Dental caries, oral health and life style variables among school children in Qatar

Background: Effective delivery of dental services must be based on reliable information regarding the prevalence and severity of disease in the target population. Evaluation of the various factors known to influence the severity and progression of disease is essential for health policy makers to promote oral health resources and address oral health needs. Objective: The overall aim of this research is to describe the situation of dental caries and investigate the associations of level of oral health knowledge, teeth irregularity, BMI and other life style variables (TV viewing, internet use, passive smoking and dietary habits) with dental caries, including the impact of socio-demographic factors amongst school children in Qatar. Materials and methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted in Qatar from October 2011 to March 2012. A total of 2,113 children aged 12-14 years were randomly selected from 16 schools from different areas. Clinical examination was conducted by three calibrated examiners using World Health Organization criteria for diagnosing dental caries. Teeth irregularity was determined clinically according to a method described by Björk et al (1964). A pre-tested and structured questionnaire was used to assess oral health knowledge and life style data. Data analyses were performed. Results: The mean decayed, missing and filled teeth index values was 4.62 (±3.2), 4.79 (±3.5), and 5.5 (±3.7), respectively, for the 12, 13 and 14 year old children. The caries prevalence was 85%. The mandibular incisors and canines were least likely to be affected by dental caries, while maxillary and mandibular molars were the most frequently attacked by dental caries. Of the total sample, only one quarter reported a high level of oral health knowledge. There were more incidences of teeth crowding (44.1%) than teeth spacing (9.5%). The overall prevalence of underweight, overweight, and obesity was 5%, 10%, and 5% respectively. Almost half of the children spent > two hours watching television and 46% spent > two hours using internet. Approximately 35.8% of children had exposure to passive smoking. Concerning dietary habits, 99.4% of children consumed sugar containing snacks in between meals. Approximately 65% consumed sugar containing snacks within one hour of bed time. Almost 49.1% skipped eating breakfast regularly and 22.7% skipped eating lunch regularly. Around 83.8% consumed diary snacks in between meals. Overall, 74.2% drank tea in-between meals and 80.1% chewed gum in-between meals. All variables were affected by socio-demographic factors, but significant differences were found in female children in that they were more at risk to dental caries than male children. Also, children who resided in semi-urban areas were more at risk to dental caries than children who resided in urban areas. The occurrence of dental caries is significantly associated with the level of oral health knowledge, teeth irregularity, and other life style variables. Conclusion: The need to reduce sedentary behaviors and to promote a more active and healthy lifestyle is becoming increasingly essential in Qatar. Implementation of a community-based preventive oral health programs on a healthy diet and practices of adequate oral hygiene should be promoted in schools through integration into the school curriculum and services to combat the growing problem of dental caries

Eliot’s Approach to Ethical Poetry: The Waste Land

This study aims at showing the ethical approaches in T. S. Eliot’s poetry. I argue that Eliot’s poetry is loaded with ethical approaches that characterized the era in which he lived. Also, the significance of this study arises from the fact that ethics have become buried in modern life. I, among others, feel we need it urgently these days to survive in a nice manner.When reading Eliot’s The Waste Land, we have come with a pessimistic reading of the poem. This reading applies to our life nowadays. Eliot imagines the modern world as a wasteland, a land that has been mixed with ambiguity, aridness, and destruction. This land, according to some critics, gives no indication of purity, which neither the land nor the people could visualize. In The Waste Land, various characters are sexually frustrated or dysfunctional, unable to cope with either reproductive or no reproductive sexuality

Factors Associated with Pediatrician Attitudes over the Use of Complementary and Traditional Medicine on Children in Muscat, Oman

This study aimed to evaluate the attitude of pediatricians toward the use of complementary and Traditional Medicine (TM) on children in Muscat, Oman. A cross-sectional survey was performed using a self-completed questionnaire during the year 2012. A total of 67 pediatricians, comprising of 30 males (44.8%) and 37 females (55.2%) participated in the study. The majority of the studied group (83.5%) was of the opinion that most types of complementary and TM are not safe for children, except spiritual healing, to which 53.7% considered as safe. About one third (29.9%) of the participants reported that they might recommend complementary and TM for sick children in the future. Almost half the participants (52.2%) acknowledged personal use of complementary and TM in the past and 67.2% reported that their family members used these medicines. Herbal therapy was found to be the most commonly used method (38.9%) followed by spiritual (33.9%), cautery (20.2%) and Curucoma (15.7%). Other methods, which include; acupuncture, bone healing and Chinese healing were also found to be in use but in rare manner. Knowledge level of TM and complementary medicine of most of the doctors was found to be low but one third of them acknowledged that they may recommend these treatments to their patients in future. Therefore, training pediatricians on the types, benefits and side effects of complementary and TM is recommended

Dynamic Traffic Light System to Reduce The Waiting Time of Emergency Vehicles at Intersections within IoT Environment

