As yet no unifying grading system for meningiomas has been adopted. We evaluate epidemiologic factors of meningioma in Iran & degree of agreement between the two commonly used grading systems namely WHO (2000) and Mahmood systems. During a 6-year period 238 meningiomas were selected and reviewed by two independent pathologists using both grading systems. 205(86.1%) cases were benign, 19(8%) atypical and 14(5.9%) malignant. 181(18%) cases were primary and 51(27%) secondary; 35(68%) of the latter benign, 7(14%) atypical and 9(18%) malignant. All intraspinal meningiomas were benign. In benign cranial and spinal types female to male ratios were 1.9: 1 and 1.3: 1 ; while in atypical and malignant types were 1 :1.4 and 1:3.1 respectively. Mean ages were 49.9 for benign. 41.1 for atypical and 50 for malignant types. The most frequent site of involvement in all grades of intracranial tumors was cerebral convexity (31.1 %). The most common subtype was menigothelial (65.1%). Female preponderance seen in benign nonrecurrent meningioma became increasingly less prominent and even reversed in recurrent, atypical and malignant forms. Benign recurrent tumors were similar to non-recurrent tumors microscopically. Kappa value comparing two grading systems was 0.947, so good agreements were found between Mahmood and WHO grading systems.
Benign ; Cancer cells grading system ; Malignant Neoplasms ; Meningioma ; agreement

· AIM: This study was conducted to compare the outcomes of amniotic membrane transplantation (AMT) with conjunctival autograft transplantation (CAT) in primary and recurrent pterygium. The main outcome measurement was the recurrence rate after surgery.· METHODS: This study was designed as a prospective study on consecutive cases of pterygium from April 2004 to Feb2006. The cases were randomly divided into two groups of AMT (26 cases) and CAT (24 cases). All subjects were operated with an extensive excision of the fibro vascular tissues with AMT or CAT approach. Patients were followed for recurrence and complications for 24 months. The surgical procedures were performed by a single surgeon.The associations between demographic variables, surgical techniques (AMT, CAT), recurrences and postoperative complications were analyzed.· RESULTS: The patients' male to female ratio was 4:1. Involvement of right to left eye ratio was 3:2. Pterygium in70% of cases was primary and in 30% was recurrent. The most common clinical signs were red eye and reduced visual acuity while the most common complications were recurrence and corneal scar. In the first month of follow up, the recurrence rates in AMT and CAT approaches were 3.8% vs 8.3%respectively and these rates increased to 46.2% vs 25% respectively after 24 months of follow up.· CONCLUSION: The success rate of 2 years follow up was better in CAT technique. The AMT technique for pterygium surgery has an unacceptably high recurrence rate.

No abstract available.
Delivery of Health Care ; Global Health ; World Health Organization

OBJECTIVES: Two main digital signal processing technologies inside the modern hearing aid to provide the best conditions for hearing aid users are directionality (DIR) and digital noise reduction (DNR) algorithms. There are various possible settings for these algorithms. The present study evaluates the effects of various DIR and DNR conditions (both separately and in combination) on listening comfort among hearing aid users. METHODS: In 18 participants who received hearing aid fitting services from the Rehabilitation School of Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences regularly, we applied acceptable noise level (ANL) as our subjective measure of listening comfort. We evaluated both of these under six different hearing aid conditions: omnidirectional-baseline, omnidirectional-broadband DNR, omnidirectional-multichannel DNR, directional, directional-broadband DNR, and directional-multichannel DNR. RESULTS: The ANL results ranged from −3 dB to 14 dB in all conditions. The results show, among all conditions, both the omnidirectional-baseline condition and the omnidirectional-broadband DNR condition are the worst conditions for listening in noise. The DIR always reduces the amount of noise that patients received during testing. The DNR algorithm does not improve listening in noise significantly when compared with the DIR algorithms. Although both DNR and DIR algorithms yielded a lower ANL, the DIR algorithm was more effective than the DNR. CONCLUSION: The DIR and DNR technologies provide listening comfort in the presence of noise. Thus, user benefit depends on how the digital signal processing settings inside the hearing aid are adjusted.
Hearing Aids* ; Hearing Loss ; Hearing* ; Humans ; Noise* ; Rehabilitation ; Signal Processing, Computer-Assisted

