Background: The occurrence of seizures in bacterial meningitis is important, as it has been reported to increase the risk of complications; however, its frequency and predictors are not well studied yet. Objective: To assess the frequency, clinical, and biochemical predictors of seizures in children with acute bacterial meningitis. Method: A cross-sectional study recruited confirmed acute bacterial meningitis cases based on positive CSF culture and sensitivity among children aged 2 months to 15 years admitted to the Central Child Teaching Hospital emergency department in Iraq. Patients were divided into two groups based on seizure at presentation time. Demographic characteristics [age, gender, residence, duration of fever and disease, presenting complaints and antibiotic intake]; hematological [WBC, neutrophils] Lymphocyte, N/L ratio, packed cell volume, platelets, blood sugar, and cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) indices were compared between groups. Results: Seizures had a frequency of 18% among the 122 children and were significantly higher in younger cases with female predominance. By multivariate analysis and odds ratio (OR), predictors for seizure were as follows: CSF lymphocytes (OR=0.25, 95%CI=0.08–0.26), lethargy (OR=8.15, 95%CI=1.03-68.65), headache (OR=0.09, 95%CI=0.02-0.45), neck stiffness (OR=0.07, 95% CI=0.01-0.61) and poor feeding (OR=4.8, 95%CI=1.21–18.97). Conclusions: CSF lymphocytes reliably predicted seizure with good sensitivity and specificity of 75% and 73%. Lethargy and poor feeding had the highest odds as clinical predictors of seizures. Together, those results can help with risk stratification and allocate resources for high-risk cases to improve patient outcomes
Quality control is an effective statistical tool in the field of controlling the productivity to monitor and confirm the manufactured products to the standard qualities and the certified criteria for some products and services and its main purpose is to cope with the production and industrial development in the business and competitive market. Quality control charts are used to monitor the qualitative properties of the production procedures in addition to detecting the abnormal deviations in the production procedure. The multivariate Kernel Density Estimator control charts method was used which is one of the nonparametric methods that doesn’t require any assumptions regarding the distribution o
... Show MoreHepatitis is one of the diseases that has become more developed in recent years in terms of the high number of infections. Hepatitis causes inflammation that destroys liver cells, and it occurs as a result of viruses, bacteria, blood transfusions, and others. There are five types of hepatitis viruses, which are (A, B, C, D, E) according to their severity. The disease varies by type. Accurate and early diagnosis is the best way to prevent disease, as it allows infected people to take preventive steps so that they do not transmit the difference to other people, and diagnosis using artificial intelligence gives an accurate and rapid diagnostic result. Where the analytical method of the data relied on the radial basis network to diagnose the
... Show MoreTensile strength is a critical property of Hot Mix Asphalt (HMA) pavements and is closely related to distresses such as fatigue cracking. This study aims to evaluate methods for assessing fatigue cracking in Asphalt Concrete (AC) mixes. In order to achieve optimum density at different binder contents, the mixes were compressed using a gyratory compactor. Tensile strength was assessed using the Indirect Tensile (IDT) and Semi-Circular Bend (SCB) tests. The results showed that the tensile strength measured by the SCB test was consistently higher than that measured by the IDT test at 25 °C. In addition, the SCB test showed a stronger correlation between increasing binder content and tensile strength. For binder contents ranging from 4
... Show MoreIn order to take measures in controlling soil erosion it is required to estimate soil loss over area of interest. Soil loss due to soil erosion can be estimated using predictive models such as Universal Soil Loss Equation (USLE). The accuracy of these models depends on parameters that are used in equations. One of the most important parameters in equations used in both of models is (C) factor that represents effects of vegetation and other land covers. Estimating land cover by interpretation of remote sensing imagery involves Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI), an indicator that shows vegetation cover. The aim of this study is estimate (C) factor values for Part of Baghdad city using NDVI derived from satellite Image of Landsat-7
... Show MoreA Pap test can identify the pre-cancerous and cancerous problem in the vagina and uterine cervix. Cervical tumour is the easiest gynecologic disease to be diagnosed, treated and prevented using regular screening tests and follow-up. This review aimed to explore the opinion of specialists about cytological changes and the precancerous lesions with Pap smear test and visual inspection of the cervices, also to determine the relationship of this malignancy with demographic characteristics of patients. Results showed that few cervical cancer and pre-cancer were with women in postmenopausal period, but more were with women in the premenopausal period. Visual inspection of the cervix can show erosion lesions by gross inspection. Upon cytology exam
... Show MoreThis study investigates the surgical and thermal effects on oral soft tissues produced by CO2 laser emitting at 10.6 micrometers with three different fluences 490.79, 1226.99 and 1840.4 J/cm2. These effects are specifically; incision depth, incision width and the tissue damage width and depth. The results showed that increasing the fluence and /or the number of beam passes increase the average depths of ablation. Moreover, increasing the fluence and the number of beam passes increase the adjacent tissue damage in width and depth. Surgeons using CO2 laser should avoid multiple pulses of the laser beam over the same area, to avoid unintentional tissue damage.