Cranial remolding orthosis for children with deformational skull deformities: A systematic review on the factors affecting success and duration of treatment.

Deformational plagiocephaly, deformational brachycephaly, and deformational scaphocephaly are the most common types of skull deformities during the first year of life. Using a cranial remolding orthosis (CRO) can have an important role in achieving a satisfactory level of improvement in symmetry and proportion of the deformed skulls. However, there is no consensus on the most important parameters for the success or length of treatment with a CRO. In this study, we did a systematic literature review in PubMed, Scopus, Web of Science, and EMBASE on January 2023. Titles/abstracts of the found studies were screened by two independent reviewers. The Newcastle-Ottawa Scale was used to evaluate the quality of the included articles. The best evidence synthesis was considered to determine the strength of the reported factors. A total of 25 articles with an accumulated sample of 7594 participants were included. Nine predictive factors, including age at initiation of CRO treatment, CRO compliance, deformity severity, deformity type, torticollis, gestational age, gestational type, delivery method, and developmental delay, were considered for CRO treatment length or success. Moderate evidence suggests that CRO treatment length is linked to a patient's age at the start of treatment and the deformity severity. Moreover, treatment success is correlated with a patient's age at the start of treatment, CRO compliance, and deformity severity. Moderate evidence indicates that there is no relationship between the presence of torticollis and gestational age with CRO treatment success.

The effects of orthotics device on the balance control in multiple sclerosis patients: A systematic review and meta-analysis.

BACKGROUND: Multiple sclerosis refers to a progressive autoimmune inflammatory disease in the central nervous system usually accompanied by balance disorder. Our systematic review aimed to investigate the effects of orthotic devices on balance control of multiple sclerosis patients. METHODS: The search procedure was according to the population, intervention, comparison, and outcome (PICO) strategy. We looked into PubMed, Embase, ISI Web of Knowledge, and Scopus databases and included all studies published since 1980. Two researchers did the searches separately and evaluated the selected papers' quality based on the physiotherapy evidence database (PEDro) scale and Cochrane risk of bias tool. We did a meta-analysis to evaluate the interventions' effects on the balance factors. RESULTS: We found nine studies, of which seven studies with 162 participants were included in our meta-analysis. Four studies investigated the effect of foot orthoses, one evaluated the effect of shoe modifications and four evaluated the effect of ankle foot orthoses. There was no significant immediate difference between the insole and control groups in center of pressure velocity change, C7 displacement, in both open and closed eyes conditions. Also, there was no significant immediate difference between ankle foot orthosis' intervention and control groups in center of pressure velocity and displacement changes in antero-posterior and medio-lateral directions, in both open and closed eyes conditions. We could not do a meta-analysis for shoe modification. CONCLUSION: Few studies have assessed the effects of orthoses on balance control in multiple sclerosis patients. Studies on ankle foot and foot orthoses show inconsistent results. According to our meta-analysis, orthotic interventions do not seem to improve the balance of people with multiple sclerosis.

Design of new truncated derivatives based on direct and reverse mirror repeats of first six residues of Caerin 4 antimicrobial peptide and evaluation of their activity and cytotoxicity.

Caerin 4 is a family of AMPs isolated from the frog called Litoria caerulea. In silico drug designing methods and using machine learning algorithms for AMPs design can reduce their usage restrictions such as production costs and the time required for investigation of their activity and toxicity. In this study, two short peptides were designed based on direct and reverse mirror repeats of GLWQKI conserved sequence from Caerin 4 family that called dCar12 and rCar12. Also, Caerin 4.1 was synthesized without primary GLWQKI sequence and named Car7-23 . Following the synthesis of peptides, their antimicrobial properties, cytotoxicity, secondary structure, and mode of action were further evaluated. Results indicated that rCar12 had a good antibacterial activity (at an MIC of 3.9-62.5 µg/ml), while Car7-23 did not have any antimicrobial properties. Cytotoxicity of rCar12 at MICs range was <5%, which is much less than Caerin 4.1. In conclusion, rCar12 with reverse mirror repeat has different functional properties compared with dCar12. These results corroborate the fact that in two peptides with identical residues and length, the position and arrangement of amino acids are very important concerning peptide function. Moreover, GLWQKI sequence is highly crucial for the antimicrobial activity of Caerin 4 antimicrobial peptide family.