BACKGROUND: The present analysis focuses on phenotypic and genotypic characterizations of efflux-mediated erythromycin resistance in Streptococcus pneumoniae due to an increase in macrolide resistance in S. pneumoniae worldwide. METHODS: We investigated the prevalence of efflux-mediated erythromycin resistance and its relevant genetic elements from 186 specimens of S. pneumonia isolated from clinical and normal flora from Tehran, Iran. The presence of erythromycin resistance genes was tested by PCR with two sets of primers, specific for erm(B) and mef(A/E), and their genetic elements with tetM, xis, and int genes. Isolates were typed with the BOX PCR method and tested for resistance to six antibiotics. RESULTS: Antibiotic susceptibility tests revealed that 100% and 47% isolates were resistant to tetracycline and erythromycin, respectively. The erythromycin and clindamycin double-disc diffusion test for macrolide-lincosamide-streptograminB (MLSB) resistance phenotype showed 74 (84%) isolates with the constitutive MLSB phenotype and the remaining with the M phenotype. BOX PCR demonstrated the presence of 7 types in pneumococci with the M phenotype. Fourteen (16%) isolates with the M phenotype harbored mef(A/E), tetM, xis, and int genes. CONCLUSIONS: The present results suggest dissemination of polyclonal groups of S. pneumoniae with the M phenotype carrying resistance genes attributed to transposon 2009.
Anti-Bacterial Agents/*pharmacology ; Bacterial Proteins/genetics ; DNA, Bacterial/metabolism ; Drug Resistance, Multiple, Bacterial/*genetics ; Erythromycin/*pharmacology ; Genotype ; Humans ; Microbial Sensitivity Tests ; Phenotype ; Pneumococcal Infections/microbiology/pathology ; Polymerase Chain Reaction ; Streptococcus pneumoniae/*drug effects/*genetics/isolation & purification ; Tetracycline/pharmacology

OBJECTIVES: Risk factors for heart failure (HF) have not yet been studied in myocardial infarction (MI) patients in Iran. This study was conducted to determine these risk factors. METHODS: In this nationwide, hospital-based, case-control study, the participants were all new MI patients hospitalized from April 2012 to March 2013 in Iran. The data on 1,691 new cases with HF (enrolled by census sampling) were compared with the data of 6,764 patients without HF as controls. We randomly selected four controls per one case, matched on the date at MI and HF diagnosis, according to incidence density sampling. Using conditional logistic regression models, odds ratios (ORs) with a 95% confidence interval (CI) were calculated to identify potential risk factors. RESULTS: The one-year in-hospital mortality rate was 18.2% in the cases and higher than in the controls (12.1%) (p<0.05). Significant risk factors for HF were: right bundle branch block (RBBB) (OR, 2.86; 95% CI, 1.95 to 4.19), stroke (OR, 2.00; 95% CI, 1.39 to 2.89), and coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG) (OR, 2.03; 95% CI, 1.34 to 3.09). Diabetes, hypertension, percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI), atrial fibrillation, ventricular tachycardia, and age were determined to be the factors significantly associated with HF incidence (p<0.05). The most important factor in women was diabetes (OR, 1.41; 95% CI, 1.05 to 1.88). Age, hypertension, PCI, CABG, and RBBB were the most important factors in men. CONCLUSIONS: Our findings may help to better identify and monitor the predictive risk factors for HF in MI patients. The pattern of risk factors was different in men and women.
Atrial Fibrillation ; Bundle-Branch Block ; Case-Control Studies* ; Censuses ; Cohort Studies* ; Coronary Artery Bypass ; Diagnosis ; Epidemiology ; Female ; Heart Failure* ; Heart* ; Hospital Mortality ; Humans ; Hypertension ; Incidence ; Iran* ; Logistic Models ; Male ; Mortality ; Myocardial Infarction* ; Odds Ratio ; Percutaneous Coronary Intervention ; Risk Factors* ; Stroke ; Tachycardia, Ventricular

