Adjunctive quetiapine for serotonin reuptake inhibitor-resistant obsessive-compulsive disorder: A meta-analysis of randomised controlled treatment trials

Small studies have shown positive effects from adding a variety of antipsychotic agents in patients with obsessive–compulsive disorder who are unresponsive to treatment with serotonin reuptake inhibitors. The evidence, however, is contradictory. This paper reports a meta-analysis of existing double-blind randomized placebo-controlled studies looking at the addition of the second-generation antipsychotic quetiapine in such cases. Three studies fulfilled the inclusion criteria. Altogether 102 individuals were subjected to analysis using Review Manager (4.2.7). The results showed evidence of efficacy for adjunctive quetiapine (< 400 mg/day) on the primary efficacy criterion, measured as changes from baseline in total Yale–Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale scores (P = 0.008), the clinical significance of which was limited by between-study heterogeneity. The mechanism underlying the effect may involve serotonin and/or dopamine neurotransmission

Mining Semantic Loop Idioms

To write code, developers stitch together patterns, like API protocols or data structure traversals. Discovering these patterns can identify inconsistencies in code or opportunities to replace these patterns with an API or a language construct. We present coiling, a technique for automatically mining code for semantic idioms: surprisingly probable, semantic patterns. We specialize coiling for loop idioms, semantic idioms of loops. First, we show that automatically identifiable patterns exist, in great numbers, with a large-scale empirical study of loops over 25MLOC. We find that most loops in this corpus are simple and predictable: 90% have fewer than 15LOC and 90% have no nesting and very simple control. Encouraged by this result, we then mine loop idioms over a second, buildable corpus. Over this corpus, we show that only 50 loop idioms cover 50% of the concrete loops. Our framework opens the door to data-driven tool and language design, discovering opportunities to introduce new API calls and language constructs. Loop idioms show that LINQ would benefit from an Enumerate operator. This can be confirmed by the exitence of a StackOverflow question with 542k views that requests precisely this featur

Deciphering reward-based decision-making in schizophrenia: a meta-analysis and behavioral modeling of the Iowa Gambling Task

Background: Patients with schizophrenia (SZP) have been reported to exhibit impairments in reward-based decision-making, but results are heterogeneous with multiple potential confounds such as age, intelligence level, clinical symptoms or medication, making it difficult to evaluate the robustness of these impairments. Methods: We conducted a meta-analysis of studies comparing the performance of SZP and healthy controls (HC) in the Iowa Gambling Task (IGT) as well as comprehensive analyses based on subject-level data (n = 303 SZP, n = 188 HC) to investigate reward-based decision-making in SZP. To quantify differences in the influence of individual deck features (immediate gain, gain frequency, net loss) between SZP and HC, we additionally employed a least-squares model. Results: SZP showed statistically significant suboptimal decisions as indicated by disadvantageous deck choices (d from 0.51 to −0.62) and lower net scores (d from −0.35 to −1.03) in a meta-analysis of k = 29 samples (n = 1127 SZP, n = 1149 HC) and these results were confirmed in a complementary subject-level analysis. Moreover, decision-making in SZP was characterized by a relative overweighting of immediate gain and net losses and an underweighting of gain frequency. Moderator analyses revealed that in part, decision-making in the IGT was moderated by intelligence level, medication and general symptom scores. Conclusion: Our results indicate robust impairments in reward-based decision-making in SZP and suggest that decreased cognitive resources, such as working memory, may contribute to these alterations

Studies on Hepatoprotective Properties of Leaf Extracts of Azadirachta indica A. Juss (Meliaceae)

The present study was carried out to evaluate the hepatoprotective role of leaf extracts of Azadirachta indica A. Juss. Hepatoprotective activities of ethanolic and aqueous extracts of A. indica were examined against carbon tetrachloride induced liver damage in mice using silymarin as control. Enzyme activities of Serum Glutamate Oxaloacetate Transaminase (SGOT), Serum Glutamate Pyruvate Transaminase (SGPT) and Alkaline Phosphatase (ALP) were analyzed. Phytochemical leaf extracts of A. indica exhibited significant hepatoprotective activity. Ethanolic and aqueous leaf extracts of A. indica exhibited moderate activity over carbon tetrachloride treated animals. Results confirm the traditional - ethnomedicinal use of A. indica as a potential source of hepatoprotective agent

Investigations on Hepatoprotective Activity of Leaf Extracts of Aegle marmelos (L.) Corr. (Rutaceae)

The present study was carried out to screen and evaluate the hepatoprotective activity of leaf extracts of Aegle marmelos (L.) Corr. Hepatoprotective activities of ethanolic and aqueous extracts of A. marmelos were examined against carbon tetrachloride induced liver damage in mice using silymarin as control. Enzyme activities of Serum Glutamate Oxaloacetate Transaminase (SGOT), Serum Glutamate Pyruvate Transaminase (SGPT) and Alkaline Phosphatase (ALP) were analyzed. Results indicate that ethanolic and aqueous leaf extracts of A. marmelos had moderate activity over carbon tetrachloride treatment as compared to control. Results of the present investigation confirm the traditional uses of this plant as a potential hepatoprotective agent

Some results on a graph associated with a non-quasi-local atomic domain

Let R be an atomic domain which admits at least two maximal ideals. Let Irr(R) denote the set of all irreducible elements of R and let A(R) = {Rπ | π ∈ Irr(R)}. Let I(R) denote the subset of A(R) consisting of all Rπ ∈ A(R) such that π does not belong to the Jacobson radical of R. With R, we associate an undirected graph denoted by G(R) whose vertex set is I(R) and distinct vertices Rπ1 and Rπ2 are adjacent if and only if Rπ1 ∩ Rπ2 = Rπ1π2. The aim of this article is to discuss some results on the connectedness of G(R) and on the girth of G(R)

How does a cadaver model work for testing ultrasound diagnostic capability for rheumatic-like tendon damage?

