Association of low serum vitamin D level among pulmonary tuberculosis patients

Background: Recent studies suggest that the incidence and severity of tuberculosis is associated with low levels of Vitamin D, this is especially important in developing countries like India which carries a major portion of global Tuberculosis burden. Therefore, this study aimed to determine the prevalence of Vitamin D deficiency in newly diagnosed tuberculosis patients in our institute. Aims and objective is to study the deficiency of Vitamin D In newly diagnosed sputum positive pulmonary TB and to compare the level of Vitamin d with that of age matched healthy control population.Methods: This was a descriptive cross-sectional case control study to asses Vitamin D deficiency among 140 cases which included 2 categories of patients (a) Group 1: 70 sputum AFB positive newly diagnosed pulmonary TB patients, (b) Group 2: 70 apparently healthy people who came to the hospital with regular checkup.Results: Mean age of study groups and control in years were, Control: 40.3857±10.231, Cases: 36.885±11.076. Mean BMI was significantly higher in controls when compared with new TB cases (19.27±2.455 vs 15.215±1.774) kg/m2 p <0.05).There was significant decrease in mean Vitamin D3 value when new cases TB patients were compared with controls (18.212±9.3027 vs 36.1267±8.410 p <0.05).Conclusions: Patients with tuberculosis are significantly Vitamin D deficient as compared to normal people. This deficiency is more marked in females and those with low BMI. The present finding favours the role of Vitamin D in the prevention and treatment of tuberculosis in developing countries like India

A study of radiological presentation in bronchogenic carcinoma along with prevelance of pulmonary TB in a tertiary center

Background: Lung cancer is most common cause of cancer related death in men and women world wise responsible for over 1 million death annually. Lung cancer is leading cause of cancer death in united states and worldwide. Lung cancer is the most common neoplasm contributing more frequent among males causing cancer related mortality in both sexes. Objective of this study was to radiological presentation in bronchogenic carcinoma along with   prevalence of pulmonary TB in a tertiary center.Methods: Total of 100 patients with histologically proven lung cancer, from July 2018 to June 2019 at a tertiary center Kota Rajasthan. Data of participants regarding demographics, history of smoking habit, clinical presentation, histopathological type, radiographic findings on chest radiograph, ultrasonography, computed tomography (CT) scan, Statistical analysis was performed using descriptive statistics of the collected data.Results: Most common age group of bronchogenic carcinomas was seen between 60-69 years of age (37%) with male predominance (82%).  smoking history present in about (80%) patients.  Most common radiological presentation was a mass lesion present in 91% patients (n=91) followed by unilateral hilar prominence present in 44% of patients (n=44). Other common finding includes mediastinal widening (38%), collapse (26%). pleural effusion (22%), metastasis (22%), cavitation (13%), consolidation (12%), bony erosion (11%), pneumothorax (5%), and pancost tumor (4%).  prevalence of pulmonary TB in bronchogenic carcinoma is 9% and this is due to high burden of pulmonary TB in India.Conclusions: In this study adenocarcinoma was found to be most common type of lung cancer. Smoking is most common risk factor. Pulmonary TB coexistence with bronchogenic carcinoma was more common. The local immunity is deteriorated in cancer cases

Utility of the Epworth sleepiness scale: Hindi version in identifying obstructive sleep apnoea in adult patients with symptoms of sleep disordered breathing in a tertiary care centre

Background: Excessive daytime sleepiness is a key symptom in patients with sleep- breathing disorders (SBD) and represents a new major public health issue due to its repercussions. The ESS is a simple and validated method, which measures the probability of falling asleep in a variety of situations. Aims and objectives is to study the accuracy of the Epworth Sleepiness Scale (ESS) questionnaire in the identification of Obstructive Sleep Apnoea (OSA) in patients with symptoms of sleep disordered breathing in a tertiary care centre.Methods: This present study was conducted in the Department of Respiratory medicine, New Medical College, Kota on 70 adult patients who presented with symptoms of Sleep Disordered Breathing and underwent Type 2 Polysomnography after answering Epworth sleepiness score in Hindi Language.Results: Epworth sleepiness scale has predicted excessive day time sleepiness in 60% of study subjects with ESS score more than 10 taken as cut off. Mean value for ESS in the study was 10.78. 35.71% of the patients had severe OSA diagnosed by polysomnography and 30% patients had moderate OSA. Mild OSA was detected in 7.14% patients. Sensitivity of the ESS score >10 in diagnosing OSA was found to be 72.5%. Specificity of the scale was 73.6%.There was significant correlation between ESS score and diagnosis of OSA (p value <0.001).Conclusions: The study concludes that ESS has got good relevance in predicting OSA in patients with sleep disordered breathing

Role of medical thoracoscopy in the management of parapneumonic effusion and empyema thoracic

