Animating the cities...Dynamic exploration of harmonized urban databases (United-States, France 1800-2000)

This paper presents a generic visual tool for mapping and analyzing the evolution of a system of cities on a long-term period (2 centuries), in France and United States. The project started in 2008 in the framework of an a national grant (Action Nationale de la Recherche Corpus et Outils de la Recherche en SHS Harmonie-cités : construction de bases de données harmonisées sur les populations, les activités et les réseaux des villes). The conception of a visual tool for exploring the database represents the last part of this project and has been developed recently. Three main objectives were challenged: Designing a generic tool, that could be possibly used in the future for several countries under study, allowing a dynamic exploration of the different databases, which raises a range of difficulties as they are spatio-temporal and multi-level (cities themselves and systems of cities), giving an interactive application, that could be used by a large range of Internet users, from pupils to researchers or urban planners. The resulting interface combines time, location and attributes (population, area). The application integrates interactivity in order to propose an exploratory and animated cartography of urban dynamics, according to an evolutive conception of the urban system. It enables a large variety of possibilities for exploring city trajectories

Practical clinical guidelines of the EOTTD for treatment and referral of gestational trophoblastic disease

Background and aim: Gestational trophoblastic disease (GTD) is a heterogeneous group of disorders characterised by abnormal proliferation of trophoblastic tissue. Since GTD and its malignant sequel gestational trophoblastic neoplasia (GTN) are rare diseases, little evidence is available from randomised controlled trials on optimal treatment and follow-up. Treatment protocols vary within Europe, and even between different centres within countries. One of the goals of the ‘European Organisation for Treatment of Trophoblastic Diseases’ (EOTTD) is to harmonise treatment in Europe. To provide a basis for European standardisation of definitions, treatment and follow-up protocols in GTD, we composed a set of guidelines for minimal requirements and optimal management of GTD. Methods: Members from each EOTTD country attended multiple workshops during annual EOTTD meetings. Clinical guidelines were formulated by consensus and evidence where available. The following guidelines were discussed: diagnostics of GTD and GTN, treatment of low-risk GTN, high-risk GTN, ultra-high-risk GTN, placental site and epithelioid trophoblastic tumours and follow-up. Results: Between 40 and 65 EOTTD members from 17 European countries and 7 non-European countries attended the clinical workshops held on 6 occasions. Flow diagrams for patient management were composed to display minimum and best practice for most treatment situations. New agreed definitions of recurrence and chemotherapy resistance were formulated. Conclusions: Despite the many differences between and within the participating countries, an important step in uniform treatment of GTD and GTN within Europe was made by the Clinical Working Party of the EOTTD. This is an example on how guidelines and harmonisation can be achieved within international networks