A medical importance

Drmanac et al. [31] confirmed the accuracy and speed of SBH arrays in detecting mutations in a medically important gene. The researchers used in situ mutagenesis to create a variety of insertion, deletion, and substitution mutations in a single p53 clone. PCR-amplified DNA samples from these mutants were then spotted directly to membranes without further purification, a protocol that could be applied to any patient DNA sample. Replica arrays were created containing all p53 samples and a variety of positive and negative controls. 

Another practical development is within reach the large scale in vitro synthesis of HA. Since HA is a medically important product there is a need for production of the polysaccharide without protein and nucleic acid contaminations, which are difficult to remove in preparations from tissues. Attempts to produce in vitro have already been made [57]. 

In addition to the CIR process the cosmetic industry has instituted a second, important, self-regulatory procedure the voluntary reporting of adverse reactions, which is intended to provide data on the type and incidence of adverse reactions noted by consumers or by their medical advisors. This reporting procedure creates early awareness of problems handled outside hospital emergency facilities or centers for acute poisoning. 

These two examples hint at a few of the reasons for the importance of knowledge-based systems. A medical faciHty may handle hundreds of infectious disease cases a year. Speedy, accurate diagnosis of these cases, aided by a system such as Mycin, may help the medical faciHty handle more patients, more effectively. Likewise, configuring large computer systems composed of many components can be a time-consuming and error-prone task. 

Many different combinations, separation -i- element-selective detection, have been attempted but HPLC in conjunction with ISP-MS has emerged as one of the best combinations. HPLC is a versatile technique, which due to the vai iety of sepai ation mechanisms developed, can be applied to a great vai iety of medically important analytes. 

Some microbial exopolysaccharides contain the inorganic substituents phosphate and sulphate. Phosphate has been found in exopolysaccharide from bacteria of medical importance, including Escherichia coli. Sulphate is far less common than phosphate and has only been found in spedes of cyanobaderia. In addition to these inorganic components, which form part of the structure of some exopolysaccharides, all polyanionic polymers will bind a mixture of cations. Exopolysaccharides are, therefore, purified in the salt form. The strength of binding of the various cations depend on the exopolysaccharide some bind the divalent cations calrium, barium and strontium very strongly, whereas others prefer certain monovalent cations, eg Na ... 

Dextran can be produced in a range of molecular weights and crossed-linked or substituted with a variety of functional groups. These products (Sephadex) are routinely used in the purification of proteins and pharmaceutical and other medically important compounds. 

Larone D.H. 995 ) Medically Important Fungi A Guide to Identification, 3rd e(hi. Washington American Society for Microbiology. 

The ability to grow at the expense of 4-hydroxy- and 3,4-dihydroxybenzoate has been nsed for the classification of medically important yeasts inclnding Candida parapsilosis (Cooper and Land 1979). This organism degrades these snbstrates by oxidative decarboxylation, catalyzed by a flavoprotein monooxygenase (Eppink et al. 1997). 

Infection is a primary cause of death in acute leukemia patients. The majority of chemotherapy used to treat ALL and AML can cause severe myelosupression, placing the patient at risk for sepsis from otherwise normal bacteria. It is important to recognize that symptoms and signs of infection maybe absent in a severely immunosuppressed or neutropenic patient. Fever (greater than 38.3°C, 100.9°F) in a neutropenic patient is a medical emergency. Following chemotherapy, the period of neutropenia usually reaches its nadir approximately 14 days after the... 

An essential detail for the statistical programmer to watch for in prior or concomitant medications data is whether or not the start and stop dates are important for analyses. Unfortunately, it is often the case that the importance of the timing of prior or concomitant medications is not determined until after much of the data have been entered or even after the database is closed to entry. For instance, it may be decided later that a specific concomitant medication has to be watched carefully for interaction with a medication used in the study. If insufficient attention was placed on the quality of the medication start and stop dates, then determining whether there is overlap with study medication is difficult if not impossible. 

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