Mental stress in infertility: a tertiary care hospital-based study

Background: Most of the couples suffering from infertility report it to be the most stressful and depressing period of their life, more so if it is a primary infertility. Studies regarding the prevalence and role of infertility-specific stress especially in eastern part of India is very limited. The objective of the present study was to estimate the prevalence of infertility-specific stress and its role in marital adjustment in women diagnosed with infertility.Methods: It was a cross-sectional study done on 80 married couple diagnosed with infertility (both primary and secondary) over 1 year from July 2016 to June,2017. Dyadic Adjustment Scale (DAS), "semi-structured questionnaire" compiled by the authors and "ICD-10 Classification of Mental and Behavioral Disorders (Clinical Descriptions and Diagnostic Guidelines)" were used for the evaluation. The analysis was done using SPSS (version 16) and Chi-square test.Results: Around 86% infertile women and 21% infertile men were found to suffer from mental stress. Infertility related stress were more in patients with primary infertility than in secondary one. Women mostly (56.5%) coped with stress by self-blaming whereas men (58.2%) by blaming the partner.Conclusions: Mental stress was significantly associated with infertility. In fact, maladjustment in marital relation caused by the stress adversely affected the conjugal life and thus also the fertility. Proper counselling of both partners might be helpful to solve this problem

Socio-Demographic and Clinical Profile of Drug Resistant Tuberculosis Patients in a Tertiary Care Centre of Kolkata

Background: Drug resistant tuberculosis is a major public health threat that hinders progress in tuberculosis control worldwide. In 2019, India contributed highest cases of TB (27%) Worldwide. In 2019, 3.3% of new TB cases and 18% of previously treated cases had MDR/RRTB worldwide and India (27%) had the largest share of the global burden. This study was done to find out the sociodemographic and clinical profile of drug resistant TB patients. Methodology: It is an observational descriptive study with cross-sectional design, conducted at the drug resistant tuberculosis centre of R. G. Kar Medical College of Kolkata, West Bengal. Study Population consisted of the patients who were registered for the DR-TB regimen. Study duration was July 2016 –March 2017. Pre-tested, semi-structured schedule was designed to capture their sociodemographic profile, treatment history, clinical findings and available medical records. Data were compiled in MS Excel and analyzed in IBM SPSS 23.0. Results: Out of 159 cases, 27% patients were between 21-30 years. Males were predominant (68.6%). Most patients (56.6%) were underweight (BMI<18.5kg/m2). HIV seropositivity was found in 4 (2.5%) cases. Among all cases, 81.1% had history of taking ATD and 34.4% was cured in previous episode of treatment. The commonest associated comorbidity was DM (15.7%). Rifampicin resistance (93.1%) was most common followed by Isoniazid (8.2%). Pallor was found among 94.3% patients. Most patients had bilateral (62.3%) and moderately extensive (57.2%) lesions in chest x-ray. Conclusion: DR-TB control should focus adequately on younger age group as numbers of resistance is increasing among them. Relapse in previously cured cases was found to be major contributor of DR-TB suspect cases. Though, Rifampicin resistance was so common but prevalence of resistance to 2nd line drugs is still low. Focus should be given on early detection of drug resistance in all TB cases and improvement of nutritional status of the TB patient

Treatment Cost for Typhoid Fever at Two Hospitals in Kolkata, India

The purpose of this study was to estimate treatment cost for typhoid fever at two hospitals in Kolkata, India. This study was an incidence-based cost-of-illness analysis from the providers’ perspective. Micro-costing approach was employed for calculating patient-specific data. Unit costs of medical services used in the calculation were directly measured from the study hospital by standard method. The study hospitals were selected based on accessibility to data and cooperation. Eighty-three Widal-positive and/or culture-confirmed patients with typhoid fever during November 2003–April 2006 were included in the study. Most (93%) patients were children. Eighty-one percent was treated at the outpatient department. The average duration of hospitalization for child and adult patients was 8.4 and 4.2 days respectively. The average cost of treating children, adults, and all patients was US$16.72, 72.71, and 20.77 respectively (in 2004 prices). Recalculation based on 80$ 14.53, 36.44, and 16.11 respectively

