Comparative birth weights of singletons born after assisted reproduction and natural conception in previously infertile women

BACKGROUND: The possible interference of assisted reproduction techniques (ART) with epigenetic reprogramming during early embryo development has recently sparked renewed interest about the reported lower birth weight among infants born as a consequence of infertility treatments. However, the latter finding so far has relied on the comparison of the birth weight of infants conceived with ART to general population data. A more appropriate comparison group should involve pregnancies in infertile women after natural conception. Therefore, we compared neonatal birth weight data of infants born after various ART treatments, including intrauterine insemination (IUI), with those of previously infertile women achieving pregnancy after sexual intercourse. METHODS: Between August 1996 and March 2004 the data of all infertile women presenting in the infertility unit of the University Women's Hospital of Basel, Switzerland, were collected prospectively, adding up to 995 intact pregnancies and deliveries. The birth weight of all infants resulting from 741 singleton pregnancies were analysed with regard to the patients' characteristics, the occurrence of complications during pregnancy and the type of infertility treatment with which the pregnancies were achieved. RESULTS: Comparison of duration of pregnancy and birth weight of infants born after infertility treatment confirms a shorter pregnancy span and a lower mean birth weight in infants born after IVF and ICSI. If women with pregnancies after ART deliver before term, neonatal birth weight is significantly lower. CONCLUSIONS: There is a specific effect of ART, mainly IVF and ICSI, on both shortening the duration of pregnancy and lowering neonatal birth weight. Both these parameters seem to be interrelated consequences of some modification in the gestational process induced by the infertility treatment. Freezing and thawing of oocytes in the pronucleate stage had a lesser impact on pregnancy span and on neonatal birth weigh

Special focus: Selected developments in the area of children deprived of liberty

This volume of the Global Campus Human Rights Journal consists of three parts. The first part is a ‘Special focus: Selected developments in the area of children’s rights’. This is the second occasion on which the Journal devotes special attention to the rights of children. The special focus is a product of this collaboration between the Global Campus of Human Rights and the Right Livelihood Foundation. In 2019 a cooperation agreement was signed between the Global Campus of Human Rights and the Right Livelihood Foundation. Its purpose is to ‘promote the acknowledgment and observance of human and child rights and to strengthen the participation of children in all matters affecting their lives in the present and in the future’. The Right Livelihood Foundation is a Swedish charity organisation, the mission of which is to honour and support courageous people solving global problems. The Foundation is a politically-independent and nonideological platform for the voices of its Laureates to be heard. The articles in this part are linked to the UN Global Study on Children Deprived of Liberty (2019). In 2020 the ‘Global Classroom 2020’, which was presented virtually due to the COVID-19 pandemic, focused on the UN Global Study on Children Deprived of Liberty and the implementation of its recommendations. These Global Classrooms, a feature of the Global Campus since 2013, brings together students and professors from all regional hubs for a week-long conference where a topic of common interest is studied, analysed and discussed. The Global Classroom facilitates interaction among students from the different regional programmes by ii (2020) 4 Global Campus Human Rights Journal organising dedicated activities and providing a forum for discussion and networking. The articles in this part of the Journal are all products of collaboration between students and staff working with each of the regional Master’s programmes within the framework of the collaboration between the Global Campus of Human Rights and the Right Livelihood Foundation

Socio-medical significance of therapy-induced polyneuropathy in oncological patients

Polyneuropathies are one of the most common long-term side effects of oncological therapies. With the help of targeted clinical examinations including vibration sensation and functional tests, they are reliably detected and treated. However, therapeutic options are still limited. Validated active trainings are becoming increasingly established.Furthermore, the socio-medical relevance of therapeutically induced polyneuropathies has not been sufficiently researched. At present, there are only few data available that describe the effects of this long-term toxicity on participation in working life.The following article deals with clinical course of therapeutically induced polyneuropathies and addresses the socio-medical relevance with regard to performance in working life and assessment according to the law on severely disabled persons in long-term care.Polyneuropathien sind eine der häufigsten Langzeit-Nebenwirkungen onkologischer Therapien. Mit Hilfe gezielter klinischer Untersuchungen und Funktionstests werden sie zuverlässig erkannt und behandelt. Die medikamentösen Behandlungsmöglichkeiten sind immer noch begrenzt. Allerdings etablieren sich zunehmend validierte aktive Trainingstherapien. Bisher wurde die sozialmedizinische Bedeutung der Therapie-induzierten Polyneuropathie noch nicht ausreichend wissenschaftlich untersucht. Derzeit sind nur wenige Daten verfügbar, die Auswirkungen dieser Langzeit-Toxizität auf die Teilhabe am Arbeitsleben beschreiben. Der vorliegende Artikel gibt einen Überblick über den klinischen Verlauf der Therapie-induzierten Polyneuropathie sowie Hilfestellung und Orientierung für die sozialmedizinische Begutachtung

Chemotherapy induced polyneuropathy: Basics, diagnostics and prevention

Modern rehabilitation offers strategies against the therapeutic nihilism towards chemotherapy induced polyneuropathy (CIPN). Whereas the different pathomechanisms and cumulative doses are well known, little attention is payed to prevention through sensorimotortraining and early diagnose of a CIPN.Quantification of a manifest CIPN with common gradings as the common toxicity criteria shows the importance of functional trainings for the activities of daily living and participation in society. Functional diagnostics and the rehabilitation process are the basis for social medical reports.Dem therapeutischen Nihilismus gegenüber einer chemotherapieinduzierten Polyneuropathie (CIRN) kann mit modernen Rehabilitationsstrategien begegnet werden. Zwar werden die unterschiedlichen Pathomechanismen und Kumulativdosen allgemein beachtet, wenig Augenmerk gilt der rechtzeitigen Prävention mittels Sensorimotortraining und der frühzeitigen Diagnose einer CIPN. Die Quantifizierung einer manifesten CIPN mittels üblicher Gradeinteilungen, wie z.B. den common toxicity criteria verweist auf die Bedeutung funktioneller Trainingsansätze für die Aktivitäten des täglichen Lebens und Teilhabe an der Gesellschaft. Funktionsdiagnostik und Rehabilitationsverlauf sind Grundlage für die sozialmedizinische Einschätzung

Domain Models are Aspect Free

Proponents of aspect orientation have successfully seeded the impression that aspects—like objects—are so fundamental a notion that they should pervade all phases and artefacts of the software development process. Aspect orientation has therefore proliferated from programming to design to analysis to requirements, sparing neither software processes nor their favourite languages. Since modelling plays an important role in software engineering, much effort is currently being invested in making modelling languages aspect ready. However, based on an observed lack of examples for domain level (or functional) aspects this paper argues the case against the omnipresence of aspects, particularly the existence of aspects in domain models, and offers some informal arguments as well as a semiformal proof in favour of the claims made

The role of psychological comorbidities in cancer patients for socio-medical appraisal

Patients with a diagnosis of cancer suffer from several psychosocial distress und sometime psychiatric comorbidities. Relevant task after oncological rehabilitation is the sociomedical assessment for working-age patients. This article gives advises whether and how psychosocial burden or a psychiatric diagnosis can be classified in the sociomedical assessment from oncologists.Da bei malignen Erkrankungen mit psychischen Begleiterkrankungen zu rechnen ist, können diese für die sozialmedizinische Begutachtung von Patienten auch eine Rolle spielen. Dieser Artikel gibt einen Überblick über die Differenzierung psychischer Folgen, diagnostische Hinweise sowie die Einordnung für die Bedeutung in der sozialmedizinischen Begutachtung