Tehran University Medical Journal

Background: The approach of medical ethics training courses at Tehran University of Medical Sciences to change the attitude and promote medical ethics knowledge of learners has challenges. This study aims to identify the challenges in teaching medical ethics at Tehran University of Medical Sciences.
Methods: This is a qualitative study with semi-structured interviews conducted in April 2018 at Tehran University of Medical Sciences. Using purposive sampling, 23 participants were selected from the clinicians and faculty members of medical ethics and medical students. Data were analyzed by the content analysis method.

Conclusion: The effectiveness and efficiency of medical ethics courses to change the behavior and attitude of learners are not acceptable. Dealing with the existing challenges requires the efforts of the Medical Ethics Department to make maximum use of available resources and interact effectively with other academic departments.

Background: The patient's position during the recovery time after arthroplasty surgery can be a factor in reducing complications and improving patients’ condition. Therefore, this study was performed to compare the knee range of motion after soft tissue repair in both flexion and extension positions of total knee arthroplasty.
Methods: This study is a double-blind clinical trial. The study population was all candidates for total knee arthroplasty surgery in Al-Zahra and Kashani hospitals in Isfahan from July 2011 to September 2012. The sample size was selected using the statistical formula of 88 patients and randomly divided into two groups of flexion and extension. In the first group during the knee soft tissue repair, the knee was in flexion and in the second group it was in extension and then it was repaired. Information such as age, sex, body mass index and surgical position were recorded in the checklist. The knee range of motion was measured at the end of the first, second, fourth, eighth and twelfth weeks and recorded in a checklist. In order to compare the pattern of changes in mean knee range of motion over time in the two groups, mixed linear models and conventional marginal models to generalized estimator equations were used by STATA software.

Background: mechanical bowel preparation (MBP) is a common practice before laparoscopic gynecologic surgeries but the role and efficacy of preparation have been questioned. this study assesses visualization and bowel handling in a group of patients who receive MBP and the control group and thereafter; compares the results.
Methods: We designed and conducted this randomized, single-blinded and controlled trial on patients who underwent advanced gynecologic laparoscopic surgeries. This clinical trial was carried out between July 2020 and January 2021. The patients were enrolled from l the laparoscopic office. 120 women aged 18-65 years undergoing level 2 and 3 benign gynecologic laparoscopic surgeries were randomized to bowel preparation with a normal saline enema (n=60) or non-bowel preparation (n=60) groups. Our patients underwent level 2 and 3 of benign laparoscopic gynecologic surgeries with or without MBP. The visualization and bowel handling were assessed by the primary surgical team and a questionnaire was later obtained. The outcomes included intraoperative surgical view and bowel handling, preoperative and post-operative patient signs and symptoms. The patients were also assessed in respect to discomfort prior and after the surgery, this assessment was obtained using a questionnaire. The gathered data was analyzed using IBM’s SPSS v26 software.

Background: Hemorrhoids are one of the most common perianal diseases. They have several surgical and non-surgical treatment methods. Among surgical procedures, Stapler hemorrhoidopexy method has recently gained widespread acceptance. Hemorrhoidopexy with a circular stapler usually has a series of common and mild complications and a few rare and life-threatening complications such as rectal perforation, which requires emergency surgery. In this article, a case of rectal perforation in a middle-aged man following hemorrhoidopexy with Circular Stapler in a Procedure for Prolapse and Hemorrhoids (PPH) is reported that he underwent emergency surgery.
Case Presentation: The patient is a 43-year-old man who presented to the emergency department of Mashhad Ghaem Hospital in June 2020 due to acute general abdominal pain especially in the lower abdomen that started 3 days ago the patient has a history of hemorrhoidopexy with a Circular Stapler in a Procedure for Prolapse and Hemorrhoids (PPH) 5 days ago. The patient had a fever at the time of referral, other vital signs were normal. During the examination, the patient had tenderness and rebound tenderness, especially in the lower abdomen. Hydropneumoperitoneum or Retropneumoperitoneum or Hydroretropneumoperitoneum was reported on the abdomen and pelvic Computed Tomography (CT) scan with and without oral and intravenous contrast. The patient was diagnosed with intraperitoneal rectal perforation. He was then diagnosed with intraperitoneal rectal perforation and treated with intravenous antibiotics and surgery. After surgery, the patient's general condition improved and he was discharged without mortality and morbidity with the good condition after 6 days.