Some Comparison of Solutions by Different Numerical Techniques on Mathematical Biology Problem

We try to compare the solutions by some numerical techniques when we apply the methods on some mathematical biology problems. The Runge-Kutta-Fehlberg (RKF) method is a promising method to give an approximate solution of nonlinear ordinary differential equation systems, such as a model for insect population, one-species Lotka-Volterra model. The technique is described and illustrated by numerical examples. We modify the population models by taking the Holling type III functional response and intraspecific competition term and hence we solve it by this numerical technique and show that RKF method gives good results. We try to compare this method with the Laplace Adomian Decomposition Method (LADM) and with the exact solutions

Treatment Cost for Typhoid Fever at Two Hospitals in Kolkata, India

The purpose of this study was to estimate treatment cost for typhoid fever at two hospitals in Kolkata, India. This study was an incidence-based cost-of-illness analysis from the providers\u2019 perspective. Microcosting approach was employed for calculating patient-specific data. Unit costs of medical services used in the calculation were directly measured from the study hospital by standard method. The study hospitals were selected based on accessibility to data and cooperation. Eighty-three Widal-positive and/or cultureconfirmed patients with typhoid fever during November 2003\u2013April 2006 were included in the study. Most (93%) patients were children. Eighty-one percent was treated at the outpatient department. The average duration of hospitalization for child and adult patients was 8.4 and 4.2 days respectively. The average cost of treating children, adults, and all patients was US$16.72, 72.71, and 20.77 respectively (in 2004 prices). Recalculation based on 80occupancy rate in inpatient wards (following the recommendation of the World Health Organization) found that the cost of treating children, adults, and all patients was US$ 14.53, 36.44, and 16.11 respectively

Switch or stay? Automatic classification of internal mental states in bistable perception

The human brain goes through numerous cognitive states, most of these being hidden or implicit while performing a task, and understanding them is of great practical importance. However, identifying internal mental states is quite challenging as these states are difficult to label, usually short-lived, and generally, overlap with other tasks. One such problem pertains to bistable perception, which we consider to consist of two internal mental states, namely, transition and maintenance. The transition state is short-lived and represents a change in perception while the maintenance state is comparatively longer and represents a stable perception. In this study, we proposed a novel approach for characterizing the duration of transition and maintenance states and classified them from the neuromagnetic brain responses. Participants were presented with various types of ambiguous visual stimuli on which they indicated the moments of perceptual switches, while their magnetoencephalogram (MEG) data were recorded. We extracted different spatio-temporal features based on wavelet transform, and classified transition and maintenance states on a trial-by-trial basis. We obtained a classification accuracy of 79.58% and 78.40% using SVM and ANN classifiers, respectively. Next, we investigated the temporal fluctuations of these internal mental representations as captured by our classifier model and found that the accuracy showed a decreasing trend as the maintenance state was moved towards the next transition state. Further, to identify the neural sources corresponding to these internal mental states, we performed source analysis on MEG signals. We observed the involvement of sources from the parietal lobe, occipital lobe, and cerebellum in distinguishing transition and maintenance states. Cross-conditional classification analysis established generalization potential of wavelet features. Altogether, this study presents an automatic classification of endogenous mental states involved in bistable perception by establishing brain-behavior relationships at the single-trial level

Ferromagnetism in transparent Mn(II)-doped indium tin oxide films prepared by sol-gel process

We observe remarkably strong room temperature ferromagnetism (~1.5 Bohr Magneton/Mn) in optically transparent Mn(II)-doped indium tin oxide (ITO) films. The nanocrystalline films with average grain size 10-22 nm and thickness 150-350 nm are prepared by sol-gel coating technique on sodalime silica glass substrate. The ferromagnetic property is, of course, weak for films deposited on pure silica glass substrate. The structural parameters of the films appear to be governing the magnetic property strongly which vary appreciably depending on the substrate. The observation of room temperature ferromagnetism in transparent conducting ITO films may find a plethora of applications in the area of magneto-optics.Comment: 17 pages including 3 figures; pdf onl

