diaphragm

Did you know the most dominant apes and monkeys are usually the kindest? They share the most food, groom others more often, break up fights, are slow to anger, and breathe in a relaxed manner. Those on the bottom of the social hierarchy are the opposite. They are stingy, combative, irritable, anxious, depressed, and they breathe shallowly. It is not easy for a submissive primate to become dominant. They have mindsets, mannerisms, and muscle tension that keep them from escaping their subordinate social strategy and the chronic stress it produces.

All of this generalizes to people. If you want to be free of negative emotion, you need to rehabilitate physical trauma in your breath, eyes, face, voice, heart, gut, spine, and brain. Program Peace will coach you to do precisely this by first retraining your breathing pattern, and then walking you through dozens of innovative and effective self-care exercises. After creating new mindsets and mannerisms, and learning to reinvigorate muscles you never knew you had, you will find yourself more confident, healthier, kinder, and reprogrammed for peace.

The diaphragm is receiving renewed attention as a promising female-controlled method of preventing HIV and other sexually-transmitted infections. It is anticipated that female-controlled technologies will reduce women's biological susceptibility and assist in counteracting their sociocultural vulnerability to HIV. Understanding the subjective experiences of diaphragm users in different settings has the potential to inform the development and promotion of such methods. This paper explores the perspectives of female sex workers and women attending sexual and reproductive health services in Mombasa, Kenya. Data are reported from focus group discussions and in-depth interviews with women and men, following a prospective study investigating diaphragm continuation rates over six months. Discussions highlighted covert use of the diaphragm, during sex work or with casual partners, and coital independence as favourable attributes. These features were especially pronounced compared with male condoms. Few difficulties with diaphragm use were reported, although its insertion and removal occasionally presented problems. Many women--especially those in long term partnerships--wished to disclose its use but found the disclosure process highly problematic. Accidental discovery often resulted in partner conflict. Although future uptake of the diaphragm may be high in this setting, its use may be limited to certain types of relationships and relationship context.

Deterioration of diaphragm function is one of the prominent factors that contributes to the susceptibility of serious respiratory infections and development of respiratory failure in patients with Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy (DMD). The NF-κB signaling pathway has been implicated as a contributing factor of dystrophic pathology, making it a potential therapeutic target. Previously, we demonstrated that pharmacological inhibition of NF-κB via a small NEMO Binding Domain (NBD) peptide was beneficial for reducing pathological features of mdx mice. Now, we stringently test the effectiveness and clinical potential of NBD by treating mdx mice with various formulations of NBD and use diaphragm function as our primary outcome criteria. We found that administering DMSO-soluble NBD rescued 78% of the contractile deficit between mdx and wild-type (WT) diaphragm. Interestingly, synthesis of a GLP NBD peptide as an acetate salt permitted its solubility in water, but as a negative consequence, als...

Both total subdiaphragmatic vagotomy (TVAGX) and serotonin3 receptor blockade with tropisetron or ondansetron attenuate amino acid-imbalanced diet (Imb) anorexia. Total vagotomy is less effective than tropisetron in reducing Imb-induced anorexia and also blunts the tropisetron effect. With the use of electrocautery at the subdiaphragmatic level of the vagus, we severed the ventral and dorsal trunks as well as the hepatic, ventral gastric, dorsal gastric, celiac, and accessory celiac branches separately or in combination to determine which vagal branches or associated structures may be involved in these responses. Rats were prefed a low-protein diet. On the first experimental day, tropisetron or saline was given intraperitoneally 1 h before presentation of Imb. Cuts including the ventral branch, i.e., TVAGX, ventral vagotomy (above the hepatic branch), and hepatic + gastric vagotomies (but not hepatic branch cuts alone) caused the highest ( P < 0.05) Imb intake on day 1 with or wi...

Recent evidence indicates that hypoxia enhances the generation of oxidants. Little is known about the role of free radicals in contractility of the rat diaphragm during hypoxia. We hypothesized that antioxidants improve contractility of the hypoxic rat diaphragm and that xanthine oxidase (XO) is an important source of free radicals in the hypoxic diaphragm. The effects of N-acetylcysteine (NAC; 18 mM), Tiron (10 mM), and the XO inhibitor allopurinol (250 μM) were studied on isometric and isotonic force generation during hypoxia (Po 2 ∼7 kPa). NAC and Tiron decreased maximal force generation, slowed the shortening velocity, and decreased the power output. Fatigue rate was decreased in the presence of either NAC or Tiron. Allopurinol did not alter the contractility or fatigability of the diaphragm. During hyperoxia (Po 2 ∼85 kPa), neither NAC nor allopurinol affected the contractility or fatigability of the diaphragm. Thus free radicals play a significant role in diaphragm contractili...

... 12. Nguyen HB, Rivers EP, Knoblich BP, et al. ... Hepatodiaphragmatic interposition of the bowel was first described by Demetrius Chilaiditi in 1910.1 It is often an incidental finding, which can exist temporarily or permanently, and can be mistaken for pneumoperitoneum. ...

Scorpions are among the oldest venomous living organisms and the family Buthidae is the largest and most medically relevant one. Scorpion venoms include many toxic peptides, but recently, a metalloprotease from Tityus serrulatus called antarease was reported to be capable of cleaving VAMP2, a protein involved in the neuroparalytic syndromes of tetanus and botulism. We have produced antarease and an inactive metalloprotease mutant in a recombinant form and analyzed their enzymatic activity on recombinant VAMP2 in vitro and on mammalian and insect neuromuscular junction. The purified recombinant antarease paralyzed the neuromuscular junctions of mice and of Drosophila melanogaster whilst the mutant was inactive. We were unable to demonstrate any cleavage of VAMP2 under conditions which leads to VAMP proteolysis by botulinum neurotoxin type B. Antarease caused a reduced release probability, mainly due to defects upstream of the synaptic vesicles fusion process. Paired pulse experiments...

Congenital diaphragmatic hernia (CDH) is a major congenital malformation. Different types have been described. Bochdalek hernia (BH) remains most prevalent with high mortality rates. Other variants are less common and carry good prognosis. Although, the diagnosis can be made antenatally, the presentation may be delayed. There is paucity of national literature on CDHs. We present our experience with these challenging paediatric malformations. Medical records of 18 patients (< or =14 years) treated by the group of authors between October 1998 and April 2002 were retrospectively reviewed and demographic data, clinical presentation, morbidity and outcome were studied. There were 13 (72%) children with Bochdalek hernia, 2 (11%) with eventration of the diaphragm, 2 (11%) with hiatus hernia and 1(6%) with a Morgagni hernia. The lesions were more common in girls and all the defects were left sided. The average age at the time of presentation of BH was 23 hours (2 to 72 hours) commonly pr...