Prevalence and incidence of metabolic syndrome in a cohort of patients with rheumatoid arthritis : a correlation between body mass index and disease activity

Rheumatoid Arthritis (RA) is an inflammatory disease associated with high morbidity and increased cardiovascular disease, and Metabolic Syndrome (MS) is understood as a set of metabolic disorders that correlates with obesity and sedentary lifestyle. The aim of this study is to evaluate the prevalence of MS in a cohort of patients with RA and its correlation to specific factors of the disease. A retrospective cohort study was conducted with 283 patients with RA, followed at the Rheumatology Outpatient Clinic of the Hospital de Clínicas de Porto Alegre (HCPA) between 2008 and 2016; 187 continued to be followed and agreed to be reevaluated between January and November 2016. MS was defined according to the National Cholesterol Education Program and disease activity was assessed using the Disease Activity Score (DAS28). Clinical, biochemical, and anthropometric evaluations were conducted. The prevalence of MS in the first evaluation was 43.9% and, after 8 years, 59.4%. Increased waist circumference and blood pressures, elevated triglycerides and low High-Density Lipoprotein were the most frequent features of MS. The DAS28 was significantly lower in the reevaluation (p = 0.006). The prevalence of MS was higher at the end of 8 years; disease activity, as well as blood pressure, decreased during this period. Steroid use had also decreased at the end of follow-up. There was an increase of 15% of cases with MS in an 8-year follow-up cohort of patients, which was in agreement with the current literature and showed how the inflammatory process in RA is correlated to MS. The parameters of MS that varied the most were blood pressure, cholesterol and triglycerides. Ultimately, these parameters and disease activity must be observed closely in order to improve the prognosis of patients with RA

Uma Arquitetura Distribuída para Sistemas de Tempo Real Baseados em VANT´s / A Distributed Architecture for UAV-based Real-Time Systems

A evolução ocorrida no desenvolvimento dos VANT´s fez surgir alguns desafios, sendo que um deles está relacionado ao ambiente distribuído de suporte à aplicação. Esse artigo apresenta uma arquitetura distribuída para suporte à construção de sistemas baseados em VANT´s. A arquitetura proposta considera a existência de uma base em terra, de um servidor, e de um cliente embarcado no VANT Com o uso do conceito de middleware, as funcionalidades do sistema são visíveis aos usuários sob a forma de uma API. Para validar a arquitetura proposta, foi realizada uma implementação, na qual um VANT captura imagens e as envia para uma base em terra, em tempo real. A comunicação entre cliente e servidor é feita com o uso de uma rede wireless. As imagens são capturadas por uma câmera acoplada a um Raspberry embarcado no VANT. O sistema se encontra operacional e o uso do conceito de middleware se mostrou adequado ao desenvolvimento de sistemas baseados em VANT´s