Rising burden of Hepatitis C Virus in hemodialysis patients

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Aim</p> <p>High prevalence of Hepatitis C virus (HCV) has been reported among the dialysis patients throughout the world. No serious efforts were taken to investigate HCV in patients undergoing hemodialysis (HD) treatment who are at great increased risk to HCV. HCV genotypes are important in the study of epidemiology, pathogenesis and reaction to antiviral therapy. This study was performed to investigate the prevalence of active HCV infection, HCV genotypes and to assess risk factors associated with HCV genotype infection in HD patients of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa as well as comparing this prevalence data with past studies in Pakistan.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Polymerase chain reaction was performed for HCV RNA detection and genotyping in 384 HD patients. The data obtained was compared with available past studies from Pakistan.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Anti HCV antibodies were observed in 112 (29.2%), of whom 90 (80.4%) were HCV RNA positive. In rest of the anti HCV negative patients, HCV RNA was detected in 16 (5.9%) patients. The dominant HCV genotypes in HCV infected HD patients were found to be 3a (n = 36), 3b (n = 20), 1a (n = 16), 2a (n = 10), 2b (n = 2), 1b (n = 4), 4a (n = 2), untypeable (n = 10) and mixed (n = 12) genotype.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>This study suggesting that i) the prevalence of HCV does not differentiate between past and present infection and continued to be elevated ii) HD patients may be a risk for HCV due to the involvement of multiple routes of infections especially poor blood screening of transfused blood and low standard of dialysis procedures in Pakistan and iii) need to apply infection control practice.</p

Multiple autoimmune syndromes associated with psoriasis: a rare clinical presentation

Autoimmune diseases are known to have association with each other but it is very rare to see multiple autoimmune diseases in one patient. The combination of at least three autoimmune diseases in the same patient is referred to as multiple autoimmune syndrome. The case we are reporting features multiple autoimmune syndrome with five different conditions. The patient had type 1 diabetes mellitus, autoimmune hemolytic anemia, systemic lupus erythematosus, vitiligo, and psoriasis. Psoriasis has rarely been reported previously under the spectrum of autoimmune syndrome. Although the relationship of autoimmune conditions with each other has been explored in the past, this case adds yet another dimension to the unique evolution of autoimmune pathologies. The patient presented with a combination of five autoimmune diseases, which makes it consistent type three multiple autoimmune syndromes with the addition of psoriasis. The current case is unique in this aspect that the combination of these five autoimmune disorders has never been reported in the past

A review of photocatalytic characterization, and environmental cleaning, of metal oxide nanostructured materials

Industrial waste is the primary source of highly toxic organic pollutants and heavy metal contaminants. Treatment of such effluence is necessary to mitigate environmental pollution to provide a clean ecosystem for living species. Various approaches have been effectively utilized for the removal of industrial waste particularly, photocatalysis being an effective, economical, and time-efficient approach to remove toxic ions. Large organic molecules found in pesticides and dyes can be removed with relative ease using nano-photocatalysts with a wide energy band gap, which is one of its major merits. For this purpose, a combination of various metal oxides with relevant materials is generally employed to activate visible regions in photocatalysts. Moreover, modification in physical parameters such as surface area of the catalyst, crystallinity, particle size and morphology, band gap, and microstructure is undertaken, which serves to enhance the photocatalytic activity. Here, advanced techniques that are presently used to synthesize different types of photocatalysts and their potential use in the degradation of the organic dye have been described in detail. The focus of the current review is various metal oxide NPs such as ZnO, TiO2, WO3, SnO2, and CuO with potential applications in photocatalysis, their structural characteristics, classification, and their photocatalytic mechanism. The review covers the influence of dopants on morphological, electrical, optical, and photocatalytic activity of selected nanocomposite systems. Moreover, the current review grasps extensive literature on the role of metal oxides as a photocatalyst that will facilitate researchers by providing guidelines to design more suitable nano-photocatalytic systems