Growth or decline in the Church of England during the decade of Evangelism: did the Churchmanship of the Bishop matter?

The Decade of Evangelism occupied the attention of the Church of England throughout the 1990s. The present study employs the statistics routinely published by the Church of England in order to assess two matters: the extent to which these statistics suggest that the 43 individual dioceses finished the decade in a stronger or weaker position than they had entered it and the extent to which, according to these statistics, the performance of dioceses led by bishops shaped in the Evangelical tradition differed from the performance of dioceses led by bishops shaped in the Catholic tradition. The data demonstrated that the majority of dioceses were performing less effectively at the end of the decade than at the beginning, in terms of a range of membership statistics, and that the rate of decline varied considerably from one diocese to another. The only exception to the trend was provided by the diocese of London, which experienced some growth. The data also demonstrated that little depended on the churchmanship of the diocesan bishop in shaping diocesan outcomes on the performance indicators employed in the study

Weekend admission and mortality for gastrointestinal disorders across England and Wales

BACKGROUND: Little has been reported on mortality following admissions at weekends for many gastrointestinal (GI) disorders. The aim was to establish whether GI disorders are susceptible to increased mortality following unscheduled admission on weekends compared with weekdays. METHODS: Record linkage was undertaken of national administrative inpatient and mortality data for people in England and Wales who were hospitalized as an emergency for one of 19 major GI disorders. RESULTS: The study included 2 254 701 people in England and 155 464 in Wales. For 11 general surgical and medical GI disorders there were little, or no, significant weekend effects on mortality at 30 days in either country. There were large consistent weekend effects in both countries for severe liver disease (England: 26·2 (95 per cent c.i. 21·1 to 31·6) per cent; Wales: 32·0 (12·4 to 55·1 per cent) and GI cancer (England: 21·8 (19·1 to 24·5) per cent; Wales: 25·0 (15·0 to 35·9) per cent), which were lower in patients managed by surgeons. Admission rates were lower at weekends than on weekdays, most strongly for severe liver disease (by 43·3 per cent in England and 51·4 per cent in Wales) and GI cancer (by 44·6 and 52·8 per cent respectively). Both mortality and the weekend mortality effect for GI cancer were lower for patients managed by surgeons. DISCUSSION: There is little, or no, evidence of a weekend mortality effect for most major general surgical or medical GI disorders, but large weekend effects for GI cancer and severe liver disease. Lower admission rates at weekends indicate more severe cases. The findings for severe liver disease may suggest a lack of specialist hepatological resources. For cancers, reduced availability of end-of-life care in the community at weekends may be the cause

Annular pigment band on the posterior capsule following blunt ocular trauma: a case report

BACKGROUND: To report an unusual case of annular pigment band on the posterior capsule following blunt ocular trauma. CASE PRESENTATION: We describe an annular pigment band on the posterior capsule following blunt ocular trauma in a 28-year old male patient. Repeat examinations revealed no evidence of other signs of blunt ocular trauma or pigment dispersion syndrome in either eye. CONCLUSION: The annular pigment band in this case corresponds to the adherence of the hyaloideocapsulare ligament to the posterior capsule and reconfirms its rare visualization in the living eye. This finding may be an isolated sign of blunt ocular trauma and a compromised integrity of the vitreolenticular interface should be strongly suspected. We recommend careful documentation in context of future cataract surgery in these eyes

Dyskeratosis Congenita links telomere attrition to age-related systemic energetics.

Underlying mechanisms of plasma metabolite signatures of human ageing and age-related diseases are not clear but telomere attrition and dysfunction are central to both. Dyskeratosis Congenita (DC) is associated with mutations in the telomerase enzyme complex (TERT, TERC, and DKC1) and progressive telomere attrition. We analyzed the effect of telomere attrition on senescence associated metabolites in fibroblast conditioned media and DC patient plasma. Samples were analyzed by gas chromatography/ mass spectrometry and liquid chromatography/ mass spectrometry. We showed extracellular citrate was repressed by canonical telomerase function in vitro and associated with DC leukocyte telomere attrition in vivo; leading to the hypothesis that altered citrate metabolism detects telomere dysfunction. However, elevated citrate and senescence factors only weakly distinguished DC patients from controls, whereas elevated levels of other tricarboxylic acid cycle metabolites, lactate and especially pyruvate distinguished them with high significance. The DC plasma signature most resembled that of patients with loss of function pyruvate dehydrogenase complex mutations and that of older subjects but significantly not those of type 2 diabetes, lactic acidosis, or elevated mitochondrial reactive oxygen species (1-3). Additionally, our data are consistent with further metabolism of citrate and lactate in the liver and kidneys. Citrate uptake in certain organs modulates age-related disease in mice and our data has similarities with age-related disease signatures in humans. Our results have implications for the role of telomere dysfunction in human ageing in addition to its early diagnosis and the monitoring of anti-senescence therapeutics, especially those designed to improve telomere function

The structure of the PapD-PapGII pilin complex reveals an open and flexible P5 pocket

