Background: Quality of life in brain tumor patients is an emerging issue and has prompted neurosurgeons to recon¬sider the need for cognitive assessment in the course of treatment. To date there has been a lack of comprehensive neuropsychological assessment performed preoperatively and in the acute postoperative period in our hospitals.Objectives: to establish the effects of tumors and their surgical treatment, from a neuropsychological perspective, on cognitive functioning in patients with cerebral Gliomas. Methods: This is a prospective study conducted in the Neurosurgical Hospital in Baghdad, Iraq, during the period from January 1999 to January 2001. Any patient admitted during the period of the study with clinical history, signs, symptoms, and contrast enhanced MRI suggesting a cerebral glioma and confirmed by postoperative histopathological results of glioma has been included in this study. While multifocal lesions, long-lasting epilepsy, use of antiepileptic therapy, multiple cranial lesions, previous cranial surgery, any chronic illness, and histopathological result of other tumors were exclusion criteria. All patients were at their first operation for brain tumors. Patients were examined by analyzing several functional domains (intelligence, executive functions, memory, language, praxis, gnosis and mood state) in order to establish the effect of tumor and surgery on cognition.Results: 29 patients who fulfilled the selection criteria were included. Mean duration of clinical history was 5 months (range 1–9 months). At baseline, using test- and domain-based criteria, 79% and 38% of patients, respectively, were impaired, the former related to tumor factors such as edema (P < 0.05), larger size (P < 0.05) and higher grade (P = 0.001). Verbal memory, visuospatial memory and word fluency were the most frequently affected functions, partly associated with depression. Postoperatively, 38% and 55% of patients, respectively, were unchanged, 24% and 21% improved, and 38% and 24% worsened; 24% and 62% of patients were intact, respec-tively.Conclusions: The extent of removal did not influence the outcome. Improvement involved previously impaired functions and was correlated with high-grade tumors. Worsening regar¬ded executive functions was related to tumor size and was partly explained by radiological findings on postoperative MRI. This prospective study, focusing on the effects of tumor and surgery, showed that tumor significantly affects cognitive func¬tions, mainly due to the mass effect and higher grading. Surgical treatment improved the functions most frequently affected preoperatively and caused worsening of execu¬tive functions soon after operation, leaving the overall cognitive burden unchanged and capable of improvement prospectively.
The high cost of chemical analysis of water has necessitated various researches into finding alternative method of determining portable water quality. This paper is aimed at modelling the turbidity value as a water quality parameter. Mathematical models for turbidity removal were developed based on the relationships between water turbidity and other water criteria. Results showed that the turbidity of water is the cumulative effect of the individual parameters/factors affecting the system. A model equation for the evaluation and prediction of a clarifier’s performance was developed:
Model: T = T0(-1.36729 + 0.037101∙10λpH + 0.048928t + 0.00741387∙alk)
The developed model will aid the predictiv
... Show MoreEight patients (3 male and 5 female) were treated in this study by Endovenous Laser Ablation (EVLA); Mathematical models are proposed to estimate the applied laser power and to assess the recovery period. The estimations of the applied laser power and recovery period in these models will be depended mainly on the diameter of the incompetent vein. In addition, Excel Program was utilized to find the proposed models. A 1470 nm diode laser up to 15W continuous power (CW) was used in the treatment of venous ulcers by EVLA procedure. Following up by duplex ultrasound was started in the 1st week after the first session until the vein is completely closed. The present study concluded that the relationship both between
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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
... Show MoreBackground : To assess the actual practice of breast self-examination (BSE), as an early detection tool for breast cancer, among a sample of patients affected with breast cancer in Iraq.Methods: A random sample of 200 female patients with breast cancer was analyzed to evaluate the extent of their actual practice of breast self-examination before the diagnosis of the disease. The examined variables included the age of the patients, marital status, education, occupation, smoking habit, family history of cancer, frequency of gravidity, parity and abortions. Results: The age of patients ranged from (24-70) years with a mean age of 48 years. The highest frequency of the examined sample
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This studay was performd on 30 serum specimens of patients having type II diabetes with cardiac disease, and 40 normal specimens were investigated as control group.The activity rate of AAP in patients (125.31± 3.28)I.U/L and activity rate of AAP in normals (6.76±2.21) I.U/L, in addition purification of AAP from serum patients having type II diabetes with cardiac diaease by using dialysis bag and gel filtration (Sephadex G-50). The results of the study reveal that Alanine aminopeptidase (AAP) activity of type II diabetes with cardiac disease patients' serum show a high signifiacant increase (p<0.001) compare to normal subject .
SMNs like Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, WhatsApp,..etc. are among the most popular sites on the Internet. These sites can provide a powerful means of sharing, organizing, finding information and knowledge. The popularity of these sites provides an opportunity to measure the use them in knowledge sharing, which needs a special scale, but unfortunately, there is no special scale for that. Thus, this study supposes to use SCT as a scale to measure the use of SMNs in electronic knowledge sharing due to it has been used to measure knowledge sharing with its traditional form. This study can help the decision-makers to use these SMNs to share the academics’ knowledge in educational institutes to the communi
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In this numerical study a detailed evaluation of the heat transfer characteristics and flow structure in a laminar and turbulent flow through a rectangular channel containing built-in of different type vortex generator has been a accomplished in a range of Reynolds number between 500 and 100,000.A modified version of ESCEAT code has been used to solve Navier-Stokes and energy equations. The purpose of this paper is to present numerical comparisons in terms of temperature, Nusselt number and flow patterns on several configurations of longitudinal vortex generator including new five cases. The structures of heat and flow were studied, using iso-contours of velocity components, vortices, temperature and Nusselt n
... Show MoreCyclophosphamide (CP) is a cytotoxic alkylating agent it's used associated with different side effects including lung toxicity. Vitamin B2 and vitamin B12 have lung-protective effects. This study was designed to evaluate lung-protective effects of both vitamins against lung toxicity induced by cyclophosphamide. seventy healthy adult albino male and female rats divided into seven groups each group containing ten rats were used in the present study and treated for seven days. On day eight rats were sacrificed and serum was obtained for glutathione and total antioxidant capacity measurement and lung extracted for immunohistochemical study; both vitamins significantly (P<0.05) increased glutathione and total antioxidant capacity in compar
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