Editorial

اولاً شهادت مظهر عدالت و شجاعت و سرسلسله ولايت و امامت، امام علي (ع) را خدمت حضرت ولي‌عصر (ع)، مقام معظم رهبري و تمامي انسان‌هاي عدالتخواه و بخصوص خانواده پرتلاش دانشگاه علوم پزشكي شهيد بهشتي، تسليت مي‌گويم و اميدوارم همگي بيش از پيش توفيق خدمتگزاري به ملت شريف ايران كه با شور و شعور و عشق و علاقه به آن امام هُمام در اين فضاي معنوي به تلاش و سازندگي، اشتغال دارند را داشته باشيم. بدون شك، روز پزشك يكي از ايام‌الله است، زيرا در بينش توحيدي، خداوند متعال را طبيب مي‌ناميم و طبابت را مهندسي دستگاهي مي‌دانيم كه آفريدگار آن پروردگار قادر متعال است و علاوه برآن مهم‌ترين رسالت پيامبران الهي را پيشگيري از امراض اجتماعي، درمان اينگونه بيماري‌ها و ساماندهي جامعه‌اي سالم، تشكيل مي‌دهد. پس در يوم‌الله اوّل شهريورماه، كه با اين تعبير، تعلق خاصي به ذات اقدس الهي و رسالت انبياء عظام (ع) دارد روز پزشك بر همكاران عزيز پزشك و كليه كساني كه در راستاي حفظ و ارتقاء سلامتي جامعه و بازگرداندن سلامتي به كالبد بيماران، قدم بر مي‌دارند، مبارك باد و همگي سالم و سعادتمند باشند و به مصداق فرمايش آن شاعره عارفه ـ پروين اعتصامي ـ كه فرمود:       «عافيت از پزشكِ تنها نيست         هم زِ دارو هم از پرستار است» فرصت را مغتنم شمرده يوم‌الله ششم شهريورماه كه به نام روز داروسازي نام نهاده‌اند را نيز به كليه فارماكولوژيست‌ها و كساني كه در اين عرصه مهم فعاليت دارند تبريك و تهنيت گفته قدردان قداست، شرافت شغلي و زحمات اين عزيزان در راه رسيدن به خودكفايي، بوده و خواهيم بود و مگر پزشكي و درمان، بدون خدمات صادقانه و طاقت‌فرساي پرستاري، مي‌تواند رسالت اصلي خود را به انجام برساند؟! پس هم روز اول شهريور كه روز پزشك است و هم روز ششم شهريور كه روز داروسازي است را بر تكميل­كنندگان فعاليت‌هاي پزشكي و داروسازي يعني پرستاران گرامي نيز تبريك مي‌گويم و سعادت همگي آنان را در راه خدمت به ملت شريف ايران اسلامي كه بدون شك، شايستة خالصانه‌ترين، صادقانه‌ترين و بهترين خدمات هستند، از درگاه احديت، خواهانم. ....First of all, I offer my condolences on the martyrdom of Imam Ali (AS), the manifestation of justice, courage and the head of the province and Imamate, in the service of Hazrat Vali-e-Asr (AS), the Supreme Leader and all justice-seeking people, especially the hardworking family of Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences. May we have the success of serving the honorable nation of Iran, who are engaged in effort and construction in this spiritual atmosphere with passion, intelligence, love and interest in that Imam. Undoubtedly, the day of the physician is one of the days of God, because in the monotheistic view, we call God Almighty a physician and we consider medicine to be the engineering of a device whose creator is God Almighty. In addition, the most important mission of the divine prophets is to prevent social diseases, cure diseases and such diseases. Organizes healthy communities. Therefore, on the first day of September, which with this interpretation, has a special belonging to the essence of the Holy God and the mission of the great prophets (PBUH), Doctor's Day is a step towards dear physician colleagues and all those who maintain and promote the health of society and restore health to patients. May they be blessed and may they all be healthy and happy, and according to the order of the mystic poet - Parvin Etesami - who said: "Relief is not only from the doctor, but also from the medicine and the nurse." I would like to take this opportunity to congratulate all pharmacologists and those who work in this important field on the 6th of September, which has been named Pharmacy Day, and we appreciate their holiness, job honor and the efforts of these loved ones on the way to self-satisfaction. And can medicine and treatment, without honest and exhausting nursing services, fulfill its main mission ?! Therefore, I congratulate both the first day of Shahrivar, which is the day of the physician, and the sixth day of Shahrivar, which is the day of pharmacy, to the accomplices of medical and pharmaceutical activities, ie dear nurses, and I wish them all the best in serving the honorable nation of Islamic Iran, which is undoubtedly the most sincere. , Are the most honest and best services, from the door of oneness, I ask. ...

