Severity of Giardia infection associated with post-infectious fatigue and abdominal symptoms two years after

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>A high rate of post-infectious fatigue and abdominal symptoms two years after a waterborne outbreak of giardiasis in Bergen, Norway in 2004 has previously been reported. The aim of this report was to identify risk factors associated with such manifestations.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>All laboratory confirmed cases of giardiasis (n = 1262) during the outbreak in Bergen in 2004 received a postal questionnaire two years after. Degree of post-infectious abdominal symptoms and fatigue, as well as previous abdominal problems, was recorded. In the statistical analyses number of treatment courses, treatment refractory infection, delayed education and sick leave were used as indices of protracted and severe <it>Giardia </it>infection. Age, gender, previous abdominal problems and symptoms during infection were also analysed as possible risk factors. Simple and multiple ordinal logistic regression models were used for the analyses.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The response rate was 81% (1017/1262), 64% were women and median age was 31 years (range 3-93), compared to 61% women and 30 years (range 2-93) among all 1262 cases. Factors in multiple regression analysis significantly associated with abdominal symptoms two years after infection were: More than one treatment course, treatment refractory infection, delayed education, bloating and female gender. Abdominal problems prior to <it>Giardia </it>infection were not associated with post-infectious abdominal symptoms. More than one treatment course, delayed education, sick leave more than 2 weeks, and malaise at the time of infection, were significantly associated with fatigue in the multiple regression analysis, as were increasing age and previous abdominal problems.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Protracted and severe <it>giardiasis </it>seemed to be a risk factor for post-infectious fatigue and abdominal symptoms two years after clearing the <it>Giardia </it>infection.</p

Analyzing the effects of UAV mobility patterns on data collection in wireless sensor networks

Sensor nodes in a Wireless Sensor Network (WSN) can be dispersed over a remote sensing area (e.g., the regions that are hardly accessed by human beings). In such kinds of networks, datacollectionbecomesoneofthemajorissues. Getting connected to each sensor node and retrieving the information in time introduces new challenges. Mobile sink usage—especially Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs)—is the most convenient approach to covering the area and accessing each sensor node in such a large-scale WSN. However, the operation of the UAV depends on some parameters, such as endurance time, altitude, speed, radio type in use, and the path. In this paper, we explore various UAV mobility patterns that follow different paths to sweep the operation area in order to seek the best area coverage with the maximum number of covered nodes in the least amount of time needed by the mobile sink. We also introduce a new metric to formulate the tradeoff between maximizing the covered nodes and minimizing the operation time when choosing the appropriate mobility pattern. A realistic simulation environment is used in order to compare and evaluate the performance of the system. We present the performance results for the explored UAV mobility patterns. The results are very useful to present the tradeoff between maximizing the covered nodes and minimizing the operation time to choose the appropriate mobility pattern

The relations between attacks and menstrual periods and pregnancies of familial Mediterranean fever patients

Familial Mediterranean fever (FMF) is an autosomal recessive disease characterized by short lived, febrile serosal inflammatory attacks. Although majority of patients have random pattern of attacks, some reports described precipitating factors. There are also contradictory reports relating FMF attacks with menstruation and the natural course of their pregnancies. Seventy-two female patients with FMF with a mean age of 34.9 +/- 12.4 were interviewed. A standardized questionnaire was used inquiring any associations of FMF attacks of the patients with their menstruations and pregnancies. Thirty-eight patients (53%) reported that their attacks frequently coincided with their menstrual cycles and 17 patients noticed pleuritic chest pain in addition to their abdominal attacks. One patient experienced only febrile pleural attacks during her menstrual cycles. Unlike dysmenorrhoea, none of these patients' attacks responded to non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs. All of the patients could correctly differentiate their FMF attacks from dysmenorrhoea. Forty patients could give detailed information about the frequency and severity of their FMF attacks during 73 pregnancies: 25 patients (62.5%) experienced complete symptomatic remissions; the attacks were aggravated (7 patients), ameliorated (6 patients) or did not change (2 patients) in the rest of the pregnancies. Four patients continued to use colchicine during their pregnancies and delivered healthy babies. One patient gave birth to a child with Down's syndrome although she was not on colchicine therapy. Although FMF attacks and discomforts of menstrual cycles do overlap frequently, patients can easily differentiated them. Patients can be reasonably assured that the period of pregnancy will be comfortable but abstaining from colchicine should not be recommended. Gynecologists must be aware of FMF in the differential diagnosis of dysmenorrhoea or endometriosis