Conclusion: Hemorrhoidopexy with a stapler is more widely accepted than other hemorrhoidectomy methods especially manual methods for prolapse hemorrhoids due to less postoperative pain, shorter hospital stays, and faster return to work. Although this procedure usually has mild side effects that do not require surgery, sometimes life-threatening complications such as rectal perforation may happen, which requires prompt diagnosis and appropriate treatment.

Conclusion: According to the findings of this study, the measuring of optic nerve sheath diameter in patients suspected of increasing the pressure of idiopathic intracranial hypertension can be helpful as a non–invasive diagnosis method.

Background: Glioma is the most common primary brain tumor, and early detection of tumors is important in the treatment planning for the patient. The precise segmentation of the tumor and intratumoral areas on the MRI by a radiologist is the first step in the diagnosis, which, in addition to the consuming time, can also receive different diagnoses from different physicians. The aim of this study was to provide an automated method for segmenting the tumor and intratumoral areas.
Methods: This is a fundamental-applied study that was conducted from May 2020 to September 2021 using multimodal MRI images of 285 patients with glioma tumors from the BraTS 2018 Database. This database was collected from 19 different MRI imaging centers, including multimodal MRI images of 210 HGG patients, and 75 LGG patients. In this study, a 2D U-Net architecture was designed with a patch-based method for training, which comprises an encoding path for feature extraction and a symmetrical decoding path. The training of this network was performed in three separate stages, using data from high-grade gliomas (HGG), and low-grade gliomas (LGG), and combining two groups of 210, 75, and 220 patients, respectively.

Results: The proposed model estimated the Dice Similarity Coefficient (DSC) results in HGG datasets 0.85, 0.85, 0.77, LGG datasets 0.80, 0.66, 0.51, and the combination of the two groups 0.88, 0.79, 0.77 for regions the whole tumor, tumor core, and enhancing region in the training dataset, respectively. The results related to Hussdorf Distance (HD) for HGG datasets were 8.24, 9.92, 4.43, LGG datasets 11.5, 11.31, 2.23, and the combination of the two groups 7.20, 8.82, 4.43 for regions the whole tumor, tumor core, and enhancing region in the training dataset, respectively. Conclusion: Using the U-Net network can help physicians in the accurate segmentation of the tumor and its various areas, as well as increase the survival rate of these patients and improve their quality of life through accurate diagnosis and early treatment.

Background: Congenital heart defects (CHD) are the most common type of birth defects. The main screening tests used to identify babies with congenital heart defects include prenatal echocardiography and postnatal clinical assessment. Routine pulse oximetry has been reported as an additional screening test that can potentially improve the early diagnosis of critical congenital heart disease (CCHD).
Methods: This study is a multi-stage evolutionary study that was conducted for 12 months from March 2021 to March 2022 at Pediatric Cardiovascular Research Center in Cardiovascular Institute, Isfahan, Iran. In the first phase, after identifying the topic and aims of the present study, questions were designed through the PICO method including (population, intervention, control, and outcomes). Then conducting systematic searches, the quality of all existing clinical guidelines (CG) of this field were evaluated using the Appraisal of Guidelines for Research and Evaluation (AGREE) instrument and a committee consisting of pediatric cardiologists and neonatologists in the field. Next, based on the opinions of experts, the quality of 1 out of 6 clinical guidelines for early detection of critical congenital heart disease at birth by pulse oximetry was assessed as optimal. Finally, the clinical guidelines draft was evaluated using the Delphi method and the panel of experts. After expert panel meetings and consensus between members, the final version of the guideline for early detection of critical congenital heart diseases at birth by pulse oximetry was developed.

