PARENTS\u27 PERCEPTIONS AND PARENTAL STRESS RELATED OBESITY OF CHILDREN IN UNITED ARAB EMIRATES

Aim: This study aims to explore parents’ perception of obesity in children and stress related to obesity during childhood period in Emirate of Abu Dhabi in United Arab Emirates. Background: The prevalence of excess weight among children is increasing in both developed and developing countries. Overweight and obesity are leading cause of the most common health problems in children. The degree of parents’ perception about their child’s weight is likely to play a critical role in the development and management of childhood obesity. Greater parental perception and involvement is likely to encourage more active monitoring and controlling of child’s dietary intake, and a greater inclination to seek treatment for an obese child. Methods: A cross-sectional comparative descriptive design was utilized to collect the data from a convenience sample of 1097 parents of children from 37 government and private primary schools in Emirate of Abu Dhabi, Al Ain city, in United Arab Emirates. Results: Nearly 35% of parents were reported semi levels of obesity awareness, and most of the parents under estimated their children body weight, moreover parental stress level showed that about 32% of the parents had high parental stress. Around 70% of parents were very concerned about their child weight. There were a significant correlation between fathers (r=0.140, p\u3c0.001) and mothers’ age (r=0.167, p\u3c0.001) with children BMI, also there are correlation between fathers (r=-0.075, p\u3c0.05) and mothers (r=-0.080, p\u3c0.01) educational level and their children BMI, whereas there are no correlation between school category (r=0.001, p\u3e0.05) or working mothers (r=-0.015, p\u3e0.05) and children BMI. Parents showed high level of stress related their children’s body weight status; parents’ nationality and educational level effected their perception of obesity in children. Mothers showed higher stress than fathers due to their children weight status, parental stress levels were varied among the parents’ nationalities and level of education, children genders has no effect on parental perception level or parental stress level. Conclusion: Most of the parents perceive and aware of the causes of the obesity and its consequences in childhood, moreover most of the parents especially female parent had experienced psychological distress regarding their children body weight status more than fathers. The involvement and support of parents is essential to the success of any intervention aimed at prevention and management of obesity in young children as long as the parents has an adequate awareness and perception of obesity in childhood. Because parents who are aware of and concerned about their child’s weight might be willing to overcome the barriers and help their children maintain or achieve a healthy weight. Keywords: Obesity, Perception, Stress, Parents, Children, United Arab Emirates

Bilateral Deep Reinforcement Learning Approach for Better-than-human Car Following Model

In the coming years and decades, autonomous vehicles (AVs) will become increasingly prevalent, offering new opportunities for safer and more convenient travel and potentially smarter traffic control methods exploiting automation and connectivity. Car following is a prime function in autonomous driving. Car following based on reinforcement learning has received attention in recent years with the goal of learning and achieving performance levels comparable to humans. However, most existing RL methods model car following as a unilateral problem, sensing only the vehicle ahead. Recent literature, however, Wang and Horn [16] has shown that bilateral car following that considers the vehicle ahead and the vehicle behind exhibits better system stability. In this paper we hypothesize that this bilateral car following can be learned using RL, while learning other goals such as efficiency maximisation, jerk minimization, and safety rewards leading to a learned model that outperforms human driving. We propose and introduce a Deep Reinforcement Learning (DRL) framework for car following control by integrating bilateral information into both state and reward function based on the bilateral control model (BCM) for car following control. Furthermore, we use a decentralized multi-agent reinforcement learning framework to generate the corresponding control action for each agent. Our simulation results demonstrate that our learned policy is better than the human driving policy in terms of (a) inter-vehicle headways, (b) average speed, (c) jerk, (d) Time to Collision (TTC) and (e) string stability

Validation and Optimal Cut-Off Scores of the Bahasa Malaysia Version of the Montreal cognitive assessment (MoCA-BM) for mild cognitive impairment among community dwelling older adults in Malaysia

The goal of this study was to examine the reliability and validity of the Bahasa Malaysia version of the Montreal cognitive assessment (MoCA-BM) and to determine its optimal cut-off score among older adults with mild cognitive impairment (MCI), after adjustments for age, gender, levels of education, physical functioning and depressive symptoms. A total of 2237 community dwelling older adults aged 60 years and above were randomly selected for the study, excluding those with MMSE score below 14. Instruments administered were the MoCA-BM, the Malay Mini-Mental State Examination (MMMSE), the Rey Auditory Verbal Learning Test (RAVLT), the Digit Span and the Digit Symbol subtests of the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS), activities of daily living (ADL) and the Geriatric Depression Scale (GDS). MCI were determined using the Petersen’s 2014 criteria as the gold standard. SPSS version 22 was used for reliability and validity analysis and optimal cut-off score detection. Cronbach’s α of the MoCA-BM was 0.691 and concurrent validity was high between MoCA-BM and MMMSE scores (r=0.741). Optimal cut-off point for MoCA-BM to detect MCI among older adults in Malaysia was 17/18, with sensitivity of 68.2% and specificity of 61.3%. Using this cut-off, 38.9% of participants were detected to be at risk of MCI. In conclusion, MoCA-BM is a reliable and valid screening instrument for MCI among Malaysian elderly community. The newly derived optimal cut-off for MCI is much lower than the original MoCA with modest ability to discriminate between normal and MCI older adults in the community

Interaction of Hb South Florida (codon 1; GTG→ATG) and HbE, with β-thalassemia (IVS1-1; G→A): expression of different clinical phenotypes

