Middle East Journal of Rehabilitation and Health Studies
Volume:4 Issue: 4, Oct 2017

The risk of drug abuse during youth and adolescence depends on the individual’s family structure. Parents’ interaction methods and parenting styles are an important part of the social context. Since the interaction between parents and children has a great influence on students’ addiction, this study was conducted to assess the relationship between parental bonding and academic burnout with addiction potential among students studying in Semnan University of Medical Sciences.

This study was a cross sectional descriptive analytical study conducted on 245 students studying in Semnan University of Medical Sciences (2014 - 2015) using the valid Pierson’s questionnaire about parental bonding, school burnout, and addiction potential. The scores of addiction potential, school-burnout, and parental child bonding were obtained. The correlation and multiple regression models were then investigated.

The scores of addiction potential and academic burnout were 79.03 ± 13.26 and 32.02 ± 15.84, respectively. In fact, in the reduced multiple regression model only male gender (b = 6.718, P < 0.001), higher grade point average (b = 3.556, P = 0.020), higher school-burnout (b = 6.460, P < 0.001), higher care by parents (father’s care, b = 6.503, P < 0.001, mother’s care (b = 6.336, P = 0.001), and less control by the father (b = -4.058, P = 0.007) were associated with increased susceptibility of students to addiction.

Numerous factors, such as male gender, higher grade point average, greater school burnout and care by both parents and less control by the father were associated with increased susceptibility of students to addiction and they provided the conditions for addiction among students.

CCR5 is identified as one of the most important chemokine receptors with a major role in the creation of chemotaxis and mobilization of immunocompetent cells and moving them toward the liver for thorough cleaning of the virus. CCR5-59353 (C/T) is an important promoter polymorphism of chemokine receptor 5. Some studies showed a relationship between CCR5-59353 (C/T) polymorphism and clearance or persistence of hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection.

The current study aimed at developing polymorphism CCR5-59353 (C/T) in Iranian patients with chronic HBV infection.

A total of 200 blood samples including 100 healthy controls and 100 HBsAg-positive patients were randomly selected. Samples were tested for HBsAg by the enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) and HBV-DNA by the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) method. Genomic DNA was extracted from blood buffy coat using the salting out method. CCR5-59353 (C/T) polymorphism was genotyped by the allele specific amplification (ASA) PCR. Chi-square test was used for statistical analysis.

Five percent of control samples and 12% of patient samples had CC mutant genotype. Nevertheless, there was no significant difference in genotypes frequency of CCR5-59353 between the groups (P = 0.1).

It seems that CCR5-59353 polymorphism was not associated with chronic HBV infection outcome in the Iranian population. However, the frequency of CC genotype was higher in the patient group (12%) than the control group (5%).

Chronic renal failure and its end-stage disease are one of the most important causes of death and disability, and its prevalence is increasing in the world. This disease can cause many complications in the patients with end- stage renal disease.

The present study aimed at comparing cognitive impairment in patients with end- stage renal disease (ESRD) and chronic renal failure (CRF) with a control group.

In this cross-sectional study, 85 ESRD, dialysis dependent patients, 200 CRF patients, non-dialysis dependent, as well as 180 patients with high blood pressure or diabetes as control group who referred to Kowsar hospital during 2015 and 2016 were studied. The Persian version of the mini mental status examination (MMSE) questionnaire was used to collect data. It was completed by one of the skilled and trained nurses.

The results revealed that 28.2% of ESRD, 1% of CRF patients, and 0.6% of control group patients had severe cognitive impairment. Cognitive health score in ESRD group was lower than that in CRF (P < 0.001) and control group (P < 0.001). In addition, cognitive health score of CRF patients was lower than that in the control group (P = 0.005). ESRD patients had significantly higher impairment in time and place orientation, calculation, recall, language, and repetition compared to control and CRF groups (P < 0.001), but there were no significant differences between control and CRF groups. With respect to complex commands, the control group had a significantly lower impairment, but the other 2 groups were not significantly different in this regard. The three experimental groups were not significantly different in per-test stage.

ESRD patients have severe cognitive impairment compared to CRF patients. Therefore, it is recommended that these patients be examined cognitively and proper rehabilitation programs be considered for them

School function assessment (SFA) is a criterion-referenced assessment that uses functional tasks to determine the level of participation and performance of students. The purpose of this study is to assess the face and the content validity of the Persian version of SFA for normal Iranian 6 – 12-year-old children.

This study has a methodological and psychometric design. We used a standard protocol, international quality of life assessment (IQOLA), for translating the SFA test. This protocol includes translation to Persian and backward-translation to English as well; both of these translation qualities are estimated. In order to ensure content validity, 20 occupational therapists, who are experts in the field of pediatrics, completed the content validity index (CVI) and the content validity ratio (CVR) forms through 11 sessions using the IQOLA scale. Twenty elementary school teachers completed these forms as well.

