EVALUATION OF APPLICATION OF INTERNATIONAL PROSTATE SYMPTOMS SCORE IN SUDANESE PATIENTS WITH BENIGN PROSTATIC HYPERPLASIA

Objectives: The purpose of the present study is to assess the reliability and validity of IPSS in pre- and treatment of Sudanese patients with BPH. Material and methods: In a descriptive prospective study, 350 Sudanese patients with LUTS attended the Urology department of Gezira Hospital for Renal Diseases and Surgery from September 2003 to April 2006. They were interviewed by urologists and answered the International Prostate Symptom Score (IPSS) questionnaire. Clinical work up was done for all only patients with benign hyperplasia were included in the analysis .Europeans guideline was adopted in the management and the out come was also subjected to IPSS evaluation. Results: The most common voiding symptoms was a weak stream (93% of subjects), followed by intermittency (57%) and hesitancy (54%). The most prevalence of storage symptoms was nocturia (87% of subjects), followed by frequency (73%) and urgency (64%). 64% of the study subjects   presented with severe IPSS, 33% with moderate IPSS, while only 3% of the patients presented with mild IPSS. Digital rectal examination (DRE) was done to all study subjects. There was no significant correlation between DRE and IPSS reported. The postoperative IPSS post treatment follow up was mild in 87%, moderate in 4% and sever in 9% of the patients.   Conclusion: Our study indicates that IPSS is informative and reproducible in assessment of patients with BPH. &nbsp

Global Verification and Analysis of Network Access Control Configuration

Network devices such as routers, firewalls, IPSec gateways, and NAT are configured using access control lists. However, recent studies and ISP surveys show that the management of access control configurations is a highly complex and error prone task. Without automated global configuration management tools, unreachablility and insecurity problems due to the misconfiguration of network devices become an ever more likely. In this report, we present a novel approach that models the global end-to-end behavior of access control devices in the network including routers, firewalls, NAT, IPSec gateways for unicast and multicast packets. Our model represents the network as a state machine where the packet header and location determine the state. The transitions in this model are determined by packet header information, packet location, and policy semantics for the devices being modeled. We encode the semantics of access control policies with Boolean functions using binary decision diagrams (BDDs). We extended computation tree logic (CTL) to provide more useful operators and then we use CTL and symbolic model checking to investigate all future and past states of this packet in the network and verify network reachability and security requirements. The model is implemented in a tool called ConfigChecker. We gave special consideration to ensure an efficient and scalable implementation. Our extensive evaluation study with various network and policy sizes shows that ConfigChecker has acceptable computation and space requirements with large number of nodes and configuration rules

Recurrent Transvaginal Leak of Dialysate as a Complication of Peritoneal Dialysis Catheter Tip Capture by Fallopian Tube after Tubal Occlusion

Introduction: Peritoneal dialysis (PD) catheter malfunction may result from obstruction by various intra-peritoneal structures. Such obstruction may rarely be caused by fallopian tubes, in which case it may present as out flow failure and/or per vaginum (PV) leak of dialysate. Case report: A 46 years old female developed early out-flow obstruction while maintaining adequate dialysate inflow soon after PD catheter insertion. The patient also had PV leak of the dialysate that was misinterpreted by the patient as urine incontinence. Fluoroscopic catheterogram confirmed catheter patency and outlined the right fallopian tube. Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) revealed the presence of fluid in vagina with no obvious peritoneo-vaginal fistulous track. Laparoscopy was performed, at which time examination under anesthesia excluded the presence of peritoneo-vaginal fistula. During laparoscopy, the catheter tip was found to be captured by the fimbriae of the right fallopian tube. The catheter tip was released and right tubal occlusion was performed, after which adequate flow was restored. Three month later, the catheter was replaced because of fungal peritonitis. Vaginal leak recurred six weeks after insertion of the new catheter through the same occluded tube. Mini laparotomy and tubal ligation with catheter removal were done and the patient was maintained on hemodialysis until she received a kidney transplant four months later. Conclusion: Vaginal leak of dialysate can occur as an early complication of PD secondary to fallopian tube capture of PD catheter tip. It is important to distinguish between tubal capture of the catheter tip which can be treated laparoscopically and peritoneo-vaginal fistula which often requires laparotomy for fistulous tract debridement and repair. Key words: Peritoneal Dialysis, Dialysate, Transvaginal leak, Fallopian tub

