Vitamin D Supplementation Practices during Pregnancy and Infancy among a Sample of Muslim Women in Ireland and Saudi Arabia

Vitamin D is a steroid hormone, a group of fat-soluble pro-hormones, which encourages the absorption and metabolism of calcium and phosphorous. The requirement for the nutrient is high at particular stages of the lifecycle especially during pregnancy and infancy. Severe vitamin D deficiency during pregnancy may increase the risk of developing preeclampsia and gestational diabetes in pregnancy and rickets in the child. While vitamin D supplementation has been a policy recommendation in Ireland since 2007, at the time of this study, it was not a policy recommendation in Saudi Arabia. The present quantitative cross-sectional survey was conducted to determine the prevalence of vitamin D supplementation in pregnancy as well as to infants 0-3 years of age among Muslim mothers living in Ireland and in Saudi Arabia. Seventy seven Muslim mothers living in Ireland were recruited from the Islamic Culture Center of Ireland while one hundred and twenty one Muslim mothers living in Saudi Arabia were recruited from three hospitals in Makkah. Only 28.6% (22/77) of the Irish cohort mothers and 7.4% (9/121) of the Saudi mothers had taken vitamin D supplements during their pregnancy. While 62.3% (48/77) of the Muslim mothers in Ireland and 37.2% (45/121) in Saudi Arabia were aware of the recommendation to give a daily vitamin D supplements to their infants until they were one year of age just 49.4% (38/77) living in Ireland and 13.2% (16/121) from Saudi Arabia did so. While a majority of mothers living in Ireland (53.2%; 41/77) and Saudi Arabia (37.2%; 45/121) were spending more than 30 minutes a day outside, protective clothing that completely cover the body was worn by the entire sample (100%), sunscreen was used by 44.2% (34/77) in Ireland and 53.7% (65/121) in Saudi Arabia. Poor vitamin D supplementation practices are evident among Muslim mothers and infants both in Ireland and Saudi Arabia. To improve this situation, mothers should be educated about the importance of vitamin D during pregnancy and infancy

Macroeconomic Variables, Government Effectiveness and Sovereign Credit Rating: A Case of Egypt

Sovereign credit rating reflects the country ability to meet its financial obligations (at present and in future) on its maturities, therefore, it is an important indicator that concerns international financial institutions and foreign investors who are interested in foreign direct investment in order to know the minimum expectation of risks that can be faced in specific country. This paper aims to i) examine the effect of macroeconomic variables on the Egyptian sovereign credit rating (SCR) and ii) also investigate the impact of investment environment (measured by government effectiveness) on the SCR using the dynamic ordinary least squares (DOLS) method over the period from 1990 to 2014.  The results indicate that GDP growth, inflation, fiscal balance, reserves, current account balance, public domestic debt, and the government effectiveness have a significant impact on the sovereign credit rating in Egypt. This study has important implications for investors and policymakers

Validation of the thermal equilibrium assumption in periodic free convection in porous channel using Darcy-Brinkman Forchheimer model

Paper presented at the 9th International Conference on Heat Transfer, Fluid Mechanics and Thermodynamics, Malta, 16-18 July, 2012.Examination of the thermal equilibrium assumption in the periodic natural convection channel flow is investigated numerically. The periodic disturbance in the free convection flow is due to a periodic thermal disturbance imposed on the channel walls. The Darcy-Brinkman-Forchheimer model is used to describe the flow inside the porous channel. A scripted finite element model builder and numerical solver, FlexPDE, is used to solve the equations. Five dimensionless parameters are found to have significant effect on the local thermal equilibrium assumption. These parameters are thermal conductivity, volumetric Nusselt number, thermal diffusivity ratio, amplitude of thermal disturbance and frequency of the thermal disturbance. The effects of these parameters on the local thermal equilibrium assumption are investigated. The volumetric Nusselt number is found to have the most significant effect on this assumption.dc201

