CLOZAPINE-INDUCED DIABETIC KETOACIDOSIS: A CASE REPORT

 The objective of this study was to report a case of a person with psychiatric illness treated with clozapine presented with diabetic ketoacidosis (DKA). A clinical monitoring was done on a 38-year-old Indian man affected by schizoaffective disorder, bipolar type presented with DKA after 3 months of clozapine therapy (250 mg/day). After treatment of DKA and discontinuation of clozapine, the patient improved symptomatically, his blood sugar levels normalized and insulin requirements also decreased. This report thus highlights that clinicians should be vigilant about the potential risk of new-onset diabetes and DKA in patients taking clozapine and utilize appropriate clinical and laboratory monitoring early in the course of treatment to prevent serious adverse effects

MEROPENEM INDUCED REDUCTION IN SERUM VALPROATE LEVEL- A CASE REPORT

Objective: To report a case of meropenem induced reduction in serum valproate level. Methods: The clinical data of an epileptic patient who experienced a decrease in seizure control due to a drug interaction between valproate and meropenem is described.Results: The patient was a 26 years old male who was a known case of refractory focal epilepsy and underwent surgery for the same. This patient was on five antiepileptic drugs including valproate. On treatment with meropenem for the management of post surgical site infection due to multidrug resistant Klebsiella pneumoniae, the patient experienced seizures due to decline in valproate level. Increasing the dose of valproate could not control the seizures. However, changing the antibiotics to a non carbapenem controlled the seizures.Conclusion: The present report highlights the potential drug interaction between valproate and meropenem. Physicians should thus avoid co-administration of both these agents. If concomitant administration is essential, close monitoring of valproate concentration and clinical monitoring for breakthrough seizures are necessitated.Â

Waiting for Godot: A cross sectional survey based analysis of the hydroxychloroquine prophylaxis strategy against COVID-19 in India

Background: India currently has the second largest burden of infections due to COVID-19. Health Care Worker (HCW) shortages are endemic to Indian healthcare. It should therefore be a huge priority to protect this precious resource as a critical component of the systemic response to this pandemic. Advisories from the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) have focused on using hydroxychloroquine prophylaxis against COVID-19 in at risk HCW. This prophylaxis strategy has no evidence. In further jeopardy there appear to insubstantial attempts to build this evidence as well. In this connection, we commissioned a survey within our Institution to estimate the penetration of hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) use and use this to statistically model the impact of current ongoing studies in India. We also briefly review the literature on HCQ prophylaxis for COVID-19. Design and methods: A structured survey designed using RedCAP application was disseminated among healthcare professionals employed at an academic referral tertiary care centre via online social media platforms. The survey was kept open for the entire month of June 2020. The survey was additionally used to statistically model the size of studies required to comprehensively address the efficacy of HCQ in this setting.Results: 522 responses were received, of which 4 were incomplete. The ICMR strategy of 4 or more doses of HCQ was complete only in 15% of HCW in our survey. The majority of respondents were doctors (238, 46%). Amongst all category of responders, only 12% (n=63) received the full course. A majority of those who initiated the chemoprophylaxis with HCQ turned out to be medical professionals (59/63) with neither nurse nor other categories of healthcare workers accessing the medication. The respondents of our institutional survey did not report any life-threatening side effects. Presuming efficacy as per ICMR modelling for new registry trial on the lines of the published case control study, equal allocation between cases and controls and assuming a RR of 1.3.6, the power of such a study would be very low for n=2000 for event rates from 2.5-12.5%. Conclusion: We report the low penetration of HCQ chemoprophylaxis among the healthcare workers of our institution.  We highlight the inherent drawbacks in the study design of current national COVID related trial based on the statistical modelling of our survey results and published literature, and thereby emphasis the need of evidence-based strategies contributing to research policy at national level

An international analysis evaluating frontline bendamustine with rituximab in extranodal marginal zone lymphoma

: Extranodal marginal zone lymphoma (EMZL) is a heterogeneous non-Hodgkin lymphoma. No consensus exists regarding the standard-of-care in patients with advanced-stage disease. Current recommendations are largely adapted from follicular lymphoma, for which bendamustine with rituximab (BR) is an established approach. We analyzed the safety and efficacy of frontline BR in EMZL using a large international consortium. We included 237 patients with a median age of 63 years (range, 21-85). Most patients presented with Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group (ECOG) performance status 0 to 1 (n = 228; 96.2%), stage III/IV (n = 179; 75.5%), and intermediate (49.8%) or high (33.3%) Mucosa Associated Lymphoid Tissue International Prognosis Index (MALT-IPI). Patients received a median of 6 (range, 1-8) cycles of BR, and 20.3% (n = 48) received rituximab maintenance. Thirteen percent experienced infectious complications during BR therapy; herpes zoster (4%) was the most common. Overall response rate was 93.2% with 81% complete responses. Estimated 5-year progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) were 80.5% (95% CI, 73.1% to 86%) and 89.6% (95% CI, 83.1% to 93.6%), respectively. MALT-IPI failed to predict outcomes. In the multivariable model, the presence of B symptoms was associated with shorter PFS. Rituximab maintenance was associated with longer PFS (hazard ratio = 0.16; 95% CI, 0.04-0.71; P = .016) but did not impact OS. BR is a highly effective upfront regimen in EMZL, providing durable remissions and overcoming known adverse prognosis factors. This regimen is associated with occurrence of herpes zoster; thus, prophylactic treatment may be considered

Controlled anisotropic wetting behaviour of multi-scale slippery surface structure of non fluoro polymer composite

A facile process for in-situ modification of surface properties of Waste Expanded Polystyrene (WEP)/graphite film produced by spin coating technique has been described. The additives undergo spontaneous surface agglomeration with formation of islands of forest of flake structure during the spinning process. This results in polymer films with enhanced roughness and highly hydrophobic surfaces. Wettability was analyzed using static water contact angle, surface morphology was observed using atomic force microscopy (AFM) and field emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM). The polymer composite exhibited maximum water contact angle (WCA) of 129°. Surface texture reveals the variation of surface roughness which enables anisotropic surface wettability property. The present work exhibits promising approach for fabricating nano flake forest in polymer structures for various industrial applications

User Story based Automatic Test Case Classification and prioritization using NLP (Natural Language Processing) based Deep Learning

The research is built upon a comprehensive compilation of user stories and their associated test cases, which have been carefully extracted from existing software projects in real?world settings. Each user story and test case are represented as a collection of unigrams by capturing the essential features and requirements of the respective functional components. By emphasizing the Three C’s - Card, conversation, and confirmation, user stories are crafted to be precise, comprehen?sible through teamwork, and are subjected to thorough testing. This strategy improves communication, reduces the risk of misinterpretation, and yields software that strictly meets user requirements </p