Tehran University Medical Journal

Background: Contact lenses are transparent, thin plastic disks that cover the surface of the cornea. Appropriate lens prescription should be performed properly by an expert to provide better visual acuity and reduce side effects. The lens administration is a multi-stage, complex and time-consuming process involving many considerations. The purpose of this study was to develop a decision support system in the field of contact lens prescription.
Methods: In this fundamental study, data were collected from 127 keratoconus patients referred to the contact lens clinic at Farabi Eye Hospital, Tehran, Iran during the period of March 2013 to July 2014. Five parameters in the contact lens prescribing process were investigated. Parameters were collected as follows. “Lens vertical position”, “vertical movement of the lens during blinking” and “width of the rim” in the fluorescein pattern were obtained by recording videos of the patients while wearing the lens. “Fluorescein dye concentration” under the lens was evaluated by the physician and “patient comfort” was obtained by asking the patient to fill a simple scoring system. Approved and disapproved lenses were judged and recorded based on the decision of an expert contact lens practitioner. The decision support system was designed using artificial neural networks with the mentioned variables as inputs. Approved and disapproved lenses are considered as system outputs. Artificial neural network was developed using MATLAB® software, version 8.3 (Mathworks Inc., Natick, MA, USA). Eighty percent of the data was used to train the support vector machine and the rest of the data (20%) to test the system's performance.
Results: Accuracy, sensitivity and specificity, calculated using the confusion matrix, were 91.3%, 89.8% and 92.6% respectively. The results indicate that the designed decision support system could assist contact lens prescription with high precision.
Conclusion: According to the results, we conclude that hard contact lens fitness could be evaluated properly using an artificial neural network as a decision support system. The proposed system detected approved and disapproved contact lenses with high accuracy.

Background: Matrix metalloproteases (MMPs) are multi-chain proteins that regulated by tissue inhibitor of metalloproteinases (TIMP) and several other mechanisms. This Includes transcription regulation and protein form secretion. The roles of MMPs in wound healing and tissue repair. In tuberculosis (TB), the activity of MMPs is increased and TIMP inhibitors decrease activity. Therefore, in tuberculosis, MMPs cause excessive damage to the lung tissue and cavity formation.
Methods: In a case-control study, plasma samples of healthy controls, symptomatic respiratory tract controls and tuberculosis patients were evaluated by available sampling in Ali Ibn Abitaleb and Bouali Hospitals, Zahedan, Iran, from Apri1 2015 to April 2018. Patients were divided into two groups: tuberculosis and control group and the level of MMPs were measured by the enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) method in plasma samples of the two groups. For MMP-8, which was important in the diagnosis of tuberculosis, a cutoff point was obtained.
Results: 384 people including 123 healthy controls. 107 non-tuberculosis, and 154 tuberculosis patients were examined; 230 patients in the control group and 154 patients in the tuberculosis group. Levels of MMPs in tuberculosis and symptomatic respiratory group were higher than healthy group. The mean of MMP-8 was significantly different between two groups (P<0.001). In this study, sensitivity, specificity, positive and negative predictive value of plasma MMP-8 in detection of TB in non-TB patients in MMP-8 cutoff point=6650 pg/ml were 65.4%, 78.2%, 50%, and 93% respectively outcome. Significantly, the rate of pulmonary cavity was significantly higher in the TB group; Higher cavity, higher concentration of plasma MMPs.
Conclusion: In this study, first comprehensive analysis of MMPs was performed. Two collagenases, MMP-1 and MMP-8, were active in tuberculosis, but MMP-8 was specifically higher in tuberculosis than in both symptomatic and healthy controls. Level of MMP-1, 3, 8, 9 was higher in men than in women. The analysis of genders separately showed MMP-8 was increased in tuberculosis group in comparison with control group and MMP-1 group in both TB and symptomatic respiratory tract increased.

Background: Spasticity is one of the most important symptoms of stroke, which leads to movement constraints and disability. The presence of spasticity in the ankle and toe plantar flexor muscles disturbs the balance and gait of patients with stroke. Dry needling has been introduced as a new method for the treatment of spasticity. The aim of this study was to investigate the immediate effects of the ankle and toe plantar flexors dry needling on spasticity and balance in patients with stroke.
Methods: This study was a clinical pretest-posttest study. Twenty patients with stroke (12 males and 8 females), the mean age of 56.5±13 years were included. The assessments were performed before dry needling, immediately after dry needling and 15 minutes after that. Dry needling was used to treat gastrocnemius (ankle plantar flexor) muscles, flexor digitorum longus, and flexor digitorum brevis of the affected lower limb of the patients, for one session. Each muscle was needled for one minute with fast in-fast out technique. The outcome measures of the study were modified modified Ashworth scale (MMAS) for the assessment of the severity of muscle spasticity, timed up and go test and one leg stance test, for balance evaluation. The study was conducted in neurological physical therapy, Clinic of Rehabilitation School, Tehran University of Medical Sciences in Iran, from April 2017 to April 2018.
Results: The results showed a significant decrease in the ankle and toe plantar flexor muscles spasticity both immediately after dry needling and at 15 minutes follow-up (P=0.001). The duration of timed up and go test (P=0.001) and one leg stance test (P=0.001) improved significantly after dry needling and this improvement persisted for 15 minutes after dry needling. The effect size for timed up and go test and one leg stance test was small (Cohen'sd=0.33 and 0.32 respectively).
Conclusion: This study suggests that dry needling is effective in improving spasticity of ankle and toe plantar flexor muscles and the balance of patients with stroke. Further research with larger sample size and control group is necessary.