Bak Compensated for Bax in p53-null Cells to Release Cytochrome c for the Initiation of Mitochondrial Signaling during Withanolide D-Induced Apoptosis

The goal of cancer chemotherapy to induce multi-directional apoptosis as targeting a single pathway is unable to decrease all the downstream effect arises from crosstalk. Present study reports that Withanolide D (WithaD), a steroidal lactone isolated from Withania somnifera, induced cellular apoptosis in which mitochondria and p53 were intricately involved. In MOLT-3 and HCT116p53+/+ cells, WithaD induced crosstalk between intrinsic and extrinsic signaling through Bid, whereas in K562 and HCT116p53−/− cells, only intrinsic pathway was activated where Bid remain unaltered. WithaD showed pronounced activation of p53 in cancer cells. Moreover, lowered apoptogenic effect of HCT116p53−/− over HCT116p53+/+ established a strong correlation between WithaD-mediated apoptosis and p53. WithaD induced Bax and Bak upregulation in HCT116p53+/+, whereas increase only Bak expression in HCT116p53−/− cells, which was coordinated with augmented p53 expression. p53 inhibition substantially reduced Bax level and failed to inhibit Bak upregulation in HCT116p53+/+ cells confirming p53-dependent Bax and p53-independent Bak activation. Additionally, in HCT116p53+/+ cells, combined loss of Bax and Bak (HCT116Bax−Bak−) reduced WithaD-induced apoptosis and completely blocked cytochrome c release whereas single loss of Bax or Bak (HCT116Bax−Bak+/HCT116Bax+Bak−) was only marginally effective after WithaD treatment. In HCT116p53−/− cells, though Bax translocation to mitochondria was abrogated, Bak oligomerization helped the cells to release cytochrome c even before the disruption of mitochondrial membrane potential. WithaD also showed in vitro growth-inhibitory activity against an array of p53 wild type and null cancer cells and K562 xenograft in vivo. Taken together, WithaD elicited apoptosis in malignant cells through Bax/Bak dependent pathway in p53-wild type cells, whereas Bak compensated against loss of Bax in p53-null cells

Potential of leaf litter for phenol adsorption —A kinetic study

298-301The present study envisages the use of plant material, Shorea robusta for the removal of phenol by adsorption process. The effect of pH, contact time, particle size and initial concentration of adsorbate on removal process was investigated. The maximum removal of phenols from their aqueous solutions occurred in the pH range of 4-6. Kinetic parameters as a function of concentration and pH were evaluated to predict the nature of adsorption. Equilibrium adsorption data were correlated with Freundlich adsorption isotherm model. The maximum adsorption capacity of leaf litter was found to be 0.06 mg/g.</b

Stability and response analyses of phenol degrading biochemical systems

7-16Chemical systems having non-linear dynamic state equation exhibit unusual behaviour like multiplicity, sustained oscillations etc., when perturbation in any forcing function is somehow introduced to an existing steady state. Under this situation a reacting system may exhibit one or more ambiguous steady states. Biochemical systems using microorganisms following either substrate- or product-inhibited growth kinetics are usually characterized with this type of behaviour. In the present investigation biodegradation of phenol using Pseudomonas putida following substrate inhibited growth kinetics has been taken as model system. The system has been studied in a 2 dm³ B. Braun fermenter in batch and continuous modes of operation separately. Using the experimental data obtained in batch mode of operation the kinetic parameters of the systems have been determined considering substrate inhibited Haldane type kinetics for biodegradation of phenol. Two separate techniques, viz., linear stability analysis and phase plane analysis have been performed to study the characteristics of steady states from local and global points of view respectively. Response analysis of the system has been performed using step-type perturbations in inlet substrate concentrations of different amplitudes. The experimental findings show good agreement with the simulated results