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Methodological recommendations for plasma viscosimetry using different paper and polymer filters were elaborated. Standardization of the filters with crystalloid solutions was established to be advisable before plasma viscosity investigation. The viscosimetric characteristics of soviet and foreign filters were compared during work with donor's plasma. As a clinical trial of the method measurements were made of plasma viscosity in patients with virus hepatitis A, who were diagnosed to have the plasma hyperviscosity syndrome. It is recommended that during plasma (serum) viscosimetry, one should employ metal clamps for filters (prolongs) and filters with pores measuring over 0.65 micron in diameter.

The paper historically considers the impact of social differentiation on the physical development of children and adolescents. It analyzes the scientific contribution of Prof. Lev Abramovich Syrkin (1894-1951) to the formation and development of a system for anthropometric studies in Russia in the first half of the twentieth century (1920s to 1950s), to the elaboration of principles in the standardization of tools, and to the unification of anthropometric studies and standards for the physical development of preschool and school children.

The paper deals with the history of design and development of implanted pacemakers, emphasis is also laid on electric neuromyostimulators. Present-day problems and prospects in this area are touched upon.

The paper provides a scientific rationale for that it is necessary to improve the existing state statistic records, such as [symbol: see text] No. 125/Y "Occupational Disease or Intoxication Recording Schedule". The document fails to obtain "accumulated" data on the incidence of occupational diseases (OD), changes in the health status and working ability, to make an analysis of relationships between the working conditions and the development of OD. The "Schedule" has been improved, which records data on a patient rather than a diagnosis. The schedule is a final recording document, a sectorial register of railway occupational diseases, and it is of departmental character.

The specialized plague control facilities which began being founded as a system of institutions in Russia in 1897 have made a great contribution to epidemiological well-being against quarantine and particularly menacing diseases. The developmental stages of plague control service in different periods of the country's social life and its place in the general governmental preventive and antiepidemic measures are shown. The paper emphasizes that it is expedient to maintain the antiepidemic readiness of plaque control facilities due the fact that the epidemic situation is due menacing and zoonosis is expected to aggravate in the late 20th to the early 21st centuries.

Misdetection of occupational diseases in railway workers is discussed. The reason is that medical staff has poor knowledge of occupational diseases and patients with their signs and symptoms are not all registered. The paper gives scientific rationale for creating a register of occupational diseases in the system of enterprises subordinate to the Ministry of Railways.

The paper describes the procedure for producing the solid radiometric sources with their large plane linear capillary and volumetric working surface having a high uniformity of the external ionizing irradiation of a radionuclide and gives the basic parameters of the state reference samples which have been made on the basis of the developed technology for the activity of long-living radionuclides used as medical emission test objects to test radionuclide diagnostic apparatuses.

The paper is concerned with foundation of the Association of Medical Physicists under the Physical Society of the USSR. The Association is to unite the efforts of physicists, chemists, mathematicians and engineers working at the medical institutions and engaged in physical problems of medicine and in the design of appropriate instruments, devices, equipment and materials in industry, at the Institutes of the Academy of Sciences, and at higher educational establishments. The functions of medical physicists and their roles in consolidation of the relations between medicine and natural sciences and engineering are discussed.

This paper presents the concept of occupational health of man, interpreted as the process of maintenance and development of regulatory properties of the body and his physical, psychic and social well-being, which provide high reliability of his professional activities, professional longevity and maximal lifetime. The paper discusses the main areas of biochemical investigations to evaluate occupational health of the flying personnel, which include identification of correlates between biochemical or immune changes and pathological or premorbid states, that reduce tolerance to environmental effects, as well as study of functional specificities related to the reserves and mechanisms of implementation of adaptive capabilities of the human body. It gives detailed biochemical data derived from pilots with neurotic problems and biochemical indicators of stress tolerance measured during exposure to +Gz acceleration, angular acceleration, hyperthermia, hypoxia, and exercise.

The paper is concerned with the materials of a study of long-term effects of irradiation at small doses of a limited population, taking by way of example lethal developmental defects in descendants. In 1957 a radioactive trace was formed as a result of an explosion of a tank with highly active radiochemical by-products. The population in this area was exposed to irradiation. Mortality from lethal developmental defects in the descendants was analyzed. The data obtained have shown that the effect on the gonads of external irradiation at doses of 0.1-0.5 Sv (33,500 persons) revealed no statistically significant variations in the mortality of the descendants from developmental defects as compared to the controls.

The paper is concerned with analysis of all lethal outcomes in a followed-up group of patients with chronic radiation sickness (931 patients) from external occupational gamma irradiation. In a majority of cases over a 2-2.5 year period a mean dose of total irradiation was 3.26 +/- 0.13 Gy. During a follow-up period of 37 years 177 patients died. Only 2 patients (2.2%) died of chronic radiation sickness resulting from anaplastic anemia. In the first decade (1952-1961) malignant neoplasia, including leukemia accounted for 42.2%; in the second decade the rate for leukemia was 26.2 decreasing to 5.2%; the rates for tumors were 18.4, 20.6, 23.5%, those for CHD were 7.7-41.8%. Despite high doses of irradiation the tumor mortality rate was 22.6%, coinciding with that in industrial countries (15-23%).

