Plastic Toys Research Articles

In Memoriam, Asmund S. Laerdal

Asmund Laerdal, a patron, catalyst and leader for resuscitation developments worldwide, died from cancer at his home in Stavanger, Norway on November 19, 1981. At the funeral services on America's Thanksgiving Day, we said thanks for what he has given the world. He was a great man, whose quiet, but determined, manners and eagerness to help whenever he perceived a need, earned him much respect and love.Asmund Laerdal was born in Norway on October 11, 1913. He went to business school, traveled throughout Europe by bicycle during his youth, married Margit in 1939, and started a small printing business in 1940. Nazi occupation between 1941 and 1945 threatened his life, but did not wreck his little company. Throughout the 1940s and 1950s he printed childrens' books and calendars and made inexpensive wooden and plastic toys. The latter included “Anne Doll,” the “toy of the year,” made of soft plastic, with sleeping eyes and natural hair.

Giving visibility to accidentally swallowed toy

Now, the invisible no longer has to be invisible when pediatricians treat children who swallow or inhale small plastic toys or their parts. Mattel Inc, Hawthorne, Calif, working with the Committee on Accident and Poison Prevention of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), Evanston, Ill, has introduced a process that uses barium sulfate (BaSo 4 ) in plastic toy production. This process makes small toys and small pieces of toys radiopaque. And, to enhance the plastic's visibility during the retrieval process, the industry-physician team now is preparing a list of colors to use or avoid in manufacturing such toys. According to Charles Williams, vice-president of quality, safety, and integrity at Mattel, this is the first year that all loose small parts used in Mattel toys are being made with BaSo 4 . He adds that such small parts are legal and are used only in toys intended and labeled for children older

Simulated acidic degradation of sanitary landfill materials

Abstract The levels of various metals in plastic food wrappings and toys which are frequently subjected to degradation in sanitary landfills have been determined by atomic absorption spectroscopy and neutron activation analysis. The effect of acidic leaching of metals at various pH levels from the disposable items has also been studied to simulate natural environmental degradation.

A Clinical Study on 63 Cases with Foreign Bodies of the Tracheo-bronchial Tree

A review was made on 63 cases (males: females=43:20) with various kinds of foreign bodies of the tracheobronchial tree treated mainly at the ENT Department of Hirosaki University and at the Central Hospital of Aomori Prefecture. The youngest among the 63 cases was 6 month-old baby boy and the eldest was 63 year-old male. Bronchoscopic removal of foreign bodies was carried out without general anesthesia on 21 cases who were seen before 1967, whereas since 1968, ventilation bronchoscopy under general anesthesia has been in use when necessary. Postbronchoscopic tracheostomy was necessitated in only 1 case.The 63 foreign bodies were classified into two categories, i. e. non-radiopaque and radiopaque, and the ratio was 45:18. Among the non-radiopaque foreign bodies, there were peanuts (24 cases), beans, seeds, corns or other vegetables (9 cases), pieces of meat (3 cases), plastic pencil cap (4 cases), plastic bullet of toy gun (2 cases), a part of plastic toy (2 cases) and celluloid pipe (1 case). Sixteen among the 24 cases with peanuts were under 2 years of age (males: females=11:5). The radiopaque foreign bodies were: needles (2 cases), drawing pin (2 cases), nail, single false tooth, head of ball-point pen, staple, screw of compass and dental reamer (1 case each). Among those, 2 staples located in the lingular division and a pin located in the right upper anterior bronchus (B3α) were removed under X-ray TV monitoring.

The leaching of cadmium from plastic toys

A systematic examination has been made of the factors that influence the leaching of cadmium from solid ABS (acrylonitrile-butadiene-polystyrene) plastic toys containing cadmium sulphide or selenide pigments, and realistic test procedures have been developed that give reproducible results. It has been shown that in the absence of light less than 100 ppm of cadmium is extracted from the pigmented plastic used for toys on sale in the United Kingdom.

Selective retrieving by maternal and nonmaternal female rats.

