Join the 200th Anniversary Celebration

Issue IndexA searchable index of tables of contents

Find An Issue

By Volume and Issue
By Date

Table of contents for

February 17, 2005  Vol. 352 No. 7

Perspective
647-649

Dr. Allan Rosenfield and Karyn Schwartz discuss a decade of initiatives of the International Conference on Population and Development. They state that the past 10 years have been disappointing in terms of the broad goals of the ICPD program of action, but ...

649-652
  • Free Full Text

Driving through KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, one is struck by the lush farmland and beautiful coast, write Drs. Bisola Ojikutu and Valerie Stone. Beyond this panorama, however, lie rural communities with high unemployment and rampant violence, where 40 ...

652-654

On February 20, 1905, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the right of the city of Cambridge to mandate vaccination against smallpox. Wendy Parmet, Dr. Richard Goodman, and Amy Farber assert that today, as physicians, policymakers, and public health officials ...

Original Articles
655-665

In this randomized trial involving nulliparous women at term, the rate of cesarean delivery was not higher among women who were given intrathecal analgesia early in labor than among those given systemic analgesia early in labor. Women who received intrathecal analgesia early also had better pain control and a shorter time to delivery.

666-675
  • Free Full Text

B-type natriuretic peptide is released by the ventricles in response to hemodynamic stress, and circulating levels have prognostic value in heart failure and unstable coronary disease. In this study, there was a significant independent association between circulating levels of N-terminal pro-BNP (an inactive fragment of the parent molecule) and overall mortality in stable coronary disease. The findings extend the prognostic value of this biomarker to a wider population of patients with cardiac disease.

676-685

Patients being treated for gonorrhea or chlamydia were offered medication to give to their sexual partners or standard referral of partners. There was a lower rate of recurrent or persistent gonorrhea among the patients with expedited treatment of partners than among those with standard referral of partners (10 percent vs. 13 percent). This strategy had a smaller effect on recurrent chlamydial infection than on recurrent gonorrhea.

686-691

In southern Vietnam, a four-year-old boy presented with severe diarrhea, followed by seizures, coma, and death. His nine-year-old sister had died from a similar syndrome two weeks earlier. In both children, the clinical diagnosis was acute encephalitis. Neither had respiratory symptoms at presentation.

Review Articles
692-699

    This practical review for clinicians explains that memory dysfunction is now understood in terms of four systems: episodic memory, semantic memory, procedural memory, and working memory. Separate anatomical areas of the brain are responsible for each memory system. This overview of memory should help nonspecialists in the evaluation and diagnosis of patients with various types of memory dysfunction.

    700-707

    Although much has been published about the pathophysiology and treatment of necrotic spider bites, therapeutic interventions continue without evidence-based justification.

    Images in Clinical Medicine
    708
    • Free Full Text

    A 34-year old bisexual man with newly diagnosed human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) infection presented with a one-month history of anal and oral lesions. He recalled having had a lesion on the foreskin of his penis three months previously; it had ...

    e6
    • Free Full Text

    A 46-year-old woman with a history of infection with the human immunodeficiency virus presented with a violaceous plaque on the pretibial surface. Interspersed within hives were numerous yellow-white pustules.

    Case Records of the Massachusetts General Hospital
    709-716
    • Video

    A 53-year-old man had decreased energy and appetite after losing his job; he came to the emergency department for psychiatric evaluation. A diagnosis of major depressive disorder was made; on the medical-clearance evaluation, a pulmonary infiltrate and a high white-cell count were found. While awaiting admission, he became short of breath; pulmonary edema was observed.

    Editorials
    718-720

    The pain of childbirth is arguably one of the most severe types of pain a woman will endure in her lifetime. Relief of the pain of childbirth has always been controversial. Misinterpretations of biblical scripture (“In sorrow thou shalt bring forth ...

    720-721

    Proper clinical and public health treatment of patients with gonorrhea or chlamydial infection must include the treatment of their sexual partners. Such partners are often asymptomatic and, unless treated, will reinfect the index patient or spread ...

    Clinical Implications of Basic Research
    722-723

    A recent study suggests that a molecule that binds amyloid and recruits an endogenous protein to its surface may pave the way for the development of efficient inhibitors of amyloidogenesis.

    Correspondence
    724-725

    To the Editor: Dave et al. (Nov. 18 issue)1 report their findings concerning the molecular features of tumor-infiltrating immune cells in follicular lymphoma. This low-grade lymphoma includes heterogeneous subtypes that require different treatment ...

    726-728
    • Free Full Text

    To the Editor: Landrigan et al. (Oct. 28 issue)1 show that reducing interns' work hours in the intensive care unit (ICU) decreased serious medical errors, probably prompting widespread reevaluation of traditional ICU on-call schedules. No one would argue ...

    728-731

    To the Editor: The article by Aharon-Peretz et al. (Nov. 4 issue)1 is of considerable interest to us because it substantiates our previously published study2 in which glucocerebrosidase mutations were identified in brain samples from patients with ...

    731

    To the Editor: Mou and associates (Oct. 14 issue)1 report that the use of fresh whole blood for pump priming in cardiopulmonary bypass surgery in infants had no advantage over the use of reconstituted whole blood (a combination of red cells and fresh-...

    732-733
    • Free Full Text

    To the Editor: We entirely agree with Guttmacher et al. (Nov. 25 issue)1 about the importance of each patient's filing his or her family medical history. However, we wonder why the “My Family Health Portrait” form2 contains no place to indicate whether ...

    733-734

    To the Editor: Blumenthal's article (Oct. 28 issue)1 about the complex and controversial relationships between doctors and drug companies should provoke soul-searching on the part of all physicians who rationalize accepting gifts from the pharmaceutical ...

    734-735

    To the Editor: In 1999, we reported on the results of a randomized study of adjuvant therapy after liver resection for metastatic colorectal cancer.1 One group of patients was treated with hepatic arterial infusion with floxuridine and dexamethasone plus ...

    Book Reviews
    736-737

    Scientists, medical researchers, and academic physicians share a fundamental shortcoming: we consistently fail to translate and describe our professional world — its struggles, its successes, and even its basic workings — to the general public. In science,...

    737-738
    • Free Full Text

    Estimates of the prevalence of epilepsy — which is defined as two or more unprovoked seizures or a condition for which antiepileptic medications have been used, in either case within the past five years — range from 0.5 to 1 percent of the population. ...

    738-739

    Progress in epilepsy research during the past several decades has advanced our understanding of the disease and greatly expanded our choice of treatments. Research in molecular and cellular biology has improved our understanding of the pathologic changes ...

    739-740

    The second edition of The Treatment of Epilepsy is a vital contribution to the field. The book's primary focus is on the medical and surgical evaluation and treatment of the disease. Experts around the globe who have made seminal contributions to the ...

    Corrections
    740

    Prevention of Hepatitis B with the Hepatitis B Vaccine Clinical Practice, N Engl J Med 2004:351;2832-2838.. On page 2832, under the heading “Hepatitis B Virus and Infection,” lines 1 and 2 should have read, “It is one of the smallest DNA viruses known to ...

    740

    Cytoplasmic Nucleophosmin in Acute Myelogenous Leukemia with a Normal Karyotype Original Article, N Engl J Med 2005:352;254-266.. On page 263, in Panel B of Figure 4, the data under the column heading “No./No. of Cases (%)” are incorrect. They should read,...