATRICK 
Published: January 2006

Introduction: Among a range of chloride channels, outwardly rectifying Cl− channels have been reported in the heart of various species. Although the anionic current carried by this channel has been subjected to intense electrophysiological investigations, paradoxically no examination of single‐channel currents has been reported for human cardiomyocytes. Methods and Results: Using the cell‐attached and cell‐free configurations of the patch‐clamp technique, we have characterized the properties of an outwardly rectifying chloride current (ORCC) at the unitary level in freshly isolated human atrial cardiomyocytes. In excised inside‐out patches, the channel presented a nonlinear I/V relationship with a conductance of 76.5 ± 14.7 pS in the positive voltage range and 8.1 ± 2 pS in the negative voltage range, indicating an outward rectification. Preincubation with the protein kinase C activator phorbol 12‐myristate 13‐acetate (PMA) significantly increased the number of spontaneously active channels observed. The channel was Cl− selective (Cl− to Na+ permeability ratio, PCl/PNa= 18) with the permeability sequence I− > Br− > Cl− > F− > gluconate. It was blocked by the classical Cl− channels blockers glibenclamide, NPPB, SITS, and DIDS. Channel activity was not dependent upon internal calcium concentration. In the cell‐attached configuration, ORCC channel activation was observed under perfusion of a hypotonic solution. Conclusion: Human atrial myocytes express an outwardly rectifying Cl− channel that is sensitive to PKC activation. This channel shares biophysical and pharmacological properties with the swelling‐activated chloride current implicated in cardiac pathologies such as myocardial ischemia and dilated cardiopathies.
The functional (−1171 5A→6A) polymorphisms of matrix metalloproteinase 3 gene as a risk factor for oral submucous fibrosis among male areca users
Authors: Tu H.‐F. , Liu C.‐J. , Chang C.‐S. , Lui M.‐T. , Kao S.‐Y. , Chang C.‐P. , Liu T.‐Y. 
Published: January 2006

Background:  Insertion/deletion (−1171 5A→6A) polymorphisms in the promoter region of matrix metalloproteinase 3 (MMP3) gene result in different transcriptional activities. MMP3 is able to degrade collagens types II, V, IX, and X, and other extracellular matrix. The functional promoter polymorphism of MMP3 has been related to the susceptibility in some inflammatory diseases and metastasis of cancers.Methods:  Oral submucous fibrosis (OSF) and oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) are prevalent among Asian areca users. In this study, genomic DNA obtained from the blood of OSCC (n = 150), OSF (n = 71), and control non‐diseased areca user (n = 98) in male were subjected to polymerase chain reaction (PCR)‐based genotyping of MMP3.Results:  The 5A genotype in MMP3 promoter was observed more frequently in OSF group than in control group (P = 0.01). No significant difference was noted between OSCC and control groups on the 5A genotype frequency (P = 0.18). No association was found between 5A genotype in MMP3 promoter and site or lymph node metastasis and stage of OSCC.Conclusion:  The results indicated that the 5A genotype of MMP3 promoter was associated with the risk of OSF but not OSCC.