Presentation of Novel Architecture for Diagnosis and Identifying Breast Cancer Location Based on Ultrasound Images Using Machine Learning.

Breast cancer is one of the main causes of death among women worldwide. Early detection of this disease helps reduce the number of premature deaths. This research aims to design a method for identifying and diagnosing breast tumors based on ultrasound images. For this purpose, six techniques have been performed to detect and segment ultrasound images. Features of images are extracted using the fractal method. Moreover, k-nearest neighbor, support vector machine, decision tree, and Naïve Bayes classification techniques are used to classify images. Then, the convolutional neural network (CNN) architecture is designed to classify breast cancer based on ultrasound images directly. The presented model obtains the accuracy of the training set to 99.8%. Regarding the test results, this diagnosis validation is associated with 88.5% sensitivity. Based on the findings of this study, it can be concluded that the proposed high-potential CNN algorithm can be used to diagnose breast cancer from ultrasound images. The second presented CNN model can identify the original location of the tumor. The results show 92% of the images in the high-performance region with an AUC above 0.6. The proposed model can identify the tumor's location and volume by morphological operations as a post-processing algorithm. These findings can also be used to monitor patients and prevent the growth of the infected area.

Reliability and Validity of Kurdish Language Version of Health Promoting Lifestyle Profile II among Kurdish Healthcare Providers Kurdish Version of HPLP-II.

BACKGROUND: Unhealthy lifestyles pose significant threat to public health. This study aimed to assess the validity and reliability of a Kurdish version of the HPLP-II instrument among Kurdish healthcare providers, whose society and culture differ from that of North America and Spain, where the instrument was developed. METHODS: The instrument was translated into Kurdish, back translated, and pilot tested to ascertain cultural sensitivity. It was then evaluated using a convenience sample of 460 healthcare providers in the Kurdistan region, northern Iraq using a principal components factor analysis. RESULTS: The order of factors was entirely identical to those isolated previously during the psychometric assessment of the English language version. The majority of our study participants were male (55%). In addition, 39.2% of participants were nurses. In addition, 42% of participants had less than five years of working experience. Furthermore, 82.1% of our study population held a high school diploma. The mean (SE) of Physical Activities dimension was low (15.3 ± 4.8) compared to Spiritual Growth dimension (24.5 ± 4.4). Moreover, the Cronbach's alpha coefficient for the overall HPLP-II questionnaire was 0.870; however, the nutrition dimension was low (0.622) compared to Physical Activities dimension (0.792). Furthermore, the correlation between items ranged from 0.099 to 0.611. CONCLUSIONS: The Kurdish version of the HPLP-II demonstrated initial reliability and validity. It is a precious tool to evaluate and assess lifestyle and lifestyle interventions built to improve the health of Kurds.

Assessing the Knowledge, Attitudes, and Practices of Students Regarding Ebola Virus Disease Outbreak.

BACKGROUND: The emergence and spread of Ebola outbreak is a growing problem worldwide, which represents a significant threat to public health. Evidence has shown that the level of knowledge, attitude, and practice of people in the society play major roles in controlling the spread of Ebola virus disease. This study was designed to determine knowledge, attitude and practice of students at School of Public Health, Tehran University of Medical Sciences towards Ebola. METHODS: A cross-sectional survey was performed in Tehran, Iran in 2014 using a pretested self-administered questionnaire on a stratified sample of 400 students. Descriptive and multivariate analyses were used for statistical analysis. RESULTS: All-in-all, 385 students returned the completed questionnaires making a response rate of 96.3%., 239 (62.2%) were females and 145 (37.8%) were males. The mean age of female and males were 28.44 and 30.3 years respectively. Of the 385 students, 83 (21.7%) were studying at PhD level, 210 (55.0%) at Masters Level (including MPH) and 89 (23.3%) at Bachelors level. knowledge of the students regarding EVD transmission was lowest among students of Department of Occupational Health (50.0%), followed by Health Education and Promotion Department (33.3%). Virology Department recorded the highest percentage of students who had selected correct answers regarding EVD prevention (100.0%). CONCLUSION: These findings will aid in the assessment of the adequacy of current students' educational curriculum. Also, it will provide further insight in designing future multifaceted interventions to promote specific messages to change attitude and improve practice.