Computerized Evaluatution of Microsurgery Skills Training

The style of imparting medical training has evolved, over the years. The traditional methods of teaching and practicing basic surgical skills under apprenticeship model, no longer occupy the first place in modern technically demanding advanced surgical disciplines like neurosurgery. Furthermore, the legal and ethical concerns for patient safety as well as cost-effectiveness have forced neurosurgeons to master the necessary microsurgical techniques to accomplish desired results. This has lead to increased emphasis on assessment of clinical and surgical techniques of the neurosurgeons. However, the subjective assessment of microsurgical techniques like micro-suturing under the apprenticeship model cannot be completely unbiased. A few initiatives using computer-based techniques, have been made to introduce objective evaluation of surgical skills. This thesis presents a novel approach involving computerized evaluation of different components of micro-suturing techniques, to eliminate the bias of subjective assessment. The work involved acquisition of cine clips of micro-suturing activity on synthetic material. Image processing and computer vision based techniques were then applied to these videos to assess different characteristics of micro-suturing viz. speed, dexterity and effectualness. In parallel subjective grading on these was done by a senior neurosurgeon. Further correlation and comparative study of both the assessments was done to analyze the efficacy of objective and subjective evaluation

Trends in acquisition and usage of electronic resources at Indian Institutes ofTechnology libraries

The paper studies the trends in acquisition of e-resources vis-a-vis their print counterparts, identifies the e-resourcesbeing subscribed by Indian Institute of Technology (IITs) libraries at Kharagpur, Bombay, Madras, Delhi, Kanpur,Guwahati and Roorkee either individually or through a consortium, and analyzes the usage of these resources during2004-11. The study also compiles a union list of all e-resources accessible at IIT Libraries. Data were collected bypersonal visits, interviews, and using a questionnaire. Web sites and annual reports of the Ministry of Human ResourceDevelopment, IITs and INDEST-AICTE Consortium were also scanned to supplement the above information.COUNTER compliant data as provided by the publishers were used to study the usage. Data analysis revealed that IITlibraries spend a significantly large proportion of their budgets to acquire e-resources. There is a clear shift in thecollection development policies of these libraries where e-resources have become a vital part of their core collections.E-resources in all IITs are being heavily used as the number of downloads have increased from 32,33,818 to 76,17,691articles reflecting a growth of 135% over a period of 8 years

Immunohistochemical analysis of glutamate, cholecystokinin and vasoactive intestinal polypeptide in the lateral geniculate complex of albino rat: a developmental study

The lateral geniculate nuclear complex of albino rats was investigated with respect to the development of neurotransmitters/neuromodulators such as glutamate, cholecystokinin and vasoactive intestinal polypeptide at gestational day 18, various postnatal age periods and in the adult using immunohistochemical methods. The study shows the unequivocal presence of and the sequential changes in the profile of glutamate while cholecystokinin and vasoactive intestinal polypeptide are not demonstrable at any of the age periods. Glutamate is seen both in the cells and fibres from 40 postnatal day onwards and immunoreactivity is more intense in the adult. The findings are discussed with relevance to the role of neurotransmitters in development

Top-down design in the context of parallel programs

A class of parallel programs, based on Free Choice Petri nets, is modeled by associating operators and predicates with vertices of the net. The model, called a formal parallel program (FPP), forms a natural extension of flow-chart notation to parallel programs. Definitions are made of the behaviour of an FPP, and the simulation of one FPP by another. A class of top-down FPPs is next defined, by requiring program graphs to be obtained through successive refinement steps, using a restricted set of control structures. Using the above definitions, it is shown that there exists an FPP ℰ satisfying the property that for any top-down FPP ℰ′ simulating ℰ, the degree of parallelism attainable in ℰ′ is smaller than that in ℰ. The measure of parallelism used is the number of different ways of carrying out a computation. In the case of parallel programs, this phenomenon of loss of parallelism therefore uncovers a performance factor which may offset some of the advantages of using top-down design

A study of the knowledge, attitude and behavior among patients with psoriasis vulgaris during the COVID-19 lockdown period

