Improving the Measurement of Maternal Mortality: The Sisterhood Method Revisited

Background: Over the past several decades the efforts to improve maternal survival and the consequent demand for accurate estimates of maternal mortality have increased. However, measuring maternal mortality remains a difficult task especially in developing countries with weak information systems. Sibling histories included in household surveys (most notably the Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS)) have emerged as an important source of maternal mortality data. Data have been mainly collected from women and have not been widely collected from men due to concerns about data quality. We assess data quality of histories obtained from men and the potential to improve the efficiency of surveys measuring maternal mortality by collecting such data. Methods and Findings: We used data from 10 Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS) that have included a full sibling history in both their women’s and men’s questionnaires. We estimated adult and maternal mortality indicators from histories obtained from men and women. We assessed the completeness and accuracy of these histories using several indicators of data quality. Our study finds that mortality estimates based on sibling histories obtained from men do not systematically or significantly differ from those obtained from women. Quality indicators were similar when comparing data from men and women. Pooling data obtained from men and women produced narrower confidence intervals. Conclusion: From experience across nine developing countries, sibling history data obtained from men appear to be a reliable source of information on adult and maternal mortality. Given that there are no significant differences between mortality estimates based on data obtained from men and women, data can be pooled to increase efficiency. This finding improves the feasibility for countries to generate robust empirical estimates of adult and maternal mortality from surveys. Further we recommend that male sibling histories be collected from all sample households rather than from a subsample

Do rating scales and web administration of surveys impact survey results?

Dissertation (DScD) --Boston University, Henry M. Goldman School of Dental Medicine, 2010 (Department of Health Policy and Health Services Research).Includes bibliography: leaves 119-123.BACKGROUND: The use of Web-based surveys in dental research is gaining popularity. However, no research establishing its equivalence to the more traditional paper-and-pencil surveys is available in the dental literature. Also, no studies are available to assess the effect of changing rating scales in dental patients satisfaction surveys on satisfaction scores. PURPOSE: The purpose of this study is to identify methodological differences between paper-and-pencil and Web-based administration methods of dental patient satisfaction surveys. This is to assess whether dental patient satisfaction scores differ based on the method of administering the satisfaction surveys through paper-and-pencil or W eh-based methods, and to investigate whether patients who respond to Web-based satisfaction surveys are different from those-who respond to paper-and-pencil satisfaction surveys. In addition, we investigated the impact of modifying the rating scale used in items measuring patient satisfaction from an unbalanced scale to a balanced one on the satisfaction scores. [TRUNCATED

The Orphan Nuclear Estrogen Receptor–Related Receptor α (Errα) Is Expressed Throughout Osteoblast Differentiation and Regulates Bone Formation in Vitro

The orphan nuclear estrogen receptor–related receptor α (ERRα), is expressed by many cell types, but is very highly expressed by osteoblastic cells in which it transactivates at least one osteoblast-associated gene, osteopontin. To study the putative involvement of ERRα in bone, we first assessed its expression in rat calvaria (RC) in vivo and in RC cells in vitro. ERRα mRNA and protein were expressed at all developmental stages from early osteoprogenitors to bone-forming osteoblasts, but protein was most abundant in mature cuboidal osteoblasts. To assess a functional role for ERRα in osteoblast differentiation and bone formation, we blocked its expression by antisense oligonucleotides in either proliferating or differentiating RC cell cultures and found inhibition of cell growth and a proliferation-independent inhibition of differentiation. On the other hand, ERRα overexpression in RC cells increased differentiation and maturation of progenitors to mature bone-forming cells. Our findings show that ERRα is highly expressed throughout the osteoblast developmental sequence and plays a physiological role in differentiation and bone formation at both proliferation and differentiation stages. In addition, we found that manipulation of receptor levels in the absence of known ligand is a fruitful approach for functional analysis of this orphan receptor and identification of potential target genes

A comparative analytical study of the Arabian Gulf broadcasting systems : the foreign contextual television penetration

Thesis (M.A.)--Michigan State University. Department of Communication, 1987Includes bibliographical references (pages 185-189

Saudi-American Bilateral Relations: a Case Study of the Consequences of Interdependence on International Relations