Background: The empty sella syndrome (ESS) is a neurological or pathologic finding in which sella turcica is devoid of pituitary tissue and the subarachnoid space extends into sella turcica, which is either primary or secondary as well as partial and complete. The widespread use of CT scans and MRIs today has made the ESS a common finding in imaging. The aim of this study was to evaluate the prevalence of the empty sella syndrome.
Methods: This is a retrospective descriptive-analytic study in which all patients referred to Imam Ali Hospital (Zahedan) for electromagnetic brain imaging (n=1856) were recruited by cross-sectional sampling during the first 6 months from 21 March 2018 to 23 September 2018. Inclusion criteria included the absence of another known problem in the central nervous system and the absence of concurrent underlying disease. The data gathering tool was a questionnaire consisting of demographic and related variable to empty sella disorder.

Background: Oxford Shoulder Score (OSS) is a specific questionnaire for the assessment of pain and function in subjects with shoulder pain. The reliability and validity of the Persian version of this questionnaire have been shown previously. But its responsiveness has not been investigated yet. This study aimed to determine the Persian OSS responsiveness in subjects with shoulder pain.
Methods: This was a prospective cohort study design conducted in the Physiotherapy Clinic, School of Rehabilitation, Tehran University of Medical Sciences in 2018.  Thirty-one subjects with shoulder pain (20 females and 11 males) with a mean age of 50±15.3 participated in this study. They completed the Persian OSS, Disability of Arm, Shoulder & Hand (DASH) questionnaire, and Visual Analog Scale (VAS) before and after 10 physiotherapy sessions. After the 10th session, the Global Rating of Change (GRC) was also completed. The statistical analysis included the Effect Size (ES), Standardized Response Mean (SRM), and the Spearman or Pearson correlation coefficients.

Background: Studies have shown that 75% of men and 35% of women over the age of 10 have hamstring tightness. Hamstring tightness is one of the major causes of hamstring injury and loss of function. Dry needling which is a common intervention used by physiotherapists for the treatment of common various conditions can improve hamstring flexibility in less time than other interventions. So, the present study aimed to investigate the effect of dry needling on flexibility and electrophysiological indices in healthy men with hamstring tightness.
Methods: In this two-way blind clinical trial with a control group, which was performed from November 2018 to February 2019 in the laboratory of the Faculty of Rehabilitation of Tehran University of Medical Sciences, 30 healthy men with hamstring tightness were randomly divided into two groups of dry needling (n=15) and sham needle (n=15). In both groups, dry needling and sham needle, three points of hamstring muscle were needled, each point for one minute during a single session. Outcome measures included flexibility based on passive knee extension test, H-reflex latency, and motor neuron excitability, which were measured three times: before the intervention, immediately after the intervention, and one week after the intervention.
Results: The results revealed that the mean of passive knee extension test (P=0.54), the mean delay time of H-reflex (P=0.84) and the mean of excitability of the motor neuron (P=0.41) didn’t have significant different between two groups after intervention.
Conclusion: The findings of this study showed that dry needling had no effect on hamstring flexibility and electrophysiological indices recorded in the soleus muscle of healthy individuals with hamstring tightness.

Background: Low-level lasers are used for various medical applications including wound healing and hair loss treatment. Cell Therapy using skin stem cells could be a novel approach to hair transplantation. However, there is no study on the effect of low-level laser on the hair follicle stem cells. So, in this study, we investigated the effect of low level laser irradiation on viability and ROS production in the hair follicle stem cells.
Methods: This study was performed in the cell culture laboratory of Medical Laser Research Center, Yara Institute in 2020 (June 2020 to February 2020). The hair follicle was isolated from the Safe Donor Area (SDA) using the 4mm punch method. In the laboratory, after separating the follicular units, the bulb region of each follicle was isolated via mechanical and enzymatic methods and cultured in FBS+F12-DMEM. Afterward, the stem cells were characterized via flow cytometry. The effect of low-level laser (685 nm) with different doses (1-20 J/cm²) was investigated on cell proliferation, viability and ROS production.

Background: Understanding hand structures is necessary to diagnose its diseases and injuries. Several methods have been used to teach the anatomy of this body part. In this article, we introduce a new educational tool and examine the impact of its use in learning anatomy.
Methods: Color images of different layers of hand structures were connected with a spring. On each page, the desired structure was cut and that part could be turned from another direction so that the tool was beyond a booklet and could create a three-dimensional image of the region. In this way, a multi-layered structure was made that looking at each part of it and going to the next part was equivalent to removing a layer from the palm of the hand and observing the layer beneath. After making the educational tool, 280 students who participated in the study were divided into two groups: control (A) and experimental (B). Both groups participated in a pre-test. After teaching the theory of hand anatomy for both groups, the control group received practical training using the traditional method and the experimental group using the proposed educational tool, and both groups participated in a post-test and the scores of the pre and post-test groups were compared. Data were analyzed using SPSS 24 statistical software using Mann-Whitney and Wilcoxon tests.

