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As improved recording technologies have created new opportunities for neurophysiological investigation, emphasis has shifted from individual neurons to multiple populations that form circuits, and it has become important to provide evidence of cross-population coordinated activity. We review various methods for doing so, placing them in six major categories while avoiding technical descriptions and instead focusing on high-level motivations and concerns. Our aim is to indicate what the methods can achieve and the circumstances under which they are likely to succeed. Toward this end, we include a discussion of four crosscutting issues: the definition of neural populations, trial-to-trial variability and Poisson-like noise, time-varying dynamics, and causality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

BACKGROUND: Medical records are important for facilitating the process and quality of care. However, little is known about their current state in primary care practices. This article describes features of medical record systems in diverse practices and examines their association with preventive service delivery rates. METHODS: Medical records were reviewed from a consecutive sample of outpatients seen by 198 family physicians in 79 community-based practices in Northeast Ohio. The physicians were participants in a clinical trial designed to increase preventive service delivery. Research nurses performed baseline medical record reviews and used ethnographic field notes and a practice environment checklist to provide global assessments of features of medical records. RESULTS: In 79 practices, 3462 medical records were reviewed. Medical records were rated as highly easy to use in 52% of practices; outpatient visit notes were dictated in 54%. Nine percent of practices grouped individual charts by family. Patient notes were computerized in 1% of practices, although several practices had previously tried and abandoned computerized systems. Flow sheets for immunization, screening, and counseling were present on 71%, 63%, and 16% of charts and were used on 34%, 33%, and 3% of charts, respectively. The presence and use of flow sheets were associated with higher preventive service delivery rates. CONCLUSION: Medical record organization, completeness, and use vary widely, and computerized records remain rare. The association of flow sheet presence and use with preventive service delivery rates shows the potential importance of medical records for enhancing the process and outcome of patient care. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We report a very rare case of a lumbar nerve root schwannoma presenting with torsion and infarction. The patient was a 16-year-old male presenting with severe low back pain and urinary retention following an aggressive game of hockey. Subsequent MRI of the lumbar spine revealed a nonenhancing lumbar intradural lesion at the level of L3. The patient was taken to the operating room where he underwent a bilateral L2 and L3 laminectomy and gross total resection of an intradural nerve root tumor, which appeared to have undergone torsion and infarction. Subsequent histopathological examination of the surgical specimen verified the diagnosis of infarcted schwannoma. This is a unique case of lumbar nerve root schwannoma, with atypical MRI findings, presenting with infarction due to torsion of the involved nerve root.Copyright © 2002 S. Karger AG, Basel [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The picture we have drawn shows clearly that the historical process has a spatial dimension. From the very first date we can establish, the stream of history flows to an ever-widening area until, finally, every place on earth where human life is possible enters the historical stage. Equally clear is another dimension: the fact that new segments of humanity were constantly entering the historical arena. This entry proceeded in two ways: in certain cases the old historical areas were supplemented by new ones populated by peoples hitherto outside the orbit of human history. In other cases new peoples left the sites of their initial habitation and intruded upon the life of old historical areas. As examples of the first way we may cite the history of the peoples of Japan, Korea, the Latins in Italy, the Celts in Gaul, etc. As examples of the second way we may cite the so-called migration of peoples, which has been observed repeatedly in history. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The meaning of history, the laws of history, the direction of history-an eminent Soviet historian examines these sweeping questions in the light of world history itself. Vestnik Istodi Mirovoi Kultury (Journal of the History of World CuZtzcre), 1961, No. 2. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is a field of study known as the philosophy of history. But rather diverse content is treated under that heading. The subject matter of the philosophy of history may be historical knowledge as such, its nature, its limits, its forms. When this is its content, the philosophy of history is, strictly speaking, the theory of knowledge as applied to history. The philosophy of history may also embrace the study of the general laws of historical existence as revealed in the destiny of mankind. Here philosophy of history is, in its essence, the general theory of the historical process. The purpose of philosophy of history may be seen as elucidation of the question as to the meaning of history: does it have any meaning at all and, if so, what is it; and moreover what precisely are we to understand by "meaning" when we are talking about history? Finally, the term philosophy of history may be employed to denote reflections on the usefulness of history: is the historical experience of mankind projected into its subsequent destiny? Does it influence men's acts in history? Does it teach anyone anything? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The world of literature of the cultured countries of our time - those of Europe, in any case - has long been made up of two elements: works appearing in the given country and works brought into that country from the literatures of other countries. It has long been our good fortune that truly significant works of any literature rapidly penetrate into the world of literature of some other country and to some degree become part of the literature of that country. Naturally, what penetrates is, in the first place, what attracts special attention in the given country, what is needed and important for literary reality in that country and for its social thought, or what helps to provide a better understanding of the state of literature and social thought in the country where the given work originated. However, what has only brief but noisy success often also makes this transition. Often everything notable in the current literature makes this transition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]