134 battered children: a medical and psychological study

A controlled investigation of 134 battered children showed that nearly half had serious injuries and 21 died. Sixty-five had been battered more than once, 20 had permanent neurological sequelae, a quarter were low birth weight babies, and 10 had serious congenital defects. Twenty-three had been previously admitted to hospital with failure to thrive and the overlap with physical neglect was considerable. Mortality and morbidity among their siblings was also high. Difficulties with the child were attributable to interaction with neurotic mothers.The risk of battering diminishes after a child's second birthday. The establishment of specialized hospital teams to tackle the overall problem is suggested as a method of improving management. Prevention may lie in educating mothers in the basic physical and psychological requirements of children and overcoming their reluctance to avail themselves of medical care.

Parents of battered babies: a controlled study

A controlled investigation of 214 parents of battered babies shows that they were young and predominantly of lower social class. Premature parenthood is an associated feature. Among the mothers 76% had an abnormal personality and 48% were neurotic. Nearly half were of borderline or subnormal intelligence; 11% had a criminal record. Of the fathers 64% had an abnormal personality, more than half being psychopaths. Twenty-nine per cent. had a criminal record. Recidivism is an associated feature.The risk of battering possibly diminishes with time. The teaching of appropriate child-rearing skills, symptomatic relief, and social relearning are suggested as realistically based treatment methods and should be combined with a care order. When response to treatment appears unlikely permanent removal from parental care should be considered.

Studies on the analysis of fluorescence decay data by the method of moments

The method of moments, as presented by Isenberg and Dyson (1969; Biophys. J. 9:1337) has been shown to be a reliable way of obtaining the amplitudes and time constants of several simultaneously emitting species, even in the presence of an overlapping excitation. Recent improvements in the method include (a) a component incrementation test for determining the number of relaxations, (b) a procedure, which we call exponential depression, for dramatically improving convergence, and (c) a new algorithm for implementing the method of moments on a digital computer with a high degree of flexibility and efficiency. These improvements, as well as new general theory, are described and tested using both synthetic and real experimental data. Component incrementation consists of examining models with increasing numbers of exponential terms. Given adequate precision, we find that an analysis for N + 1 components, of data that are actually represented by N components, provides the correct amplitudes and time constants plus an N + 1 term with an insignificant amplitude. Exponential depression is a transformation in which the original excitation and fluorescence, E(t) and F(t), are multiplied by exp (-lambdat), where lambda is an arbitrary parameter. While the convolution is invariant to this transformation, the proper choice of lambda greatly reduces the number of iterations necessary to obtain the amplitudes and time constants and may even improve their accuracy. In addition, an appendix by John P. Mullooly presents a statistical analysis of the effect of counting error on the method of moments estimates of fluorescence decay parameters, applicable when data are obtained by the monophoton technique. Formulas are derived that give the approximate precision of the decay parameters for the general case of N exponential components, with calculational details for one and two component systems.

Failure to thrive and anorexia nervosa

A case study is reported of an anorexia nervosa mother who battered her elder male child (‘battered baby’) and in collusion with her psychopathic husband starved to death her 10-week-old daughter. The association of anorexia nervosa in the mother with death by starvation has not previously been reported in the literature. The possible underlying psychopathology is briefly discussed.

Acute myocardial infarction secondary to thromboembolism from a fractured prosthetic aortic valve

A case of coronary artery embolism from thrombus in a fracture in an aortic Starr-Edwards prosthesis was documented at necropsy. This 40-year-old white man had replacement of the aortic and mitral valves by ball-valve prostheses 5 years prior to his death. Following surgery, he was able to return to full-time work. He did not return for follow-up for 2 years, and when next seen he had an acute myocardial infarction and left ventricular failure. An embolus to the left anterior descending coronary artery was demonstrated at the postmortem examination. The mitral ball was intact, but the aortic ball had two large fractures which contained thrombi.