Factors Affecting Adherence to Pediatrics Antiretroviral Therapy in Mekelle Hospital, Tigray Ethiopia

The most important factor in the success of HIV treatment is adherence to antiretroviral therapy (ART).The challenge to adherence to ART is particularly serious in Sub-Saharan Africa as the high rates of HIV/AIDS lead to greater numbers of affected individuals. Although long-term good ART adherence has been observed in certain settings of public sectors the magnitude of this challenge in Sub-Saharan Africa remains large and there is evidence for high rates of patient\u27s poor adherence. Study aimed to assess the factors affecting adherence to pediatrics antiretroviral therapy (ART) among children in Mekelle hospital, Tigray, Ethiopia. A Hospital based cross-sectional study was conducted on 226 children on antiretroviral therapy from May 01 to 30/2014 at Mekelle hospital. Data was collected from care givers of children under 15 years old who are on ART. Of the 226 children under 15 years, 90.3 % reported complete adherence to antiretroviral therapy medications at the regular schedule over the past 7 days. Factors associated with adherence were having male care giver (AOR=2.10[1.01, 7.22]), age of the child (AOR=1.43[1.16, 3.98]) below 5 years and use of first line ART drugs (AOR=2.86[1.54, 3.67]). Over all the adherence of children on ART to their medication in this study is relatively higher as compared to others. However, complete adherence is expected in order to make the drugs effective. Different strategies have to be designed to improve the adherence level

An NMR Analog of the Quantum Disentanglement Eraser

We report the implementation of a three-spin quantum disentanglement eraser on a liquid-state NMR quantum information processor. A key feature of this experiment was its use of pulsed magnetic field gradients to mimic projective measurements. This ability is an important step towards the development of an experimentally controllable system which can simulate any quantum dynamics, both coherent and decoherent.Comment: Four pages, one figure (RevTeX 2.1), to appear in Physics Review Letter

Retrospective Assessment of Malnutrition Among Under-five Children in Ayder Referral Hospital, Tigray Ethiopia

Currently worldwide there are about 60 million children with moderate acute and 13 million with severe acute malnutrition. About 9% of sub-Saharan African and 15%of south Asian children have moderate acute malnutrition and about 2% of children in developing countries have severe acute malnutrition. The objective of aim the study was to assess the magnitude of malnutrition in under five children in Ayder referral hospital using a retrospective cross-sectional study design. This study showed that male children, 168(58.1%), were higher than female, 121(41.9%).. Majority, 133(46%), were in the age group b/n 12 to 24 months .More than half, 186(64.4%) were rural dwellers. The types of malnutrition identified were Marasmus, kwashiorkor, Marasmic kwash and underweight which account for 116(40.1%), 69(23.9%), 54(18.7%) and 50(17.5%) respectively. Marasmus was the predominant type of malnutrition in all age groups of under five malnourished children with prevalence of 40.1% where as underweight was the prevalent type of malnutrition (17.3%). More over the infant feeding practices such as exclusive breast feeding, timely initiation of complementary feeding, and having history of breast feeding once in their life during infancy were relatively higher among the children as compared with other studies

Spintronics and Quantum Dots for Quantum Computing and Quantum Communication

Control over electron-spin states, such as coherent manipulation, filtering and measurement promises access to new technologies in conventional as well as in quantum computation and quantum communication. We review our proposal of using electron spins in quantum confined structures as qubits and discuss the requirements for implementing a quantum computer. We describe several realizations of one- and two-qubit gates and of the read-in and read-out tasks. We discuss recently proposed schemes for using a single quantum dot as spin-filter and spin-memory device. Considering electronic EPR pairs needed for quantum communication we show that their spin entanglement can be detected in mesoscopic transport measurements using metallic as well as superconducting leads attached to the dots.Comment: Prepared for Fortschritte der Physik special issue, Experimental Proposals for Quantum Computation. 15 pages, 5 figures; typos corrected, references adde

