BACKGROUND: The aim of the study was to evaluate whether cadmium concentrations in kidney (K-Cd), blood (B-Cd) or urine (U-Cd) could reveal previous occupational cadmium exposure at a metal smelter. METHODS: The study included 90 smelters and 35 controls (B-Cd and U-Cd determination). In a subgroup (N = 33), K-Cd was also determined. RESULTS: B-Cd (median 4.6; range 0.5-53 nmol/L), U-Cd (0. 29; 0.

The project reported on here, construed within the general ontological framework of hermeneutic inquiry, considers the methodological consequences of this basic approach. A specific methodology that was developed, capturing both subjective contents and discursive construction processes, is described. It consists of a Diary-in-group method combining personal diary writing with group conversations a

Two species within the Delia cardui species group were known to have males with the abdominal sternite III bipartite or very deeply incised, viz., D. bipartita Suwa from Japan and China and D. polaris Griffiths from extreme northern and high-altitude sites in North America. Two new species with this extraordinary character are described from northern Europe: D. rimiventris sp. nov. from southern N

The IDEM3 maturity model is a process improvement framework that can be used by an organisation to assess and improve their IT dependability management processes. The framework focuses on the coordination of IT management and safety management within an organisation. In this paper, an evaluation plan for the maturity model is presented to evaluate its applicability, assessment accuracy, and practi

There are an increasing number of medical research studies involving children, including many long-term birth cohort studies. Involving children raises many issues, and little is known about children's own views. This study explored children's views (N = 5,851) on participation in a long-term screening study for type 1 diabetes. The results show that children 10 to 13 years of age have in general

We would like to thank Prof. Dal Moro for his valuable contribution[1]. Indeed, many patients, especially those who are older and who suffer from several concomitant diseases, are at risk of being "overtreated with good intentions". The main problem is that the diagnosis of essential hypertension is at times assigned very liberally based on a single ambulatory measurement without taking into consi

Genomic selection is a new technology in which selection decisions are based on direct genomic values (DGVs) or genomic enhanced breeding values (GEBVs). The objective of this study was to evaluate the relations between DGVs and several milk traits important for both the nutritional value and processability of milk. This is a new approach and can be used to increase the knowledge on how genomic se

Downtimes in a manufacturing cell, a production line or an individual machine are characterized by a complex statistical behavior that their frequency and duration display. The work reported here concerns likenesses and differences between various statistical distributions that apply to functional times (TBF) and downtimes (DT) in connection with different discrete manufacturing processes. The TBF

In this study we investigated how managers make strategical decisions in complex, dynamic, and real-time environments and in different decision domains. The managers we interviewed were usually ‘in charge’ of the tasks. Our results showed that the informants mostly constructed only one or two decision alternatives and that they did this to a large extent through communication with other persons, w

Background: Studies during the 1990s showed that it was possible to reduce the rate of negative appendectomies by using various diagnostic methods. The present study aims to evaluate the effect on diagnostic accuracy of implementation of repeated clinical examination and blood tests in a small county hospital without possibilities of radiological assistance on a 24-hour basis. Methodology: Prospec

To evaluate the effects of dietary phospholipids on plasma lipoproteins in the postprandial phase six normolipidemic men were fed alternatively a test meal rich in phosphatidylcholine and a control meal low in phosphatidylcholine. Plasma very low-density lipoproteins, low-density lipoproteins, and high-density lipoproteins were isolated at 2, 4 and 6 h after the meals. The changes in lipoprotein c