P pili are hairlike polymeric structures that mediate binding of uropathogenic Escherichia coli to the surface of the kidney via the PapG adhesin at their tips. PapG is composed of two domains: a lectin domain at the tip of the pilus followed by a pilin domain that comprises the initial polymerizing subunit of the 1,000-plus-subunit heteropolymeric pilus fiber. Prior to assembly, periplasmic pilin domains bind to a chaperone, PapD. PapD mediates donor strand complementation, in which a beta strand of PapD temporarily completes the pilin domain's fold, preventing premature, nonproductive interactions with other pilin subunits and facilitating subunit folding. Chaperone-subunit complexes are delivered to the outer membrane usher where donor strand exchange (DSE) replaces PapD's donated beta strand with an amino-terminal extension on the next incoming pilin subunit. This occurs via a zip-in-zip-out mechanism that initiates at a relatively accessible hydrophobic space termed the P5 pocket on the terminally incorporated pilus subunit. Here, we solve the structure of PapD in complex with the pilin domain of isoform II of PapG (PapGIIp). Our data revealed that PapGIIp adopts an immunoglobulin fold with a missing seventh strand, complemented in parallel by the G1 PapD strand, typical of pilin subunits. Comparisons with other chaperone-pilin complexes indicated that the interactive surfaces are highly conserved. Interestingly, the PapGIIp P5 pocket was in an open conformation, which, as molecular dynamics simulations revealed, switches between an open and a closed conformation due to the flexibility of the surrounding loops. Our study reveals the structural details of the DSE mechanism

Correlated dynamics in egocentric communication networks

We investigate the communication sequences of millions of people through two different channels and analyze the fine grained temporal structure of correlated event trains induced by single individuals. By focusing on correlations between the heterogeneous dynamics and the topology of egocentric networks we find that the bursty trains usually evolve for pairs of individuals rather than for the ego and his/her several neighbors thus burstiness is a property of the links rather than of the nodes. We compare the directional balance of calls and short messages within bursty trains to the average on the actual link and show that for the trains of voice calls the imbalance is significantly enhanced, while for short messages the balance within the trains increases. These effects can be partly traced back to the technological constrains (for short messages) and partly to the human behavioral features (voice calls). We define a model that is able to reproduce the empirical results and may help us to understand better the mechanisms driving technology mediated human communication dynamics.Comment: 7 pages, 6 figure

Neuroaxial anesthesia in a patient with progressive systemic sclerosis : case presentation and review of the literature on systemic sclerosis

BACKGROUND: Systemic sclerosis (SSc), a progressive disease characterized by excessive accumulation of connective tissue components. Although most patients have long survival, some of them progress rapidly to death. Pulmonary system involvement and pulmonary hypertension are the most frequent cause of death. When the patient with SSc is to be operated, the anesthetic procedure could be a serious problem. In this article, we report a combined spinal – epidural technique in a patient with progressive SSc and the anesthetic considerations that could be recommended for these patients. CASE PRESENTATION: A 68-year-old woman who had a history of progressive systemic sclerosis, pulmonary fibrosis, kyphoscoliosis and decreased oral apertura underwent total hip arthroplasty. This operation was performed successfully under combined spinal epidural anesthesia. CONCLUSION: Systemic sclerosis is a complex disease that involves multiple organ systems. Every aspects of anesthetic care may be altered or hindered by the pathogenesis of disease. Although the choice of regional or general anesthesia is unclear, to choose combined spinal epidural anesthesia may be useful

Scintillator-based ion beam profiler for diagnosing laser-accelerated ion beams

Next generation intense, short-pulse laser facilities require new high repetition rate diagnostics for the detection of ionizing radiation. We have designed a new scintillator-based ion beam profiler capable of measuring the ion beam transverse profile for a number of discrete energy ranges. The optical response and emission characteristics of four common plastic scintillators has been investigated for a range of proton energies and fluxes. The scintillator light output (for 1 MeV > Ep < 28 MeV) was found to have a non-linear scaling with proton energy but a linear response to incident flux. Initial measurements with a prototype diagnostic have been successful, although further calibration work is required to characterize the total system response and limitations under the high flux, short pulse duration conditions of a typical high intensity laser-plasma interaction

Knowledge, experience, and potential risks of dating violence among Japanese university students: a cross-sectional study

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>The Domestic Violence Prevention Act came into effect in Japan in 2001, but covers only marriage partner violence and post-divorce partner violence, and does not recognize intimate partner violence (IPV). The present study was performed to determine the experience of harassment, both toward and from an intimate partner, and recognition of harassment as IPV among Japanese university students.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>A self-administered questionnaire survey regarding the experience of harassment involving an intimate partner was conducted as a cross-sectional study among freshman students in a prefectural capital city in Japan.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>A total of 274 students participated in the present study. About half of the subjects (both male and female students) had experience of at least one episode of harassment toward or had been the recipient of harassment from an intimate partner. However, the study participants did not recognize verbal harassment, controlling activities of an intimate partner, and unprotected sexual intercourse as violence. Experience of attending a lecture/seminar about domestic violence and dating violence did not contribute to appropriate help-seeking behavior.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>An educational program regarding harassment and violence prevention and appropriate help-seeking behavior should be provided in early adolescence to avoid IPV among youth.</p