Clark, MC, Weiman, DS, Pate, JW & Gir, S 1997, 'Perfluorocarbons: Future Clinical Possibilities', Journal of Investigative Surgery, vol. 10, no. 6, pp. 357-365.
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Davey, GCL, Menzies, R & Gallardo, B 1997, 'Height phobia and biases in the interpretation of bodily sensations: Some links between acrophobia and agoraphobia', Behaviour Research and Therapy, vol. 35, no. 11, pp. 997-1001.
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The present study was designed to investigate some of the factors that might underlie the commonly found association between agoraphobia and fear of heights (acrophobia). The results showed that measures of acrophobia are highly associated with the tendency to interpret ambiguous bodily sensations as threatening, and with an increased tendency to report bodily sensations of anxiety. These features of acrophobia did not appear to be characteristics found in phobic states in general, nor did measures of acrophobia show any significant relationship to the tendency to interpret external and social stimuli as threatening. These findings suggest that the frequently found co-morbidity between agoraphobia and acrophobia may be linked to cognitive biases in the discrimination and interpretation of bodily sensations that agoraphobia and acrophobia share in common. In addition, the present findings also generate testable hypotheses about the aetiology of acrophobia.
de Vet, HCW, de Bie, RA, van der Heijden, GJMG, Verhagen, AP, Sijpkes, P & Knipschild, PG 1997, 'Systematic Reviews on the Basis of Methodological Criteria', Physiotherapy, vol. 83, no. 6, pp. 284-289.
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This paper describes a method of systematic reviewing. This method puts much emphasis on the methodological quality of the randomised clinical trials involved. Various items concerning the internal validity, precision and relevance of the studies are scored in such a way that next to the methodological quality the amount of uncertainty about it also becomes visible. These quality assessments are not only useful for systematic reviews, but also have an educational function for researchers with respect to the design and publication of a clinical trial.
Garton, A 1997, 'The abstracts of the 32nd Annual Conference of the Australian Psychological Society 2-6 October 1997 Cairns, Queensland', Australian Journal of Psychology, vol. 49, no. sup1, pp. 80-132.
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Harvey, LA, Newton-John, T, Davis, GM, Smith, MB & Engel, S 1997, 'A comparison of the attitude of paraplegic individuals to the Walkabout Orthosis and the Isocentric Reciprocal Gait Orthosis', Spinal Cord, vol. 35, no. 9, pp. 580-584.
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Jones, MK & Menzies, RG 1997, 'Danger Ideation Reduction Therapy (DIRT): preliminary findings with three obsessive-compulsive washers', Behaviour Research and Therapy, vol. 35, no. 10, pp. 955-960.
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Three obsessive-compulsive patients received Danger Ideation Reduction Therapy (DIRT) in an initial treatment trial. All three subjects presented with contamination/washing concerns but refused to participate in exposure and response prevention. DIRT is solely directed at decreasing danger-related expectancies concerning contamination. DIRT procedures do not attempt to address inflated personal responsibility. In addition, DIRT does not involve director filmed exposure to contamination-related stimuli, or behavioural experiments. Components of DIRT include corrective information cognitive restructuring, filmed interviews, microbiological experiments, attentional focusing and Hoekstra's (1989) probability of catastrophe estimation task. Treatment consisted of between six and ten 1 hr weekly sessions. At post-treatment, substantial reductions in scores on the Padua Inventory, Maudsley Obsessional-Compulsive Inventory and two global rating scales were apparent for all subjects. These improvements were maintained at a 3-month follow-up. The theoretical and clinical implications of these preliminary findings are discussed.
Jones, MK & Menzies, RG 1997, 'The cognitive mediation of obsessive-compulsive handwashing', Behaviour Research and Therapy, vol. 35, no. 9, pp. 843-850.