Traditional traffic light system, which works based on fixed cycle can be a main reason for traffic jam, due to lack of adaptation to road conditions. Traffic jam has a bad impact on drivers and road users due to the time delay it causes for road users to reach their destinations. This delay can cause a life threat in case of emergency vehicles, such as ambulance vehicles and police cars. One key solution to solve traffic jam on intersections is the dynamic traffic lights, where traffic light operation adapts based on the intersection traffic conditions. Since few of researches projects in the literature interested in solving traffic jam problem for emergency vehicles, the contribution of this paper is to introduces a novel approach to operate traffic light system. The new approach consists of two algorithms which are pure operation mode and hybrid operation mode. These operation modes aim to reduce the waiting time of emergency vehicles on traffic intersections. They assume that there is a smart infrastructure system uses Internet of Things (IoT) that can detect emergency vehicles arrival to an intersection. The smart infrastructure system switches traffic light operation from fixed cycle mode to dynamic mode. The dynamic mode manages traffic lights at intersections to reduce the waiting time of emergency vehicles. The paper presents a simulation of the proposed algorithms, highlights their advantages. In order to evaluate the efficiency of the new technique, we compared our approach with Wen algorithm in the literature and the Traditional traffic light system. Our evaluation study indicated that the proposed algorithms outperformed Wen technique and the Traditional system under different traffic scenario

Oral cancer knowledge, attitude, and practice of dentists in the state of Qatar

Objectives: The aim of this study was to assess existing knowledge on oral cancer (OC), attitude toward OC examination, and clinical practice among dentists practicing in the governmental health sector in the State of Qatar, including the influence of personal characteristics. Materials and Methods: All 271 dentists practicing in Primary Health Care Centers (PHCC) and the Hamad Medical Corporation (HMC) were invited to participate in this cross-sectional study. Of these, 177 completed a self-administered, 48-item questionnaire. Based on the responses, knowledge of the risk factors for and clinical presentation of OC was categorized as high, medium, or low, and then further separated into satisfactory (medium/high) and unsatisfactory (low). Information on attitudes toward OC examination and clinical practice was also taken from the questionnaire. Results: The mean score for knowledge of the clinical presentation of OC was 7.59 (standard deviation [SD] = 2.40) out of 14. The mean score for knowledge of the risk factors for OC was 8.96 (SD = 2.31) out of 16. Dentists with ?10 years of experience were more likely to have satisfactory knowledge of OC compared to dentists with >15 years of experience. Attending a continuous professional development (CPD) course on OC showed a trend with satisfactory clinical knowledge, although it was not statistically significant. Conclusion: This study identified gaps in dentists' knowledge of OC; dentists demonstrated unsatisfactory knowledge of the clinical presentation of and risk factors for OC. The findings highlighted the need for educational interventions on OC, which are essential to improving health care outcomes and delivery of care. - 2019 by the Authors.Acknowledgments: This research was supported by a student grant QUST-1-CHS-2018-13 from the Qatar University Office of Research Support. My gratitude goes to Hanan Abdul Rahim, Head of the Department of Public Health College of Health Sciences, for her guidance; Asmaa AlKhatib, Manager of the Oral Health Division of the PHCC, and Khouloud Zidan for their help during data collection; and all the dentists who participated in this survey.Scopu

Analysis of the Causes of Minorities’ Forced Migration from Mosul to the Nineveh Plain during (2013 – 2004)

