From the Editor

Dr Abdulrazak Abyad  Chief Editor

Family medicine is a science and art. In a number of countries in the world the medical school is under the school of art. Medicine is a science when we try to solve and differentiate the problem and an art when dealing with the patient as a human being.

This issue of the journal deals with various issues in Family Medicine from surgical problems to behavioral modification.

A special editorial that will appear in a number of medical journals by the Ian Roberts the editor, of the Cochrane Injuries Group and Clinical Co-ordinator of the CRASH-2 trial. In this editorial

In this editorial the author stressed that in people at between the ages of 5 to 45 years, trauma is second only to HIV/AIDS as a cause of death. He added that Anti-fibrinolytic agents have been shown to reduce blood loss in patients with both normal and exaggerated fibrinolytic responses to surgery. There is a need to do a large randomised trial of the use of a simple, inexpensive, widely practicable anti-fibrinolytic treatment such as tranexamic acid. The author finally stressed the importance to recruit enough patients for the Crash 2 trial that will be a large international, placebo controlled trial of the effects of the early administration of the anti-fibrinolytic agent tranexamic acid on death, vascular events and transfusion requirements.

Dr Al-Eisa et al. presented presents a paper on risk factors, diseases and sociodemographic background distribution among attendants of the Health Promotion Clinic at in the Capital Health Region, Kuwait. The authors reviewed 700 subjects attending the clinic. They showed that 9.1% of subjects were smokers, 34.7% were obese, 11.3% had hypertension, 10.0% had diabetes, and 21.3% had hyper-cholestrolaemia. The authors stressed at the end the importance of the Health Promotion Clinic for early detection of diseases and risk factors.

A research paper on "Neurodevelopmental Outcome at 12 months in Preterm Infants with Post-Haemorrhagic Ventriculomegaly, Hydrocephalus and Periventricular Echodensities" by Owaidha et al. studied prospectively the outcome at 12 months of age in four different groups of infants with intraventricular haemorrhage. They carried out follow up assessments at 12 months. The authors revealed that neuromotor outcome is more a function of parenchymal damage than of ventriculomegaly per sec and hydrocephalus following haemorrhage should be managed aggressively to prevent severe neurological damage.

The study by Prof Kavari SH analyzed the The results of requesting C.C.U. Beds by the hospital Emergency emergency ward from the Emergency Medical Services (EMS) in Shiraz university University of Medical Sciences in year 2003.

The paper on radiofrequency surgery reviewed the modalities and discussed the advantages of such an approach to ano-rectal diseases. Treatment of a child who has Bartter's syndrome with ibuprofen was reported from Kuwait. In addition there are a number of regional news and development articles.