Toxicologic analysis in cases of possible sudden infant death syndrome: a worthwhile exercise?

The diagnosis of sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS) is one of exclusion. At the Department of Forensic Medicine, Westmead Hospital, toxicologic analysis is performed as part of the postmortem examination of all apparent SIDS deaths. The results for the 5-year period January 1, 1994, to December 31, 1999, were audited to determine whether such routine testing was worthwhile. During this time there were 117 cases with a history consistent with SIDS. Drugs were detected in 19 (16%) of these cases. In 1 case, death was attributed to the finding of methadone. The presence of methadone was regarded as a possible contributing factor to death in a further 2 cases. The presence of possible methadone toxicity had not been expected from the history given before the examination in these 3 cases. In 114 cases there was a suitable sample for alcohol testing; in no case was alcohol detected. In 13 cases the postmortem examination revealed an anatomic cause of death (including 3 cases consistent with whiplash/shaken baby/impact head injury), which excluded a diagnosis of SIDS. In conclusion, routine toxicologic testing in all possible cases of SIDS death supplements the postmortem examination in excluding cases of non-SIDS.     

Chōra/Chōros: Samuel R. Delany and the masculine semiotic in Through the Valley of the Nest of Spiders (2012)

Julia Kristeva’s idea of the semiotic chōra continues to haunt gender, literary, and political theory and practice. Reaching what some might consider its controversial climax in the early to middle 1990s – following its introduction in La revolution du langage poétique – the fate of the chōra was left mainly with Judith Butler’s deconstruction of Kristeva’s use of the term in Gender Trouble and Bodies that Matter. Respectively Butler argues: (a) ‘Kristeva restricts herself to an exclusively prohibitive conception of the paternal law, [and] is unable to account for the ways in which the paternal law generates certain desires in the form of natural drives’ and (b) ‘Kristeva insists upon [the] identification of the chora with the maternal body.’ The present article seeks to resurrect this debate with a critique of Kristeva’s as well as Butler’s position regarding the chōra; my argument is twofold: (i) Kristeva is guilty of being unable to account for the generative capacity of the paternal law and (ii) Kristeva’s use of the semiotic chōra does indeed resonate uncomfortably close to certain frequencies of essentialism in gender theory; however, both criticism can be overcome by adding chōros, the masculine form of chōra, to Kristeva’s theoretical lexicon. In order to sketch out the implications for gender, literary, and political theory and practice I turn to American author and critic Samuel R. Delany’s Through the Valley of the Nest of Spiders.     

Reviews

Rachel Rosenthal . Edited by Moira Roth. Baltimore and London: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997.

Mourning Sex: Performing Public Memories . By Peggy Phelan. Routledge, 1997.

Phaedra in Delirium . Written by Susan Yankowitz, directed by Alison Summers, performed by Kathleen Chalfant, Peter Jay Fernandez and Sandra Shipley. Presented by the Women's Project and Productions and the Classic Stage Company, New York City. January 20‐February 15, 1998.

Face to Face . Performed by Peeling the Banana, Second Stage Theatre. New York City, April 27, May 4, May 11, 1998.

Dancing the Self: the Solo Art Form . Featuring choreographers Terry Hollis, Amy Kail, Mark Kenison, Laura Staton, and Kathy Westwater in new solos. The 92nd Street Y Harkness Dance Center, New York City. February 1, 1998.

Jack Smith: Flaming Creature . A museum exhibition at P.S. 1 Contemporary Art Museum, Long Island City, NY, October 29, 1997‐March 1, 1998.     

A Psychosocial Risk-Targeted Intervention to Reduce Work Disability: Development, Evolution, and Implementation Challenges

Research has been consistent in showing that certain psychosocial variables can increase the risk for prolonged work disability. Four psychosocial variables have emerged as robust predictors of disability across a wide range of debilitating health and mental health conditions. These include catastrophic thinking, symptom exacerbation fears, disability beliefs, and perceived injustice. The Progressive Goal Attainment Program (PGAP) is a psychosocial risk-targeted intervention that was developed to reduce psychosocial barriers to work resumption in individuals with debilitating health or mental health conditions. This paper describes the conception, developmental process, and the evolution of the PGAP. Research studies are summarized that have played a significant role in the developmental trajectory of the PGAP. Some of the legal and legislation-relevant challenges that were faced in the development and implementation the PGAP are discussed.     

Public Attitudes Toward Social Spending in the United States: The Differences Between Direct Spending and Tax Expenditures

This paper uses a survey experiment to examine differences in public attitudes toward ‘direct’ and ‘indirect’ government spending. Federal social welfare spending in the USA has two components: the federal government spends money to directly provide social benefits to citizens, and also indirectly subsidizes the private provision of social benefits through tax expenditures. Though benefits provided through tax expenditures are considered spending for budgetary purposes, they differ from direct spending in several ways: in the mechanisms through which benefits are delivered to citizens, in how they distribute wealth across the income spectrum, and in the visibility of their policy consequences to the mass public. We develop and test a model explaining how these differences will affect public attitudes toward spending conducted through direct and indirect means. We find that support for otherwise identical social programs is generally higher when such programs are portrayed as being delivered through tax expenditures than when they are portrayed as being delivered by direct spending. In addition, support for tax expenditure programs which redistribute wealth upward drops when citizens are provided information about the redistributive effects. Both of these results are conditioned by partisanship, with the opinions of Republicans more sensitive to the mechanism through which benefits are delivered, and the opinions of Democrats more sensitive to information about their redistributive effects.