Frequency of worsening liver function in severe dengue hepatitis patients receiving paracetamol: A retrospective analysis of hospital data.

Objective: To determine the frequency of worsening liver function among hospital in-patients with severe dengue hepatitis receiving paracetamol. Methods: This retrospective study was conducted at the Department of Medicine, Aga Khan University Hospital, Karachi, and comprised records of dengue patients with severe hepatitis who received paracetamol for control of fever between June 2007 and December 2014. Alanine aminotransferase at baseline and following paracetamol administration was noted, as well as dosage and duration of paracetamol, along with participants\u27 demographic details. Frequency of patients who developed worsening or improvement of alanine aminotransferase was also noted. SPSS 19 was used for data analysis. Results: Of the 113 subjects, 73(64.6%) were male and 40(35.4%) were female. Overall improvement was observed in subsequent alanine aminotransferase levels (491 units per litre, IQR 356.5 TO 775 vs 151 units per litre, IQR 49.5 to 299.5). Most commonly prescribed dose of paracetamol was 2g (IQR 1 to 5 grams), which was taken for a median duration of 1 day (IQR 1 to 3 days). Moreover, 100(88.5 %) patients showed improvement in alanine aminotransferase. Only 13(11.5 %) patients developed worsening of alanine aminotransferase. Of those with worsening liver function, 8(61.5 %) were discharged home with no clinical deterioration and 5(38.5 %) deaths were observed. However, causes of deaths were unrelated to liver dysfunction. Conclusion: The frequency of worsening liver function following paracetamol administration in patients with severe dengue hepatitis was relatively low

A mini review on food preservatives

Food additives are not recently discovered, humans used food additives from ancient times.These food additives enhance the color and taste of food but also, kill harmful pathogens andkeep food safe for a long time. Ancient people used salting, smoking, jugging and many moretechniques to preserve food but in modern times, lifestyles changed, and people used advancedtechniques like ultra-sonication, vacuum packing, electro plasmolysis, bio preservation,nanotechnology, etc. There are many natural compounds extracted from plants like caffeine,anthocyanin, turmeric, saffron used as food additives. Similarly, many synthetic additives canbe used in food for example ampicillin, benzoic acid, tetrazine and many more. These syntheticadditives are more dangerous as compared to natural additives; therefore, many additives arebanned in the world. These additives are given E codes (European union numbers) and INS(International numbering system of food), but E code is used more commonly and labelled onall food items like chips, biscuit, pharmaceutics, cosmetics etc. In this review, we summarizesome traditional and modern food preservation techniques and give some most commonly usedfood additives with E codes

Protective effect of Parthenium hysterophorus against carbon tetrachloride- and paracetamol-induced hepatotoxicity in rabbits

Purpose: To investigate the possible hepatoprotective potential of Parthenium hysterophorus crude extract (Ph.Cr) against carbon tetrachloride (CCL4)- and paracetamol-induced hepatotoxicity in rabbits.Methods: Twenty rabbits were divided into five groups of four rabbits each. Group 1 served as normal control and received normal saline (5 mL/kg). Group 2 received normal saline followed by CCL4 (0.75 mL/kg p.o dose) after 1 h. Groups 3 and 4 received Ph.Cr at doses of 15 and 30 mg/kg po, respectively, for 7 days followed by one dose of CCL4, 2 h after the last extract dose (0.75 mL/kg, sc). Group 5 received silymarin as reference standard at a dose of 100 mg/kg orally for 7 days followed by one dose of CCL4 (0.75 mL/kg, sc), 2 h after the last drug dose. The effect of the extract on potassium (K+)- induced contractions in isolated rabbit jejenum was also evaluated. At the end of the study, the animals were sacrificed and their liver architecture examined microscopically.Results: Pre-treatment of rabbits with Ph.Cr reduced ALT, ALP and TB levels (p < 0.05, p < 0.01, p < 0.001) dose dependently. Hepatoprotective data indicate that Ph.Cr markedly reduced CCL4- and paracetamol-induced toxicity by preserving the histological architecture of the liver tissue at near normal. In isolated rabbit jejunum tissue, Ph.Cr relaxed high K+ (80 Mm)-induced contractions in a concentration-dependent (0.03 - 10 mg/mL) manner like that caused by silymarin.Conclusion: In the light of the results obtained, Parthenium hysterophorous  possesses hepatoprotective activity against CCL4- and paracetamol-induced  hepatic damage, possibly mediated via its antioxidant and Ca++ antagonist mechanisms.Keywords: Parthenium hysterophorus, Toxins, Hepatoprotection, Ca++ antagonist, Silymari

Parallelisation of a cache-based stream-relation join for a near-real-time data warehouse

