Does Aerobic Vaginitis Have Adverse Pregnancy Outcomes? Prospective Observational Study.

Background: Aerobic vaginitis (AV) is an aberration within the balanced vaginal microbiota. Only few reports have documented the adverse pregnancy outcomes related to AV. Nonetheless, the exact role of AV in pregnancy and the potential benefit of its screening need further study. Our goal was to evaluate the association between aerobic vaginitis (AV) in late pregnancy and maternal and neonatal outcomes. Methods: In this prospective observational study, a total of 600 singleton pregnant women with intact fetal membranes at a gestational age of 34-36 weeks were recruited (one hundred women with AV and 500 pregnant women without AV). The study protocol excluded patients with other forms of vaginal infection. Pregnancy outcomes were traced and documented. The primary outcome was the association between AV and preterm labor. The current study compared the maternal and neonatal outcomes among pregnant women with and without AV in unadjusted and adjusted analyses with the odds ratio (OR) and 95% confidence interval (CI) reported. Results: There was an association between AV and with preterm birth (adjusted OR 3.06, 95% CI 1.58-5.95) and prelabor rupture of membranes (adjusted OR 6.17, 95% CI 3.24-11.7). For neonatal outcomes, AV was associated with a higher incidence of neonatal ICU admission (adjusted OR 2.19, 95% CI 1.1-4.34). Severe forms of AV significantly increased the incidence of PTB (p = 0.0014) and PROM (p = 0.0094) when compared to less severe forms of AV. Conclusion: AV is common in late pregnancy and is linked to a diversity of adversative pregnancy outcomes including preterm birth, PROM, and neonatal ICU admission. Moreover, the incidence of PTB and PROM might further increase with the severity of AV. Clinicians should pay more consideration to vaginal microbiota assessment during pregnancy.

Classification of dental diseases using hyperspectral imaging and laser induced fluorescence.

PURPOSE: Early diagnosis of tooth enamel demineralization, and dentin caries lesions, present a valuable solution to avoid or decrease their deleterious effect. The aim of this study was to design a simple, effective, and non-invasive technique, employing a novel laser wavelength to classify and differentiate between various tooth abnormalities in-vitro, by estimating wavelengths, showing distinctive appearance for each tooth class. METHODS: This study implies a fluorescence hyperspectral imaging system employing a 395-nm laser diode source, irradiating a pre-diagnosed 12 molars and premolars teeth. The obtained reconstructed images were displayed and processed by HSAnalysis2XL, accompanied by a custom made digital, and image signal processing algorithms, revealing the exact wavelengths, characterizing the fluorescence of each tooth pre-diagnosed class. RESULTS: The proposed hyperspectral imaging system was able to discriminate between normal, and abnormal dental classes for the entire specimens. Furthermore, a series of wavelengths, noting each lesion individually were obtained from the spectroscopic hyperspectral output. The root calculus, white spot, dentin caries, and enamel caries have a bright visual appearance at λ3 = 702 nm, λ5 = 771 nm, and λ6 = 798 nm respectively. Consequently, these abnormalities exhibit a dark appearance at λ1 = 421 nm, λ2 = 462 nm, and λ4 = 734 nm. The wavelength selections were confirmed by the grayscale image outcomes. CONCLUSIONS: This study provides a set of wavelengths that can be employed by dentists to diagnose white spot, root calculus, and enamel dentin caries lesions under the irradiation of a new UV-vis laser illumination source without, any hazardous thermal or mechanical effects.

A Method for Medical Diagnosis Based on Optical Fluence Rate Distribution at Tissue Surface.

Optical differentiation is a promising tool in biomedical diagnosis mainly because of its safety. The optical parameters' values of biological tissues differ according to the histopathology of the tissue and hence could be used for differentiation. The optical fluence rate distribution on tissue boundaries depends on the optical parameters. So, providing image displays of such distributions can provide a visual means of biomedical diagnosis. In this work, an experimental setup was implemented to measure the spatially-resolved steady state diffuse reflectance and transmittance of native and coagulated chicken liver and native and boiled breast chicken skin at 635 and 808 nm wavelengths laser irradiation. With the measured values, the optical parameters of the samples were calculated in vitro using a combination of modified Kubelka-Munk model and Bouguer-Beer-Lambert law. The estimated optical parameters values were substituted in the diffusion equation to simulate the fluence rate at the tissue surface using the finite element method. Results were verified with Monte-Carlo simulation. The results obtained showed that the diffuse reflectance curves and fluence rate distribution images can provide discrimination tools between different tissue types and hence can be used for biomedical diagnosis.