PURPOSE Urinary tract infections (UTIs) are widespread and affect a large portion of the human population. Cranberry juices and extracts have been used for UTI prevention due to their content of bioactive proanthocyanidins (PACs), particularly of the A type (PAC-A). Controversial clinical results obtained with cranberry are often due to a lack of precise determination and authentication of the ...

BACKGROUND Haemophilus influenzae is the most common colonizing bacteria of the bronchial tree in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), and positive cultures for this potentially pathogenic microorganism (PPM) has been associated with local inflammation changes that may influence the relationships between H. influenzae and the bronchial mucosa. METHODS A cross-sectional analysis of st...

χ Value in the Chi-square distribution used to test for significant differences between three (or more) independent groups when using the Kruskall-Wallis non-parametric analysis of variance where the dependent variable is measured on an ordinal scale. p Probability of making a type I decision error. U Critical value in the Mann-Whitney U test to test for significant differences between two inde...

Materials and Methods: A total of 1,422 subjects, 704 women (49.5%) and 718 men (50.5%), were enrolled in the Maracaibo City Metabolic Syndrome Prevalence Study. The results were expressed as medians and inter-quartile ranges (p25-p75). Differences were determined through the Mann-Whitney U test and one-way ANOVA test with the Bonferroni adjustment. A multiple logistic regression model was desi...

OBJECTIVE(S) The aim of this study was to investigate the association between HLA class I alleles (HLA-A*02, HLA-A*24, HLA-Cw*08, HLA-B5401) and proviral load in HTLV-I associated myelopathy/tropical spastic paraperesis (HAM/TSP) patients in Iranian population. MATERIALS AND METHODS 20 new cases of HAM/TSP patients and 30 HTLV-I infected healthy carriers were recruited. Peripheral blood sampl...

We investigate gravitational waves with sub-nanoHz frequencies ($10^{-11}$ Hz $\lesssim f_{\rm GW} \lesssim 10^{-9}$ Hz) from the spatial distribution of spin-down rates milli-second pulsars. As we suggested in Yonemaru et al. 2018, a single source induces bias observed pulsars depending on relative direction between and pulsar. To improve constraints time derivative gravitational-wave amplitud...

BACKGROUND Scar tissue formation is the major cause of failure in peripheral nerve surgery. Use of a hyaluronic acid-carboxymethylcellulose (HA-CMC) membrane (Seprafilm) as a solid anti-adhesion barrier agent is one of the therapeutic approaches to reduce postoperative scar tissue formation. However, a solid membrane may not be suitable for repair of a weak peripheral nerve site. This study exa...

Editor: I read with great interest the article by Dr Megibow and colleagues (1) in the January 2006 issue of Radiology. I have some concerns about the Materials and Methods and Results sections of this article. In the Materials and Methods section, under the subtitle “Statistical Analysis,” the authors state that the two groups included in their study were compared with respect to the mean valu...

The purpose of this comparative cross-sectional study was to investigate the use of standardized clinical tests for dry eye in pediatric patients with active and quiet vernal keratoconjunctivitis (VKC) and to compare them with healthy children. We recruited 35 active VKC, 35 inactive VKC, and 70 age-matched control healthy subjects. Each child underwent a complete eye examination, including vis...