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The potential mediating roles of danger expectancies, responsibility, perfectionism, anticipated anxiety and self-efficacy on obsessive-compulsive handwashing were examined. Ratings were obtained from 27 obsessive-compulsive patients before and during a behavioural avoidance test involving a compound stimulus of potting soil, animal hair, food scraps and raw meat. Correlation and partial correlation analyses were conducted to examine the relationships between the cognitive predictor variables and anxiety, urge to wash, time in task and duration of post-test washing. Large and significant relationships between danger expectancies and the dependent measures were obtained, even when alternative mediators were held constant. No other variable remained significantly related to any of the dependent measures when severity of disease ratings were held constant. Results suggest that of the cognitive variables examined, danger expectancies are the most likely mediator of washing-related behaviour in obsessive-compulsive disorder.
Kneebone, I, Clarnette, R & Frendin, L 1997, 'The Dysfunctional Behaviour Rating Instrument: Utility in an Australian Population', Australian Journal on Ageing, vol. 16, no. 4, pp. 208-210.
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This report examines the validity and reliability of the Dysfunctional Behaviour Rating Instrument (DBRI), designed for completion by caregivers of individuals with dementia residing in the community. Randomly selected carers completed the instrument and scores were compared to scores on measures of ADL, cognition and caregiver burden. The DBRI correlated weakly with cognition, r = ‐0.20 (p < .05), but moderately with burden r = 0.49 and ADL r = 0.33 (both p < 0.001), The DBRI is considered to be both valid and reliable for use with an Australian population.
Lincoln, MA & Onslow, M 1997, 'Long-Term Outcome of Early Intervention for Stuttering', American Journal of Speech-Language Pathology, vol. 6, no. 1, pp. 51-58.
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This paper reports the long-term outcome of treatment from two previous studies: Onslow, Costa, and Rue (1990), and Onslow, Andrews, and Lincoln (1994). These studies evaluated the effect of a parent-administered, operant, nonprogrammed stuttering treatment (The Lidcombe Programme) when used with preschool-age children who stuttered. The original studies provided outcome data on 4 and 12 children, respectively, until 12 months posttreatment. This study provides outcome data on the children at 2 to 7 years posttreatment. Additionally, data were collected 1 to 4 years posttreatment on a comparable clinical population who received the same treatment. The subjects in this study were 43 children who had been treated for stuttering between 2 and 5 years of age. Parents were requested to make three 10-minute recordings of their child's speech each year for 3 years. They were instructed to record their child talking to a family member at home, talking to a non-family member outside the home, and to make a covert recording of the child speaking to a different family member. Questionnaires were sent to the parents at the same time as the tapes. Near-zero stuttering levels were achieved posttreatment and were maintained in the long-term. These results suggest that preschool-age children treated for stuttering may not need to re-enter treatment for up to 7 years after their initial treatment.
Lincoln, MA, Onslow, M & Reed, V 1997, 'Social Validity of the Treatment Outcomes of an Early Intervention Program for Stuttering', American Journal of Speech-Language Pathology, vol. 6, no. 2, pp. 77-84.
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This research was designed to provide a socially valid evaluation of the posttreatment speech of children who received an operant treatment for early stuttering (The Lidcombe Program). Part A compared the posttreatment percent syllables stuttered (%SS) for preschool and school-age children with nonstuttering control children matched for age and sex. This study found that both groups attracted similar measures of %SS. Part B compared the number of 'stuttering' versus 'not stuttering' judgments made by experienced clinicians and unsophisticated listeners on the same speech samples. Control children were identified as 'stuttering' significantly more than the treated children. The clinician listeners identified significantly more control samples and posttreatment samples as stuttering than the unsophisticated listeners. The implications of these results are discussed. It is concluded that The Lidcombe Program resulted in socially valid modifications in the participant's speech.
Menzies, RG & Harris, LM 1997, 'Mode of onset in evolutionary-relevant and evolutionary-neutral phobias: Evidence from a clinical sample', Depression and Anxiety, vol. 5, no. 3, pp. 134-136.
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Onslow, M, O'Brian, S & Harrison, E 1997, 'The Lidcombe Programme of early stuttering intervention: Methods and issues', International Journal of Language & Communication Disorders, vol. 32, no. 2, pp. 231-250.