Near real-time data warehousing is an important area of research, as business organisations want to analyse their businesses sales with minimal latency. Therefore, sales data generated by data sources need to reflect immediately in the data warehouse. This requires near-real-time transformation of the stream of sales data with a disk-based relation called master data in the staging area. For this purpose, a stream-relation join is required. The main problem in stream-relation joins is the different nature of inputs; stream data is fast and bursty, whereas the disk-based relation is slow due to high disk I/O cost. To resolve this problem, a famous algorithm CACHEJOIN (cache join) was published in the literature. The algorithm has two phases, the disk-probing phase and the stream-probing phase. These two phases execute sequentially; that means stream tuples wait unnecessarily due to the sequential execution of both phases. This limits the algorithm to exploiting CPU resources optimally. In this paper, we address this issue by presenting a robust algorithm called PCSRJ (parallelised cache-based stream relation join). The new algorithm enables the execution of both disk-probing and stream-probing phases of CACHEJOIN in parallel. The algorithm distributes the disk-based relation on two separate nodes and enables parallel execution of CACHEJOIN on each node. The algorithm also implements a strategy of splitting the stream data on each node depending on the relevant part of the relation. We developed a cost model for PCSRJ and validated it empirically. We compared the service rates of both algorithms using a synthetic dataset. Our experiments showed that PCSRJ significantly outperforms CACHEJOIN

Utilization of malted barley flour as replacement of wheat flour to improve technological, rheological, physicochemical, and organoleptic parameters of fortified breads

Introduction: Flours from cereal grains have the potential to be used in the production of bakery products, especially breads, and the addition of other non–wheat plant materials in the form of flours, extracts and malts has always been the area of interest for food producers. Methods: In this research work, barley grains were converted into barley malt flour (BMF), by adopting a series of processes, including steeping, germination, kilning, drying and milling. With the aim of compensating the role of commercial bread improvers, wheat flour was replaced at 0, 2.5, 5, 7.5, and 10% levels with BMF, to study the effect of BMF on physicochemical and sensory characteristics of bread. Results and discussion: Chemical analysis of flours revealed that ash, fat, moisture, protein and fibers were found greater in BMF and BMF–incorporated composite flours, as compared to wheat flour. Significant increases in water absorption and decrease in dough stability, dough development time and falling number were noticed, as a result of an increase in the replacement level of BMF. Water absorption of control dough was 58.03%, which increased to 58.77% in composite flour having 10% BMF, whereas dough development time, dough stability and α–amylase activity of control, were 6.97 min, 12 min, and 736 s, respectively, which were decreased to 3.83 min, 4.73 min, and 360 s, respectively in composite flour having 10% BMF. The internal and external characteristics of breads obtained the best sensorial score at 5% replacement level of BMF, and deterioration in the quality of breads was noticed, as the level of BMF was further increased to 7.5 and 10%. Hence, breads developed with 5% BMF and 95% wheat flour, were not only nutritionally rich, but were also with optimum physical and sensory features. BMF could prove a useful alternate ingredient of wheat flour, and a cost-effective replacement of commercially available bread improvers, in the breads manufacturing process in replacement of synthetic bread improvers.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Utilization of malted barley flour as replacement of wheat flour to improve technological, rheological, physicochemical, and organoleptic parameters of fortified breads

Introduction: Flours from cereal grains have the potential to be used in the production of bakery products, especially breads, and the addition of other non–wheat plant materials in the form of flours, extracts and malts has always been the area of interest for food producers. Methods: In this research work, barley grains were converted into barley malt flour (BMF), by adopting a series of processes, including steeping, germination, kilning, drying and milling. With the aim of compensating the role of commercial bread improvers, wheat flour was replaced at 0, 2.5, 5, 7.5, and 10% levels with BMF, to study the effect of BMF on physicochemical and sensory characteristics of bread. Results and discussion: Chemical analysis of flours revealed that ash, fat, moisture, protein and fibers were found greater in BMF and BMF–incorporated composite flours, as compared to wheat flour. Significant increases in water absorption and decrease in dough stability, dough development time and falling number were noticed, as a result of an increase in the replacement level of BMF. Water absorption of control dough was 58.03%, which increased to 58.77% in composite flour having 10% BMF, whereas dough development time, dough stability and α–amylase activity of control, were 6.97 min, 12 min, and 736 s, respectively, which were decreased to 3.83 min, 4.73 min, and 360 s, respectively in composite flour having 10% BMF. The internal and external characteristics of breads obtained the best sensorial score at 5% replacement level of BMF, and deterioration in the quality of breads was noticed, as the level of BMF was further increased to 7.5 and 10%. Hence, breads developed with 5% BMF and 95% wheat flour, were not only nutritionally rich, but were also with optimum physical and sensory features. BMF could prove a useful alternate ingredient of wheat flour, and a cost-effective replacement of commercially available bread improvers, in the breads manufacturing process in replacement of synthetic bread improvers

