Sharing information and experiences about maternal and child health data sets through the World Wide Web.

Maternal and child health programs face increasing requirements to collect, analyze, and disseminate information on current health status and needs of population groups. Data sets vary according to data elements. Population groups, organizational and agency boundaries, and other situation-specific characteristics. Until recently, the major venue for sharing information about various dimensions of data sets has been informal, often word-of-mouth, communications. The World Wide Web provides an opportunity to replace these slow and incomplete information exchanges with instant and comprehensive ones. This article outlines the development of a web site that includes descriptive information about 12 MCH data sets.

Vibrational spectroscopic study of tetracalcium phosphate in pure polycrystalline form and as a constituent of a self-setting bone cement.

Polycrystalline tetracalcium phosphate (TTCP), a material of considerable interest for human implantation due to its similarity to hydroxyapatite, was studied by means of Raman and FT-IR spectroscopy. The spectra were interpreted on the basis of group theoretical considerations. In addition, the setting reaction of a calcium phosphate cement (CPC) consisting of an equimolar mixture of TTCP and dicalcium phosphate (DCPA) was investigated by Raman spectroscopy. The band of the totally symmetric phosphate mode v1 of TTCP showed marked factor group splittings. The splitting components arose at coincident wave numbers in the IR and Raman spectra. This observation was in accordance with space group P2(1) (factor group C2(2), Z = 4). The characteristic splitting of v1 allowed the setting reaction of CPC to hydroxyapatite to be followed. According to the Raman spectroscopic results, considerable amounts of TTCP must be present at the sample surface after 24 h of setting in an aqueous environment.