Cochlear implantation of a Hungarian deaf and blind patient with discharging ears suffering from Behçet's disease

A case is reported in which a Nucleus 22 channel intracochlear device was implanted a deaf/blind Hungarian adult with discharging ears suffering from Behçet's disease. Preconditioning surgery was employed three months prior to the implantation procedure to ensure a sterile, dry protected environment for the electrodes. One month after implantation, the patient exhibited excellent auditory discrimination capability at the time of the first switch on. We suggest that some deaf/blind individuals may serve as very good candidates for intracochlear implantatio

Does urban sprawl increase the costs of providing local public services? Evidence from Spanish municipalities

This paper examines the impact of urban sprawl, a phenomenon of particular interest in Spain, which is currently experiencing this process of rapid, low-density urban expansion. Many adverse consequences are attributed to urban sprawl (e.g., traffic congestion, air pollution and social segregation), though here we are concerned primarily with the rising costs of providing local public services. Our initial aim is to develop an accurate measure of urban sprawl so that we might empirically test its impact on municipal budgets. Then, we undertake an empirical analysis using a cross-sectional data set of 2,500 Spanish municipalities for the year 2003 and a piecewise linear function to account for the potentially nonlinear relationship between sprawl and local costs. The estimations derived from the expenditure equations for both aggregate and six disaggregated spending categories indicate that low-density development patterns lead to greater provision costs of local public services