Impact of early intervention of speech and language therapy among hearing impaired child

Background: Hearing impairment is a factor that directly compromises the individual’s language which can affect emotional and academic defects by delayed development of communicative ability. This can vary according to the type and degree of hearing loss. Speech therapy intervention is important, along with the use of sound amplification devices, so that the child may have a chance to develop speech, consequently learning and re-habilitation to the society. Aims of the present study was performed to assess the effectiveness of early intervention of speech and language therapy after use of hearing aids to hearing impaired children on their syntactic and lexical development.Methods: This quasi-experimental study conducted on 100 children having different degree of hearing loss at department of Neurology and department of ENT, King George’s Medical University, Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh. After collecting socio-demographic data of subjects by observation, completion of questionnaires, and speech recording by audiologist; Speech and language therapy provide by audiologist for six month after providing hearing aids and improvement in their syntactic and lexical development recorded.Results: There is significant improvement in verbal response from 14% before therapy to 81% after therapy and non-verbal response before therapy was 86% and after therapy was 19%. Before giving speech and language therapy to subjects pointing score was 24%, sign language was 10% and words response was 0% which increases after therapy were 1%, 2% and 39% respectively. Early identified/intervened hearing-impaired children had a notable positive difference in all assessed lingual gains.Conclusions: This is study results definitely point to positive effects of intensive and continuous application of speech and language therapy to syntactic and lexical development of hearing impaired children

Reproductive biology of the Indian scad, Decapterus russelli (Ruppell, 1830) from Maharashtra waters, Northwest coast of India

The length at which 50% of females of Decapterus russelli attain maturity was estimated at 153 mm. The presence of mature, ripe and spent gonads was observed from June to October and December to April indicating prolonged spawning season. The sex-ratio varied from 1:0.43 in 140-149 mm to 1:1 in 110-119 mm length groups. Month-wise distribution of sex-ratio indicated significant predominance of male at 5% in April, May and November. The absolute fecundity ranged from 29,986 to 1,52,123 eggs. Based on the GSI studies it is inferred that the species has a prolonged spawning season probably falling between December to March and June to October. The relative condition factor value was highest in January which indicates the peak spawning month. Length-wise condition factor of males and females were maximum in the length range of 100-229 mm. In the present study size of ova diameter ranged from 0.01 to 0.97 mm. The species seems to spawn twice in a season and the period between two spawning may not be a long one

Stock assessment of the Indian scad, <i style="">Decapterus russelli</i> (Ruppell, 1830) from Mumbai waters

680-686Present study consists the Growth, mortality and the stock assessment of Decapterus russelli . ‘L∞’ was estimated as 277 mm and ‘K’ as 1.237/year. The to estimated by VBGF plot was – 0.3443 year. Growth in length of D. russelli described following von Bertalanffy growth equation as, Lt = 277[ 1-e -1.237{t-(-0.3443)}]. Longevity was estimated to be 2.42 years. Total mortality rate (Z), natural mortality rate (M) and fishing mortality (F) were estimated to be 6.66, 2.1 and 4.56 respectively. In this study, Z/K was found to be 5.38 indicating that the stock of D. russelli is presently mortality dominated in Mumbai waters. Exploitation rate (U) was calculated as 0.6838 and the Exploitation ratio (F/Z) as 0.6847. Thompson and Bell long-term prediction analysis indicated that there is no decline in yield of D. russelli even if the fishing effort is doubled. Present level of fishing has no deleterious effect on the fishery of D. russelli</i

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Not AvailableThe length at which 50% of females of Decapterus russelli attain maturity was estimated at 153 mm. The presence of mature, ripe and spent gonads was observed from June to October and December to April indicating prolonged spawning season. The sex-ratio varied from 1:0.43 in 140-149 mm to 1:1 in 110-119 mm length groups. Month-wise distribution of sex-ratio indicated significant predominance of male at 5% in April, May and November. The absolute fecundity ranged from 29,986 to 1,52,123 eggs. Based on the GSI studies it is inferred that the species has a prolonged spawning season probably falling between December to March and June to October. The relative condition factor value was highest in January which indicates the peak spawning month. Length-wise condition factor of males and females were maximum in the length range of 100-229 mm. In the present study size of ova diameter ranged from 0.01 to 0.97 mm. The species seems to spawn twice in a season and the period between two spawning may not be a long one.Not Availabl

Checklist of earthworm species (Oligochaeta) of the North Eastern Region of India

Tiwari, Nalini, Paliwal, R., Rashid, Azhar, Yadav, Shweta (2020): Checklist of earthworm species (Oligochaeta) of the North Eastern Region of India. Zootaxa 4772 (2): 277-305, DOI: https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.4772.2.

