Prospective Evaluation of Outcomes of Mechanical Devices in Women with Symptomatic Pelvic Organ Prolapse in Ogbomoso, South-Western Nigeria

Background: Symptomatic pelvic organ prolapse (POP) impacts the sufferers’ quality of life negatively. There is a preference for a mechanical device in certain conditions though the definitive management of POP is surgical. Objectives: We conducted the study to evaluate the outcome of management of POP using mechanical devices. Methods: It was a prospective study. It took place in the gynecology unit of the Bowen University Teaching Hospital Ogbomoso between May 2014 and April 2019. We followed up with eligible patients who opted for pessary use for a median duration of 18 months (Range 12 - 84 months). We excluded those who refuse to participate in the study. Results: Of the 127 patients with symptomatic POP, seventy-five (59.1%) opted for the use of mechanical devices, and 70 successfully retained them four weeks after insertion. We lost Six (9.2%) patients to follow up. Of the 64 women included in the analysis, 16 (25%) discontinued use at some point after four weeks, whereas 36 (56.3%) used the pessary successfully throughout the follow-up period. Overall, 12.1% of the women experienced minor complications (6.9% pain or discomfort, 3.2% excoriation or bleeding, and 2.0% dis-impaction or constipation). After cessation of pessary use, 12 (25%) of the 48 women chose surgery, and 10 (20.8%) chose no further treatment. Conclusion: This study concluded that pessary use for pelvic organ prolapse is safe in low resource settings. Therefore, it is justifiable to offer pessaries in the initial management of uterovaginal prolapse to all patients who opt for conservative management and those awaiting surgery.

Study on Net Hauler Safety Device for Fishing Vessels

[Objective] To design a safety device set for fishing vessel net hauler, in order to reduce the severe potential safety hazards in offshore operation. [Method] In view of the operation and structure of net hauler on the fishing trawler, this paper investigated the existing safety protection devices and designed a new set of purely mechanical structure without changing the original structures of the vessel significantly. [Result] Using the easily-adjustable functions of the main shaft of CNC lathe, and simulating the operation performance of different hauling line speeds and testing the safety device, the results showed that the new device could protect the crew from safety accidents caused by net hauler. [Conclusion] The result provides references for the design and application of mechanical protection devices for net haulers on other fishing trawlers.

Cryptanalysis of an Improved Flexible Ping-Pong Protocol in Perfect and Imperfect Quantum Channels

We recently proposed a flexible quantum secure direct communication protocol [Chin. Phys. Lett. 23 （2006） 3152]. By analyzing its security in the perfect channel from the aspect of quantum information theory, we find that an eavesdropper is capable of stealing all the information without being detected. Two typical attacks are presented to illustrate this point. A solution to this loophole is also suggested and we show its powerfulness against the most general individual attack in the ideal case. We also discuss the security in the imperfect case when there is noise and loss.

Design method and verification of a hybrid prosthetic mechanism with energy-damper clutchable device for transfemoral amputees

Transfemoral amputees(TAs)have difficulty in mobility during walking,such as restricted movement of lower extremity and body instability,yet few transfemoral prostheses have explored human-like multiple motion characteristics by simple structures to fit the kinesiology,biomechanics,and stability of human lower extremity.In this work,the configurations of transfemoral prosthetic mechanism are synthesized in terms of human lower-extremity kinesiology.A hybrid transfemoral prosthetic(HTP)mechanism with multigait functions is proposed to recover the gait functions of TAs.The kinematic and mechanical performances of the designed parallel mechanism are analyzed to verify their feasibility in transfemoral prosthetic mechanism.Inspired by motion-energy coupling relationship of the knee,a wearable energy-damper clutched device that can provide energy in knee stance flexion to facilitate the leg off from the ground and can impede the leg’s swing velocity for the next stance phase is proposed.Its co-operation with the springs in the prismatic pairs enables the prosthetic mechanism to have the energy recycling ability under the gait rhythm of the knee joint.Results demonstrate that the designed HTP mechanism can replace the motion functions of the knee and ankle to realize its multimode gait and effectively decrease the peak power of actuators from 94.74 to 137.05 W while maintaining a good mechanical adaptive stability.

Bioinspired approaches for medical devices

Advances in medical devices have revolutionized the treatment of human diseases,such as stents in occluded coronary artery,left ventricular assist devices in heart failure,pacemakers in arrhythmias,etc.Despite their significance,the development of devices for reducing and avoiding the thrombosis formation,obtaining excellent mechanical performance,and achieving stable electronic physiology remains challenging and unresolved.Fortunately,nature serves as a good resource of inspirations,and brings us endless bioinspired physicochemical ideas to better the development of novel artificial materials and devices that enable us to potentially overcome the unresolved obstacles.Bioinspired approaches,in particularly,owe much of their current development in biology,chemistry,materials science,medicine and engineering to the design and fabrication of advanced devices.The application of bioinspired devices is a burgeoning area in these fields of research.In this perspective,we would take the cardiovascular device as one example to show how these bioinspired approaches could be used to build novel,advanced biomedical devices with precisely controlled functions.Here,bioinspired approaches are utilized to solve issues like thrombogenic,mechanical and electronic physiology problems in medical devices.Moreover,there is an outlook for future challenges in the development of bioinspired medical devices.

Review of recent progresses on flexible oxide semiconductor thin film transistors based on atomic layer deposition processes

The current article is a review of recent progress and major trends in the field of flexible oxide thin film transistors（TFTs）, fabricating with atomic layer deposition（ALD） processes. The ALD process offers accurate controlling of film thickness and composition as well as ability of achieving excellent uniformity over large areas at relatively low temperatures. First, an introduction is provided on what is the definition of ALD, the difference among other vacuum deposition techniques, and the brief key factors of ALD on flexible devices. Second, considering functional layers in flexible oxide TFT, the ALD process on polymer substrates may improve device performances such as mobility and stability, adopting as buffer layers over the polymer substrate, gate insulators, and active layers. Third, this review consists of the evaluation methods of flexible oxide TFTs under various mechanical stress conditions. The bending radius and repetition cycles are mostly considering for conventional flexible devices. It summarizes how the device has been degraded/changed under various stress types（directions）. The last part of this review suggests a potential of each ALD film, including the releasing stress, the optimization of TFT structure, and the enhancement of device performance. Thus, the functional ALD layers in flexible oxide TFTs offer great possibilities regarding anti-mechanical stress films, along with flexible display and information storage application fields.