Background: The treatment modality use in early pleural empyema mainly depends on the antimicrobial therapy along with thoracocentesis. In case of complicated empyema this modality does not work and lung not fully expand, until removal of adhesions. The main purpose of the current study is to analyze the experience of management of complicated parapneumonic effusion and empyema thoracic through rigid medical thoracoscopy under local anaesthesia. Aim and objective is to study the role of medical thoracoscopy in the management of empyema thoracic and parapneumonic effusion at tertiary health centre.Methods: This is a descriptive case series study in which 49 patients were recruited, who have clinically and radiologically show empyema thoracic, from department of Respiratory medicine, GMC, Kota, Rajasthan. All patients underwent medical thoracoscopy under local anesthesia. Written Informed consent was taken from the study participants. Ethical approval was obtained from Ethical Review Committee of the hospital. Patients who have HIV and Hbsag positive, those with multiple organ failure and bleeding disorders were excluded.Results: Total 49 patients, out of them 41(84%) were male and 8(16%) were female with mean age 45 years (range 18 to 70 years). Final evolution through chest x-ray revealed complete resolution or successful thoracoscopy done in 37 case of fibrinopurulent (92.50%) and 5 cases of organizing empyema (55.56%). overall success rate 85.71%. Total 7 cases (3 case of fibrinopurulent and 4 cases of organizing empyema) refer to higher center for decortications.Conclusions: Medical Thoracoscopy under local anaesthesia is a safe procedure, efficient and cost-effective intervention for early management of complicated empyema, particularly in early stage of empyema (fibro purulent)

Bench-scale Microbial assisted arsenic removal using Acidothiobacillus ferrooxidance mediated by iron oxidation

Oxidation of ferrous ions using Acidothiobacillus ferrooxidance has an important application in removal of arsenic(As) by chemo-biochemical process.Arsenite (As+3) was found to oxidised to arsenate (As+5) in presence of A. ferrooxidance and ferric (Fe+3) ions. The resulting arsenate can be removed by precipitation and filtration. The aim of present work was to establish the effect of basic parameters namely temperature, pH, initial cell density and Fe+2 concentration on microbial assisted arsenic removal using bio-oxidation of ferrous to ferric at bench scale

Evaluation of the effect of size reduction and thermal treatment on metal extraction from PCBs of mother board and digital video drive of desktop PC

The study aims at evaluating the effect of particle size and thermal treatment on printed circuit boards (PCBs) of Mother Board (MB) and DVD on metal extraction. Results show around 90–95% (w/w) and 35–40% (w/w) of total Al and Cu respectively, in CPU could be recovered by systematized disassembly. Re-maining embedded Al and Cu require metallurgical or hydro-metallurgical processing. Cu extraction in-creases with size reduction. Thermal treatment of MB–PCB shows reduction in Cu extraction (23–38%) for all sizes in comparison without thermal treatment, while DVD–PCB showed surge in extraction after thermal treatment (41–141%) in comparison without thermal treatment

A mosquito attractant or lurent composition and the device thereof

A device and method is describe for producing CO2, body odour and other attractants such as lights, heat, moisture, together as an mosquito-insects attractants near or within an electric field enclosure. The invention describes a use of developed low cost non-hazardous material in a specially design device which produces mosquito-insects attractants in more economical and convenient way, which lures the mosquitoes-insects towards the source i.e. device and gets eventually kill by electric field. The invention has low operating cost and effective way of controlling the mosquitoes-insects menace without any negative implications on user health or environment

Removal of arsenic by Acidothiobacillus ferrooxidans bacteria in bench scale fixed-bed bioreactor system

In the present study arsenic contaminated simulated water and groundwater was treated by the combination of biological oxidation of tri-valent arsenite [As (III)] to penta-valent arsenate [As (V)] in presence of Acidothiobacillus ferrooxidans bacteria and its removal by adsorptive filtration in a bioreactor system. This method includes the immobilisation of A.ferrooxidans on Granulated Activated Carbon (GAC) capable of oxidising ferrous [Fe (II)] to ferric [Fe (III)]. The Fe (III) significantly converts the As (III) to As (V) and ultimately removed greater than 95% by the bed of GAC, limestone, and sand. The significant influence of Fe (II) concentration (0.1–1.5 gL−1), flowrate (0.06–0.18 Lh−1), and initial As (III) concentration (100–1000 μgL−1) on the arsenic removal efficiency was investigated. The simulated water sample containing the different concentration of As (III) and other ions was used in the study. The removal of other co-existing ions present in contaminated water was also investigated in column study. The concentration of arsenic was found to be <10 μgL−1 which is below Maximum Contaminant Level (MCL) as per WHO in treated water. The results confirmed that the present system including adsorptive-filtration was successfully used for the treatment of contaminated water containing As (III) ions

A simple method for estimating the quality factor of cylindrical re-entrant cavity of Klystrons

A simple method for estimation of the unloaded quality factor of single and double re-entrant cylindrical cavities was developed based on Wheeler�s incremental inductance rule. The proposed approach was benchmarked for a Ka-band re-entrant cavity against 3D electromagnetic simulation using CST Studio and also with measurements. The analysis is general and unlike the approach of Fujisawa, it could be extended to analyze the re-entrant cavity comprising dissimilar materials. The effect of surface roughness on the quality factor of the cavity also could be estimated using the present analysis. © 2019, © 2019 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group

Copper Oxide Nanograss for Efficient and Stable Photoelectrochemical Hydrogen Production by Water Splitting

A biphasic copper oxide thin film of grass-like appendage morphology is synthesized by two-step electro-deposition method and later investigated for photoelectrochemical (PEC) water splitting for hydrogen production. Further, the thin film was characterized by UV–Visible spectroscopy, x-ray diffraction (XRD), Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and PEC techniques. The XRD analysis confirms formation of biphasic copper oxide phases, and SEM reveals high surface area grass appendage-like morphology. These grass appendage structures exhibit a high cathodic photocurrent of � 1.44 mAcm�2 at an applied bias of � 0.7 (versus Ag/AgCl) resulting in incident to photon current efficiency (IPCE) of � 10% at 400 nm. The improved light harvesting and charge transport properties of grass appendage structured biphasic copper oxides makes it a potential candidate for PEC water splitting for hydrogen production