This study examines the consequences of interdependence between Saudi Arabia and the United States from 1960 to 1978 as it relates to the concepts of cooperation and conflict. Research on interdependence focuses primarily on relations among Western countries and on whether interdependence is increasing or decreasing between them. It has rarely addressed relations between countries with different levels of economic development or the consequence of interdependence for international relations in terms of conflict and cooperation. Specifically, this study examines the following question: Does the level of interdependence between Saudi Arabia and the United States have any affect on the level of bilateral conflict and cooperation between the two countries? The hypotheses are tested using regression analysis. The primary conclusion is that increases in bilateral interdependence between Saudi Arabia and the United States from 1960 to 1978 produced increased cooperation as well as conflict

Shaping Ability of the Root Canal System Using Reciproc and Reciproc Blue in Preparation of Artificial Canals

Objective: To evaluate the effect of repeated usage of Reciproc and Reciproc Blue on their shaping ability and to determine the maximum number of artificial canals that they can prepare until fracture. Material and Methods: The two file systems, Reciproc and Reciproc Blue, were used to instrument a total of 436 resin blocks. The blocks simulated standardized root canals with a 35° angle of curvature. The rotary systems were divided into two groups (n=21). All canals were prepared to an apical size of 25 according to the manufacturer\u27s instructions. A computer imaging program was then used to analyze canal straightening after pre- and post-instrumentation digital photography was superimposed. Results: Both Reciproc and Reciproc Blue instruments respected the original canal curvature. There were no significant differences between the instruments in terms of maintaining canal curvatures. Moreover, there were no significant differences in preparation time and the number of canals prepared before failure between the two instruments. Conclusion: Reciproc and Reciproc Blue were safe to use under the conditions of this study. Reciprocal motion files with or without heat treatment had comparable preparation time, shaping abilities, and the ability to maintain root canal curvatures

The Aesthetic of Buildings’ Envelope and its Effect on Social Consciousness

Buildings have been part of human life and community development since ancient times. With the advancement of architecture technology, building designs, especially building envelopes have evolved with various design features. These elements have its own influence of the user perspective in terms of social consciousness. Thus, this paper has presented a brief overview of the aesthetics of building’s envelope and its effect on social consciousness. This paper begins with the brief introduction of building envelopes and how it functions, Next, the paper discusses the characteristics of building envelopes. Next, the paper has presented the common materials used as building façade or building envelop. In addition, this work has adopted survey method to analyse the effect of building envelop on social consciousness. The survey was carried out with 40 respondents. The comparison was made between Kings Road Tower and Beach Tower at Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. The key findings have shown that that most people like King Road Tower over the Beach Tower due to its creativity in design

Gene expression study of breast cancer using Welch Satterthwaite t-test, Kaplan-Meier estimator plot and Huber loss robust regression model

Objective: Breast Cancer (BC) is one of the deadliest diseases in women, causing thousands of deaths annually despite the advent of high-throughput genomic platforms in the recent past. Microarray-based gene expression profiling with different statistical methods have been extensively used to understand the disease at the molecular level. We plan to apply Welch Satterthwaite t-test, Kaplan-Meier estimator plot and Huber Loss robust regression model on microarray data to improve the analysis and find biomarkers for future diagnosis, prognosis, and treatment. Methods: We retrieved microarray data (GSE10810 dataset) of 31 breast tumor samples and 27 normal breast samples from Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO, NCBI). Welch Satterthwaite t-test was applied to identify the most statistically significant genes, Huber loss robust regression model was applied to investigate the existing mathematical relations between tumor and control variables, and Kaplan-Meier Plotter was used to confirm their association with overall metastatic relapse-free survival of BC patients. Results: We identified 1837 differentially expressed genes, including 638 overexpressed (COL11A1, KIAA0101, S100P, GJB2, TOP2A, LINC01614, RRM2, INHBA, C15orf48 and CKS2) and 1199 under expressed (LEP, ADIPOQ, PLIN1, PCK1, PCOLCE2, ADH1B, LYVE1, FABP4, ABCA8, and CHRDL1) genes passing the threshold (fold change ± 2 and p value < 0.001). KM analysis revealed 12 out of 20 DEGs (log rank p value < 0.05) as potential prognostic and therapeutic biomarkers. Conclusion: Huber loss robust regression model was found to be one of the best performing algorithms for the mathematical relationship between the control and breast tumor samples with co-relation coefficient of 0.4398 and mean absolute error of 1.069 ± 0.020. In conclusion, with high mathematical confidence, we detected DEGs have high potential to be BC biomarkers using Welch t-test and Kaplan-Meier plot having minimum underlying assumptions.Temple University. College of Science and TechnologyBiolog