EFFICACY OF PIPER NIGRUM (BLACK PEPPER): A REVIEW

Abstract-  Considerable literature on medicinal uses of Black Pepper is available in the traditional system of medicine. Black Pepper has been used in many traditional particularly Unani system of medicine. In this review paper, the study of Black Pepper its medicinal uses along with pharmacological actions is being presented. The plant description, its chemical constituents and properties have also been included. The paper also demonstrate the geographical distribution of Black Pepper across the world. The analysis shows that Black Pepper could be used as an effective medicine for various ailments mainly gastro-intestinal disorders in both as single as well in compound formulations.Key Words- Black Pepper,  Filfil Siyah, Unani Medicine,Â

Frequency of mortality in patients with high AIMS65 score presenting with upper GI bleed

Introduction: Upper gastrointestinal bleeding is a common reason for hospitalisation across the world, with a UK frequency of 10% and a death rate of 8-14 percent. [1] Several risk assessment scores have been created to predict clinically relevant outcomes like death, the requirement for hospital-based care, rebleeding, and hospital stay length Objective: To determine frequency of mortality in patients with high AIMS65 score presenting with upper gastrointestinal bleeding. Setting: Gastroenterology Department –removed for blind review--- Material & Methods: It was a cross-sectional, prospective, observational research study. Patients having a high AIMS score were recruited in the study. The patient's medical history, physical examination, and biochemical data were all properly recorded. Patients were observed for the outcome variable, which was hospital mortality. Results: 119 patients fulfilling the inclusion criteria were included. There were 77 (64.7%) males and 42 (35.3%) females. The mean age was 43.10 ± 14.213 years On analysis of demographic data, it was observed that 61 (51.3%) patients were below 40 years of age. On analysis of organ dysfunction 79 (66.4%) had cardiovascular dysfunction, 55 (46.2%) had respiratory dysfunction, 39 (32.8%) had renal dysfunction. On outcome variable, It was observed that 81 (68.1%) of the people had died. Conclusion: Majority of the patients with high AIMS had mortality. Majority of the patients were males and had cardiovascular dysfunction. Key words: GERD, endoscopy, gastroduedonal disease, carcinoma, gastritis

Therapeutic Potential of Evolvulus alsinoides

Background: Evolvulusalsinoidesis a well-known herbal drug possessing various promising medicinal properties described by prominent ancient scholars and also numerous preclinical and clinical researches has been performed, thus attestingit’s ample of pharmacological actions. So, thorough review of classical as well as contemporary literature has been executed on Evolvulusalsinoides to validate the pharmacological actions mentioned.           . Methods:For classical review,a comprehensive search of Unani literature is done and for latest research work on evolvulus, articles published in English language using PubMed, MEDLINE, and the Google scholar with search term including Sahnkpushpi, sankhaoli, Evolvulusalsinoides since 1991 to 2019 is done. Results: The search includescontemporary literature, ethnomedicinal sources and 35 research articles from 1992 to 2019 which further ascertains various pharmacological actions being mentioned in Unani literature including anti-inflammatory, anti-diarrheal, anti-helminthic, anti-convulsantand nootropicproperty of herb. Conclusion: The pharmacological action and therapeutic application of Shankhaholi/ Shankpushpiwhich ismentioned inclassical Unani literature are in accordance with latest research. Despite of having several researches on Evolvulusalsinoides there are still numerous indications mentioned in classical literature which are yet to be explored.   Keywords: Evolvulusalsinoides, herb, Unani, contemporary. &nbsp

Energy Storage Optimization for Grid Reliability

Large scale renewable energy integration is being planned for multiple power grids around the world. To achieve secure and stable grid operations, additional resources/reserves are needed to mitigate the inherent intermittency of renewable energy sources (RES). In this paper, we present formulations to understand the effect of fast storage reserves in improving grid reliability under different cost functions. Our formulations and solution schemes not only aim to minimize imbalance but also maintain state-of-charge (SoC) of storage. In particular, we show that accounting for system response due to inertia and local governor response enables a more realistic quantification of storage requirements for damping net load fluctuations. The storage requirement is significantly lower than values determined when such traditional response are not accounted for. We demonstrate the performance of our designed policies through studies using real data from the Elia TSO in Belgium and BPA agency in the USA. The numerical results enable us to benchmark the marginal effect on reliability due to increasing storage size under different system responses and associated cost functions

