A Salient Based Bag of Visual Word model (SBBoVW): improvements toward difficult object recognition and object location in image retrieval

Object recognition and object location have always drawn much interest. Also, recently various computational models have been designed. One of the big issues in this domain is the lack of an appropriate model for extracting important part of the picture and estimating the object place in the same environments that caused low accuracy. To solve this problem, a new Salient Based Bag of Visual Word (SBBoVW) model for object recognition and object location estimation is presented. Contributions lied in the present study are two-fold. One is to introduce a new approach, which is a Salient Based Bag of Visual Word model (SBBoVW) to recognize difficult objects that have had low accuracy in previous methods. This method integrates SIFT features of the original and salient parts of pictures and fuses them together to generate better codebooks using bag of visual word method. The second contribution is to introduce a new algorithm for finding object place based on the salient map automatically. The performance evaluation on several data sets proves that the new approach outperforms other state-of-the-arts

Mapping 123 million neonatal, infant and child deaths between 2000 and 2017

Since 2000, many countries have achieved considerable success in improving child survival, but localized progress remains unclear. To inform efforts towards United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 3.2—to end preventable child deaths by 2030—we need consistently estimated data at the subnational level regarding child mortality rates and trends. Here we quantified, for the period 2000–2017, the subnational variation in mortality rates and number of deaths of neonates, infants and children under 5 years of age within 99 low- and middle-income countries using a geostatistical survival model. We estimated that 32% of children under 5 in these countries lived in districts that had attained rates of 25 or fewer child deaths per 1,000 live births by 2017, and that 58% of child deaths between 2000 and 2017 in these countries could have been averted in the absence of geographical inequality. This study enables the identification of high-mortality clusters, patterns of progress and geographical inequalities to inform appropriate investments and implementations that will help to improve the health of all populations

Global, regional, and national cancer incidence, mortality, years of life lost, years lived with disability, and disability-Adjusted life-years for 29 cancer groups, 1990 to 2017 : A systematic analysis for the global burden of disease study

Importance: Cancer and other noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) are now widely recognized as a threat to global development. The latest United Nations high-level meeting on NCDs reaffirmed this observation and also highlighted the slow progress in meeting the 2011 Political Declaration on the Prevention and Control of Noncommunicable Diseases and the third Sustainable Development Goal. Lack of situational analyses, priority setting, and budgeting have been identified as major obstacles in achieving these goals. All of these have in common that they require information on the local cancer epidemiology. The Global Burden of Disease (GBD) study is uniquely poised to provide these crucial data. Objective: To describe cancer burden for 29 cancer groups in 195 countries from 1990 through 2017 to provide data needed for cancer control planning. Evidence Review: We used the GBD study estimation methods to describe cancer incidence, mortality, years lived with disability, years of life lost, and disability-Adjusted life-years (DALYs). Results are presented at the national level as well as by Socio-demographic Index (SDI), a composite indicator of income, educational attainment, and total fertility rate. We also analyzed the influence of the epidemiological vs the demographic transition on cancer incidence. Findings: In 2017, there were 24.5 million incident cancer cases worldwide (16.8 million without nonmelanoma skin cancer [NMSC]) and 9.6 million cancer deaths. The majority of cancer DALYs came from years of life lost (97%), and only 3% came from years lived with disability. The odds of developing cancer were the lowest in the low SDI quintile (1 in 7) and the highest in the high SDI quintile (1 in 2) for both sexes. In 2017, the most common incident cancers in men were NMSC (4.3 million incident cases); tracheal, bronchus, and lung (TBL) cancer (1.5 million incident cases); and prostate cancer (1.3 million incident cases). The most common causes of cancer deaths and DALYs for men were TBL cancer (1.3 million deaths and 28.4 million DALYs), liver cancer (572000 deaths and 15.2 million DALYs), and stomach cancer (542000 deaths and 12.2 million DALYs). For women in 2017, the most common incident cancers were NMSC (3.3 million incident cases), breast cancer (1.9 million incident cases), and colorectal cancer (819000 incident cases). The leading causes of cancer deaths and DALYs for women were breast cancer (601000 deaths and 17.4 million DALYs), TBL cancer (596000 deaths and 12.6 million DALYs), and colorectal cancer (414000 deaths and 8.3 million DALYs). Conclusions and Relevance: The national epidemiological profiles of cancer burden in the GBD study show large heterogeneities, which are a reflection of different exposures to risk factors, economic settings, lifestyles, and access to care and screening. The GBD study can be used by policy makers and other stakeholders to develop and improve national and local cancer control in order to achieve the global targets and improve equity in cancer care. © 2019 American Medical Association. All rights reserved.Peer reviewe

