bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Opinions, attitudes and practices of Australian neurologists with regard to epilepsy and driving
Authors: Beran R. G. , Ainley L. A. E. , Beran M. E. 
Published: March 2007

AbstractIntroduction: Austroads Guidelines for fitness to drive were promulgated in 2003. Epilepsy was one of the conditions included and this paper reports results of a survey of Australian neurologists regarding opinions and practices relevant to the guidelines.Methods: The survey was developed, piloted and Human Research Ethics Committee approved. Members of the Australian Association of Neurologists received three mailings and results were analysed.Results: Almost 70% of 236 surveyed indicated assessment of epilepsy and driving with <9% not doing so – establishing ∼77% response for eligible neurologists. Most questions achieved 90% response. Almost 90% respondents assessed epilepsy and 70% found the guidelines helpful. Seventy‐seven per cent endorsed doctor assessors although half discounted General Practitioners as insufficiently knowledgeable and half advocated that only neurologists evaluate potential drivers with epilepsy. Most respondents supported reporting recalcitrant patients; yet only <30% did so. Three‐quarters favoured licences carrying a warning to self‐report and two‐thirds felt that product information should identify driving implications. Although many questions attracted expected responses, the surprise was the large undecided numbers, which were greater than expected. Neurologists were more lenient than prescribed by the guidelines with neither consensus for controlled epilepsy nor mandatory driving restrictions.Conclusion: Respondents supplied predictable answers regarding ideal circumstances; yet most did not report recalcitrant patients. Most claimed to adhere to the guidelines and yet advocated more lenient driving restrictions that may allow preventable accidents. There was agreement between neurologists and guidelines for more rigourous restrictions for commercial drivers although again neurologists were more lenient. There is need for prospective research on epilepsy and driving.
Social information and emigration: lessons from immigrants
Authors: Cote J. , Clobert J. 
Published: March 2007

Abstract‘Should I stay or should I go?’ is a fundamental question facing any candidate for emigration, as emigrating without outside information has major costs. Most studies on this topic have concentrated on risk‐reducing strategies (e.g. exploration) developed after leaving the natal habitat. The idea that information might be acquired before leaving has not been investigated. Immigrants carrying information about their origins could provide such information to potential emigrants in their initial habitat. We manipulated the density of common lizard (Lacerta vivipara) populations, to investigate whether immigrants originating from these populations transmitted such information to the population they joined. Emigration of the residents of this new population clearly depended on the origin of the immigrant. Immigrants are therefore a source of information, in this case about surrounding population densities, and may have a major effect on dispersal and species persistence in a fragmented habitat.
The Problem of Optimum Income Taxation: A Remark on Its Monotonicity Constraint
Authors: RUIZ del PORTAL X. 
Published: March 2007

AbstractWe apply a generalized version of Brito and Oakland's (1977) approach to deal with monotonicity constraints in the nonlinear taxation problem of Mirrlees (1971). This allows removing some analytical weaknesses in the derivation of the necessary conditions that characterize the optimal income tax, impossible to handle with the type of variation used for the proof in Mirrlees (1969). The qualitative properties of the tax are thus restored provided the candidate consumption functions are restricted to be twice differentiable, except on countably many points, with no corners near the intervals where they show a strictly concave shape.
A General‐Equilibrium Analysis of Public Policy for Pharmaceutical Prices
Authors: KELTON CHRISTINA M. L. , REBELEIN ROBERT P. 
Published: March 2007

AbstractRetail sales of prescription drugs totaled $154.5 billion in 2001 and will likely exceed $400 billion by 2010. This paper contrasts the welfare and distributional effects of the current patented‐monopoly system with those of (1) a price ceiling on pharmaceutical products and (2) a universal insurance program covering pharmaceutical purchases. We use a version of the Kelton and Wallace (1995) two‐good, general‐equilibrium monopoly model in which a license is required to produce one good. Individuals have heterogeneous preferences, but are otherwise identical. Results indicate potential welfare gains for both the price‐ceiling and universal‐insurance policies, with very distinct distributional effects.
Discontinuous Payoffs, Shared Resources, and Games of Fiscal Competition: Existence of Pure Strategy Nash Equilibrium
Authors: ROTHSTEIN PAUL 
Published: March 2007

