Health services in the USSR

As Malta's participant at the recent World Health Organization Advanced Course in Health Planning held in the Soviet Union, the author had the opportunity of observing certain characteristic features of the Soviet public health system. Health services in the U.S.S.R. are organized to meet the requirements of a specific social system and philosophy, and are designed to provide comprehensive medical care for the whole population through the integration of curative and preventive services at all levels of administration. The basic principles of public health services in the U.S.S.R are highlighted. A number of top Soviet establishments have been visited, such as the Semashko Scientific Research Institute of Social Hygiene and Public Health Organization, the Institute of Clinical and Experimental Surgery, the Central Institute of Traumatology and Orthopedics, the Gamaleya Institute of Epidemiology and Microbiology, Institute of Oncology, and various hospitals and polyclinics.peer-reviewe

Accurate aeroacoustic measurements in closed-section hard-walled wind tunnels

Noise emissions from aircraft are of major concern to aircraft manufacturers. There are various analytical, empirical and numerical tools to help in the design of quieter aircraft, however aeroacoustic measurements in wind tunnels are still required. There is a growing interest in simultaneous aerodynamic and aeroacoustic measurements in hard-walled closed-section wind tunnels. The research hypothesis of this work is whether accurate aeroacoustic measurements are possible in this type of wind tunnel. Two issues are of particular concern: the reverberation sound field and high background noise levels. De-reverberation, based on an Image Source Model (ISM), is proposed to tackle the first issue by incorporating the reflections in the focused beamformer. This technique is computationally fast and easy to implement. Source Power Integration and deconvolution techniques are shown to be still valid in de-reverberation. Measurements in a closed section wind tunnel have shown that an ISM gives a better estimate of the Green's functions, when compared to free-space Green's functions. Furthermore de-reverberation yielded more accurate source strength estimates from the beamformer. Qualitatively, de-convolved results were no different than when using free-space Green's functions. Simulations have shown that the ISM can become unstable at high frequencies if position errors are present. It is therefore recommended to limit the application of the ISM to frequencies below 10 kHz. At low frequencies the accuracy of beamforming levels is highly dependent on the level of noise contamination of the input data. Removing the diagonal of the cross spectral matrix might not be sufficient to eliminate this noise

Clinical and financial consequences of setting up an asthma clinic at St. Luke’s Hospital

The effects of setting up an asthma clinic were assessed in an audit study. A comparison was made between the quality and quantity of medication used by patients before and after attending the asthma clinic. The number and severity of exacerbations during a six month period before and a six month period after attending were also assessed. The cost of treatment before and after was also calculated. In 14% of patients, occupational factors, drugs or underlying lung disease were significant contributors to asthma. The number of acute episodes of severe asthma were reduced from 98 to 47, with hospital admissions falling from 26 to 1. Pulmonary function (%FEV1) improved in the group as a whole with the number of patients having their best FEV above 80% improving from 44 to 71. In spite of the expense of high cost drugs and the running costs of the clinic there were substantial savings largely from the reduced number of hospital admissions. The calculated annual cost fell from Lm 22,769 to Lm 10,654.peer-reviewe

Targeting chemokines : new drugs for old diseases

Chemokine receptor antagonists are set to become novel important pharmacological tools within the current therapeutic repertoire available for the management of various inflammatory conditions.peer-reviewe

Deep MERLIN 5GHz Radio Imaging of Supernova Remnants in the M82 Starburst

The results of an extremely deep, 8-day long observation of the central kpc of the nearby starburst galaxy M82 using MERLIN (Multi-Element Radio Linked Interferometer Network) at 5 GHz are presented. The 17E-06 Jy/beam, rms noise level in the naturally weighted image make it the most sensitive high resolution radio image of M82 made to date. Over 50 discrete sources are detected, the majority of which are supernova remnants, but with 13 identified as HII regions. Sizes, flux densities and radio brightnesses are given for all of the detected sources, which are all well resolved with a majority showing shell or partial shell structures. Those sources within the sample which are supernova remnants have diameters ranging from 0.3 to 6.7 pc, with a mean size of 2.9 pc. From a comparison with previous MERLIN 5 GHz observations made in July 1992, which gives a 9.75 year timeline, it has been possible to measure the expansion velocities of ten of the more compact sources, eight of which have not been measured before. These derived expansion velocities range between 2200 and 10500 km/s.Comment: 34 pages, 10 figures. Accepted by MNRA

