It's About Time: Examining the Effect of Interviewer-Quoted Survey Completion Time Estimates on Survey Efficiency.

Declining response rates may introduce bias into survey results and increase costs. Two national surveys, the National Immunization Survey (NIS) and the NIS-Teen, were used to study the impact of survey length, as stated by the interviewer, and inclusion of a topic of interest to respondents on response rates. The two studies included comparisons of the standard survey instruments to revised, condensed instruments.

Randomized control trial for evaluation of a hands-free pointer for surgical instruction during laparoscopic cholecystectomy.

Introduction: Training surgeons in minimally invasive surgery (MIS) requires surgical residents to operate under the direction of a consultant. The inability of the instructing surgeon to point at the laparoscopic monitor without releasing the instruments remains a barrier to effective instruction. The wireless hands-free surgical pointer (WHaSP) has been developed to aid instruction during MIS.

Murine islet allograft tolerance upon blockade of the B-lymphocyte stimulator, BLyS/BAFF.

Background: Immunologic rejection is a major barrier to successful long-term outcomes in clinical transplantation. The importance of B lymphocytes-and their secretory products, alloantibodies-in the pathogenesis of allograft rejection is accepted. Furthermore, it is now clear that the dominant regulator of peripheral B-cell homeostasis and tolerance is the B-lymphocyte stimulator (BLyS), also referred to as the B-cell activating factor (BAFF).

Is patient-centred care a good thing?

The Problem: Rehabilitation professionals recognize the need to adopt a social as well as a medical model of disability, but the full implications of a social orientation towards disability are less easily accepted. If the physical environment can both produce and alleviate disability, so also can the social environment. If disablement is not to be seen as the problem of one individual then problems in rehabilitation must be 'owned' not solely by a single patient but also by other people implicated in a situation.

CCR5 blockade is well tolerated and induces changes in the tissue distribution of CCR5+ and CD25+ T cells in healthy, SIV-uninfected rhesus macaques.

Background: CCR5 is a main co-receptor for HIV, but also homes lymphocytes to sites of inflammation. We hypothesized that inhibition of CCR5 signaling would reduce HIV-associated chronic immune activation.

Methods: To test this hypothesis, we administered an antagonistic anti-CCR5 monoclonal antibody (HGS101) to five uninfected rhesus macaques (RMs) and monitored lymphocyte dynamics in blood and tissue.

On doing nothing: descriptions of sleep, fatigue, and motivation in encephalitis lethargica.

Epidemics of encephalitis lethargica (EL), from 1917 to the 1930s, are an important milestone in the history of movement disorders. Today, the two best-known features of EL are somnolence and parkinsonism but the full clinical picture was variable and complex. States of wakeful inactivity--as opposed to drowsiness--were often described both in the acute and postacute stages and were referred to in the EL literature as "lethargy" or "torpor.

Using systemic approaches, methods and techniques in rehabilitation medicine.

This series of articles for rehabilitation in practice aims to cover a knowledge element of the rehabilitation medicine curriculum. Nevertheless they are intended to be of interest to a multidisciplinary audience. The competency addressed in this article is 'The trainee demonstrates a knowledge of benefits and limitations of counselling approaches, specifically in this article systemic family therapy.

B-cell homeostasis requires complementary CD22 and BLyS/BR3 survival signals.

Peripheral B-cell numbers are tightly regulated by homeostatic mechanisms that influence the transitional and mature B-cell compartments and dictate the size and clonotypic diversity of the B-cell repertoire. B-lymphocyte stimulator (BLyS, a trademark of Human Genome Sciences, Inc.) plays a key role in regulating peripheral B-cell homeostasis.

B lymphocyte stimulator expression in pediatric systemic lupus erythematosus and juvenile idiopathic arthritis patients.

Objective: To assess the expression of B lymphocyte stimulator (BLyS) in patients with pediatric systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) or juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA).

Methods: Blood samples collected from patients with pediatric SLE (n = 56) and patients with JIA (n = 54) at the beginning and end of a 6-month interval were analyzed for plasma BLyS protein levels by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay and for blood leukocyte full-length BLyS and DeltaBLyS messenger RNA (mRNA) levels by quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction (normalized to 18S expression). Healthy siblings (n = 34) of these patients served as controls.

In vivo BLyS/BAFF neutralization ameliorates islet-directed autoimmunity in nonobese diabetic mice.

B lymphocytes are required for the pathogenesis of autoimmune diabetes in NOD mice. Previous studies established that a lymphopenic transitional (TR) B cell compartment reduces the competitive constraint on the entry of newly emerging TR B cells into the splenic follicle (FO), thereby disrupting a peripheral negative selection checkpoint in NOD mice. Thus, development of clinically feasible immunotherapeutic approaches for restoration of appropriate negative selection is essential for the prevention of anti-islet autoimmunity.

Design features of portable wheelchair ramps and their implications for curb and vehicle access.

This study evaluated a range of portable wheelchair ramps to highlight the effect of different product features on ease of use when wheelchair users climb curbs or access vehicles. Twelve portable ramps were evaluated. Although all the ramps were designed to load powered wheelchairs into motor vehicles, they were manufactured in different designs.

The 'Impact on Participation and Autonomy': acceptability of the English version in a multiple sclerosis outpatient setting.

To elicit the opinion of multiple sclerosis (MS) patients about the acceptability of a newly designed participation questionnaire--the 'Impact on Participation and Autonomy' (IPA), 35 MS outpatients who had completed an English version of the IPA questionnaire (IPA-E) were interviewed. Patients were recruited consecutively from outpatients attending the MS clinic. They were invited to answer 15 short questions during a 20-minute interview after signing a consent form and completing the IPA-E questionnaire.

Neuropsychiatric interpretations of postencephalitic movement disorders.

This study reviews the impact of encephalitis lethargica (EL) on concepts of behaviour and movement during the 1920s and 1930s. Clinicopathological correlations were imprecise but supported the role of subcortical structures in complex patterns of motor behaviour. This possibility challenged the widely assumed hegemony of the cerebral cortex.

BLyS and APRIL form biologically active heterotrimers that are expressed in patients with systemic immune-based rheumatic diseases.

BLyS and APRIL are two members of the TNF superfamily that are secreted by activated myeloid cells and have costimulatory activity on B cells. BLyS and APRIL share two receptors, TACI and BCMA, whereas a third receptor, BAFF-R, specifically binds BLyS. Both BLyS and APRIL have been described as homotrimeric molecules, a feature common to members of the TNF superfamily.