To study the association between initial fetal crown-rump length and subsequent abortion in a viable first trimester pregnancy

Background: Ultrasonography is one of the most important and useful diagnostic tool in the field of modern medicine. In the 1st trimester fetal crown rump length correlates closely with gestational age and is often used as the gold standard for dates. It provides the most accurate estimate of gestational age and crown rump length at 6-10 weeks predicts the due date with an accuracy of ±3 days. The objective of the study is to study the association between initial fetal crown-rump length (CRL) and subsequent abortion in a viable first trimester pregnancy.Methods: Hospital based analytic type of observational study was conducted in a tertiary care maternity hospital. The recruited participants were young pregnant women at 6-10 weeks of viable gestation. Transvaginal ultrasonography was performed to determine pregnancy viability and measure the embryonic CRL.75 first trimester pregnancy cases with normal initial crown-rump-length and 75 first trimester pregnancy cases with deficit initial crown-rump-length were taken. The deviation of observed and expected CRL was calculated and expressed in standard deviations (SD) as Z- score. The primary outcome measure was the percentage of pregnancies with antecedent growth delay that aborted by the end of the first trimester.Results: In 150 women who met with the inclusion criteria, the pregnancy remained viable in 97 (64.66%) and 53 (35.34%) suffered abortion. At the first transvaginal ultrasound, the mean Z- score for CRL was significantly lower in pregnancies that subsequently aborted compared to pregnancies that remained viable (-0.613 vs 0.335 , respectively, P <0.001). Among 75 cases of normal CRL 65 (86.67%) remained viable and 10 (13.33%) aborted and in deficit CRL 32 (42.67%) cases remained viable and 43 (57.33%) aborted. Out of 53 pregnancies which aborted 43 (81.13%) had deficit CRL. Significant difference was present (P <0.001, significant).Conclusions: We infer that a deficit in initial fetal CRL in a viable first trimester pregnancy has a significant positive association with subsequent abortion. With increasing deviation of observed CRL from the expected CRL the risk of subsequent abortion increases

Alzheimer's Disease – Not an Exaggeration of Healthy Aging

The world population is becoming older now. The boom of the elderly population comes from public health efforts to improve living conditions and prevent disease, and from improved medical interventions. People more than 65-year-old who are representing 12.9% of the population now is expected to grow to be 19% of the population by 2030. Very few numbers of diseases will have such socioeconomic burden on society in the newer world. Although Alzheimer's disease (AD) has been studied very well recently, still its exact etiopathogenesis is unknown. Currently there are no available tests for the definitive diagnosis of AD. So the clinical diagnosis of AD remains a diagnosis of exclusion. This limits the potential for early intervention. The difference between normal degenerative processes of brain and preclinical changes of AD is a gray zone and there is no particular way to distinguish between the two. Now several modalities like functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), positron emission tomography (PET) scan, electrophysiological tests and cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) biomarkers for tauopathy and Aβ have shown to be promising in the development of early diagnostic tools for neurodegenerative changes and help us to differentiate between healthy aging and pathological aging. In this article we tried to discuss about the differences between pathological and physiological aging process from radiological, pathological, biochemical, and electrophysiological point of view. However, differentiating between physiological and pathological dementia still remains a challenge

Unusual complication of dental extraction: Lingual abscess

Acute lingual swelling is a potentially life threatening clinical condition which is encountered very rarely, the differential diagnosis of which includes hemorrhage, infarction, abscess, tumor and edema. Herein we report a case of lingual abscess that presented with acute tongue swelling and respiratory distress after extraction of lower two incisor teeth

Estratégias de adaptação e injúrias demonstradas por plantas sob diferentes condições ambientais: uma curta revisãoe

A wide variety of favorable or disadvantageous external conditions affect the growth, development and productivity of plants. Plants cannot avoid adverse environmental conditions (such as soil salinity, drought, heat, cold, flooding, heavy metal contamination, predators and pathogen infections) due to their sessile nature. Nature¿s wrath in the form of various biotic and abiotic stress factors adversely affect plant growth and productivity causing the loss of crop yield. These abiotic and biotic stress factors are a threat for plants, prevent them from reaching their full genetic potential and limit crop productivity worldwide. Stress cause injury, disease or aberrant physiology by imposing a constraint or highly unpredictable fluctuations on regular metabolic patterns of plants. These fluctuations are mainly associated with altered metabolic functions; one of those is either loss of or reduced synthesis of photosynthetic pigments. This results in declined light harvesting and generation of reducing powers, which are a source of energy for dark reactions of photosynthesis. Thus, this review article describes some induced changes in morphological, physiological and pigments composition in crops due to stresses and research progress in plant responses to abiotic stresses and biotic stresses is summarized from the physiological level to the molecular level

Late-onset neonatal sepsis: Overview of risk factors and bacterial etiology in a tertiary care hospital in North India

Background: Septicemia in neonates is one of the leading causes of mortality. The increasing number of multidrug-resistant pathogens is a serious concern. With this background, this study was done to evaluate the risk factors of late-onset sepsis (LOS) (community- and hospital-acquired infections) in newborns and to determine the antibiotic resistance pattern of the isolates in these infections. Materials and Methods: This retrospective study was conducted at Sarojini Naidu Medical College, Agra, on newborns admitted between August 2015 and January 2016. Newborns with the final diagnosis of sepsis obtained from the case records during the study period were included in the study. Those newborns with positive blood culture results were included in the study. Clinical details and antibiotic sensitivity of the isolates were also obtained from the records. Results: Sixty-eight newborns with LOS (38 community- and 30 hospital-acquired infections) were included in the study. Staphylococcus and Klebsiella were the most common bacteriological isolates for both community- and hospital-acquired infection cases in 36%, 26% and 26%, 33.3%, respectively. Home delivery (52.6%) and faulty breastfeeding were (57.8%) seen in significantly larger numbers in community-acquired infections (P = 0.03 and 0.01, respectively) whereas invasive procedures such as intubation were seen in 40% of nosocomial infections as compared to only 5.2% of community-acquired infections. Antibiotic susceptibility pattern in both the infections was similar. Staphylococcus aureus was susceptible to vancomycin in 100% cases while high resistance was seen for ampicillin in both the groups. Similarly, gentamicin was found to be resistant in both the groups for Klebsiella while imipenem was susceptible in 100% cases. Conclusion: Both community- and hospital-acquired infections had similar isolates and antibiotic susceptibility pattern; however, the risk factors associated with both the infections differed