AbstractWe define a class of games with discontinuous payoffs that we call shared resource games and establish a pure strategy Nash equilibrium existence theorem for these games. We then apply this result to a canonical game of fiscal competition for mobile capital. Other applications are also discussed. Our result for the mobile capital game holds for any finite number of regions, permits general preferences over private and public goods, and does not assume that production technologies have a particular functional form, or are identical in all regions, or satisfy the Inada condition at zero.
Trade liberalization and institutional reforms1
Authors: Cheptea Angela 
Published: March 2007

AbstractThe accession of Central and Eastern European (CEE) countries to the European Union (EU) is expected to lead to the new member countries becoming more like the older members, including in terms of trade. In this paper, we focus on two factors promoting CEE–EU trade integration: trade liberalization and institutional reforms. Measures of trade liberalization undertaken by both parties during the 1990s were very substantial, but did not always produce the expected upsurge of regional trade flows. Much less progress has been made in improving the functioning of CEE institutions (e.g., progress in the privatization process or in reducing corruption). Countries where most important changes at the institutional level occurred were also those that most increased their trade with the EU. Comparing the impact of these two factors, we find that improving institutions in CEE countries can generate as much trade as the removal of all tariff and non‐tariff barriers. The paper also addresses the issue of the presence of reversed causality between trade and institutions, and the pro‐trade effect of institutional similarity.
Channels of restructuring in privatized Czech companies1
Authors: Fidrmuc Jana P. 
Published: March 2007

AbstractThe main contribution of this paper to the literature on restructuring in the transition economies of Central and Eastern Europe is the analysis of productivity‐growth effects for different channels of restructuring. It examines a panel of 737 voucher‐privatized Czech companies in the first years after the transfer of ownership (between 1993 and 1998). The results indicate that asset sales and employee incentives serve as restructuring channels through which productivity of the privatized companies increases. The analysis also indicates that capital expenditures, labour shedding and CEO replacements are not significantly correlated to productivity growth. Furthermore, the analysis suggests that the availability of bank loans is positively associated with productivity growth, but not for less profitable firms. This provides some evidence in support of soft budget constraints accommodated via bank lending.
The supply of and demand for accounting information
Authors: Goncharov Igor , Zimmermann Jochen 
Published: March 2007

AbstractThe article analyzes the use of accounting information in Russia. We assess reporting behaviour in the lending process for a sample of Russian companies in the years 1999–2004 and postulate that Russian companies manage their earnings in order to avoid showing losses when applying for bank financing. Once a credit has been granted, companies are predicted to manage earnings because of the bank's monitoring activities. By means of univariate and multivariate analysis we are able to attribute the discontinuity around a zero target in the earnings distribution with firms’ response to the banks’ assessment of accounting performance. This implies that financing considerations affect the reporting incentives of Russian companies.
Blood pressure‐lowering efficacy of olmesartan relative to other angiotensin II receptor antagonists: an overview of randomized controlled studies
Authors: Zannad Faiez , Fay Renaud 
Published: March 2007

