Gender based differences in diabetic peripheral neuropathy

Diabetic peripheral neuropathy (DPN) is one of the common complications of diabetes mellitus. Aim: To find out gender based differences in frequency of DM, age at diagnosis of DM and subsequent onset of DPN, duration of DM and DPN and electrophysiological patterns. Methodology: On the basis of non-probability purposive sampling, a cross sectional study was conducted at Neurology department, Mayo Hospital, Lahore. Patients fulfilling the ADA criteria for DM, and DPN were included in the study. Data was analyzed using SPSS 16 version. Results: A total of 125 patients were included in the study with 57/125 (45.6%) males and 68/125 (54.4%) females. This difference in gender based frequency was not statistically significant (p\u3c0.324]. Although mean age of females [51.83+10.04 yrs.] was lower than that of males [53.29+9.39 yrs.] but this difference was also not significant (p\u3c0.504). There was no significant difference (p\u3c0.685) in the mean age at onset of DM in men (42.03+9.97yrs) and women (41.24+10.62yrs). Both genders took a mean period of 08 yrs to develop DPN. The mean age of onset of DPN was 50.87+9.43yrs in men and 49.25+10.62yrs in women and this was not statistically significant (p\u3c0.374). Sensory-motor mixed polyneuropathy was the commonest electrophysiological pattern (51%) seen in both the genders. Conclusion: In our study, gender based differences in DPN are statistically not significant with respect to frequency of diabetes, age at diagnosis of diabetes or at onset of DPN, duration of DM before onset of DPN and electrophysiological patterns. More studies are required to settle whether gender based differences in onset and progression of diabetic neuropathy exist

Anosmia in Parkinson’s Disease in Pakistan: A Matched Case – Control Study

Objective:  To assess olfactory dysfunction in Parkinson's disease (PD) patients in Pakistan utilizing an autochthonous smell test. Setting:  Tertiary care center, single-center study. Materials and Methods:  Eighty-seven non-demented patients with PD, who fulfilled Queen Square Brain Bank Criteria were enrolled at the Movement Disorder Clinic, Lahore General Hospital (LGH), Lahore. Fifty-eight controls matched by gender, age, and place of residence were enrolled among patients and visitors attending other hospital clinics. Both groups underwent olfactory testing using the Pakistani Smell Identification test (PKSIT). The participants were required to identify the smell from a set of choices and were scored out of 10. Results:  Among patients in the study group, the mean duration of disease was 4.7 years (range 6 months to 19 years). The PD onset mean age was 52.15 ± 13.02 years among patients. The mean number of smell test items accurately recognized by the PD patients was 4.55 ± 2.4. A multiple linear regression demonstrated that age (P < 0.05) but not disease duration (P = 0.899) was a significant determinant of the smell test result in PD and control groups. The mean number of smell test items appropriately recognized by the controls was 7.33 ± 1.69. Logistic regression showed that the PKSIT had 73.2% sensitivity and 84.3% specificity to distinguish PD from control. Conclusion:  PKSIT being easily available, cheap, and more convenient to use in the Pakistani population, can be used in the evaluation of olfactory dysfunction in PD subjects

Epilepsy in Pakistan: national guidelines for clinicians (part 2)

In 2013 an international taskforce of the ILAE shaped out a communal definition of Epilepsy.(2) This definition is useful for all or most practical purposes, thus more helpful in management. Epilepsy was defined as recurrent unprovoked seizures i.e 2 or more at least 24 hours apart. The revised practical definition implies that Epilepsy can be considered even after a single seizure in individuals who have other factors predictive of a second unprovoked seizure, a risk set at 60%. The factors include the diagnosis of an epilepsy syndrome, structural lesions like stroke, CNS infections, intraparenchymal contusions after trauma, as well as reflex seizures such as photosensitive seizures

E2-MACH: Energy Efficient Multi-Attribute Based Clustering Scheme for Energy Harvesting Wireless Sensor Networks

Internet of things have emerged enough due to its applications in a wide range of fields such as governance, industry, healthcare, and smart environments (home, smart, cities, and so on). Internet of things–based networks connect smart devices ubiquitously. In such scenario, the role of wireless sensor networks becomes vital in order to enhance the ubiquity of the Internet of things devices with lower cost and easy deployment. The sensor nodes are limited in terms of energy storage, processing, and data storage capabilities, while their radio frequencies are very sensitive to noise and interference. These factors consequently threaten the energy consumption, lifetime, and throughput of network. One way to cope with energy consumption issue is energy harvesting techniques used in wireless sensor network–based Internet of things. However, some recent studies addressed the problems of clustering and routing in energy harvesting wireless sensor networks which either concentrate on energy efficiency or quality of service. There is a need of an adequate approach that can perform efficiently in terms of energy utilization as well as to ensure the quality of service. In this article, a novel protocol named energy-efficient multi-attribute-based clustering scheme (E2-MACH) is proposed which addresses the energy efficiency and communication reliability. It uses selection criteria of reliable cluster head based on a weighted function defined by multiple attributes such as link statistics, neighborhood density, current residual energy, and the rate of energy harvesting of nodes. The consideration of such parameters in cluster head selection helps to preserve the node’s energy and reduce its consumption by sending data over links possessing better signal-to-noise ratio and hence ensure minimum packet loss. The minimized packet loss ratio contributes toward enhanced network throughput, energy consumption, and lifetime with better service availability for Internet of things applications. A set of experiments using network simulator 2 revealed that our proposed approach outperforms the state-of-the-art low-energy adaptive clustering hierarchy and other recent protocols in terms of first-node death, overall energy consumption, and network throughput

Permuting Tri-Multiderivation on Incline Algebra

In this paper, the concept of permuting tri-multiderivation onincline algebra is initiated and some results are proved by using this idea

Determination of Chemical Stability of Various Famotidine Dosage Forms by UV –Visible Spectrophotometric Method and Data Analysis by R-GUI Stability Software

H2 receptor antagonists are still the first line of therapy in treating gastro esophageal reflux diseases as well as other ulcers of the upper gastrointestinal tract. Accelerated stability studies of different brands of Famotidine tablets (20mg) and suspension(10mg/5ml),both liquid and dry, were carried out at 40 oC ± 2 oC (Temperature) and 75% R.H. ± 5% R.H. The assay of tablets was conducted by both HPLC and UV/Visible Spectrophotometric methods whereas for suspensions only UV/Visible Spectrophotometric method was used. The tests were conducted at 0, 1, 3 and 6 months as per guidelines of ICH for accelerated studies. The results of physical tests indicated that the dissolution of tablet decreases in all cases with time whereas disintegration of all brands was found within 15 minutes throughout the course of study while the hardness demonstrated to be decline with time. Kinetic treatment to determine rate constants and shelf lives indicated that dry suspension was more stable than liquids while the tablets showed stability for three years which was parallel to their claimed expiry. Among tablets, brand A was the most stable and among suspensions, brand C showed the longest stability. The stability studies were also carried out by using a software R-Gui (version 2.13) and results were compared with manually calculated results

Determination of Chemical Stability of Various Famotidine Dosage Forms by UV –Visible Spectrophotometric Method and Data Analysis by R-GUI Stability Software

Abstract: H2 receptor antagonists are still the first line of therapy in treating gastro esophageal reflux diseases as well as other ulcers of the upper gastrointestinal tract. Accelerated stability studies of different brands of Famotidine tablets (20mg) and suspension(10mg/5ml),both liquid and dry, were carried out at 40