Home follow-up of early- and mid-stage Alzheimer's patients.

The study is carried out as an action research to investigate the effect of nursing interventions during home visits to early- and mid-stage Alzheimer's patients problems and the anxiety and depression levels. The study was realized as one initial visit, six weekly visits and another visit 1 month later in 40 early- and mid-stage Alzheimer's patients who met the study criterion and accepted to join the study presenting at a Turkish university hospital. The data were collected using the Alzheimer's Patient Data Collection Form, Cornell Scale for Depression in Dementia and Spielberg's State-Trait Anxiety Inventory. We found a statistically significant decrease in patient problems compared to the initial with nursing interventions administered during home visits during the study (P < 0.05). However, the follow-up visit 1 month after the weekly visits did not show persistence of this decrease in problems and some problems were found to have increased. There was a statistically significant decrease in the mean depression and situational and continuous anxiety scores of the patients at the end of the follow-up compared to the initial period with the nursing interventions administered during the follow-ups (P < 0.05). According to these results, it is recommended that continuous programmes for home care should be developed for Alzheimer's patients in Turkey.

Association between emotional and behavioral problems and metabolic control in children and adolescents with Type 1 diabetes.

OBJECTIVE: We aimed to investigate the differences in emotional and behavioral problems and to explore the association between the level of psychiatric problems and the metabolic control in Type 1 diabetes. METHODS: The children with Type 1 diabetes (no.=42) and the "healthy" control group (no.=42), their parents and endocrinology specialist completed the forms prepared for the study. The parents completed the Child Behavioral Checklist (CBCL/4- 18). RESULTS: The groups had significant differences in CBCL activities (p<0.001), social competence (p<0.001), total competences (p<0.001), withdrawal (p=0.036), anxiety/depression (p=0.033), social problems (p=0.009), and aggressive behavior (p=0.04) scores. We did not find significant differences in CBCL scores between the groups with good, moderate and bad metabolic control (p>0.05). DISCUSSION: The parents of children with Type 1 diabetes reported emotional and behavioral problems significantly more. We did not find any significant association between the level of metabolic control and the emotional and behavioral problems.

The effects of fronto-parieto-squamosal suture fusion on cranial growth: an experimental study.

Craniosynostoses have been known for at least 20 centuries, but their etiopathogeneses are still unclear. There are three main theories to explain the etiology of craniosynostosis, Moss's theory being the most popular. According to Moss, the development of the neurocranial form is viewed as an integration of the growth of the skull base, the calvarial bones, the meninges, and the enclosed brain. Experimental studies, however, are generally focused on cranial vault suture synostosis. This study aims to demonstrate the effects of cranial base synostosis by performing fronto-parieto-squamosal suture fusion. This fusion affected the whole cranial configuration. These effects were more prominent closer to the cranial vault, increasing at the anterior facial height and the lower facial length, reflected by ventral dislocation of the total face, and increasing of the kyphosis at the cranial base. It has also been demonstrated that synostosis of a junction point near the cranial base affects the vault and the base simultaneously. Any approach that tries to treat the cause, and not the symptom, of synostosis must, then, be based on an understanding of how cranial growth occurs and of how sutural growth processes are related to the totality of cranial growth.