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Effectively incorporating selected multimedia content into medical publications.

Until fairly recently, medical publications have been handicapped by being restricted to non-electronic formats, effectively preventing the dissemination of complex audiovisual and three-dimensional data. However, authors and readers could significantly profit from advances in electronic publishing that permit the inclusion of multimedia content directly into an article.

For the first time, the de facto gold standard for scientific publishing, the portable document format (PDF), is used here as a platform to embed a video and an audio sequence of patient data into a publication. Fully interactive three-dimensional models of a face and a schematic representation of a human brain are also part of this publication. We discuss the potential of this approach and its impact on the communication of scientific medical data, particularly with regard to electronic and open access publications.

Finally, we emphasise how medical teaching can benefit from this new tool and comment on the future of medical publishing.

Antioxidant status, C-reactive protein and iron status in patients with pulmonary tuberculosis.

The objective of this study was to evaluate the influence of acute pulmonary tuberculosis and the effect of drug therapy on markers of oxidative stress (malondialdehyde [MDA] and total antioxidant status [TAS]), C-reactive protein (CRP) and iron body status indices.

The impact of asthma and COPD in sub-Saharan Africa.

Many countries in sub-Saharan Africa have the highest risk of developing chronic diseases and are the least able to cope with them. AIM: To assess the current knowledge of the prevalence and impact of asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) in sub- Saharan Africa.

METHODS: A literature search was conducted using Medline (1995-2010) and Google Scholar.

RESULTS: Eleven studies of the prevalence of asthma in sub-Saharan Africa were identified, all of which showed a consistent increase, particularly in urban regions. The data on asthma show a wide variation (5.7-20.3%), with the highest prevalence in 'westernised' urban areas. Only two studies of the prevalence of COPD in sub-Saharan Africa have been performed. Nevertheless, COPD has become an increasing health problem in sub-Saharan Africa due to tobacco smoking and exposure to biomass fuels. In most countries of sub-Saharan Africa, 90% of the rural households depend on biomass fuel for cooking and heating, affecting young children (acute lower respiratory infections) and women (COPD). This is the cause of significant mortality and morbidity in the region.

CONCLUSIONS: Asthma and COPD in sub-Saharan Africa are under-recognised, under-diagnosed, under-treated, and insufficiently prevented. A major priority is to increase the awareness of asthma and COPD and their risk factors, particularly the damage caused by biomass fuel. Surveys are needed to provide local healthcare workers with the possibility of controlling asthma and COPD.

Nomenclature and classification of vasculitis: lessons learned from granulomatosis with polyangiitis (Wegener's granulomatosis).

Names influence how something is perceived. Diagnostic terms (diagnoses) are the names of diseases that are usually derived either from some distinctive characteristic of the disease or include an eponym recognizing someone who elucidated the disease. No matter how logical and appropriate a name may be, if it is not usable and used it is of no lasting value.

This brief commentary focuses on the nomenclature of systemic vasculitides, and uses as a prime example Wegener's granulomatosis, which has been renamed recently 'granulomatosis with polyangiitis', in part because of concerns about the suitability of Friedrich Wegener as the source of an eponym. The most distinctive pathological feature of Wegener's granulomatosis is multi-focal necrotizing inflammation that has long been called granulomatosis. The systemic variant of Wegener's granulomatosis also is characterized by inflammation in many different vessels or different types, i.e. polyangiitis. Thus, granulomatosis with polyangiitis is a very appropriate alternative term for Wegener's granulomatosis. This term also is in accord with the name for a closely related vasculitis, i.e. microscopic polyangiitis. Terms that indicate aetiology and pathogenesis, when known, are useful to include in names for diseases (diagnoses). Anti-neutrophil cytoplasmic autoantibodies specific for myeloperoxidase (MPO-ANCA) or proteinase 3 (PR3-ANCA) are implicated in the cause of granulomatosis with polyangiitis and thus also should be specified in the diagnosis (e.g. PR3-ANCA-positive granulomatosis with polyangiitis or MPO-ANCA-positive microscopic polyangiitis).

As our understanding of the clinical manifestations, pathogenesis and aetiology of vasculitides change over time, the names and approaches for diagnosing these diseases will change accordingly.

Chest radiography patterns in 75 adolescents with vertically-acquired human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection.

To evaluate lung disease on chest radiography (CR), the relative frequency of CR abnormalities, and their clinical correlates in adolescents with vertically-acquired human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection.

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