Background: Long-term and intensive physical exercise can change the function of different cells in the immune system in athletes, predisposing them to viral infections such as coronavirus disease (COVID-19). The purpose of this brief report was to provide protocols related to the immune system in athletes to prevent infectious diseases.

Background: The median nerve is one of the most important branches of the brachial plexus. Due to the role of the median nerve in sensory and motor innervation of the forearm and hand in the upper limbs, its blood supply is very important. Awareness of variations in the blood supply pattern to this nerve reduces the incidence of necrosis and ischemia of the nerve during surgical and diagnostic procedures.
Case Presentation: During routine dissection of the cadaver of a 65-year-old man fixed in formalin (10%), in the Department of Anatomy and Reproductive Biology, Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, a rare variation was observed in the median nerve nutritional artery at the distal end of the left forearm. After dissection of the skin, superficial and deep fascia, anterior compartment forearm muscles, nerves and blood vessels were exposed from surrounding tissues. The median nerve passed through the two heads of the pronator teres muscle and left the cubital fossa in the depth of the flexor digitorum superficialis and the surface of the flexor digitorum profundus in the forearm. It was observed that at the distal end of the left forearm between the flexor carpi radialis and the flexor digitorum superficialis, a relatively thick branch originates from the radial artery and supplies blood to the median nerve. This branch was separated from the radial artery (before the artery enters the anatomical snuffbox) and crossed the surface of the flexor carpi radialis muscle and inserted into the median nerve sheath. In the forearm, this branch was the only artery supplying blood to the median nerve.

Background: Breast cancer is the most common type of cancer in many countries, accounting for over 18% of all cancers in females. There are more than one million new cases of breast cancer each year. Most women diagnosed with breast cancer are over the age of 50, but younger women can also get breast cancer. About one in seven women are diagnosed with breast cancer during their lifetime. There's a good chance of recovery if it's detected at an early stage. In Iran, breast cancer is the most common cancer among women, making up 21.4% of all female cancers. The mortality rate of this cancer is 4.33 for every 100,000 people. The purpose of this research is to see how often different kinds of early breast cancer come back and how long people live after being diagnosed.
Methods: This retrospective study evaluated the medical records of 500 breast cancer patients at two hospitals in Mashhad, Iran during April 2006 to March 2016. We used SPSS software, version 16 (SPSS Inc., Chicago, IL, USA) to analyze data. A P value less than 0.05 means that the results are considered statistically significant.

Results: We included 230 women with breast cancer. The average overall survival was 130.7 months, with 83.2% of people surviving for five years and 78.8% surviving for 10 years. The stage of the disease is strongly linked to the recurrence (P=0.000). Additionally, the specific type of disease is also strongly related to disease recurrence (P=0.01) or metastasis (P=0.01). Patients who have the triple-negative subtype had the highest chance of the cancer spreading and recurrence compared to patients with other subtypes. Conclusion: The different types of breast cancer are strongly linked to the disease recurrence or metastasis. Patients with triple-negative subtypes had the most cases of cancer spreading to other parts of the body and coming back again, compared to other subtypes. Our findings also showed that patients with the triple-negative disease had the worst overall and disease-free survivals.

Background: Choosing a specialty in medicine is an important decision for the individual. It is also important decision for the health system. This study aimed to investigate the factors affecting the interest of specialized assistants to continue studying in subspecialized fields.
Methods: This descriptive cross-sectional study investigated the factors affecting the interest of 261 specialized assistants to continue their studies in subspecialized fields from March 2021 to March 2022. All the specialized assistants of Kerman University of Medical Sciences (KMU), whose assistantship continued until the end of March 2022, were included in the study by census method. The data collection tool was a 4-part questionnaire. 1) demographic information including 13 questions (age, gender, marital status, city where the family lives, place of residence to complete the residency course, specialized field, level of education, grade point average, parents' education, parents' occupation and having first-degree relatives with subspecialized degrees), 2) the willingness or unwillingness to continue studying in subspecialized fields and the field of interest, 3) the reasons for the assistants' interest in continuing their education, included 14 questions, and 4) the reasons for the assistants' lack of interest in continuing their education, included 14 questions.

Results: The average age of the assistants was 31.53±3.90 years old. Most of the assistants were women (57.9%). 57.5 percent of the assistants were interested in continuing their studies in subspecialized fields. The most important reason for residents' interest in continuing their studies was "increasing practical-clinical knowledge" (80.1%). The most interest in continuing education was observed in internal assistants (17.33%). The assistant's age, specialist field and having first-degree relatives with a subspecialist degree had a significant relationship with the interest of the assistants to continue studying in subspecialist fields. Conclusion: The results showed that a significant percentage of assistants were interested in continuing their studies in subspecialized fields. Age, the assistant's specialty and having first-degree relatives with a subspecialist degree had a significant effect on this interest.