scholarly journals The potential of pregnant women as a sentinel population for malaria surveillance

2019 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Nina C. Brunner ◽  
Frank Chacky ◽  
Renata Mandike ◽  
Ally Mohamed ◽  
Manuela Runge ◽  
...  

Abstract Background With increasing spatial heterogeneity of malaria transmission and a shift of the disease burden towards older children and adults, pregnant women attending antenatal care (ANC) have been proposed as a pragmatic sentinel population for malaria surveillance. However, the representativeness of routine ANC malaria test-positivity and its relationship with prevalence in other population subgroups are yet to be investigated. Methods Monthly ANC malaria test-positivity data from all Tanzanian health facilities for January 2014 to May 2016 was compared to prevalence data from the School Malaria Parasitaemia Survey 2015, the Malaria Indicator Survey (MIS) 2015/16, the Malaria Atlas Project 2015, and a Bayesian model fitted to MIS data. Linear regression was used to describe the difference between malaria test-positivity in pregnant women and respective comparison groups as a function of ANC test-positivity and potential covariates. Results The relationship between ANC test-positivity and survey prevalence in children follows spatially and biologically meaningful patterns. However, the uncertainty of the relationship was substantial, particularly in areas with high or perennial transmission. In comparison, modelled data estimated higher prevalence in children at low transmission intensities and lower prevalence at higher transmission intensities. Conclusions Pregnant women attending ANC are a pragmatic sentinel population to assess heterogeneity and trends in malaria prevalence in Tanzania. Yet, since ANC malaria test-positivity cannot be used to directly predict the prevalence in other population subgroups, complementary community-level measurements remain highly relevant.

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nina C. Brunner ◽  
Frank Chacky ◽  
Renata Mandike ◽  
Ally Mohamed ◽  
Manuela Runge ◽  
...  

2020 ◽  
Vol 24 (5) ◽  
pp. 434-443
Author(s):  
Mehdi Sahmani ◽  
◽  
Nilofar Ahmadi ◽  
Somayeh Asadian ◽  
Talaat Dabaghi Ghaleh ◽  
...  

Background: Preeclampsia is a complex disorder of pregnancy with an unknown etiology. Numerous studies have shown the possible role of gene polymorphisms, especially metalloproteinases, in development of this disease, but there are no definitive results. Objective: This study aims to investigate the possible association between rs3918242 (−1562C>T) polymorphism in Matrix Metalloproteinase 9 (MMP9) gene with the risk of preeclampsia in pregnant women. Methods: In this cross-sectional study, participants were 90 pregnant women with preeclampsia and 199 healthy pregnant women (controls). The genotypes of rs3918242 polymorphism were investigated using Polymerase Chain Reaction technique and Limited Fragment Length Polymorphism method. Logistic regression analysis was used to investigate the relationship between rs3918242 polymorphism and preeclampsia. Findings: The frequency of CC, CT, TT genotypes of rs3918242 polymorphism was reported 47.8%, 47.8% and 4.2% in patients and 84.8, 13.1 and 2% in controls, respectively, and the difference between groups was significant (P<0.001). The frequency of TT genotype in patients was significantly higher than in controls (P<0.001). Moreover, the frequency of T allele in patients was 52.2%, while in controls it was 15.2% and the difference between the two groups was significant (P<0.001). Conclusion: The rs3918242 polymorphism of MMP9 gene plays an important role in the incidence of preeclampsia in pregnant women.


Interpreting ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 21 (2) ◽  
pp. 165-195 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher D. Mellinger ◽  
Thomas A. Hanson

Abstract This article adopts a meta-analytic research framework to examine the strength of the relationship between working memory and simultaneous interpreting. This quantitative analysis utilizes a random effects model to combine multiple studies in an examination of differences between professional interpreters and various comparison groups as well as the relationship between working memory capacity and interpreter performance. Moderating and control variables are discussed, and a classification scheme for work on these topics is proposed. Two moderating variables are examined by testing the difference between working memory tests relying on auditory and visual stimuli as well as storage tasks (short-term memory) and processing tasks (working memory). Published studies were collected from several field-specific databases by querying working memory and simultaneous interpreting as key terms, and then supplemented by reviewing references, searching Google Scholar, and reviewing the work of scholars known to work in the area. Results are indicative of differences between professional and comparison groups, with professional interpreters exhibiting greater working memory capacity. Additionally, an overall positive correlation was observed between working memory capacity and measures of the quality of simultaneous interpreting.


1986 ◽  
Vol 51 (4) ◽  
pp. 362-369 ◽  
Author(s):  
Donna M. Risberg ◽  
Robyn M. Cox

A custom in-the-ear (ITE) hearing aid fitting was compared to two over-the-ear (OTE) hearing aid fittings for each of 9 subjects with mild to moderately severe hearing losses. Speech intelligibility via the three instruments was compared using the Speech Intelligibility Rating (SIR) test. The relationship between functional gain and coupler gain was compared for the ITE and the higher rated OTE instruments. The difference in input received at the microphone locations of the two types of hearing aids was measured for 10 different subjects and compared to the functional gain data. It was concluded that (a) for persons with mild to moderately severe hearing losses, appropriately adjusted custom ITE fittings typically yield speech intelligibility that is equal to the better OTE fitting identified in a comparative evaluation; and (b) gain prescriptions for ITE hearing aids should be adjusted to account for the high-frequency emphasis associated with in-the-concha microphone placement.


VASA ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 1-6
Author(s):  
Hanji Zhang ◽  
Dexin Yin ◽  
Yue Zhao ◽  
Yezhou Li ◽  
Dejiang Yao ◽  
...  

