L’eau et le peint : l’élément liquide dans les manifestations picturales du Néolithique

In France and in Spain, shelters painted by the end of the Neolithic are chosen by the men according to four recurring criteria: their Southern orientation, the red color of their walls, their dominant and locatable position and the periodic flows of the water on and near the site. This fourth parameter, called hygrophilia, is analyzed here further to numerous new discoveries of sites with schematic paintings. The revealing of these very diversified flows of water gives evidence of a fine observation of places by men who selected them. Sometimes, the criterion of the hygrophilia was used in the limits of the meaning of this term. Sometimes also, the men added painted or engraved elements to patent these flows: concretions painted in red, lines painted on or against these concretions, drains and cupules engraved to channel and get back the water. The natural potentialities of sites regarding limited flows of the water are transformed into cultural criteria on a local or micro-regional scale.     

Personnages dans l’art saharien : le réel et l’imaginé

In the Sahara, wherever there are naked rock surfaces, engravings and paintings have been found in large numbers. This rock art includes various types of images — the oldest dating about ten millenniums — among which human beings, wild or domesticated animals, therianthrops and non-explicit images can be identified. According to periods and styles, the human being has been represented under extremely varied aspects from particularly realistic — similar to the reality — till very simplified, even caricatural drawings. For some realistic representations of women and men, we can observe anatomical or morphological peculiarities which, without being frequent, show cases of steatopygy and gynoïd or androïd obesity, pathological or not. For certain periods, we also find imaginary, fantastic or caricatural representations. These images characterize particularly styles previous to that called “Round Heads”. So, in the Saharan art, the human being has been represented either in his physical truth, or according to multiple stylistic conventions or graphic stereotypes, which could characterize certain ethnic groups.     

L’évaluation des nouvelles technologies en santé : un nouveau besoin,l’évaluation de l’adaptation à l’usage

In healthcare, technologies have a critical role in diagnostic, treatment and monitoring of the patients, either in hospitals settings or at home. But in order to be used in clinical routine, their assessment does not always comply with strict scientific criteria. In some situations, these technologies can also turn out useless, too costly or dangerous when integrated without precaution in the healthcare professional environment. In France, to address this issue, the Ministry of Health and the National Agency for Research in Medicine have installed new “Innovative Technologies” (IT) modules attached to existing Centres for Clinical Research (CRC). Eight CRC-IT (in short, CIT) have been accredited in different technological domains. They may support and secure the dissemination of promising IT applications in healthcare by assessing (i) the actual benefit for the patients, or medical service rendered, (ii) the potential drawbacks and (iii) the anticipated Return On Investment for the healthcare system. The procedures used to evaluate other healthcare innovations such as new drugs cannot be applied for the evaluation of innovative technologies. CIT also have to adapt their methodology to the type of device and domain. Besides the impact on the patient or public health, CIT are able to analyze the impact of innovative technologies on the quality of care and on their use by professionals.     

L’échographie Doppler dans le diagnostic des duplications gastriques chez l’enfant

Gastric duplication is a rare congenital gastrointestinal malformation responsible for abdominal pain and digestive disorders in children. When it is not discovered prenatally, it raises the problem of diagnosis of abdominal cystic mass leading to surgical excision with histological confirmation. We report 4 cases of gastric duplication diagnosed in children aged 11 days, 4 months, 6 years and 13 years of the pediatric imaging unit of the southern Teaching hospital of Rennes (France). Our goal is to emphasize on the role of medical imaging in particular the color Doppler ultrasound in the diagnosis and the monitoring of this uncommon disease of the child.     

L’axe du Paléolithique supérieur : le site de Velikanov,Kazakhstan

Very old Upper Paleolithic is here considered as one of the origins of equivalent traditions in European Continent.     

