The leisure participation of clients with a dual diagnosis

People with a dual diagnosis experience disruption in carrying out their daily occupations. This article describes a study in which an occupational therapist explored the leisure participation of clients with a dual diagnosis. In-depth, semi-structured interviews were conducted with four outpatients from an alcohol and drug rehabilitation programme. Inductive analysis of the informants’ interviews identified two main themes: leisure as part of the recovery process and the barriers to leisure participation. This study provides support for the need to understand the leisure occupations of the clients with whom occupational therapists work. Further research is required to examine the interventions that assist clients with a dual diagnosis to develop meaningful leisure activities.

The leisure satisfaction of people with psychiatric disabilities

Leisure plays a dynamic role in peoples' lives and it would be useful to know how the satisfaction gained from leisure choices relates to personal and social adjustment, mental health and life satisfaction for people with psychiatric ability. Lloyd et al identify the extent of satisfaction derived from leisure activities for people with a mental illness and determine whether or not a standardized measure of leisure satisfaction can be applied to a population of people with mental illness.

Corneal endothelial response to induced myopia in the chicken

Purpose: To investigate the role of corneal endothelial surface enlargement in the chicken myopia model in inducing corneal endothelial changes. Methods: Lid suture was performed on one eye of 1-day-old cockerels. Five chickens were killed at 1 week, and four chickens killed at each of 3 weeks, 6 weeks, and 10 weeks postnatal. The endothelial morphology was obtained by flat mounting the endothelial surface and the subsequent digitisation. Comparisons were undertaken between the control unsutured eye and the lid-sutured eye endothelium, and between the central endothelial areas compared to the peripheral endothelial areas in both the myopic and the normal corneas. Calculation of the contribution to the endothelial change by hypertrophy and mitosis were calculated using Bahn's formula. Results: Total endothelial surface area increased significantly over time in the myopic model compared to control eyes but the mean cell area of endothelial cells remained the same for both the enlarged myopic endothelial surface area and in the normal controls. Sampling from the central and the peripheral corneal endothelial surface also disclosed no difference. The mean cell area did increase steadily with age but was the same for both normal and myopic corneas. Conclusions: It would appear that there are equal contributions from hypertrophy and mitosis in the myopic group and the normal corneal group with a slightly increasing trend towards mitotic activity in the myopic corneal endothelial layer.

Review of treatment of pterygium in Queensland: 10 years after a primary survey

Purpose: To assess the practices in pterygium removal as a follow-up study to a similar project 10 years ago, in order to compare the current trends with those noted a decade ago. Methods: A survey was sent to all practising ophthalmologists in Queensland (100). Results: Eighty-seven of the 100 ophthalmologists undertook pterygium surgery with no change in indications for removal, grading or anaesthesia compared to 10 years ago. Nearly half of the ophthalmologists varied their surgical technique from eight commonly used methods according to the individual patient. More than half the respondents used a swinging conjunctival flap and 29% used simple excision leaving the area bare for primary pterygia, although nearly one-quarter of the ophthalmologists added adjunctive therapies such as beta irradiation or mitomycin. For recurrent pterygia, one-third of ophthalmologists preferred adjunctive therapies, and 57% used an autoconjunctival transplant. Conclusion: There has been no consistent trend in surgical removal of pterygia with a significant number of primary pterygia still removed using bare scleral closure.

The effect of high-pass filtering on TEOAE in 2-month-old infants

The aim of the present study was to investigate the effect of high-pass filtering on TEOAE obtained from 2-month-old infants as a function of filter cut-off frequency, activity states and pass/fail status of infants. Two experiments were performed. In Experiment 1, 100 2-month-old infants (200 ears) in five activity states (asleep, awake but peaceful, sucking a pacifier, feeding, restless) were tested by use of TEOAE technology. Five different filter conditions were applied to the TEOAE responses post hoc. The filter conditions were set at 781 Hz (default setting), 1.0, 1.2, 1.4 and 1.6 kHz. Results from this experiment showed that TEOAE parameters, such as whole-wave reproducibility (WR) and signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) at 0.8 kHz and 1.6 kHz, changed as a function of the cut-off frequency. The findings suggest that the 1.6 kHz and 1.2 kHz filter conditions are optimal for WR and SNR pass/fail criteria, respectively. Although all infant recordings appeared to benefit from the filtering, infants in the noisy states seemed to benefit the most. In Experiment 2, the high-pass filtering technique was applied to 23 infants (35 ears) who apparently failed the TEOAE tests on initial screening but were subsequently awarded a pass status based on the results from a follow-up auditory brainstem response (ABR) assessment. The findings showed a significant decrease in noise contamination of the TEOAE with a corresponding significant increase in WR. With high-pass filtering at 1.6 kHz, 21/35 ears could be reclassified into the pass category.

