Optilume® drug-coated balloon dilation for the treatment of refractory post-TURP bladder neck contracture.

This case report presents the first use of Optilume® drug-coated balloon (DCB) technology for the management of post-transurethral resection of the prostate bladder neck contracture (BNC), a condition often resistant to traditional treatments. A 62-year-old male with recurrent BNC, unresponsive to multiple operative interventions, underwent treatment with the Optilume® DCB, resulting in significant symptom resolution without further invasive procedures. This novel application of DCB technology, delivering paclitaxel directly to the affected tissue, offers a promising alternative by targeting the underlying pathophysiology of BNC.

Application of machine learning algorithms to predict the thyroid disease risk: an experimental comparative study.

Thyroid disease is the general concept for a medical problem that prevents one's thyroid from producing enough hormones. Thyroid disease can affect everyone-men, women, children, adolescents, and the elderly. Thyroid disorders are detected by blood tests, which are notoriously difficult to interpret due to the enormous amount of data necessary to forecast results. For this reason, this study compares eleven machine learning algorithms to determine which one produces the best accuracy for predicting thyroid risk accurately. This study utilizes the Sick-euthyroid dataset, acquired from the University of California, Irvine's machine learning repository, for this purpose. Since the target variable classes in this dataset are mostly one, the accuracy score does not accurately indicate the prediction outcome. Thus, the evaluation metric contains accuracy and recall ratings. Additionally, the F1-score produces a single value that balances the precision and recall when an uneven distribution class exists. Finally, the F1-score is utilized to evaluate the performance of the employed machine learning algorithms as it is one of the most effective output measurements for unbalanced classification problems. The experiment shows that the ANN Classifier with an F1-score of 0.957 outperforms the other nine algorithms in terms of accuracy.

Early age at menarche and its associated factors in school girls (age, 10 to 12 years) in Bangladesh: a cross-section survey in Rajshahi District, Bangladesh.

BACKGROUND: Early onset of menarche is one of the most important factors for breast cancer and other associated health hazards. The aim of this study was to investigate the early age at menarche and its associated factors in school girls (age, 10-12 years) in Rajshahi District, Bangladesh. METHODS: Data was collected from Rajshahi District, Bangladesh, using multistage random sampling. Independent sample t test and binary logistic regression model were used in this study. A total number of 386 school girls aged 10-12 years were considered as a sample for this study. RESULTS: This study revealed that more than 48% girls already attained menarche within the age of 12 years, among them 25.6%, 41.0%, and 58.3% girls experienced menarche at the age of 10, 11, and 12 years, respectively. It was observed that the menarcheal girls were significantly taller (p < 0.01) and heavier (p < 0.01) than non-menarcheal girls. The menarcheal girls' mothers were heavier (p < 0.01), shorter (p < 0.01), had more BMI (p < 0.01), reached menarche (p < 0.05) earlier than non-menarcheal girls' mothers. Menarcheal girls had less number of siblings (p < 0.01) and lower order of birth (p < 0.05) than non-menarcheal girls. After controlling the effect of other factors, multiple logistic regression model demonstrated that obese girls were more likely to attain menarche than under- [AOR = 0.279, CI 95% 0.075-0.986; p < 0.05] and normal [AOR = 0.248, CI 95% 0.082-0.755; p < 0.05] weight girls. Urban school girls had more chance to get menarche than rural school girls at same age (AOR = 0.012, 95% CI 0.003-0.047; p < 0.01). CONCLUSIONS: Therefore, modern lifestyle changes may have the important factors for early age at menarche of the studied girls in Bangladesh.

A study with Bangladeshi women: Seeking care for breast health.

In many low- and middle-income countries, breast cancer survival is low. Reasons for this are multifactorial, but delayed presentation for care is a common theme. In this survey study with 100 urban Bangladeshi women, we examined the role of socioeconomic and sociocultural factors on their likelihood to seek breast care from a family physician. In our multivariate model, a woman's age and education significantly predicted her likelihood to see a physician. Sociocultural aspects (e.g., concerns about time commitment of family members, personal household obligations) were significant at bivariate level. Findings are discussed in relation to practice, policy, and research.

Age at menarche of university students in Bangladesh: secular trends and association with adult anthropometric measures and socio-demographic factors.

Age at menarche has been shown to be an important indicator for diseases such as breast cancer and ischaemic heart disease. The aim of the present study was to document secular trends in age at menarche and their association with anthropometric measures and socio-demographic factors in university students in Bangladesh. Data were collected from 995 students from Rajshahi University using a stratified sampling technique between July 2004 and May 2005. Trends in age at menarche were examined by linear regression analysis. Multiple regression analysis was used to assess the association of age at menarche with adult anthropometric measures and various socio-demographic factors. The mean and median age of menarche were 13.12+/-1.16 and 13.17 years, respectively, with an increasing tendency among birth-year cohorts from 1979 to 1986. Menarcheal age was negatively associated with BMI (p<0.01), but positively associated with height (p<0.05). Early menarche was especially pronounced among students from urban environments, Muslims and those with better educated mothers. Increasing age at menarche may be explained by improved nutritional status among Bangladeshi populations. Early menarche was associated with residence location at adolescence, religion and mother's education.