The paper is concerned with physicotechnical and dosimetric support of technology of therapeutic whole-body irradiation on a serial gamma apparatus ROKUS, with which a majority of radiological institutions in the USSR are fit out. Technology consists of the following procedures: patient positioning with relation to a source with a horizontal axis of radiation. Correction of dose distribution by means of a three-element compensator taking into account patient's constitutional peculiarities and preradiation preparation data; double irradiation in the bilateral regimen in the supine position.

This paper discusses current problems of psychophysiological support of manned space missions and presents the concept of a psychophysiological complex of the orbital biomedical laboratory Medilab and other advanced space vehicles based on new methodological approaches. The paper describes principles of selection of psychophysiological methods to be used in Medilab programs as well as their instrumental, mathematical, hardware and software structures.

This paper presents the data about red blood cell metabolism and the structure and function of erythrocyte membranes obtained from two cosmonauts after their 326- and 160-day flights. In both cases we observed inhibition of energy formation (decrease of the rate of glycolysis and ATP content) and enhancement of oxidative processes (decrease of reduced glutathione and activity of antioxidative enzymes). The above changes in the metabolic status of erythrocytes are correlated with shifts at the membrane level, particularly with variations of membrane lipids, phospholipid spectrum and ratios of phospholipid fractions, alteration of membrane-bound enzymes (ATPase) and increase of cell resistance to acid hemolysis. The changes in the erythrocyte membrane leading to lower cell deformability and possible shifts of blood rheological properties give evidence that it is necessary to use preventive membrane stabilization measures at certain flight stages and during readaptation.

The paper is concerned with the problems of technical equipment of standard clinico-diagnostic laboratories (CDL) in this country. The authors suggest a mathematic model that may minimize expenditures for laboratory studies. The model enables the following problems to be solved: to issue scientifically-based recommendations for technical equipment of CDL; to validate the medico-technical requirements for newly devised items; to select the optimum types of uniform items; to define optimal technical decisions at the stage of the design; to determine the lab assistant's labour productivity and the cost of some investigations; to compute the medical laboratory engineering requirement for treatment and prophylactic institutions of this country.

The paper presents the analysis of the development and pilot operation of hygienic monitoring of ambient air pollution on the basis of the automized informational system (AIS). Monitoring involves services of surveillance and control over sources of discharges and harmful impurities content in the atmosphere, meterological conditions, and AIS carrying out the functions of data collection and accumulation, analysis and assessment, prediction of the air basin status. The created instrument can be functioning in several regimens: for the analysis and assessment of the observed atmospheric status and the role of industrial sources in air pollution; for the prediction and assessment of the air basin status in association with the planned or expected effectiveness of measures aimed at the reduction of exhaust. The feasibility of it is demonstrated in the paper through results of pilot operation of the proposed system.

The paper is concerned with main values of dose exposure of the USSR population as a result of medical roentgenological investigations. The authors issue practical organizational-methodological recommendations for irradiation reduction resulting from giving up chest x-ray, a decrease in prophylactic fluorography, improvement of technical facilities for investigations of the digestive tract, and organization of roentgenoradiological departments as independent health service units.

The relation between lead content in urine and blood of workers and the degree of manifestation of a disease is analysed in the paper. It has been found out that along with the increase in lead content in biomedia the severity of its effect on the organism is increased too. It has been shown that the determination of this element in urine is characterized by high diagnostic significance (more than 95%). The rate of lead excretion with urine increases with the increase of severity of a disease, and it is twice as much in people with chronic lead intoxication compared to that in practically healthy workers. It is proposed that determination of urine lead content be included as an obligatory test into the examination of workers in contact with lead.

This paper presents the results of examinations of 19 cosmonauts, 12 of whom made 7-day flights and 7 took part in space flights of 150, 211 or 237 days. In plasma, parathyrin, calcitonin and gastrin concentrations were measured. A complex mosaic of hormonal regulation of bone metabolism reflects multifactorial and flexible patterns of calcium homeostasis, with individual variations included. It is probable that the specific weight of different components of the system maintaining calcium homeostasis varies depending on the exposure time and activity of related regulatory systems.

The paper presents data on the development of eco-hygienic concept of human nutrition. The scheme of migration of various xenobiotics and biological contaminants along the food chain is given. The necessity for the substantiation of unified MACs of alien substances for all eco-systems is indicated. The ++eco-hygienic concept of nutrition should be directed at the protection (purity) of the inner human environment and normalization of the processes of its activity in interrelations with the environment.

The paper is concerned with an automated line for the manufacture of sterilizer doors made of sheet metal with a C-section around the edges. The automated line is likely to be applied in any branch of machine building, instrument making and other branches of industry producing box-like goods.

