OBJECTIVE To evaluate the impact of enzyme replacement therapy for Gaucher Disease on clinical and laboratory parameters after two, five and ten years of treatment. METHODS Data were collected from patient records and analyzed using BioEstat software (version 5.0). Student's t-test, Analysis of Variance (ANOVA), Wilcoxon test and Kruskal-Wallis test were used for statistical analysis. Hepatom...

Objective To identify the attitude of health professionals toward the patient safety culture at a bone marrow transplant unit. Methods Quantitative research approach, cross-sectional survey conducted at a bone marrow transplant unit in Santa Catarina, Brazil. Data were collected using a Safety Attitudes Questionnaire with 33 health professionals in August and September of 2013. A total of 37 at...

Methods of 1450 patients currently on ART, 504 HIV-1 infected patients with persistently undetectable viral load for 5 or more years (mean = 8±2 years) were selected. Results of plasma viral load (performed by PCR RNA-HIV, Amplicor 1.5®) and CD4 count of all patients obtained every 3 or 6 months were abstracted. The distribution of 5-year CD4 count was described using medians and compared betwe...

Waterpipe smoking and its association with chronic bronchitis has not been assessed in Lebanon. This case-control study in Beirut in 2009/2010 evaluated this relationship: 274 cases of chronic bronchitis and 559 controls without the condition aged > or = 40 years were enrolled. Data were collected by questionnaire on: sociodemographic characteristics, respiratory symptoms, smoking (waterpipe an...

Statistical ranking, filtering, adduct detection, isotope correction, and molecular formula calculation are essential tasks in processing mass spectrometry data in metabolomics studies. In order to obtain high-quality data sets, a framework which incorporates all these methods is required. We present the MarVis-Filter software, which provides well-established and specialized methods for process...

OBJECTIVE This study evaluated the effects of photodynamic therapy (PDT) on buccal candidiasis in mice and on the adherence of yeast to buccal epithelial cells (BECs) in vitro. STUDY DESIGN A total of 56 immunosuppressed mice with buccal candidiasis were subjected to PDT, consisting of treatment with erythrosine (400 μmol/L) followed by exposure to a green LED (14.34 J cm(-2)). After treatmen...

Fear of falling (FOF) creates a psychological barrier to performing activities for many older adults. The negative impact of fear of falling increases risk of curtailment of activities, future falls, and injury. The specific aim for this study was to investigate the relationship between two fear of falling measures used in clinical research, the FOF Likert scale and Falls Self Efficacy Scale-In...

In EFL programs, rating scales used in writing assessment are often constructed by intuition. Intuition-based scales tend to provide inaccurate and divisive ratings of learners’ writing performance. Hence, following an empirical approach, this study attempted to develop a rating scale for elementary-level writing at an EFL program in Saudi Arabia. Towards this goal, 98 students’ essays were sco...