Background: Fatigue symptoms are often found in cancer patients. One test to assess fatigue is the Multidimensional Fatigue Inventory (MFI-20). It has been successfully applied to specific groups of cancer patients. However, until now population-based norm values are missing. Methods: We conducted an investigation on a representative sample of the adult German population, which comprised 2,037 subjects aged 14–92 years. Results: The reliability of the 5 MFI-20 subscales (general fatigue, physical fatigue, reduced activity, reduced motivation, and mental fatigue) is satisfying. The correlations between MFI-20 subscales and the fatigue scale of the quality-of-life questionnaire EORTC indicate convergent validity. As an important result we found that all subscales of the MFI-20 showed a clear and nearly linear dependency on age with higher fatigue values for older subjects (p < 0.0001). Females as compared with males are characterized by higher mean values in all MFI-20 subscales (p < 0.001). Conclusions: The results show that it is necessary to take into account age and sex when different groups of cancer patients have to be compared.

The aim of this study was to determine optimal cutoff scores for the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS) when used in evaluating cancer patients in acute care. A total of 689 cancer patients were assessed during their first days of in-patient treatment, using the structured clinical interview for DSM and the HADS. Statistical analysis was performed using ROC curves. A total of 222 patients (32%) had a mental disorder. The area under the curve was the best in the total scale of the HADS, namely 0.73. With a score of X13, it is possible to detect 76% of the cases with a specificity of .60, whereas 95% of the cases can be detected with a score of X6 (specificity 0.21). With scores of X16 and X22, recommended by the test authors for primary care, only 59 and 30% of the comorbid cancer patients are indicated. Lower HADS cutoff scores when preferable when evaluating cancer patients than are recommended for use in primary care. When using HADS in clinical practice and epidemiological studies, it is important to decide whether, for the task at hand, high detection rates of affected patients or low misclassification rates are more important.

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We present a new class of micro lasers based on nanoporous molecular sieve host-guest systems. Organic dye guest molecules of 1-ethyl-4-[4-( p-dimethylaminophenyl)-1,3-butadienyl]-pyridinium Perchlorat were inserted into the 0.73-nm-wide channel pores of a zeolite AlPO₄-5 host. The zeolitic microcrystal compounds were hydrothermally synthesized according to a particular host-guest chemical process. The dye molecules are found not only to be aligned along the host channel axis, but to be oriented as well. Single mode laser emission at 687nm was obtained from a whispering gallery mode oscillating in a 8-μm-diameter monolithic microresonator, in which the field is confined by total internal reflection at the natural hexagonal boundaries inside the zeolitic microcrystals