ACUTE OTITIS EXTERNA AS SEEN AT THE UNIVERSITY OF NIGERIA TEACHING HOSPITAL, ENUGU.

Aim: is to evaluate clinical features of AOE diagnosed in and to update the previous study from our facility.Methods: A prospective, clinical and laboratory study in a tertiary health facilityResults: A total of 3793 consecutive patients that attended the otorhinolaryngology clinics of the university of Nigeria teaching hospital Enugu during the period under study were assessed for clinical diagnosis of otitis externa. A total of 155 ears from127 patients were diagnosed clinically and confirmed by microbial studies as having acute otitis externa. There were 66 males and 61 females out of the 127 patients seen.71 ears had only bacteria isolated from the culture of their ear swab specimens, 28 fungus only and, 32 ears had both bacterial and fungal isolates while 24 ears had no isolates of microbes of the 3793 patients assessed.Conclusions: Acute otitis externa is a common disease in Enugu  with no gender biasand there were three times more cases of bacterial otitis externa than fungal otitis externa.

Wideband microstrip patch antenna design for breast cancer tumour detection

A patch antenna is presented which has been designed to radiate into human breast tissue. The antenna is shown by means of simulation and practical measurement to possess a wide input bandwidth, stable radiation patterns and a good front-to-back ratio. Consideration is also given to its ability to radiate a pulse, and in this respect it is also found to be suitable for the proposed application

Breast tumour detection using a flat 16 element array

A new experimental prototype of a breast cancer detection technique using real aperture multi-static radar is presented. The system comprises a fully-populated 16 element flat array and an associated system to switch between different transmit and receive elements. 3D images are produced using backscatter signals from a synthetic breast phantom. After suppression of skin reflections, initial images demonstrate the successful detection of 4-mmdiameter tumours

Breast cancer tumour detection using microwave radar techniques

A breast cancer detection technique using multi-static radar is proposed herein. Images of a breast tumour are produced using this technique, with backscatter data. A wideband antenna design suitable for a breast cancer detection system is also described. Practical measurements are performed using a network analyser and a pair of antennas that are used to simulate an array. These initial images demonstrate the successful detection of a tumour phantom immersed in a liquid phantom with similar dielectric properties as the breast tissues

Microwave detection of breast tumours

Copyright @ 2003 European Bioelectromagnetics Association

Numerical analysis of microwave detection of breast tumours using synthetic focussing techniques

Microwave detection of breast tumours is a non-ionising and potentially low-cost and more certain alternative to X-ray mammography. Analogous to ground penetrating radar (GPR), microwaves are transmitted using an antenna array and the reflected signals, which contain reflections from tumours, are recorded. The work presented here employs a post reception synthetically focussed detection method developed for land mine detection (R. Benjamin et al., IEE Proc. Radar, Sonar and Nav., vol. 148, no.4, pp. 233-40, 2001); all elements of an antenna array transmit a broadband signal in turn, the elements sharing a field of view with the current transmit element then record the received signal. By predicting the path delay between transmit and receive antennas via any desired point in the breast, it is then possible to extract and time-align all signals from that point. Repeated for all points in the breast, this yields an image in which the distinct dielectric properties of malignant tissue are potentially visible. This contribution presents a theoretical evaluation of the breast imaging system using FDTD methods. The FDTD model realistically models a practical system incorporating wide band antenna elements. One major challenge in breast cancer detection using microwaves is the clutter arising from skin interface. Deeply located tumours can be detected using windowing techniques (R. Nilavalan et al., Electronics Letters, vol. 39, pp. 1787-1789, 2003); however tumours closer to the skin interface require additional consideration, as described herein

Particle production in the outflow of a midlatitude storm

The concentrations of atmospheric gases and condensation nuclei (CN) or aerosol in the outflow of a storm were measured aboard a NASA DC-8 aircraft, as described in a companion paper [Twohy et al., 2002]. The data are used here to study the production of the aerosol. Major fluctuations in CN concentration are observed, in correlation with gas-phase species, but these are shown to arise as the result of the mixing of two distinct air masses. It is deduced that the CN originated in a storm outflow air mass and that its concentration before mixing was approximately uniform over a flight distance of about 200 km. The formation of the aerosol by nucleation followed by growth and coagulation is analyzed assuming that it consists of water and sulphuric acid produced locally by the oxidation of SO2. The analysis uses analytic models, and it is concluded that a 5 min burst of nucleation was followed by growth and coagulation over a period of about 5 hours. Both the mass and number concentrations of the observed aerosol can be reproduced by this analysis within a timescale consistent with that of the storm. The final number concentration is very insensitive to the initial SO2 concentration

Multilayer and conformal antennas using synthetic dielectric substrates

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Experimental investigation of real aperture synthetically organised radar for breast cancer detection

Breast cancer is the most common cancer in woman, and early detection increases the likelihood of successful treatment and long-term survival screen film mammography is currently the most effective method for detecting breast tumours, however this technique suffers from relatively high false negative and positive detection rates, and it involves uncomfortable compression of the breast. This paper presents the experimental investigation of real aperture synthetically organised radar for breast cancer detection. The work presented herein originated as a theoretical study employing FDTD models. This contribution presents subsequent experimental validation using a mechanically-scanned 2 element antenna array and a breast phantom consisting of synthetic biological materials