An earler study reported that nonpregnant females do not selectively retrieve a pup over a small plastic toy, while lactating mothers retrieve the pup more often than the toy. The present study was undertaken to see whether nonpregnant females made maternal by exposure to pups would act more like nonmaternal females than lactating mothers. The behavior toward a pup and a toy was studied in 1 group of nonmaternal virgins, 2 groups of maternal virgins, and 1 group of lactating mothers, during 7 daily 5-min. tests. Measures of the frequency and duration of retrieving-related behavior and analysis of behavioral sequences in relation to the pup and toy showed that pup-induced maternal virgins more closely resemble the lactating mothers than nonmaternal virgins.

Is Retrieving a Measure of Maternal Behavior in the Rat?

Lactating, pregnant and nonpregnant adult female, and adult male rats were exposed to a rat pup, a food pellet, and a plastic toy for 3 min. on 7 consecutive days. Lactating females were the most active retrievers and showed a marked preference for the pup. All other groups showed retrieving behavior but there was no preference for the pup relative to the inanimate objects. It is concluded that “maternal” behavior must be demonstrably oriented toward the young of the species rather than the execution of behavior which is merely within the repertoire of the animal.

トルエンおよびキシレン作業者の尿中馬尿酸,メチル馬尿酸の排泄量について : Thinner 中毒第9報,有機溶剤中毒第13報

The uninary hippuric acid (H.A.) of workers in an automobile factory, a plastic toy factory, and a gravure painting factory, where toluene is used, was determined, and the urinary hippuric acid and the methyl hippuric acid (M.H.A.) of the worker using thinner containing toluene and xylene were also measured. The concentration of toluene or xylene in the air was determined by gas chromatography with FID and by a Kitagawa's detector, and the average concentration inhaled by workers was calculated with a chart showing the relationship between the toluene or xylene density in the air of an artificial exposure chamber and the excretion per minute or the concentration of H.A. or M.H.A. of volunteers as reported previously. The results obtained were as follows. 1. Seasonal measurements of urinary H.A. and M.H.A. in workers, who were using thinner containing toluene and xylene, were conducted six times in two years. Both urinary excretions per mimute of H.A. and M.H.A. increased during the working time. As daily urinary H.A. and M.H.A. excretions varied according to the concentration of toluene or xylene due to the kind and velocity of the spraying work; in fact, the amount of excretion of worker's urinary H.A. and M.H.A. during work varied every time when the survey was made. Therefore, it was found necessary to check the excretion of H.A. and M.H.A. in worker's urine at least once a month. 2. Molar ratio of toluene to m-and p-xylene in the thinner was similar to that of urinary H.A. and to M.H.A. in the worker who was using that thinner. 3. We can screen out a worker exposed to toluene plus xylene at 200 p.p.m. from the excretion perminute by the following equation. (H.A. excretion per minute in working time (mg/min))/(H.A. excretion exposed to 200 p.p.m. of toluene (3.77 mg/min))+(M.H.A. excretion per minute (mg/min))/(M.H.A. excretion exposed to 200 p.p.m. of xylene (4.10 mg/min)) ⪌ 1…(1) or simply by (H.A. + M.H.A. excretion mg per minute (mg/min))/(3.95 mg/min) ⪌ 1…(2) When the value of equation (1) or (2) is over 1, the average concentration of the sum of toluene and xylene in the worker who has inhaled both, is judged to be over the threshold limit value (T.L.V.). Equation (2) was found useful in the case in which the sum of H.A. and M.H.A. exretions per minute was measured by the simple paper chromatograph with buthanol-acetic acid-water as a developing solvent. 4. The worker working in the atmosphere higher in the density of toluene excreted so much higher concentration of urinary hippuric acid. And also, the higher the densities of toluene and xylene in the environmental air, the higher was the concentration of glycine conjugates (H.A. + M.H.A.). 5. In evaluating the results of the medical examination of workers who were using thinner containing toluene and xylene, results of measurements of urinary H.A. and M.H.A. of workers, indicating the amount of toluene and xylene inhaled by the workers, should be taken into account in addition to counting erythrocytes and leucocytes, because toluene and xylene have relatively higher narcotic actions.