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AbstractsThe Lidcombe Programme is an operant intervention for early stuttering that parents administer to children in their everyday speaking environments. The treatment was developed at the Suttering Unit, Bankstown Health Service, Sydney, and The University of Sydney. Recently, staff from the Australian Stuttering Research Centre, The University of Sydney, toured universities and clinics in the UK to present lectures about this treatment. We were encouraged to write this paper because an independent survey showed that most speech and language therapists who attended the presentations were open to this treatment. Prior to and following that lecture tour, publications in the press and professional journals in the UK alluded to many positive features of the Lidcombe Programme, but also raised several issues about it. The purpose of this paper is to summarise the Lidcombe Programme and address the following criticisms of the treatment that were raised in the UK: (1) Stuttering is complex but the Lidcombe Programme is simple; (2) the Lidcombe Programme is not an operant treatment, but invokes positive changes in children's environments; (3) the Lidcombe Programme is harmful to children; and (4) the scientific evidence in support of the Lidcombe Programme is flawed. Each of these issues is addressed from logical, theoretical and empirical viewpoints.Le Lidcombe Programme est un traitment qui agit directement dans le cos de bégaiement précoce, et que les parents administrent à leurs enfants dans le cadre linguistique quotitien. Ce traitement a été mis au point au sein de l'Unité du Bégaiement du Service de Santé de Banktown à Sydney, et dans l'Université de Sydney. Récemment des membres du Centre de Recherches sur le Bégaiement de l'Université de Sydney ont fait une tournée d'Universités et de cliniques britanniques pour donner des conférences sur ce traitement. L'encouragement à écrire cet article est venu ...
Onslow, M, O'Brian, S & Harrison, E 1997, 'The Lidcombe Programme: Maverick or Not?', International Journal of Language & Communication Disorders, vol. 32, no. 2, pp. 261-266.
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Onslow, M, Packman, A, Stocker, S, Doorn, JV & Siegel, GM 1997, 'Control of Children's Stuttering With Response-Contingent Time-Out', Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, vol. 40, no. 1, pp. 121-133.
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Many stuttering treatments incorporate contingencies for stuttering that are thought to contribute to treatment effectiveness. One contingency used in a number of treatment programs for children is time-out (TO) from speaking. However, although TO has been shown to control stuttering in adults there are no clear demonstrations of this effect in children. One aim of the present study was to demonstrate in the laboratory that TO reduces stuttering in children. Three school-age children spoke in a single-subject ABA experiment. In the B phase, a red light was illuminated for 5 seconds when the subject stuttered, during which time the subject stopped talking. Two of the three children showed clear reductions in stuttering in response to TO. The second aim of the study was to detect whether the children who responded to TO adopted an unusual speech pattern in order to control their stuttering. Listeners did not detect any differences between the perceptually stutter-free speech of baseline conditions and that of TO conditions, and a subsequent acoustic analysis revealed a reduction in the variability of vowel duration during TO in one subject and no changes in the other. The theoretical and clinical implications of the findings are discussed.
Packman, A, Onslow, M & Attanasio, J 1997, 'Multifactorial does not necessarily mean multicausal', Journal of Fluency Disorders, vol. 22, no. 2, pp. 92-92.
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Pate, JW, Sweeney & Fulton, RL 1997, 'Traumatic aortic transections: Eight-year experience with the ''clamp-sew'' technique - Discussion', ANNALS OF THORACIC SURGERY, vol. 64, no. 2, pp. 387-388.
Ryan, A, McGill, J & Mountain, H 1997, 'Rapid testing for the MCAD G583A mutation, by PCR-mediated site directed mutagenesis, in an Australian population of SIDS patients.', Dis Markers, vol. 13, no. 2, pp. 131-134.