Global burden and strength of evidence for 88 risk factors in 204 countries and 811 subnational locations, 1990–2021: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2021

Background: Understanding the health consequences associated with exposure to risk factors is necessary to inform public health policy and practice. To systematically quantify the contributions of risk factor exposures to specific health outcomes, the Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries, and Risk Factors Study (GBD) 2021 aims to provide comprehensive estimates of exposure levels, relative health risks, and attributable burden of disease for 88 risk factors in 204 countries and territories and 811 subnational locations, from 1990 to 2021. Methods: The GBD 2021 risk factor analysis used data from 54 561 total distinct sources to produce epidemiological estimates for 88 risk factors and their associated health outcomes for a total of 631 risk–outcome pairs. Pairs were included on the basis of data-driven determination of a risk–outcome association. Age-sex-location-year-specific estimates were generated at global, regional, and national levels. Our approach followed the comparative risk assessment framework predicated on a causal web of hierarchically organised, potentially combinative, modifiable risks. Relative risks (RRs) of a given outcome occurring as a function of risk factor exposure were estimated separately for each risk–outcome pair, and summary exposure values (SEVs), representing risk-weighted exposure prevalence, and theoretical minimum risk exposure levels (TMRELs) were estimated for each risk factor. These estimates were used to calculate the population attributable fraction (PAF; ie, the proportional change in health risk that would occur if exposure to a risk factor were reduced to the TMREL). The product of PAFs and disease burden associated with a given outcome, measured in disability-adjusted life-years (DALYs), yielded measures of attributable burden (ie, the proportion of total disease burden attributable to a particular risk factor or combination of risk factors). Adjustments for mediation were applied to account for relationships involving risk factors that act indirectly on outcomes via intermediate risks. Attributable burden estimates were stratified by Socio-demographic Index (SDI) quintile and presented as counts, age-standardised rates, and rankings. To complement estimates of RR and attributable burden, newly developed burden of proof risk function (BPRF) methods were applied to yield supplementary, conservative interpretations of risk–outcome associations based on the consistency of underlying evidence, accounting for unexplained heterogeneity between input data from different studies. Estimates reported represent the mean value across 500 draws from the estimate's distribution, with 95% uncertainty intervals (UIs) calculated as the 2·5th and 97·5th percentile values across the draws. Findings: Among the specific risk factors analysed for this study, particulate matter air pollution was the leading contributor to the global disease burden in 2021, contributing 8·0% (95% UI 6·7–9·4) of total DALYs, followed by high systolic blood pressure (SBP; 7·8% [6·4–9·2]), smoking (5·7% [4·7–6·8]), low birthweight and short gestation (5·6% [4·8–6·3]), and high fasting plasma glucose (FPG; 5·4% [4·8–6·0]). For younger demographics (ie, those aged 0–4 years and 5–14 years), risks such as low birthweight and short gestation and unsafe water, sanitation, and handwashing (WaSH) were among the leading risk factors, while for older age groups, metabolic risks such as high SBP, high body-mass index (BMI), high FPG, and high LDL cholesterol had a greater impact. From 2000 to 2021, there was an observable shift in global health challenges, marked by a decline in the number of all-age DALYs broadly attributable to behavioural risks (decrease of 20·7% [13·9–27·7]) and environmental and occupational risks (decrease of 22·0% [15·5–28·8]), coupled with a 49·4% (42·3–56·9) increase in DALYs attributable to metabolic risks, all reflecting ageing populations and changing lifestyles on a global scale. Age-standardised global DALY rates attributable to high BMI and high FPG rose considerably (15·7% [9·9–21·7] for high BMI and 7·9% [3·3–12·9] for high FPG) over this period, with exposure to these risks increasing annually at rates of 1·8% (1·6–1·9) for high BMI and 1·3% (1·1–1·5) for high FPG. By contrast, the global risk-attributable burden and exposure to many other risk factors declined, notably for risks such as child growth failure and unsafe water source, with age-standardised attributable DALYs decreasing by 71·5% (64·4–78·8) for child growth failure and 66·3% (60·2–72·0) for unsafe water source. We separated risk factors into three groups according to trajectory over time: those with a decreasing attributable burden, due largely to declining risk exposure (eg, diet high in trans-fat and household air pollution) but also to proportionally smaller child and youth populations (eg, child and maternal malnutrition); those for which the burden increased moderately in spite of declining risk exposure, due largely to population ageing (eg, smoking); and those for which the burden increased considerably due to both increasing risk exposure and population ageing (eg, ambient particulate matter air pollution, high BMI, high FPG, and high SBP). Interpretation: Substantial progress has been made in reducing the global disease burden attributable to a range of risk factors, particularly those related to maternal and child health, WaSH, and household air pollution. Maintaining efforts to minimise the impact of these risk factors, especially in low SDI locations, is necessary to sustain progress. Successes in moderating the smoking-related burden by reducing risk exposure highlight the need to advance policies that reduce exposure to other leading risk factors such as ambient particulate matter air pollution and high SBP. Troubling increases in high FPG, high BMI, and other risk factors related to obesity and metabolic syndrome indicate an urgent need to identify and implement interventions