Removal of a Toy Bullet From the Lung With a New Instrument

INTO the multitude of foreign objects causing distress in the respiratory or gastrointestinal tract a new element was introduced with the wider usage of plastic materials in everyday life. Children are especially endangered by plastic toys consisting of small parts or breaking into small parts. There are numerous toys on the market catching a child's attention by expelling supposedly harmless plastic objects, such as battleships, plastic guns, etc. The skill and ingenuity of the endoscopist has been tested in the past undoubtedly many times by unusual situations or unusual foreign objects. The following case was handled successfully by the application of a new instrument. <h3>Report of a Case</h3> A 7-year-old boy was admitted to the Ponce de Leon Infirmary on Nov 21, 1964, with the history of an unsuccessful attempt at removal of a plastic bullet from the right lung the night before admission. According to the parents, they noted

Dangers of Toys

In the short article by Wolf relating to plastic toy injury (Pediatrics, 32:594) the conclusion is reached: "the pediatrician . . . should warn parents against their purchase." This conclusion is unwarranted from the evidence presented of one child's injury. Shall we condemn forks, pencils, bikes, bats, plastic or otherwise, because of careless injury? Parents should be warned to teach care in the handling of toys to their children. It is the child's carelessness rather than the toy, plastic or otherwise, that causes injury.

Plastic Toy Injury

The pediatrician should be alert to the dangerous potentiality of hard plastic toys and should warn parents against their purchase.

THE CONDITIONING OF TEXTUAL RESPONSES USING “EXTRINSIC” REINFORCERS1

Six 4-year-old Ss were presented with a textual program consisting of 26 words arranged so the word stimuli were gradually combined into sentences and then short "stories." Three Ss were given the No-Reinforcement condition first, and only social reinforcers were presented. They were switched to the Reinforcement condition as soon as they requested discontinuance of the activity. The other three Ss were given Reinforcement-No Reinforcement-Reinforcement treatments. The No-Reinforcement treatment in this case lasted until S requested discontinuance of the activity. The reinforcers were mixed edibles and trinkets, as well as tokens backed up by small plastic toys on a 1:24 ratio. The unit of response was the number of new texts acquired as a result of each of the 45-min experimental sessions. It was demonstrated that the program, procedure, and reinforcement conditions produced curves which are analogous to those produced in common operant-conditioning procedures. The results indicate that other operant principles may be studied in this significant area of human behavior, with important practical consequences.

Spontaneous expulsion of nonopaque foreign body in tracheobronchial tree.

THE DIAGNOSIS of foreign bodies in the tracheobronchial tree is made from the history, radiological findings, and physical examination. There are times, however, when reports on physical findings and radiological findings, if not interpreted properly, can be misleading unless the bronchoscopist checks and interprets the findings. Errors in diagnosis occasionally occur on the part of the examiners, sometimes due to unfamiliarity in what to look for in a given case. Therefore herewith is presented a case in kind to illustrate this pitfall in diagnosis. <h3>REPORT OF CASE</h3> H. E. (A-21650), a 4½-year-old boy, was admitted to the hospital on the morning of Oct. 1, 1953, with a bizarre history of having accidentally swallowed or aspirated a portion of a plastic toy that he had been sucking upon that morning at home. The child immediately developed a dry and nonproductive cough. This point was brought out by the mother. Further

The Symmetrical Spherical Top

THE plastic toy top described by C. M. Braams1 recalls a similar top described in some detail in Prof. John Perry's “Operatives' Lecture of the British Association Meeting at Leeds, September 6, 1890”, or in his book “Spinning Tops”, 67–74 (Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1890). He gives the reason for the unusual behaviour of the top in terms of the rule : “Hurry on the precession and the body rises in opposition to gravity”, and ascribes the theory of the effect to Lord Kelvin (1874). Perry's Fig. 35, which is on p. 75 of “Spinning Tops”, is almost the modern “Tippe Top”.