HEALTH, A STRATEGIC NATIONAL RESOURCE

Health has always been the most valuable and beautiful gift that Nature offered to humans. Unfortunately, nowadays, people value and desire more wealth than health; often they remain indifferent to the degradation of their own health. Only in front of serious diagnoses people start appreciating their true wealth – the health. The allopathic medicine has no giants’ power, as it sometimes treats symptoms and diseases instead of illnesses’ fundamental causes.Education, the other field revealing the horizon of knowledge, provides creative alternatives for spending revenues in favour of healthy individuals and societal robust development. The purpose almost remains the same: use both complex potentials and opportunities to increase motivation, accomplish joy of life and fulfil desires to build wellbeing. The link between Health and Education has complex links and hidden mechanisms waiting for to be explored and used in favour of all

Experimental Pharmacological Research Regarding the Potential Antidepressant Activity Induced by Some Newly Synthesised Dibenzo[a,d]cycloheptene Compounds

Background. Depression is a relatively frequent encountered mental disorder in the general population, affecting both the quality of the individual life and its ability to perform the social tasks; it is generally accepted that new studies related to this pathologic condition are further necessary, in order to identify more adequate, efficient and accessible therapeutic compounds. Materials and Methods. This study was performed on a sample of 60 white male mice, NMRI strain, who were divided into 6 groups of 10 animals and treated with 4 new derivatives of dibenzo [a, d] cycloheptene, amitriptyline as a reference substance, or with distilled water for the control group. The animals were tested in respect to the forced swim test, both before and at 2 hours after administration of the mentioned substances. It was determined thus the time of immobilization. Results. The study showed the fact that only two of the four investigated compounds presented a relatively similar antidepressant effect with the reference substance. Conclusions. Minor structural changes, such as modifications of some substitutes from the basic chemical core of the reference substance can decisively influence the conservation or loss of the antidepressant properties

Metoclopramide Neurological Side Effects Screening; A Pharmacovigilence Study in Romanian Community Pharmacies

Background. Metoclopramide is a pharmacological agent frequently used in therapy against nausea and vomiting that can occur in indigestion, motion sickness, gastric ulcer, pyloric spasm and after surgery as a side effect of some anesthetics. Knowing the frequency and intensity of metoclopramide neurological side effects is essential for an efficient management of the dysfunctions it addresses. Material and method. Based on a standard questionnaire containing questions regarding metoclopramide therapy, we analyzed the answers given by 1000 patients or patient tutors in 20 open circuit pharmacies situated all over Bucharest. All subjects freely consented to participate in this study that was coordinated only by pharmacists. Results. Our study highlights the fact that in certain situations having to do with the age of patients, with the use of multiple drugs or with the tendency to self medicate, the neurological side effects of metoclopramide can reach dangerous levels. In some cases it might even be necessary to immediately interrupt metoclopramide therapy, despite its positive benefit/ risk ratio. Conclusions. Respecting the physician’s recommendations, avoiding self medication and reporting side effects as quickly as possible, are essential elements for minimizing the consequences of metoclopramide side effects

Primary hyperparathyroidism can generate recurrent pancreatitis and secondary diabetes mellitus – A case report

Introduction. Acute or recurrent pancreatitis may be a complication of primary hyperparathyroidism and patients with previous episodes of pancreatitis may develop secondary diabetes mellitus. Case report. We describe the clinical case of a 52-year old Caucasian man diagnosed with chronic recurrent pancreatitis in 2007. The first episode of acute pancreatitis occurred in 2002, followed by another 4 episodes in 2004 and 2007. In 2004, papilosfincterectomy was implemented with a stent mount that was removed one month later. In 2005, the patient underwent a surgical intervention for the diagnosis of chronic lithiasis, and cholecystectomy was performed. Additional investigations on the etiology of recurrent chronic pancreatitis, initially diagnosed as idiopathic, revealed elevated values of total serum calcium, serum parathormone, and the presence of a parathyroid adenoma in the right lower pole of the thyroid. In September 2007, parathyroidectomy was performed with a favorable evolution and the remission of the acute pancreatitis episodes. The patient had not had any family history of diabetes; in 2017 he was diagnosed with diabetes. Conclusion. In cases of recurrent pancreatitis, screening for hyperparathyroidism is recommended. Metabolic evaluation is required, because the risk of developing diabetes in patients with recurrent pancreatitis is high

Experimental pharmacological research regarding some newly synthesized benzamides on central nervous system functions

