Effectiveness of Emotional Intelligence Training on the Quality of Life of Mothers of Children with Leukemia

 AbstractBackground and Objectives: Leukemia is highly prevalent among children, and affects the family in addition to the child's life. The present study aimed to assess the effectiveness of training emotional intelligence on the quality of life of mothers of children with leukemia.Materials and Methods: The present quasi-experimental pretest-posttest uncontrolled study was conducted on 35 mothers of children with leukemia selected by convenient sampling from those attending selected hospitals affiliated to Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences. Data were collected using mothers’ and children’s demographic details and the Persian version of Caregiver Quality of Life Index-Cancer questionnaire. Participants were assessed over 4 two-hour educational sessions using group discussion method (5 to 8 people). Two weeks after the intervention, questionnaires were completed by mothers again.Results: The results obtained using paired t and Wilcoxon tests showed significant reductions in the scores of mothers' quality of life two weeks after intervention in disruptiveness, and mental, physical, and financial concern dimensions (P<0.005) and a significant increase in positive adaptation dimension (P<0.005).Conclusion: The results obtained showed that training emotional intelligence skills can improve the quality of life of mothers of children with leukemia. It is therefore recommended that these skills be taught to mothers in order to improve their quality of life.Keywords: Emotional Intelligence, Quality of Life, Mothers, Children, Leukemia

Investigation of LRTOMT gene (locus DFNB63) mutations in Iranian patients with autosomal recessive non-syndromic hearing loss.

Hearing loss (HL) is the most frequent sensory defect affecting 1 in 1000 neonates. This can occur due to genetic or environmental causes or both. The genetic causes are very heterogenous and over 100 loci have been identified to cause autosomal recessive non - syndromic hearing loss (ARNSHL). The aim of this study was to determine the contribution of the LRTOMT gene mutations in causing ARNSHL. One hundred fifty seven pupils affected with ARNSHL from Azarbaijan Sharghi, Kordestan, Gilan and Golestan provinces, north and west of Iran, were ascertained. In this descriptive - laboratory study, the presence of LRTOMT mutations were initially checked using PCR - Single - strand conformation polymorphism (SSCP) and heteroduplex analysis (HA) strategy. Samples with shifted bands on the gel were confirmed by DNA sequencing method. The PCR-SSCP/HA and the subsequent direct DNA sequencing showed no mutation in the population studied. We conclude that LRTOMT mutations have no role in causing sporadic deafness in the studied population. Further studies on other populations and samples could clarify the exact role of LRTOMT mutations

Long and Short-term Metformin Consumption as a Potential Therapy to Prevent Complications of COVID-19

Purpose: The aim of the study is to evaluate the effect of metformin in complication improvement of hospitalized patients with COVID-19. Methods: This was a randomized clinical trial that involved 189 patients with confirmed COVID-19 infection. Patients in the intervention group received metformin-500 mg twice daily. Patients who received metformin before admission were excluded from the control group. Patients who were discharged before taking at least 2000 mg of metformin were excluded from the study. Primary outcomes were vital signs, need for ICU admission, need for intubation, and mortality. Results: Data showed that patients with diabetes with previous metformin in their regimen had lower percentages of ICU admission and death in comparison with patients without diabetes (11.3% vs. 26.1% (P=0.014) and 4.9% vs. 23.9% (P≤0.001), respectively). Admission time characteristics were the same for both groups except for diabetes and hyperlipidemia, which were significantly different between the two groups. Observations of naproxen consumption on endpoints, duration of hospitalization, and the levels of spO2 did not show any significant differences between the intervention and the control group. The adjusted OR for intubation in the intervention group versus the control group was 0.21 [95% CI, 0.04-0.99 (P=0.047)]. Conclusion: In this trial, metformin consumption had no effect on mortality and ICU admission rates in non-diabetic patients. However, metformin improved COVID-19 complications in diabetic patients who had been receiving metformin prior to COVID-19 infection, and it significantly lowered the intubation rates

The effect of Anethum graveolens L. oil consumption on the intensity of nausea after cesarean section

Background &amp; Objective: Nausea and vomiting are common complaints after cesarean section which typically occurs during the first postoperative times. Also herbal medicine use is one way to improve the syndrome. Therefore, this study was conducted to determine the effect of Anethum graveolens L. Oil on nausea after cesarean in sabzevar Mobini hospital. Materials &amp; method: This double-blinded clinical trial, involving 128 women who underwent cesarean (placebo 59 - drug 69), was carried out in Mobini Hospital in Sabzevar in2014.The method was eat drug and placebo after finished npo , three dose 40 drop per 20 minutes in those women with nausea. The effect of Anethum graveolens L oil on nausea with using v.a.s. was evaluated.This scale was shown patient's feelings with different colors. Significantly was p<0.05.The study statistical methods included Chi-square, Fisher's exact test, and t-student. Results: According of result, chi � Squire Test indicated a significant difference between two groups in nausea had decreased in second and third 20 minutes (P<0/001). Subjects did not declaration any side effects either during or after the study. Discussion: Therefore, Anethum graveolens L oil is effective on nausea intensity after cesarean section then the research hypothesis was confirmed.Also considering the importance of maternal and neonatal healthy, a similar study on other nausea causes is recommended