A novel pH-responsive hydrogel system based on Prunus armeniaca gum and acrylic acid: Preparation and evaluation as a potential candidate for controlled drug delivery

pH-responsive hydrogels have become effective and attractive materials for the controlled release of drugs at pre-determined destinations. In the present study, a novel hydrogel system based on Prunus armeniaca gum (PAG) and acrylic acid (AA) was prepared by a free radical mechanism using N, N-methylene bisacrylamide (MBA) as cross-linker and potassium persulfate (KPS) as initiator. A series of hydrogels varying PAG, AA, and MBA concentration was developed to determine the impact of these components. Formulated hydrogels were characterized for pH-responsive swelling, drug release, gel content, and porosity. Structural analysis was performed by FTIR, XRD, and SEM analysis. TGA study was applied to assess thermal stability. Oral acute toxicity and in vivo drug release were performed in rabbits. Hydrogels exhibited pH-dependent swelling and drug release. Swelling, drug loading and release, and porosity increased by increasing PAG and AA concentration while decreased by increasing MBA. The gel content of formulations was increased by increasing all three components. FTIR studies confirmed the development of copolymeric networks and the loading of drug. XRD studies revealed that hydrogels were amorphous, and the crystalline drug was changed into an amorphous form during loading. TGA results indicated that hydrogels were stable up to 600 °C. Acute oral toxicity results confirm that hydrogels were nontoxic up to a dose of 2 g/kg body weight in rabbits. The pharmacokinetic evaluation revealed that hydrogels prolonged the availability of the drug and the peak plasma concentration of the drug was obtained in 6 h as compared to the oral solution of the drug. Tramadol hydrochloride (THC) was used as a model drug. Hence, pH-responsive swelling and release, nontoxic nature and improved pharmacokinetics support that PAG-based hydrogels may be considered as potential controlled-release polymeric carriers

Effects of a high-dose 24-h infusion of tranexamic acid on death and thromboembolic events in patients with acute gastrointestinal bleeding (HALT-IT): an international randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial

Background: Tranexamic acid reduces surgical bleeding and reduces death due to bleeding in patients with trauma. Meta-analyses of small trials show that tranexamic acid might decrease deaths from gastrointestinal bleeding. We aimed to assess the effects of tranexamic acid in patients with gastrointestinal bleeding. Methods: We did an international, multicentre, randomised, placebo-controlled trial in 164 hospitals in 15 countries. Patients were enrolled if the responsible clinician was uncertain whether to use tranexamic acid, were aged above the minimum age considered an adult in their country (either aged 16 years and older or aged 18 years and older), and had significant (defined as at risk of bleeding to death) upper or lower gastrointestinal bleeding. Patients were randomly assigned by selection of a numbered treatment pack from a box containing eight packs that were identical apart from the pack number. Patients received either a loading dose of 1 g tranexamic acid, which was added to 100 mL infusion bag of 0·9% sodium chloride and infused by slow intravenous injection over 10 min, followed by a maintenance dose of 3 g tranexamic acid added to 1 L of any isotonic intravenous solution and infused at 125 mg/h for 24 h, or placebo (sodium chloride 0·9%). Patients, caregivers, and those assessing outcomes were masked to allocation. The primary outcome was death due to bleeding within 5 days of randomisation; analysis excluded patients who received neither dose of the allocated treatment and those for whom outcome data on death were unavailable. This trial was registered with Current Controlled Trials, ISRCTN11225767, and ClinicalTrials.gov, NCT01658124. Findings: Between July 4, 2013, and June 21, 2019, we randomly allocated 12 009 patients to receive tranexamic acid (5994, 49·9%) or matching placebo (6015, 50·1%), of whom 11 952 (99·5%) received the first dose of the allocated treatment. Death due to bleeding within 5 days of randomisation occurred in 222 (4%) of 5956 patients in the tranexamic acid group and in 226 (4%) of 5981 patients in the placebo group (risk ratio [RR] 0·99, 95% CI 0·82–1·18). Arterial thromboembolic events (myocardial infarction or stroke) were similar in the tranexamic acid group and placebo group (42 [0·7%] of 5952 vs 46 [0·8%] of 5977; 0·92; 0·60 to 1·39). Venous thromboembolic events (deep vein thrombosis or pulmonary embolism) were higher in tranexamic acid group than in the placebo group (48 [0·8%] of 5952 vs 26 [0·4%] of 5977; RR 1·85; 95% CI 1·15 to 2·98). Interpretation: We found that tranexamic acid did not reduce death from gastrointestinal bleeding. On the basis of our results, tranexamic acid should not be used for the treatment of gastrointestinal bleeding outside the context of a randomised trial