Three newly synthesized benzamides by the Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry of the Faculty of pharmacy from the University of Medicine and Pharmacy „Carol Davila” Bucharest were tested in order to determine whether these new molecules have similar effects on the central nervous system as those already in therapeutic use belonging to the same chemical group, such as tiapride (neuroleptic) or lidocaine (local anaesthetic). Tests were carried out on NMRI mice which were given new compounds, conventionally named I5C, I14C, and II5C in a dose of 1/20 of the lethal dose 50% (LD50), as previously determined. They received this treatment daily for 21 days. The evasive–investigating capacity of mice was determined using the platform test, and the motor activity using an Activity cage device. The results have shown that compounds I5C and II5C decrease the investigation capacity of the mice; and compound I5C inhibits motor activity, while II5C stimulates it. Thus we concluded that only compounds I5C and II5C have a neuroleptic potential that might be investigated further

The role of biotransformation processes in mediating interactions between psychotropic drugs and natural products

Many patients are not aware that natural products such as fruit juices or plant infusions can cause significant interactions with several drugs, some of which can be dangerous, especially when the medical treatment is for neurological or psychiatric disorders. Among the most predisposed for interacting with drugs are citric juices, particularly grapefruit and plant infusions, especially St John`s wort (Hypericum perforatum). Understanding the mechanism and the frequency of this type of interaction helps to avoid it. The goal of this research was to identify and summarize the most relevant reports on interactions between psychotropic drugs and natural beverages, in order to raise awareness among physicians that they should invest more time in educating patients how to administer drugs properly, thus reducing the likelihood of such unwanted events. For the purpose of this study, an electronic search of PubMed database was conducted until September 2019. We concluded that natural beverage consumption along side medical treatment is a widespread practice and the main mechanism generating interactions is related to the functioning of biotransformation enzymes

Serum markers of bone fragility in type-2 diabetes mellitus

Patients with type-2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) have normal or increased bone mineral density (BMD) but despite that, they are characterized by an increased hip and vertebral fracture risk that involves the alteration of bone quality and not the reduction in bone mass. BMD is utilized for the diagnosis and evaluation of osteoporosis, but BMD itself cannot provide an accurate diagnosis of the individuals at increased risk of fracture and, therefore, studies have focused on identifying other risk factors that are partially or fully independent of BMD. The fracture risk score tool-FRAX® models provide information about a 10-year probability of osteoporotic fractures, but do not include risk factors specific to illness such as diabetes duration, diabetes drug therapy, glycemic control, or the presence of micro-vascular complications. Multiple markers have been investigated to provide information on the risk of fractures in patients with T2DM such as: advanced glycation end products (AGEs), insulin-like growth factor-I (IGF-I), osteocalcin (OC), adiponectin, and sclerostin, but epidemiological studies did not provide homogeneous information regarding the link between these markers and bone fragility in T2DM subjects. Markers that increase the accuracy of fracture risk estimation in patients with T2DM need to be identified and employed in current medical practice

Toward language-independent program verification

Recent years have seen a renewed interest in the area of deductive program verification, with focus on verifying real-world software components. Success stories include the verification of operating system kernels and of compilers. This dissertation describes techniques for automatically building efficient correct-by-construction program verifiers for real-world languages from operational semantics. In particular, reachability logic is proposed as a foundation for achieving language-independent program verification. Reachability logic can express both operational semantics and program correctness properties, and has a sound and (relatively) complete proof systems that derives the program correctness properties from the operational semantics. These techniques have been implemented in the K verification infrastructure, which in turn yielded automatic program verifiers for C, Java, and JavaScript. These verifiers are evaluated by checking the full functional correctness of challenging heap manipulation programs implementing the same data-structures in these languages (e.g. AVL trees). This dissertation also describes the natural proof methodology for automated reasoning about heap properties

Considerations Regarding the Conditions for Retaining Tenure for Teachers Who Must Retire and for Reinstatement or Continuation of Employment for Those Retired

This study presents the conditions for maintaining the tenure of teachers who have to retire and for the reinstatement or continuation of employment of retired teachers, as they emerge from the analysis, not simple and necessarily in its entirety, of the provisions of S. 289 of Law no. 1/2011 on national education, of which only those of paragraphs (1), (3), (6) and (7) are still applicable. Especially in the light of the new form of paragraph (7) introduced by item 37 of Article I of Government Emergency Ordinance no. 117/2013 due to the fact that, as noted in its explanatory memorandum, by Constitutional Court Decision no. 397/2013, the previous form of this paragraph was declared unconstitutional. The analysis of this decision is conclusive from the perspective of the teleological method of interpretation, which together with the logical, historical, systematic and grammatical method helps us in our legal research to provide solutions; each university had/has to transpose the provisions which are difficult to interpret into a methodology approved by the university senate, providing for the other legal and procedural conditions. The study is also important from the perspective of the new draft of the higher education law which seems to omit the criticisms and conclusions of the Constitutional Court referred to above