Assessment of atrial electromechanical delay and left atrial mechanical functions in chronic kidney disease

Article HistoryReceived Accepted 01 / 05 / 201618 / 05 / 2016The risk of atrial fibrillation (AF) development was revealed to be increased in patients with end-stage renal disease (ESRD) Elongation of the time of atrial electromechanical delay (AEMD) is a famous typical of the atrium. AEMD is a risk factor for AF development and it could be associated with chronic kidney disease (CKD). The aim of our study is to examine mechanical functions of the left atrium (LA) and AEMD times in ESRD. A total of 86 participant, 46 with ESRD and 40 as the control group, were included in the study. The demographical and laboratory information were documented. Echocardiographic dimensions were achieved in all patients. Left atrial mechanical functions and AEMD durations were calculated. Demographic and laboratory characteristics of the groups were similar except the mean diastolic blood pressure, hemoglobin, creatinine, glucose, uric acid, calcium and potassium levels. The echocardiographic assessment exposed that the ventricular septal thickness (12.7±1.5 vs. 10.4±1.5, p<0.001), posterior wall thickness (12.6±1.6 vs. 10.1±1.9, p<0.001), LA dimension (40.9±5.3 vs.34.6±2.6, p<0.001) and diastolic parameters decreased in the ESRD group when compared to the control group; also, LA volumes, mechanical functions, inter atrial EMD (33.2±9.1 vs. 22.7±7.7, p<0.001), intraright-EMD (18.5±7.7 vs. 13.2±6.4, p=0.001) and intra-left-EMD (18.5±7.7 vs. 13.7±5.7, p=0.002) were also different between groups. (p<0.005) The correlation analysis showed that serum ferritin levels were correlated with AEMD. We found deteriorated LA functions and elongation in the times of AEMD in the ESRD group compared with the control group. Additionally, we found positive correlation between ferritin levels and AEMD. This result show that AEMD might be used to predict the risk of development of AF in patients with ESRD. © 2016 OMUArticle HistoryReceived Accepted 01 / 05 / 201618 / 05 / 2016The risk of atrial fibrillation (AF) development was revealed to be increased in patients with end-stage renal disease (ESRD) Elongation of the time of atrial electromechanical delay (AEMD) is a famous typical of the atrium. AEMD is a risk factor for AF development and it could be associated with chronic kidney disease (CKD). The aim of our study is to examine mechanical functions of the left atrium (LA) and AEMD times in ESRD. A total of 86 participant, 46 with ESRD and 40 as the control group, were included in the study. The demographical and laboratory information were documented. Echocardiographic dimensions were achieved in all patients. Left atrial mechanical functions and AEMD durations were calculated. Demographic and laboratory characteristics of the groups were similar except the mean diastolic blood pressure, hemoglobin, creatinine, glucose, uric acid, calcium and potassium levels. The echocardiographic assessment exposed that the ventricular septal thickness (12.7±1.5 vs. 10.4±1.5, p<0.001), posterior wall thickness (12.6±1.6 vs. 10.1±1.9, p<0.001), LA dimension (40.9±5.3 vs.34.6±2.6, p<0.001) and diastolic parameters decreased in the ESRD group when compared to the control group; also, LA volumes, mechanical functions, inter atrial EMD (33.2±9.1 vs. 22.7±7.7, p<0.001), intraright-EMD (18.5±7.7 vs. 13.2±6.4, p=0.001) and intra-left-EMD (18.5±7.7 vs. 13.7±5.7, p=0.002) were also different between groups. (p<0.005) The correlation analysis showed that serum ferritin levels were correlated with AEMD. We found deteriorated LA functions and elongation in the times of AEMD in the ESRD group compared with the control group. Additionally, we found positive correlation between ferritin levels and AEMD. This result show that AEMD might be used to predict the risk of development of AF in patients with ESRD. © 2016 OM

Antinuclear antibody testing in a Turkish pediatrics clinic: is it always necessary?