The results of face validity showed that all the terms were clear and simple, and all the terms except one were higher than 1.5 in the impact score. The content validity results showed that five item’s score was lower than the acceptable score (< 0.7). Finally, in the expert panel, all the CVI and the CVR items achieved an acceptable score. In this panel, the experts negotiated about the clarity, the simplicity, and the necessity of all the items. Therefore, the Persian version of SFA can evaluate the school function of Iranian children.

The Persian version of the SFA achieved a good match in terms of cultural and face validity. Agreements above 80% in the results of face validity confirm that the Persian version of SFA is clear, simple, and understandable for its target population. The content validity results indicate different cultural perceptions for certain items. To determine and construct the validity and the reliability of the Persian version of SFA, other studies are required.

Depression is one of the common non-motor symptoms in patients with Parkinson disease (PD), which can have a negative effect on the quality of life of the patients. Therefore, it is necessary to have suitable, accurate, cheap, and simple diagnostic tools to identify depression in patients with PD and apply a proper treatment. The current study aimed at comparing the single-item visual analog scale (VAS) with the multi-item hospital anxiety and depression scale (HADS) and patient health questionnaire-9 (PHQ-9) in respect to their sensitivity and specificity to diagnose depression in patients with idiopathic PD.

The current cross sectional, comparative study employed the simple non-probability method and selected 79 patients with idiopathic PD, with the mean (SD) age of 59.10 (10.84) years and the average (SD) of disease progression level of 3.24 (1.13), based on Hoehn and Yahr scale. The single-item scale VAS and multi-item tests HADS and PHQ-9 were used as an index tests, and Beck depression inventory (BDI) was employed as the reference test to evaluate depression in 3 levels of lack of (or mild) depression, moderate depression, and severe depression using 90% sensitivity and 90% specificity. To determine the sensitivity, specificity, and the ability of each index test in order to diagnose depression, agreement percent of index tests with reference test and receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis were used.

The results of ROC analysis showed that VAS (AUC = 0.84) and HADS (AUC = 0.87) and PHQ-9 (AUC = 0.85) possessed similar abilities to discriminate depression in patients with PD. The sensitivity of VAS, HADS, and PHQ-9 tests in moderate or greater threshold were 92%, 96%, and 89%, respectively, and in severe threshold were 64%, 79%, and 49%, respectively. Specificity of these tests in moderate or greater threshold were 42%, 50%, and 62%, respectively, and in severe threshold were 88%, 77%, and 88%, respectively. The highest agreement level with BDI in mild/moderate and severe levels of depression were found in VAS and PHQ-9, respectively.

The single-item scale VAS, similar to multi-item tests HADS and PHQ-9, had a low to high sensitivity and specificity to diagnose depression in moderate or greater and severe thresholds in patients with PD.

Nurses routinely deal with anxiety. Thus, it causes several major problems for nurses and patients. This study was conducted to determine the level of situational anxiety in nurses.

This descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted on 118 nurses working at FayazBakhsh and Imam Reza hospitals. Situational anxiety was assessed via Persian version of Spiel Berger anxiety inventory questionnaire (SAIQ) consisting of 20 multiple-choice items based on the Likert Scale. Data were analyzed using SPSS16.

64.4% of the participants were female and 80.5% were married. 66% of them had children. The mean age and standard deviation were 35.75 ± 5.18 and the work experience was 11.31 ± 5.02. 17.8% of the nurses were suffering from low anxiety, 71.18% had moderate or higher than moderate anxiety, and 11.02% had relatively severe or severe anxiety. No significant difference was found in situational anxiety among the nurses in terms of marital status, work shift, and ward of work.

There was a moderate level of situational anxiety among nurses. Nursing care, regardless of the type of ward, creates anxiety and needs more attention to be reduced.

Death from pneumonia is more common in elderly individuals. Expiratory flow plays an important role in minimizing the risk of infection by expelling foreign substances and excessive mucus from the lungs. Expiratory flow results primarily from the activities of abdominal muscles. As part of the normative aging process, there is a decline in muscle thickness. However, little is known about the association of abdominal muscle thickness and expiratory flow rate.

The purpose of this study was to compare the relationships between peak expiratory flow and individual and combined abdominal muscle thickness in elderly subjects.

Thirty-one elderly females (81.7 ± 5.8 years), who could walk independently, participated in this study. The thickness of the abdominal muscles including, right rectus abdominis, external oblique, internal oblique, and transverse abdominis muscles, was measured using B-mode ultrasound, at the end of a relaxed expiration, with the subject in the supine position. Peak expiratory flow was obtained using a peak flow meter with the subject in the sitting position. Correlations between normalized peak expiratory flow and the thickness of normalized individual and combined muscle were determined using Pearson’s correlation coefficient.

Among individual muscles, the thickness of the internal oblique muscle had the highest correlation with peak expiratory flow (r = 0.513, P = 0.003). The combined thickness of the external and internal oblique muscles had the highest correlation with peak expiratory flow (r = 0.563, P = 0.001) among all individual and combined muscles.

The current results indicate that thinner external and internal oblique muscles may decrease the peak expiratory flow in elderly females, when compared to elderly females with thicker external and internal oblique muscles