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ABSTRACTAlthough fire management is essential to conserve ecosystems and protect communities in Australia, the best way to achieve these goals is controversial. Recent advances that use satellite imagery to map fire severity focus on canopy effects and provide limited ecological information. Fires and prescribed burns can also occur over weeks to months, limiting the relevance of a single post-fire image. We adapted the composite burn index, a field-truthing method commonly used in North America, to include parsimonious metrics that assess resprouting dynamics common among Australian eucalypts and the retention and recovery of key fauna habitat attributes. We used multitemporal satellite imagery to compile the greatest impacts within fire boundaries over several months and derive the maximum differenced normalised burn ratio (dNBR max). We used the dNBR max and a new field method, the OzCBI, to create distinct fire-severity models for three forested biogeographical regions in southwest Western Australia. Ecological outcomes were used to set thresholds between severity classes that were common to the three models. Balanced accuracies averaged above 0.7 across the models. This study demonstrates a practical method to incorporate ecological assessment into fire-severity maps. The approach informs efforts to achieve best-practice fire management that balances risk reduction and the conservation of natural environments.

Pain in chronic pancreatitis is usually so intense and long-lasting that follow-up care of patients is often difficult and frustrating. Many therapeutical options to relieve pain have been recommended, but controlled studies are limited. The approach to patients with chronic pancreatitis complicated by pain is dependent on several factors. Medical therapy is initially attempted, but a switch to drainage procedure shortly thereafter in patients with persistent pseudocysts or a dilated pancreatic duct. Lithotripsy and endoscopic removal of pancreatic duct concrements may reduce pain in selected patients with a limited number of stones and strictures. In many patients, however, a drainage procedure cannot be offered and advantages and disadvantages of a resection or denervation procedure should be weighed against long-term treatment with analgetics. Resections should be limited to the most affected part of the pancreas. Usually this concerns the head. In such cases, a Whipple resection is often carried out, but duodenum-preserving procedures may offer several advantages.

Proximal involvement of the innervation of the arm is a well recognised cause of hand symptoms; a proximal vascular abnormality is rarely responsible. This case report describes such a rare cause, namely, a post-stenotic aneurysm of the subclavian artery due to an abnormal first rib but in the absence of a cervical rib or scalene bands.

Spondyloepiphyseal dysplasia congenita is a rare genetic entity in which it is very important to involve anaesthetists early on to discuss the possible anaesthetic complications for both general or regional anaesthesia. A case is described of a patient with spondyloepiphyseal dysplasia and multifetal pregnancy in which successful epidural anaesthesia for caesarean section was performed.