Contrôle neurologique de l’éjaculation

The brain control of the genital tract and sexual behaviour remains poorly understood. Clinical results and basic research indicate that the neural control of ejaculation depends on three levels of organization. The first level consists of peripheral autonomic and somatic nerves. Leaving the spinal cord, these nerves control the motility, secretions and blood supply of the genital tract, and contractions of perineal striated muscles. Their path in the abdominal cavity and the effects of their neuro-transmitters on peripheral tissues have been established. These nerves also convey sensory information from the genital tract to the spinal cord. The second level is represented by the spinal cord. The thoracolumbar (sympathetic), and sacral (parasympathetic and pudendal) segments of the cord contain the somata of autonomic and somatic motoneurons, whose axons run in the above nerves. These motoneurons are part of a spinal network that likely organizes the activity of the whole genital tract in a given context such as copulation. The role of the different spinal cord segments in the control of ejaculation is mainly inferred from observations of the deleterious effects of spinal cord injury in human patients. A small population of galaninergic positive neurons has recently been identified in the lumbar segments of the rat spinal cord that plays a major role in ejaculation (Truitt and Coolen, 2003). Selective lesion of this population abolishes in copula ejaculations, but spares erection. Finally, the third level of organization is represented by supraspinal nervous structures. The spinal cord receives direct excitatory and inhibitory information from the brainstem, pons and hypothalamus. In turn, these structures receive sensory information from the genital tract. However, their role in the control of ejaculation remains poorly investigated. Again, it is mainly inferred from the observation of the deleterious effects of pharmacological treatments on brain neurotransmission. Positron emission tomography has recently been used to observe brain areas whose activity is enhanced during ejaculation in humans (Holstege et al., 2003). In this study, several areas of the right side of the cortex and the cerebellum were activated. The targets of future clinical and basic research include: the neural basis of the required coordination between spinal autonomic and somatic nuclei that innervate the genital tract, the role of sensory information from the genital tract in the recruitment and coordination of spinal and supraspinal nuclei, and finally the integration of descending excitatory and inhibitory influences onto the spinal cord. Both the organization during development and the activation at puberty of the spinal neural network that controls the genital tract are dependent on androgens. Future research should identify the regulatory factors that, in response to the action of androgens, provide neurons with the possibility of building their connexions and selecting their neurotransmitters and receptors.     

Place de l’embolisation percutanée de la varicocèle dans le traitement de l’infertilité

Objectives

To describe percutaneous embolization of varicocele and to evaluate the effect on fertility disorders.

Materials and methods

One hundred nineteen patients, aged 11 to 48 years, underwent percutaneous embolization for varicocele indicated by a fertility disorder in 23% of cases. Correction of the varicocele and resolution of associated pain, improvement of testicular trophicity and the effect on fertility were studied and a review of the literature was performed.

Results

Percutaneous embolization was performed using neuroleptanalgesia on an outpatient basis. The technique combined venous sclerotherapy and placement of coils in the gonadal vein. The technique was successful in 95% of cases and one complication was observed. At 3 months, the varicocele and related pain had resolved in 98% of treated patients. According to previous reports in the literature, the relations between varicocele and fertility disorders are still unclear, but improvement of fertility (semen quality and conception rates) after varicocele repair has been established.

Conclusion

Although the consequences of varicocele on fertility have not been fully elucidated, treatment of varicocele appears to be beneficial. Percutaneous embolization of varicocele is a safe and effective alternative to surgery. This technique, based on a urological and radiological consensus, is the first-line treatment for varicocele in our institution.     

L’utilisation de l’obsidienne au Paléolithique supérieur dans le nord-ouest de la Roumanie

Obsidian artefacts are numerous in the Upper Paleolithic sites of Northwest Romania. The use of obsidian begins during the Aurignacian and continues during the Gravettian, All the stages of the lithic reduction sequence are present. The obsidian tools are numerous in some sites. Non-destructive chemical analysis by X-ray fluorescence (XRF) was performed on 232 obsidian artefacts from five sites: Buşag, Remetea Şomoş I, Călineşti I, Boineşti and Turulung. The results show that Early/Middle Upper Paleolithic people in northwest Romania acquired their obsidian, directly or indirectly, from sources on the western flank of the Carpathians, up to 170 km away.     

