Preimmunisation hepatitis B screening in Singapore--a viewpoint from private sector clinics.

Blood samples from 1,600 persons who sought immunisation against hepatitis B in private clinics in Singapore in 1988-1989 were screened for two viral markers. Of that total, 4.81% were positive for HBsAg and 17.31% had anti-HBs levels greater than 10 mIU/ml, indicating that about 22.12% of the general population would not benefit from immunisation. Preimmunisation screening will identify persons not requiring the hepatitis B vaccine and thus, avoid wastage. When immunisation has already been performed without screening, recall for post-immunisation screening should be considered in order to detect the infectious hepatitis B carriers. Data in this study indicates that at this point in time, it is important to immunise adolescents and adults, in addition to neonates and children.

A comparison of three methods to determine the radiochemical purity of 99Tcm-hexamethylpropylene amine oxime (99Tcm-HMPAO).

Determining the radiochemical purity of 99Tcm-HMPAO using the standard method suggested by the manufacturer of the HMPAO kit is slow, consuming much of the 30 min useful shelf-life of the radiopharmaceutical. We have compared two new methods (a solvent extraction technique and a method involving a disposable, pre-packed reverse phase chromatography cartridge) with the standard method for determining the radiochemical purity of 99Tcm-HMPAO. There were no significant differences (F test, p less than 0.05) in the results obtained by all three methods. However, the reversed phase chromatography method gave better agreement (correlation coefficient of 0.877) with results obtained using the standard method than did the solvent extraction technique (correlation coefficient of 0.693). The solvent extraction technique took about 10 min to perform whereas the reversed phase chromatography method took only 5 min. Both of the new methods did not achieve complete separation of the secondary, less lipophilic 99Tcm-HMPAO complex from the primary, lipophilic 99Tcm-HMPAO complex but the error introduced was small (typically only 3-5%). The new methods offer the capability of determining the radiochemical purity of 99Tcm-HMPAO quickly, reliably and accurately, prior to administration of the radiopharmaceutical to the patient.

Mandatory continuing pharmacy education in Alberta, Canada: the response to live programs and correspondence courses.

This report briefly describes mandatory continuing pharmacy education in Alberta and provides survey data to determine the response of pharmacists to the program. The survey results indicate that most pharmacists exceeded the required number of education units and that more than 70 percent of the total acquired were obtained by completing correspondence courses. Females, those under 40 years of age and retail staff preferred correspondence programs. Managers, hospital staff and those over 40 years of age took somewhat fewer education units by correspondence, but attended more live programs than the former group. The popularity of correspondence is presumably due to the fact that most were provided free and because they are a more convenient method of obtaining education units. The freedom allowed to design their own educational program plus the modest costs involved are probably the two main reasons for the acceptability of Albert's continuing education program to pharmacists.