The Highmark Pegasus Project report: characteristics of highly successful health plans.

The Highmark Blue Cross/Blue Shield Pegasus Project was created in the fall of 1996 to benchmark best practices at health plans around the United States through extensive interviews, literature searches, and other measures. Characteristics of highly successful health plans across a number of major categories are summarized in the final recommendations presented by this report.

A case of syncytial giant-cell hepatitis treated with an extracorporeal liver assist device.

Syncytial giant cell hepatitis (SGCH) has recently been reported to be a cause of severe hepatitis, with little chance of patient recovery without orthotopic liver transplantation. We have recently seen a patient with multisystem disease and histologic features of SGCH. Upon reaching stage IV coma, she was treated with an extracorporeal liver assist device containing 200 g of cultured liver cells. There was an immediate improvement in her galactose elimination capacity, and her own liver recovered to the point that therapy could be discontinued after 58 h. The patient recovered slowly from her multisystem disease and was discharged with mildly elevated transaminases and biochemical evidence of cholestasis. All laboratory values are normal at 2 yr, and the patient appears to have no sequelae of her disease.

Frequency of occurrence of various nuclear reactions when fast neutrons (approximately less than 50 MeV) pass through tissue-equivalent material.

Calculated results are presented for the frequency with which various partial nuclear reaction cross sections are utilized when fast neutrons (approximately less than 50 MeV) are transported through a tissue-equivalent phantom to obtain an indication of which cross sections are of most importance for radiotherapy applications and are therefore in need of experimental verification.

Saturation curve in gases of high atomic number at pressures up to 8 atm. I. Krypton and xenon.

The saturation curve has been studied in xenon and in krypton up to a pressure of 8 atm. An empirical formula has been found that describes the fraction of current collected over a wide range of voltages, pressures, ionization intensities, and electrode spacings. This is of practical value in the design of ionography chambers. For krypton the collection fraction fKr = (1 + 0.25eta-1.74)-1, and for xenon fXe = (1 + 0.16eta-1.88)-1, where eta = Fp-0.7Vd-2q-1/2 with F = 3.61 X 10(-7) and 2.50 X 10(-7) for krypton and xenon, respectively. The ranges of the variables covered in the experiments were p = 1-8 atm, V = 5-25000 V, d = 0.3-1.3 cm, and q = 4 X 10(-9)-6 X 10(-8) A/cm3.