93 research outputs found
Delusional Infestation:Perspectives from Scottish Dermatologists and a 10-year Case Series from a Single Centre
Perceptions of the clinical management of delusional infestation (DI) were compared with clinical outcomes in this 10-year case series from a single centre in Dundee, UK. An online questionnaire (survey-monkey, a TM brand of online survey available for free for basic use) was sent to Scottish Dermatologists to gauge their opinions and confidence in the management of DI. Also, a retrospective review of medical case notes of patients seen by dermatologists in one institution was undertaken and clinical outcomes were reported by patients’ general practitioners (GP). The survey showed that 61% of responding dermatologists encountered 1–5 cases of DI per year. Twenty-four percent respondees were ‘confident’ in managing patients with DI, 54% were ‘somewhat confident’. Forty-seven patients (62% female, 70% single) were seen over the 10 years; 43% brought a self-collected specimen to clinic, 68% of patients had a psychiatric comorbidity, 23% of patients had primary DI and 11/47 (23%) were seen by a psychiatrist. Clinical outcomes as rated by patients’ GPs were reasonable or good in 2/3 patients. A poor outcome was seen in 12 patients and associated with chronic pain in 50% (p< 0.01) and psychiatric comorbidity in 100% (p < 0.01). We conclude that good outcomes can be achieved in some patients with DI without psychiatric input and without psychoactive treatment
Q-ball Formation in Affleck-Dine Baryogenesis with Gravity-mediated SUSY Breaking
To date, the properties of Q-balls arising from an Affleck-Dine condensate in
gravity-mediated SUSY breaking have been obtained primarily through numerical
simulations. In this work, we will derive the expected charge of the Q-balls
formed in such a scenario through an analytical treatment. We will also examine
the numerically observed difference between Q-ball formation in weakly charged
condensates and formation in strongly charged condensates.Comment: 19 pages, 1 figure. Uses elsart.cl
Decay of Affleck-Dine Condensates with Application to Q-balls
Analytical and numerical estimates show that a charged Affleck-Dine
condensate will fracture into Q-balls only when the Hubble time is
significantly larger than the inverse soft-breaking mass of the field in
question. This would generally imply that the decay of the field into light
fermions will compete with Q-ball formation. We will show that for typical flat
directions the large field value will significantly suppress decays of the
condensate to fermions even if no baryon charge asymmetry exists. We will
consider the details of the decay process for a condensate that does carry
charge, and show that it is qualitatively different from that of an uncharged
condensate. Finally, we will consider the possibility of resonant production of
heavy bosons. We will show that this can have a strong effect on the
condensate. Contrary to intuition, however, our results indicate that boson
production would actually assist Q-ball formation in condensates with
significant charge.Comment: 9 pages, 1 figure. Uses elsart.cl
Universal low-temperature crossover in two-channel Kondo models
An exact expression is derived for the electron Green function in two-channel
Kondo models with one and two impurities, describing the crossover from
non-Fermi liquid (NFL) behavior at intermediate temperatures to standard Fermi
liquid (FL) physics at low temperatures. Symmetry-breaking perturbations
generically present in experiment ensure the standard low-energy FL
description, but the full crossover is wholly characteristic of the unstable
NFL state. Distinctive conductance lineshapes in quantum dot devices should
result. We exploit a connection between this crossover and one occurring in a
classical boundary Ising model to calculate real-space electron densities at
finite temperature. The single universal finite-temperature Green function is
then extracted by inverting the integral transformation relating these Friedel
oscillations to the t matrix. Excellent agreement is demonstrated between exact
results and full numerical renormalization group calculations.Comment: 26 pages, 14 figures: updated version including new a section and
figure comparing exact results to finite-temperature numerical
renormalization group calculation
Exploring Patients' Insight, Concerns, and Expectations at Dermatology Clinic:An Observational Study in 2 Centers in Scotland and Spain
Background:
Effective doctor–patient communication is of great importance in order to optimize medical consultation outcomes. However, it can be difficult to address all patients’ concerns and expectations in clinic.
Objective:
To identify how much patients know about their medical condition, their fears and concerns, and their expectations, as well as evaluate the benefits of using a preconsultation questionnaire routinely.
Methods:
This study included consecutive patients attending dermatology outpatients from Dundee (Scotland) and Granada (Spain) who completed a simple preconsultation 3-part questionnaire. Answers to this questionnaire were discussed during clinic visits.
Results:
Two hundred patients participated in the study. Of all, 111 (55.5%) patients already knew their diagnosis or were able to describe their symptoms and/or feelings quite accurately at their visit to Dermatology. Most patients (85%) had fears regarding their dermatological problem. A majority of patients (97%) came to clinic with specific expectations, and many (41.5%) had multiple expectations. A high proportion of patients (74%) found the questionnaire useful.
Conclusion:
Patients attend clinic with different levels of knowledge, fears, and expectations. We recommend using a brief and easy to use preconsultation questionnaire as a cost-effective way of enhancing doctor–patient communication
Critical Theories of the Dissipative Hofstadter Model
It has recently been shown that the dissipative Hofstadter model (dissipative
quantum mechanics of an electron subject to uniform magnetic field and periodic
potential in two dimensions) exhibits critical behavior on a network of lines
in the dissipation/magnetic field plane. Apart from their obvious condensed
matter interest, the corresponding critical theories represent non-trivial
solutions of open string field theory, and a detailed account of their
properties would be interesting from several points of view. A subject of
particular interest is the dependence of physical quantities on the magnetic
field since it, much like , serves only to give relative
phases to different sectors of the partition sum. In this paper we report the
results of an initial investigation of the free energy, -point functions and
boundary state of this type of critical theory. Although our primary goal is
the study of the magnetic field dependence of these quantities, we will present
some new results which bear on the zero magnetic field case as well.Comment: 42 pages (25 reduced
Entropy in Black Hole Pair Production
Pair production of Reissner-Nordstrom black holes in a magnetic field can be
described by a euclidean instanton. It is shown that the instanton amplitude
contains an explicit factor of , where is the area of the event
horizon. This is consistent with the hypothesis that measures the
number of black hole states.Comment: 24 pages (harvmac l mode
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