Background: Neural tube defects (NTDs) are said to be inherited in a multifactorial fashion, i.e. genetic-environmental interaction. Maternal nutritional deficiencies had long been reported to cause NTDs, especially folate deficiency during early pregnancy. More attention had been paid to the exact mechanism by which this deficiency state causes these defects in the developing embryo. The most significant of all researches was that connecting reduced folate and increased homocysteine level in maternal serum on one hand and the risk of developing a NTD baby on the other hand. Objectives : to determine the significance of homocysteine level in Iraqi mothers who gave birth to babies with NTDs as compared to normal controls. Patients, Materials and Methods: Fifty Iraqi women having babies born with NTDS, referred to the genetic clinic in Baghdad Teaching Hospital, were included in this study (the study group) as well as 37 healthy women having normal children (the control group). This study was conducted from November, 2002 till October, 2003. Analysis of total serum homocysteine level for all women was done using a computerized HPLC system. Results : the age of women in both groups was comparable (mean+SD in the study group was 26.2+5.14 years vs. 26.3+4.57 years in the controls). Among the study group, 4 (8%) had normal tHcy level; 44 (88%) had mildly elevated level, and only 2 (4%) had moderately elevated tHcy level, while all (100%) women in the control group had their tHcy level within normal level. This difference was statistically highly significant (p<0.001). Conclusions : Women become at an increased risk of delivering a baby with NTD when having an elevated tHcy level in their sera, and that tHcy level is an important marker in maternal serum that is associated significantly with pregnancy outcome.
Background: Post-partum depression (PPD) is a form of postnatal depression that affects mothers. Clinical manifestations usually appear within six months after delivery. Risk factors that influence the severity of post-partum depression are not fully known in the Iraqi population.
Objectives: We aim to evaluate the risk factors and identify potential predictors that may influence the symptom levels (severity) of post-partum depression among Iraqi women from Baghdad.
Subjects and Methods: The current study is cross-sectional, and we used the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale (EPDS) and a cut-off value of 13 to differentiate patients into two those with lower symptom levels (LSL) and higher symptom levels (HSL). We also explored p
Virtual platforms are online classes used in teaching and learning EFL that let both teachers and students connect, communicate and cooperate online in real time. Learners get access to educational possibilities at home easily. Virtual classes can be conducted using a variety of techniques, including video conferencing, Google Meet, Zoom, conversations, reactions, and screen sharing. Users can access these programs on a range of gadgets, including laptops, tablets, and smartphones. The COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic affected all educational institutions, including schools, colleges, and universities. Our Iraqi educational institutions have been switched to use virtual platforms in this pandemic, much as all other foreign institutions
... Show MoreThis study shows impoliteness as a form of face-threatening that can be intentionally caused by verbal threats in a particular setting. It investigates: what strategies and mitigators do Iraqi-Kurdish English as a foreign language (EFL) learners use in situations of threat responses? The present investigation paper aims to examine impoliteness strategies and mitigators by these learners when they respond to threatening situations in their context. Thus, it fills a gap in pragmatics literature by investigating the reactions to threats in an Iraqi-Kurdish EFL context. To this end, 50 participants have participated in this study. An open-ended questionnaire in the form of a Discourse Completion Task (DCT) is used to elicit responses fr
... Show More<div><p><em>This study investigates the use of the speech act of request by </em><em>Iraqi EFL (English as a foreign language) learners </em><em>in student-professor e-mail communication. It aims to examine request strategies and internal modifications in academic requests in e-mail. There has been little investigation of the issue of an academic request made by Arab EFL learners to a higher status person via an authentic data. Thus, this study intends to provide more investigation of the strategies and internal modifiers that are produced by Iraqi EFL learners when they interact with their professors via e-mail. However, this study adapts the CCSARP (cross-cultural speech act realization pr
... Show MoreThe musical templates are the fundamental reason for admiration and interest among a lot of cultural and societal medias because of the beauty of it's melodic value, where a lot of Iraqi singing and music specialists and composers try to consolidate daily life idea and translate it into music in a manner that preserve the template and rhythm horizontally and vertically, through the involvement of the scientific and philosophical concepts and theories of modern thought to reach the recipient,, as is the theory of form (Gestalt), one of the most important theories that stretched to their interpretations to the field in general art and in music science, especially, as an area that can be manifested as partial components template music, conn
... Show MoreThe excellence and uniqueness is what makes the artwork creative or not, and the School of Op. Art in Iraq came to reveal new phenomena distinct style, unique in units built, although a few worked in this aspect of the art, but they left their mark distinct, in the research, construction and installation of what binds them in heritage and civilization, it is a new vision of linking the past with the present, they adopt and engineering units may be architectural sometimes in composition, concluded a researcher at the end of the research to the main findings and conclusions, which is that more business was a square-shaped or semi-square, which is commensurate painting with visual, which is a set of vocabulary or repeat units, we do not fin
... Show MoreThe approach of greening existing buildings, is an urgent necessity, because the greening operation provides the speed and optimal efficiency in the environmental performance, as well as keeping up with the global green architecture revolution. Therefore, greening existing buildings in Iraq is important for trends towards renewable energies, because of what the country went through economic conditions and crises and wars which kept the country away from what took place globally in this issue. The research problem is: insufficient knowledge about the importance and the mechanism of the greening of existing buildings, including its environmental and economic dimensions, by rationalization of energy consumption and preservi
... Show MoreIn folk medicine there are various medicinal amalgamation possessing hepatoprotective activity. This activity is of significance because several toxins cause liver injury. Hence, many pharmaceutical companies are targeting herbal medicines for the treatment of liver abnormalities and towards evolving a safe and effective formulation with desired route of administration. In current review we have focused on the studies showing hepatoprotective effect using marine compounds and plant derived compounds. Liver disorder, a global health problem, usually include acute or chronic hepatitis, heptoses, and cirrhosis. It may be due to toxic chemicals and certain antibiotics. Uncontrolled consumption of alcohol also affects liver in an unhealthy wa
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