[Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder at schools in Sfax-Tunisia]

Background: Frequency, social impact, the negative effects of ADHD on personal development, make it a public health problem. Tunisian existing data confirm its frequency and severity in clinical population. The absence of data in student population has led us to develop this work. The objectives of our study were to study epidemiological profile of ADHD in school population

Methods: The analysis involved a cross-sectional descriptive study conducted from April 2008 to October 2008 using a representative randomized multistage sample of schoolchildren between 6 and 12 years old. Measurement was performed in two stages first the parents and teachers of each children filled Conners questionnaire separately then students with the score in subscales inattention, hyperactivity with impulsivity higher than 70 were selected for psychiatric interview. Psychiatric interview was intended to confirm or refute the diagnosis of ADHD. The diagnoses were made according to DSM IV-TR. To study the possible associated factors with the disorder they were compared in children with ADHD and children without the disorder taken as controls

Results: A total of 51 students out of 513 had ADHD. Prevalence was found to be 9,94%. For the study of factors associated with ADHD were found in males, neonatal hospitalization, psychiatric and family history of ADHD and the existence of a family dysfunctionment

Conclusion: Our prevalence is similar to the majority of those reported by studies conducted through the same methodology as ours. The etiology of ADHD is not unequivocal. The disorder appears to be multifactorial

[Emotional disorders and inflammatory bowel disease]

The co-occurrence of emotional disorders [alexithymia, depression and anxiety] and inflammatory bowel disease [IBD] is reported in the literature. There are several possible explanations for this co morbidity. To evaluate the prevalence of alexithymia, anxiety and depression among patients with IBD and to compare them with a control group of healthy individuals and to discuss the relation between emotional disorders and IBD. We built a case - control study of 50 patients with IBD [ulcerative colitis [UC] and Crohn's disease [CD]]. The control group compounded 50 subjects without IBD and paired according sex, age, and school level. Alexithymia was assessed with the 20-item version of the Toronto Alexithymia Scale [TAS -20]. Participants completed the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale [HADS], which is a 14-item self-report scale providing separate subscale scores for anxiety [HADS-A] and depression [HADS-D]. Among the group of patients, the rates of anxiety, depression and alexithymia were, respectively, 52%, 44% and 54%. In this group, there were significantly more anxious, depressed, and alexithymic subjects than in the control group [p respectively, 0, 007, 0, 015 and 0, 002]. The anxiety and the depression were more frequent among patients who had active disease or symptoms than those in remission [p respectively, 0, 011 and 0, 035]. The comorbidity of emotional disorders and IBD seems to be frequent. Therefore, clinicians should look for those disorders in patients with IBD, by using specific scales. The adjunction of emotional disorder treatment, if needed, would allow optimizing the management of MICI

[Percutaneous vertebroplasty for pain relief in patients with osteoporotic spine fractures]

Percutaneous vertebroplasty [PVP] is an interventional radiology technique where pathological vertebral bodies are filled with acrylic cement. This method is used to strengthen the vertebral body and reduce pain in certain diseases involving the vertebrae such as osteoporosis. To evaluate PVP in symptomatic osteoporotic vertebral fractures after failure of conservative management. Between November 2008 to December 2009, PVP was performed for osteoporotic vertebral fractures in 12 consecutive patients in a single institution. Medium term [3 days and 15 days post PVP] and long term follow up [1 month and 3 months post PVP] consisted in the evaluation of residual or secondary pain using Huskisson's visual analogue scale. A total of 20 vertebrae were treated. Mean follow up was 80 days [30-90 days]. Significant symptomatic improvement [p=0.002] was noted with pre PVP pain score of 7.4 [ +/- 1.6], 3 days post PVP score of 4.1 [ +/- 2.1], 15 days post PVP score of 1.8 [ +/- 1.1], 1 month post PVP score of 1.22 [ +/- 1.06] and 3 months post PVP score of 1.4 [ +/- 1.14]. PVP appears to be an effective technique in the treatment of symptomatic osteoporotic vertebral fractures with approximately 94% of satisfactory results in the short and medium term period

Depression in chronic hemodialysis patients: About 106 cases

Depression is the most common psychiatric disorder in chronic hemodialysis patients and is associated with mortality. To evaluate the prevalence of the depression in patients undergoing chronic hemodialysis, and to identify the correlated factors. The study population included 106 patients on chronic hemodialysis. The Hospital-Anxiety and Depression Scale was used to diagnosis depression. The prevalence of the depression among the patients surveyed was 46.2%. Among 8 factors correlated with the depression at the univariate analysis, only 2 factors were still strongly correlated at the multivariate analysis: professional inactivity [OR = 6.54; p = 0.01] and anxiety [OR = 1 ., 5; p = 0.00]. According to our study, professional inactivity and/or anxiety should make looking for depression in order to optimize the management of the patients on chronic hemodialysis

Sanitary's indicators of the university hospital hedi chaker of sfax in 2002

The objective of this work was to present the main results of this investigation during the year 2002 and to describe the profile of the hospital morbidity. In the setting of the epidemiologic supervision, the Community Medicine and Epidemiology service in Sfax leads a continuous descriptive study of the hospital morbidity and mortality. The average age of the hospitalized was 32, 10 years. The sex-ratio was estimated at 0, 94. The socio-economic level was relatively low. The chronic pathologies come in head and are dominated by the chronic renal failure, schizophrenia and diabetes. The profile of morbidity reflects an epidemiological transition phenomenon and call to a backing of the ambulatory handling and the development of specific services capable to make decrease the needs of hospitalizations