ABSTRACT
Background: Prevalence of hypomagnesaemia is significantly higher in diabetic patients with microvascular complications compared to diabetics with no microvascular complications. The aim of this study is to measure levels of serum magnesium in patients with newly diagnosed type 2 diabetes mellitus and study its association with the presenting microvascular complications.Methods: This was hospital based, one year cross-sectional study carried out in Department of Medicine, IGMC Shimla in patients with newly diagnosed type 2 diabetes mellitus. Total 53 patients were enrolled in this study who presented in medicine OPD or admitted in medicine ward.Results: Serum Magnesium value of the patients ranged from 1.20-3.0 mg/dl with mean value of 1.9±0.3 mg/dl. Fourteen patients (26.4%) had hypomagnesaemia. A total of 34 (64.2%) patients presented with complications of diabetes in which proteinuria was present in 34 (64.2%), retinopathy in 4 (7.5%) and neuropathy in 1 (1.9%). Fourteen (41.2%) patients with hypomagnesaemia presented with complications of diabetes (p value=0.003). 34 (64.2%) patients presented with proteinuria out of which 14 (41.2%) patients had hypomagnesaemia while 20 (58.8%) had normomagnesaemia (p=0.03). One (1.9%) patient had neuropathy and hypomagnesaemia was also present in this patient (p=0.6). Four patients (7.5%) presented with retinopathy out of which 3 (5.7%) had hypomagnesaemia while 1 (1.9%) had normomagnesaemia.Conclusions: Hypomagnesaemia is associated with microvascular complications of diabetes. Also there is statistically significant relationship between proteinuria and hypomagnesaemia in patients with newly diagnosed type 2 diabetes mellitus.
ABSTRACT
Primary healthcare workers being grassroot workers in rural areas can be effective in oral health promotion in these areas. Aim: To assess oral health knowledge and practices among primary healthcare workers in Shimla district in Himachal Pradesh. Setting and Design: A cross-sectional study. Subjects and Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted to assess oral health knowledge and practices of primary healthcare workers in Shimla using a self-administered questionnaire. Statistical Analysis Used: Data were analyzed using SPSS package version 16. The tests used were t-test and Fisher's exact test. A P value < 0.05 was considered statistically significant. Results: Of 130 subjects, there were 60 (46.2%) males and 70 (53.8%) females. The mean age of the population was 48.4 ± 5.9 with a range of 25–57. The mean knowledge score percent of the population was 51.9 ± 18.2. It was higher for males (52.3 ± 15.0) when compared with females (51.5 ± 20.7). The mean knowledge score percent was positively associated with education and negatively associated with age. Tooth brush was used by 97.7% and tooth paste by 121 (93.1%). The frequency of brushing twice was reported by 79 (60.8%). Conclusion: Though the overall knowledge about oral health is good among primary healthcare workers, the understanding about various aspects is lacking. Therefore, it is recommended that health workers should be given education to enhance knowledge and practices toward oral healthcare and to increase their screening capacity for common dental problem which will serve the community in long way.
ABSTRACT
Background: Genetic and epigenetic changes (DNA methylation) were examined in the tissue-culture propagated interspecific potato somatic hybrids between dihaploid Solanum tuberosum and S. pinnatisectum. Amplified fragment length polymorphism (AFLP) and methylation-sensitive amplified polymorphism (MSAP) were applied to detect the genetic and epigenetic changes, respectively in the somatic hybrids mother plants (1st cycle) and their regenerants (30th cycles sub-cultured). Results: To detect genetic changes, eight AFLP primer combinations yielded a total of 329 scorable bands of which 49 bands were polymorphic in both mother plants and regenerants. None of the scorable bands were observed in term of loss of original band of mother plant or gain of novel band in their regenerants. AFLP profiles and their cluster analysis based on the Jaccard’s similarity coefficient revealed 100% genetic similarity among the mother plant and their regenerants. On the other hand, to analyze epigenetic changes, eight MSAP primer pair combinations detected a few DNA methylation patterns in the mother plants (0 to 3.4%) and their regenerants (3.2 to 8.5%). Out of total 2320 MSAP sites in the mother plants, 2287 (98.6%) unmethylated, 21 (0.9%) fully methylated and 12 (0.5%) hemi-methylated, and out of total 2494 MSAP sites in their regenerants, 2357 (94.5%) unmethylated, 79 (3.1%) fully methylated and 58 (2.3%) hemi-methylated sites were amplified. Conclusion: The study concluded that no genetic variations were observed among the somatic hybrids mother plants and their regenerants by eight AFLP markers. However, minimum epigenetic variations among the samples were detected ranged from 0 to 3.4% (mother plants) and 3.2 to 8.5% (regenerants) during the tissue culture process.