Stevens Johnson syndrome in Pakistan: a ten-year survey

Objective: A pre-tested questionnaire-based, retrospective study to highlight the causative factors, mode of presentation, complications and outcome of patients with Stevens Johnson syndrome.SETTING: Aga Khan University Hospital over a 10 year period.Methods: All case records with a diagnosis of Steven Johnson Syndrome in the period 1990 to 2000 were retrospectively reviewed. Data was retrieved on a comprehensive questionnaire. The demographic variatbles and drugs taken within the previous 21 days were noted. Date analysis was done by Epi-Info Version 6.0.Results: Of the 101 studied patient files, the most common offender was found to be the Penicillins as a group and Sulfadoxine-Pyrimethamine (Fansidar) when considering all drugs individually. Most common complications included electrolyte disturbances (13.9%) and congestive heart failure (6.9%). Mortality rate was high at 10.1%.CONCLUSION: SJS was found to be a rare condition but having a mortality rate of 10.1%. As it can be induced by a large number of drugs, caution should be practiced while prescribing

Acaricidal activity of tea tree and lemon oil nanoemulsions against Rhipicephalus annulatus

Tick infestation is a serious problem in many countries since it has an impact on the health of animals used for food production and pets, and frequently affects humans. Therefore, the present study aimed to investigate the acaricidal effects of nanoemulsions of essential oils o

The relationship between tissue transglutaminase IgA antibodies and the clinical manifestations in a group of children, adolescent and adult patients with type -I diabetes mellitus

Background: Type-1 diabetes mellitus (T1-DM) is the commonest endocrine-metabolic disease in childhood. The prevalence of CD in type-1 DM ranges from 0.6 to 16.4% compared with 0.01–0.03% in the general population. The mechanism of association between the two diseases involves a shared genetic background of HLA genotype. Serum tissue transglutaminase IgA antibodies (tTG IgA) are considered specific and sensitive markers for screening of Celiac disease in more than 95 % of patients.Objective: Screening for the presence of serum tissue transglutaminase IgA antibodies (tTG ab) as a specific and sensitive biochemical marker for Celiac disease in patients with type-1DM and its relation to the clinical manifestations of those patients.Methods: One hundred-forty-nine patients with type-1 DM attending the out-patient clinic of endocrine and metabolism, Minia University Hospital were screened for the presence of serum tissue transglutaminase IgA antibodies during the period from March 2014 to November 2015.Results: Out of 149 patients 8 patients (5.3%) were positive for IgA tTG antibodies. They who were predominantly of female gender (75% were females). According to each age group, there were four sero-positive cases in children (with age group between 9 and ≤ 12 years); two cases in adolescents (with age group between 12 and ≤ 16 years) and two cases in adults (with age group 16-21 years). Intestinal manifestations, chronic diarrhea, recurrent abdominal pain/ distension, recurrent aphtha's stomatitis, anemia and bleeding tendency were significantly more common in sero-positive cases (P=0.001, 0.001, 0.016, 0.00, 0.001and 0.04 respectively). All sero-positive cases (100%) had lower BMIs than normal. There were no correlations between the tTG antibodies levels and HbA1c levels.Conclusions: The presence of tTG IgA antibodies is associated with significant changes in the clinical status of patient with type-1 DM. Celiac disease related manifestations like weight loss; anemia and chronic diarrhea were more common in sero-positive diabetic patients. Serological screening for CD should be performed in all patients with type-1DM for early diagnosis and prevention of complications.Keywords: Type-1 DM, tissue transglutaminase, IgA antibodie

Mycogenic silver nanoparticles from endophytic trichoderma atroviride with antimicrobial activity

