Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is an autoimmune disease with polymorphic expression. B cells have an essential contribution in immune system activation via the production of different cytokines and functioning as potent antigen-presenting cells. Therefore, a drug that particularly targets B cells may represent an ideal therapeutic approach for SLE. Rituximab (RTX), an anti-CD20 monoclonal antibody causing transient B-cell depletion, has been used to manage SLE. This study aims to assess Rituximab effects on lupus nephritis (LN) patients when added to conventional immunosuppressants. Twenty four patients, 15-32 years old, with class III/IV/V LN were involved in this study. All were on steroids before lupus nephritis occurrence. They were given rituximab induction therapy and mycophenolate mofetil (MMF) maintenance therapy. RTX was indicated for refractory and relapsing SLE. Several investigations done before and after RTX treatment and in the last follow up (done one year after starting Rituximab). Those included protein in urine, serum creatinine, double stranded DNA, C3, C4, and Estimated Glomerular Filtration Rate (eGFR). Proteinuria decreased significantly after RTX treatment and in the last measurement (P=0.01 and P=0.001, respectively). Serum creatinine significantly decreased only in the last measurement (P=0.02). Double stranded DNA decreased remarkably after treatment (P=0.01) with a further decrease in the last measurement (P=0.006). C3 and C4 increased after treatment but the increase was significant only for C3 (P=0.002) and this increase continues till the last measurement (P=0.0006). Active urine sediments found in fifteen patients and disappeared after RTX treatment. Rituximab can be promising in treating lupus nephritis when used along with traditional immunosuppressants. It can reduce disease activity and improve renal function in such patients.
Background: Significant numbers of patients with spinal tuberculosis (TB), especially in developing countries, still present late after disease onset with severe neurological deficits.
Objective:This study was conducted to assess the outcome of surgery in patients with tuberculosis of the spine with motor deficits.
Type of the study: Retrospective study.
Methods: We retrospectively analyzed data obtained in all the patients with severe motor deficits due to spinal TB admitted to and surgically treated in four hospitals in Baghdad/Iraq during the period from January 2012 to January 2014. History, examination, imaging, histological, postoperative, a
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Although cinema is moving towards art, it has dealt with the character since the beginning of the discovery of cinematic art in films such as (Doctor Caligari's cabin) and most German expressive films in the third decade of the twentieth century, but the interest of cinema is growing in the estranged human personality, meaning that this character It lives by its alienation from the environment and society that surrounds it, because our present days have witnessed on the material and moral level more social breakdowns such as wars and disasters, and the sharp contradiction in the social and economic level of people themselves or between different societies, or between the individual and his community, and new social relations have increas
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Background: Otitis media with effusion is a common and important pediatric clinical problem; it is the leading cause of hearing impairment in children. Medical treatment remains controversial. Aim: To evaluate the usefulness of using topical nasal steroids in the treatment of otitis media with effusion. Patients and Methods: Between November 2019 and October 2022, a prospective controlled clinical study was carried out in the department of otolaryngology at Al-Jerrahat Teaching Hospital in Medical City, Baghdad, Iraq. This study comprised 40 patients with bilateral otitis media with effusion (23 males, 17 females). Two groups were created for the patients. Patients in group A (20 patients) were treated with mometasone furoate nasal spra
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The aesthetic and technical expertise help in producing the artistic work and achieving results in aesthetic formulations that reflect the aesthetic and expressive dimensions and the reflective dimensions of the pottery, surpassing its traditions, asserting its active presence in life, cherishing it even when it breaks or get damaged by employing techniques that are originated from the Japanese environment.
The research problem is to study how ( Kintsugi) technique and similar techniques are used to create new rebirths of pottery piec
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Research deals the crises of the global recession of the facets of different and calls for the need to think out of the ordinary theory and find the arguments of the theory to accommodate the evolution of life, globalization and technological change and the standard of living of individuals and the size of the disparity in income distribution is not on the national level, but also at the global level as well, without paying attention to the potential resistance for thought the usual classical, Where the greater the returns of factors of production, the consumption will increase, and that the marginal propensity to consume may rise and the rise at rates greater with slices of low-income (the mouths of the poor) wi
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Greywater is a possible water source that can be improved for meeting the quality required for irrigation. Treatment of greywater can range from uncomplicated coarse filtration to advanced biological treatment. This article presents a simple design of a small scale greywater treatment plant, which is a series of physical and natural processes including screening, aeration, sedimentation, and filtration using granular activated carbon filter and differentiates its performance with sand filter. The performance of these units with the dual filter media of (activated carbon with sand) in treatment of greywater from Iraqi house in Baghdad city during 2019 and that collected from several points including washbasins, kitchen si
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Salmonella enteritidis one of more important as epidemiological bacteria between other salmonella types. It is very important pathologically that cause food poising and gastrointestinal tract infections. This study includes some of immunological changes that appear by ELISA test and antibiotic sensitivity test against these bacteria in mice. ELISA test results appears high immunological response happen after 3 days of inoculation, mean titration readings beginning 0.198 and the maximum mean titration after 15 days of inoculation 1.538 and begin to decrease after this time slowly to remain about 0.297 after 40 days of inoculation. An antibiotics sensitivity test result appears, this bacteria sensitive to Chloramphenicol, Ceftriaxone,
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