Gill Histopathological Effects of PAHs on Adult Pearl Oyster, <i>Pinctada radiata</i>at Al-Khiran Coast in Kuwait

The hazardous effect of water pollution on the histopathology of gill organ of the pearl oyster, Pinctada radiata was studied with respect to polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon contamination in Al-Khiran coast at Kuwait. Thirty oyster samples from each site, site one where dead oysters were located, site two which is two kilometers away from site one and the control site which is ten kilometers away from site one were collected from Al-Khiran area where a massive number of dead oysters were reported. The gills of oysters were immediately removed and transferred to Bouin’s solution for fixation and then processed for sectioning, staining and mounting and gill tissues were ready for examination. Histopathological changes in gills of oysters exposed to polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in site one and site two included necrosis and edemas of branchial lamellae, complete degeneration of gill filaments, loss of regular shape and haemolysis, and inflammation. Gill tissues of oysters from the control site had normal appearance. The study showed a clear evidence that PAHs caused severe histopathological changes in gills of pearl oyster Pinctada radiata.

Method Verification and Validation of Hydralazine Hydrochloride: Spectrophotometric Analysis in Pure and Pharmaceutical Formulations

The new method proposed is based on the formation of hydralazine-Bromophenol blue ion pair simply and without further extraction or heating. The ion pair was prepared in the presence of pH 3 citrate buffer forming a yellow-colored chromogen. A new maximum UV-visible band formed at 416 nm. The color was stable for more than 10 hours and obeyed Beer’s Law over the concentration range of 10 - 50 µg/mL. The calculated molar absorptivity and Sandell’s sensitivity were 1.01 × 104 L∙mol−1∙cm−1 and 0.0514 µg/mL, respectively. The elements of method validation stipulated by The International Conference on Harmonization [Q2 (R1)] were applied for hydralazine hydrochloride assay in pure and pharmaceutical tablet formulation. The average recoveries of the pure solution and the pharmaceutical formulation were 98.94% and 99.50%, respectively. The results were statistically compared by F-test, which indicates that the method can be precise and repeatable for both pure and pharmaceutical solutions. The method was found to be accurate, reproducible, and cost-effective, and validated for the assay of hydralazine in terms of the routine quality control.

Reliability and validity of the Arabic version of the PedsQL^TM4.0 generic ore scales and PedsQL^TM3.0 diabetes module

Background: Health related quality of life (HRQOL) has become a field of extensive research involving children and adolescents with diabetes. There are no HRQOL instruments designed or adapted for the Arabic culture and language. The objectives of the study are to test the Arabic translated version of the PedsQLTM 4.0 Generic Core Scales (GCS) and the PedsQLTM 3.0 Diabetes Module (DM) in children and adolescents with type 1 diabetes (T1DM) in Kuwait and analyse their psychometric properties. Methods: After the process of translation, committee review and pre-testing (linguistic validation), 131 children and adolescents with and 104 without T1DM, with their parents completed the Arabic version of GCS. Those with T1DM completed the Arabic DM. Demographic and diabetes-related data were collected using specially designed questionnaires. Internal consistency was checked by Cronbach’s alpha coefficient. The intraclass correlations coefficient, celling and floor effects and construct validity were assessed to determine the psychometric properties of both instruments. Results: Cronbach’s alpha of the child self-report and parent proxy-report was greater than 0.70, for both instruments, indicating internal consistency reliability. Items of both instruments had minimal missing responses, and required a brief time (5 - 7 minutes) to finish indicating their feasibility. No floor effect was demonstrated. Ceiling effect ranged from 5.8% to 15.8%. The GCS distinguished between healthy and diabetic children. The intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) between child self-report and parent proxy-report of GCS scores showed good to excellent agreement, p < 0.001. However, in the DM reports, the correlation was lower, but still significant. Girls reported lower HRQOL scores in worries and communication subscales of the diabetes module than boys, p < 0.05. Conclusions: The Arabic version of the PedsQL GCS and PedsQL DM showed sufficient feasibility, reliability and validity to be used for research purposes in public health setting for children 2 - 18 years old and their parents.

The Gulf Crisis:An Insight Into Kuwait’s Mediation Efforts

Mediation is an important peaceful means of resolving international disputes.In such cases,the mediator invites member states in dispute to roundtable negotiations to bring about a reconciliation.In the late GCC crisis between Qatar on one hand and Saudi Arabia,UAE,Bahrain,and Egypt on the other,Kuwaiti mediation tries to bridge the gap and prevent escalation that might lead to military confrontation against Doha to force a change of regime.However,this mediation is always in danger of an elongated crisis that might worsen the situation and hinder the parties reaching a reconciliatory settlement of their dispute.This is a challenge that confronts the Kuwaiti mediator and jeopardizes the very existence of the GCC in case the Kuwaiti mediator fails to reach a settlement.The dispute went beyond a limited geographic one with Egypt joining the boycott and the symbolic presence of Turkish troops in Qatar.As such,the dispute has created an unprecedented political rift among Gulf States and their rulers and somehow worries the existing regimes.This worrying situation threatens the core principles of some of these States,including those who are still neutral towards the dispute.

Jones type fifth metatarsal fracture fixation in athletes:A review and current concept

Jones type fifth metatarsal fracture is a common occurrence among athletes at all levels.These fractures may occur due to several mechanisms,but inversions and twisting injuries are considered some of the leading causes in sports.However,while Jones fracture incidences are frequent in the sporting world,there is still a lack of consensus on how such fractures should be effectively managed.There are numerous treatment options for patients with fifth metatarsal Jones fractures.The role of nonoperative treatment remains controversial,with concerns about delayed union and nonunion.Surgical stabilization of metatarsal Jones fractures is therefore often recommended for athletes,as it is often associated with a low number of complications and a higher rate of union than nonoperative management.This review will focus on literature regarding the prevalence of Jones type fifth metatarsal fracture,alongside the efficacy of both conservative and surgical treatment within this population.