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Medium Chain Acyl CoA Dehydrogenase (MCAD) deficiency is the most common genetic disorder of fatty acid metabolism and has been reported as a cause of sudden death in infants. We investigated the incidence of a rare MCAD mutation (G583A) in a large population of SIDS patients. A method utilising PCR mediated site directed mutagenesis and restriction enzyme digestion was devised to enable rapid and simple testing of large numbers of samples. The G583A mutation was not detected in 413 SIDS patients tested suggesting the mutation is not an important cause of sudden death in infants. The prevalence of this mutation in the general population was estimated to be between 0 and 0.89%.
Schulz, M & Schmoldt, A 1997, 'Therapeutic and toxic blood concentrations of more than 500 drugs.', Pharmazie, vol. 52, no. 12, pp. 895-911.
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In order to assess the significance of drug levels measured in clinical and forensic toxicology as well as for Therapeutic Drug Monitoring (TDM) it is essential that good collections of data are readily available. For more than 500 frequently used drugs therapeutic and, if data was available, toxic, and fatal plasma concentrations as well as elimination half-lives were compiled in a table. The compilation includes data for hypnotics like barbiturates and benzodiazepines, diphenhydramine, neuroleptics, antidepressants, sedatives, analgesics, antiinflammatory agents (e.g., NSAIDs), antihistamines, antiepileptics, betaadrenergic antagonists, antibiotics (penicillins, cephalosporins, aminoglycosides, gyrase inhibitors), diuretics, calcium-channel blockers, cardiac glycosides, antiarrhythmics, antiasthmatics, ACE-inhibitors, opiate agonists, and local anesthetics, among others. In addition, some toxicological relevant xenobiotics were listed. Data have been abstracted from published information, both compilations and primary sources and have been completed with data collected in our own forensic and clinical toxicology laboratories. Wherever possible, ranges for therapeutic plasma concentrations are expressed as trough concentration at steady state. The half-life values given for each drug are chosen to represent the terminal log-linear phase at most. It is the purpose to rapidly assess the significance of drug levels for the therapeutic monitoring of patients, and to facilitate the diagnostic assessment in case of intoxications.
Sitharthan, T, Sitharthan, G, Hough, MJ & Kavanagh, DJ 1997, 'Cue exposure in moderation drinking: A comparison with cognitive–behavior therapy.', Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, vol. 65, no. 5, pp. 878-882.
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To date, the published controlled trials on exposure to alcohol cues have had an abstinence treatment goal. A modification of cue exposure (CE) for moderation drinking, which incorporated priming doses of alcohol, could train participants to stop drinking after 2 to 3 drinks. This study examined the effects of modified CE within sessions, combined with directed homework practice. Nondependent problem drinkers who requested a moderation drinking goal were randomly allocated to modified CE or standard cognitive-behavior therapy (CBT) for alcohol abuse. Both interventions were delivered in 6 90- min group sessions. Eighty-one percent of eligible participants completed treatment and follow-up assessment. Over 6 months, CE produced significantly greater reductions than CBT in participants' reports of drinking frequency and consumption on each occasion. No pretreatment variables significantly predicted outcome. The modified CE procedure appears viable for nondependent drinkers who want to adopt a moderate drinking goal.
Verhagen, AP, de Vet, HC, de Bie, RA, Kessels, AG, Boers, M & Knipschild, PG 1997, 'Taking baths: the efficacy of balneotherapy in patients with arthritis. A systematic review.', J Rheumatol, vol. 24, no. 10, pp. 1964-1971.
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OBJECTIVE: To review English, French, German, and Dutch language studies of the effectiveness of balneotherapy. Balneotherapy (hydrotherapy or spa therapy) is one of the oldest forms of therapy for patients with arthritis. One of the aims of balneotherapy is to relieve pain. METHODS: We performed a systematic review that included randomized and nonrandomized studies. Quality scores of the studies were determined using a criteria list. RESULTS: Most studies report positive findings, but all studies showed methodological flaws. A quality of life measurement was never reported as an outcome measure. None of the randomized clinical trials included intention-to-treat analysis or comparison of effects between groups. CONCLUSION: Because of the methodological flaws a conclusion about the efficacy of balneotherapy cannot be provided from studies we reviewed. We conclude that most flaws found could be avoidable in future research.
