Adjuvant interferon gamma in patients with drug – resistant pulmonary tuberculosis: a pilot study

BACKGROUND: Tuberculosis (TB) is increasing in the world and drug-resistant (DR) disease beckons new treatments. METHODS: To evaluate the action of interferon (IFN) gamma as immunoadjuvant to chemotherapy on pulmonary DR-TB patients, a pilot, open label clinical trial was carried out in the Cuban reference ward for the management of this disease. The eight subjects existing in the country at the moment received, as in-patients, 1 × 10(6 )IU of recombinant human IFN gamma intramuscularly, daily for one month and then three times per week up to 6 months as adjuvant to the indicated chemotherapy, according to their antibiograms and WHO guidelines. Sputum samples collection for direct smear observation and culture as well as routine clinical and thorax radiography assessments were done monthly. RESULTS: Sputum smears and cultures became negative for acid-fast-bacilli before three months of treatment in all patients. Lesion size was reduced at the end of 6 months treatment; the lesions disappeared in one case. Clinical improvement was also evident; body mass index increased in general. Interferon gamma was well tolerated. Few adverse events were registered, mostly mild; fever and arthralgias prevailed. CONCLUSIONS: These data suggest that IFN gamma is useful and well tolerated as adjunctive therapy in patients with DR-TB. Further controlled clinical trials are encouraged

Die lewe en werk van Rudolf Bultmann (1884–1976): ʼn Leksikografiese bydrae tot Reformasie 500

Rudolf Bultmann was one of the leading thinkers within an influential theological direction that arose in Europe after the First World War, known as dialectical theology. Comprehensive introductions to the life and work of Bultmann in the South African theological journals, written in Afrikaans, either does not exist, or are difficult to trace for the Afrikaans readership. This article on Bultmann aims to fill the gap by offering a lexicographical contribution on the life and work of Bultmann. The focus of this article is on Bultmann as a Lutheran thinker. The theme of the New Testament and systematic theology is essentially the same, namely to explain the concept of Christian self-understanding as an eschatological event in which faith is expressed for the sake of faith in God and only in God. Bultmann explained the same theological concepts with his theology as those that were explained by the church reformers of the 16th century, but under radically new circumstances. The so-called modern and postmodern people of our time not only broke ties with the past, but in the process they also lost their ability for using historical-critical patterns of thought that tries to bridge historical distances, and therefore sacrificed all efforts to think systematically on the altar of relativism. We can learn from Bultmann what systematic reformed theology really is

法学部図書室

Background: Bromocriptine has been used in previous studies to treat people with non-fluent aphasia with varying levels of success.Aims: This single case study set out to describe the effect of a 30 mg dose of bromocriptine on the behaviour, cognition and linguistic skills of a person with aphasia post-cerebrovascular accident.Methods & Procedures: The participant received speech and language therapy alone and combined with the drug. Four testing points were made to examine the effects of bromocriptine: (1) at baseline before the drug was administered, (2) once the drug reached 30 mg dosage, (3) after the combined speech and language therapy and drug regime and (4) after drug and therapy withdrawal.Outcomes & Results: The participant responded on all behavioural measures to the use of bromocriptine. The combined use of speech and language therapy with bromocriptine provided clear improvements in the participant’s overall behaviours and specifically in her verbal output.Conclusions: There is a case for the careful and correct selection of participants to use bromocriptine in combination with speech and language therapy. People who are adynamic, have non-fluent Broca’s type or transcortical motor type aphasia may benefit from this combined treatment