Introduction: Interactions of different hemoglobin variants with thalassemia alleles can result in various clinical phenotypes. HbE-β-thalassemia generally manifests with severe anemia where individuals exhibit β-thalassemia major with regular blood transfusions or β-thalassemia intermedia with periodic blood transfusions. This study presents a unique Malay family with three β-globin gene defects—HbE, Hb South Florida, and IVS1-1 (G→A). Materials and methods: HbE activates a cryptic splice site that produces non-functional mRNAs. Hb South Florida is a rare β-hemoglobin variant, and its interactions with other β-thalassemia alleles have not been reported. IVS1-1 is a Mediterranean mutation that affects mRNA processing giving rise to βo-thalassemia. Results and discussion: Fifteen mutations along the β-globin gene complex were analyzed using the amplification refractory mutation system. Hb South Florida was identified by direct sequencing using genomic DNA Conclusion: The affected child with HbE/IVS1-1 produced a β-thalassemia major phenotype. Compound heterozygosity for Hb South Florida/IVS1-1 produced a β-thalassemia carrier phenotype in the mother

Pandangan golongan dewasa di daerah-daerah terpilih negeri Kedah terhadap hak kebebasan bersuara

On August 20, 2001, The Human Rights Commission of Malaysia better known as Suhakam, issued an official report on the handling by the police of a public assembly organised by opposition parties at Kesas Highway and Kebun Road on Novembers 5, 2000. The report pointed to the fact that there have been some human rights violation committed by the police in their handling of the assembly. The former Malaysian Prime Minister, Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohamad on the following day criticised the organisation and accused the report as "biased and influenced by western thought", and thus is against the national interest. In this context, the concept of freedom of speech during the assembly may be presumed as a "western idea" and thus may not be an appropriate concept to be practised in Malaysia. The aim of this article is to highlight the concept of freedom of speech in Malaysia, particularly in the state of Kedah, seen from various perspectives such as law, political culture,media, government and the society in general. The article is based on the findings of a study conducted on members of the public and private sectors,as well as members of the various trade unions in Kedah, namely in Alor Setar, Kubang Pasu, Sungai Petani and Pendang. The result of this study indicated that the people of Kedah are in favour ofa greater freedom of speech without any obstruction by thegovernment through legislative controls. The respondents believe that the existing rights should be expanded for the sake common interest. They however do not believe in absolutefreedom of speech.There should be some limitations imposed but they should not be as restrictive as they are now. Undoubtedly, there is a growing awareness among the population of the importance of the human rights andfreedom of expression concepts to be nurtured for democracy to work in a credible and more meaningful manner in this country

Preliminary study on antinociceptove effect of aqueous extract of Boesenbergia pandurata in formalin-induced nociception test in mice

Pain is an unpleasant sensation associated with body state dysfunction that negatively affects the productivity of patients. Non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) are commonly used as over-the-counter pain reliever medication due to its cost effectiveness. However, prolonged usage of NSAIDs usually accompanied with adverse side effects such as ulcer, nausea and even kidney failure. Hence, researchers are now focused on traditional herbal research to search for potential analgesic substances that are with minimal or no adverse effects. Boesenbergia pandurata，it is also known as temu kunci in Malaysia is a perennial herb that belongs to Zingiberaceae family. Boesenbergia pandurata is widely distributed in Southeast Asia and its rhizomes are commonly used as food ingredients or as traditional medicine to treat diseases conditions such as inflammation, cancer, and fungal infection. The aim of this study is to evaluate the inhibitory effect of aqueous extract of Boesenbergia pandurata (AEBP) on formalin-induced nociception test in mice. Mice were pre-treated with AEBP via intraperitoneal injection 30 min before challenged with intraplantar injection of formalin. It was demonstrated that intraperitoneal administration of AEBP at doses (0.3, 1, 3 and 10 mg/kg) produced significant antinociceptive response in both neurogenic and inflammatory phases of pain response induced by formalin. The findings indicated preliminary study on antinociceptive effect of AEBP, but further study should be conducted to explore the exact mechanism of pain inhibition by AEBP

Automobile adsorption air-conditioning system using oil palm biomass-based activated carbon: A review

Refrigeration and air-conditioning technology are required to evolve in accordance to Montreal Protocol adopted in 1987 and Kyoto Protocol in 1997. This regulation concerns about the climate change in an attempt to phase-out chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), followed by hydro chlorofluorocarbons (HCFCs) and then moving to 1,1,1,2-tetrafluoroethane (HFC-134a) starting 2011. This trend leads to a strong demand of new systems for air-conditioning, especially in automobile. Adsorption cooling system, among other proposed cooling technologies, has a very good potential for automobile applications. Hence, there exists a need for a creative design and innovation to allow adsorption technology to be practical for airconditioning in automobile in a near future. Oil palm shell-based activated carbon has been widely applied in various environmental pollution control technologies, mainly due to its high adsorption performance yet low cost. However, limited studies have been carried out on the characteristics and application of oil palm shell-based activated carbon in adsorption air-conditioning system. This paper is to present a comprehensive review on the past efforts in the field of adsorption air-conditioning systems for automobile. This work also aims to investigate the physicochemical properties of oil palm shell-based activated carbon and its feasibility for application in adsorption air-conditioning system. Some of the limitations are outlined and suggestions for future improvements are pointed out