Impact of Changes in Reserve Requirement on Banks Profitability: A Case of Commercial Banks in Pakistan

This study examines the relationship between Reserve Requirement Ratio and Banks Profitability in Pakistan. It emphasizes on the effect of changes in CRR on commercial banking profitability and how it affects the ROE and ROA. The data collected for the research was secondary and quantitative time series data for the ten year period 2005-2014. Using correlation analysis followed by Linear Regression carries the empirical analysis of the study. The finding of study reveal that CRR taken as measure for Reserve Requirement has significant inverse relationship on banks’ financial performance, which is measured by ROA and ROE. Keywords: Reserve Requirement Ratio (RRR), Cash Reserve Ratio (CRR), Return on Assets (ROA), Return on Equity (ROE)

Vehicle to Vehicle Communication System for Smart Cities

A Vehicle-to-Vehicle (V2V) communication system for smart cities is proposed here. The V2V communication system is an advance wireless technology to reduce the number of fatal roadway accidents by providing early warning messages. For development of smart cities V2V and V2R are important to reduce road accidents on highways. It gives ease of access by providing different facilities such as ATM transaction, accidents safety messages to the transport or central unit. Based on a careful analysis of application requirements, an effective protocol can be used, which comprising congestion control policies, service differentiation mechanisms and methods for emergency warning dissemination. The proposed protocol achieves low latency in delivering emergency warnings and use of efficient bandwidth in stressful road scenarios. This system uses WSN for communication between two vehicle modules

Societal preferences for gender of surgeons: A cross-sectional study in the general population of Pakistan

Background: Sociocultural norms and gender biases may result in surgeon gender preferences among the general public. This study aimed to understand preferences and perceptions related to surgeon gender among the general population in Pakistan, a lower-middle-income country.Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted by the Aga Khan University, Karachi, among the adult general population in Pakistan. Sequential mixed-mode data collection was performed via online dissemination on social media platforms and in-person surveying at different geographic locations in Karachi.Results: Among 1604 respondents, 50% did not report having surgeon gender preferences in general. Among respondents with gender preferences, there was a highly significant preference for gender concordance across all surgical subspecialties (p Conclusion: While around half of respondents do not have gender preferences, a significant proportion prefers a gender concordant surgeon across subspecialties. In a society where conservative sociocultural norms play a significant role when seeking health care, this makes yet another compelling argument for gender parity in surgery

Service brand rehab: Diagnosing trust repair mechanisms

This paper aims to understand consumers’ response to the trust repair mechanisms adopted by corporate brands in a service sector context following prominent trust damaging organizational transgressions. Adopting a qualitative approach, six focus group discussions are employed to investigate three high profile consumer trust erosion cases within the service sector. Consumer trust varies by context. Despite the severity of trust damage, corporate brands can recover trust towards their brands amongst consumers not directly affected by transgressions. Not all trust repair mechanisms are equally applicable to all service contexts and re-branding could be used as a trust repair mechanism. Corporate brands in the service sector should focus on sense-making, relational approaches and transparency. Orchestration of trust repair mechanisms needs to be integrated within the trust rehabilitation processes. This study illustrates it is important to reconsider trust repair processes to accommodate context and integrate post-transgression consumer research. Successful corporate brand rehabilitation of consumer trust requires examination of the trustworthiness dimensions consumers express before and after the transgression to select the most appropriate trust repair mechanisms. Findings suggest organizations also have preventative trust repair management programs. This research is the first to empirically apply the conceptual framework of Bachmann et al. (2015) to explore consumer responses to the trust repair mechanisms adopted by corporate brands by context

Characterization of a pathogenic variant in the ABCD1 gene through protein molecular modeling

Background. The ATP-binding cassette, subfamily D, member 1 (ABCD1) protein is a peroxisomal half-transporter that allows for very long chain fatty acid (VLCFA) degradation. Pathogenic variants of ABCD1 cause VLCFAs to build up in various tissues and bodily fluids, resulting in a disorder called X-linked adrenoleukodystrophy (X-ALD). This disorder is most commonly marked by adrenocortical insufficiency and high VLCFA concentration, and has varying levels of neurological involvement depending on phenotype. For example, the Addison-only form of X-ALD has no neurological impact, while the cerebral form of X-ALD often causes severe sensory loss, motor function impairment, cognitive decline, and death. Methods. A newly characterized and suspected pathogenic variant in ABCD1 was analyzed using our protein informatics platform (PIP). Personalized protein-level molecular studies were completed on genetic testing data, complementing the analysis and clinical study. Results. A case of adult onset adrenomyeloneuropathy (AMN) and a novel ABCD1 variant are presented. The unique ABCD1 protein is discussed, and the proband’s case is compared to existing reports of AMN. Conclusions. Data fusion from multiple sources was combined in a comprehensive approach yielding an enriched assessment of the patient’s disease and prognosis. Molecular modeling was performed on the variant to better characterize its clinical significance and confirm pathogenicity

Eribulin treatment for patients with metastatic breast cancer:The United Kingdom experience - a multicenter retrospective study

Introduction: This study examined real-world data from patients who received eribulin for metastatic breast cancer (MBC) collected from 14 hospitals across the UK. Methods: Anonymized data were collected retrospectively from patients with MBC who had received eribulin. The data included the hormone-receptor status, histological diagnosis, age, prior chemotherapy, response to eribulin, progression-free survival (PFS), and overall survival (OS). Results: Among 577 patients analyzed, the median age was 56 years, and most patients (73%) were estrogen-receptor positive. The median OS was 288 days (95% confidence interval [CI]: 261–315), and the PFS was 117 days (95% CI: 105–129). The median OS was higher among older patients (≥65 vs. p = 0.028). The median OS was also higher in patients who received eribulin after fewer prior lines of chemotherapy (≤2 vs. >2 prior: 328 days [95% CI: 264–385] vs. 264 days [95% CI: 229–298]; p = 0.042). Discussion/Conclusion: These retrospective data suggest that eribulin can be successfully used in older patients with MBC. Eribulin treatment was more effective in earlier-line settings, which, while predictable, supports consideration of eribulin as a second-line treatment option. </p

Non-A Hepatitis B Virus Genotypes in Antenatal Clinics, United Kingdom

Serostatus for viral e antigen is no longer accurate for inferring potential infectivity of pregnant virus carriers

SLO-ML:A Language for Service Level Objective Modelling in Multi-cloud applications

Cloud modelling languages (CMLs) are designed to assist customers in tackling the diversity of services in the current cloud market. While many CMLs have been proposed in the literature, they lack practical support for automating the selection of services based on the specific service level objectives of a customer's application. We put forward SLO-ML, a novel and generative CML to capture service level requirements. Subsequently, SLO-ML selects the services to honour the customer's requirements and generates the deployment code appropriate to these services. We present the architectural design of SLO-ML and the associated broker that realises the deployment operations. We evaluate SLO-ML using an experimental case study with a group of researchers and developers using a real-world cloud application. We also assess SLO-ML's overheads through empirical scalability tests. We express the promises of SLO-ML in terms of gained productivity and experienced usability, and we highlight its limitations by analysing it as application requirements grow