L’avenir de l’oncologie passe-t-il par la médecine nucléaire ?

During the last decennials, nuclear medicine demonstrated a lot of significant progresses, so that “nuclear oncology” could be considered now as a well recognized entity. These progresses have been made on one hand in the diagnostic field, and on the other hand for therapeutic applications of radiopharmaceuticals able to target tumour cells, the number and performances of which being continuously growing. For diagnosis, beyond its capability to visualize tumour lesions otherwise difficult to demonstrate, it could be said that nuclear medicine is useful for the tumour characterization, allowing imaging of prognosis factors and criteria of treatment's choice, and evaluation of treatments efficiency as well. In the therapeutic field, while thyroid carcinomas treatment using iodine 131 is still of interest and benefits of recent improvements, internal targeted radiotherapy is clearly becoming clinically useful, as it has been proved that it could improve patients’ survival in combination with other treatments. That is true for radio-immunotherapy of follicular lymphoma and bone metastasis treatment, and probably in the very near future for several solid tumours. This paper reviews the most significant aspects of these recent progresses, in order to convince that nuclear oncology has become a full part of oncology.     

Le comportement symbolique des derniers chasseurs cueilleurs paléolithiques : regard sur l’art rupestre du Magdalénien cantabrique

Between 2010 and 2014, an assemblage of Cantabrian Recent Magdalenian rock art sites was studied. The sample, representative of Palaeolithic art of this period in the region, included a total of 9 parietal ensembles and almost 500 graphic units. The results of this research led to the discovery of a several unpublished figures and reinterpretations of an even larger number of graphic units. Most importantly they formed a body of data large enough to produce statistically significant information. This can be used to define guidelines about the symbolic behavior of the populations that inhabited the Cantabrian Region at that period. In this paper, the main results are summarized, and a brief discussion about the implications of these data in the social and cultural context of Late Pleistocene populations in Southwestern Europe is presented. The conclusions reveal the existence of a rich graphic activity, reflection of complex societies, with large exchange and social networks, including cultural elements within a common realm of ideas, which covered many hundreds and even thousands of kilometers at the end of the Pleistocene.     

Techniques de contrôle de l’éjaculation dans l’ancienne Chine

The erotic literature of ancient China constitutes an inexhaustible source of information on ejaculation control techniques, which remain valid today and are the source of the techniques advocated by contemporary sex therapists.     

Les origines de l’art et les théories sur l’évolution humaine : le cas français

In recent years, we have witnessed an international debate about the question of the origins of art. On the one hand, some specialists have suggested that art appeared for the first time at the beginning of the Upper Paleolithic associated to the emergence of Homo sapiens sapiens. From this point of view, Paleolithic art as well as other hallmarks of behavioral modernity were exclusive to anatomically modern humans. On the other hand, some scholars have put into question the traditional paradigm concerning the origins of art and have suggested that artistic objects arose over a long period of time among different species, including Neanderthals. In order to contextualize this debate, we analyze in this article the history of the different interpretations and controversies concerning the question of the origins of art. Taking as reference the French case, we examine the connections between the different theories about art's origins suggested by Pleistocene art specialists during the last century and the dominant paradigms in human paleontology during the same period. Informed by one another, the question of the origins of art and that of human evolution seems to be inextricable linked.     

Importance de l’étape pré-analytique en spermiologie pour le diagnostic et l’évaluation des thérapeutiques

Semen analysis is subject to great variability, partly due to the mechanism of ejaculation. This variability can be reduced by taking certain precautions, such as interviewing the patient to eliminate any external factor of variability, by imposing a 3- to 5-day period of sexual abstinence, by explaining the procedures to avoid bacterial contamination of the sample, by verifying whether the whole semen sample has been collected, by checking that the temperature of the sample is maintained at 37°C and finally, by carefully homogenising the sample to obtain good quality liquefaction.     