The solutions to increase the participation of men in sexual and reproductive health of women in Iran: an analytic hierarchy process (AHP) analysis

Ever since the Cairo Declaration in 1994, women’s Sexual and Reproductive Health (SRH) has become a priority and substantial efforts have been made to improve it. Men’s contribution to promote the SRH of women is essential. Therefore, this study aimed to identify the best solutions to increase the men’s participation in the SRH of women in Iran, using an analytic hierarchy process (AHP) approach. A cross-sectional study was conducted among 150 married men in Iran. The data was collected using a questionnaire. To determine the best solutions to improve the men’s participation in women’s SRH, the opinions of an expert group from academia, Ministry of Health (MOH) were employed and the best solution were selected based on the scores, applying analytic hierarchy process (AHP) approach. The statistical analysis was performed using SPSS V.20 and Expert Choice software. In the final analysis ‘Well-oriented sex education focused on men’s involvement’, ‘Well-trained professional employment’ and ‘Sex education in society, schools, and universities’ were the solutions with highest coefficients, respectively.Impact statement What is already known on this subject? SRH of women, is a major part of primary efforts regarding the increase of SRH’s quality; among which, the role and place of men is of utmost importance. Struggling to participate men in issues related to the health of women can not only promote inter family relationships, but also can affect the quality of relationship between man and woman in the society. What do the results of this study add? According to results of the study, one of the main obstacles of men participation was educational and information barriers, regarding which, having adjusted and improved educational systems, opportunity could be prepared for men participation. Current centres for educating those who are already getting married are the first and main places where men can be educated to meet their educational needs in their marriage life such as SRH. Through integrating three selected approaches in the experts’ meetings in the educational program of before marriage, men participation can be increased in SRH. What are the implications of these findings for clinical practice and/or future research? The findings could inform and guide the policies in formulating effective solutions to improve the men’s participation in SRH in Iran

Creating a positive perception of childbirth experience: systematic review and meta-analysis of prenatal and intrapartum interventions

Abstract Background A negative experience in childbirth is associated with chronic maternal morbidities. The aim of this systematic review and meta-analysis was to identify currently available successful interventions to create a positive perception of childbirth experience which can prevent psychological birth trauma. Methods Randomized controlled trials of interventions in pregnancy or labour which aimed to improve childbirth experience versus usual care were identified from 1994 to September 2016. Low risk pregnant or childbearing women were chosen as the study population. PEDRO scale and Cochrane risk of bias tool were used for quality assessment. Pooled effect estimates were calculated when more than two studies had similar intervention. If it was not possible to include a study in the meta-analysis, its data were summarized narratively. Results After screening of 7832 titles/abstracts, 20 trials including 22,800 participants from 12 countries were included. Successful strategies to create a positive perception of childbirth experience were supporting women during birth (Risk Ratio = 1.35, 95% Confidence Interval: 1.07 to 1.71), intrapartum care with minimal intervention (Risk Ratio = 1.29, 95% Confidence Interval:1.15 to 1.45) and birth preparedness and readiness for complications (Mean Difference = 3.27, 95% Confidence Interval: 0.66 to 5.88). Most of the relaxation and pain relief strategies were not successful to create a positive birth experience (Mean Difference = − 2.64, 95% Confidence Intervention: − 6.80 to 1.52). Conclusion The most effective strategies to create a positive birth experience are supporting women during birth, intrapartum care with minimal intervention and birth preparedness. This study might be helpful in clinical approaches and designing future studies about prevention of the negative and traumatic birth experiences

SNPPhenA: a corpus for extracting ranked associations of single-nucleotide polymorphisms and phenotypes from literature

Abstract Background Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms (SNPs) are among the most important types of genetic variations influencing common diseases and phenotypes. Recently, some corpora and methods have been developed with the purpose of extracting mutations and diseases from texts. However, there is no available corpus, for extracting associations from texts, that is annotated with linguistic-based negation, modality markers, neutral candidates, and confidence level of associations. Method In this research, different steps were presented so as to produce the SNPPhenA corpus. They include automatic Named Entity Recognition (NER) followed by the manual annotation of SNP and phenotype names, annotation of the SNP-phenotype associations and their level of confidence, as well as modality markers. Moreover, the produced corpus was annotated with negation scopes and cues as well as neutral candidates that play crucial role as far as negation and the modality phenomenon in relation to extraction tasks. Result The agreement between annotators was measured by Cohen’s Kappa coefficient where the resulting scores indicated the reliability of the corpus. The Kappa score was 0.79 for annotating the associations and 0.80 for the confidence degree of associations. Further presented were the basic statistics of the annotated features of the corpus in addition to the results of our first experiments related to the extraction of ranked SNP-Phenotype associations. The prepared guideline documents render the corpus more convenient and facile to use. The corpus, guidelines and inter-annotator agreement analysis are available on the website of the corpus: http://nil.fdi.ucm.es/?q=node/639 . Conclusion Specifying the confidence degree of SNP-phenotype associations from articles helps identify the strength of associations that could in turn assist genomics scientists in determining phenotypic plasticity and the importance of environmental factors. What is more, our first experiments with the corpus show that linguistic-based confidence alongside other non-linguistic features can be utilized in order to estimate the strength of the observed SNP-phenotype associations. Trial Registration: Not Applicabl