Effective salience-based fusion model for image retrieval

Recently Bag of Visual Words (BoVW) has shown promising results for image annotation and retrieval tasks. In the traditional BoVW model, all visual words are collected and treated the same, regardless of whether or not they are from an important part or the background of a picture. Traditional Scale Invariant Feature Transform (SIFT) features have no spatial information; therefore, the recognition of diffcult objects requires more attention. The first objective of this thesis was to develop a new BoVW model, the Salient Based Bag of Visual Word (SBBoVW) model, to recognize diffcult objects that previous methods were unable to accurately identify. This new model collects visual words based on their importance and combines several Pyramidal Histogram of visual Words (PHOW) feature vectors from the salient, rectangular part of a picture, as well as from the whole picture, to overcome the above-mentioned problem. After implementation, it was found that this method of feature extraction affects the accuracy of the results, which were more accurate than results obtained using seven other state-of-the-art models. However, the SBBoVW model focused only on gray-scale pictures.Previous research found that integrating color, significantly improved the overall performance of both feature detection and extraction because color is an important characteristic of human vision. Based on the literature, most of the image classification strategies have been developed for gray-based SIFT descriptors. Since color content is ignored, misclassification may occur. The Dominant Color Descriptor (DCD) is the best color descriptor for region color and the focus of improvements because it is a low-dimensional or less expensive descriptor representing colors in images. The DCD uses one to eight colors for each picture, and one to four colors for each region. However, some background colors are not used in the object of an image. Therefore, the second objective of this research was to establish a new Salient Dominant Color Descriptor (SDCD) to estimate the number of colors in a salient region using an easily implemented algorithm. Based on the results, it was found that if the maximum Euclidean color distance (dmax) was set to 20, as suggested by other researchers, more accurate results were obtained.The DCD is both low-dimensional and less expensive for representing image colors compared to the previous BoVW model that concentrated on the Color Scale Invariant Feature Transform (CSIFT), combinations of color SIFTs extracted from different color spaces, and opponent-color SIFTs extracted from opponent color spaces to add color information to a SIFT. Therefore, the final objective of this research was to develop a late fusion model, the SDCD BoVW and SBBoVW model. This model fuses the SDCD BoVW, and SBBoVW models using late fusion from histograms and is a comprehensive model for color object recognition. After implementation, the final proposed model provided more accurate results than the other three state-of-the-art models mentioned here and 19 additional color feature extraction methods

The Role of Social and Familial Factors as Predicting Factors Related to Hookah and Cigarette Smoking among Adolescents in Jahrom, South of Iran

Background: Tobacco and hookah smoking is a worldwide problem among adolescents. The present study aimed to determine familial and social factors in predicting the tobacco and hookah smoking among high school students in Jahrom, South of Iran. Materials and Methods: This cross-sectional study was conducted for assessing the factors affecting hookah and cigarette smoking among high school students during January to April 2015. The participants were 630 high school students (girls=315 and boys=315). The self-administered questionnaire containingstudents’ demographics, parent education, family sizes, tobacco using, tobacco using of the family, hookah smoking, and hookah smoking in the family was used. Multiple logistic regression (MLR) models using the Enter method were fitted to assess the factors that increased or decreased the risk of smoking. Results: The risk of cigarette smoking was increased with: cigarette smoking by sister (s) or brother (s) (36.8 [95% confidence interval(CI) (1.28-105)]; P=0.03), hookah smoking by mother (6.64 [95%CI (1.28-34.2)]; P=0.02), hookah smoking by father (OR: 5.33 [95%CI:1.88-15.07; P=0.02 ]), hookah smoking by mother (OR: 29.53 [95%CI:10.26-85.01,