Le Paléolithique supérieur dans l’ouest de l’île principale du Japon

The Kinki, Chugoku and Shikoku regions are located in the western part of the Japanese mainland. This area lacks the Pleistocene volcanic soil except a part of Chugoku Mountains. For this reason, the chronology of the late Paleolithic stone industries has been mainly studied by technology and typology of the fields excavated. However, after the late 1980s, the analysis of volcanic ash that contained the Paleolithic sediments had remarkable development. As a result, the cultural layer between the distant Paleolithic sites is compared by several widespread volcanic ashes such as Aira-Tanzawa (in short AT) as key bed. In this paper, we offered chronological order of the late Paleolithic culture in these regions by comparing cultural layers on the basis of the widespread volcanic ashes, referring to typological analysis of industries. The Sétoüchi technique and Ku industry characterize the late Paleolithic culture in these regions. The Sétoüchi technique is the unique one to produce the Ku type backed knife blunting on only one side, using the particular side-blow flaking technology based on physical characteristics of sanukite stone which is a kind of andesite. However, a hypothesis named the “Sétoüchi concept” was proposed in 2001, and it has been used as a substitute of the “Sétoüchi technique” by a few Japanese researchers. So we point out the mistake of the Sétoüchi concept relying on the fact which yielded stratigraphically two different industries in the Suncheon site.     

Apport de l’iode 131 dans le traitement de l’adénome thyroïdien toxique

IntroductionToxic thyroid adenoma is an evolutive condition requiring radical treatment. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the contribution of 131 in the treatment of toxic thyroid adenoma.Patients and methodsThis is a retrospective study of patients treated with iodine 131 for toxic thyroid adenoma. The diagnosis of toxic adenoma is confirmed by scintigraphy and/or ultrasound. Data collected were age, sex, previous treatments, pre treatment hormonal status, radioiodine activity received and post therapy hormonal status.Results and conclusionWe have 45 women to seven men with a sex ratio of 6.42. Mean age of our patients is 53 years. Mean age for women at time of treatment is 57.33 years and 52.85 years for men. 98.07% of our patients treated with iodine 131 gained euthyroidism or became hypothyroid vs. 1.92% in whom hyperthyroidism persisted. These results are comparable to literature. Moroccan patients socioeconomic status pleads for an expansion of use of radioiodine in toxic thyroid adenoma due to its favourable cost/effectiveness ratio.     

Testostérone et contrôle central de l’érection

Testosterone orchestrates the perinatal organization and activation of cerebral and spinal neuronal structures involved in the expression of male sexual behaviour in adults. The present review briefly describes testosterone effects in the regulation of sexual motivation and erection, as well as the genetic models developed to date in order to unravel its central mechanisms of action.     

Don de sperme: le lien entre l’anonymat et le bénévolat

France has been the first country to introduce a new policy in matter of semen donation, based on anonymity and unpaid donation. The aim was to put sperm and more largely gametes into the category of human tissues that are, according to the law, out of the market. Nowadays there are trends in the opinion to abolish sperm donors’ anonymity. But, numerous sociological studies show that anonymity and unpaid donation are closely linked with the social intrinsic power to strengthen a joint solidarity based on unselfish altruism. Dissociating anonymity and no payment would open the way to the marketing business in semen donation.     

Les thérapies comportementales et cognitives, l’épicurisme et le stoïcisme

This article aims to show that philosophy, particularly Epicureanism and Stoicism, had an essentially therapeutic role in antiquity — the various schools of philosophy dispensing specific teachings aimed at treating mental suffering, in a precise place (the scholé), with a master and a specified methodology. Of course, it may seem anachronistic to try and compare a modern, progressive and proven therapeutic method such as cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT, TCC in French) with a frequently dogmatic, 2000-year-old school of philosophy. And yet, the difference is not as clear-cut as we might think, since the two have much in common, such as similar kinds of suffering, a referent (or therapist), common methods (language, reasoning) and a common goal (peace of mind). We therefore intend to try and synthesise the meeting points and also the differences between two main schools of antique philosophy and CBT.