Efficacy of Vitamin C and Vitamin E as an add on therapy in diabetic foot ulcer and red blood cell morphology as a biomarker of oxidative stress: a randomized, open label, comparative pilot study

Background: Diabetes mellitus is a major cause of increased morbidity and mortality in developing countries. Foot ulcer is one of the long term complications of diabetes. Oxidative stress plays a major role in pathogenesis of diabetes mellitus and its long term complications. Impaired wound healing in diabetic individuals is due to ischemia and hypoxia occurring as a consequence of oxidative stress. Vitamin C and E have antioxidant property. This study aims to assess their efficacy in healing of diabetic ulcer. Objective of the study was to evaluate the efficacy of Vitamin C and E in healing diabetic foot ulcer.Methods: 60 adult patients with diabetic foot ulcer were randomized to test and control groups (30 in each). Treatment period was 12 weeks + 4 weeks follow up per patient. After obtaining written informed consent, patients in test group received Vitamin C (500mg BD) and Vitamin E (400mg BD) for 12 weeks along with standard treatment for diabetes and antibiotics for foot ulcer.Results: At the end of 12 weeks, increase in healing of foot ulcer assessed by percent reduction of ulcer area in study group 72.50% than control group 39.67% (p<0.001) was observed. There was a significant reduction of fasting blood glucose, Oxidative stress induced damage to RBCs and BP in the study group compared to control group. No serious adverse effects occurred.Conclusions: Vitamin C and E reverse oxidative stress induced morphological changes in RBCs, improve anemia and increase blood flow to ulcer area. Hence they are highly effective in healing diabetic foot ulcer along with standard therapy.

Digital detox, the need of the hour: a cross-sectional study on psychometric evaluation of college students using smart phones

Aim: The aim of the study was to analyse the pattern of mobile usage and its impact on behaviour among college students. Methods: A cross-sectional, semi-structured questionnaire based study was conducted among 275 students of various colleges of Tamil Nadu after obtaining IEC clearance. Quantitative data is expressed as mean ± standard deviation and compared by independent sample t test or ANOVA. Qualitative data is expressed in percentages. Results: Out of the 275 study participants, 140 were from medical college and 135 were from non- medical colleges. Around 42.8% participants were using mobile phones for 3-6 hours per day and 58% were using social media more frequently in a day. The estimated mean of the behavioural analysis score with the social media usage and mobile phone usage revealed that the mean score increased if the usage of social media or mobile increased (p < 0.001). Conclusion: The pattern of mobile phone use among the college students reported in this study appears to have some behavioural influence on them. This has to be recognized at an earlier stage and measures must be taken to reduce it

A Mechanism for the Inhibition of Neural Progenitor Cell Proliferation by Cocaine

Investigating the mechanism of cocaine's effect on fetal brain development, Chun-Ting Lee and colleagues find that down-regulation of cyclin A by a cocaine metabolite inhibits neural proliferation

Native American students: blood quantum, identity, and educational success

Includes bibliographical references.2015 Summer.Native American ancestors were fighting a war to maintain their relevance; today Natives are fighting another war, a war of self-existence. Studies of Native American identity and education are plentiful but studies of blood quantum and educational success are very scarce. This study explored whether Native American students fit in (if at all) the higher education system. In all 67 self-identified Native Americans from a U.S. university participated in the study. The analysis generated differences and correlations between blood quantum, student-identity, acculturation and place of residence and Grade Point Average (GPA) as the measure of their effects on college success. The findings suggest academic success supports Native American students who are acculturated, who do not strongly self-identify with their respective culture and were raised off the reservation. Those students who grew up on the reservation, who practice their culture and are not fully acculturated, do these students have to make a choice to maintain or put aside their identity in order to be successful in obtaining a higher education

Role of Antioxidants like Vitamin E and Vitamin C in Healing of Diabetic Foot Ulcer as an Add on Therapy and Looking for Morphological Changes in the Red Blood Cells as a Marker of Oxidative Stress: A Randomized, Open Label, Comparatative Pilot Study

BACKGROUND: Diabetes mellitus is a major cause of increased morbidity and mortality in developing countries. Foot ulcer is one of the long term complications of diabetes. Oxidative stress plays a major role in pathogenesis of diabetes mellitus and its long term complications of diabetes The impairment in wound healing is due to ischemia caused by vasospasm as a consequence of decreased bioavailability of Nitric Oxide in the endothelium and hypoxia due to reduced oxygen carrying capacity and loss of flexibility in RBCs. Vitamin E and C have antioxidant property and therefore this study aims to assess their efficacy in healing of diabetic ulcer. AIM OF THE STUDY: To study the efficacy of Vitamin E and Vitamin C in healing of diabetic foot ulcer. METHOD: 60 adult patients with diabetic foot ulcer attending Surgery OPD of Rajiv Gandhi Government General Hospital are randomized to test and control groups (30 in each). Treatment period is 12 weeks + 4 weeks follow up per patient. After obtaining written informed consent, patients in test group received Vitamin C 500 mg BD and Vitamin E 400 mg BD for 12 weeks along with standard treatment for diabetes and antibiotics for foot ulcer. RESULTS: At the end of 12 weeks, there was a 24.60% reduction of fasting blood glucose in the study group compared to control group 7.19% (p=0.017), 81.64% reduction in oxidative stress induced damage to RBCs in study group compared to control group 2.9% (p<0.001) and increase in healing of foot ulcer assessed by percent reduction of ulcer area in study group 72.50% than control group 39.67% (p<0.001). No serious adverse effects occurred. CONCLUSION: Vitamin E and C reverse oxidative stress induced morphological changes in RBCs, improve blood flow and anemia. Hence they are highly effective in healing diabetic foot ulcer along with standard therapy