Semantic priming in Parkinson's disease: Evidence for delayed spreading activation

Nineteen persons with Parkinson's disease (PD) and 19 matched control participants completed a battery of online lexical decision tasks designed to isolate the automatic and attentional aspects of semantic activation within the semantic priming paradigm. Results highlighted key processing abnormalities in PD. Specifically, persons with PD exhibited a delayed time course of semantic activation. In addition, results suggest that experimental participants were unable to implicitly process prime information and, therefore, failed to engage strategic processing mechanisms in response to manipulations of the relatedness proportion. Results are discussed in terms of the 'Gain/Decay' hypothesis (Milberg, McGlinchey-Berroth, Duncan, & Higgins, 1999) and the dopaminergic modulation of signal to noise ratios in semantic networks.

Adult mouse intrinsic laryngeal muscles express high levels of the myogenic regulatory factor, MYF-5

The intrinsic laryngeal muscles display unique structural and functional characteristics that distinguish them from the skeletal muscle of the trunk and limbs. These features include relatively small muscle fibers, super-fast contraction speed, and fatigue resistance. The molecular basis of tissue-specific functions and other characteristics is differential gene expression. Accordingly, we have investigated the molecular basis of the functional specialization of the intrinsic laryngeal muscles by examining the expression of two key genes in the larynx, known to be important for skeletal muscle development and function: (a) the muscle regulatory factor, Myf-5, and (b) the superfast-contracting myosin heavy chain (EO-MyHC). We have found that the adult thyroarytenoid muscles express much higher levels of both Myf-5 and EO-MyHC messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA), compared to lower hindlimb skeletal muscle where Myf-5 mRNA levels are very low and EO-MyHC is not detectable. These findings suggest that the unique functional characteristics of the intrinsic laryngeal muscles may be based in laryngeal muscle-specific gene expression directed by a unique combination of muscle regulatory factors. Such laryngeal muscle-specific genes may allow the future development of new treatments for laryngeal muscle dysfunction.

Articulatory dysfunction in multiple sclerosis: An electropalatographic study

Dysfunction of the articulatory subsystem (i.c.. the lips, tongue, and jaw) has bccn identified as a major contributor to the reduction in speech intelligibility experienced by a high proportion of people with multiple sclerosis (MS). In particular. consonant imprecision has been reported to be the articulatory deficit that contributes most to variations in overall intelligibility of MS speakers. Electropalatography(EPG) IS an instrurncntal technique that visually documents the location and timing of tongue-topalatc contacts during speech. Although such a technique would be valuablc in objectively assessing the articulatory disturbances exhibited by individuals with dysarthria ia motor speech disorder) associated with MS, to-date no such study ha< been reported. The aim of the present study was to use EPG to assess tongue-to-palate contact patterns and articulatory timing in patients with dysarthria associated with MS. A dysarthric participant with a diagnosis of definite MS was fitted with an acrylic EPG palate (Reading EPG.?) and asked to read aloud a list of single syllable words which contained lingual consonants in the word-initial position and in consonant clusters. Each mord was repeated five times. The EPG palate was specifically moulded to tit the participant's hard palate and contained 62 electrodes that detected the tongue contacts. A non-neurologically impaired participant matched for age and sex servcd as a control. The results of the study revealed that the tongue-to-palate contacts produced by the participant with MS varied from those produced by the control in a number of ways in regard to spatial configurations and timing characteristics exhibited. The rcsults arc discussed in relation to the neuropathophysiological effects of MS on speech production. The potcntial use of EPG in programs for treating speech disorders associated with MS will be highlightcd.

Dynamic assessment of tongue function in children with dysarthria associated with acquired brain injury using electromagnetic articulography

The study to be presented is the first to use a new physiological device, the electromagnetic articulograph, to assess articulatory dysfunction in children with acquired brain injury. Two children with dysarthria subsequent to acquired brain injury participated in the study. One child, a female aged 12 years 9 months exhibited a mild-moderate ataxic dysarthria following traumatic head injury while the other, a male aged 13 years 10 months, demonstrated a moderate-severe flaccid-ataxic dysarthria also following traumatic head injury. The speed and accuracy of their tongue movements was assessed using the Carstens AG100 electromagnetic articulograph. Movement trajectories together with a range of quantitative kinematic parameters were estimated during performance of ten repetitions of the lingual consonants /t, s, k/ and consonant cluster /kl/ in the word initial position of single syllable words. A group of ten non-neurologically impaired children served as controls. Examination of the kinematic parameters, including movement trajectories, velocity, acceleration, deceleration, distance travelled and duration of movement, revealed differences in the speed and accuracy of the tongue movements in both children with acquired brain injury compared to those produced by the non-neurologically impaired controls. The results are discussed in relation to contemporary theories of the effects of acquired brain injury on neuromuscular function. The implications of the findings for the treatment of articulatory dysfunction in children with motor speech disorders associated with acquired brain injury are highlighted.