A multiple choice test with nine statistical questions was sent to a random sample of Danish doctors to assess their knowledge of elementary statistical expressions (SD, SE, p less than 0.05, p greater than 0.05 and r). One hundred and forty eight (59 per cent) of 250 doctors answered the questions. The test was also completed by 97 participants in postgraduate courses in research methods, mainly junior hospital doctors. The median number of correct answers was 2.4 in the random sample and 4.0 in the other sample of doctors. It is concluded that the statistical knowledge of most doctors is so limited that they cannot be expected to draw the right conclusions from those statistical analyses which are found in papers in medical journals. Sixty-five per cent of the doctors in the random sample stated that it is very important that this problem is raised.
Evidence of depression and anxiety is commonly found in patients with TLE. Depression improves not because of epilepsy surgery per se, but because of improved seizure control. This is more commonly achieved by surgery than medical treatment. The results are consistent with the hypothesis that depression in TLE is caused by pathological epileptic activity rather than a fixed structural defect.
Clinical effects at three different serum levels of sodium valproate (VPA) were compared in a triple-blind, multiple crossover trial comprising 13 epileptic inpatients. Patients were selected regardless of seizure type, and all were in concomitant antiepileptic treatment, which was kept constant throughout the study. A significant relationship between the decrease in number of seizures and increasing VPA serum level was demonstrated. The relationship between VPA dose and serum level was curvilinear. Statistical evaluation of patients by seizure type in relation to clinical effect of VPA was only possible for secondary generalized seizures. Between phenytoin, phenobarbital, and carbamazepine and the different VPA serum levels no interactions could be demonstrated. Recorded side effects were always mild and transient. No obvious correlation between side effects and VPA serum level was established.
Enteroglucagon concentration in peripheral blood was determined before and after a test meal in 24 morbidly obese patients. Eighteen had jejunoileal bypass, 6 with a 3:1 and 12 with a 1:3 jejunoileal ratio of the functioning segment, and 6 were unoperated. All three groups exhibited an increment of enteroglucagon concentration after the meal. Both the fasting values and the postprandial integrated increments were higher in operated patients than in unoperated patients and higher after 1:3 bypass than after 3:1 bypass. The findings agree with the hypothesis that enteroglucagon secretion is stimulated by exposure of the lower bowel to upper-bowel content, and that the effect of enteroglucagon is, as seen after bypass operation, stimulation of growth and reduction of motility of the intestine.
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