Differences in Reporting of Violence and Deliberate Self Harm Related Injuries to Health and Police Authorities, Rawalpindi, Pakistan

Background: The aim of study was to assess differences in reporting of violence and deliberate self harm (DSH) related injuries to police and emergency department (ED) in an urban town of Pakistan. Methods/Principal Findings: Study setting was Rawalpindi city of 1.6 million inhabitants. Incidences of violence and DSH related injuries and deaths were estimated from record linkage of police and ED data. These were then compared to reported figures in both datasets. All persons reporting violence and DSH related injury to the police station, the public hospital\u27s ED, or both in Rawalpindi city from July 1, 2007 to June 30, 2008 were included. In Rawalpindi city, 1 016 intentional injury victims reported to police whereas 3 012 reported to ED. Comparing violence related fatality estimates (N = 56, 95% CI: 46–64), police reported 75.0% and ED reported 42.8% of them. Comparing violence related injury estimates (N = 7 990, 95% CI: 7 322–8 565), police reported 12.1% and ED reported 33.2% of them. Comparing DSH related fatality estimates (N = 17, 95% CI: 4–30), police reported 17.7% and ED reported 47.1% of them. Comparing DSH related injury estimates (N = 809, 95% CI: 101–1 516), police reported 0.5% and ED reported 39.9% of them. Conclusion: In Rawalpindi city, police records were more likely to be complete for violence related deaths as compared to injuries due to same mechanism. As compared to ED, police reported DSH related injuries and deaths far less than those due to other types of violence

Alteration in Asbabe-Sitta-Zaruriyah (Six essential pre-requisite for maintaining health) to prevent Intithār al-Sha‘r (Telogen Effluvium): An Insight

With increased industrialization and urbanization, although a lot of progress has been achieved in the medical field leading to the increase in life expectancy. But simultaneously there has been an emergence of health and cosmetic related issues. Almost every individual is suffering from one or the other problem due to change in their lifestyle, dietary habits, stress, and other environmental factors such as pollution.  Hair fall, among various health and dermatology problems is most common cosmetic concern experienced by everyone at any point of their life with prevalence of 50% by the age of 35years which increases with advancing age in men and in women to 40% by the age of 50 years. Though it is not life threatening or debilitating condition but it has huge social and psychological impact as it is concerned with one’s appearance. In Unani System of Medicine, hair fall is classified as Intithār al-Sha‘r (Telogen Effluvium) and a number of local and oral drugs have been mentioned in classical Unani literature for the management of hair fall, but before starting pharmacotherapy Unani scholars recommend balance moderation in Asbab –e sitta zaruriyah (Six essential pre-requisite for maintaining health), to cut down dependency over pharmacotherapy.  In this paper, we have discussed the prevention of Intithār al-Sha‘r (Telogen Effluvium) by alteration in Asbab-e- Sitta Zaruriyah. Key words: Hair fall, Asbabe Sitta Zaruriyah, Telogen Effluvium &nbsp

A novel cooperative micro-caching algorithm based on fuzzy inference through NFV in ultra-dense IoT networks

Minimizing transaction latency and network traffic is pivotal in large-scale Internet of Things (IoT) applications. This paper investigates the fundamentals of distributed caching, cache coordination, network function virtualization, fog computing, and software-defined networking to avoid service loss and enhance quality of experience (QoE) in IoT applications. We visualize caching as a virtual network function (VNF) and use fog nodes to persistently host a large number of micro-caches as VNFs in the vicinity of their interest locations. We formulate the cache placement and migration process as a multi integer linear programming (MILP) problem. Firstly, we propose a cache consensus function to decide whether a content needs caching or not. Secondly, we propose a fuzzy inference based algorithm to solve the MILP problem for dynamic placement and migration of micro-caches at appropriate locations in geographically co-located 5G radio access networks. Another significant contribution of the proposed scheme is the inter-RAN cooperation among micro-caches to augment service quality by mitigating network traffic. Simulation results show the superiority of the proposed scheme over existing approaches

