Correction: Reference 7 / Pre-hospital airway management guidelines (Harald Genzwuerker, 09Oct2008)
Unfortunately, there is a small mistake regarding reference 7 ("Pre-hospital airway management: guidelines from a task force from the Scandinavian Society for Anaesthesiology and Intensive Care Medicine."), which is not published in Anesth Analg but rather in Acta Anaesthesiol Scand. Published in the mean time, the correct reference is: Berlac P, Hyldmo PK, Kongstad P, Kurola J, Nakstad AR, Sandberg M. Pre-hospital airway management: guidelines from... read full comment

Total agreement.. (Dorothea Penizek, 09Oct2008)
That was one of the most sensible things I have read in a long time. Too many restrictions are totally counterproductive and total reliance on DNA testing and the subsequent removal of carriers and even affecteds from the gene pool only limits genetic diversity. Dorothea Penizek... read full comment

Correction and citation (Dustin Holloway, 07Oct2008)
Although the KEGG database is mentioned at several points within the text, readers should also note that the layout of the WNT pathway as seen in Figure 4 was modeled after that seen in the KEGG WNT Signaling Pathway(http://www.genome.jp/kegg/pathway/hsa/hsa04310.html). Please also note that, in Figure 2, the y-axis is the Positive Predictive Value (PPV). Finally, identifiers for several of the TFs in the bottom portion of Figure 6A are missing. ... read full comment

Figure Correction (Dustin Holloway, 07Oct2008)
Please note the following minor correction to Figure 1: The small box on the bottom right hand corner of Figure 1 contains the following text: "100X Average Accuracy." This should instead read "50X Average Accuracy." (The Figure legend provides the correct number). Also, the text directly next to the box should read "Average the Accuracy Estimates Over 50 Repeats", rather than "...Over 100 Repeats." ... read full comment

Factors affecting circuit lifespan in critically ill children: A child is not a small adult (Jesus Lopez-Herce, 06Oct2008)
We read with interest the comments of Drs Ricci et al (1) on our article Circuit lifespan in critically ill children on continuous renal replacement treatment: a prospective observational evaluation study (2). We agree with the authors that children are not equal to adults. There are important differences between children and adults in their anatomy, physiology, diseases and response to disease and in the treatments given. In fact, it is essential... read full comment

Correction (Chris Arme, 06Oct2008)
Corrections to this article have been published in Parasites & Vectors 2008, 1:37 ... read full comment

Paramount Inherited Functional Mitochondrial Cytopathy, Pre-Metabolic and Metabolic Syndrome are based on. (Sergio Stagnaro, 04Oct2008)
Sirs, this paper is really intriguing and interesting. However, in Primary Prevention as well as early bedside diagnosis of Metabolic Syndrome, physicians have necessarily to know Biophysical-Semeiotic Constitutions, fundamental ground of Single Patient Based Medicine, which fortunately completes EBM! (1, 2). Really, the constitutions exist and are based on inherited mitochondrial functional cytopathy, I discovered and described - for the first... read full comment

Pre-Metabolic and Metabolic Syndrome are based on Inherited Mitochondrial Cytopathy. (Sergio Stagnaro, 04Oct2008)
Sirs, I find this paper really interesting and useful in preventing rather than recognizing metabolic syndrome. However, in Primary Prevention as well as early bedside diagnosis of Metabolic Syndrome, physicians have at the best to know Biophysical-Semeiotic Constitutions, fundamental ground of Single Patient Based Medicine, which fortunately completes EBM! (1, 2). Really, these constitutions exist and are based on inherited mitochondrial functional... read full comment

Further information on existing data on management strategies for CFS (Tom Kindlon, 01Oct2008)
As well as giving the protocol for the PACE Trial, this paper also gives information and data from some previous studies in the area. Depending on which pieces of data are presented for any treatment in medicine, a treatment can often look more or less useful or effective. Readers of this paper may be interested to know about a recent meta-analysis of the efficacy of CBT for CFS[1]. The studies involved a total of 1371 patients. This involved calculating... read full comment

Some problems with the 'London Criteria' (Angela Kennedy, 01Oct2008)
With regard to Doctor Goudsmit's assertions regarding the 'London Criteria', it is important to set out what is known about these 'criteria' themselves for the purpose of clarifying their problematic inclusion in the PACE Trial: The London criteria have never been published in a peer reviewed publication. They were mentioned in the National Task Force Report as being one of nine different PROPOSED definitions and descriptions (see page 88, Appendix... read full comment

