Evaluation of Treatment Thresholds for Unconjugated Hyperbilirubinemia in Preterm Infants:Effects on Serum Bilirubin and on Hearing Loss?

Background: Severe unconjugated hyperbilirubinemia may cause deafness. In the Netherlands, 25% lower total serum bilirubin (TSB) treatment thresholds were recently implemented for preterm infants.Objective: To determine the rate of hearing loss in jaundiced preterms treated at high or at low TSB thresholds.Design/Methods: In this retrospective study conducted at two neonatal intensive care units in the Netherlands, we included preterms (gestational age 35 dB).Results: There were 479 patients in the high and 144 in the low threshold group. Both groups had similar gestational ages (29.5 weeks) and birth weights (1300 g). Mean and mean peak TSB levels were significantly lower after the implementation of the novel thresholds: 152 +/- 43 mu mol/L and 212 +/- 52 mu mol/L versus 131 +/- 37 mu mol/L and 188 +/- 46 mu mol/L for the high versus low thresholds, respectively (PConclusions: Implementation of lower treatment thresholds resulted in reduced mean and peak TSB levels. The incidence of hearing impairment in preterms with a gestational age</p

Postcolonial archaeologies between discourse and practice

As postcolonial theories have gradually but persistently gained more prominence in archaeology over the last decade or so, most attention has been directed towards critiques of contemporary academic and, to a lesser extent, popular representations of past colonial contexts. Much less effort has been spent on alternative and fresh interpretations of the colonial contexts in the past themselves. In this issue, however, the focus is firmly on 'doing archaeology' along postcolonial lines. That means either novel interpretations and perspectives on colonial situations in the past, whether distant or less so, or reflections on fieldwork and research in contemporary postcolonial contexts. In both cases, the underlying assumption is that postcolonial theories offer exciting perspectives for doing archaeology differently and it is the aim of this issue to explore these differences, both past and present

Roman Peasant and Rural Organisation in Central Italy: An Archaeological Perspective

Roman rural landscapes have long been associated with villas, that generally were regarded as its central feature; studies of Roman landscapes were consequently often limited to a villa and its immediate vicinity. This bias in most historical and archaeological research is now increasingly being redressed, mainly by intensive archaeological surveying. The resulting large numbers of small rural sites in particular point to a much more varied Roman countryside with considerably more complex organisation. Concentrating on the rural landscape outside the villas, therefore, the peasantry and their relations with the rural elite are the central issues in a case study of a small valley in Roman northern Etruria