Robert Brody

OBJECTIVE: To determine whether an advance directive redesigned to meet most adults' literacy needs (fifth grade reading level with graphics) was more useful for advance care planning than a standard form (>12th grade level).

METHODS: We enrolled 205 English and Spanish-speaking patients, aged >/=50 years from an urban, general medicine clinic. We randomized participants to review either form. Main outcomes included acceptability and usefulness in advance care planning. Participants then ...

An evaluation of patient satisfaction with pain management is one component of a total quality assurance program on pain management recommended by the American Pain Society. This study utilized the patient satisfaction survey recommended by the Quality Assurance Committee of the American Pain Society and was conducted in an acute care, municipal hospital. Seventy-two medical-surgical patients were interviewed about their pain management. Data from the survey suggest that while patients ...

To the Editor.— We describe two patients in whom, while receiving isotretinoin for severe cystic acne previously uncontrolled by conventional therapy, severe vasculitis developed, one patient with Wegener's granulomatosis and the other patient with small-vessel angiitis.Report of Cases.—Case 1 (Wegener's Granulomatosis).— Acne of the face and upper trunk developed in this patient at age 15 years in 1980. In November 1983, he began therapy with isotretinoin orally administered at 80 mg ...

Actinic reticuloid is a polymorphous dermatosis resulting from a photosensitivity to long wavelength ultraviolet light and occasionally also to visible light, often with clinical and histological resemblance to lymphoma. We describe a patient who is the second American case to be reported with this disease and review the literature. Actinic reticuloid must be distinguished from mycosis fungoides, polymorphous light eruption, persistent light reaction, and contact dermatitis.

In this paper we establish the strongest possible criterion for the hyperbolicity of a compact complex manifold: such a manifold is hyperbolic if and only if it contains no (nontrivial) complex lines. In addition, we study the behavior of such manifolds under deformation and, in particular, answer the two most natural questions about such deformations: Is the space of hyperbolic complex structures on a given C∞{C^\infty } manifold open in the space of all its complex structures? (Yes.) ...

The ethical issues of clinical competency and confidentiality are addressed. The authors identify the influence of a more diverse student population and of a society seeking greater information on these two ethical issues. Case examples are presented illustrating these changes.