In Tadoma, speech is received by placing a hand on the talker's face and monitoring actions associated with speech production. Our initial research has documented the speech perception, speech ...production, and linguistic abilities of deaf-blind individuals highly trained in Tadoma. This research has demonstrated that good speech reception can be achieved through the tactile sense: Performance is roughly equivalent to that of normals listening in noise or babble with a signal-to-noise ratio in the range 0-6 dB. It appears that the principal cues employed are lip movement, jaw movement, oral airflow, and laryngeal vibration, and that the errors which occur are caused primarily by inadequate information on tongue position. Our current research includes (1) learning of Tadoma by normal subjects with simulated deafness and blindness, (2) augmenting Tadoma with a supplemental tactile display of tongue position, and (3) developing a synthetic Tadoma system in which signals recorded from a talker's face are used to drive an artificial face. This research is expected to increase our understanding of Tadoma and its relation to other tactile communication methods, show that performance obtained through Tadoma does not represent the ultimate limits of the tactile sense, and provide a research tool for studying transformations of Tadoma.
Nutritional data compiled during the Growth Failure in Children with Renal Diseases Clinical Trial were analyzed to determine the relationship between the dietary intake of divalent minerals and ...sodium, nutritional status, and serum calcium, phosphorus, and parathyroid hormone (PTH) concentrations and blood pressure in black versus white children. One hundred eighteen patients are included in this report; 25 were black (21%) and 93 were white (79%). Although more of the blacks were male, the age distribution, midarm circumference, midarm muscle circumference, blood pressure, and serum calcium, phosphorus, and PTH concentrations were comparable in the two groups. Phosphorus intake was within the recommended daily allowance in both groups; in contrast, calcium intake was inadequate in all patients: 81% of the recommended daily allowance in whites, and 74% in blacks. Sixteen children were noted to be hypertensive during the observation period; six patients were receiving a variety of antihypertensive medications, including diuretics in two children. Linear regression analysis revealed that systolic and diastolic blood pressures were directly related to calcium and phosphorus intake in black patients. In white children, only dietary phosphorus intake and diastolic blood pressure were directly related. There was no relationship between sodium intake or GFR and blood pressure in the white or black children. PTH levels were directly correlated with systolic and diastolic blood pressure in all children. The correlations between PTH and blood pressure were stronger in white versus black patients.
BACKGROUND The National Eye Institute Visual Function Questionnaire (NEI-VFQ) measures vision-targeted quality of life, but it is unclear whether it is sensitive to changes within individuals over ...time. OBJECTIVE To determine the responsiveness of the NEI-VFQ to "within-individual" changes in visual acuity in patients who had subfoveal choroidal neovascularization in at least one eye secondary to age-related macular degeneration, ocular histoplasmosis syndrome, or idiopathic causes, and who participated in randomized trials of submacular surgery. METHODS Trained telephone interviewers administered the NEI-VFQ as part of annual follow-up data collection for pilot trials and larger clinical trials of submacular surgery. Best-corrected visual acuity was measured by local vision examiners at 12 months after enrollment and, typically, by central "traveling" vision examiners at 24 months after enrollment. Changes in visual acuity and NEI-VFQ scores from 12 to 24 months were analyzed using linear regression methods. RESULTS Two-hundred eighteen patients had both interviews and visual acuity measurements at 12 and 24 months after enrollment. Changes in the overall NEI-VFQ score and in 9 of the subscales (near activities, dependency, driving, role difficulties, distance activities, mental health, general vision, peripheral vision, and social functioning) were related to changes in visual acuity of the better-seeing eye based on linear regression analysis (P<.05). In our analysis, a 3-line decrease in the visual acuity of the better-seeing eye was associated with 3.6- to 16.2-point decreases in the overall NEI-VFQ score and 9 subscale scores. CONCLUSIONS Most of the NEI-VFQ subscales were responsive to changes in the visual acuity of the better-seeing eye over a 12-month interval in this patient population. Thus, the NEI-VFQ can be used to measure change in vision-targeted quality of life over time to augment clinical measurements of visual acuity.Arch Ophthalmol.2003;121:531-539
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Left ventricular aneurysm has been associated with increased mortality rates. The Cardiac Arrhythmia Suppression Trial (CAST) database was used prospectively to assess (1) the prognostic significance ...of left ventricular (LV) aneurysm after myocardial infarction on mortality rates and (2) the relation of LV aneurysm to ventricular arrhythmias and their suppressibility. All patients in the CAST study were enrolled after myocardial infarction. They had > or = 6 ventricular premature depolarizations (VPDs) per hour and ejection fraction < or = 55%; they were enrolled in the study an average of 96 days after the index myocardial infarction. Of 2494 patients with wall motion data, 164 had LV aneurysm, 600 had only dyskinesis, 913 had only akinesis, and 817 had none of these. Radionuclide scan was used in 39%, two-dimensional echocardiography in 30%, and LV angiogram in 31%. Baseline VPDs and nonsustained ventricular tachycardia were similar in all groups. LV aneurysm patients were more frequently eliminated during open-label titration. The incidence of sustained VT during follow-up was only 2.8% for aneurysm patients, a rate that was similar to the other groups. Patients with LV aneurysm had significantly lower survival rates (82% vs 91%) at 16 months after study entry than those without these wall motion abnormalities (p < 0.005). When survival rates were adjusted for ejection fraction there was still a moderately large hazard ratio (1.34) of LV aneurysm that was not statistically significant (p = 0.18). We conclude that (1) the presence of LV aneurysm does not independently worsen prognosis, and (2) older concepts of LV aneurysm and ventricular arrhythmias must be reevaluated.
Rates of fecal pellet production in Mediomastus ambiseta (Hartman), a capitellid polychaete, were determined by collecting and counting the number of pellets deposited on the sediment surface at ...three censusing intervals (6, 12 and 24 hours). The field-collected worms were maintained in culture in a dark incubator at near-ambient water temperature (20°C) for at least a month prior to the study. Rates of pellet production exhibited a dramatic and repeatable cycle over the course of the day. Pellet production by worms censused at 6-hour intervals was highest from 2400 to 0600 (Daylight Savings Time) and decreased by about a factor of four from 0600 to 1800; almost no pellets were produced between 1800 and 2400. From these experiments it is not possible to determine if the cycle is an innate, programmed behavior (e.g. a circadian rhythm) or a response to some cyclically occurring external stimulus. Whether genetically or externally controlled, the cyclemay be for avoiding predation by a twilight- or night-active predator or it may be due to physiological constraints.
The metabolism of the bactericide N-(2,3-dichlorophenyl)-3,4,5,6-tetrachlorophthalamic acid, techlofthalam, has been studied, under controlled conditions, in paddy soil and after application to rice ...plants by using the super(14)C-labeled compound. Reductive dechlorination of the tetrachlorophthalamic acid moiety was shown to be the major degradative pathway in paddy soil stored in laboratory flasks. Monodechlorinated products were detected after 2 weeks of incubation, and after 32 weeks more than 90% of the extractable radioactivity, equivalent to about 30% of the applied radioactivity, was associated with two or possibly more monodechlorinated products. Nine percent of the applied radioactivity was converted to super(14)CO sub(2) during 32 weeks. The imide of techlofthalam was a minor metabolite in paddy soil but was the major transformation product detected in rice leaves treated with ( super(14)C)techlofthalam.
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