- Email: [email protected]
Update on SIDS
1590
THE LANCET
commercials designed to alert parents to the dangers of VSA. The report on VSA deaths should reveal what effect, if any, this campaign has had.
next
John McConnell
1.
Taylor JC, Norman CL, Griffitths JM, Anderson HR, Ramsey JD. Trends in deaths associated with abuse of volatile substances 1971-1991. London: St George’s Hospital Medical School, 1993.
studies may provide some insight into the roles of overwrapping, overheating, and infections in SIDS. However, other research
suggests that a disturbance of maturation of the brain may be involved. Pathological dendrite formation in neurons of the substantia nigra has been found in brains of infants who died of SIDS and also in infants with intrauterine growth retardation. According to Professor Dick van Velzen, Royal Liverpool Children’s Hospital, UK, these changes may be important in the aetiology of SIDS because they occur in an area involved in the control of breathing, heart rate, and temperature.
Life expectancy and handedness
Astrid James
arm slow with wickets against Australia, died aged 84 after an
R. 102
Peel, left test
irregular,
even
accident-prone,
life. Not a classic illustration of the thesis of Aggleton and colleagues,t who have been looking at the lifespans of cricketers and report a two-year gap in favour of right-handers, much of it ascribable to fewer deaths in accidents or in war. Yorkshire cricket has been graced with world-class slow bowlers. Rhodes, like Peel, lived to a great age; others did not; and one was killed in action. But this study, from psychologists in Durham, is Peel Robert ("Bobby") demography not anecdote. Their source is Who’s Who of (1857-1941). Cricketers (1984) in which Aggleton et al found 3165 dead ones whose handedness could be determined. This game is one where left-handedness has some advantage and considerable nuisance value so it is not surprising that as many as 18-5% of these first-class performers were left-handed. The focus of the paper is the 147 cricketers known to have died from unnatural causes (excluding suicide). 28-6% were left-handed and this figure was much the same for those killed in action and for those killed in other ways. With earlier hints from baseball these data point to an ergonomic cause-ie, machinery and systems designated by the right-handed for right-handers-rather than more elaborate explanations, such as the immunological.
David Sharp 1.
Aggleton JP, Kentridge RW, Neave NJ. Evidence for longevity differences between left handed and right handed men: an archival study of cricketers. J Epidemiol Commun Health 1993; 47: 206-09.
Harmonising therapeutics teaching
in
Europe
The European Network of Therapeutics Teachers (ENOTT) has been formed to encourage the optimisation and hannonisation of undergraduate and postgraduate therapeutics teaching in Europe. Some of their aims are that learning methods should be non-directive, interactive, and based on clinical cases and that teaching should foster the ability to evaluate critically published data on different treatments and new drugs. They also believe that therapeutics should be examined as a separate subject in the final year of undergraduate study and that emphasis should be given to therapeutics throughout the whole medical curriculum, with a minimum of 100 hours being dedicated specifically to the subject. Further information can be had from Prof A. Benetos, Hospital Broussais, Service de Medicine 1,96 rue Didot, 75674 Paris Cedex
14, France.
Pharmacovigilance in Europe A European Phannacovigilance Research Group (EPRG) has been set up; it was established with support from the European Commission under the Biomed Programme to develop and validate methods of pharmacovigilance that are applicable to the divergent patterns of health care delivery across the European Community and that are compatible with national legal, cultural, and ethical customs.
As part of its work the EPRG is anxious to construct, and then make widely available to interested parties, an inventory of all case-control studies that are in progress across Europe and that are to investigate possible associations between particular conditions and prior exposure to medicinal products. Investigators conducting such studies are invited to contact the EPRG Project Co-ordinator (Prof M. D. Rawlins, Wolfson Unit of Clinical Pharmacology, Department of Pharmacological Sciences, University of Newcastle, Newcastle upon Tyne NE2 4HH, UK) briefly outlining the study (in not more than 2 to 3 sentences), its start date, its planned date of termination, and the projected numbers of cases and controls to be recruited.
designed
Update on SIDS
NHS staff and the media
Although the number of cases of sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS) in the UK in 1992 was half that in 1991 (456 vs 912, respectively), SIDS remains the commonest cause of death in babies older than 1 week. Last week the UK Department of Health confirmed its earlier recommendations that the risk of cot death is reduced if infants are laid to sleep on their backs, if they are not exposed to cigarette smoke before or after birth, and if they are not overwrapped or overheated, especially when feverish or unwell. Preliminary results presented at a meeting organised by the Foundation for the Study of Infant Deaths may provide some leads toward the mechanisms involved in SIDS. Dr Peter Fleming, Bristol Maternity Hospital, UK, reported that changes in the variability of respiration in response to alterations in room temperature have been found in some normal infants. In addition, preliminary results of a postoperative study reported by Dr Stewart Petersen, University of Leicester, UK, and Dr Mike Wailoo, Leicester Royal Infirmary, suggest that changes in an infant’s body temperature may precede (by up to 1 week) the development of other symptoms of infection that are recognised by parents. These
The National Health Service has issued its guidelines to staff on their right to speak out on concerns about health care (NHS executive letter EL[93]51). Unauthorised disclosure to the media is no longer described as a "potentially serious breach of contract" (see Lancet Oct 24,1992, p 1031,andNov21,p 1277 for draft guidance), but the new advice says that if such disclosure is judged to be unjustified it could result in disciplinary action.
Guidance Guidance
on on
Vancouver
style
the Vancouver format for articles submitted
to
journals is now available in booklet form. Single copies of Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals are available free of charge from the URM Secretariat Office, American College of Physicians, Independence Mall West, Sixth Street at Race, Philadelphia, PA 19106-1572, USA. Prices for purchases of 10 copies or more may be obtained from the ACP Customer Service (+215 351 2600).