There is an increasing interest in developing nanoparticles with diverse biologic activities. To this end, we prepared 10 to 15 nm silver nanoparticles (AgNP) from native isolates of Trichoderma atroviride. Within this study, endophytic fungi hosted four medicinal plants in Saint Katherine Protectorate, South Sinai, Egypt have been isolated by surface sterilization technique on four isolation media. Ten species, based on their frequency of occurrence, out of twenty recovered taxa were tested for their capability to synthesize extracellular AgNPs. Trichoderma atroviride hosted Chiliadenus montanus was found to be the best candidate for the production of mycogenic AgNPs among all examined species. The mycosynthesized AgNPs were compared with chemically synthesized and characterized using Ultraviolet-visible (UV-vis) spectroscopy, Raman spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction (XRD) and high-resolution transmission electron microscopy (HRTEM) techniques. The HRTEM result showed the distribution of spherical AgNPs ranging from 10 to 15 nm. Trichoderma atroviride isolate was subjected to sequencing for confirmation of phenotypic identification. The internal transcribed spacer (ITS) 1–5.8 s – ITS2 rDNA sequences obtained were compared with those deposited in the GenBank Database and registered with accession number MH283876 in the NCBI Database. Antibacterial, anticandidal and antifungal effects of chemically and mycosynthesized AgNPs were examined at various concentrations in vitro against six pathogenic bacteria and 4 pathogenic fungi by agar well diffusion technique. Standard antibiotics; Gentamicin, Amoxicillin, Clotrimazole, and Nystatin at 5 μg/disk were taken as positive controls, while 5% DMSO was used as the negative control. Our data revealed that the application of mycogenic AgNPs at a concentration of 100 ppm resulted in maximum inhibition of pathogenic bacteria and fungi. These data suggest that AgNPs from native isolates of Trichoderma atroviride (MH283876) offer a source of rapid synthesis of eco-friendly, economical biomaterials that show antimicrobial activities

Acaricidal activity of Foeniculum vulgare against Rhipicephalus annulatus is mainly dependent on its constituent from trans-anethone

Globally, the economic losses due to hard ticks infestation and the control of the associated diseases have been calculated at USD $13.9-18.7 billion per year. The economic impact is related to its direct damage to the skins, blood loss, anemia, severe immunological reactions and indirect losses that related to the effects of hemoparasites, cost of treatment for clinical cases and expenses incurred in the control of ticks. The current study evaluated the acaricidal activities of fennel Foeniculum vulgare essential oil and its main components; trans-anethole and fenchone; against R. annulatus. GC-MS analysis revealed that this oil contained 16 components representing 99.9% of the total identified compounds with E-anethole being the predominant component(64.29%), followed by fenchone (9.94%). The fennel oil and trans-anethole showed significant acaricidal activities. The LC50 of the fennel oil was attained at concentrations of 12.96% for adult ticks and 1.75% for tick larvae meanwhile the LC50 of trans-anethole was reached at concentrations of 2.36% for adult tick and 0.56% for tick larvae. On the contrary, fenchone showed no any significant adulticidal activities and its LC50 attained at a concentration of 9.11% for tick larvae. Regarding repellence activities, trans-anethole achieved 100% repellency at the concentration of 10% while fennel showed 86% repellency at the same concentration. Fenchone showed no repellency effect. Treatment of larvae with fennel, trans-anethole, and fenchone LC50 concentrations significantly inhibited the acetylcholinesterase activity. Meanwhile, glutathione s-transferase activity was significantly decreased in fennel treated larvae but no significant effect was found in the larvae of trans-anethole and fenchone groups. These results indicate that the acaricide effect of fennel oil may attributed to its high content of trans-anethole. This was supported by potent adulticidal, larvicidal, and repellency effects of trans-anethole against Rhipeciphalus annulatus tick and therefore it could be included in the list of acaricide of plant origin

Prevalence and antimicrobial sensitivity of Escherichia coli and Salmonella species in field cases of rabbit intestinal coccidiosis treated with prebiotic

This study aimed to investigate the effect of prebiotic treatment on E. coli and Salmonella species during natural intestinal coccidiosis in rabbits. The experiment was conducted on 45 selected farm rabbits of which 15 were coccidian free (Negative control; NC, group) and 30 were naturally coccidian infected. The infected animals were allocated into two equal groups including positive control (PC) and prebiotic treated (PT) that were orally treated with prebiotic for 8 successive days. Fecal oocyst count was assessed daily during the course of treatment. Meanwhile, the PC group had a significantly high oocyst count (21.67×103 ± 0.82 OPG), with a significant increase in the prevalence of E. coli and Salmonella (86.7 % and 46.7 %, respectively). Moreover, the NC group remained coccidian free and exhibited E. coli infection only with no detection of salmonella isolates. Findings of in-vitro susceptibility testing showed that E. coli isolates were highly resistant to most of the tested antimicrobials while Salmonella isolates showed variable degrees of resistance. In conclusion, the prebiotic treatment significantly reduced the prevalence of E. coli and Salmonella infections coexisted with intestinal coccidiosis in naturally infected rabbits