Results: In the present study, criteria of clinical practice regarding the stages of newborn screening by pulse oximetry at birth were determined based on the evidence and health conditions and were presented in twenty-eight recommendations and six sections. The final recommendations were presented in the results section. Conclusion: The finding of the present study showed that physicians, nurses, and midwives can apply the recommendations of this clinical guideline for the early detection and referral of neonates with critical congenital heart disease.

Background: Infection with Strongyloides stercoralis is common in tropical and subtropical regions. To prevent and treat these diseases, information on the distribution and frequency of these parasites in different geographical areas is needed. Due to the importance of diseases in the northern provinces of Iran, the present study was performed to determine the prevalence of Strongyloides stercoralis.
Methods: From April 2011 to March 2020, stool samples from patients who were referred to Rouhani hospital in Mazandaran province, Babol, were gathered. For stool samples, microscopic detection was performed immediately using the wet expansion method, followed by a formal-ether concentration process. Based on the sample size calculation, the minimum number of patients with Strongyloides stercoralis infection was considered to be 380 patients from the years 2011-2020. Mean and standard deviation indices were used to describe quantitative data and numbers and percentages were used to describe qualitative data.

Results: Out of the total number of 39,800 archived patient files that were reviewed, a total of 420 (1.05%) patients were confirmed for the presence of Strongyloides stercoralis in their feces. The age range of patients was 3 to 89 years. The population of male patients (249 patients) was higher than females (171 patients). In patients with positive Strongyloides stercoralis, disease symptoms were positive in 206 patients and negative in 214 patients. The most common underlying disease in patients was abdominal pain (220 patients). 271 patients received steroids. Conclusion: Strongyloides stercoralis infection was detected in the northern region of Iran. The prevalence of this parasite was higher in men, the elderly, and people with underlying comorbidities. These results can be used to identify and compare areas where the prevalence of infection is higher. Therefore, revealing the effect of Strongyloides stercoralis infection on public health makes the need for in-depth clinical and diagnostic studies important. People with chronic diseases, whether symptomatic or asymptomatic, should be screened for parasitic diseases.

Background: Medical ethics is an applied branch of ethics that deals with ethical challenges in medical and health environments, and its related topics have a long history, but its education as an academic subject in universities has received a lot of attention in the last 40 years. In recent years, medical universities have made extensive efforts to expand medical ethics education, which has been accompanied by significant progress, but given that the modern medical ethics education system is a growing and nascent structure, more research is needed. Therefore, this study aims to assess the status of the medical ethics education system at Tehran University of Medical Sciences to identify its gaps so that the current situation can be improved with proper planning.
Methods: The type of this research is descriptive quantitative-qualitative and it was collected from December 2018 to September 2019 at Tehran University of Medical Sciences. First, the educational curriculum of 165 educational levels at Tehran University of Medical Sciences was reviewed and described in terms of the existence of a medical or professional ethics course in the educational curriculum. Then, a semi-structured interview was conducted with the 13 professors in charge of teaching this course in all faculties, and content analysis was performed to describe and identify the obstacles in its effectiveness.

Results: The results showed that in 53% of the educational levels, there was no separate medical or professional ethics course in the educational curriculum and the most educational coverage of this course took place in the faculties of medicine, dentistry, nursing and midwifery. The obstacles in the effectiveness of teaching this unit were categorized into five main themes of educational curriculum, hidden curriculum, teaching methods, teachers and education management. Conclusion: The results show that the content of curricula needs to be revised and education should be inclusive. Creating a coherent educational organization and monitoring the hidden curriculum are other issues that should be considered to increase the effectiveness of this education.