Pulmonary moniliasis caused by candida tropicalis

This article examines a rare condition, namely Pulmonary moniliasis caused by candida tropicalis. A description of candida species and where it can be located in parts of the body is provided. This condition is illustrated by a case report of a 29 year old man who complained of repetitive cough and low grade fever. He was given various medications including sulphamethoxypyridazine, streptomycin and ampicillin with no results. When the sputum was examined specifically for fungi and a copious growth of Candida tropicalis was isolated, the patient was treated with nystatin inhalations. At this stage that a remarkale improvement occurred. Expectoration diminished, a chest X-Ray showed marked reduction and clearing of the radiological opacities, and no fungi have been found in the sputum since the start of the nystatin therapy. Indeed, nystatin aerosol therapy proved to be successful.peer-reviewe

Volatile aldehydes in libraries and archives

Volatile aldehydes are produced during degradation of paper-based materials. This may result in their accumulation in archival and library repositories. However, no systematic study has been performed so far. In the frame of this study, passive sampling was carried out at ten locations in four libraries and archives. Despite the very variable sampling locations, no major differences were found, although air-filtered repositories were found to have lower concentrations while a non-ventilated newspaper repository exhibited the highest concentrations of volatile aldehydes (formaldehyde, acetaldehyde, furfural and hexanal). Five employees in one institution were also provided with personal passive samplers to investigate employees’ exposure to volatile aldehydes. All values were lower than the presently valid exposure limits. The concentration of volatile aldehydes, acetic acid, and volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in general was also compared with that of outdoor-generated pollutants. It was evident that inside the repository and particularly inside archival boxes, the concentration of VOCs and acetic acid was much higher than the concentration of outdoor-generated pollutants, which are otherwise more routinely studied in connection with heritage materials. This indicates that further work on the pro-degradative effect of VOCs on heritage materials is necessary and that monitoring of VOCs in heritage institutions should become more widespread

Determination of serum zinc levels in normal Maltese adults by atomic absorption spectrophotometry

The importance of zinc as one of the essential trace elements in the living organisms is becoming increasingly recognised. In the process of carrying out measurements to establish normal reference values for our laboratory, it was noticed that the values being obtained, generally appeared to be higher than those published in the literature where similar techniques had been employed. It is important to gain further understanding of this metal in both health and disease as it appears that zinc is essential to an important variety of metabolic processes in man. We are unable to offer a satisfactory explanation for the difference in serum zinc levels in the two groups reported in this paper. Local water does not appear to have high zinc content and Maltese soil is known to be zinc deficient. It is known however that local farmers use a zinc containing fungicide (Zineb) on a large scale.peer-reviewe

Lifetime of colour photographs in mixed archival collections

Chromogenic prints, which make up around 99% of all colour photographs, are amongst the most vulnerable materials in archival storage. However, although environmental standards for storage are available, antagonistic requirements within archives mean that the recommended conditions are not always appropriate. This study evaluated the impact of mixed archival storage on chromogenic prints by following three lines of research: environmental, material and values. During storage, three environmental parameters predominantly influence chromogenic print lifetime: temperature, relative humidity (RH) and pollutants. The pollutant of greatest interest was determined to be acetic acid as it is the most abundant pollutant within archival boxes and also causes greatest changes in dye concentrations. Materials research focussed on the development of two non-destructive analytical methods. The first used the sRGB colour model for monitoring dye concentrations. The second combined near infrared spectroscopy to develop applications for dating and stability prediction of chromogenic prints. The third line of research related to values, specifically fitness-for-purpose of an image within the context of an archival collection. A psychophysical approach was taken to determine the point at which colour changes are no longer acceptable, defined as the unacceptability threshold. It was identified that while assessor characteristics did not affect the threshold, image characteristics, particularly fading profile and image detail, did. Having investigated the three lines of research separately, their integration led to a more holistic approach. Accelerated degradation experiments were planned using design-of-experiment principles to develop a multiparametric dose-response function. The function relates the rate of degradation to temperature, RH and acetic acid concentration. This allowed for isoperms and isochrones, which connect points of equal permanence and lifetime respectively, to be developed. Finally, an innovative photographic lifetime calculator has been developed using principles of stock modelling and the developed damage function, thus incorporating material and value change dependent upon environmental parameters