Anterior malalignment and the risk for poor oral health

Little knowledge and contradictory results are available on the effectiveness of incisor malalignment as an indicator of poor oral health (e.g., dental caries, periodontal disease). This research project aimed to examine the relationship between incisor malalignment and two common diseases of poor oral health—periodontal disease and dental caries—and their cumulative outcome (i.e., tooth loss) in anterior teeth. Prospective and cross-sectional data from the Veterans Affair (VA) Dental Longitudinal Study were utilized in this research. Incisor malalignment traits were measured by determining the anterior tooth size–arch length discrepancy index (aTSALD) and Little’s Irregularity Index (LII). Incisor malalignment indices were categorized by severity. We computed per arch adjusted estimates of the amount of change/events in anterior periodontal disease, tooth loss, and dental caries (i.e., coronal and root caries) by the level of the incisor malalignment traits. Pocket depth (PD), clinical attachment loss (CAL), and alveolar bone loss (ABL) were used as periodontal disease outcomes. Prospective data included information from 400 maxillary and 408 mandibular casts with a complete set of anterior sextants. In the upper anterior arch, crowding and spacing were significantly associated with an increased mean PD. Maxillary incisor irregularity involved a significantly increased mean CAL. In the anterior mandibular arch, incisor crowding and irregularity were significantly associated with increased PD, CAL, and ABL. Prospective data to test the association between all-cause tooth loss and incisor alignment traits included a sample size of 400 maxillary and 408 mandibular casts with a complete set of anterior sextants. Maxillary segments with spacing had a 401% significantly greater hazard (hazard ratio [HR]= 5.01, 95% confidence interval [CI] = 1.16-21.64) of all-cause tooth loss, compared to the ideal alignment (i.e., the reference group). Multiple cross-sectional data to test the association between anterior dental caries outcomes and malalignment traits included a sample size of 211 maxillary and mandibular casts with a complete set of anterior sextants. Compared to ideally aligned teeth, spacing in the maxillary segment significantly decreased the mean maxillary anterior CDFT by 0.93 teeth. Specific malalignment traits may be linked to certain poor oral health indicators.2018-09-28T00:00:00

Investigation of Voice Pathology Detection and Classification on Different Frequency Regions Using Correlation Functions.

Automatic voice pathology detection and classification systems effectively contribute to the assessment of voice disorders, which helps clinicians to detect the existence of any voice pathologies and the type of pathology from which patients suffer in the early stages. This work concentrates on developing an accurate and robust feature extraction for detecting and classifying voice pathologies by investigating different frequency bands using correlation functions. In this paper, we extracted maximum peak values and their corresponding lag values from each frame of a voiced signal by using correlation functions as features to detect and classify pathological samples. These features are investigated in different frequency bands to see the contribution of each band on the detection and classification processes.Various samples of sustained vowel /a/ of normal and pathological voices were extracted from three different databases: English, German, and Arabic. A support vector machine was used as a classifier. We also performed a t test to investigate the significant differences in mean of normal and pathological samples.The best achieved accuracies in both detection and classification were varied depending on the band, the correlation function, and the database. The most contributive bands in both detection and classification were between 1000 and 8000 Hz. In detection, the highest acquired accuracies when using cross-correlation were 99.809%, 90.979%, and 91.168% in the Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary, Saarbruecken Voice Database, and Arabic Voice Pathology Database databases, respectively. However, in classification, the highest acquired accuracies when using cross-correlation were 99.255%, 98.941%, and 95.188% in the three databases, respectively

Knowledge, attitudes and practice among high school teachers toward students with mental disorders in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia

Background: Mental disorders are highly prevalent among adolescents, and they correlate negatively with students’ achievement, performance, and leadless school engagement and participation. School Teachers can contribute significantly to the early detection and intervention strategies for mental disorders among adolescents. This study estimates high school teachers’ knowledge, attitude, and practice toward mental disorders and determines the association between selected demographic factors.Methods: The ethical committee of King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, approved this cross-sectional study. Multistage random sampling was done, which included 62 male and 48 female high schools in Riyadh between August and December 2021. An Anonymous self-administered questionnaire consisting of 39-item was used for data collection.Results: A total 487 responses were received from the high school teachers, on a scale of 10 maximum score, only (60.4%) showed adequate knowledge regarding mental disorders. Even though, Majority of teachers (76.2%) show a favorable attitude toward mental disorders on a scale of 24 maximum scores. Furthermore, approximately one-third of study participants (34.4%) on a scale of 4 points maximum show good practice toward mental disorders.     Conclusions: This study revealed teachers’ lack of knowledge about mental disorders with poor practice. Even though school teachers have shown favourable attitudes in most aspects toward mental disorders, implantation of the mental health literacy program is recommended to enhance the essential role of school staff in providing the needed support for promoting student mental health

Development of the Arabic Voice Pathology Database and Its Evaluation by Using Speech Features and Machine Learning Algorithms

A voice disorder database is an essential element in doing research on automatic voice disorder detection and classification. Ethnicity affects the voice characteristics of a person, and so it is necessary to develop a database by collecting the voice samples of the targeted ethnic group. This will enhance the chances of arriving at a global solution for the accurate and reliable diagnosis of voice disorders by understanding the characteristics of a local group. Motivated by such idea, an Arabic voice pathology database (AVPD) is designed and developed in this study by recording three vowels, running speech, and isolated words. For each recorded samples, the perceptual severity is also provided which is a unique aspect of the AVPD. During the development of the AVPD, the shortcomings of different voice disorder databases were identified so that they could be avoided in the AVPD. In addition, the AVPD is evaluated by using six different types of speech features and four types of machine learning algorithms. The results of detection and classification of voice disorders obtained with the sustained vowel and the running speech are also compared with the results of an English-language disorder database, the Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary (MEEI) database

Intra- and Inter-database Study for Arabic, English, and German Databases:Do Conventional Speech Features Detect Voice Pathology?