Background: To improve the quality of sedation in procedures, different medications are used alone or in combination with each other, but so far, no administration method that is agreed upon by anesthesiologists has been presented. This study aimed to investigate the effectiveness and safety of intranasal ketamine in comparison with intravenous ketamine in cataract surgery.
Methods: This clinical trial was performed from December 2016 to March 2017 in Feyz Hospital, Isfahan. Ninety patients over the age of 18 who were candidates for cataracts surgery were randomly assigned to receive 1 mg/kg ketamine through the nasal route (INk) or intravenously (IVK). Ten minutes before the surgery, ketamine was administered in the INK group and intranasal saline in the IVK group. Two minutes before the start of surgery, normal saline was administered in the INK group and ketamine was administered intravenously in the IVK group. Patients received intravenous midazolam 0.04 mg/kg during prep and drape. The quality of sedation and analgesia, vital signs, patient and doctor satisfaction, and side effects were recorded during the study period. Data were analyzed using of SPSS software, version 23 (IBM SPSS, Armonk, NY, USA).

Results: In this study, 90 people were included in the study, 53 of whom (58.9%) were men. The mean age of the patients was 61.5±10.6. Two groups had a significant difference in terms of gender (P=0.696), age (P=0.960), weight (P=0.212), height (P=0.632), underlying disease (P=0.094), and type of disease (P=0.090). Two groups were not significantly different in terms of mean heart rate (P=0.77), mean arterial blood pressure (P=0.13), mean blood oxygen saturation (P=0.58), patient satisfaction (P=0.470) and surgeon satisfaction (P=0.115), pain intensity (P=0.506), level of sedation level (P=0.477) and side effects (P=0.221). Conclusion: Intranasal administration of ketamine provides similar sedation and cardiovascular response compared to intravenous administration of ketamine. Administering ketamine intranasally is a non-invasive, safe and effective method with easy application and can be a suitable alternative to intravenous administration.

Methods: In this retrospective and descriptive-analytical study, men with isolated hypogonadotropic hypogonadism based on the normality of other pituitary axes who had a tendency to be fertile were studied. From November 2017 to February 2020, these patients had been referred to the doctor at the endocrinology and urology clinics of Ahvaz for fertility purposes. The initial test was based on clinical examinations and testosterone measurement and sperm count for the patients was recorded after the treatment. The treated patients simultaneously received HMG 75 units every other day (three times a week) and HCG 5000 units every other day. Hormonal evaluation and clinical examinations were assessed again. Results: This research showed that the size of the testicles increased in 54.8% of these patients. Secondary characteristics (secondary hair growth) were developed in 88.9% of the patients. Spermatogenesis induction occurred in 36 patients, 29 of whom became fathers. Meanwhile, in 67.3% of patients, sexual desire and in 69.4% of them hormonal activity increased. In addition, it was observed that the response time to replacement therapy is more than 12 months in 47.5% of the patients. Moreover, 6.6% of the study samples had used assisted reproductive methods. Conclusion: The results of this research indicate the timely initiation of treatment to improve infertility and treat hypogonadism among men.According to the results, it seems that the use of HMG and HCG in the treatment of hypogonadotropic hypogonadism disease is effective in creating secondary sexual characteristics and increasing hormonal activity and fertility.

Background: Improving the quality of life of patients is the main goal of therapeutic interventions in chronic diseases. One way to achieve this is to decrease the severity of symptoms. The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of curcumin capsule on quality of life and symptoms of patients with irritable bowel.
Methods: This clinical trial study was performed on 60 patients with irritable bowel syndrome referred to Amir al-Momenin Hospital in Arak city from April to September 2018, using convenience sampling and Extra-intestinal symptoms severity scale and WHOQOL_BREF tools. The patients were divided into two groups of intervention and control, curcumin capsules were used in the first one, and in the second one, placebo capsules were used twice a day after lunch and dinner for four weeks. All patients were examined at the beginning of the study, the fourth week and three months later, in terms of quality of life, severity and frequency of symptoms and possible complications. During this period, the patients were followed up on a monthly basis through phone calls, and the contact number of the researcher was provided to the patients to call in case of any problems or questions.