AbstractThe aim of the present work was to review published studies investigating the dose‐related efficacy on blood pressure (BP) of olmesartan and of other commercially available angiotensin II type I receptor blockers (ARBs). Patient population comprises mild to moderate hypertensive adult patients. We selected studies with comparable design and dose ranges. Dose–effect relationship plots were fitted for diastolic (DBP) and systolic (SBP) BP to the simplified Emax model. We also examined controlled studies of olmesartan vs. other individual ARBs. Our overview was based on 7280 patients, of which 5769 received an ARB and 1511 received placebo. Except for losartan, the data fitted correctly to the Emax model, with correlation coefficients ranging from 0.77 to 0.99. BP‐lowering efficacy defined as Emax was superior with olmesartan, (DBP/SBP mmHg: −9.0/−12.4) when compared with candesartan (−6.7/−11.3), irbesartan (−6.5/−11.2) and valsartan (−6.3/−8.9). Head‐to‐head comparisons of olmesartan to each of the other ARBs used at per‐label ‘recommended doses’, support the finding of a greater BP‐lowering effect of olmesartan. This overview suggests that clinically relevant differences in maximal efficacy, as well as in efficacy of per‐label recommended doses can be evidenced among individual ARBs. Olmesartan efficacy was consistently at the highest end of the range of efficacy of ARBs studied.
Study on the antinociceptive action of Tyr‐K‐MIF‐1, a peptide from the MIF family
Authors: Zamfirova R. , Bocheva A. , Dobrinova Y. , Todorov S. 
Published: March 2007

Summary 1 Tyr‐K‐MIF‐1 is a melanocyte inhibiting factor (MIF) neuropeptide, isolated from the brain. Opposite to other MIFs (Tyr‐MIF‐1, Tyr‐W‐MIF‐1), it has a very low affinity for opiate μ‐receptors, but interacts with Tyr‐MIF‐1 specific binding sites. Tyr‐MIF‐1 and Tyr‐W‐MIF‐1 evoke antinociception mainly by activating opioid receptors. We investigated the possible antinociceptive effect of Tyr‐K‐MIF‐1 and the involvement of histaminergic system in its mechanism of action. 2 Tested on rats by paw‐pressure test, Tyr‐K‐MIF‐1 (0.5, 1 and 2 mg kg−1) was associated with short‐lasting analgesia, which was abolished by naloxone (1 mg kg−1). 3 Injected intraperitoneally (i.p.) 15 min before Tyr‐K‐MIF‐1, antagonists of H1 (diphenhydramine, 100 mg kg−1) or H2 (famotidine, 0.3 and 0.6 mg kg−1) histamine receptors diminished peptide antinociceptive effect. Simultaneous H1‐ and H2 blockade, as well as pretreatment with 5 mg kg−1 dimaprit (H2 agonist) abolished Tyr‐K‐MIF‐1‐induced analgesia. Tyr‐K‐MIF‐1‐induced analgesia was also abolished by treatment with R‐(α)‐methylhistamine (10 mg kg−1, i.p.), an H3 histamine receptor agonist that acts to inhibit histamine release. 4 Our results together with data reported in the literature support the conclusion that activation of the histaminergic system is involved in the mechanism of Tyr‐K‐MIF‐1‐induced antinociception.
When epitaxy controls garnet growth
Authors: SPIESS R. , GROPPO C. , COMPAGNONI R. 
Published: March 2007

AbstractWithin a mica schist from the coesite‐bearing Brossasco‐Isasca Unit (Western Alps), microstructural analysis shows that Alpine garnet grains are aligned with the crenulated foliation. Garnet crystallographic orientation was analysed with electron backscatter diffraction (EBSD): the obtained crystallographic dispersion patterns and distribution patterns of misorientation axes suggest a strong parallelism of {110} garnet planes with a 56°W‐dipping foliation. The data are interpreted as evidence for an epitaxial growth of garnet upon (001) biotite planes, sometime during and/or after dispersion of the biotite/garnet crystals from their initially foliation‐parallel orientation by rotation about the Alpine crenulation axis. This interpretation is based on the comparison of the measured EBSD data with: (i) theoretical dispersion trajectories of garnet crystallographic data, (ii) numerically modelled pole figures, and (iii) numerically modelled misorientation axis distribution patterns. Our data suggest that epitaxial growth of garnet upon biotite is allowed by distortion of the pseudohexagonal basal oxygen ring structure on (001) biotite surfaces, and that distortion is driven by introduction of missing ions. Our data further suggest that the spatial distribution of precursor phases influences the distribution patterns of garnet within mica schists.
Dialysis, cardiovascular disease, and the future
Authors: RITZ Eberhard , DIKOW Ralf , GROSS Marie‐Luise 
Published: March 2007

