OBJECTIVES To describe bottled, filtered, and tap water consumption and fluoride use among pediatric patients; to analyze differences between ethnic and socioeconomic groups; and to describe the frequency of physician-parent discussions regarding water consumption. DESIGN Convenience sample survey. SETTING An urban public health clinic. PARTICIPANTS Parents attending a public health clini...

PURPOSE This article describes the effects of a new intensive dysarthria treatment program (Be Clear) on speech intelligibility in adults with dysarthria secondary to stroke and traumatic brain injury. METHOD A small group-repeated measures research design was used to examine the effects of treatment on the speech of 8 participants with nonprogressive dysarthria. Treatment consisted of a 1-hr...

OBJECTIVES We sought to evaluate methodologies to compare physician-related long-term patient outcomes appropriately. BACKGROUND Evaluation of physicians on the basis of short-term patient outcome is becoming widely practiced. These analyses fail to consider the importance of long-term outcome, and methods appropriate to such an analysis are poorly defined. METHODS All patients undergoing c...

BACKGROUND A survey of newly qualified doctors in the UK in 2000/2001 found that 42% of them felt unprepared for their first year of employment in clinical posts. We report on how UK qualifiers' preparedness has changed since then, and on the impact of course changes upon preparedness. METHODS Postal questionnaires were sent to all doctors who qualified from UK medical schools, in their first...

BACKGROUND The main objective of this study was to test Argus II subjects on three real-world functional vision tasks. DESIGN The study was designed to be randomized and prospective. Testing was conducted in a hospital/research laboratory setting at the various participating centres. PARTICIPANTS Twenty eight Argus II subjects, all profoundly blind, participated in this study. METHODS Sub...

This was a safety study where the hypothesis was that the newer-design CPCS femoral stem would demonstrate similar early clinical results and micromovement to the well-established Exeter stem. Both are collarless, tapered, polished cemented stems, the only difference being a slight lateral to medial taper with the CPCS stem. A total of 34 patients were enrolled in a single-blinded randomised co...

BACKGROUND The implementation of primary healthcare-based screening and advice that is effective in reducing heavy drinking can be enhanced with training. OBJECTIVES Undertaking secondary analysis of the five-country ODHIN study, we test: the extent to which practice, provider and patient characteristics affect the likelihood of patients being screened and advised; the extent to which such ch...

OBJECTIVES To explore the views of a range of stakeholders regarding whether patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs) can be developed to measure key attributes of long-term conditions (LTCs) care in England, and the potential value of a single generic measure. DESIGN Qualitative semistructured interview study, analysed using a framework approach. PARTICIPANTS AND SETTING Interviews with 3...

BACKGROUND There are currently no national measures in England reporting the experiences of people who have been involved with adult safeguarding services following concerns that they may be at risk of abuse or neglect. The Health and Social Care Information Centre (HSCIC) aimed to develop a new adult safeguarding outcome measure (survey) for local authorities (LAs) that could be added to the A...

A preliminary investigation of the efficacy of a group intervention combining a range of psychological approaches and techniques for seizure management in adults with poorly controlled epilepsy. An uncontrolled AB group design was employed. Seven adults with intractable seizures took part in 8, weekly group sessions which included providing information, employed cognitive-behavioural techniques...