Simultaneous in vivo comparison of water-filled and air-filled pressure measurement catheters: Implications for good urodynamic practice.

AIMS: This study aimed to evaluate whether the pressure readings obtained from air-filled catheters (AFCs) are the same as the readings from simultaneously inserted water-filled catheters (WFCs). It also aimed to make any possible recommendations for the use of AFCs to conform to International Continence Society (ICS) Good Urodynamic Practices (GUP). METHODS: Female patients undergoing urodynamic studies in a single center had water-filled and air-filled catheters simultaneously measuring abdominal and intravesical pressure during filling with saline and during voiding. The pressures recorded by each system at each event during the test were compared using paired t-test and Bland-Altman analyses. RESULTS: 62 patients were recruited, of whom 51 had pressures that could be compared during filling, and 23 during voiding. On average, the pressures measured by the two systems were not significantly different during filling and at maximum flow, but the values for a given patient were found to differ by up to 10 cmH2 O. CONCLUSIONS: This study shows that AFCs and WFCs cannot be assumed to register equal values of pressure. It has further shown that even when the pdet readings are compared with their value at the start of a test, a divergence of values of up to 10 cmH2 O remains. If AFCs are used, care must be taken to compensate for any pdet variations that occur during patient movement. Before AFCs are adopted, new normal values for resting pressures need to be developed to allow good quality AFC pressure readings to be made. Neurourol. Urodynam. 35:926-933, 2016. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Investigations on Babesia motasi isolated from Wales.

A number of observations were carried out on the effect of the newly isolated parasite, Babesia motasi (Wales) on intact and splenectomised sheep and on a splenectomised goat. The parasite was not pathogenic for intact animals but caused fever and anaemia in splenectomised ones. B motasi (Wales) was also studied morphologically, morphometrically and serologically. The common form of the parasite was seen to be a double pyriform, the mean length of one side being 2.23 micrometer. It appeared to be morphometrically and serologically close to the other north European B motasi strains but distinct from B motasi (Turkey). In a limited serological survey, experience of infection with B motasi appeared to be common in sheep grazing in coastal areas of North Wales, but rare in a part of South Wales known to harbour the vector tick Haemaphysalis punctata. Transovarial transmission of B motasi by H punctata took place with facility.

Target-set and response-set interaction: implications for models of human information processing.

In binary character-classification tasks, reaction time generally has been reported to increase substantially with the number of target elements. However, when the targets formed a familiar set and subjects were not required to make explicit "no" responses, reaction time did not increase significantly as the target set increased in size from one to three.

Free recall and abstractness of stimuli.

The relation of abstractness of stimuli to efficiency of free recall was studied in college and fourth-grade students. Groups were shown a sequence of objects, pictures, and object names and were asked to recall what they had seen. Recall tests were conducted either immediately after presentation of the stimulus-sequence, after 24 hours, or after 1 week. Objects were recalled more frequently than pictures, and pictures more frequently than words. Adults performed better than children, except in the case of objects.