THE LANCET
commercials designed to alert parents to the dangers of VSA. The report on VSA deaths should reveal what effect, if any, this campaign has had.
next
John McConnell
1.
Taylor JC, Norman CL, Griffitths JM, Anderson HR, Ramsey JD. Trends in deaths associated with abuse of volatile substances 1971-1991. London: St George’s Hospital Medical School, 1993.
studies may provide some insight into the roles of overwrapping, overheating, and infections in SIDS. However, other research
suggests that a disturbance of maturation of the brain may be involved. Pathological dendrite formation in neurons of the substantia nigra has been found in brains of infants who died of SIDS and also in infants with intrauterine growth retardation. According to Professor Dick van Velzen, Royal Liverpool Children’s Hospital, UK, these changes may be important in the aetiology of SIDS because they occur in an area involved in the control of breathing, heart rate, and temperature.
Life expectancy and handedness
Astrid James
arm slow with wickets against Australia, died aged 84 after an
R. 102
Peel, left test
irregular,
even
accident-prone,
life. Not a classic illustration of the thesis of Aggleton and colleagues,t who have been looking at the lifespans of cricketers and report a two-year gap in favour of right-handers, much of it ascribable to fewer deaths in accidents or in war. Yorkshire cricket has been graced with world-class slow bowlers. Rhodes, like Peel, lived to a great age; others did not; and one was killed in action. But this study, from psychologists in Durham, is Peel Robert ("Bobby") demography not anecdote. Their source is Who’s Who of (1857-1941). Cricketers (1984) in which Aggleton et al found 3165 dead ones whose handedness could be determined. This game is one where left-handedness has some advantage and considerable nuisance value so it is not surprising that as many as 18-5% of these first-class performers were left-handed. The focus of the paper is the 147 cricketers known to have died from unnatural causes (excluding suicide). 28-6% were left-handed and this figure was much the same for those killed in action and for those killed in other ways. With earlier hints from baseball these data point to an ergonomic cause-ie, machinery and systems designated by the right-handed for right-handers-rather than more elaborate explanations, such as the immunological.
David Sharp 1.
Aggleton JP, Kentridge RW, Neave NJ. Evidence for longevity differences between left handed and right handed men: an archival study of cricketers. J Epidemiol Commun Health 1993; 47: 206-09.
Harmonising therapeutics teaching
in
Europe
The European Network of Therapeutics Teachers (ENOTT) has been formed to encourage the optimisation and hannonisation of undergraduate and postgraduate therapeutics teaching in Europe. Some of their aims are that learning methods should be non-directive, interactive, and based on clinical cases and that teaching should foster the ability to evaluate critically published data on different treatments and new drugs. They also believe that therapeutics should be examined as a separate subject in the final year of undergraduate study and that emphasis should be given to therapeutics throughout the whole medical curriculum, with a minimum of 100 hours being dedicated specifically to the subject. Further information can be had from Prof A. Benetos, Hospital Broussais, Service de Medicine 1,96 rue Didot, 75674 Paris Cedex
14, France.
Pharmacovigilance in Europe A European Phannacovigilance Research Group (EPRG) has been set up; it was established with support from the European Commission under the Biomed Programme to develop and validate methods of pharmacovigilance that are applicable to the divergent patterns of health care delivery across the European Community and that are compatible with national legal, cultural, and ethical customs.
As part of its work the EPRG is anxious to construct, and then make widely available to interested parties, an inventory of all case-control studies that are in progress across Europe and that are to investigate possible associations between particular conditions and prior exposure to medicinal products. Investigators conducting such studies are invited to contact the EPRG Project Co-ordinator (Prof M. D. Rawlins, Wolfson Unit of Clinical Pharmacology, Department of Pharmacological Sciences, University of Newcastle, Newcastle upon Tyne NE2 4HH, UK) briefly outlining the study (in not more than 2 to 3 sentences), its start date, its planned date of termination, and the projected numbers of cases and controls to be recruited.
designed
Update on SIDS
NHS staff and the media
Although the number of cases of sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS) in the UK in 1992 was half that in 1991 (456 vs 912, respectively), SIDS remains the commonest cause of death in babies older than 1 week. Last week the UK Department of Health confirmed its earlier recommendations that the risk of cot death is reduced if infants are laid to sleep on their backs, if they are not exposed to cigarette smoke before or after birth, and if they are not overwrapped or overheated, especially when feverish or unwell. Preliminary results presented at a meeting organised by the Foundation for the Study of Infant Deaths may provide some leads toward the mechanisms involved in SIDS. Dr Peter Fleming, Bristol Maternity Hospital, UK, reported that changes in the variability of respiration in response to alterations in room temperature have been found in some normal infants. In addition, preliminary results of a postoperative study reported by Dr Stewart Petersen, University of Leicester, UK, and Dr Mike Wailoo, Leicester Royal Infirmary, suggest that changes in an infant’s body temperature may precede (by up to 1 week) the development of other symptoms of infection that are recognised by parents. These
The National Health Service has issued its guidelines to staff on their right to speak out on concerns about health care (NHS executive letter EL[93]51). Unauthorised disclosure to the media is no longer described as a "potentially serious breach of contract" (see Lancet Oct 24,1992, p 1031,andNov21,p 1277 for draft guidance), but the new advice says that if such disclosure is judged to be unjustified it could result in disciplinary action.
Guidance Guidance
on on
Vancouver
style
the Vancouver format for articles submitted
to
journals is now available in booklet form. Single copies of Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals are available free of charge from the URM Secretariat Office, American College of Physicians, Independence Mall West, Sixth Street at Race, Philadelphia, PA 19106-1572, USA. Prices for purchases of 10 copies or more may be obtained from the ACP Customer Service (+215 351 2600).