Efficacy of Vitamin C and Vitamin E as an add on therapy in diabetic foot ulcer and red blood cell morphology as a biomarker of oxidative stress: a randomized, open label, comparative pilot study

Background: Diabetes mellitus is a major cause of increased morbidity and mortality in developing countries. Foot ulcer is one of the long term complications of diabetes. Oxidative stress plays a major role in pathogenesis of diabetes mellitus and its long term complications. Impaired wound healing in diabetic individuals is due to ischemia and hypoxia occurring as a consequence of oxidative stress. Vitamin C and E have antioxidant property. This study aims to assess their efficacy in healing of diabetic ulcer. Objective of the study was to evaluate the efficacy of Vitamin C and E in healing diabetic foot ulcer.Methods: 60 adult patients with diabetic foot ulcer were randomized to test and control groups (30 in each). Treatment period was 12 weeks + 4 weeks follow up per patient. After obtaining written informed consent, patients in test group received Vitamin C (500mg BD) and Vitamin E (400mg BD) for 12 weeks along with standard treatment for diabetes and antibiotics for foot ulcer.Results: At the end of 12 weeks, increase in healing of foot ulcer assessed by percent reduction of ulcer area in study group 72.50% than control group 39.67% (p&lt;0.001) was observed. There was a significant reduction of fasting blood glucose, Oxidative stress induced damage to RBCs and BP in the study group compared to control group. No serious adverse effects occurred.Conclusions: Vitamin C and E reverse oxidative stress induced morphological changes in RBCs, improve anemia and increase blood flow to ulcer area. Hence they are highly effective in healing diabetic foot ulcer along with standard therapy.

Send reprint requests to: IDENTIFICATION OF CYTOCHROME P-45011B1 AS A COCAINE-BIOACTIVATING ISOFORM IN RAT HEPATIC MICROSOMES AND IN CULTURED RAT HEPATOCYTES

ABSTRACT: Inductio

A Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea Virus Outbreak in One Geographic Region of the United States: Descriptive Epidemiology and Investigation of the Possibility of Airborne Virus Spread.

This study describes a spring 2013 outbreak of porcine epidemic diarrhea virus (PEDv), using data from 222 swine sites in 14 counties area in 4 contiguous states in the United States. During the outbreak, the premises-level incidence of PEDv was 40.5 percent (90/222 sites). One of the three companies from which data were collected had a lower incidence (19.5 percent) than the other two companies (41.1 and 47.2 percent). Sow sites had the highest incidence of PEDv during the outbreak (80.0 percent). Spatial analysis showed that PEDv was clustered rather than randomly distributed, which suggested that sites near a positive site had increased risk of acquiring PEDv infection. Meteorological data were used to investigate the hypothesis that PEDv was spread by air. If airborne dissemination played a role in this outbreak, we would expect the direction of disease spread to correlate with the predominant wind direction. Two methods were used to determine the direction of disease spread--linear direction mean analysis in ArcGIS and the direction test in ClusterSeer. The former method indicated PEDv spread was south to slightly southwest, and the latter indicated spread was to the southeast. The predominant wind direction during the month of the outbreak was toward the south, with some southeast and southwest winds; the strongest wind gusts were toward the southwest. These findings support the hypothesis that PEDv was spread by air. The results, however, should be interpreted cautiously because we did not have information on direct and indirect contacts between sites, such as movement of trucks, feed, pigs or people. These types of contacts should be evaluated before pathogen spread is attributed to airborne mechanisms. Although this study did not provide a definitive assessment of airborne spread of PEDv, we believe the findings justify additional research to investigate this potential mechanism of transmission

Graphic depiction of ArcGIS linear directional mean function.

<p>The ArcGIS linear directional mean function converts the mean daily vectors for direction and distance of virus spread (left) into a single vector that indicates the mean direction and mean distance of virus spread over time.</p

Weekly directional ellipses showing an overall north-south orientation of virus spread.

<p>No ellipse was generated for the first week because only one positive was reported that week. During the third week, an outlying positive in the southeastern extent of the outbreak caused a northwest to southeast orientation.</p