Evaluation of a classical unani pharmacopeial formulation safoof-e-muhazzil in hyperlipidemia: A randomized, standard controlled clinical study

Aim of the Study: The aim of the following study is to evaluate the efficacy and tolerability of a compound Unani formulation in hyperlipidemia on clinical and biochemical parameters. Materials and Methods: A total of 90 patients with total cholesterol level of 220 mg/dl and above were included. In Group ′A′ thirty patients with total cholesterol 243.5 ± 5.294 mg/dl received Unani formulation safoof-e-muhazzil (SM) in its classical powder form 5 g twice daily orally, in Group ′B′ thirty patients with total cholesterol 234 ± 3.822 mg/dl received the SM but in compressed tablet form in the same dosage and in Group ′C′ 30 patients with total cholesterol 242.7 ± 5.563 mg/dl received atorvastatin 10 mg as a standard control. Follow-up was carried out on second, fourth and 6th week and patients were evaluated on clinical as well as biochemical parameters. Results: Group A before treatment had mean total cholesterol of 243.5 ± 5.294 mg/dl which decreased significantly after treatment to 225.6 ± 5.953 mg/dl (P 0.5) relief in palpitation and 26.17% (P < 0.001) relief in dyspnea post-treatment. Group B fatigue decreased significantly by 18.14% (P < 0.01), palpitation by 22.91% (P < 0.01) and dyspnea by 20.46% (P < 0.01). In Group C a non-significant increase of 2.2% was observed in fatigue post-treatment, palpitation decreased by 10.22% non-significantly and dyspnea decreased significantly by 17.64% (P < 0.001). Results indicate that the test drug safely and effectively ameliorates the clinical condition of patients with hyperlipidemia while decreasing cholesterol level as well

Effectiveness of Laparoscopic Cholecystectomy

Background: To observe and compare the postoperative morbidity in terms of pain, fever, tolerance to oral feed, wound infections and duration of hospital stay in patients undergoing laparoscopic and open cholecystectomy. Methods: In this randomized controlled study, the patients were divided into open and laparoscopy groups and their age, sex, operative time, complications, time of discharge and pain scores were compared and analyzed. Results: Total of 174 patients were included in the study, 97 underwent laparoscopy whereas 77 underwent open cholecystectomy. Female to male ratio of patients was 2:1.Mean age was 44 years (±10.3).Operative time was 55.9 minutes in the open and 54.2 minutes in the laparoscopic group. Wound infection was 5 % in open and 2 % in laparoscopic surgery. Post operative pain scores, time of discharge and nausea and vomiting were significantly less in laparoscopic group (p&lt;0.001). Conclusion: Laparoscopic cholecystectomy is superior in terms of less morbidity and shorter post operative hospital sta

Flexible Fuzzy Goal Programming Approach in Optimal Mix of Power Generation for Socio-Economic Sustainability: A Case Study

The demand for cost-efficient and clean power energy cannot be overemphasised, especially in a developing nation like India. COVID-19 has adversely affected many nations, power sector inclusive, and resiliency is imperative via flexible and sustainable power generation sources. Renewable energy sources are the primary focus of electricity production in the world. This study examined and assessed the optimal cost system of electricity generation for the socio-economic sustainability of India. A sustainable and flexible electricity generation model is developed using the concept of flexible fuzzy goal programming. This study is carried out with the aim of achieving the government’s intended nationally determined contribution goals of reducing emission levels, increasing the capacity of renewable sources and the must-run status of hydro and nuclear, and technical and financial parameters. The result shows an optimal cost solution and flexibility in how increased electricity demand would be achieved and sustained via shifting to renewable sources such as solar, wind and hydro