Background: Chronic hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection is a common health problem that has a worldwide distribution. Apart from the direct effect of the virus on the liver, there are many extrahepatic manifestations among which the probable effect on bone turnover associated with low bone mineral density (BMD). Objectives: This study aimed to determine the association between treated and untreated chronic HBV infection with BMD. Methods: This is a cross-sectional study which included a total of 48 patients with chronic HBV (28 patients treated with tenofovir-disoproxil-fumarate [TDF] antiviral drug and 20 patients have not yet started treatment). Other age- and sex-matched 30 apparently healthy individuals were recruited to represent the healthy controls. BMD was measured using dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry on the anteroposterior lumbar spine (L1–L4 spine) views, from which T-score was calculated. Liver function tests were also evaluated from serum samples. Results: Treated patients showed a lower T‑score (−0.48 ± 0.72) than either healthy individuals (1.08 ± 0.84) or untreated patients (0.78 ± 0.51), with highly significant differences. In multivariate regression, only disease duration (adjusted odds ratio [OR] = 9.71, 95% confidence interval [CI] = 4.8–16.68) and TDF treatment (adjusted OR = 6.4, 95% CI = 4.18–97.05) were significantly associated with BMD. Conclusions: Prolonged use of TDF in the treatment of HBV infection can significantly reduce BMD. Moreover, BMD can also be inversely affected in long-standing HBV, regardless of treatment regimen.
In this paper, preliminary test Shrinkage estimator have been considered for estimating the shape parameter α of pareto distribution when the scale parameter equal to the smallest loss and when a prior estimate α0 of α is available as initial value from the past experiences or from quaintance cases. The proposed estimator is shown to have a smaller mean squared error in a region around α0 when comparison with usual and existing estimators.
Background: Oxidative stress may contribute to the etiology of hypertension in humans. Oxidative stress is an imbalance between reactive oxygen species (ROS) and antioxidant defense mechanisms, causing damage to biological macromolecules and dysregulation of normal metabolism and physiology. Amlodipine as an antihypertensive agent is a long-acting calcium channel blocker that dilates blood vessels and improves blood flow. The aim of this study was to assess the oxidative stress in hypertensive patients on Amlodipine treatment through the assessment of salivary Malondialdehyde (MDA) and superoxide dismutase (SOD) as a marker of oxidative stress.
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... Show MoreSingapore has invested its human resources for the development of the country since earlier times, so it has directed attention to the education sector. Education and development complement each other, as investment in education has contributed over several years to the development of Singapore economy and has made it one of the strongest economies in Asia and the world. Despite the obstacles that faced educational policies in Singapore, the presence of a wise leadership capable of overcoming difficulties and solving them, and providing the appropriate atmosphere for the development of education has contributed significantly to making it one of the most advanced educational systems in the world, and making this system the main pillar for
... Show MoreThe main reason for the emergence of a deepfake (deep learning and fake) term is the evolution in artificial intelligence techniques, especially deep learning. Deep learning algorithms, which auto-solve problems when giving large sets of data, are used to swap faces in digital media to create fake media with a realistic appearance. To increase the accuracy of distinguishing a real video from fake one, a new model has been developed based on deep learning and noise residuals. By using Steganalysis Rich Model (SRM) filters, we can gather a low-level noise map that is used as input to a light Convolution neural network (CNN) to classify a real face from fake one. The results of our work show that the training accuracy of the CNN model
... Show MoreAntimicrobial resistance is one of the most significant threats to public health worldwide. As opposed to using traditional antibiotics, which are effective against diseases that are multidrug-resistant, it is vital to concentrate on the most innovative antibacterial compounds. These innate bacterial arsenals under the term «bacteriocins» refer to low-molecularweight, heat-stable, membrane-active, proteolytically degradable, and pore-forming cationic peptides. Due to their ability to attack bacteria, viruses, fungi, and biofilm, bacteriocins appear to be the most promising, currently accessible alternative for addressing the antimicrobial resistance (AMR) problem and minimizing the negative effects of antibiotics on the host’s m
... Show MoreInsufficient and poor sleep quality significantly impacts the health and quality of life of persons with end-stage renal failure (ESRF) on hemodialysis. This study explored the effectiveness of teaching patients on hemodialysis, Benson’s relaxation technique. Seventy-one persons on hemodialysis in Iraq were randomly assigned to either the experimental or the control group. The experimental group received training and encouragement to use the Benson relaxation technique. The Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) score was collected for all the patients before and after the intervention. After 8 weeks a repeated measurement of the post-test on sleep quality was done for both groups. The experimental group showed a statistically sign
... Show MoreThe image caption is the process of adding an explicit, coherent description to the contents of the image. This is done by using the latest deep learning techniques, which include computer vision and natural language processing, to understand the contents of the image and give it an appropriate caption. Multiple datasets suitable for many applications have been proposed. The biggest challenge for researchers with natural language processing is that the datasets are incompatible with all languages. The researchers worked on translating the most famous English data sets with Google Translate to understand the content of the images in their mother tongue. In this paper, the proposed review aims to enhance the understanding o
... Show MoreThe topic of supra.topological.spaces considered one of the important topics because it is a generalization to topological.spaces. Many researchers have presented generalizations to supra open sets such as supra semi.open and supra pre.open sets and others. In this paper, the concept of δ∼open sets was employed and introduced in to the concept of supra topology and a new type of open set was extracted, which was named S∼δ∼open. Our research entails the utilization of this category of sets to form a new concepts in these spaces, namely S∼δ∼limit points and S∼δ∼derive points, and examining its relationship with S∼open and S∼reg∼open. Based on this class of sets, we have introduced other new concepts such as S∼isolate
... Show MoreIn this communication, introduce the split Mersenne and Mersenne-Lucas hybrid quaternions, also obtaining generating functions and Binet formulas for these hybrid quaternions and investigating some properties among them.
Image pattern classification is considered a significant step for image and video processing. Although various image pattern algorithms have been proposed so far that achieved adequate classification, achieving higher accuracy while reducing the computation time remains challenging to date. A robust image pattern classification method is essential to obtain the desired accuracy. This method can be accurately classify image blocks into plain, edge, and texture (PET) using an efficient feature extraction mechanism. Moreover, to date, most of the existing studies are focused on evaluating their methods based on specific orthogonal moments, which limits the understanding of their potential application to various Discrete Orthogonal Moments (DOM
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