Concurrent 2009 pandemic influenza A (H1N1) virus infection in ferrets and in a community in Pennsylvania.

We report a fall 2010 cluster of pandemic influenza A/H1N1 (pH1N1) infections in pet ferrets in Lehigh Valley region of Pennsylvania. The ferrets were associated with one pet shop. The influenza cluster occurred during a period when the existing human surveillance systems had identified little to no pH1N1 in humans in the Lehigh Valley, and there were no routine influenza surveillance systems for exotic pets. The index case was a 2.5-month-old neutered male ferret that was presented to a veterinary clinic with severe influenza-like illness (ILI). In response to laboratory notification of a positive influenza test result, and upon request from the Pennsylvania Department of Health (PADOH), the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture (PDA) conducted an investigation to identify other ill ferrets and to identify the source and extent of infection. PDA notified the PADOH of the pH1N1 infection in the ferrets, leading to enhanced human surveillance and the detection of pH1N1 human infections in the surrounding community. Five additional ferrets with ILI linked to the pet shop were identified. This simultaneous outbreak of ferret and human pH1N1 demonstrates the important link between animal health and public health and highlights the potential use of veterinary clinics for sentinel surveillance of diseases shared between animals and humans.

Demographically corrected norms for the California Verbal Learning Test.

The California Verbal Learning Test (CVLT) is designed to quantify components of verbal learning, retention and retrieval. The present study used multiple regression analyses to correct for demographic characteristics on CVLT performance measures. There were 906 subjects, of whom 549 were Caucasians (61%) and 357 were African Americans (39%). Age, education, ethnicity, and gender were found to be significant predictors of performance on several CVLT indices, including Total Words Recalled, Trial 1, Trial 5, List B, Short Delay Free Recall (SDFR), and Long Delay Free Recall (LDFR). Demographically corrected T-scores were calculated for a base sample of 672 subjects and cross-validated on 234 separate subjects. Tables and regression equations are offered to convert raw scores into T-scores corrected for age, gender, education, and ethnicity. Demographically corrected Recognition Discriminability cutoff scores were calculated for age and education levels. In order to provide some indices of important memory processes, we also computed indices of retrieval, Short-Delay forgetting and Long-Delay forgetting and present normative information for them.

Follicular mucinosis as a presenting sign of acute myeloblastic leukemia.

Follicular mucinosis is often associated with mycosis fungoides and has been rarely observed to occur with other neoplastic and inflammatory conditions. We describe a 60-year-old patient with follicular mucinosis who later developed acute myelogenous leukemia. This is the first reported case of follicular mucinosis as a presenting sign of acute myeloblastic leukemia in the absence of mycosis fungoides or leukemia cutis.

Response difficulty: response rate relation and sex of subjects.

Past research on the relation between response effort and response rate in humans has not considered the effect of subjects' sex. Subjects (22 men and 23 women) were asked to pull a trigger repeatedly when the force required to pull the trigger was varied for each subject at 5, 10, 15, or 20 lb. At the lower force requirements, combined, women made more responses than at the combination of the two higher force requirements. For men, however, this relation was reversed. Possible implications of these findings are discussed.

Physical activity and responses to projective stimuli in neurotic vs. psychotic depression.

Responses to projective material by neurotically and psychotically depressed patients were scored for fluency, movement, and primary process during light physical activity and inactivity. A depression measure was also obtained. Significant positive correlations were found between fluency, movement, and primary process. Movement scores did not increase significantly during physical activity for either group. No significant correlations were found between level of depression and production of movement and primary process. However, primary process, controlled for fluency, increased significantly during physical activity for neurotic, but not for psychotic depressives.

The effect of feeding magnesium-enriched diets on the quality of the albumen of stored eggs.

1. Pullets were given from 1-d-old diets containing 1-6, 4-1, 8-1 and 12-0 g Mg/kg. Only small effects of these diets on live weight, food consumption, egg number, egg weights or egg-shell thickness were observed except at the highest level (12-0 Mg/kg) which caused diarrhoea and an appreciable lowering of the live weight of growing pullets. A further group was given from point-of-lay a diet containing 9-3 g Mg/kg. 2. Eggs laid on 3 consecutive days from each of eighteen hens were collected at intervals of 3 weeks until the birds were 68-5 weeks old. Eggs laid on the 3rd day were used to determine the initial proportion of thick egg-white present and also the concentration of Mg, Ca, Na and K in the thick egg-white. Eggs laid on the 1st and 2nd days were stored at 20 degrees for 20 d to establish the proportion of thick egg-white remaining after storage. 3. With the unsupplemented diet the proportion of residual thick egg-white after storage of eggs for 20 d at 20 degrees was 306, 161 and 305 mg/g total egg-white when the hens were 26-5, 53-5 and 68-5 weeks of age respectively. When the diet containing 9-3 g Mg/kg was given, the proportion of thick egg-white after storage remained approximately 400 mg/g throughout the period of the trial. 4. The mean Mg concentration in the thick egg-white of eggs laid by hens given unsupplemented diets was 5-77 mM. The addition of extra Mg to the diet increased the content of Mg in the thick egg-white, for example when the diet contained 9-3 g Mg/kg the mean concentration rose to 7-69 mM.