A Method for Modeling Decoherence on a Quantum Information Processor

We develop and implement a method for modeling decoherence processes on an N-dimensional quantum system that requires only an $N^2$-dimensional quantum environment and random classical fields. This model offers the advantage that it may be implemented on small quantum information processors in order to explore the intermediate regime between semiclassical and fully quantum models. We consider in particular $\sigma_z\sigma_z$ system-environment couplings which induce coherence (phase) damping, though the model is directly extendable to other coupling Hamiltonians. Effective, irreversible phase-damping of the system is obtained by applying an additional stochastic Hamiltonian on the environment alone, periodically redressing it and thereby irreversibliy randomizing the system phase information that has leaked into the environment as a result of the coupling. This model is exactly solvable in the case of phase-damping, and we use this solution to describe the model's behavior in some limiting cases. In the limit of small stochastic phase kicks the system's coherence decays exponentially at a rate which increases linearly with the kick frequency. In the case of strong kicks we observe an effective decoupling of the system from the environment. We present a detailed implementation of the method on an nuclear magnetic resonance quantum information processor.Comment: 12 pages, 9 figure

Generation and Suppression of Decoherence in Artificial Environment for Qubit System

It is known that a quantum system with finite degrees of freedom can simulate a composite of a system and an environment if the state of the hypothetical environment is randomized by external manipulation. We show theoretically that any phase decoherence phenomena of a single qubit can be simulated with a two-qubit system and demonstrate experimentally two examples: one is phase decoherence of a single qubit in a transmission line, and the other is that in a quantum memory. We perform NMR experiments employing a two-spin molecule and clearly measure decoherence for both cases. We also prove experimentally that the bang-bang control efficiently suppresses decoherence.Comment: 25 pages, 7 figures; added reference

Experimental Implementation of Hogg's Algorithm on a Three-Quantum-bit NMR Quantum Computer

Using nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) techniques with three-qubit sample, we have experimentally implemented the highly structured algorithm for the 1-SAT problem proposed by Hogg. A simplified temporal averaging procedure was employed to the three-qubit spin pseudo-pure state. The algorithm was completed with only a single evaluation of structure of the problem and the solutions were found with probability 100%, which outperform both unstructured quantum and the best classical search algorithm.Comment: Revtex, 14 pages and 1 table, 4 EPS figure

High seroprevalence of anti-SARS-CoV-2 antibodies among Ethiopian healthcare workers

BACKGROUND: COVID-19 pandemic has a devastating impact on the economies and health care system of sub-Saharan Africa. Healthcare workers (HWs), the main actors of the health system, are at higher risk because of their occupation. Serology-based estimates of SARS-CoV-2 infection among HWs represent a measure of HWs' exposure to the virus and could be used as a guide to the prevalence of SARS-CoV-2 in the community and valuable in combating COVID-19. This information is currently lacking in Ethiopia and other African countries. This study aimed to develop an in-house antibody testing assay, assess the prevalence of SARS-CoV-2 antibodies among Ethiopian high-risk frontline HWs. METHODS: We developed and validated an in-house Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assay (ELISA) for specific detection of anti-SARS-CoV-2 receptor binding domain immunoglobin G (IgG) antibodies. We then used this assay to assess the seroprevalence among HWs in five public hospitals located in different geographic regions of Ethiopia. From consenting HWs, blood samples were collected between December 2020 and February 2021, the period between the two peaks of COVID-19 in Ethiopia. Socio-demographic and clinical data were collected using questionnaire-based interviews. Descriptive statistics and bivariate and multivariate logistic regression were used to determine the overall and post-stratified seroprevalence and the association between seropositivity and potential risk factors. RESULTS: Our successfully developed in-house assay sensitivity was 100% in serum samples collected 2- weeks after the first onset of symptoms whereas its specificity in pre-COVID-19 pandemic sera was 97.7%. Using this assay, we analyzed a total of 1997 sera collected from HWs. Of 1997 HWs who provided a blood sample, and demographic and clinical data, 51.7% were females, 74.0% had no symptoms compatible with COVID-19, and 29.0% had a history of contact with suspected or confirmed patients with SARS-CoV-2 infection. The overall seroprevalence was 39.6%. The lowest (24.5%) and the highest (48.0%) seroprevalence rates were found in Hiwot Fana Specialized Hospital in Harar and ALERT Hospital in Addis Ababa, respectively. Of the 821 seropositive HWs, 224(27.3%) of them had a history of symptoms consistent with COVID-19 while 436 (> 53%) of them had no contact with COVID-19 cases as well as no history of COVID-19 like symptoms. A history of close contact with suspected/confirmed COVID-19 cases is associated with seropositivity (Adjusted Odds Ratio (AOR) = 1.4, 95% CI 1.1-1.8; p = 0.015). CONCLUSION: High SARS-CoV-2 seroprevalence levels were observed in the five Ethiopian hospitals. These findings highlight the significant burden of asymptomatic infection in Ethiopia and may reflect the scale of transmission in the general population