Purpose: Brucellosis as a worldwide zoonotic illness affect domestic animals and humans doesn’t have any vaccine for the prevention of infection in humans yet. The aim of this study was to evaluate the specific immune response following the administration of glycine nanoparticles as adjuvant and delivery system of a chimeric antigen contained trigger factor, Omp31, and Bp26 in murine model. Materials and Methods: The chimeric antigen of Brucella was cloned and expressed in Escherichia coli (E. coli) BL21 (DE3). Purification and characterization of recombinant protein was conducted through Ni-NTA (nickel-nitrilotriacetic acid) agarose, SDS-PAGE (sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis), and Western blot. Nanoparticle characteristics including morphology, particle size distribution, zeta potential, protein retention rate, and release rate were measured in vitro. Subsequently, nanoparticle contained antigen was administered to mice and blood sample was taken to measured the antibody level. Results: The protein retention in the nanoparticles was successfully done and the nanoparticle characteristics were appropriate. The average size of glycine particles containing antigen was about 174 nm, and the absorption of protein was approximately 61.27% of the initial value, with a release rate of approximately 70% after 8 hours. Enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay result proved that the immunized sera of mice which were administered with nano-formula contains high levels of antibodies (immunoglobulin G) against recombinant chimeric antigen and also a high level of mucosal antibody (immunoglobulin A) in the oral group, which showed a desirable immunity against Brucella. Conclusion The results showed that chimeric antigen-loaded glycine nanoparticles can act as a vaccine candidate for inducing the cellular and humoral immune response against brucellosis.

Objectives: To elucidate the possible ways by which hydroxyurea molecules affect globin chain (αor β-like) synthesis.Methods:5 and 26 years were treated for five months with 15 mg/(kg·day) of hydroxyurea. Hemoglobins electrophoresis and globin chain electrophoresis was performed on each sample at different time points before and during the treatment. A total of 23 thalassemia intermedia patients (13 male and 10 female) aged between Results: Fetal hemoglobin increased significantly in most patients and average episodes of transfusion decreased. Both Gγ and Aγ-globin chains increased significantly andα-globin:Nonα-globin chain as well as Gγ-globin:Aγ globin chains ratios decreased. Conclusions: Improvement in α:non-α ratio and consequent decrease of free α-globin chain might be the cause of beneficial effects of hydroxyurea therapy. Two patients who felt better didn’t show significant increase in their fetal hemoglobin level, and this is in contradiction with the hypothesis claiming that the HbF level increase is the cause of such therapeutic effect. In spite of the unclear mechanism of action of this drug, hydroxyurea therapy had noticeable impacts on thalassemia intermedia and also sickle cell disease and even patients suffering from thalassemia major.

Background: Styrene is one of the aromatic compounds used in acetonitrile–butadiene–styrene (ABS) producing petrochemicals, which has an impact on health of workers. Therefore, this study aimed to investigate the health risks of styrene emitted from the petrochemical industry in Iran. Methods: Air samples were collected based on NIOSH 1501 method. The samples were analyzed by the Varian-cp3800 gas chromatograph. Finally, risk levels of styrene's health effects on employees were assessed by the quantitative method of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (U.S. EPA) and the semiquantitative way by the Singapore Occupational Safety and Health Association. Results: Based on the results, the employees had the highest average exposure to styrene vapors (4.06x10-1 mg.(kg - day)-1) in the polybutadiene latex (PBL) unit. Therefore, the most top predictors of cancer and non-cancer risk were 2.3x10-4 and 7.26x10-1, respectively. Given that the lowest average exposure (1.5x10-2mg.(kg - day)-1) was in the dryer unit, the prediction showed a moderate risk of cancer (0.8x10-6) and non-cancer (2.3x10-3) for the employees. The EPA method also predicted that there would be a definite cancer risk in 16% and a probable risk in 76% of exposures. However, according to the semiquantitative approach, the rate of risk was at the “low” level for all staff. The results showed that there was a significant difference (p < 0.05) between the units in exposure and health risk of styrene (p < 0.05). Conclusion Given the high risk of styrene's health effects, appropriate control measures are required to reduce the exposure level.