A large population around the world has voice complications. Various approaches for subjective and objective evaluations have been suggested in the literature. The subjective approach strongly depends on the experience and area of expertise of a clinician, and human error cannot be neglected. On the other hand, the objective or automatic approach is noninvasive. Automatic developed systems can provide complementary information that may be helpful for a clinician in the early screening of a voice disorder. At the same time, automatic systems can be deployed in remote areas where a general practitioner can use them and may refer the patient to a specialist to avoid complications that may be life threatening. Many automatic systems for disorder detection have been developed by applying different types of conventional speech features such as the linear prediction coefficients, linear prediction cepstral coefficients, and Mel-frequency cepstral coefficients (MFCCs). This study aims to ascertain whether conventional speech features detect voice pathology reliably, and whether they can be correlated with voice quality. To investigate this, an automatic detection system based on MFCC was developed, and three different voice disorder databases were used in this study. The experimental results suggest that the accuracy of the MFCC-based system varies from database to database. The detection rate for the intra-database ranges from 72% to 95%, and that for the inter-database is from 47% to 82%. The results conclude that conventional speech features are not correlated with voice, and hence are not reliable in pathology detection

An Investigation of Multidimensional Voice Program Parameters in Three Different Databases for Voice Pathology Detection and Classification

Background and Objective Automatic voice-pathology detection and classification systems may help clinicians to detect the existence of any voice pathologies and the type of pathology from which patients suffer in the early stages. The main aim of this paper is to investigate Multidimensional Voice Program (MDVP) parameters to automatically detect and classify the voice pathologies in multiple databases, and then to find out which parameters performed well in these two processes. Materials and Methods Samples of the sustained vowel /a/ of normal and pathological voices were extracted from three different databases, which have three voice pathologies in common. The selected databases in this study represent three distinct languages: (1) the Arabic voice pathology database; (2) the Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary database (English database); and (3) the Saarbruecken Voice Database (German database). A computerized speech lab program was used to extract MDVP parameters as features, and an acoustical analysis was performed. The Fisher discrimination ratio was applied to rank the parameters. A t test was performed to highlight any significant differences in the means of the normal and pathological samples. Results The experimental results demonstrate a clear difference in the performance of the MDVP parameters using these databases. The highly ranked parameters also differed from one database to another. The best accuracies were obtained by using the three highest ranked MDVP parameters arranged according to the Fisher discrimination ratio: these accuracies were 99.68%, 88.21%, and 72.53% for the Saarbruecken Voice Database, the Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary database, and the Arabic voice pathology database, respectively

Diagnostic impact of emergency ultrasound for cholecystitis

Background: Previous studies reported different rates of accuracy considering the use of POCUS in diagnosis of cholecystitis indicating that POCUS is not enough when deciding the management. The aim of this study is to compare POCUS findings in the diagnosing of the acute cholecystitis performed by both emergency medicine residents and radiologists. Methods: A retrospective chart review was conducted in the ED of KAMC, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. The population consisted of patients presented to the ER with RUQ (right upper quadrant pain) and had an abdominal ultrasound performed in the past 6 year. The study used BEST Care system to access the data of patients who underwent ultrasonography, since January 2016 using a data collection sheet. Results: Our results included 1871 patients admitted in KAMC. Emergency physicians had success rate of 25% in correctly reporting the presence or absence of wall thickening, and 44.1% for pericholecystic fluid. In addition, scanning by emergency physicians has a success rate of 60% in detecting CBD dilatation, 12.7% for Murphy’s sign, and 46.3% for acute cholecystitis. Moreover, we found that the presence of thickened gallbladder wall in the ultrasonographic finding is a significant predictor for cholecystitis as it is increasing its incidence by 2.09 times (P=0.038). Conclusions: Ultrasonography conducted by emergency department could be useful in detecting characteristics of gallbladder however, in our study, it showed low accuracy in detecting gallstones and acute cholecystitis compared with surgical and pathological finding

Heat Stroke in Emergency Department: Diagnosis and Management

Background: Heat stroke is a severe health concern with the potential for multi-organ failure, necessitating rapid and effective management. With rising global temperatures, there is increasing concern regarding the vulnerability of populations in high-heat areas, notably in Saudi Arabia, especially during the annual Hajj pilgrimage. Objective: This paper aims to review the epidemiology, evaluation and management techniques of heat stroke, emphasizing the situation during Hajj pilgrimages in Saudi Arabia, and to outline the best practices for emergency management. Methodology: A comprehensive review of literature and studies related to heat stroke, both globally and specific to Saudi Arabia, was undertaken. An in-depth analysis of emergency management, including initial assessment, cooling methods, organ support, medication, and prevention strategies, was conducted. Results: Heat stroke remains a significant cause of emergency department visits, with specific groups, such as men and the elderly, being more susceptible. During the Hajj in 2016, 267 patients were diagnosed with heat-related illnesses, with heatstroke accounting for 29% of these cases. With the threat of global warming, studies indicate a potential tenfold increase in heat stroke risk with a 2°C rise in temperatures. Swift and comprehensive cooling is pivotal for recovery. Management emphasizes rapid recognition, assessment, and varied cooling methods, along with targeted treatments for organ dysfunctions. Prevention strategies play a vital role, given the higher efficacy and practicality over treating organ dysfunctions. Conclusion: Heat stroke is a pressing health challenge, particularly in high-risk environments like Saudi Arabia during the Hajj pilgrimage. While effective emergency management protocols exist, an emphasis on prevention is crucial. It is imperative to incorporate a comprehensive approach to address both the immediate threat and long-term risks of heat stroke, especially with the looming challenge of global warming