Cephalometric Mandibular Dimensions in Growing Turkish Children: Trends of Change, Sex-Specific Differences, and Comparisons with Published Norms

Objective: The aims of this study were to investigate cephalometric mandibular dimensions in growing Anatolian Turkish children and to identify the periods of rapid growth for boys and girls. Furthermore, the secondary aim was to compare obtained values with published standards in the literature.Methods: A total of 528 pretreatment lateral cephalometric radiographs, grouped according to age and sex, were analyzed. Effective mandibular length, ramus height, and corpus lengths were comparatively evaluated within age groups for boys and girls and between sexes for the same age group. Data acquired from this study were compared with American, Canadian, Chinese, and European norms. Growth curves for mandible were constructed for each sex group.Results: Effective mandibular length was almost always significantly longer in boys, except for 9- and 12-year-age groups. Effective mandibular length in girls increased significantly between ages 8 and 10, 10 and 12, and 11 and 13 years, while in boys between ages 8 and 10, 9 and 11, and 13 and 15 years. Turkish girls had significantly shorter effective mandibular lengths than American girls at age 14. No significant difference was found between Turkish and Chinese girls and boys. Turkish girls and boys had significantly shorter corpus lengths from their Norwegian counterparts at age 12.Conclusion: Except for 9- and 12-year-age groups, effective mandibular length was almost always significantly longer in boys compared to the girls. It is suggested to use norm values from more recently conducted studies and which are representative of the studied population. Growth curves can be used to predict the approximate mandibular dimensions at a particular age

A model to investigate effects of competition on the level of remanufacturability

EFFECTS OF COMPETITION ON PRODUCT RECOVERY DECISIONSZ. Pelin Bayindir, Can Baris Cetin, Ismail Serdar BakalOne of the commonly implemented value recovery method is remanufacturing. Remanufacturability of end-of-life product is proportional to its remanufacturability level, which is set at the beginning of life cycle of the product by the original equipment manufacturer (OEM). Firms can make remanufacturing at the later periods of product’s life cycle since end of life products should be accumulated. Another issue is not knowing which returned items are suitable for remanufacturing operations, i.e., sorting information is not readily available, hence remanufacturing process to have yield loss. When the original product is designed and produced for remanufacturing, other firms also engage in remanufacturing. These are called independent remanufacturers (IR). As a result, competition arise in the remanufactured product market. The design decisions by OEM affect IR’s remanufacturing process efficiency as well. In this study, we have the following main research questions: 1.What are the equilibrium manufacturing quantity, remanufacturability level and remanufacturing quantities of OEM and IR? 2.How does the following affect the economic and environmental performances of OEM and IR? a)entry of a competitor in remanufactured product market, b)availability of sorting information c)OEM ignoring a potential entrant. In order to gain insights on these, we introduce several stylized models. We consider a two-period setting. In the first period, the OEM determines the level of investment on the remanufacturability of the product and the number of new products to manufacture. In the second period, a certain fraction of manufactured items by OEM are shared by OEM and IR and thy determines number of units to remanufacture. The yield of the remanufacturing process depends on the investment made by the OEM. A quantity sensitive price function is used. We build models for both monopolistic and duopolistic settings with and without perfect sorting information. Our results reveal that competition has negative effects on profits. Sorting information increases the profits unless it is available for only OEM. Effects of competition and sorting information to environmental performance is sensitive to the problem parameters. Lack of competition awareness of OEM always decreases OEM’s profit and always increases remanufacturability investment

Characteristics and outcomes of COVID-19 patients with IPF: A multi-center retrospective study.

BACKGROUND: : There are few data on severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) (COVID-19) infection in patients with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF). The objective of this study is to describe the characteristics and outcomes of IPF patients confirmed COVID-19 infection. METHODS: : In this retrospective, multi-center, cohort study, patients from 4 hospital medical records with known IPF and a COVID-19 diagnosis were identified. Demographic and clinical outcome data were abstracted through a review of electronic medical records. RESULTS: : Records for 46 patients with IPF and COVID-19 were abstracted. The mean age was 65±10 years. The most common symptom was dyspnea, followed by fever and cough. Ground-glass opacities (n=35, 83.3%) and consolidations (n=11, 26.1%) were the main imaging features of the disease in thorax computed tomography (CT). Twenty-four patients (52.1%) required hospitalization. Among the hospitalized patients, 16 (66.6%) were admitted to the intensive care unit (ICU), and 10 (41.6%) underwent invasive mechanical ventilation. Thirteen patients (28.2%) died of COVID-19 complications. Mortality rate was significantly associated with lower DLCO/VA, long term oxygen therapy and consolidation finding on CT of thorax (p<0.05). On multivariable analysis, neither factor was associated with hospitalization or mortality. CONCLUSIONS: : IPF patients represent a vulnerable population for COVID-19, according to the high rate of hospitalization, ICU requirement and mortality rate. Measures to minimize the risk of COVID-19 infection remain key to protect IPF patients