The paper treats of the problems related to the design of the apparatus and programmed means of a set up for auricular diagnosis and therapy based on the experimental and reported data the authors substantiate the selection of the modes of the set up running in the course of search for active acupuncture areas, their diagnosis and therapy, describe technical decisions aimed at the enhancement of the ergonometric and technical characteristics of the set up. Provide a block diagram of the set up and algorithm maintaining its work in different modes.

This paper presents medical results obtained in a Salyut-7 8-month manned mission in which a physician-cosmonaut took part. The results include body mass and height measurements, vestibular studies, cardiovascular studies at rest and in response to staged functional loads (with echocardiographic examinations accentuated), metabolic and hormonal studies. The paper also gives information about medical aspects of extravehicular activities. It is emphasized that during the mission both old and new methods of research were used and medical results of preceding flights were considered.

The paper is concerned with a comparative analysis of the immediate and short-term results of chemo- and radiotherapy of 174 patients with well differentiated inoperable lung cancer. The data were presented by the participants of the CMEA cooperative trial (the Hungarian People's Republic, the USSR and the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic over the period of 1976-1980). In the course of a randomized study radiotherapy (at a summary dose of 60 Gy) was given to 98 patients, chemotherapy to 76 (methotrexate and 5-fluorouracil). Comparative analysis has shown that the use of adjuvant chemotherapy tends to improve an immediate therapeutic effect. In well differentiated squamous cell carcinoma, a marked positive effect was obtained in 48.6% of the patients as compared to 31.2% in radiotherapy alone. However, judging by the survival rates such differences in favor of chemotherapy were not revealed. After conservative treatment (radio- and chemotherapy) of patients with differentiated lung cancer in the inoperable stage 55.7% survived for 1, 17.27% for 5, 8.55% for 3 yrs. Direct correlation between the immediate effect of radio- and chemotherapy and the survival of the patients was revealed. Of 67 patients with a marked immediate effect 49 (73.1%) lived over 1 year, 8 out of 9 patients lived for 3 yrs.

This paper presents a criterion for measuring the efficiency of adaptation to an altered environment. The criterion is related to the quantitative evaluation of memory adequacy at early stages of the exposure to a new environment. An improvement in the reproduction of emotional words and a slight deterioration of the recollection of neutral words may be regarded as a prognostically significant criterion of the adaptation success. The lack of an improvement in the reproduction of emotionally important information and a significant deterioration of the recollection of neutral information at early stages of adaptation is an adverse sign predicting a potential failure of the adaptation process.

The paper presents data concerning the amino acid pool of rats flown on board Cosmos-1129 and exposed to the ground-based synchronous experiment. Certain changes in the amino acid pool of flight and synchronous rats have been found. The changes seem to be associated with the selective rate of incorporation of free amino acids into the biosynthetic processes during acute adaptation and with alterations in the protein synthesis rate.

The paper describes the effect of exercises, LBNP, controlled water and salt consumption, and drugs used as countermeasures against cardiovascular deconditioning during prolonged (2--7 weeks) head-down bed rest. Each of the above countermeasures applied separately had a limited effect. The use of a combination of exercises, LBNP and water-salt supplements at the final stage of the bed rest experiment made it possible to prevent entirely deterioration of work capacity and decrease of orthostatic tolerance of the test subject. The paper presents the scheme and regimens of the above countermeasures employed to meet the requirements of the flights of the orbital station "Salyut".

Paper presents the data on the morbidity pattern of parasitic diseases in the USSR as well as on the trends in ascariasis, trichocephaliasis and hymenolepiasis infection rates. Problems of improving the prophylactic and antiepidemic measures are discussed with regard both to practical parasitology and investigations.

The paper gives the results of physical examinations of P.I. Klimuk and V.I. Sevastyanov during their flight aboard the orbital station Salyut-4. The examinations were carried out by means of the Polynomial-2 device at rest and under the conditions approximating basal metabolism. Since the end of the first flight week the circulation parameters did not differ substantially from the preflight values. Stroke volume and cardiac output increased slightly. In weightlessness circulation parameters varied with respect to the work done by the cosmonauts. On the first postflight day peripheral resistance, arterial pressure and cardiac output were increased.

This paper describes multifaceted investigations of the flying work by Soviet aviation medicine in the 1920-30s. It examines the early stages of the professional activity that is at present termed ergonomic foundations of the design, manufacture and use of the aircraft. The paper discusses one of the first formulations of the problem of standardization of the human factors.

This review of radiation protection in space flight considers specific features of radiation effects (the composition of radiation, space-time changes of fluxes of charged particles, nonuniform radiation fields in spacecraft modules, formation of secondary radiations, etc) and the major sources of radiation hazards in space (Earth radiation belts, solar and galactic cosmic radiations). The paper presents estimates of the equivalent dose of protons and electrons of the Earth radiation belts at various orbits, as well as radiation characteristics of certain proton solar flares and galactic cosmic radiation. The paper also discusses the present-day criteria of radiation safety used in calculations of the shielding of manned spacecraft. The paper gives the standards of allowable radiation levels used in the USSR.