Category: F

Cultures of most bacteria may be preserved indefinitely by this means. The several methods in use employ usually phosphorus pentoxide as a dessicant, coupled with the use of a high vacuum pump to expedite evaporation. After primary drying the ampoules are connected to a manifold equipped with multiple exhaust lugs and the pump restarted. After…

Heterophile antibodies. In experimental work Forssman showed that guinea-pig (and some other) tissues injected into rabbits produced heterophile antibody, haemolytic for sheep red cells.  

Identification of bacterial or viral antigen or antibody by the use of fluorescent-dye-tagged antiserum and examination by ultra-violet microscopy. The two dyes most frequently employed are fluorescein isothiocyanate and lissamine rhodamine, giving respectively green and yellow fluorescence.  

The identification of cells, bacteria etc. by staining with fluorescent dyes (particularly auramine, rhodamine and fluorescein), the illuminant being a source of ultra-violet or light of other short-wave length. The method has been used particularly in the identification of acid-fast bacilli, and in fluorescent antibody staining.  

A hospital policy dealing with the issues presented by futile care.  

Useless; vain. Treatment, other than comfort care, which will not result in improvement or cure and which could not, in the opinion of the physician (and, usually, consultants), reasonably be expected to result in a quality of life which would be acceptable to the patient. In clinical practice, any intervention that will not improve a…

Planned and coordinated activities by which the organization seeks gifts. Fund-raising goes under the term “development,” and the fund-raising director is called “the director of development.”  

A term often used by nonprofit organizations in their financial statements to indicate the difference between assets and liabilities. A positive fund balance is sometimes called a gain; in the profit sector, it would be called a profit. A negative fund balance is a loss in either sector. Nonprofit organizations may also refer to the…

A concept used in developing statistics on the size of a work force. The idea is to express a work force made up of both full- and part-time employees as the number of workers that would be employed if all were full time. It is computed by dividing the total hours worked by all employees…

A policy which permits patients to choose their own physicians. Such choice is at least restricted for persons who are members of an HMO or other managed care plan, because they must go to physicians within the plan (or themselves pay for care obtained elsewhere). In some HMOs patients must be satisfied with the physician…