On Life and Language:\ud Limit, Context and Belief in Wittgenstein and Ortega y Gasset

Despite both thinkers belonging to the tragic generation of\ud 1914, Ludwig Wittgenstein (1888-1951) and José Ortega y\ud Gasset (1883-1955) never actually met in their lives or in\ud their texts (neither those they wrote nor those they read).\ud Coming from very separate philosophical traditions – the\ud logical atomism of Wittgenstein and the neo-Kantianism\ud and phenomenology of Ortega – the works of these two\ud philosophers nevertheless show latent conceptual\ud affinities. We shall limit ourselves to suggesting three\ud possible conceptual keys: limit, context and belief. We\ud shall then finally take Wittgenstein"s distinction between\ud sagen and zeigen in the light of the difference Ortega\ud highlights between talking and saying, reflecting upon the\ud limits of language and the meaning each thinker gives to\ud silence

Drug and xenobiotic biotransformation in the blood–brain barrier: a neglected issue

Drug biotransformation is a crucial mechanism for facilitating the elimination of chemicals from the organism and for decreasing their pharmacological activity. Published evidence suggests that brain drug metabolism may play a role in the development of adverse drug reactions and in the clinical response to drugs and xenobiotics. The blood–brain barrier (BBB) has been regarded mainly as a physical barrier for drugs and xenobiotics, and little attention has been paid to the BBB as a drug-metabolizing barrier. The presence of drug-metabolizing enzymes in the BBB is likely to have functional implications because local metabolism may inactivate drugs or may modify the drug’s ability to cross the BBB, thus modifying drug response and the risk of developing adverse drug reactions. In this perspective paper, we discuss the expression of relevant xenobiotic metabolizing enzymes in the brain and in the BBB, and we cover current advances and future directions on the potential role of these BBB drug-metabolizing enzymes as modifiers of drug response

EVALUATION OF TWO in vitro MATURATION MEDIUM FOR EMBRYO PRODUCTION IN SHEEP

The aim of this work was to evaluate the effect of HECM-9 and TCM-199 as maturation media on maturation (MR), in vitro fertilization (IVF) and embryo development (ED) rate of oocytes from hair sheep collected from slaughter house ovaries. Cumulus-oocyte-complexes (COC) were obtained by manual aspiration, from 2-6mm diameter follicles. Groups of 10-20 COC, quality 1 and 2 were placed into 450μL of HECM-9 or TCM-199 and incubated 24h at 38.5 ºC and 5% CO2. For IVF, COC were transferred to 450μL of SOFm+Oaa, 0.5 x 106 motile spermatozoa were added and then incubated at 38.5 ºC and 5% CO2. Alleged zygotes were transferred to 450μL of SOFm+Oaa+glucose. Embryo development and morphology were evaluated at 2, 4, 5 and 6 days of culture, not developed zygotes were removed on day 2 and the final rate of embryo production was determined on day 8 of culture. Oocyte MR showed no significant differences (P>0.05) between treatments (73.3 vs. 71.4 % HECM-9 and TCM-199, respectively). Fertilization rate was different (

Prevalencia de factores de riesgo asociados al desarrollo de contractura capsular posterior a la colocación de implantes de mama

Objetivo: Determinar la prevalencia de los principales factores de riesgo asociados a contractura capsular posterior a mamoplastia de aumento en un centro de referencia. Método: Estudio retrospectivo de 210 pacientes en el que se registraron variables sociodemográficas, escala clínica de Baker y resultados histopatológicos. Resultados: Se realizó el análisis estadístico de 210 pacientes; el 98.1% fueron mujeres. La edad promedio fue de 47 años (± 11), el índice de masa corporal 25 kg/m2 (± 10) y el inicio de los síntomas 13 años (± 8.5). Factores sociodemográficos: labores domésticas 63.3%. Alcoholismo 70% y tabaquismo 65.7%. El principal motivo de consulta fue dolor más deformidad, en el 81.6%. Los factores de riesgo con significancia estadística fueron el antecedente de traumatismo, con un 83.3% (p = 0.004), y el plano subglandular, con un 73.8% (p = 0.0115). Histopatología: cápsula fibrosa 81.4%. Conclusiones: La prevalencia de los factores de riesgo descritos es similar a lo reportado en la literatura. Solo para el antecedente de traumatismo y el plano subglandular hubo significancia estadística

Burden and centralised treatment in Europe of rare tumours: results of RARECAREnet - a population-based study

Background Rare cancers pose challenges for diagnosis, treatments, and clinical decision making. Information about rare cancers is scant. The RARECARE project defined rare cancers as those with an annual incidence of less than six per 100 000 people in European Union (EU). We updated the estimates of the burden of rare cancers in Europe, their time trends in incidence and survival, and provide information about centralisation of treatments in seven European countries. Methods We analysed data from 94 cancer registries for more than 2 million rare cancer diagnoses, to estimate European incidence and survival in 2000–07 and the corresponding time trends during 1995–2007. Incidence was calculated as the number of new cases divided by the corresponding total person-years in the population. 5-year relative survival was calculated by the Ederer-2 method. Seven registries (Belgium, Bulgaria, Finland, Ireland, the Netherlands, Slovenia, and the Navarra region in Spain) provided additional data for hospitals treating about 220 000 cases diagnosed in 2000–07. We also calculated hospital volume admission as the number of treatments provided by each hospital rare cancer group sharing the same referral pattern. Findings Rare cancers accounted for 24% of all cancers diagnosed in the EU during 2000–07. The overall incidence rose annually by 0.5% (99·8% CI 0·3–0·8). 5-year relative survival for all rare cancers was 48·5% (95% CI 48·4 to 48·6), compared with 63·4% (95% CI 63·3 to 63·4) for all common cancers. 5-year relative survival increased (overall 2·9%, 95% CI 2·7 to 3·2), from 1999–2001 to 2007–09, and for most rare cancers, with the largest increases for haematological tumours and sarcomas. The amount of centralisation of rare cancer treatment varied widely between cancers and between countries. The Netherlands and Slovenia had the highest treatment volumes. Interpretation Our study benefits from the largest pool of population-based registries to estimate incidence and survival of about 200 rare cancers. Incidence trends can be explained by changes in known risk factors, improved diagnosis, and registration problems. Survival could be improved by early diagnosis, new treatments, and improved case management. The centralisation of treatment could be improved in the seven European countries we studied. Funding The European Commission (Chafea)

Ability of university-level education to prevent age-related decline in emotional intelligence

Numerous studies have suggested that educational history, as a proxy measure of active cognitive reserve, protects against age-related cognitive decline and risk of dementia. Whether educational history also protects against age-related decline in emotional intelligence (EI) is unclear. The present study examined ability EI in 310 healthy adults ranging in age from 18 to 76 years using the Mayer–Salovey–Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test (MSCEIT). We found that older people had lower scores than younger people for total EI and for the EI branches of perceiving, facilitating, and understanding emotions, whereas age was not associated with the EI branch of managing emotions. We also found that educational history protects against this age-related EI decline by mediating the relationship between age and EI. In particular, the EI scores of older adults with a university education were higher than those of older adults with primary or secondary education, and similar to those of younger adults of any education level. These findings suggest that the cognitive reserve hypothesis, which states that individual differences in cognitive processes as a function of lifetime intellectual activities explain differential susceptibility to functional impairment in the presence of age-related changes and brain pathology, applies also to EI, and that education can help preserve cognitive-emotional structures during aging. [This Document is Protected by copyright and was first published by Frontiers. All rights reserved. it is reproduced with permission.