Checklist development for assessing the dental students\' clinical skills in oral and maxillofacial medicine course and comparison with global rating

Background and Aims: The objective of this study was the development of a checklist for assessment of students’ clinical skills in the clinical oral medicine. The second aim was the assessment of stake holders’ satisfaction of this checklist in comparison to the routine global rating method. Materials and Methods: The checklist was developed in an expert panel sessions and the validity and reliability of checklist were assessed by CVI and test-retest method, respectively. All students (n=66) were assessed in 2 groups, one with developed checklist and another with global rating. At the end of the session, the satisfaction’s level of staff and students were analysized using Wilcoxon and Mann-Whitney test and the mean scores of students were analysized using Paired T test. Results: Content validity index (CV I) of checklist was 0.88. Reliability of checklist confirmed with high correlation coefficient (0.9). Staffs’ satisfaction had no significant difference between the two methods (Wilcoxon P=0.06). The mean score of students who assessed by checklist was higher than global rating with no significant differences (P=0.06). Conclusion: Regarding the higher students’ satisfaction from checklist and more attention to component of assessment and more objectivity of this method and also higher score in checklist, it seems that the use of a checklist is more proper method for assessing the students’ clinical skills

Comparative Efficacy of Topical Curcumin and Triamcinolone for Oral Lichen Planus: A Randomized, Controlled Clinical Trial

Objectives: Lichen planus (LP) is a chronic inflammatory mucocutaneous disease. Its treatment is often symptomatic and includes topical and systemic corticosteroids. Although corticosteroid therapy is usually successful, it has side effects and thus, an alternative treatment is favorable. The aim of this study was to compare the efficacy of topical curcumin and triamcinolone for treatment of oral lichen planus (OLP).  Materials and Methods: In this study, 50 patients (36 women and 14 men) in the age range of 38 to 73 years with OLP were randomly divided into two groups. Each group received 0.1% triamcinolone or 5% curcumin oral paste three times a day for four weeks. Assessment of the appearance score and severity of pain was done at baseline and at the end of two and four weeks and recorded in the patients’ questionnaires. The data were analyzed by SPSS 17 software, using the Mann-Whitney and Spearman’s tests. Results: With respect to pain reduction, nine patients (36%) in the curcumin group and eight patients (32%) in the triamcinolone group showed complete remission. With respect to the appearance score, one patient (4%) in each group showed complete remission. No statistically significant difference was noted between the two groups. Conclusion: Application of curcumin is suggested for treatment of OLP because of its desirable anti-inflammatory effects and insignificant side effects

Mapping routine measles vaccination in low- and middle-income countries

The safe, highly effective measles vaccine has been recommended globally since 1974, yet in 2017 there were more than 17 million cases of measles and 83,400 deaths in children under 5 years old, and more than 99% of both occurred in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs)1–4. Globally comparable, annual, local estimates of routine first-dose measles-containing vaccine (MCV1) coverage are critical for understanding geographically precise immunity patterns, progress towards the targets of the Global Vaccine Action Plan (GVAP), and high-risk areas amid disruptions to vaccination programmes caused by coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19)5–8. Here we generated annual estimates of routine childhood MCV1 coverage at 5 × 5-km2 pixel and second administrative levels from 2000 to 2019 in 101 LMICs, quantified geographical inequality and assessed vaccination status by geographical remoteness. After widespread MCV1 gains from 2000 to 2010, coverage regressed in more than half of the districts between 2010 and 2019, leaving many LMICs far from the GVAP goal of 80% coverage in all districts by 2019. MCV1 coverage was lower in rural than in urban locations, although a larger proportion of unvaccinated children overall lived in urban locations; strategies to provide essential vaccination services should address both geographical contexts. These results provide a tool for decision-makers to strengthen routine MCV1 immunization programmes and provide equitable disease protection for all children