Summary: Our meta-analysis focused on the relationship between homocysteine (Hcy) level and the incidence of aneurysms and looked at the relationship between smoking, hypertension and aneurysms. A systematic literature search of Pubmed, Web of Science, and Embase databases (up to March 31, 2020) resulted in the identification of 19 studies, including 2,629 aneurysm patients and 6,497 healthy participants. Combined analysis of the included studies showed that number of smoking, hypertension and hyperhomocysteinemia (HHcy) in aneurysm patients was higher than that in the control groups, and the total plasma Hcy level in aneurysm patients was also higher. These findings suggest that smoking, hypertension and HHcy may be risk factors for the development and progression of aneurysms. Although the heterogeneity of meta-analysis was significant, it was found that the heterogeneity might come from the difference between race and disease species through subgroup analysis. Large-scale randomized controlled studies of single species and single disease species are needed in the future to supplement the accuracy of the results.


2020 ◽  
Vol 22 (3) ◽  
pp. 341-361
Author(s):  
Gonzalo Grau-Pérez ◽  
J. Guillermo Milán

In Uruguay, Lacanian ideas arrived in the 1960s, into a context of Kleinian hegemony. Adopting a discursive approach, this study researched the initial reception of these ideas and its effects on clinical practices. We gathered a corpus of discursive data from clinical cases and theoretical-doctrinal articles (from the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s). In order to examine the effects of Lacanian ideas, we analysed the difference in the way of interpreting the clinical material before and after Lacan's reception. The results of this research illuminate some epistemological problems of psychoanalysis, especially the relationship between theory and clinical practice.


2012 ◽  
Vol 6 (1-3) ◽  
pp. 165-184
Author(s):  
Timothy Beal

This essay attends to a distinction that requires closer examination and theorization in our discourse on iconic books and other scriptures: the difference between iconic object and cultural icon. How do we conceive of relations between the particular, ritualized iconicities of particular scriptures in particular religious contexts and the cultural iconicities of scriptures in general, such as “the Bible” or “the Quran,” whose visual and material objectivity is highly ambiguous? How if at all are the iconic cultural meanings of the ideas of such books related to the particular iconic textual objects more or less instantiate them? These questions are explored through particular focus on the relationship between the particular iconicities of particular print Bibles, as iconic objects, and the general iconicity of the cultural icon of the Bible.


2017 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 137
Author(s):  
Noorlela Binti Noordin ◽  
Abdul Razaq Ahmad ◽  
Anuar Ahmad

This study was aimed to evaluate the Malay proficiency among students in Form Two especially non-Malay students and its relationship to academic achievement History. To achieve the purpose of the study there are two objectives, the first is to look at the difference between mean of Malay Language test influences min of academic achievement of History subject among non-Malay students in Form Two and the second is the relationship between the level of Malay proficiency and their academic achievement for History. This study used quantitative methods, which involved 100 people of Form Two non-Malay students in one of the schools in Klang, Selangor. This study used quantitative data were analyzed using descriptive statistics and statistical inference with IBM SPSS Statistics v22 software. This study found that there was a relationship between the proficiency of Malay language among non-Malay students with achievements in the subject of History. The implications of this study are discussed in this article.


Author(s):  
Pamela J. McKenzie

Caring relationships are recognized as important resources for information seekers. I consider how nine pregnant women map their relationships with their midwives as they evaluate them as information sources. Data come from interviews. Women described the relationship as a trajectory, beginning with the “idea” of a midwife. As women get to know their midwife, they are able to draw on a set of resources, including the relationship itself, as informative. These resources are not static but are re-negotiated on an ongoing basis. A single encounter therefore maps both to the trajectory of the relationship and to a broader discursive community.Les relations bienveillantes sont reconnues comme ressources importantes pour ceux qui cherchent de l'information. En analysant les données de neuf entrevues, je tenterai de déterminer comment neuf femmes enceintes se représentent leur relation avec leur sage-femme vue comme source d'information. Les femmes décrivent leur relation comme une trajectoire qui s'appuie sur « l'idée » qu'elles se font d'une sage-femme. Au fur et à mesure que la relation avec leur sage-femme évolue, les femmes peuvent se prévaloir d'un ensemble de ressources informatives, y compris la relation elle-même. Ces ressources ne se veulent pas statiques, mais bien renégociées de façon continue. Une rencontre unique représente alors la trajectoire d'une relation ainsi que d'une communauté discursive. 


2017 ◽  
Vol 68 (5) ◽  
pp. 1070-1072
Author(s):  
Dan Navolan ◽  
Mirela Nicolov ◽  
Simona Vladareanu ◽  
Ioana Ciohat ◽  
Marius Craina ◽  
...  

Screening of fetal aneuploidies in early pregnancy is a well-established method in the materno-fetal medicine. The aim of our study was to analyze if the medians recommended by the manufacturers are adequate to perform an accurate screening or if there is a need for own laboratory medians calculation in second trimester biochemical marker screening.Sera were collected between 14 wp and 22 wp from 3374 singleton pregnancies. We analyzed three second trimester biochemical markers (AFP, hCG and free Estriol) concentration in all pregnant women and in a subgroup of pregnant women in which gestational age was determined based on crown-rump length. Our results showed that for all biochemical markers the difference between the manufacturer and the own calculated median was lower than 10% excepting the hCG value in the group of pregnant women in which the gestational age was determined on basis of crown-rump-length. Our results show it is recommended to replace the values of the median for hCG measurement with the own laboratory calculated medians. This does not seem to be necessary in the case of AFP and free Estriol measurement.


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