Introduction:&nbsp;the term anti-nuclear antibody (ANA) is used to define a large group of autoantibodies which specifically bind to nuclear elements. Although healthy individuals may also have ANA positivity, the measurement of ANA is generally used in the diagnosis of autoimmune disorders. However, various studies have shown that ANA testing may be overused, especially in pediatrics clinics. Our aim was to investigate the reasons for antinuclear antibody (ANA) testing in the general pediatrics and pediatric rheumatology clinics of our hospital and to determine whether ANA testing was ordered appropriately by evaluating chief complaints and the ultimate diagnoses of these cases. Methods:&nbsp;the medical records of pediatric patients in whom ANA testing was performed between January 2014 and June 2016 were retrospectively evaluated. Subjects were grouped according to the indication for ANA testing and ANA titers. Results:&nbsp;ANA tests were ordered in a total of 409 patients during the study period, with 113 positive ANA results. The ANA test was ordered mostly due to joint pain (50% of the study population). There was an increased likelihood of autoimmune rheumatic diseases (ARDs) with higher ANA titer. The positive predictive value of an ANA test was 16% for any connective tissue disease and 13% for lupus in the pediatric setting. Conclusion:&nbsp;in the current study, more than one-fourth of the subjects were found to have ANA positivity, while only 15% were ultimately diagnosed with ARDs. Our findings underline the importance of an increased awareness of correct indications for ANA testing

Effect of interpolation on specular reflections in texture-based automatic colonic polyp detection

Reflections of LED light cause unwanted noise effects called specular reflection (SR) on colonoscopic images. The aim of this study was to seek answers to the following two questions. (a) How are the texture features used in automatic detection of polyps affected by the interpolation on specular reflections? (b) If they are affected does it really affect the classification performance? In order to answer these questions, we used 610 colonoscopy images, and divided each image into tiles whose sizes were 32-by-32 pixels. From these tiles, we selected the ones without any specular reflection. We added different shape and size specular reflections cropped from real images onto the reflection-free tiles. We then used the nearest neighbors, bilinear and bicubic interpolation techniques on the tiles on which SRs were added. On these tiles we extracted 116 texture features using 3 second-order approaches, and 4 first-order statistics. First, we used paired samplettest. Second, we performed automatic classification of polyps and background using random forest and k nearest neighbors (k-NN) approaches using the texture features for different combinations of specular reflections added on the tiles from the polyp or background. The results showed that depending on the size of specular reflection, interpolation can cause a significant difference between the texture features that were coming from reflection-free tiles and the same tiles on which interpolation was performed. In addition, we note that bicubic interpolation may be preferred to eliminate specular reflection when texture features are used for background and polyp discrimination

Bilinçli-Farkındalık Temelli Öz-yeterlik Ölçeği-Yenilenmiş: Türkiye Uyarlama Çalışması (BFÖÖ-Y)

The purpose of this study is to investigate the validity and reliability of the Turkish adaptation of Mindfulness-Based Self Efficacy Scale Revised developed by Cayoun, Francis, Kasselis, and Skilbeck (2012). The original form of the scale is in English and consists of 22 likert-type five-point items in a six-factor structure. The revised version of the Turkish form was applied to a sample of 713 students in 5th, 6th and 7th grades in two different public schools. The internal consistency coefficient Cronbach Alpha for the entire scale (= .72) and the factors Emotion Regulation (= .73), Equanimity (= .68), Social Skills (= .65), Distress Tolerance (= .62), Taking Responsibility (= .61) and Interpersonal Effectiveness (= .65) were found to be at acceptable values when the low number of items in each subscale is taken into consideration. Discriminant validity test results revealed that there were no statistically significant differences between the average means of boys and girls, whereas there were statistically significant differences in the average means based on students grade levels. The results indicated that the Turkish adaptation of the scale is a valid and reliable instrument of measuring students mindfulness-based self-efficacy. Both theoretical and methodological implications of the findings are discussed

Bilinçli-Farkındalık Temelli Öz-yeterlik Ölçeği-Yenilenmiş: Türkiye Uyarlama Çalışması (BFÖÖ-Y) = Mindfulness-based self efficacy scale-revised (MSES-R): Turkish adaptation study

The purpose of this study is to investigate the validity and reliability of the Turkish adaptation of Mindfulness-Based Self Efficacy Scale Revised developed by Cayoun, Francis, Kasselis, and Skilbeck (2012). The original form of the scale is in English and consists of 22 likert-type five-point items in a six-factor structure. The revised version of the Turkish form was applied to a sample of 713 students in 5th, 6th and 7th grades in two different public schools. The internal consistency coefficient Cronbach Alpha for the entire scale (= .72) and the factors Emotion Regulation (= .73), Equanimity (= .68), Social Skills (= .65), Distress Tolerance (= .62), Taking Responsibility (= .61) and Interpersonal Effectiveness (= .65) were found to be at acceptable values when the low number of items in each subscale is taken into consideration. Discriminant validity test results revealed that there were no statistically significant differences between the average means of boys and girls, whereas there were statistically significant differences in the average means based on students grade levels. The results indicated that the Turkish adaptation of the scale is a valid and reliable instrument of measuring students mindfulness-based self-efficacy. Both theoretical and methodological implications of the findings are discussed