Health-related quality of life of Egyptian children with immune thrombocytopenia and their parents.

Health-related quality of life has been recognized as an important pediatric outcome measurement. Kid's ITP Tool was used to measure health-related quality of life of 80 Egyptian children with immune thrombocytopenia and their parents in relation to different disease parameters. A positive correlation between scores of child/proxy reports and parent report was found. Patients with newly diagnosed immune thrombocytopenia had significantly lower scores of both child/proxy reports and parent reports than chronic patients. Longer duration of illness was correlated with higher scores of child/proxy reports. Negative correlations were found between severity of bleeding and both scores of child/proxy reports and parent reports. Platelet count was positively correlated with parent report score. Regression analysis revealed that severity of bleeding had the highest significant impact on parent report score. Improving parents' knowledge about the pathogenesis and course of the disease may improve their quality of life.

Atomoxetine in Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder in Children With and Without Comorbid Mood Disorders.

Objectives: Mood disorders are commonly associated with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), adding to the clinical complexity. Some symptoms associated with ADHD are often associated with an increase in emotional disorders and depression. Hence, the management of comorbid mood symptoms in the context of ADHD represents a particularly difficult clinical challenge. Few studies in literature, and probably none in the Arab world, have investigated the impact of individual common comorbid disorders on the efficacy of atomoxetine (a nonstimulant norepinephrine reuptake inhibitor) as a monotherapy for the treatment of these comorbid mood symptoms. Therefore, our aim was to investigate the effect of atomoxetine in a sample of drug-naive Egyptian children with ADHD, with and without comorbid mood disorders. Methods: A prospective, naturalistic, open-label study. Results: Atomoxetine is an effective treatment for the symptoms of ADHD in the presence of comorbid mood disorder, but with a slower rate of improvement than if applied in the absence of mood disorder; in addition, our study showed improvement regarding the depressive symptoms in the mood group after 1 month. Conclusions: The study highlighted that atomoxetine is an effective treatment for ADHD in the presence of comorbid mood disorder, and improves depressive symptoms in the mood group. It also predicts mild resistance to the effects of atomoxetine on ADHD with slower improvement than those with ADHD only.

Impact of personality temperaments and characters on academic performance and specialty selection among a group of Egyptian medical graduates.

BACKGROUND: The relationship between personality temperaments, academic achievement and specialty interest is important because of its implications in career counseling. AIM: To assess the effect of personality on academic performance and career selection and to study the impact of some sociodemographic factors on academic achievement and career choice of medical graduates. METHODOLOGY: A total of 436 medical graduates of Ain Shams medical school were approached, out of which 331 participated. They were given a sociodemographic questionnaire, and the Temperament and Character Inventory-Revised (TCI-R; 240) for personality construct; they had to answer questions about academic achievement, ranking, scores and choice of medical specialty. RESULTS: Novelty seeking (NS1, NS2 and NS3) and self-transcendence (ST1 and ST2) were correlated with graduation ranking, (r = .2, p = .00; r = .15, p = .009; r = .16, p = .005; r = .12, p = .003; r = .14, p = .02; r = .17, p = .004; r = .13, p = .03, respectively), that is, lower NS and ST had better academic outcome. Only high school score was associated with better achievement (p = .00). In specialty selection, females were significantly overrepresented in pediatrics and clinical pathology, whereas males were significantly predominating surgical specialties except for obstetrics and gynecology (p = .00). Students choosing patient-centered specialties had higher reward dependence (RD), persistence (PS) and cooperativeness (C); those choosing clinical pathology had highest harm avoidance (HA), whereas those choosing radiology had lowest HA and those choosing surgery had significantly higher self-directedness (SD3). CONCLUSION: Personality impacts academic achievement and specialty choice with other factors as gender and previous scholastic performance.