The direct and indirect impact of trauma types and cumulative stressors and traumas on executive functions.

The goal was to measure the effects of trauma types, cumulative trauma, posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), existential annihilation anxiety (EAA), and posttraumatic growth (PTG) on executive functions. The study sample consists of 1155 from Egypt and Kuwait. Measures included adults working memory deficits (WMD) and inhibition deficits (ID), and cumulative stressors and traumas (CST) and trauma types, PTSD, EAA, and PTG. We used Stepwise regression and PROCESS macro to analyze the data. Results indicated that survival and cumulative traumas have direct effects on a lower WMD and ID, attachment traumas and gender discrimination by parents have direct impacts on higher WMD and ID, while personal identity, status identity, secondary trauma, gender discrimination by society, community violence do not have any direct effects on WMD or ID. All traumas have indirect effects on higher WMD or/and ID via PTSD. Gender discrimination by society, community violence, and CST has an additional indirect higher impact on WMD and ID via EAA. There were indirect trajectories from survival trauma, personal identity, status identity trauma, secondary trauma, gender discrimination by society, and CST on lower WMD or/and ID via PTG. Attachment trauma, gender discrimination by parents, perpetration traumas, and community violence were not associated with PTG and its trajectories of lower WMD or/and ID. We discussed the research and clinical implication for these results.

Development and validation of spectrophotometric methods for estimation of antimigraine drug eletriptan hydrobromide in pure form and pharmaceutical formulations.

OBJECTIVES: The present study aims to develop and validate four simple, sensitive, reproducible, and low-cost spectrophotometric methods for the determination of antimigraine drug (eletriptan hydrobromide) in pure form and pharmaceutical formulations. METHODS: The methods are based on the formation of yellow colored ion-pair complex between eletriptan hydrobromide and four acid dyes, namely, bromocresol purple (BCP), bromocresol green (BCG), bromophenol blue (BPB), and bromothymol blue (BTB) with absorption maxima at 410, 420, 414 and 416nm, respectively. Several parameters such as pH, buffer type and volume, reagent volume, sequence of addition and effect of extracting solvent were optimized. RESULTS: Under the optimum experimental conditions, beer's law is obeyed over the concentration ranges of 1.0-20 and 1.0-16µgmL-1 for (BCP or BCG) and (BPB or BTB), respectively with good correlation coefficients (0.9995-0.9999). The apparent molar absorptivity and Sandell's sensitivity values are reported for all methods. The limit of detection (LOD) and the limit of quantification (LOQ) values are found to be 0.27, 0.28, 0.25, and 0.30µgmL-1 and 0.90, 0.93, 0.83, and 1.0µgmL-1 for BCP, BCG, BPB and BTB, respectively. The stoichiometric ratio of the formed ion-pair complexes was found to be 1:1 (drug: reagent) for all methods. CONCLUSION: The developed methods were successfully applied for the determination of eletriptan hydrobromide in pharmaceutical formulations with good accuracy and precision. Statistical comparison of the results was performed using Student's t-test and variance ratio F-test at the 95% confidence level and there was no significant difference between the reported and proposed methods regarding accuracy and precision. Further, the validity of the proposed methods was confirmed by recovery studies via standard addition method.

Possible role of garlic oil in ameliorating renal injury after liver ischemia/reperfusion in rats.

Acute liver failure induces renal injury by triggering inflammation and oxidative stress. The heme oxygenase system has a preventive role against reperfusion injury, while garlic oil has antioxidants and anti-inflammatory effects. This study investigated the protective effects of garlic oil pretreatment on remote renal functions after liver ischemia/reperfusion (I/R), and clarifying gene expressions of heme oxygenase 1 (HO1), autophagy-related 7 (Atg7) and peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor gamma coactivator 1-alpha (PGC1α) in renal tissues. Thirty six adult female Wistar rats were randomly divided into control, garlic oil-supplemented, liver I/R, and garlic oil-pretreated liver I/R groups. Liver ischemia was performed in anesthetized rats for 45 min, followed by reperfusion for 24 hours in metabolic cages. Serum samples were used for determination of liver enzymes and creatinine levels and total antioxidant capacity (TAC). Urine samples were assayed for albumin, volume and creatinine concentration. Right liver lobe and right kidney specimens were used for determination of oxidative stress markers (colorimeterically). Also, gene expressions of HO1, Atg7 and PGC1α were investigated in right kidney specimens using real time PCR. Left kidney specimens were used for histopathological studies. Liver I/R group exhibited higher liver enzymes and creatinine levels in serum, prominent oxidative stress in both liver and renal tissues, albuminuria, lowered GFR deranged renal structure, and upregulated HO1, Atg7 and PGC1α gene expressions in renal tissues. Garlic oil-pretreated I/R group restricted such detrimental changes in renal functions and structure, though it caused further upregulation of the studied gene expression in renal tissue to alleviate the oxidative stress. It is concluded that garlic oil exerted reno-protective effected against remote organ damage induced by liver I/R injury, through enhancing HO1, Atg7 and PGC1α gene expressions.

