Pain Efficacy of a Home-Based Low-Intensity Continuous Ultrasound Stimulator for Knee Arthritis: A Single-Arm, Open-Label, Prospective Clinical Trial

1) Background: Osteoarthritis (OA) is defined as a degenerative joint disease that mainly affects the bone. This study aims to evaluate the effect of low-intensity continuous ultrasound (LICUS) treatment on the knee of osteoarthritis patients through home-based intervention using the LICUS medical device. 2) Methods: The clinical trials were designed in a single-arm, open-label, and intervention study. Thirty-five participants, including those who dropped out (12%), were screened and enrolled. The patients received LICUS (1.1 MHz, 1.5 W/cm2, collimated beams) on the knee by the instructions of the investigator at home (5 min/session, 3 times/day, for four-weeks). Outcome measures were assessed using the Visual Analog Scale (VAS) as a primary endpoint and the Western Ontario and McMaster Universities Osteoarthritis Index (WOMAC) as a secondary endpoint to evaluate pain relief and functional recovery of the knee between pre-treatment (baseline) and post-treatment (four-weeks). 3) Results: Knee pain scores measured using the VAS and WOMAC indices were significantly reduced after a four-week treatment with LICUS compared to baseline. Knee stiffness and functional capacity were significantly reduced after the LICUS application. In addition, there were no reports of adverse effects during the study period. 4) Conclusion: Long-term and home-based application of LICUS can be recommended as an alternative option for the treatment of OA patients, as evidenced by the effect of pain relief and knee function recovery.

Effect of Trimetazidine on Functional Capacity in Patient with Ischaemic Cardiomyopathy (TOFCAPI)

Objective: This study aimed to evaluate the efficacy of trimetazidine on exercise capacity via a six-minute walk test in patients with ischaemic cardiomyopathy and also evaluate the effect of trimetazidine on left ventricular function via echocardiography in the same population. Methods: This prospective observational study, conducted at the National Institute of Cardiovascular Diseases in Dhaka, Bangladesh, enrolled 200 patients with ischaemic cardiomyopathy and a depressed left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF Results: In this study (n = 200) of ischaemic cardiomyopathy patients, the mean age was 58 years, with 76% of the patients being male. All study subjects received GDMT (Guideline-Directed Medical Therapy) for angina and heart failure. Those who received the modified released form of trimetazidine developed lesions during the 1st and 2nd follow-ups, during which the LVEF, LVIDd, and six-minute walk distance significantly improved (p Conclusion: The findings of the present study demonstrated that the addition of modified-release trimetazidine to GDMT can improve exercise capacity and left ventricular function in patients with ischaemic cardiomyopathy.

A Block Mean Insertion and Dual Stego Generation Based Embedding Strategy

In reversible data hiding, pixel value ordering is an up-to-the-minute research idea in the field of data hiding. Secret messages are embedded in the maximum or the minimum value among the pixels in a block. Pixel value ordering helps identify the embeddable pixels in a block but suffers from fewer embedding payloads. It leaves many pixels in a block without implanting any bits there. The proposed scheme in this paper resolved that problem by allowing every pixel to conceive data bits. The method partitioned the image pixels in blocks of size two. In each block, it first orders these two pixels and then measures the average value. The average value is placed in the middle of these two pixels. Thus, the scheme extends the block size from two to three. After applying the embedding method of Weng et al., the implantation task removed the average value from the block to reduce its size again to two. These two alive pixels are called stego pixels, which produced a stego image. A piece of state information is produced during implanting to track whether a change is happening to the block’s cover pixels. This way, after embedding in all blocks, a binary stream of state information is produced, which has later been converted to decimal values. Thus, image data were assembled in a two-dimensional array. Considering the array as another image plane, Weng et al.’s method is again applied to embed further to produce another stego image. Model validation ensured that the proposed method performed better than previous work in this field.

Data Classification Using Combination of Five Machine Learning Techniques

Data clustering plays a vital role in object identification. In real life we mainly use the concept in biometric identification and object detection. In this paper we use Fuzzy Weighted Rules, Fuzzy Inference System (FIS), Fuzzy C-Mean clustering (FCM), Support Vector Machine (SVM) and Artificial Neural Network (ANN) to distinguish three types of Iris data called Iris-Setosa, Iris-Versicolor and Iris-Virginica. Each class in the data table is identified by four-dimensional vector, where vectors are used as the input variable called: Sepal Length (SL), Sepal Width (SW), Petal Length (PL) and Petal Width (PW). The combination of five machine learning methods provides above 98% accuracy of class identification.

