Background: Mitral regurgitation (MR) is the most commonly encountered valve lesion in modern clinical practice. Severe mitral regurgitation may cause systolic dysfunction. Left ventricular ejection fraction may not be an accurate measurement of LV function in patients with mitral insufficiency. Myocardial performance index (MPI) is a simple non invasive measure of myocardial function. Methods: The study involved 50 patients with valvular mitral regurgitation and 50 healthy subjects as a control group. Transthoracic echocardiography was carried out for all patients and control group. The echocardiographic measurements included left ventricular end diastolic and end systolic dimensions, left atrial diameter, ejection fraction (EF), and myocardial performance index (MPI). Results: Results revealed insignificant change in MPI between patients with mild MR and controls (26.47%), and significant changes in MPI between patients with moderate and severe mitral regurgitation and control group (29.41%, 41.17% respectively) with p value b0.05. Insignificant change in EF between patients with mild MR and controls (5.52%) was noted (p value N0.05), while the changes in EF between patients with moderate and severe mitral regurgitation and control groups were (−9.3%), (−7.4%) respectively with p value b0.05. Conclusion: Myocardial performance index is a good and easily determined index in the assessment of left ventricular function in patients with mitral regurgitation and has the ability to detect LV dysfunction earlier than ejection fraction.
Tumours in pets occur naturally and are common in dogs as they are in humans. Tumours of the alimentary system have been reported in animals, although less frequently. Food patterns and specific diet components could have a big role in such tumour occurrence. Therefore, the aim of this study was to investigate the clinical signs and inspect the neoplasm lesions of the gastrointestinal (GI) tract grossly and histopathologically in dogs in Baghdad, Iraq, and to see whether pet diets had any tumourigenic effect. Throughout two years sixteen dogs were referred to Teaching Animal Hospital and private clinics at Baghdad city with masses in (GI) tract. Males and large size breeds were more likely to be affected with GI tumours. Half of the cases a
... Show MoreIn petroleum industry, the early knowledge of “pore pressure gradient” is the basis in well design and the extraction of these information is more direct when the pore pressure gradient is equal to normal gradient; however, this matter will be more complex if it deviate from that limit which is called “abnormal pore pressure”, if this variable does not put in consideration, then many drilling problems will occur might lead to entire hole loss. To estimate the pore pressure gradient there are several methods, in this study; Eaton method’s is selected to extract the underground pressure program using drilling data (normalized rate of penetration) and logs data (sonic and density log). The results shows that an abnormal high press
... Show MoreBackground: Periodontal diseases are initiated by microbial plaque, which accumulates in the sulcular region and induces an inflammatory response. The Receptor activator of nuclear factor-kappa B ligand / osteoprotegerin (RANKL/OPG) axis is involved in the regulation of bone metabolism in periodontitis, in which an increase in receptor activator of nuclear factor-kappa B ligand or a decrease in osteoprotegerin can tip the balance in favor of osteoclastogenesis and the resorption of alveolar bone that is the hallmark of periodontitis. This study was performed to investigate the role of salivary levels of RANKL and OPG in pathogenesis of chronic periodontitis. Subjects and Methods: Fifty five subjects with chronic periodontitis with ages rang
... Show MoreThe proliferation of electronic games, video games and computers has caused children and teenagers to become attracted to these games and become their favorite entertainment. The widespread of these games has generated widespread debate about positive aspects and negative aspects. It is evident that there are two main trends in the impact of electronic games on the behavior of children and adolescents. The first trend is that e-games have positive effects on children and adolescents, especially in cognitive abilities and skills in learning. While the second view sees that electronic games have negative effects that appear in social isolation and lack of movement and aggression. Through the review of previous literature, the current resea
... Show MoreA summary of zooplankton research done in Peruvian marine waters is presented. We first provide a brief overview of the evolution of zooplankton studies off Peru before reviewing zooplankton biodiversity, regional distribution, seasonal and interannual fluctuation, trophodynamics, secondary production, and modeling are some of these topics. We evaluate research on various meroplankton, macroplankton, mesoplankton, and microplankton groups and provide a list of species from both published and unpublished sources. Three regional zooplankton groups have been identified: A shelf group on the continental shelf dominated by Acartia tonsa and Centropages brachiatus; A slope group on the continental shelf with siphonophores, bivalves, foramin
... Show MoreMetaheuristics under the swarm intelligence (SI) class have proven to be efficient and have become popular methods for solving different optimization problems. Based on the usage of memory, metaheuristics can be classified into algorithms with memory and without memory (memory-less). The absence of memory in some metaheuristics will lead to the loss of the information gained in previous iterations. The metaheuristics tend to divert from promising areas of solutions search spaces which will lead to non-optimal solutions. This paper aims to review memory usage and its effect on the performance of the main SI-based metaheuristics. Investigation has been performed on SI metaheuristics, memory usage and memory-less metaheuristics, memory char
... Show MoreLeishmaniasis is a widespread parasitic disease caused by Leishmania parasite, this disease considers a major health problem among worldwide. Treatments available are expensive or with cytotoxic side effect. This study was aimed to investigate the effect of an herbal new compound, called artemisinin, derived from a Chinese plant called Artemisia annua. Various concentrations were studied in vitro against L. tropica amastigotes by chamber counting to investigate its effect on the proliferation of promastigotes. Three incubation periods were adopted (24, 48, 72) hours. The results showed a significant decrease in surviving promastigotes, in parallel with the normal parasite count of untreated promastigotes, along the periods studied. This stu
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