Background Psoriasis is one of the most prevalent chronic inflammatory skin conditions; its prevalence ranges from 1 to 3%. Tumor necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-α), a cytokine that enhances inflammation, is overexpressed in synovium and skin plaques in psoriasis. TNF-α plays a critical role in the pathogenesis of psoriasis. IL-10 is the most crucial cytokine for reducing excessive immune responses and decreasing pro-inflammatory reactions in all autoimmune disorders. Objective To evaluate the effect of Apremilast on ILـ10, TNFـα, and BMI in obese psoriatic patients. Methods Thirty patients included in this investigative study to measure the concentrations of TNFـα, ILـ10 and BMI, before and after receiving Apremilast. TNFـα and ILـ10 were examined by ELISA technique. Results The present work found that the concentration of TNF-α before receiving Apremilast was 286.80 pg/ml, and after six months from baseline, it was reduced to 131.08 pg/ml (P<0.01). Also, IL-10 before using Apremilast was 69.28 pg/ml, and after six months of treatment it increased to 112.57 ±7.89, which was statistically significant (P<0.01). There were no statistically significant differences in BMI (P>0.05). Conclusion Apremilast significantly reduced the inflammatory cytokine TNF-α and increased the anti-inflammatory cytokine IL-10, leading to improvement in psoriasis lesions. It also reduced Body Mass Index in obese psoriatic patients.
Background: Preoperative radiographical assessment of the maxillofacial lesions is of a great importance in guiding the surgeon during surgical procedure in reducing post-operative complications. This study highlighted the application of CBCT scan in the assessment of maxillofacial cystic and cystic like lesions as a part of advanced radiology Materials and methods: A total of 20 patients (15 males and 5 females) participated in this prospective study. CBCT scan (Kodak 9500 CBCT) with (DICOM) software utilized to perform scanning to all patients in order to assess lesion extension, morphological features and it’s relation to the adjacent vital structures. Results: In this study, the total cystic and cystic like lesions involving the
... Show MoreIn recent years, social media has been increasing widely and obviously as a media for users expressing their emotions and feelings through thousands of posts and comments related to tourism companies. As a consequence, it became difficult for tourists to read all the comments to determine whether these opinions are positive or negative to assess the success of a tourism company. In this paper, a modest model is proposed to assess e-tourism companies using Iraqi dialect reviews collected from Facebook. The reviews are analyzed using text mining techniques for sentiment classification. The generated sentiment words are classified into positive, negative and neutral comments by utilizing Rough Set Theory, Naïve Bayes and K-Nearest Neighbor
... Show MoreCase Report.
To present a case of a previous complicated mandibular orthognathic surgery that aimed to setback the mandible in a female cleft lip and palate (CLP) patient, which led to bone necrosis on one side with subsequent severe mandibular deviation and facial asymmetry. We additionally reviewed the previous reports of similar complications, the pathophysiology and the factors that could lead to this dreadful result.
A 27-year-old female patient presented with a severe dentofacial deformity secondary to a complicated bilateral sagittal spli
Core decompression is one of the commonest used techniques in the handling of osteonecrosis of the pre-collapsed head of the femur. Core decompression had succeeded in preserving the hip joint and delaying the requisite for total hip replacement, but it had failed in the induction of osteogenesis in the necrotic area, thus augmenting core decompression with biological agents to induce osteogenic activity. To assess the effects of platelet-rich plasma in non-traumatic avascular necrosis of the hip joint (early stage) after core decompression. Interventional comparative study for twenty-four patients (32 hip joints) with AVN of the head of the femur was involved in this prospective study, and they were separated into two groups of 16
... Show MoreThis research was conducted to determine content levels of heavy metal pollution. Samples taken from Ishaqi River bank and adjacent agricultural soils area, in ten sites, distributed along 48 km of the Ishaqi River, north Baghdad. The evaluated metals were Zinc, Copper, Manganese, Iron, Cobalt, Nickel, Chromium, Cadmium, Vanadium and Lead. PH and Electric Conductivity (EC) were measured to evaluate the acidity and (EC). Results showed that most site were contaminated with metals evaluated. Among these metals, Zn, Mn, Fe and Ni were consistently higher in all the samples (both river bank and adjacent soil) followed by PB, CU, V, Cd, Co and Cr. The level concentrations of river bank were almost higher than that of adjacent soil. As will be re
... Show MoreAbstract
β-thalassemia major is a genetic disease that causes sever defect in normal hemoglobin synthesis. The patients with β-thalassemia major need periodic blood transfusions that can result in accumulation of body iron, so treatment with iron chelating agent is required. Complications of this iron overload affecting many vital organs, including the liver. The aim of this work was to evaluate liver enzymes in β -thalassemia major patients with deferasirox versus without it. Two groups of β-thalassemia major patients were involved in this study named group A; 40 β-thalassemia patients of blood transfusion dependent without deferasirox, group B; 40 β-thalassemia patients of blood transfusion dependent on de
... Show MoreBackground: The use of minerals in treatment of different diseases is as old as man himself. zinc is the most famous trace mineral related to male sexual function. Oligoasthenozoospermic subfertile patients were treated with zinc sulphate for three months.
Objectives: Aim of the research is to investigate the role of Zinc and if it affects the abnormalities of some semen parameters and to study the possible role of pharmaceutical preperations of zinc in amelioration of male subfertility as well as to assess the ability of Zinc to induce changes in the serum and semen zinc levels in addition to the levels of reproductive hormones (FSH and Testosterone).
Type of the study:
... Show MorePregnancy-associated anemia is a widespread condition that can have varying impacts on both the mother and the developing fetus, depending on the level of hemoglobin in the mother’s blood and the stage of pregnancy at which the anemia occurs. In Iraq, 27% of all registered thalassemia cases are thalassemia minor. Pregnancy may aggravate mild undiagnosed thalassemia early in pregnancy. The objective of the study was to access the prevalence of undetected thalassemia minor in primigravida women who received prenatal care before 20 weeks and to compare the demographic and socioeconomic characteristic features between women with iron-deficiency anemia (IDA) and those without any anemia. A to
The Iraqi political and social arena has been characterized, subjectively and objectively, by the weakness of leadership building. This has led to a leadership crisis, which is reflected in the quality of the outcome of the process of rebuilding the state in Iraq. Thus, this building process has lacked the simplest requirements and conditions of success. It has suffered from a major and obvious failure: the situation in Iraq has raised conflict leaders, not constructive leaders, and this confirms the existence of a cultural crisis in the production of conscious, aware leadership compatible with democratic action. The weakness of leadership in Iraq is reflected in a series of ongoing crises that require radical solutions in accordance with l
... Show MoreThe study deals with China's soft power and diplomacy in the Middle East, and it focuses specifically on the tools and foundations of China's soft diplomacy and how it achieves its goals in the region in addition to its challenges in the region. In this regard, the study also focuses on the Chinese Belt and Road Initiative and its soft foundations and how they serve China’s diplomacy and soft power in the region. The study ends with a set of conclusions, perhaps the most prominent of which is that diplomacy and soft power have become a fundamental pillar of China's foreign policy to achieve its foreign goals and to establish an international system compatible with China's principles. As for the Middle East, China has established a poli
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