Status and ethno-medicinal usage of invasive plants in traditional health care practices: a case study from northeastern Bangladesh

Species diversity and ethno-medicinal usage of 39 species of invasive plants were explored in and around two protected areas, Khadimnagar National Park （KNP） and Rema-Kalenga Wildlife Sanctu- ary （RKWS）, of northeastern Bangladesh,. Status of invasive plants were investigated in 60 sample plots with 5 different habitat types, including forest, roadside, homestead, fallow land and others （ponds, canals, water logged areas, agricultural land, etc.）. Data about the usage of invasive plants in traditional health care were collected through interviewing 110 households. Among the five habitat types, fallow land （28 species）.possessed the highest number of species, followed by roadside （25 species）, forest （23 species）, homestead （22 species） and others （13 species）. Based on the survey, invasive plants of study areas were also categorized into five degrees of invasiveness e.g., naturalized, introduced, possibly invasive, moderately invasive and highly invasive. Additionally, there is the linear trend between degrees of invasivaness and use percentage of invasive plants. Total 39 species of invasive plants belonging to 29 families were recorded, which are generally used to treat 37 diseases, ranging from simple headache to highly complicated eye and heart diseases. The majority of the species used by the local inhabitants were herbs （16 species）, followed by some shrubs （11 species）, climbers （5 species）, trees （5 species） and grasses （2 species）. The use percentage of aboveground plant parts were higher （70.58%） than that of underground plant parts （16.18%）.

Assessment of natural regeneration status and diversity of tree species in the biodiversity conservation areas of Northeastern Bangladesh

A study was conducted at two-biodivcrsity conservation areas of Northeastern Bangladesh （a part of Sylhet Forest Division） to assess the species composition, diversity and density of natural regeneration of tree species both indigenous and exotic species. Data were collected by stratified random quadrate method during January 2010 to July 2010. Totally 200 circular plots of 2 m〉〈2 m in size had 5 different habitat types of plants namely; forest, roadside, homestead （surrounding forest dwellers house）, fallow land and others （canals, streams and tea gardens side）, which included a total of 55 regenerating species belonging to 28 families. Meliaceae is the dominant family and shows the highest family importance value （26.3）, having six species, followed by Moraeeae （24.24）. Among the five habitat types, forest （43 species） possess the highes number of species, followed by roadside （23 species）. Total 15 exotic species among 9 families and 40 indigenous species with 24 families were recorded. For exotic species, Tectona grandis possess the highest relative density （11.7%） and relative frequency （10.5%）; Senna siamea had highest relative abundance （7.83%）. In case of indigenous species, Chickrassia tabularis possess the highest relative density （4.23%） and relative frequency （4%）; Dipterocarpus turbinatus bad the highest relative abundance （3.92%）. Tectona grandis （29.66） and Chickrassia tabularis （10.8） had the highest IVI for exotic and indigenous species respectively. Different diversity indic＇es such as Shanon-Winner diversity index,＇ species diversity index, species richness index, species evenness index, Simpson index and species dominance index, etc. were applied to quantify definite diversity. The regeneration of species associated with low levelsof disturbance was in the exotic Species. Study suggests that proper protection from human disturbances and scientific management of natural regeneration of two-study forests may lead a rich biodiversity site in the country.

Yield Gap of Stress Tolerant Rice Varieties Binadhan-10 &Binadhan-11 in Some Selected Areas of Bangladesh

Binadhan-10 & Binadhan-11 are climate smart stress tolerant high yielding rice varieties (yield > 4 t⋅ha−1) have saline tolerant EC up to 12 ds/m and submergence tolerant up to 20 - 25 days capacity. The present study was an attempt to analyze the yield gap of stress tolerant varieties Binadhan-10 & Binadhan-11 in some selected areas of Bangladesh. The objectives of the study were: 1) to estimate the yield gap of Binadhan-10 &-11 growers among the study areas;2) to identify the factors affecting the yield of these variety;and 3) to suggest some policy guidelines to minimize the yield gap. The study was conducted in eight Binadhan-10 & Binadhan-11 growing areas in Bangladesh. In this study, four districts namely Satkhira, Khulna, Barishal, and Cox’s Bazar were used for Binadhan-10 and Mymensingh, Jamalpur, Sherpur and Sunamgonj were taken for Binadhan-11. It is based on primary level data from eight sub-districts among the study areas. A total of 240 farmers were randomly selected (30 from each location) to collect the data with a pre-designed questionnaire. Farmer were grouped according to saline affected and not-affected for saline tolerant variety Binadhan-10 and not affected, affected (1 - 10 days) and highly affected (10 - 20 days) for submergence tolerant rice variety Binadhan-11 to identify existing yield gap. Tabular as well as Zandstra method were applied for analysis the data. The study also found factors affecting the gap and some policy guidelines to minimize the gap.