Gaoxiong yi xue ke xue za zhi = The Kaohsiung journal of medical sciences最新文献

The purpose of this study was to explore the knowledge needs of postpartum women. A postpartum knowledge needs questionnaire was administered to 70 postpartum women during the 1st and 4th week postpartum. Data were analyzed by factor analysis to determine the relationships within categories of knowledge needs. Data were also analyzed by 2-factor repeated measure analysis of variance (ANOVA). The two factors included parity and time (period of measurement). The results indicated that the knowledge needs of postpartum women can be categorized as follows: (1) Knowledge of caring for the baby, (2) Knowledge of caring for one's self and (3) Knowledge of caring for other family members. The women during the 1st week postpartum reported a significantly higher need in knowledge of infant care than women during the 4th week postpartum. Multiparas showed a significantly higher need in knowledge of caring for other family members than primiparas.

To explore the relationship between the body mass index (BMI) and uric acid in different races before growing up into adulthood, we selected a total of 1236 five to 14 year-old children in the period from March to December 1994. The children originated from three Aboriginal tribes (the Bunun, and the Paiwan tribes--classified as South-Aborigines and Atayal tribe as North-Aborigines) and two non-Aboriginal tribes (Fukein-Taiwanese and Hakka), all of whom are from the following four countries: Chien-Shih, Sandimen, Gaushuh and Sanmin. The results showed that the percentage of hyperuricemia (> or = 7.5 mg/dl) was 28.5% (352/1236) and of obesity (BMI > or = 22 kg/m2) was 9.5% (118/1236). Increased uric acid concentration was found to be related to age, sex, BMI, race, triglyceride (TG) and cholesterol levels in both the primary analysis and after the adjusted logistic regression model. Obesity did not vary with sex (OR = 1.0; 95% CI = 0.7-1.5), or with Aborigines in north Taiwan as compared with non-Aborigines (OR = 1.0, 95% CI = 0.6-1.6), but the logistic regression model adjusted for age indicated large BMI values for children with high serum uric acid concentration, triglyceride levels and the Aborigines who originated from south Taiwan. It was concluded from this study that both of the North-Aborigines and South-Aborigines made an important influence on serum uric acid concentration in children, especially the South-Aborigines made difference to BMI as compared with non-Aborigines and North-Aborigines.

Calcification in malignant lymphoma before treatment is rare. Here we report a case of low grade non-Hodgkin lymphoma of sclerosing type presenting as a retroperitoneal calcified mass. The calcification was demonstrated with various imaging modalities, including conventional radiographs, sonography, computed tomography (CT) and magnetic resonance (MR) imaging. This case and other isolated reports show that radiographical examinations may, rarely, reveal calcification in lymphoma prior to treatment.

In this study, the genetic variation of eight dengue-1 strains isolated in Taiwan from 1987 to 1992 (including two imported strains) were studied. A fragment of 490 nucleotides from the E/NS1 junction was amplified and studied by reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) and vector cloning. By comparing the nucleotide sequences of these strains, it was found that local strains in Taiwan shared geographic similarity. The nucleotide differences among local strains were less (0.61% to 2.24%) than the differences between imported strains and other strains (2.04% to 4.29%). The differences of nucleotide sequences between local strains and the prototype remain constant (5.10%-5.29%). However, the differences in nucleotide sequences between imported strains and the prototype ranged from 3.89% to 7.14%. Since the point mutations occurred in the wobble position of the codon, only conserved changes resulted in the amino acid among the isolates.

Shoulder subluxation has been recognized as a major and frequent complication in patients with hemiplegia. It may worsen and may be associated with shoulder and extremity pain, nerve damage, and interfere with functional activities. The overall goal of this study was to examine the significant predictors of shoulder subluxation in stroke patients and to suggest a way of early prevention and management of hemiplegic shoulder subluxation. A retrospective study was performed and backward stepwise logistic regression analysis was used to analyze the available collected data. The result showed that significant predictors of hemiplegic shoulder subluxation were Brunnstrom's arm motor stage (beta = -2.480, the Wald statistic = 10.03, p = 0.0015) and arm sensory (tactile) status (beta = 1.0283, the Wald statistic = 3.93, p = 0.0474). This study supports that sensory (tactile) impairment may be a precipitating factor for hemiplegic shoulder subluxation and it may highlight the importance of both motor and sensory preventive strategies in early prevention and management of shoulder subluxation. The preventive strategies for shoulder subluxation during the acute/flaccid phase of neural recovery are also discussed in this study.