In order to describe the ontogeny of solid food consumption by pigs and determine its influence on weight gain, before and after an abrupt weaning at 4 weeks of age, individual feed consumption was measured using a technique that combined load cells and video images. Feed consumption varied greatly both between and within litters. Within litters, consumption was positively correlated with birth weight, and with early weight gains. This suggests that greater feed intake was typical of larger and more mature pigs rather than reflecting compensation for poor milk intake by smaller litter-mates. Within-litter differences in weight gain during the two weeks after weaning were positively correlated with birth weight but not correlated with pre-weaning creep feed intake. Creep feed intake appeared to contribute to pre-weaning gains and these were correlated with post-weaning gains; however a more direct affect on post-weaning gain could not be detected.

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No description available.

<p>Beach-cast kelp (the most widely used feed for commercially grown South African abalone) is plentiful during winter months when periodic storms cause kelp to wash ashore. During summer, however, this resource is not always readily available and farmed abalone are often starved for short periods. The aim of this research was to assess how periodic kelp starvation influences growth of the commercially grown abalone, Haliotis midae Linnaeus.</p>

The aim of this study was to explore how caregivers caring for severely demented patients experience ethical conflict situations. Feeding patients in a late state of dementia was chosen as focus. Special attention was paid to analyses of the caregivers' experiences with regard to their feelings, use of force, interpretations of the patients' behaviour and their ethical reasoning. The study was carried out in five separate parts, presented as five papers. A phenomenological - hermeneutic approach was consistent. Personal interviews, a projective defence mechanism test, the Meta Contrast Technique and an analysis of patient/caregiver behaviour as shown in video taped feeding sessions were the methods used. Study participants were forty-one caregivers in psychogeriatric care, registered nurses, licensed practical nurses and nurses' assistants. The result indicated that, when facing ethical decisions the caregivers were caught in a double bind conflict due to the contradicting ethical demands "Keep the patient alive!" and "Don't cause the patient suffering!". The difficulty to interpret what the patients experienced and the impossibility to know for sure what actions would be right or wrong were sources of anxiety. They defined force feeding individually, yet a pattern was found. Some caregivers defined force feeding according to the amount of persuasiveness or violence they had to perform. Some regarded force feeding from a patient wish perspective. A majority combined the two dimensions. The caregivers' ethical reasoning showed that their decision making was to be regarded as a process grounded on ethical rules. Interdependence in the relation caregiver/patient made them develop their reasoning in a direction of existential reasoning. / <p>S. 1-38: sammanfattning, s. 39-113: 5 uppsatser</p> / digitalisering@umu

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No description available.

The aim of this study was to determine whether breast milk had a stimulating effect on the development of immune responses in infants. Breast- and bottle- fed infants were studied from birth to 9 months of age. Several significant differences in immune responses were found between the groups. These differences were related to age and fell into two main time periods. In the early neonatal period, lymphocytes from breast-fed infants showed significantly greater spontaneous proliferation and proliferative responses to the T cell mitogen PHA to vitro than cells from bottle-fed infants. This may be due to a stimulatory effect to vivo of the growth factors and lymphokines in human milk acting on T cells and/or their precursors. Serum immunoglobulin levels did not however, reflect this increased lymphocyte responsiveness and although salivary IgM and IgA levels were significantly increased in the breast-fed infants at 6 days of age, this may have been due to residual milk immunoglobulins. In contrast, by 3 to 9 months of age, the cells from the bottle-fed group showed significantly greater to vitro proliferation of all classes of lymphocytes than the cells from the breast- fed infants. Salivary IgM and IgA levels and serum IgM antibodies to commensal gut organisms were also significantly higher in bottle-fed infants at this time. This indicated a higher rate of to vivo stimulation of the immune system in bottle-fed infants. It is suggested that this is due to an increased exposure of bottle-fed 'infants to antigenic material at mucosal surfaces and a greater uptake of these local antigens into the systemic circulation. Breast-feeding may therefore have contrasting effects on the development of immune responses, a stimulating effect by growth factors, particularly in the early immature period, and a suppressive effect resulting indirectly from exclusion of antigens (including those of a potentially harmful nature).

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No description available.