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Background: In the scientific literature, the impacts of plateletpheresis on leukogram parameters are not clear, with a high divergence in the studies that have evaluated changes in leukocytes. The objective of this paper was to meta-analyze the effect of plateletpheresis on the leukocyte count, based on studies published between 1980-2018., Methods: Systematic review with meta-analysis of random effects for the difference of means. The phases of the PRISMA guide were applied with 132 search strategies in Pubmed, Scielo, Science direct and Scopus. Reproducibility and evaluation of methodological quality were guaranteed. Heterogeneity was evaluated with Galbraith and Dersimonian and Laird's, publication bias with Funnel Plot and Begg; sensitivity analysis, accumulated meta-analysis and Forest Plot were carried out., Results: Nineteen studies were included with 2,358 donors, mostly from India, United States, Turkey, Germany and Austria. A mean difference of -0,80 x109⁄L (IC95%= -1,96; 0,36x109⁄L) between the predonation value and the value immediately after donation was founded; no publication bias was found and the conclusion presented good sensitivity since it does not vary with the elimination of studies in successive phases., Conclusions: The donation of platelets by apheresis does not affect the leukocyte count in the donors, in the last century there were reports of reductions in this parameter, explained by the blood loss in the cases used for the procedure and by effects produced in the blood cells by the biomaterials; however, at present the high safety of plateletpheresis for the white blood cell count is evidenced.

In October 2011 the Court of Justice of the European Union pronounced the sentence in the case Brüstle v. Greenpeace. This sentence resolves the preliminary ruling interposed by the Bundesgerichtshof. The object of the preliminary ruling was the interpretation of the expression "human embryos", on 44/98/CE Guideline, in order to resolve the litigation between Brüstle, a German neurobiologist, and Greenpeace. Brüstle have patented a process for obtaining stem cells using cells originally extracted from human embryos, Greenpeace have filed a lawsuit against this patent. The article analyzes the meaning of this sentence in the light of the discrimination of the pre-implantation embryos in Spanish law. The content of the Biopatent Guideline, the Opinions of the European Group on Ethics of Science and New Technologies related to it, the EUJC verdict and the Conclusions of the General Advocate are analyzed. We will pay special attention to the final verdict given on November 27, 2012, by the German Federal Court of Justice. The paper also considers the repercussion of Brüstle case at the European level, examining the activity of the European Parliament, in the frame of the discussion of the program Horizon 2020, and the citizen's initiative "One of us". At the Spanish level, the paper underlines the need to reform the laws of Human Assisted Reproduction and of Biomedical Investigation.

Aim: This study analyzes the productivity and visibility of Spanish publications in the area of clinical neurology in the period 2000-2009 and compared with those for Italy, France and Germany., Materials and Methods: We used the database Web of Science. The analysis (annual and in five-year) was restricted to the citable documents (original articles, reviews and proceedings papers). Bibliometric indicators used were the number of publications, citations received by publications and Hirsch's h-index. We also assessed the slope of the annual growth rate (b), the number of publications by language and the international collaboration., Results: In the period 2000-2009 there were 46,114 publications in neurology clinic of which 6,998 were Spanish publications (h = 75), 11,629 in Italy (h = 101), French 9,745 (h = 102) and 20,143 in Germany (h = 124). The rate of increase in the total number of publications in Spain (b = 15) was lower than that observed in Italy (b = 65), Germany (b = 61) or France (b = 34). In the case of publications in English, the growth rate was higher for Spain (b = 37) than for France (b = 36) but lower than for Germany (b = 54) and Italy (b = 65)., Conclusions: Although the total number of publications and the observed increase are lower in Spain compared to Italy, France or Germany, the Spanish publications in Clinical Neurology shows good trend indicators with regard to publications in English and international collaboration. This improvement was associated with greater visibility as showed by the five-year analysis of citations received by Spanish publications.