Myocardial sarcoidosis in forensic medicine

Sudden death is the most common manifestation of myocardial sarcoidosis, which is often clinically silent. The disease is rarely encountered in forensic medicine, but the diagnosis is important because it may change the interpretation of the manner of death and thus have insurance implications. Six cases of myocardial sarcoidosis diagnosed at autopsy are reported, and the significance of the findings is discussed.     

Forensic aspects of spatially and temporally related multiple corpses]

The authors analysed 171 cases of two or more corpses, found in a spatial and temporal coherence. The investigation revealed cases of manifold-homicides, homicides with suicide of the perpetrator, manifold-suicides, affects of cryptic, non human dangers from the outside, joint exposition to potential dangerous situations and casual deaths of two people at one place due to natural, internal diseases. The necessity of an autopsy in each case is pointed out.     

Training young americans for the new-manufacturing jobs

Articles

Training young americans for the new-manufacturing jobs     

Character Strengths Among Youth

Four hundred and fiftynine students from 20 different high school classrooms in Michigan participated in focus group discussions about the character strengths included in the Values in Action Classification. Students were interested in the subject of good character and able to discuss with candor and sophistication instances of each strength. They were especially drawn to the positive traits of leadership, practical intelligence, wisdom, social intelligence, love of learning, spirituality, and the capacity to love and be loved. Students believed that strengths were largely acquired rather than innate and that these strengths developed through ongoing life experience as opposed to formal instruction. They cited an almost complete lack of contemporary role models exemplifying different strengths of character. Implications of these findings for the quantitative assessment of positive traits were discussed, as were implications for designing character education programs for adolescents. We suggest that peers can be an especially important force in encouraging the development and display of good character among youth.     

Injuries due to deliberate violence in areas of Denmark. IV. Alcohol intoxication in victims of violence. The Copenhagen Study Group

A material of 1316 victims of deliberate violence was collected prospectively during a one year period in three Danish emergency wards covering a provincial/rural area and two metropolitan areas. The frequency of alcohol intoxication was determined. Forty-one percent of the patients were intoxicated. The highest frequency was found in male victims, in the provincial/rural area, in restaurants or their vicinity, in the age group 35-49, during evenings and nights and in May. It is difficult to indicate specific preventive measures. However, a more restrictive attitude is suggested with regard to serving alcohol to intoxicated persons in restaurants.     

Early epidermal changes in heat- and electrically injured pig skin. I. A light microscopic study

In order to find methods applicable for disclosing electrical torture, pig skin was exposed to heat and electricity under controlled circumstances. Biopsies were obtained immediately after exposure and the morphology of the heat lesions was compared to that of electrical lesions. The cytoplasm of epidermal cells in heat lesions appeared granular or fibrillar, while the nuclei were rather unaffected. In electrical lesions the cytoplasm appeared homogeneous often with a peculiar white colour in hematoxylin-eosin stained sections. The nuclei were either dark and shadowy or enlarged and vesicular. The keratin in electrical lesions often showed a bright yellow colour. Small defects in the epidermis were seen in some electrical lesions. Thus the morphology of electrical lesions differed markedly from that of heat lesions. Although some of these differences may be due to differences in distribution and intensity of energy, it is probable that pH shifts in the cells due to electrolysis is the main cause of the specific morphology of electrical lesions.     

Joined-Up Government in The Netherlands: Experiences with Program Ministries

Over the last 15 years there have been many experiments with joined-up (also known as whole of) government practices, aimed at horizontal coordination to overcome the fragmentation of vertical governmental structures due to departmentalism and New Public Management. These practices were initiated to address wicked problems and to better interact with society at large. Now that there are signs that the rhetoric of joined-up government is winding down and many joined-up government developments are being dismantled, it is time to evaluate this approach. This is especially appropriate as some suggest that the overall impact of these developments may be relatively small, despite (overly) optimistic claims made in the past. In this article we take experiences with joined-up government in the Netherlands as the departing point for a critical discussion of this approach. By comparing the Dutch experiences with those in other countries, we will draw a picture of the challenges and dilemmas of horizontal coordination in the vertical world of government.     

Bacteria in lung tissue from an autopsy population of alcoholics

The retrieval of bacteria from the lungs postmortem was examined in a population of alcoholics who had a medico-legal autopsy performed. The results were compared with non-alcoholic controls. Pneumococci were found more frequently in alcoholics, but in general there were no major differences. Proteus mirabilis was detected in three out of five alcoholics with unascertainable cause of death. It is speculated whether this species may cause septicaemia in some alcoholics due to abnormal splanchnicus circulation.