Results: The average age of the curcumin group was 35 years and for the placebo group was 36.43 years. There was no significant difference in the quality of life between the curcumin and placebo groups after the intervention (P>0.05). Significant were found between the curcumin and placebo groups after the intervention (P<0.05). Conclusion: The results of this study showed that there was a significant difference between curcumin and placebo in improving the clinical symptoms of patients, but the quality of life of patients in both curcumin and placebo groups did not change significantly after the intervention.

Background: Several typical and atypical findings have been observed in Covid-19 high-resolution computer tomography (HRCT). To our knowledge, there is no study investigating the relationship between the presence of nodules in Covid-19 patients and the patient's condition. Therefore, the present study assessed the frequency of pulmonary nodules in Covid-19 patients according to their condition.
Methods: This cross-sectional study assessed the medical images of the patients referred to three university-affiliated centers (Nemazi, Ali Asghar and Shahid Faghihi Hospital) to perform Covid-19 HRCT from April to September 2020. The centers have been named H1, H2, and H3. Patients who were referred to these centers had good, poor, and fair conditions, respectively. The history of patients was assessed carefully. Patients' demographic information, nodule shape, number, size, location, presence of cavitation, and GGO around the nodule were assessed and recorded.

Results: Overall, 20576 patients (mean age=46.75±16.64 years old) were included in the study. Only 2.1% of cases had solid nodules. Most of them (96.76%) were accompanied by a GGO (halo sign), and only 10.42% were associated with a cavity. The good condition, patients showed significantly more solid nodules (3.46%) than others. In size of the nodules in good-condition patients (1.8 cm) is significantly larger than in fair-condition (1.22 cm) or poor condition patients (1.15 cm). 79.86%, 12.5%, and 7.64% of nodules were multiple, dual/triple, and single, respectively. Conclusion: The frequency of nodules in the HRCTs of good-condition patients was significantly higher than in fair- or poor-conditionpatients; they also had more multiple and larger-sized nodules. The Pearson-coefficient test also revealed a small negative correlation between the presence of nodules and the patient's condition. It seems the presence of nodules indicates higher immunity to viral infections. In the follow-up, it was revealed that people who had nodules were not hospitalized in the ICU. Further study is needed to prove this point.

Background: Preventing the cancellation of surgeries is an important and devastating challenge in operating room management. Cancellation of pre-scheduled surgeries at the last moment in the operation room leads to increased length of stay, patient dissatisfaction, human resource consumption and financial burden for patients and the health care system. In this study, we have investigated the effect of recording the causes of surgery cancellations in the operation room on the incidence of surgery cancellations in patients who have been candidates for non-emergent surgeries.
Methods: A total of 545 surgeries which had been canceled in different types of surgery between March 2014 and March 2015 were recorded according to the reasons for cancellation in predetermined forms and the information was analyzed. The most common reasons for cancellation included changing the plan of treatment from surgery, a high-risk comorbidity with a high probability of mortality, patient’s refusal from surgery, an unanticipated duration of previous surgery longer than anticipated, the unavailability of an ICU bed in the hospital, requested laboratory data not being ready, failing to prepare requested packed RBCs and other hospital or patient-related problems.

Results: The percentage of surgery cancellations in most groups including orthopedics, urology, cardiac surgery, general surgery, gynecology and maxillofacial surgery, decreased during the course of this study. According to our findings the most relevant cause of non-emergent surgery cancellation was the unpredictable increased duration of previous surgery. The maxillofacial surgery group reached the highest surgery cancellation reduction rate and the cardiovascular surgery group experienced the lowest cancellation reduction rate. Also, the percentage of surgery cancellations in the field of neurosurgery increased during the study period. Conclusion: Recording the reasons mentioned by the surgical team as the reason for canceling surgeries and reducing the rate of their occurrence during the study and providing appropriate feedback and dialogue in this case had a positive effect on reducing the rate of cancellation of the surgeries and reducing the mentioned reasons.

