Rheumatoid arthritis is a chronic, progressive, inflammatory autoimmune disease of unidentified etiology, associated with articular, extra-articular and systemic manifestation that require long-standing treatment. Taking patient’s beliefs about the prescribed medication in consideration had been shown to be an essential factor that affects adherence of the patient in whom having positive beliefs is an essential for better adherence. The purpose of the current study was to measure beliefs about medicines among a sample of Iraqi patients with Rheumatoid arthritis and to determine possible association between this belief and some patient-certain factors. This study is a cross-sectional study carried out on 250 already diagnosed rheumatoid arthritis patients who attended to Baghdad Teaching Hospital/Medical City/Rheumatology department. The mean age of the patients was (50.8 ± 13.1 years). Belief about medicines was measured via the Arabic version of the Beliefs about Medicines Questionnaire. The majority of the patients (88%) had strong beliefs in the necessity of treatment (specific-necessity score greater than specific-concern). There was a significant direct correlation between age, male gender, number of other chronic disease, disease activity score 28 and clinical disease activity index with specific necessity, and direct correlation between clinical disease activity index with specific concern. Future studies should investigate how interventional approaches addressing these predictors may lead to improve beliefs about medicines among rheumatoid arthritis patients and their impression on disease control.
To compare the corneal epithelial thickness profile in patients with dry eyes and keratoconus suspect with normal healthy eyes.
The study involved 120 eyes with an age range from 19 to 30 years. Forty eyes had normal corneal topography and no dry eyes. Forty eyes had dry eyes but had normal corneal topography. The last 40 eyes were keratoconus suspect and had no symptoms or signs of dry eyes.
Central epithelial thickness was not different statistically for all eyes. ( p-value: 0.1). The superior epithelial thickness was 53.5 µm ±3.1 in the control
Background: Plaque retention during fixed orthodontic therapy is an important cause of developing enamel demineralization. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effect of different brackets types on the count of Streptococcus Mutans in orthodontic patients using conventional fluoridated toothpaste. Materials and Methods: Plaque samples were collected from maxillary 1st premolar teeth of twenty right handed patients (using split mouth technique) before bonding, after 48 hrs of bonding using tooth brush only, and after 2 weeks of using fluoridated toothpaste. Stainless steel bracket was bonded on right first premolar while the left one was bonded with sapphire bracket. The calculation of the Streptococcus Mutans count was done usin
... Show MoreA mathematical method with a new algorithm with the aid of Matlab language is proposed to compute the linear equivalence (or the recursion length) of the pseudo-random key-stream periodic sequences using Fourier transform. The proposed method enables the computation of the linear equivalence to determine the degree of the complexity of any binary or real periodic sequences produced from linear or nonlinear key-stream generators. The procedure can be used with comparatively greater computational ease and efficiency. The results of this algorithm are compared with Berlekamp-Massey (BM) method and good results are obtained where the results of the Fourier transform are more accurate than those of (BM) method for computing the linear equivalenc
... Show MoreDeception is an inseparable facet of political discourse in attaining strategic political gains though compromising public opinion. However, the employment of discursive deception strategies by the policy-making institutions of think tanks has not received due attention in the literature. The current study aims at exploring how the ideologizing deception strategies are utilized by the conservative American think tank of the Washington Institute to reproduce socio-political realities and re-shape public opinion. To fulfill this task, van Dijk’s (2000) notion of ideological polarization which shows positive self-representation and negative other representation is adopted to conduct a critical discourse analysis of four Arabic texts relea
... Show MoreIn this paper, some relations between the flows and the Enveloping Semi-group were studied. It allows to associate some properties on the topological compactification to any pointed flows. These relations enable us to study a number of the properties of the principles of flows corresponding with using algebric properties. Also in this paper proofs to some theorems of these relations are given.
The term ‘photometry’ refers to the accurate determination of the apparent brightness of an astronomical object. Until roughly 1980, nearly all astronomical photometry was done by means of analog measurements of photographic plates, or by analog or digital (photon-counting) techniques with photomultipliers. These photometers produced brightness readings which were typically displayed on dials, plotted on strip charts or printed on strips of paper, and it was often quite practical to analyse these raw data with pencil, paper and a slide rule or table of logarithms. However, during the late 1970s electronic area detectors for astronomy became more advanced: first, for a brief period, television-type cameras were employed, but these were s
... Show MoreThis paper includes the application of Queuing theory with of Particle swarm algorithm or is called (Intelligence swarm) to solve the problem of The queues and developed for General commission for taxes /branch Karkh center in the service stage of the Department of calculators composed of six employees , and it was chosen queuing model is a single-service channel M / M / 1 according to the nature of the circuit work mentioned above and it will be divided according to the letters system for each employee, and it was composed of data collection times (arrival time , service time, departure time)
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Background: Malaria remains a leading cause of mortality in sub-Saharan Africa (including Sudan). C-reactive protein (CRP) is useful as a marker of severity in malaria. African studies have shown that serum CRP levels correlate with parasite burden and complications in malaria, especially falciparum. However, there are no data on CRP levels in Sudanese malaria patients.
This study aims to evaluate the association between CRP levels with comorbidities, species, and complications of severe malaria
Subjects and Methods: A cross-sectional study enrolled 65 severe malaria patients at Khartoum state hospitals during the period from April to June2021. Manifestations of severe
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