Background: Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is a progressive airflow limitation that is preventable but not curable. It is associated with persistent symptoms that cause a considerable burden on individual productivity at work, and daily activities, and reduced quality of life, also burdening the healthcare system and society. Objectives: The study aims to measure the burden of COPD on patients in terms of daily activities and work productivity. It also seeks to investigate some inflammatory biomarkers' levels and their correlation with selected outcomes. Patients and Methods: A cross-sectional study on 120 stable COPD patients who were diagnosed and treated according to the GOLD guidelines at Kirkuk General Hospital's chest and Internal Medicine consultation clinics, and in private internist clinics in Kirkuk City, Iraq between January and April 2023. The Work Productivity and Activity Impairment Questionnaire (WPAI-COPD) measured the Burden of COPD. The symptom burden was assessed by the COPD assessment test (CAT). The level of IL-6 monoclonal antibodies was measured via a Roche Cobas 6000 analyzer and TNF-α using the ELISA sandwich technique. All these devices and machines were authorized by the Ministry of Health, Iraq. Results: The mean age was (54.1 ± 8.12) years, 62.5% being males and 37.5% being females; 41.7% were public sector employees, and 39.2% were self-employed. Due to COPD, the overall work loss was (45.9±18.91) days, the mean percentage of absenteeism was (10.9% ± 12.31%), activity impairment was (47.5% ±17.79%) among all patients, presenteeism was (40.8 ± 15.05%,) and COPD-related retirees were 14.2% of the study group. The mean CAT score (19.3±5.63) was high and the most troubling symptom among patients was chest tightness. WPAI-COPD scores were higher in older age and longer disease duration. The levels of biomarkers were above the reference ranges, the mean IL-6 level was (69.4 ± 35.29) pg/ml, and the mean TNF-α was (72.3 ± 22.45) pg/ ml. Conclusions: COPD patients exhibit a disease burden in terms of productivity loss at work and activity impairment that increases with aging and disease duration. COPD patients with low BMI are more prone to a decline in lung functions and to worse symptoms.
The - M ultiple mixing ratios of -transitions from levels of 56Fe populated in 56 56 Fe n n Fe ( , ) reactions are calculated by using const. S.T.M. This method has been used in other works [3,7] but with pure transition or with transitions that can be considered as pure transitions، in our work we used This method for mixed - transitions in addition to pure - transitions. The experimental angular distribution coefficients a2 was used from previous works [1] in order to calculet - values. It is clear from the results that the - values are in good agreement or consistent, within associated errors, with those reported previously [1]. The discrepancies that occur are due to inaccuracies existing in the expe
... Show MoreGas-lift technique plays an important role in sustaining oil production, especially from a mature field when the reservoirs’ natural energy becomes insufficient. However, optimally allocation of the gas injection rate in a large field through its gas-lift network system towards maximization of oil production rate is a challenging task. The conventional gas-lift optimization problems may become inefficient and incapable of modelling the gas-lift optimization in a large network system with problems associated with multi-objective, multi-constrained, and limited gas injection rate. The key objective of this study is to assess the feasibility of utilizing the Genetic Algorithm (GA) technique to optimize t
In the present work, the efficiency of Tri-octyl Methyl Ammonium Chloride (TOMAC) ionic liquid was investigated as new and green demulsifier for three types of Iraqi crude oil emulsions (Nafut Khana (NK), Kirkuk and Basrah). The separation efficiency was studied at room temperature and by using microwave heating technique. Several batch experiments were done to specify the suitable conditions for the emulsification and demulsification which were specified as 45 minutes and 3000 rpm for crude oil emulsification while the ionic liquid doses were (500,300,150,50) ppm and the conditions of microwave heating were 1000 watt and 50 second as irradiation time. The results were very encouraging especially for NK and Kirkuk crude oil emulsions whe
... Show MoreMassive multiple-input multiple-output (massive-MIMO) is considered as the key technology to meet the huge demands of data rates in the future wireless communications networks. However, for massive-MIMO systems to realize their maximum potential gain, sufficiently accurate downlink (DL) channel state information (CSI) with low overhead to meet the short coherence time (CT) is required. Therefore, this article aims to overcome the technical challenge of DL CSI estimation in a frequency-division-duplex (FDD) massive-MIMO with short CT considering five different physical correlation models. To this end, the statistical structure of the massive-MIMO channel, which is captured by the physical correlation is exploited to find sufficiently
... Show MoreThe aim of this paper is to present the first record of ctenophore species Pleurobrachia pileus (O. F. Müller, 1776) in the coral reef as was recently found in Iraqi marine waters. The specimens were collected from two sites, the first was in Khor Abdullah during May 2015, and the second site was located in the pelagic water of the coral reef area, near the Al-Basrah deep sea crude oil marine loading terminal. Three samples were collected at this site during May 2015, February and March 2018 which showed that P. pileus were present at a densities of 3.0, 2.2 and 0.55 ind./ m3 respectively. The species can affect on the abundance of other zooplankton community through predation.
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The present study is to investigate the possibility of using wastes in the form of scrap iron (ZVI) and/ or aluminum ZVAI for the detention and immobilization of the chromium ions in simulated wastewater. Different batch equilibrium parameters such as contact time (0-250) min, sorbent dose (2-8 g ZVI/100 mL and 0.2-1 g ZVAI/100 mL), initial pH (3-6), initial pollutant concentration of 50 mg/L, and speed of agitation (0-250) rpm were investigated. Maximum contaminant removal efficiency corresponding to (96 %) at 250 min contact time, 1g ZVAI/ 6g ZVI sorbent mass ratio, pH 5.5, pollutant concentration of 50 mg/L initially, and 250 rpm agitation speed were obtained.
The best isotherm model for the batch single Cr(III) uptake by ZVI
... Show MoreExposure assays to magnetized water have so far revealed striking results. The present study was conducted to determine the effects of magnetized water treatment with in different intensities 500 , 1000 and 1500 Gauss on some biological aspects for species of freshwater Gastropod Lymnaea lagotis (Schrank, 1803) which important species in faun of aquatic habitats of Iraq. This species are considered a component of the food chain. The obtained results compared with these species which lived in the river(control). Result of these experiments showed increased significance the shell size (shell high, shell aperture length, shell aperture width and shell width) for L. lagotis with increased intensity magnetized water such as treated water with 1
... Show MoreThe modified Hummers method was applied to prepare graphene oxide (GO) from the graphite powder. Tin oxide nanoparticles with different loading (10-20 wt.%) supported on reduced graphene oxide were synthesized to evaluate the oxidative desulfurization efficiency. The catalyst was synthesized by the incipient wetness impregnation (IWI) technique. Different analysis methods like FT-IR, XRD, FESEM, AFM, and Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET) were utilized to characterize graphene oxide and catalysts. The XRD analysis showed that the average crystal size of graphene oxide was 6.05 nm. In addition, the FESEM results showed high metal oxide dispersions on the rGO. The EDX analysis shows the weight ratio of Sn is close to its theoretical weight.
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