Rates of adherence to pharmacological treatment among children and adolescents with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.

UNLABELLED: Pharmacological intervention, mainly with psychostimulants, alone or with psychotherapy or behavioural modification, was found to be effective in increasing sustained attention span, improving concentration, reducing hyperactive behaviour and improving areas of academic deficits in children and adolescents with the diagnosis of attention deficit-hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Despite their proven efficacy, noncompliance of the children and adolescents to the prescribed medication presents serious problems to patients and health care providers alike. OBJECTIVE: To investigate the rate of adherence to prescribed medication in a clinically referred sample of children and adolescents diagnosed as having ADHD. In addition, the stability of reports of adherence over a 3 month period was explored. METHOD: Fifty-one children and adolescents (males: n = 42; females: n = 9) between the age of 7 years and 16.6 years diagnosed with ADHD and their parents were administered a children behaviour checklist, a teacher report form scale and a compliance with treatment opinion and attitude scale. RESULTS: There were very high reports of adherence by children to prescribed medications for ADHD with rates of compliance greater than 70%. Correlation between the children and adolescents' reports and the parents' reports revealed high agreement both at the end of week 1 and at the end of the study (week 12). There were also findings of stability of adherence reports over a 3 month period. CONCLUSION: The results of this study documented high rates of adherence to medication prescribed for symptoms of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder in a sample of children and adolescents. Their reports of adherence were well correlated with parents' reports. Several factors were found to be related to the high level of adherence.

Limited ovarian stimulation (LOS), prevents the recurrence of severe forms of ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome in polycystic ovarian disease.

OBJECTIVES: We aimed to test the possibility that LOS could be used to avoid the risk of occurrence of severe OHSS in PCOD patients with past history of severe OHSS in their previous IVF treatment. STUDY DESIGN: A prospective study, with patients stood as their own controls. Twenty patients with history of severe OHSS in their previous IVF treatment were included in the study. The patients received LOS cycles during the six months period commencing January 1998, a full dose of human chorionic gonadotropin (10,000 IU) was administered when the leading follicle reached a mean diameter of 12 mm, and oocytes retrieval 36 h later was followed by intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI) and embryo transfer. Signs and symptoms of severe OHSS were recorded. RESULTS: All patients produced mature oocytes, achieved fertilisation and eight clinical pregnancies were diagnosed. None of the patients re-experienced the symptoms of severe OHSS, and none required hospitalisation. CONCLUSION: We confirm that, in the studied group of patients, LOS helped in the prevention of the severe forms of OHSS in PCOD patients with past history of severe OHSS.

Limited ovarian stimulation results in the recovery of mature oocytes in polycystic ovarian disease patients: a preliminary report.

This pilot study including five patients, examined the feasibility of obtaining oocytes from partially stimulated ovarian follicles in patients with polycystic ovarian disease (PCOD). We evaluated oocyte maturity, and fertilization potentials. The diagnosis of PCOD was based on ultrasound findings and endocrine criteria. The long protocol of pituitary ovarian axis down-regulation was used and follicles were stimulated with daily injections of human menopausal gonadotropin (HMG), until the mean diameter of the leading follicle reached 12 mm. A full dose of HCG (10000 I.U.) was administered and oocytes were collected 36 h later. The mean number of oocytes collected per patient was 12.6+/-4.9, the mean number of MII oocytes was 8.8+/-4.4, with fertilization rate of 70.5% following intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI). To our knowledge this is the first report in the literature documenting the recovery of mature oocytes following limited stimulation of the ovaries. The potentials of this novel approach open a new dimension in the management of patients with PCOD.