No abstract

SUMMARYThe Guy's/Age Concern Home Support Project is a prospective controlled intervention study of the effect of clientcentred home support for elderly people with dementia. Control subjects who were in institutions at six months follow-up were significantly more depressed and physically disabled at referral than those who remained at home. Among those receiving additional home support, however, there was no difference between the depression and disability scores at referral of those who were institutionalized and those who remained at home at follow-up. These results suggest that the high prevalence of depression and physical disability in the institutionalized elderly is due to preferential selection into institutions, and that this process is prevented by providing this form of domiciliary support.

Polymeric controlled delivery systems hold great promise in the field of modern medicine. Such technology has already been converted into commercially viable products in a myriad of fields. Chemotherapy is an example of such an area where constant efficacious levels of drug can greatly enhance clinical outcomes. The key to designing such therapies is the preparation of the proper delivery system. To this end, a series of bioresorbable polyether-ester-carbonate copolymers have been developed, which when combined with a diluent, are capable injection into the body and consistently forming a drug delivery depot. The study delineated here aimed at producing a more effective treatment of a common drug, paclitaxel, using the polymeric carrier. The polymer carrier system exhibited controlled release of paclitaxel both in vitro and in vivo. Drug concentrations were analyzed by high performance liquid chromatography and apoptotic activity was confirmed through flow cytometry. Relevant success was exhibited by the regression of tumor size following a multiple injection treatment regimen in a murine xenograft model. This multiple injection treatment shows promising results when compared to the traditional paclitaxel paradigm of a single injection for a period of 3 weeks.