Results: Radiofrequency ablation with drilling was used in 22(81.5%) patients, and for the rest 5(18.5%), radiofrequency ablation with curettage and drilling was performed as a treatment procedure. The overall clinical success rate was 92.6%(25/27), with a low complication rate (7.4%). The mean diameter of nidus in pre/pos treatment was 3.46±2.02 and 2.22±1.75 mm, respectively. Femur 12(44.4%) was the most common bone in the patients. Significant differences between pre/post treatment follow up examinations in nidus size (P=0.03), nidus diameter (P=0.02), bone and calcification size (P=0.005) were detected. Additionally, it depicts that the mean values of tumor size and cortical thickening decreased after treatment. Conclusion: It is noteworthy that the present study had some limitations, including the small sample size and the relatively short follow-up period. There is no significant difference between radiofrequency ablation after drilling and curettage in treating Osteoid Osteoma. It is concluded that although there was a significant difference in pre/post-treatment imaging, there is no need for continuous imaging follow-up in treated patients without clinical complications such as pain to mitigate radiation dose risks and healthcare expenses.

Background: Screening is a cost-effective method for prevention, early detection of the disease and reducing the burden of the third deadliest cancer in the world, i.e. colorectal cancer. This study aimed to analyze the cost-effectiveness of colonoscopy screening compared to sigmoidoscopy for colorectal cancer in high-risk individuals in Iran.
Methods: This economic evaluation study was conducted using the cost-effectiveness method between July 2016 and February 2017. Evaluation of the effectiveness of screening methods was done using a systematic review. Cost evaluation was also done using the costs obtained from the tariff approved by the Iranian Ministry of Health in 2015 for colonoscopy and sigmoidoscopy. Finally, the combined model of decision tree and Markov was used to evaluate the cost effectiveness. Incremental Cost Effectiveness Ratio (ICER) formula was used for cost effectiveness analysis considering the final outcome of 5-year survival of high-risk individuals. Excel and TreeAge software were used for data analysis.

Results: The effectiveness of sigmoidoscopy and colonoscopy in increasing 5-year survival is 11 and 15.7%, respectively, and colonoscopy screening is 4.7% more than sigmoidoscopy. The cost of colonoscopy and sigmoidoscopy screening was calculated as 1000 and 19920 billion Rials, respectively. Based on cost-effectiveness analysis, the cost of treating patients in the case of screening with colonoscopy and sigmoidoscopy is lower than without screening. The ICER ratio of colonoscopy and sigmoidoscopy compared to no screening was -4/441/389/160 and -4/757/954/940 Rials respectively, and colonoscopy compared to sigmoidoscopy was -3/699/785/880 Rials, respectively. Finally, the use of colonoscopy leads to spending 3/699/785/880 Rials less in exchange for obtaining 4722 additional survivals with the prevention of colorectal cancer compared to sigmoidoscopy. Conclusion: Screening by colonoscopy and sigmoidoscopy methods are effective in reducing the incidence and death of colorectal cancer compared to no screening. Screening by colonoscopy is a dominant option for the high-risk population in Iran. Colonoscopy screening is more cost effective compared to sigmoidoscopy. However, decisions about colorectal cancer screening and screening methods depend on local resources and personal preferences.

Background: Lower gastrointestinal bleeding, a symptom that can become the cause of a life-threatening condition, has a 33 per 100,000 prevalence. The origin of lower gastrointestinal bleeding in most cases is the small intestine, colon, or anorectal parts. Surgical consultation in patients with gastrointestinal bleeding is one of the most necessary measures so that the patient can be treated at the appropriate stage with a greater chance of success before reaching shock. In the case of uncontrolled gastrointestinal bleeding, surgery is recommended as soon as possible when endoscopic and radiological treatments are not possible or effective.
Case Presentation: In this article, we present a case of uncontrolled lower gastrointestinal bleeding in a 50-year-old patient who was admitted to Imam Khomeini Hospital in Tehran on December 15, 2021. Despite performing appropriate paraclinic measures such as sonography, endoscopy, and colonoscopy the gastrointestinal bleeding origin was not determined. On the other hand, our investigations showed that she had liver cirrhosis. Due to the instability of the patient's condition due to continued lower gastrointestinal bleeding, the medical team decided to perform surgery. The surgeon noticed that the origin of the bleeding was a vascular entanglement at the small intestine-navel junction, and the procedure involved segmental excision of the small intestine.