To establish whether a cadaver model can serve as an effective surrogate for the detection of tendon damage characteristic of rheumatoid arthritis (RA). In addition, we evaluated intraobserver and interobserver agreement in the grading of RA-like tendon tears shown by US, as well as the concordance between the US findings and the surgically induced lesions in the cadaver model. RA-like tendon damage was surgically induced in the tibialis anterior tendon (TAT) and tibialis posterior tendon (TPT) of ten ankle/foot fresh-frozen cadaveric specimens. Of the 20 tendons examined, six were randomly assigned a surgically induced partial tear; six a complete tear; and eight left undamaged. Three rheumatologists, experts in musculoskeletal US, assessed from 1 to 5 the quality of US imaging of the cadaveric models on a Likert scale. Tendons were then categorized as having either no damage, (0); partial tear, (1); or complete tear (2). All 20 tendons were blindly and independently evaluated twice, over two rounds, by each of the three observers. Overall, technical performance was satisfactory for all items in the two rounds (all values over 2.9 in a Likert scale 1-5). Intraobserver and interobserver agreement for US grading of tendon damage was good (mean κ values 0.62 and 0.71, respectively), with greater reliability found in the TAT than the TPT. Concordance between US findings and experimental tendon lesions was acceptable (70-100 %), again greater for the TAT than for the TPT. A cadaver model with surgically created tendon damage can be useful in evaluating US metric properties of RA tendon lesions

The exact annihilating-ideal graph of a commutative ring

The rings considered in this article are commutative with identity. For an ideal $I$ of a ring $R$, we denote the annihilator of $I$ in $R$ by $Ann(I)$. An ideal $I$ of a ring $R$ is said to be an exact annihilating ideal if there exists a non-zero ideal $J$ of $R$ such that $Ann(I) = J$ and $Ann(J) = I$. For a ring $R$, we denote the set of all exact annihilating ideals of $R$ by $\mathbb{EA}(R)$ and $\mathbb{EA}(R)\backslash \{(0)\}$ by $\mathbb{EA}(R)^{*}$. Let $R$ be a ring such that $\mathbb{EA}(R)^{*}\neq \emptyset$. With $R$, in [Exact Annihilating-ideal graph of commutative rings, {\it J. Algebra and Related Topics} {\bf 5}(1) (2017) 27-33] P.T. Lalchandani introduced and investigated an undirected graph called the exact annihilating-ideal graph of $R$, denoted by $\mathbb{EAG}(R)$ whose vertex set is $\mathbb{EA}(R)^{*}$ and distinct vertices $I$ and $J$ are adjacent if and only if $Ann(I) = J$ and $Ann(J) = I$. In this article, we continue the study of the exact annihilating-ideal graph of a ring. In Section 2 , we prove some basic properties of exact annihilating ideals of a commutative ring and we provide several examples. In Section 3, we determine the structure of $\mathbb{EAG}(R)$, where either $R$ is a special principal ideal ring or $R$ is a reduced ring which admits only a finite number of minimal prime ideals

Cobalamin and Folic Acid Status in Relation to the Etiopathogenesis of Pancytopenia in Adults at a Tertiary Care Centre in North India

Background. Pancytopenia has multiple etiologies like megaloblastic anemia, aplastic anemia, leukemia, and various infections. We investigated the clinical, etiological and hematological profile including bone marrow morphology of patients with pancytopenia in relation to their vitamin B12 and folic acid status at a tertiary care referral hospital in north India. Methods. A total of 140 consecutive patients with pancytopenia were selected from June 2007 to December 2008. Bone marrow examination and other tests were carried out as warranted, including serum cobalamin and folate assays using liquid chromatography mass spectroscopy (LC MS/MS). Results. The study population consisted of 92 males and 48 females with a mean age of 32.8 years. Megaloblastic anemia 60.7%, aplastic anemia (7.8%), and leukemia (9.2%) were common causes. Infectious causes (16.4% of all cases) included leishmaniasis, HIV–AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis. Severe cobalamin deficiency (B12 < 100 pg/mL) was seen in 81% of all patients including 91.6% of patients with MA. In contrast, only 7.14% of all pancytopenic patients were folate deficient. Folate deficiency (<5 ng/mL) was seen in just 5% MA patients. Combined cobalamin and folate deficiency was seen in 5 patients (3.51%). Conclusion. Cobalamin deficiency was found to be more common in our setting and is largely underdiagnosed in the age of folate supplementation. Infectious diseases like tuberculosis, leishmaniasis, and increasingly HIV are important and treatable causes of pancytopenia. This is in contrast with the developed nations where the bulk of disease is due to malignancy or marrow aplasia