Mathematical Optimization Modelling for Fast-Switched and Delay Minimized Scheduling for Intra-Cell Communication in an AWGR-Based PON Data Center

As the internet traffic along with the processing power in data centers are exponentially growing, the need for the design of energy efficient with highly elastic networking infrastructure to support the different applications and cloud services that can be hosted in data centers have become a hot research area. A key departure from the norm is that conventional routers and switches in conventional data centers are replaced with high performance Passive Optical Networks (PONs) to take over the role of routing and traffic forwarding through efficient resource provisioning algorithms. In this paper, the different aspects of PONs in the design of energy efficient, high capacity, and highly elastic networking infrastructures to support the applications and services hosted by modern data centers are considered. In this work, a mathematical optimization model for energy-efficient and delay-minimized scheduling in AWGR based PON data center for PON cell fabric configuration will be presented. The performance of the proposed architecture in terms of efficient scheduling against average delay and power consumption for different traffic loads and patterns will be evaluated. Different scenarios of traffic;random and unbalanced with hotspots are examined to evaluate the average delay and power consumption with and without sleep mode. Results have shown that with sleep mode enabled, power savings for two evaluated objective functions have shown similar results when examining different traffic patterns. The power savings range between 8% and 55% during low and high load activities, respectively. However, minimization of delay model has shown improvement in reducing total average delay reaching up to 42% if compared with the model with objective of minimization of power consumption.

Mathematical Correlation for Tungsten-Based Alloy Nanopowder to Determine the Relation between Temperature Time and Weight under Certain Temperatures

High temperature treatment of tungsten alloy of W-5wt.% TM （transition metals, TM = Ni, Fe, Cu, Co） nanopowder was run under different temperatures to cover the oxidation rate at different temperatures. The correlation was developed for certain temperatures to find an equation for the relation between time and weight. The thermal treatment was done for different quantities at certain times. The proposed equation studies the correlation between temperature, time, and weight. For each temperature, a number of points were recorded from the measured oxidation curve. The shape of the curves is well-represented in this paper. The final results will present the highest temperature, the maximum weight, and the maximum time for full oxidation at high and low temperatures.

来自科威特静脉应用免疫球蛋白治疗中毒性表皮坏死松解症的前瞻性非对照开放性研究

Background. High-dose intravenous immunoglobulin (IVIG)is emerging as a promising new therapy for treating the rare but potentially fatal drug reaction toxic epidermal necrolysis (TEN). Experimental in vitro studies support that IVIG can block the Fas-FasL-mediated apoptosis in TEN. Methods. Twelve consecutive patients (7M, 5F) with TEN admitted over a 5-year period from January 1998 to December 2002 were treated with a dose of 0.5-1.0 g/kg/d of IVIG for 45 days along with standard care protocol. Clinical outcome in terms of average duration to arrest the progression, complete healing, hospital stay, side-effects and complications were determined to find the efficacy of IVIG treatment. Results. Average age was 27.16 years (7-50 years). There were four children (2M, 2F) aged 7-12 years. One patient had an underlying malignancy. No patient had HIV infection. The average total body surface area involvement was 57.5%(30-90%). An IVIG infusion was started, on average, 1.58 days (1-3 days) after admission. All patients responded well to the treatment. There was no mortality. The disease progression was arrested in a mean of 2.83 days (1-5 days). Time taken for complete healing (re-epithelialization)was 7.33 days (5-13 days). The average duration of hospital stay was 12.5 days (7-21 days). No side-effects of the IVIG treatment were observed in these patients. The drugs triggering TEN in these patients were phenytoin (four patients), followed by penicillin (three), cotrimoxazole (two), phenobarbital and furosemide (one patient each), respectively. In one patient, the offending drug could not be ascertained. Conclusion. Our experience of treating 12 patients with TEN using IVIG, in Kuwait, confirms that it is a safe and effective treatment for these patients.

Metformin for Antipsychotic-Related Metabolic Syndrome in Children： Fact or Fiction？

Use of atypical antipsychotics （AAPs） in child/adolescent psychiatry （CAP） population is rife to address a wide array of indications. Apart from the Food and Drug Administration approval in schizophrenia, bipolar mood disorders, irritability in autism spectrum disorder, and Tourette＇s syndrome, AAPs are commonly prescribed off-label for aggression in intellectual disability or attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, augmentation in depression and obsessive-compulsive disorder.

Imipramine-precipitated status epilepticus

Frontal lobe epilepsy has a complex and atypical semiology that may masquerade as psychiatric or parasomnias[1].An electroencephalography(EEG)and sleep lab workup should be an integral part of clinical assessment of these cases to avoid potential pitfalls in management with serious conse-quences as evidenced in this clinical vignette.By mistak-ing epilepsy for anxiety,imipramine,a tricyclic antidepres-sant,known to lower seizure threshold,was prescribed and resulted in status epilepticus.This letter concludes with a brief literature review of antidepressants and seizure risk.

Lithium is Clearly Underutilized in Child Psychiatry

To the Editor： Frederick Goodwin, an influential figure in bipolar mood disorder, famously said, if you can＇t, or you won＇t use lithium, get out from the business of treating bipolar disorders! Lithium remains the gold standard treatment of bipolar mood disorder.But, sorely, it is underutilized in Child/Adolescent Psychiatry, despite Food and Drug Administration＇s approvalfor age 12 and above.