ترتبط الهجرة القسرية بشكل مباشر بالظروف الأمنية والسياسية، حيث يجبر الإنسان على الهجرة وترك موطنه الأصلي دون إرادته وتكون هذه الهجرة جماعية وفي ظرف قياسي، فقد يهاجر الناس بالآلاف في غضون أيام ويترتب عليها مشاكل كثيرة في منطقتي الطرد والجذب السكاني على حد سواء، إذ تؤدي إلى تغيير ديموغرافي ومشاكل اجتماعية وزيادة حجم السكان في منطقة الجذب وما يترتب على ذلك من ضغط على الخدمات وغيرها وعكس ذلك بالنسبة لمنطقة الطرد السكاني. يتناول البحث الهجرة القسرية للأقليات (الشبك والمسيحيين والأيزيدين) من مدينة الموصل إلى سهل نينوى بعد سقوط نظام الحكم عام (2003)، وما ترتب على ذلك من أحداث مضطربة للظروف الأمنية والسياسية وخاصةً بعد دخول العصابات المسلحة (تنظيم القاعدة) إلى مدينة الموصل، إذ بدأت هذه الجماعات المتطرفة بتهديد وقتل أبناء الأقليات وعلى أساس طائفي وديني ومذهبي، وتضمن البحث الدوافع الكامنة وراء هذه الهجرة والتأثيرات السلبية الناتجة عنها. تم استخدام تقنية نظم المعلومات الجغرافية (GIS) في تمثيل بيانات الهجرة القسرية على شكل خرائط تمثل عدد العوائل المهجرة، وتبين اختلاف في اعداد العوائل المهجرة إلى مناطق سهل نينوى، إذا حت لقضاء الحمدانية المرتبة الأولى من ناحية عدد العوائل المهجرة فقد بلغ عددها (11720) عائلة وبنسبة (79.3%)، يليه قضاء تلكيف (1873) عائلة وبنسبة (12.7%)، ثم قضاء شيخان (1186) عائلة وبنسبة (8%).     Forced migration is directly related to security and political conditions, where people are forced to emigrate and leave their country of origin without their will, this migration is collective and in a standard circumstance. People may emigrate in thousands and in a few days and result in many problems in the areas of expulsion and population attraction alike, which lead to demographic change and social problems and increase the size of the population in the area of attraction and the consequent pressure on services and others and the opposite of the area of expulsion.      The study deals with forced migration of minorities (Shabak, Christians and Isidin) from the city of Mosul to the Nineveh Plain after the fall of the regime in 2003, and the consequent turbulent events of the security and political conditions, especially after the entry of armed gangs (Al Qaeda) to the city of Mosul. The extremist groups began to threaten and kill members of minorities on a sectarian, religious and sectarian basis. The research also examined the motives behind this migration and its negative effects.      GIS was used to represent forced migration data in the form of maps representing the number of displaced families. There was a difference in the number of displaced families to areas of Nineveh Plain, Al-Hamdaniya district ranked first in terms of the number of displaced families (11720) by (79.3%), the second rank was Talqeef district (1873) families by (12.7%), and the third was Sheikhan district (1186) families and by (8%)

DNA binding Test, x-ray crystal structure, spectral studies, TG-DTA, and electrochemistry of [CoX2 (dmdphphen)] (dmdphphen is 2,9-dimethyl-4,7-diphenyl-1,10-phenanthroline,x = Cl, and NCS) complexes

Two new neutral mixed-ligand cobalt(II) complexes, CoCl2(dmdphphen) 1 and Co(NCS)dmdphphen) 2, where dmdphphen is 2,9-dimethyl-4,7-diphenyl-1,10-phenanthroline, were synthesized and characterized by an elemental analysis, UV-Vis, IR, TG/DTA, cyclic voltammetry CV, and single X-ray diffraction. Complex 2 crystallized as monoclinic with a space group P21/c. Co(II) ions are located in a distorted tetrahedral environment. TG/DTA result shows that these complexes are very stable and decomposed through one-step reaction. The two complexes exhibit a quasireversible one-electron response at -550 and 580 mV versus Cp2Fe/Cp2Fe+, which has been assigned to Co(I)/Co(II) and Co(II)/Co(III) couples. Absorption spectral studies reveal that such complexes exhibit hypochromicity during their interaction with CT-DNA. © 2014 Mousa Al-Noaimi et al

Exploring the quality of life of cosmetic users: A cross-sectional analysis from eight Arab countries in the Middle East

Background The use of cosmetic products is growing in dominance in the Arab population, making it essential to measure its effects on users. The production of cosmetics has been largely driven by consumerism and a bid to keep abreast with the latest trends in the beauty industry with less attention on how the users' quality of life (QoL) is affected. Aims This study aims to investigate the effect of cosmetic products on users' quality of life in eight Arab countries. Methods A cross-sectional study was carried out using an online data collection approach. A validated and specialist instrument tool called BeautyQoL, which consists of five domains and a total of 52 questions, was distributed to a sample of 2219 cosmetic users. Descriptive and inferential statistical analysis was done using SPSS® version 26.0. Results The mean age of participants was 34 ± 11.25 years, and more women were represented in the sample (71%) than men. The majority of respondents had oily skin type (39.6%) and tan skin tone (30.4%). QoL through cosmetic use is computed with a mean score of 51 out of 100. The users' mean score satisfaction from cosmetic use is centred on attractiveness (56.1), followed by self-confidence (51.8). Cosmetics have a statistically significant effect on participants who are young adults, women, single, and employed with high income. As the respondents' skin tone deepens from very fair to dark, the mean score for each domain significantly increases, whereas when skin type changes from very oily to dry, the mean score for each domain decreases. Conclusion The effect of cosmetics on the users' QoL is limited, contrary to the narrative commonly portrayed in cosmetics' advertisements. Therefore, the use of cosmetics among the Arab population should be from an informed perspective of their specific needs instead of conforming to the viral trends pedaled by influencers and bloggers on social media, which might be irrelevant for them.Open access publishing facilitated by Monash University, as part of the Wiley - Monash University agreement via the Council of Australian University Librarians. [Correction added on 5 July 2022, after first online publication: CAUL funding statement has been added.]Scopu