Conclusion: In cirrhotic patients, lower gastrointestinal bleeding is an emergency condition, and if the source of the bleeding is not accessible via endoscopy or colonoscopy, diagnosing and treatment become extremely difficult. Computed tomography angiography and subsequent surgery are effective approaches for diagnosing and treating these conditions. When lower gastrointestinal bleeding is uncontrolled, exploratory laparotomy should be considered. Due to the unknown origin of bleeding, exploratory laparotomy may not be successful, so using endoscopy during surgery can help to diagnose the location of the lesion in these cases; However, in some cases despite all measures, the source of bleeding may not be determined, in these case the rate of rebleeding after surgery will be high.

Methods: This study used machine learning systems and similarity metrics to determine the behavior pattern of COVID-19 in different seasons of the year. The location of research was the Mousa ibn Ja'far Hospital in Mashhad, and the time was from May 2020 to August 2021. The symptoms of affected patients were compared with the compiled dataset, and the similarity of patients was prepared in a similarity matrix, and the Jaccard correlation coefficient was calculated on the data. Finally, the analysis of strains from the beginning of emergence to the latest strain was examined. The performance indicators of the algorithm in the Jaccard similarity method showed a recall metric with a value of 0.94, a precision metric with a value of 1, an F1 score with a value of 0.86, and remove accuracy metric with a value of 0.76. The most important factors in the investigation include white blood cells, platelets, RT-PCR, CT SCAN, shortness of breath, fever, SPO2, and respiratory rate. Results: The transmission of the COVID-19 virus depends on several factors, including human interaction. The evidence of the collected data shows that people with COVID-19 have low lymphocyte count and it is very consistent with the results of recent studies. Due to the lack of a dataset, a comparative study was conducted and a dataset was collected. Conclusion: This study, leveraging machine learning algorithms, identified a clear seasonal correlation in the spread of COVID-19. Considering geographical and seasonal variations among patients, distinct symptoms were observed in each season corresponding to the prevalent strain during that period.

Background: Developmental disorders in children include a group of problems and limitations in learning and acquiring specific skills of each age group. The term global developmental delay is used to describe developmental disability in children under five years of age, which is in at least two areas of major development. Neuroradiological imaging such as brain MRI provides important information for physicians. The purpose of this study is to determine the role of brain MRI in predicting the clinical outcome of global developmental delay in children.
Methods: In this cross-sectional study, from 79 - from September 2013 to September 2018 at Motahari Clinic of Shiraz University of Medical Sciences, Shiraz Iran - eligible children with developmental disabilities, 37 patient who had brain MRI were selected as a sample and children scores in five ASQ clinical areas and MRI findings were reviewed and compared. Patients suffering from metabolic, genetic, trauma, infection and neoplasms problems and diseases were excluded from the study.

Results: Out of 37 patients studied, 23 were female and 14 were male with a dispersion of three 3 to 60 months of age. 31 of these children had at least one abnormal finding in brain MRI images and the other six were completely normal. In relation to the imaging findings, the highest frequency is related to abnormal head circumference with a prevalence of 54% and the lowest frequency is related to abnormal myelinization with a prevalence of 10.8%. Results of MRI findings correlation with developmental domains demonstrated that Children with white matter disorder on MRI show severe gross motor abnormality (P<0.049) and who had MRI finding of cortical problems suffer from developmental delay in fine motor area. (P<0.001). Conclusion: Considering the mentioned findings; brain MRI can be a useful diagnostic tool in children with developmental delay and also focusing on the developmental area that is more likely to be affected, MRI can help with treatment and rehabilitation process of these children in the future.