Childhood Physical Abnormalities following Paternal Exposure to Sulfur Mustard Gas in Iran: a Case-Control Study

BACKGROUND:Mustard gas, a known chemical weapon, was used during the Iran-Iraq war of 1980-1988. We aimed to determine if exposure to mustard gas among men was significantly associated with abnormalities and disorders among progenies.METHODS:Using a case-control design, we identified all progenies of Sardasht men (exposed group, n = 498), who were born at least nine months after the exposure, compared to age-matched controls in Rabat, a nearby city (non-exposed group, n = 689). We conducted a thorough medical history, physical examination, and appropriate paraclinical studies to detect any physical abnormality and/or disorder. Given the presence of correlated data, we applied Generalized Estimating Equation (GEE) multivariable models to determine associations.RESULTS:The overall frequency of detected physical abnormalities and disorders was significantly higher in the exposed group (19% vs. 11%, Odds Ratio [OR] 1.93, 95% Confidence Interval [CI], 1.37-2.72, P = 0.0002). This was consistent across sexes. Congenital anomalies (OR 3.54, 95% CI, 1.58-7.93, P = 0.002) and asthma (OR, 3.12, 95% CI, 1.43-6.80, P = 0.004) were most commonly associated with exposure. No single abnormality was associated with paternal exposure to mustard gas.CONCLUSION:Our study demonstrates a generational effect of exposure to mustard gas. The lasting effects of mustard gas exposure in parents effects fertility and may impact child health and development in the long-term

Seroprevalence of Hepatitis a in Hemodialysis Patient Candidate for Kidney Transplant Younger Than Forty Years

Background: Hepatitis A is a common infection during childhood, especially in developing countries. It can cause severe complications in immunocompromised patients. Due to the increasing number of kidney transplants in the country and epidemiologic shift of HAV which was observed in previous studies, we're going to evaluate the seroprevalence of hepatitis A in hemodialysis patients less than forty years serving kidney transplant candidates to follow vaccination policy for them.Materials and Methods: In a cross sectional study during 2014-2015 hepatitis A antibody levels in hemodialysis patients less than forty years in kidney transplant candidates examined in 12 hospitals in Tehran, Iran. Their serums were tested for anti HAV IgM and IgG by ELISA kits.Results: Hepatitis A virus antibody was positive in 66 (72.5%) of 91 patients. The prevalence of HAV was 0% at the range of younger than 20 and 45% in under 25 years age group. This significantly increased prevalence by increasing the age, and there was according to epidemiological shifts which were shown in other studies.Conclusion: Due to the availability of vaccine and hepatitis severe complications in immunocompromised individuals, as well as a low prevalence of positive serology in individuals under 25 years, it seems the check of antibodies in patients undergoing kidney transplantation and vaccination in seronegative persons is a logical

The risk factors and related hospitalizations for cases with positive and negative COVID-19 tests: A case-control study

Background: The aim of this study was to evaluate the risk factors for hospitalizations of cases with positive and negative COVID-19 tests. Methods: In this case-control study, the case and control groups consisted of 292 COVID-19 patients and 296 non-COVID-19 patients. Patients who referred to a reference laboratory in Tehran (Iran) in March 2020 were selected and interviewed. The patients were contacted by telephone and data were recorded through a questionnaire. Results: The sample of this study consisted of 588 patients (349 59% females, 239 41% males) with a mean age of 42 ± 15. The results of this study showed that comorbidities like diabetes (OR = 7.42), hypertension (OR = 4.85), asthma and respiratory diseases (OR = 5.64) in addition to symptoms including fever (OR = 6.67), chills (OR = 11.2), anorexia (OR = 11.3), dyspnea (OR = 4.8), weakness and lethargy (OR = 5.7) were the most predictive variables for hospitalization of non-COVID-19 cases. Furthermore, demographical variables like male gender (OR = 3.71), high age (>50; OR = 3.12), BMI (>25; OR = 2.37), travel (OR = 2.79), comorbidities including diabetes (OR = 5.26), hypertension (OR = 3.7) and underlying immunosuppressant patients receiving corticosteroid therapy (OR = 3.62) in addition to symptoms like anorexia OR = 2.55 and dyspnea (OR = 6.99) tend to increase the risk of hospital admission in COVID-19 patients, suggesting their predictive values for hospitalization of COVID-19 patients. Conclusion: Our results indicated that different factors tend to increase the odds of hospital admission in patients with positive and negative COVID-19 tests, suggesting their predictive values for hospitalization. © 202

Nationwide Prevalence of Diabetes and Prediabetes and Associated Risk Factors Among Iranian Adults: Analysis of Data from PERSIAN Cohort Study