Analyses of 2 separate CFS cohorts found 6 of the 8 SF-36 subscales group together - two that don't are MH and RE (the latter is being used in this definition) (Tom Kindlon, 30Sep2008)
This paper is supposed to operationalize the recommendations in the consensus paper by Reeves et al[1]. That paper suggested that the SF-36 could be useful as a measure of functional impairment but did not specify which subscales should be used. The authors of the current paper chose to define "substantial reduction in occupational, educational, social, or recreational activities" as "scores lower than the 25th percentile of published US population... read full comment

Alcohol abuse (Sam Sam, 30Sep2008)
Alcohol abuse, as described in the DSM-IV, is a psychiatric diagnosis describing the use of alcoholic beverages despite negative consequences. It is differentiated from alcohol dependence by the lack of symptoms such as tolerance and withdrawal. ========================================== Sam Alcohol Addiction Treatment... read full comment

The effect of smoking on cancer risk and ultraviolet wavelengths on melanoma risk (William B. Grant, 30Sep2008)
The study of variation of cancer incidence by socioeconomic group in England by Shack et al. [1] presents some interesting results; however, the interpretation of the findings overlooks two important factors: the role of smoking in risk for some types of cancer and the different roles of solar ultraviolet-B (UVB) and UVA in the etiology of melanoma and non-melanoma skin cancer (NMSC). This letter presents results in the relevant journal literature... read full comment

State of the art Smith-Waterman implementations for Cell BE (Michael Farrar, 29Sep2008)
The CBESW is not the only Smith-Waterman implementation for the Cell Broadband Engine (Cell BE). The Cell BE, developed by Sony, Toshiba and IBM, is found in Sonys PlayStation 3 (PS3). The speed reported for the CBESW on the PS3 is ~3.6 GCUPS with the ability to handle sequences less than 900 residues in length. One of the first ports of the Smith-Waterman algorithm to the Cell BE was done by IBM[1]. The port was of Erik Lindhals Altivec code... read full comment

Why was sodium intake not examined? (Martin Turner, 29Sep2008)
Sodium intake is well known to affect BP in the short-term and very likely has a strong influence on the long-term rise of BP with age. See for eg: http://www.worldactiononsalt.com/ http://www.awash.org.au/ http://www.saltmatters.org/site/ Could the authors explain why they chose to ignore sodium or salt intake as a lifestyle behaviour in this study? Martin Turner... read full comment

Correction to Table 4 (James Ketudat Cairns, 29Sep2008)
In Table 4, the last two p-nitrophenyl glycosides should be alpha-linked (pNP-alpha-L-arabinoside and pNP-alpha-D-galactoside). The alpha's were accidently replaced by beta's during editing and I failed to catch it. I apologize to the readers for any confusion.... read full comment

wrong modelling of protein sequence evolution: a reply (Eric Marechal, 29Sep2008)
A comment has been posted declaring that the model of protein evolution published here was wrong. Well, in this comment it appears that the meaning of information as meant in our work has not been really understood by the reader. Information can have different meanings. - In the sense of the protein structure-function relationship (i.e. in terms of the emergence of a molecular function from a sequence), information can mean what is encrypted... read full comment

Offence or defence? (Andrew Carmichael, 29Sep2008)
In view of the work of Ruth Itzhaki at Manchester on HSV1 in AD showing 'entombment' of virus in amyloid deposits (mis-folded proteins) and the interpretation of this as a defensive mechanism it seems possible that the effects shown in this article are a parallel of the same style of CNS defence. The use of the prion to form its own 'tomb' is a smart move and the resultant product should not be viewed as the cause of the disease. This assumption of... read full comment

updated on pubished cases (Axel Petzold, 29Sep2008)
coinciding with our publication Dr Arthur Siegel and colleagues published in The American Journal of Medicine 2007;120:461.e11-461.17 a study on 'hyponatremia in marathon runners due to inappropriate arginine vasopressin secretion'. In their paper the authors refer to one of the cases reported by us [reference 1]. In order to update the data in our Table 1; the serum Na of this 32 year old runner was 123 mM, CT brain showed diffuse cerebral and pulmonary... read full comment

Mexicos experience reducing extrapulmonary tuberculosis (MANUEL ENRIQUE ACOSTA MEZA, 29Sep2008)
I found your report interesting, since in the world many countries, tuberculosis still is a very serious public health issue. It is important to share that in the experience of my country (Mexico), the cases of extra pulmonary tuberculoses have been dramatically reduced, in spite of having specific regions with high incidence of pulmonary cases. This has been possible thanks to the national program of universal vaccination with a very high coverage... read full comment