Background: Speckle tracking echocardiography (STE)-derived mitral annular displacement (MAD) utilizes the speckle tracking technique to measure strain vectors, which provides accurate estimates of left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF).Objectives: To validate the accuracy of mitral annular displacement (MAD), assessed by Speckle Tracking Echocardiography (STE), as a surrogate for determination of left ventricular systolic function in comparison to 2-Dimensions Simpson method in patients with different heart diseases.Methods : This cross-sectional study included patients who referred to outpatient department of Ibn Albitar Center for Cardiac Surgery, Baghdad, Iraq, between October 2012 and April 2013. STE continuously tracked annular motion throughout the cardiac cycle in the apical 4- and 2-chamber views. LVEF for each patient was measured by both Simpson method and STE-derived MAD.Results: This study included 100 patients, of them (35%) had ischemic heart disease (IHD), (10%) had dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM), (10%) had valvular heart disease (VHD), (25%) had normal echocardiography, and (20%) had hypertensive heart disease (HHD).There was significant correlation between EF % (derived by MAD) and EF % (derived by Simpson method) in patients with different heart diseases. This correlation was good in normal subjects (r=0.673), and those with IHD(r=0.896), DCM (r=0.724) and VHD (r=0.935), while in HHD it was moderately correlated (r=0.455). There was slight under-estimation of LVEF derived by MAD (a mean value of difference 0.846 %; p =0.022). In subgroup analysis, this difference was seen only in patients with HHD (a mean value of difference 3.145 %; p <0.001), while it was absent in other subgroups.Conclusion: STE-derived MAD provides easy, fast, and accurate assessments of global longitudinal systolic function. LVEF derived by MAD was correlated well with LVEF derived by Simpson method in patients with different heart diseases
The need to create the optimal water quality management process has motivated researchers to pursue prediction modeling development. One of the widely important forecasting models is the sessional autoregressive integrated moving average (SARIMA) model. In the present study, a SARIMA model was developed in R software to fit a time series data of monthly fluoride content collected from six stations on Tigris River for the period from 2004 to 2014. The adequate SARIMA model that has the least Akaike's information criterion (AIC) and mean squared error (MSE) was found to be SARIMA (2, 0, 0) (0,1,1). The model parameters were identified and diagnosed to derive the forecasting equations at each selected location. The correlat
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Abstract
Rayleigh distribution is one of the important distributions used for analysis life time data, and has applications in reliability study and physical interpretations. This paper introduces four different methods to estimate the scale parameter, and also estimate reliability function; these methods are Maximum Likelihood, and Bayes and Modified Bayes, and Minimax estimator under squared error loss function, for the scale and reliability function of the generalized Rayleigh distribution are obtained. The comparison is done through simulation procedure, t
... Show MoreSpecial exercises in individual games are an important pillar in learning their basic skills. The aim of the research is to prepare special exercises using tools and their effect on learning the skill of landing with Salto backward tucked to stand - knowing the effect of special exercises using tools and their effect on learning the skill of landing with Salto backward tucked to stand on the horizontal bar. Either the research assumes the existence of significant differences in the pre- and post-tests in learning the skill of landing with Salto backward tucked to stand on the horizontal bar in favor of the post-test. The researchers used the experimental method with a single sample design to suit the research problem, as the researc
... Show MoreThis paper presents a computer simulation model of a thermally activated roof (TAR) to cool a room using cool water from a wet cooling tower. Modeling was achieved using a simplified 1-D resistance-capacitance thermal network (RC model) for an infinite slab. Heat transfer from the cooling pipe network was treated as 2-D heat flow. Only a limited number of nodes were required to obtain reliable results. The use of 6th order RC-thermal model produced a set of ordinary differential equations that were solved using MATLAB - R2012a. The computer program was written to cover all possible initial conditions, material properties, TAR system geometry and hourly solar radiation. The cool water supply was considered time
... Show MoreThis study was undertaken to introduce a fast, accurate, selective, simple and environment-friendly colorimetric method to determine iron (II) concentration in different lipstick brands imported or manufactured locally in Baghdad, Iraq. The samples were collected from 500-Iraqi dinars stores to establish routine tests using the spectrophotometric method and compared with a new microfluidic paper-based analytical device (µPAD) platform as an alternative to cost-effective conventional instrumentation such as Atomic Absorption Spectroscopy (AAS). This method depends on the reaction between iron (II) with iron(II) selective chelator 1, 10-phenanthroline(phen) in the presence of reducing agent hydroxylamine (HOA) and sodium acetate (NaOAc) b
... Show MoreThe flow measurements have increased importance in the last decades due to the shortage of water resources resulting from climate changes that request high control of the available water needed for different uses. The classical technique of open channel flow measurement by the integrating-float method was needed for measuring flow in different locations when there were no available modern devices for different reasons, such as the cost of devices. So, the use of classical techniques was taken place to solve the problem. The present study examines the integrating float method and defines the parameters affecting the acceleration of floating spheres in flowing water that was analyzed using experimental measurements. The me
... Show MoreThe present paper describes and analyses three proposed cogeneration plants include back pressure steam-turbine system, gas turbine system, diesel-engine system, and the present Dura refinery plant. Selected actual operating data are employed for analysis. The same amount of electrical and thermal product outputs is considered for all systems to facilitate comparisons. The theoretical analysis was done according to 1st and 2nd law of thermodynamic. The results demonstrate that exergy analysis is a useful tool in performance analysis of cogeneration systems and permits meaningful comparisons of different cogeneration systems based on their merits, also the result showed that the back pressure steam-turbine is more efficient than other pro
... Show MoreThis paper is an attempt to foster creative performance of students in essay writing through using tips. Prewriting tips are a series of strategies ( outline in essay writing). These tips enable :::e Iraqi students to be aware of the process of writing as a guideline to what is expected from them as good essay writers. The study aims at: I .Finding out whether college students are aware of using these tips in fostering creativity performance in their essay writing? 2. To what extent can the application of these tips contribute in developing students' essay writing? To achieve these aims. 2 questionnaire and a test have been conducted and distributed on two parallel th
... Show MoreAn ingrowing toenail is a common problem affecting mainly adolescents and young adults, with a male predominance of 3:1. The disorder generally occurs in big toes. It is painful and often chronic and it affects work and social activities. Most patients initially complain of pain and later discharge, infection and difficulty in walking occur. The Objectives: The purpose of the study was to evaluate the efficacy and safety of (10600nm) CO2 laser in the treatment of ingrowing toe nail. Patients, Materials & Methods: This study was done in laser medicine research clinics from July 2013 to the end of December 2013; 10 patients including 7(70%) males and 3 (30%) females with age ranging from 18 years to 70 years with mean age of 44 years o
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