Introduction Over the past decades prevalence of diabetes has increased in Iran and other countries. This study aimed to update the prevalence of diabetes and prediabetes in Iran and to determine associated sociodemographic risk factors, as well as diabetes awareness and control. Methods This is a nationally representative cross-sectional survey that included 163,770 Iranian adults aged 35-70 years, from different ethnic backgrounds, between 2014 and 2020. Diabetes was diagnosed at fasting blood sugar of >= 6.99 mmol/L (126 mg/dL), or receiving blood glucose-lowering treatment. Multivariable logistic regression was applied to detect determinants associated with prevalence of diabetes and prediabetes, as well as predictors of diabetes awareness and glycemic control. Results Sex- and age-standardized prevalence of diabetes and prediabetes was 15.0% (95% CI 12.6-17.3) and 25.4% (18.6-32.1), respectively. Among patients with diabetes, 79.6% (76.2-82.9) were aware of their diabetes. Glycemic control was achieved in 41.2% (37.5-44.8) of patients who received treatment. Older age, obesity, high waist to hip ratio (WHR), and specific ethnic background were associated with a significant risk of diabetes and prediabetes. Higher awareness of diabetes was observed in older patients, married individuals, those with high WHR, and individuals with high wealth score. Moreover, glycemic control was significantly better in women, obese individuals, those with high physical activity, educational attainment, and specific ethnic background. Conclusions The prevalence of diabetes and prediabetes is increasing at an alarming rate in Iranian adults. High proportion of uncontrolled patients require particular initiatives to be integrated in the health care system

Blood donor incentives: A step forward or backward

Dramatic increase in blood usage and critical seasonal blood shortages are faced by various countries. Countries which previously reached 100% voluntary nonremunerated donation have been led to offer different kinds of incentives to recruit blood donors and meet their blood demands. In some cases, these incentives are considered monetary and are in complete contrast with International standards like World Health Organization (WHO). It seems that attitudes toward sole dependency on nonremunerated voluntary blood donation have been changed in recent years and experts in some developed countries are reevaluating partial reliance on paid donation. On the other hand, besides the effects of such incentives on blood safety, several economic and psychological studies have shown that incentives have discouraging effects on pro-social behaviors like blood donation and will reduce the number of blood donors in long term. With regard to the results of such studies, it seems that implementing incentive-based blood donor recruitment programs to meet blood requirements by some countries is becoming a challenge for blood banks

Image steganalysis based on statistical moments of wavelet subband histogram of images with least significant bit planes

This paper proposed a new image Steganalysis scheme based on statistical moments of histogram of multi-level wavelet subbands in frequency domain. These wavelet subbands derived from an image that has some of least significant bits of the grey level test image and some of its most significant bit planes are removed. Then we decompose the image using threelevel Haar discrete wavelet transform (DWT) into 13 subbands (here the image itself is considered as the LL0 subband).The Fourier transform of each subband histogram, is calculated. The first three statistical moments of each subband histogram are selected to form a 39-dimensional feature vector for Steganalysis. Support Vector Machines (SVM) classifier is then used to discriminate between stego-images and innocent images. We experiment our proposed scheme on LSB, Cox and QIM data hiding method. Experimental results show that the proposed method improves the detection rate especially for LSB steganography

Steganalysis of LSB-matching steganography by removing most significant bit planes

This paper proposed a new Steganalysis scheme of LSB-Matching steganography based on statistical moments of the DFT of histogram of multi-level wavelet subbands. Before deriving these wavelet subbands a pre-processing apply to images under the test. The pre-processing contains removing some most significant bit planes. Then we decompose the image using three-level Haar discrete wavelet transform (DWT) into 13 subbands (here the image itself is considered as the LL0 subband).The Fourier transform of each subband histogram, is calculated. Then it is divided into low and high frequency bands. The first three statistical moments of each band are selected to form a 78- dimensional feature vector for Steganalysis. Support Vector Machines (SVM) classifier is then used to discriminate between stego-images and innocent images

LSB data hiding detection based on gray level co-occurrence matrix (GLCM)

In this paper we present a novel steganalysis method with feature vectors derived from gray level cooccurrence matrix (GLCM) in spatial domain, which is sensitive to data embedding process. This GLCM matrix is derived from an image. We consider several combinations of diagonal elements of GLCM as features and use SVM for classification. The experimental results have demonstrated that the proposed scheme outperforms the existing steganalysis techniques in attacking the LSB steganographic schemes applied to spatial domain. Our results also show that there are different between these features for stego and non-stego images and these features are convenient for steganalysis. With randomly selected 900 images for training and the remaining 900 images for testing, the proposed steganalysis system can achieve a correct classification rate of 98.1% for LSB (0.1 bpp) and 81.1 % for LSB Matching algorithm. For combination of algorithms we reach to 95.6% correct detection rate