U.s. State and federal laws targeting distracted driving.

Distracted driving has burgeoned with the proliferation of cell phones, global positioning systems and other in-vehicle and personal electronic devices. Annually more than 3,300 people are killed and an additional 400,000 are injured in the United States in distracted driving crashes. The United States (U.S.) federal and state governments have responded to this public health problem with policies and laws; however, a more comprehensive and more effective approach is still needed. Some restrictions on the use of electronic devices while driving by federal employees and some voluntary guidelines and recommendations have been issued. Public opinion polls show support for addressing the issue of distracted driving with state laws. The majority of states have laws banning text messaging while driving and prohibiting the use of an electronic device by teenage or novice drivers. Some states prohibit all drivers from using a hand-held cellphone. Currently no state has a total ban on the use of personal electronic devices while driving. Successful past traffic safety campaigns changing driver behavior have demonstrated the necessity to adopt a "three Es" approach of Enactment of a law, Education of the public about the law, and rigorous Enforcement of the law. Experience reveals that this approach, along with future federal regulation of in-vehicle electronic devices and the employment of technology to limit the use of electronic devices while driving, is needed to alter personal behavior in order to reduce distractions and keep drivers focused on the driving task.

Temperature rise in a tissue-mimicking material generated by unfocused and focused ultrasonic transducers.

The temperature elevation in a homogeneous tissue-mimicking material with tissue-like thermal and acoustic properties, generated by unfocused and focused ultrasonic transducers operating at 1.0 and 3.5 MHz frequencies, was measured. It was found that in the vicinity of a transducer front face, both transducer surface heating and ultrasound absorption are important sources for tissue heating. As for heating due to ultrasound absorption, the experimental results are compared with theoretical predictions for nonperfused tissues resulting from different beam models. The experimental data are in reasonable agreement with the results calculated from a model developed by Nyborg and Steele, a Gaussian beam model and from the model used by the National Council on Radiation Protection and Measurements (NCRP).

The regional graduate medical education program of the University of Washington.

To address problems of geographic and specialty distribution of physicians in the states of Washington, Alaska, Montana, and Idaho, the University of Washington School of Medicine and its affiliated hospitals developed a regional program of graduate medical education beginning in 1971. The program in 1986-87 had 77 percent of the residency positions in the region and involved more than 30 hospitals and clinics. In 1986-87, 58 percent of the residents completing training were in family medicine, internal medicine, or pediatrics. The program is centrally coordinated by the school's associate dean for clinical affairs, who works with departmental program directors and hospital and university administrators.