Category: W

Peptone – milk medium of slightly acid reaction for the cultivation of Lactobacillus acidophilus. Agar may be added.  

The bacteriological standard of a water supply is indicated by its content of coll, the presence of which organism—harmless in itself—indicates faecal pollution. Other examinations for content of Cl. welchii and of faecal streptococci may be performed for the same reason. The total count of viable bacteria yields little information of value and is rarely…

Serological test for syphilis, one of the earliest and most used examples of the complement fixation test. Many modifications of the original test have been made and are variously employed; Price’s (Whitechapel) technique of 1949 -50 is a much-used UK method. The most commonly used test for the diagnosis of syphilis. A sample of the…

The portion of a payment due a physician in a managed care plan which is held back by the plan in order to provide a contingency fund to be used in case 1) the usage under the plan exceeds the predictions under which the premiums were established, and the plan is unable to pay the…

Two or more local area networks (LANs) connected together, typically over telephone lines or satellite links. In an university, for example, each department usually has its own LAN. These LANs are connected together throughout the university to form a WAN for the entire campus. The transmission medium connecting the LANs together is called a “backbone”,…

The equivalent of one completely well year of life, a measure designed to assess the benefits of health programs. The measure is used in a General Health Policy Model (GHPM). The well-year value is derived from measures of (1) life expectancy and (2) health-related quality of life (HRQOL) during years before death. If an individual,…

Health care services to normal babies in order to detect any problems early and to give preventive advice. This is the counterpart of prenatal care for pregnant women.  

A statistical method for combining numerical data from more than one source into a single value. Each value from a given source is usually multiplied by a factor (its “weight”) which has been judged by the person producing the statistic to represent the importance of that factor in relation to the importance of the other…

A component used by the Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA) in adjusting payments (prices) under the Medicare prospective payment system (PPS). The wage index is derived by HCFA starting with data supplied by hospitals in response to a questionnaire; it takes into account normal work hours, as well as part-time and overtime work hours.  

A death caused by the wrongful action of someone else. If a person dies wrongfully, usually only a member of the immediate family such as a parent, child, or spouse has the right to bring a wrongful-death lawsuit against the party responsible. Others, such as unwed fathers and co-parents, often have no such right.