Global, regional, and national burden of chronic kidney disease, 1990–2017 : a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2017

Background Health system planning requires careful assessment of chronic kidney disease (CKD) epidemiology, but data for morbidity and mortality of this disease are scarce or non-existent in many countries. We estimated the global, regional, and national burden of CKD, as well as the burden of cardiovascular disease and gout attributable to impaired kidney function, for the Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries, and Risk Factors Study 2017. We use the term CKD to refer to the morbidity and mortality that can be directly attributed to all stages of CKD, and we use the term impaired kidney function to refer to the additional risk of CKD from cardiovascular disease and gout. Methods The main data sources we used were published literature, vital registration systems, end-stage kidney disease registries, and household surveys. Estimates of CKD burden were produced using a Cause of Death Ensemble model and a Bayesian meta-regression analytical tool, and included incidence, prevalence, years lived with disability, mortality, years of life lost, and disability-adjusted life-years (DALYs). A comparative risk assessment approach was used to estimate the proportion of cardiovascular diseases and gout burden attributable to impaired kidney function. Findings Globally, in 2017, 1·2 million (95% uncertainty interval [UI] 1·2 to 1·3) people died from CKD. The global all-age mortality rate from CKD increased 41·5% (95% UI 35·2 to 46·5) between 1990 and 2017, although there was no significant change in the age-standardised mortality rate (2·8%, −1·5 to 6·3). In 2017, 697·5 million (95% UI 649·2 to 752·0) cases of all-stage CKD were recorded, for a global prevalence of 9·1% (8·5 to 9·8). The global all-age prevalence of CKD increased 29·3% (95% UI 26·4 to 32·6) since 1990, whereas the age-standardised prevalence remained stable (1·2%, −1·1 to 3·5). CKD resulted in 35·8 million (95% UI 33·7 to 38·0) DALYs in 2017, with diabetic nephropathy accounting for almost a third of DALYs. Most of the burden of CKD was concentrated in the three lowest quintiles of Socio-demographic Index (SDI). In several regions, particularly Oceania, sub-Saharan Africa, and Latin America, the burden of CKD was much higher than expected for the level of development, whereas the disease burden in western, eastern, and central sub-Saharan Africa, east Asia, south Asia, central and eastern Europe, Australasia, and western Europe was lower than expected. 1·4 million (95% UI 1·2 to 1·6) cardiovascular disease-related deaths and 25·3 million (22·2 to 28·9) cardiovascular disease DALYs were attributable to impaired kidney function. Interpretation Kidney disease has a major effect on global health, both as a direct cause of global morbidity and mortality and as an important risk factor for cardiovascular disease. CKD is largely preventable and treatable and deserves greater attention in global health policy decision making, particularly in locations with low and middle SDI