Background: Patients with psoriasis may have been directly impacted by the COVID-19 lockdown and this may have had a significant effect on disease severity and treatment compliance. This study aims to investigate the knowledge, attitude and the behavioral practices of patients with psoriasis during the lockdown period.Methods: A self-assessed questionnaire was employed for the purpose of this study and was answered by 100 patients of clinically diagnosed psoriasis.Results: Although several patients were aware of their condition and its implications, a significant number of responders were found to have a faulty treatment compliance due to the COVID-19 lockdown.Conclusions: To our knowledge, this is the first study that evaluates the knowledge, attitude and behaviour during the COVID-19 lockdown period of individuals who have been clinically diagnosed with psoriasis. This study raises the possibility that the sustained psychosocial stress induced by the current pandemic can potentially lead to exacerbations or onset of common inflammatory skin conditions like psoriasis. The overall compliance to dermatologic therapy was slightly poor as there were frequent concerns regarding the safety of visiting a hospital or a doctor as well as possible financial constraints. As per this study, there is an urgent need to convey the right information about managing psoriasis during the COVID-19 pandemic among both the general population and patients alike.

Association of Tenofovir Use With Risk of Incident Heart Failure in HIV-Infected Patients.

BackgroundThe antiretroviral medication, tenofovir disoproxil fumarate (TDF), is used by most human immunodeficiency virus-infected persons in the United States despite higher risks of chronic kidney disease. Although chronic kidney disease is a strong risk factor for heart failure (HF), the association of TDF with incident HF is unclear.Methods and resultsWe identified 21 435 human immunodeficiency virus-infected patients in the United States Veterans Health Administration actively using antiretrovirals between 2002 and 2011. We excluded patients with a prior diagnosis of HF. TDF was analyzed categorically (current, past, or never use) and continuously (per year of use). Proportional hazards regression and fully adjusted marginal structural models were used to determine the association of TDF exposure with risk of incident HF after adjustment for demographic, human immunodeficiency virus-related, and cardiovascular risk factors. During follow-up, 438 incident HF events occurred. Unadjusted 5-year event rates for current, past, and never users of TDF were 0.9 (95%CI 0.7-1.1), 1.7 (1.4-2.2), and 4.5 (3.9-5.0), respectively. In fully adjusted analyses, HF risk was markedly lower in current TDF users (HR=0.68; 95%CI 0.53-0.86) compared with never users. Among current TDF users, each additional year of TDF exposure was associated with a 21% lower risk of incident HF (95%CI: 0.68-0.92). When limited to antiretroviral-naive patients, HF risk remained lower in current TDF users (HR=0.53; 95%CI 0.36-0.78) compared to never users.ConclusionsAmong a large national cohort of human immunodeficiency virus-infected patients, TDF use was strongly associated with lower risk of incident HF. These findings warrant confirmation in other populations, both with TDF and the recently approved tenofovir alafenamide fumarate

SATCRIS

The workshops conducted in five countries of the SADCC region, described in this report, are the third in a series of workshops that the Library and Documentation Services Division at ICRISAT has conducted in Africa. The first set of workshops were held in four countries of West Africa in 1985 as part of the erstswhile project called Sorghum and Millets Information Center (SMIC). Response to these workshop indicated that endd-users (scientists, technicians, extensionists) of agricultural information in these countries did not oriented to using information as a resource in planning, research and development, and problem solving. The SMIC project was succeeded by a new project called the Semi-Arid Tropical Crops Information Service (SATCRIS) in 1986, and it was decided that an important objective of SATCRIS should be to promote its services in Africa through user-oriented workshops. Two sets of workshops were planned in the SATCRIS project. The first of these was held in three countries of Eastern Africa in 1988. The present report discusses the work done in the workshops conducted in five Southern African Dvelopment Cooridination Council (SADCC) countries. Two professional staff members of the Library and Documentation Services Division traveled to the five countries. The two-member team was joined at Zambia by the Regional Training Officer of the ICRISAT/SADCC program at Zimbabwe,and he traveled with the team from SATCRIS in India through Zambia,Zimbabwe, and Botswan

Workshops of SATCRIS in Botswana,Malawi, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe

The workshop conducted in five countries of the SADCC region, described in this report, are the third in a series of workshop that the Library and Documentation Services Division at ICRISAT has conducted in Africa. The first set of workshop was held in four countries of West Africa in 1985 on part of the erstwhile project called Sorghum and Millet Information Center (SMIC). Response to these workshops indicated end-users (scientists, technician, extensionists) of agriculture information in these countries did not have adequate access to scientific and technical information and were not oriented to using information as a resources in planning, research and development, and problem solving. The SMIC project was succeeded by a new project called the Semi-Arid Tropical Crops Information Service (SATCRIS) in 1986, and it was a decided that an important objective of SATCRIS should be to promote its services in Africa trough user-oridented worksho