Dwindling status of Epimedium elatum (Morren & Decne) and its geographical distribution in Kashmir Himalaya, India

Epimedium elatum (Morren & Decne) of family Berberidaceace is a rare perennial medicinal plant, endemic to high altitude forests of Northwestern Himalayas in India. Ethnobotanically, it has been used as an ingredient for treatment of bone-joint disorders, impotence and kidney disorders in Kashmir Himalayas. Phytochemically, it is rich in Epimedin ABC and Icariin; all of these have been demonstrated to possess remarkable biological activities like PDE-5 inhibition (treatment of erectile dysfunction), anticancer, antiosteoporosis antioxidant and antiviral properties. The present investigation reports its traditional usage, comprehensive distribution and conservation status from twenty ecogeographical regions in Kashmir Himalayas, India. The species was reported from Gurez valley for the first time. Numerous threats like excessive grazing, deforestration, habitat fragmentation, tourism encroachment, landslides and excessive exploitation have decreased its natural populations in most of the surveyed habitats. Consequently, its existence may become threatened in near future if timely conservation steps are not taken immediately by concerned stakeholders involved in medicinal plant research. Moreover, use of plant tissue culture techniques is recommended for development of its in vitro propagation protocols. Therefore, introduction of this medicinal plant in botanical gardens, protected sites and development of monitoring programmes are needed for its immediate conservation in Northwestern Himalayas, India

Medical conditions mimicking the acute surgical abdomen in children

Background: We present our experience with children landing up in our pediatric surgery emergency with potentially confounding medical conditions that evade diagnosis. It is imperative to apply sound clinical judgement in the evaluation of these patients so that an unnecessary laparotomy can be avoided but, at the same time, a lifesaving intervention is not denied.Patients and methods: This is a retrospective descriptive analysis pertaining to all patients who were admitted in our department from 1 January 2014 to 31 July 2017. A total of 27 867 patients presented to our out-patient department of these, 3034 were admitted to our ward. A total of 1531 surgeries were performed, of which 288 were for various abdominal surgical conditions. A total of 16 patients, representing 0.5 % of the admissions, were eventually found to have an acute abdomen secondary to a medical cause.Results: Out of the above 16 patients, 10 had to undergo exploratory laparotomy (62.5%). Eight patients of the 10 operated had a negative laparotomy. Two of the 10 operated were found to have a surgically correctable cause, one with ovarian torsion and one with severe colonic edema secondary to Kawasaki’s disease causing intestinal obstruction.Conclusion: Although eight patients with negative laparotomy result constitute only 0.5% of all the surgeries and 2.7% of all the laparotomies, it still forms the bulk (i.e. 8/16=50%) of the patients with underlying medical cause of the surgical abdomen. There were two deaths, representing a mortality of 12.5% (2/16=12.5%), with one in the operated group and one in the nonoperated group. This is why we want to stress the importance of caution and sound clinical judgement in evaluating this subset of patients.Keywords: acute abdomen, medical conditions mimicking, surgical abdomen in childre

Blood urea nitrogen as an early predictor of severity in acute pancreatitis

Background: Acute pancreatitis presents as acute abdominal pain and is usually associated with raised pancreatic enzyme levels in the blood or urine. Aims and objectives of the study was to evaluate the role of serial BUN measurement as an early prognostic marker of acute pancreatitis.Methods: From each patient detailed history was taken, general and systemic examination were done and relevant investigations were conducted. BUN was repeated after 24 hours and the change in the level of BUN was noted. Imaging in the form of CT after 72 hours of admission were performed in each patient. The severity of acute pancreatitis was gauged by modified CTSI and the same was compared to the change in BUN values over first 24 hours of admission.Results: Mean BUN values at ‘0’ hour in severe acute pancreatitis and non-severe acute pancreatitis were 31.91±6.79 and 15.44±5.95 mg/dl, respectively. The difference between the two groups was statistically significant with p value of <0.001. Similarly, the difference in BUN values at ‘24’ hours between the two groups was statistically significant. BUN value ≥23 mg/dl at ‘0’ hour was found to be the optimal cut off for determining the severity of pancreatitis with sensitivity of 91.3%. BUN ≥25 mg/dl at 24 hours was found to be the optimal cut-off for determining the severity of acute pancreatitis with sensitivity of 95.7%.Conclusions: BUN as a single marker for acute pancreatitis can be useful as it is easy to perform and cheap marker to predict severity without the need for complex calculations.

Conversed Fractional Programming Approach Goal Programming: A Mathematical Programming Approach

In this article, the Fuzzy technique is used to identify the optimal distribution of sample sizes in Conversed Tertiary-objective fractional goal programming. LINGO software provides the answer to formulated bi-goal fractional programming. For practical resolution, if the value of the problem is non - integer then the solution of the problem is obtained through Branch and Bound method

Oscillating behaviour of gallic acid – methyl ketone system catalysed by metal ions

705-707Studies on oscillatory behaviour of gallic acid with potassium bromate in presence of methyl ketones as co-substrates and various metal-ions as catalysts in aqueous acid medium are reported here. The investigations establish the order of reactivity of single and mixed organic substrate systems and also explore the relative efficiency of metal ions as catalysts in the reaction systems. The Mn²⁺/Fe²⁺ couple has been examined for co-catalyst effect on both single and mixed organic substrate systems

Optimal Allocation in Agriculture using Intuitionistic Fuzzy Assignment Problem

This paper deals with Intuitionistic fuzzy assignment problem in which cost C~ has been considered as an ij Intuitionistic triangular fuzzy number. The proposed accuracy function is used to defuzzifying the assignment costs which are converted into crisp values. The optimum solution of the formulated problem is obtained through Licenced LINGO software using Branch and Bound method

Photosensitive Epilepsy In Kashmir Valley

A random population of 618 people with epilepsy hailing from different parts of Kashmir valley was screened for photosensitivity both clinically and on a standard protocol of intermittent photic stimulation (IPS) provoked EEG recordings. Six (0.9&#x0025;) patients with a mean age of 15&#x002B;6.57 years were found to be photosensitive; five had generalized and one had absence seizures. The baseline EEG in all patients showed generalized epileptiform discharges. On IPS, similar EEG findings were obtained with a narrow range of stimulus frequency i.e. 7-12 cycles/sec. There appears to be a low prevalence of photo-sensitivity in our epileptic population, possibly related to genetic factors

MODELIMG CROP PATTEN SYSTEM USING LINEAR PROGRAMMING

<p>In agricultural situations, farmers usually faced with the problem of how to allocate their<br>limited production resources among cropping and livestock activities. Farmer's planners can offer<br>effective techniques, such as linear programming (lp) to address the problem and produce optimal<br>solution. In this paper we have demonstrated that how a farmer who has limited resources such as farmers<br>availability ,storage capacity and availability of land can be formulated as a linear programming having<br>linear objective function with three constraints</p> <p> </p

Posterolateral thoracotomy complicating paraplegia

Paraplegia complicating thoracotomy has been reported in literature in mid forties. However in sufficient data are available about the incidence of such a catastrophic complication. In the present study five cases of paraplegia following thoracotomy are presented. Pneumonectomy, lobectomy for bronchogenic carcinoma decortication for tubercular empyemas and thoracotomy for ductus ligation constituted one, one, two and one patient respectively. Two patients died in post operative period, two died in follow up and one patient is still on follow for the last twelve years.Department of Cardiovascular and Thoracic Surgery SKIMS, Soura, Srinaga