Reforming Fiscal Institutions in Resource-Rich Arab Economies: Policy Proposals

This paper traces the evolution of fiscal institutions of Resource Rich Arab Economies (RRAEs) over time since their pre-oil days, through the discovery of oil to their build-up of oil exports. It then identifies challenges faced by RRAEs and variations in their severity among the different countries over time. Finally, it articulates specific policy reforms, which, if implemented successfully, could help to overcome these challenges. In some cases, however, these policy proposals may give rise to important trade-offs that will have to be evaluated carefully in individual cases

Towards an Efficient Verification Approach on Network Configuration

Abstract-This paper presents our new design and implementation of a configuration verification system called ConfVS. With the increasing complexity of network configuration, verifying network behavior has become a highly time-consuming and errorprone process. Much research effort has been made to tackle this challenge. In this paper, we propose a formalization scheme based on binary decision diagram to model the entire network behavior specified by diverse configuration requirements (e.g., security policies, routing policies, and address translation rules), and design a set of algorithms to efficiently verify the compliance of network behavior to the requirements. Our experiments show that ConfVS can validate thousands of network devices configured by millions rules with ten times improved efficiency when compared to several well-known existing solutions

Network Configuration in A Box: Towards End-to-End Verification of Network Reachability and Security

Abstract — Recent studies show that configurations of network access control is one of the most complex and error prone network management tasks. For this reason, network misconfiguration becomes the main source for network unreachablility and vulnerability problems. In this paper, we present a novel approach that models the global end-to-end behavior of access control configurations of the entire network including routers, IPSec, firewalls, and NAT for unicast and multicast packets. Our model represents the network as a state machine where the packet header and location determines the state. The transitions in this model are determined by packet header information, packet location, and policy semantics for the devices being modeled. We encode the semantics of access control policies with Boolean functions using binary decision diagrams (BDDs). We then use computation tree logic (CTL) and symbolic model checking to investigate all future and past states of this packet in the network and verify network reachability and security requirements. Thus, our contributions in this work is the global encoding for network configurations that allows for general reachability and security property-based verification using CTL model checking. We have implemented our approach in a tool called ConfigChecker. While evaluating ConfigChecker, we modeled and verified network configurations with thousands of devices and millions of configuration rules, thus demonstrating the scalability of this approach. I

Valproic Acid as a Potential Inhibitor of Plasmodium falciparum Histone Deacetylase 1 (PfHDAC1): An in Silico Approach

A new Plasmodium falciparum histone deacetylase1 (PfHDAC1) homology model was built based on the highest sequence identity available template human histone deacetylase 2 structure. The generated model was carefully evaluated for stereochemical accuracy, folding correctness and overall structure quality. All evaluations were acceptable and consistent. Docking a group of hydroxamic acid histone deacetylase inhibitors and valproic acid has shown binding poses that agree well with inhibitor-bound histone deacetylase-solved structural interactions. Docking affinity dG scores were in agreement with available experimental binding affinities. Further, enzyme-ligand complex stability and reliability were investigated by running 5-nanosecond molecular dynamics simulations. Thorough analysis of the simulation trajectories has shown that enzyme-ligand complexes were stable during the simulation period. Interestingly, the calculated theoretical binding energies of the docked hydroxamic acid inhibitors have shown that the model can discriminate between strong and weaker inhibitors and agrees well with the experimental affinities reported in the literature. The model and the docking methodology can be used in screening virtual libraries for PfHDAC1 inhibitors, since the docking scores have ranked ligands in accordance with experimental binding affinities. Valproic acid calculated theoretical binding energy suggests that it may inhibit PfHDAC1