Exchange Rate Volatility and Trade: An Empirical Investigation from the Egyptian Economy

The main aim of this paper is to assess empirically the impact of exchange rate volatility (ERV) on the export and import functions in reference to Egypt’s major trading partners over the period of 1980–2016. Estimates of a cointegration relationship are obtained using the ARDL model. The conditional variance of the GARCH (1,1) model is taken as a proxy for exchange rate fluctuation. The observed outcomes reveal a significant negative coefficient of volatility on export and a non-significant positive coefficient on import. Indeed, this finding supports the traditional view that higher volatility will decrease export. To avoid the negative consequences of ERV, policymakers should shift from the concept of specialization based on the comparative advantage to competitive advantage and focus on the diversification of Egyptian exports while avoiding risks associated with market concentration by exploring potential opportunities that would increase trade openness by expanding Egypt’s trade with other countries, especially with low and middle-income and emerging countries

Impact of opioid-free analgesia on pain severity and patient satisfaction after discharge from surgery: multispecialty, prospective cohort study in 25 countries

Background: Balancing opioid stewardship and the need for adequate analgesia following discharge after surgery is challenging. This study aimed to compare the outcomes for patients discharged with opioid versus opioid-free analgesia after common surgical procedures.Methods: This international, multicentre, prospective cohort study collected data from patients undergoing common acute and elective general surgical, urological, gynaecological, and orthopaedic procedures. The primary outcomes were patient-reported time in severe pain measured on a numerical analogue scale from 0 to 100% and patient-reported satisfaction with pain relief during the first week following discharge. Data were collected by in-hospital chart review and patient telephone interview 1 week after discharge.Results: The study recruited 4273 patients from 144 centres in 25 countries; 1311 patients (30.7%) were prescribed opioid analgesia at discharge. Patients reported being in severe pain for 10 (i.q.r. 1-30)% of the first week after discharge and rated satisfaction with analgesia as 90 (i.q.r. 80-100) of 100. After adjustment for confounders, opioid analgesia on discharge was independently associated with increased pain severity (risk ratio 1.52, 95% c.i. 1.31 to 1.76; P < 0.001) and re-presentation to healthcare providers owing to side-effects of medication (OR 2.38, 95% c.i. 1.36 to 4.17; P = 0.004), but not with satisfaction with analgesia (beta coefficient 0.92, 95% c.i. -1.52 to 3.36; P = 0.468) compared with opioid-free analgesia. Although opioid prescribing varied greatly between high-income and low- and middle-income countries, patient-reported outcomes did not.Conclusion: Opioid analgesia prescription on surgical discharge is associated with a higher risk of re-presentation owing to side-effects of medication and increased patient-reported pain, but not with changes in patient-reported satisfaction. Opioid-free discharge analgesia should be adopted routinely

Is MRI More Informative for Diagnosis of Autism Compared with No Brain Imaging?

<p><i><strong>Abstract</strong></i></p><p><i><strong>Objective: </strong>To determine whether MRI is more informative for the diagnosis of Autism compared with no brain imaging.</i></p><p><i><strong>Methodology: </strong>The PubMed electronic database was searched to extract relevant and appropriate studies. A lot of literature was explored, and six studies were included in this review. These studies were chosen after the proper exclusion, and inclusion criteria were applied. The included studies were then critically reviewed and analysed to extract the most important and valuable knowledge to produce desired results.</i></p><p><i><strong>Results:</strong> The studies that we have discussed so far have shown that there are a vast literature and evidence-based research available that supports our research topic that MRI is an informative and authentic diagnosis of Autism compared to no brain imaging. Majority of literature is available, which helps that MRI is a useful diagnostic method to rule out Autism.</i></p><p><i><strong>Conclusion: </strong>From the results of recent studies and literature, it is thus concluded that brain imaging such as MRI is increasingly used in the diagnosis of ASD <strong>(</strong>Autism spectrum disorders<strong>)</strong> and has also been confirmed by published studies.</i></p&gt