Three uncharted endemicearthworm species of the genus Eutyphoeus (Oligochaeta Octochaetidae) from Mizoram, India

Tiwari, Nalini, Lone, Azhar Rashid, Thakur, Samrendra Singh, James, Samuel W., Yadav, Shweta (2021): Three uncharted endemicearthworm species of the genus Eutyphoeus (Oligochaeta Octochaetidae) from Mizoram, India. Zootaxa 5005 (1): 41-61, DOI: https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.5005.1.

Structured communicative skills training for medical interns improves history taking skills on sensitive issues: An interventional study

Background: Communication is a process that allows us to interact with other people. Medical professionals need to possess good communication skills for history taking, diagnosis, and treatment. Communicative skills are hardly taught in medical schools of India. The students are expected to learn them on their own. To address this issue, we introduced communicative skills training (CST) for medical interns. Objective: Primary – To determine the effectiveness of CST in improving history taking on sensitive issues by medical interns. Secondary – To improve patients' satisfaction through improved communicative skills. Materials and Methods: This was a randomized control study carried out on medical interns at Jamnagar. The interns were randomized to either Group A or Group B. Intervention in the form of CST was given to Group A while Group B was control. The topic of CST was “eliciting sexual history.” Assessment of participants was done by pre- and post-intervention objective structured clinical examination. For ethical reasons, Group B was also given CST by experts after completion of our study but their results were not included for analysis. Results: Although mean scores increased in both the groups, (from 6.4 to 13.4 in the intervention group and from 6.5 to 7.5 in controls), the percent increase was much larger in the intervention group than controls (109% vs. 15%). Students gave a positive feedback to CST. Opinion of teachers was favoring CST. Among the patients allotted to intervention group, 83% were satisfied. Conclusion: CST imparted to medical interns helps in improving doctor–patient relationship

A Comparative Study of Phenotypic Variability and Physico-Mechanical Properties of Dual-Purpose Flax Fiber Varieties in India

The physico-mechanical characteristics of fibers extracted from seven dual-purpose flax (DPF) and two fiber flax (FF) varieties grown in India were investigated to determine their suitability for various textile and technical applications. The selected varieties were evaluated in terms of the plant’s phenotypic traits, maturity, fiber, and seed production. The flax fibers, after water retting, were examined for extent of retting, fiber mass loss, quantity, length, fineness, color, tenacity, and elongation. Fibers were characterized by thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), Fourier Transform Infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), and X-ray diffractometry (×RD). Despite significant differences in phenotypic attributes among the nine varieties, except fiber tenacity, the difference in fineness, length, and elongation was found to be negligible. Thermo-chemical properties of the fibers also showed similarity across the nine varieties

Identification and Characterization of Staphylococcus aureus 16S rRNA gene isolated from different Food Specimens from South Indian Region

Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus) associated food-borne diseases have global impact on human health. Genome wide analyses have shown that S. aureus contains specific endotoxin expressing gene and produce toxic proteins which is responsible for food contamination. Appropriate detection of pathogens is one of the major tool to avoid infection rate and reduce the health and socio-economic burden to human being. In addition, inappropriate handing the specimens, misdiagnosis and limited standard medical support could directly influence the infection rate. The objective of this study was to identify S. aureus from different food specimens from Hyderabad, India. A total of 70 random bacterial nutrient agar medium pure plates were made based on different morphological appearance of bacterial colonies. Preliminary identification of S. aureus based on standardized morphological method showed specific golden yellow colonies. Biochemical assay also verified bacterial specimens. Furthermore, molecular characterization was performed on the basis of polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and sequencing of 16S rRNA gene of S. aureus. Newly sequenced 16S rRNA gene sequences showed 100% homology to S. aureus, analyzed using NCBI-BLAST tool. The phylogenetic analysis and nucleotide base composition studies performed using 39 sequences of 16S rRNA gene from different isolates of Staphylococcus, including Staphylococcus aureus. For the purpose, 16S rRNA gene sequences were retrieved from the NCBI in FASTA format. The phylogenetic analysis was performed using Maximum Likelihood method and revealed the relationships and percent similarity of Staphylococcus aureus 16S rRNA gene. Keywords: Food-borne diseases; 16S rRNA gene; Maximum Likelihood; Phylogenetic analysis; Staphylococcus aureus