Comparative Study on the Efficacy of Pregabalin Versus Limaprost in Patients With Lumbar Spinal Stenosis: A Prospective, Randomized Controlled Trial.

BACKGROUND: Patients with Lumbar Spinal Stenosis (LSS) typically complain of back pain and leg pain. These symptoms reduce the quality of life (QoL) and also cause sleep disturbances. This study compares pregabalin and limaprost's efficacy in LSS for pain, disability, QoL, and sleep, aiming to offer insights for medication selection. METHODS: This study was designed as a prospective, randomized, single-center, single-blinded, clinical superiority trial targeting patients with LSS. For 6 weeks, 111 patients per group were administered medication following a standard regimen, after which patient-reported outcomes were measured. The primary outcome was the Visual Analogue Scale (VAS) for back and leg pain, and the secondary outcomes included the Oswestry Disability Index (ODI), European Quality of Life 5 Dimensions (EQ-5D), and sleep quality. RESULTS: After 6 weeks of medication, there were significant improvements over time in the primary outcome, VAS for back pain and leg pain, in both groups, but no significant difference between the 2 groups. Similarly, for the secondary outcomes, ODI and EQ-5D, both groups showed significant improvements, yet there was no significant difference between them. In the subgroup analysis targeting poor sleepers (Pittsburgh sleep quality index, PSQI >5), both groups also exhibited significant improvements in sleep quality, but again, there was no significant difference between the groups. CONCLUSIONS: Efficacy of pregabalin, limaprost in back and leg pain, ODI, EQ-5D, and sleep quality, but there was no significant difference between the 2 groups. Thus, it is advisable to prescribe based on individual drug responses and potential complications.

Building IoT Services for Aging in Place Using Standard-Based IoT Platforms and Heterogeneous IoT Products.

An aging population and human longevity is a global trend. Many developed countries are struggling with the yearly increasing healthcare cost that dominantly affects their economy. At the same time, people living with old adults suffering from a progressive brain disorder such as Alzheimer's disease are enduring even more stress and depression than those patients while caring for them. Accordingly, seniors' ability to live independently and comfortably in their current home for as long as possible has been crucial to reduce the societal cost for caregiving and thus give family members peace of mind, called 'aging in place' (AIP). In this paper we present a way of building AIP services using standard-based IoT platforms and heterogeneous IoT products. An AIP service platform is designed and created by combining previous standard-based IoT platforms in a collaborative way. A service composition tool is also created that allows people to create AIP services in an efficient way. To show practical usability of our proposed system, we choose a service scenario for medication compliance and implement a prototype service which could give old adults medication reminder appropriately at the right time (i.e., when it is time to need to take pills) through light and speaker at home but also wrist band and smartphone even outside the home.

Synthesis and Characterization of Platinum(II) Complexes with Various Substituted 2,2'-Bipyridine Ligands.

The reaction of platinum 5,5"-(9,9-dioctyl-9H-fluorene-2,7-diyl)di-2,2'-bipyridine with 2,2'-bipyridine) PtCI2, (1,10-phenanthroline)PtC2 and (2,2'-bipyrimidine)PtC2: (2,2'-bipyridine)Pt[5,5"-(9,9-dioctyl-9H- fluorene-2,7-diyl)di-2,2'-bipyridine] (1) (2,2'-bipyrimi-dine)Pt[5,5"-(9,9-dioctyl-9H-fluorene-2,7-diyl)di- 2,2'-bipyridine] (2) (1,10-Phenantroline)-Pt[5,5"-(9,9-dioctyl-9H-fluorene-2,7-diyl)di-2,2'-bipyridine] (3). In the study, new platinum complex compounds were synthesized utilizing the ligand of a 5,5"-(9,9- dioctyl-9H-fluorene-2,7-diyl)di-2,2'-bipyridine). Each of the three complexes was obtained through the reaction carried out in this study. These complexes were analyzed using 1H(13C)-NMR, PL, and a UV-vis spectrophotometer. The maximum wavelengths of complexes 1, 2, and 3 appear at 519 nm, 375 nm, and 517 nm, respectively. The quantum yields of these complexes are in the range of 0.35-0.67.

Integrated semantics service platform for the Internet of Things: a case study of a smart office.

The Internet of Things (IoT) allows machines and devices in the world to connect with each other and generate a huge amount of data, which has a great potential to provide useful knowledge across service domains. Combining the context of IoT with semantic technologies, we can build integrated semantic systems to support semantic interoperability. In this paper, we propose an integrated semantic service platform (ISSP) to support ontological models in various IoT-based service domains of a smart city. In particular, we address three main problems for providing integrated semantic services together with IoT systems: semantic discovery, dynamic semantic representation, and semantic data repository for IoT resources. To show the feasibility of the ISSP, we develop a prototype service for a smart office using the ISSP, which can provide a preset, personalized office environment by interpreting user text input via a smartphone. We also discuss a scenario to show how the ISSP-based method would help build a smart city, where services in each service domain can discover and exploit IoT resources that are wanted across domains. We expect that our method could eventually contribute to providing people in a smart city with more integrated, comprehensive services based on semantic interoperability.