AbstractAtherosclerosis, particularly coronary atherosclerosis, is accelerated in renal failure, as originally postulated by Belding Scribner. But in contrast to previous opinion, myocardial infarction from coronary heart disease is not the single major cause of cardiac death in dialyzed patients, the most common causes being sudden death and cardiac failure. Apart from coronary heart disease, the following cardiomyopathic features are prevalent and explain a large part of the excess cardiac risk: cardiomyocyte dropout, left ventricular hypertrophy, cardiac interstitial fibrosis, microangiopathy with arteriolar thickening, and capillary deficit as well as reduced ischemia tolerance. Recently, cardiovascular risk factors related to abnormal mineral metabolism, particularly phosphate and vitamin D, have gained unanticipated importance. Controlled evidence has become available concerning intervention with ACE inhibitors, angiotensin receptor blockers, β‐blockers, and statins in dialyzed patients. It is imperative that apart from the “classical” cardiovascular risk factors that do not exhaustively explain the excessive cardiovascular risk in dialyzed patients, novel pathomechanisms are considered and investigated; potential examples include depression, sleep abnormalities, etc. The above arguments do not negate the fact that today's modalities of renal replacement therapy are poor substitutes for the normal kidney's function so that as a result alternative strategies, e.g., daily dialysis, may also dramatically improve cardiovascular risk.
Beyond ultrapure hemodialysis: A necessary and achievable goal
Authors: KJELLSTRAND Carl M. , KJELLSTRAND Per 
Published: March 2007

AbstractSurvival of chronic hemodialysis patients is worse than that of many patients with cancers or severe infections. An important cause of chronic inflammation is impurities infused into patients during dialysis. Definitions of dialysis purity have been narrow and focused on metals in dialysate water and on bacterial contaminants. There is no standard for priming fluids or toxins released directly into blood from inside the extracorporeal circuit. We propose a much broader standard of dialysis purity that also includes phthalate metabolites, bisphenols, spalled particles, and other contaminants from dialysis machines, filters, and bloodlines. Standards must include new methods for measuring bacteriological contaminants in addition to colony‐forming units and endotoxin determinations. These include the sensitive silkworm larva plasma test that detects peptidoglycan that is missed by endotoxin tests and standards for newly detected small molecular bacterial detritus. Current levels for “standard” bacteriological contaminants are woefully inadequate and should be increased. New standards for contamination with plasticizers and spallation are also necessary. Studies with ultrapure dialysis have shown almost immediate patient benefits with increased well‐being and stabilization of the cardiovascular system during and between dialyses. Intermediate effects include lower C‐reactive protein levels, better response to erythropoietin, increased appetite, and improved nutrition. Over the years, amyloidosis and carpal tunnel syndrome have become less common and cardiovascular deaths have decreased. Standards for dialysis purity must be sharpened and expanded and this becomes even more urgent with daily and long nightly hemodialysis. All contaminants received by patients, whether biological, chemical, or physical, must be considered.
Assessment of estradiol and its metabolites in meat
Authors: MAUME D. , DECEUNINCK Y. , POUPONNEAU K. , PARIS A. , LE BIZEC B. , ANDRÉ F. 
Published: March 2007

