Articles: disease.
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Postponement of menses is widely practised by women using oral contraceptives. One-hundred volunteers, consisting of three groups of women, each group using a different extensively used contraceptive regimen, were tested and compared. ⋯ Based on daily records of vaginal bleedings as well as on the results of a questionnaire, it could be concluded that postponement of the withdrawal bleeding for twenty extra days was generally effective; the occurrence of the bleedings was related to the duration of postponement of menses and to the contraceptive regimen that was used. However, the introduction of a seven-week cycle pill is not yet a promising alternative since the majority of the volunteers preferred the inconvenience of a monthly withdrawal bleeding.
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A provisional clinical case-definition for acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) developed by the World Health Organisation (WHO) for use in Africa was tested on 174 inpatients at Mama Yemo Hospital, Kinshasa, Zaire. In this hospital population with a 34% infection rate of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), the clinical case-definition had a specificity of 90%, a sensitivity of 59%, and a predictive value of 74% for HIV seropositivity. These results support the use of the WHO clinical definition for AIDS in Africa. However, since HIV prevalence and disease expression vary, similar evaluations should be carried out in different regions.