Cinsiyet Tayininde Rugaların Kullanımı: Bir Ön Çalışma

Amaç: Çalışmanın amacı, Anadolu popülasyonundaki palatal ruga örneklerini, sayı, uzunluk, şekil, yan dallarıyla birleşme ve yerleşim yönleri açısından incelemek, cinsiyetlere göre dağılımını belirlemek, palatal rugaların adli vakalarda ve afet kurbanlarının kimliklendirilmesinde cinsiyet tayini için kullanılabilirliğini sorgulamaktır. Gereç ve Yöntem: Çalışma, 248 bireye ait üst çene modelindeki rugalar Thomas-Kotze ve Kapali sınıflama sistemi kullanılarak değerlendirildi, erkek ve kadınlardaki ruga tiplerinin istatistiksel analizi yapıldı. Veri analizinde SPSS (17.0) versiyonu ve Pearson Chi-Square, Fisher’ın Kesin Testi ve Mann-Whitney U analizleri kullanıldı. Bulgular: Çalışmada, 132 kadın (%53,2), 116 erkek (%46,8) 248 bireye ait 2367 ruga değerlendirildi. Yapılan analizler sonucunda; ruga sayısı üzerinde cinsiyetin etkili bir faktör olmadığı, ruga toplam sayısının kadınlarda 6-15 erkeklerde ise 5-18 arasında değiştiği, cinsiyet gruplarında toplam ruga sayısı dağılımı açısından istatistiksel olarak anlamlı bir fark bulunmadığı (p=0,161) belirlendi. Ruga uzunluğu ile cinsiyet arasında (p=0,526), ruga şekli ile cinsiyet arasında (p=0,672), ruga yan dallarının birleşme şekilleriyle cinsiyet arasında (p=0,189) ve ruga yerleşim yönleri ile cinsiyet arasında (p>0,05) istatistiksel açıdan anlamlı bir bağımlılık olmadığı belirlendi. Sonuç: Değerlendirme sonunda en sık rastlanan ruga tiplerinin; uzunluk açısından birincil, şekil açısından da kavisli tip ruga olduğu belirlendi. Rugaların hiçbir tipinde seksüel dimorfizm saptanmadı. Bu sonuç, rugaların adli vakalarda cinsiyet tayini için yardımcı bir yöntem olarak kullanılabilmesi için olanak sağlamadığını, farklı bölgelerde ve daha büyük örneklem gruplarıyla çalışmanın tekrarlanmasının gerekliliği göstermektedir

Elderly idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis patients remain on therapy despite higher incidence of adverse events and dose reductions

Background: Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) predominantly affects people over the age of 60 years and its incidence increases with age. Limited data is available on the use of antifibrotics in the elderly IPF population. We aimed to examine the tolerability and safety of antifibrotics (pirfenidone, nintedanib) in elderly patients with IPF in a real-world setting. Methods: Medical records of 284 elderly (≥75 years) and 446 non-elderly IPF patients (<75 years) were retrospectively analyzed in this multi-center study. Patient characteristics, treatments, adverse events (AEs), tolerability, hospitalizations, exacerbations, and mortality were compared between the elderly and non-elderly group. Results: In the elderly group, the mean age was 79 years and the mean antifibrotic treatment duration was 26.1 months. The most commonly reported AEs were weight loss, loss of appetite and nausea. Elderly IPF patients had a significantly higher incidence of AEs (62.9% vs. 55.1%, p = 0.039) and dose reductions (27.4% vs. 18.1%, p = 0.003) than the non-elderly did, but the rate of discontinuation of antifibrotics was not different between groups (13% vs. 10.8%, p = 0.352). In addition, the severity of the disease, frequency of hospitalizations, exacerbations, and mortality rates were higher in elderly patients. Conclusion: The present study showed that elderly IPF patients experienced significantly increased AEs and dose reductions due to antifibrotic use, while the discontinuation rates of the drugs were similar to those of drugs used by non-elderly patients