Most studies related to research on steroids in main edible tissues (muscle, liver or kidney) have focused on measurement of parent or major metabolite residues. In order to evaluate the estradiol content in bovine edible tissues, a multi‐step extraction procedure was developed in conjunction with parallel metabolism studies of [14C]–17β‐estradiol in cattle (1–2). Various classes of free estradiol and conjugates were separated: estradiol −17β and −17β, estradiol‐17‐fatty acid esters, estradiol 17‐glycoside, estradiol 3–glucuronide, estradiol–17‐glycoside and 3‐ glucuronide (diconjugates) were separated. No sulphates conjugated forms have been found at the detection level of the method. The quantification was realized by calibration with deuterated 17β ‐estradiol ‐d3 standard and was validated at the ng kg–1 (ppt) level. Muscle, liver, kidney and fat samples from control or Revalor S® single (licensed implantation) or multi‐implanted steers have been assayed.The results show a wide variation between animals, but both the highest value and the mean of total estradiol content in each group proportionally increase from untreated to multi‐implanted animals. In accordance with international rules, a calculation of the daily food supply of estradiol by such edible tissues in comparison with the acceptable daily intake was performed.
Ultrasound guided dry needling and autologous blood injection for patellar tendinosis
Authors: James Steven L J , Ali Kaline , Pocock Chris , Robertson Claire , Walter Joy , Bell Jonathan , Connell David 
Published: March 2007

Objective:To evaluate the efficacy of ultrasound guided dry needling and autologous blood injection for the treatment of patellar tendinosis.Design:Prospective cohort study.Setting:Hospital/clinic based.Patients:47 knees in 44 patients (40 men, 7 women, mean age 34.5 years, age range 17 to 54 years) with refractory tendinosis underwent sonographic examination of the patellar tendon following referral with a clinical diagnosis of patellar tendinosis (mean symptom duration 12.9 months).Interventions:Ultrasound guided dry needling and injection of autologous blood into the site of patellar tendinosis was performed on two occasions four weeks apart.Main outcome measures:Pre- and post-procedure Victorian Institute of Sport Assessment scores (VISA) were collected to assess patient response to treatment. Follow up ultrasound examination was done in 21 patients (22 knees).Results:Therapeutic intervention led to a significant improvement in VISA score: mean pre-procedure score = 39.8 (range 8 to 72)vmean post procedure score = 74.3 (range 29 to 100), p<0.001; mean follow up 14.8 months (range 6 to 22 months). Patients were able to return to their sporting interests. Follow up sonographic assessment showed a reduction in overall tendon thickness and in the size of the area of tendinosis (hypoechoic/anechoic areas within the proximal patellar tendon). A reduction was identified in interstitial tears within the tendon substance. Neovascularity did not reduce significantly or even increased.Conclusions:Dry needling and autologous blood injection under ultrasound guidance shows promise as a treatment for patients with patellar tendinosis.
Work patterns and fatigue-related risk among junior doctors
Authors: Gander Philippa , Purnell Heather , Garden Alexander , Woodward Alistair 
Published: March 2007

Background:To reduce fatigue-related risk among junior doctors, recent initiatives in Europe and the USA have introduced limits on work hours. However, research in other industries has highlighted that other aspects of work patterns are important in generating fatigue, in addition to total work hours. The Australian Medical Association AMA has proposed a more comprehensive fatigue risk management approach.Objectives:To evaluate the work patterns of New Zealand junior doctors based on the AMA approach, examining relationships between different aspects of work and fatigue-related outcomes.Methods:An anonymous questionnaire mailed to all house officers and registrars dealt with demographics, work patterns, sleepiness, fatigue-related clinical errors, and support for coping with work demands. Each participant was assigned a total fatigue risk score combining 10 aspects of work patterns and sleep in the preceding week.Results:The response rate was 63 1366 questionnaires from doctors working 40 hours a week. On fatigue measures, 30 of participants scored as excessively sleepy Epworth Sleepiness Score >10, 24 reported falling asleep driving home since becoming a doctor, 66 had felt close to falling asleep at the wheel in the past 12 months, and 42 recalled a fatigue-related clinical error in the past 6 months. Night work and schedule instability were independently associated with more fatigue measures than was total hours worked, after controlling for demographic factors, The total risk score was a significant independent risk factor for all fatigue measures, in a dose-dependent manner all p<0.01. Regular access to adequate supervision at work reduced the risk of fatigue on all measures.Conclusions:To reduce fatigue-related risk among junior doctors, account must be taken of factors in addition to total hours of work and duration of rest breaks. The AMA fatigue risk assessment model offers a useful example of a more comprehensive approach.