A defensive alliance in a graph G = (V,E) is a set of vertices S ⊆ V satisfying the condition that for every vertex v ∈ S, the number of neighbors v has in S plus one (counting v) is at least as large as the number of neighbors it has in V − S. Because of such an alliance, the vertices in S, agreeing to mutually support each other, have the strength of numbers to be able to defend themselves fr...

In 1998 a lawyer working for the Dutch consumer organisation, Consumentenbond, suggested that hospitals, like hotels, should be classified according to the quality of service they provide. For the establishment of such a register it would of course be necessary to determine various parameters, including the incidence of complications occurring in each hospital. It did not take long before this ...

The Secretary of the British Medical Association rejects the arguments advanced in two preceding articles in the same Journal issue, one by legal practitioners Diana and Malcolm Brahams and the other by law student Peter Ferguson, both of which favor legislation to govern decisions on the withholding of treatment from defective newborns. Havard criticizes the draft bill proposed by the Brahams...

Introduction: Breast cancer is one of the most common types of cancer in women with an increasing outbreak. The present study aimed to investigate the relationship between defensive styles and Islamic quality of life (QoL) with death obsession in women with breast cancer. Methods: This research was a correlational study. The statistical population of the study included 220 female patients with...

We report the case of a 76-year-old patient who developed chronic right heart failure 1 year after left ventricular assist device implantation due to ischemic cardiomyopathy. Initial recompensation was achieved through dobutamin, sildenafil, and levosimendan treatment. Yet, discharge was successful only after the off-label use of the oral calcium sensitizer pimobendan. Ten months after discharg...

BACKGROUND Although combined oral and nasal steroid therapy is widely used in nasal polyposis, a subset of patients show an unfavorable therapeutic outcome. This study aimed to evaluate whether oral prednisolone produces any additive effects on subsequent nasal steroid therapy and to evaluate if any clinical variables can predict therapeutic outcome. METHODS Using a 3:2 randomization ratio, ...

BACKGROUND Inhaled corticosteroids are not as effective as oral corticosteroids in school-aged children with severe acute asthma. It is uncertain how inhaled corticosteroids compare with oral corticosteroids in mild to moderate exacerbations. PRIMARY OBJECTIVE The purpose of this work was to determine whether there is a significant difference in the percentage of predicted forced expiratory v...

PRINCIPLES Several studies have shown that patients' inappropriate knowledge about their medication is associated with non-adherence. The aim of this study was to assess immunocompromised inpatient knowledge of their oral drug treatment on discharge. METHODS We conducted a single-centre, prospective, cross-sectional study from July to November 2008 in the Immunology unit of a university-based...

INTRODUCTION The usefulness of qualitative or quantitative volumetric magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in early detection of brain structural changes and prediction of adverse outcomes in neonatal illnesses warrants further investigation. Our aim was to correlate certain brain injuries and the brain volume of feeding-related cortical and subcortical regions with feeding method at discharge amon...