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Personal hygiene refers to set of individual practices and conditions that help maintain health and prevent the spread of diseases. Maintaining personal hygiene is important for social health, physical health and psychosocial health. The present study aimed to assess the knowledge and reported practices of school going children regarding personal hygiene with a view to develop an information booklet. The study adopted cross sectional design to collect data from 410 school going children in rural villages of Haldwani block, Uttarakhand. The children were recruited via convenient sampling technique. It was found that majority (n=230, 56.09%) school going children had moderate knowledge of personal hygiene. The overall practices of children were found to be appropriate for 366 (89.51%) children. Regarding knowledge and hygienic practices, mother' s education plays vital role for school going children. Also, teachers with parents can play a pivotal role in providing health education regarding personal hygiene from early stage of childhood itself for longevity and to protect from illnesses.

COVID-19 has become a great challenge across the globe, particularly in developing and densely populated countries, such as India. COVID-19 is extremely infectious and is transmitted via respiratory droplets from infected persons. DM, hypertension, and cardiovascular disease are highly prevalent comorbidities associated with COVID-19. It has been observed that COVID-19 is associated with high blood-glucose levels, mainly in people with type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). Several studies have shown DM to be a significant risk factor affecting the severity of various kinds of infection. Dysregulated immunoresponse found in diabetic patients plays an important role in exacerbating severity. DM is among the comorbidities linked with mortality and morbidity in COVID-19 patients. Chronic conditions like obesity, cardiovascular disorders, and hypertension, together with changed expression of ACE2, dysregulated immunoresponse, and endothelial dysfunction, may put diabetic patients at risk of greater COVID-19 severity. Therefore, it is important to study specific characteristics of COVID-19 in diabetic people and treat these comorbidities along with COVID-19 infection, mainly among old individuals who are already suffering from serious and critical infections. This review will be helpful in understanding the mechanisms involved in COVID-19 and DM, the role of ACE2 in COVID-19 pathogenesis, management of DM, and associated complications in COVID-19 patients.

Diabetes is a chronic illness. Hyperglycemia is the characteristic of this disorder. Diabetes is a global crisis which affects the economy and health of all nations. Over the last decades, the number of individuals living with diabetes has significantly increased worldwide. Asia is a key epicenter of the emerging diabetes epidemic, with China and India the two nations having the highest number of diabetic people. Economic development, modernization, unhealthy diet, population aging, and sedentary lifestyles are the major factors responsible for the increasing diabetes epidemic. Diabetes is associated with several complications, and cardiovascular disease is the most important cause of morbidity and mortality among people with diabetes. These life-threatening problems can be prevented or delayed by proper management of diabetes. Lifestyle modification is an important factor to decrease the diabetes risk. The frequency of diabetic complications will rise if there is a lack of cost-effective and sustainable interventions. Hence, prevention of diabetes and its complications such as diabetic retinopathy and cardiovascular disease should be a crucial part of all future health-related public policies among all nations. This review summarizes current epidemiological aspects of diabetes in the world along with its complications, preventive measures, and treatment.

With over a million deaths every year around the world, lung cancer is found to be the most recurrent cancer among all types. Nonsmall cell lung carcinoma (NSCLC) amounts to about 85% of the entire cases. The other 15% owes it to small cell lung carcinoma (SCLC). Despite decades of research, the prognosis for NSCLC patients is poorly understood with treatment options limited. First, this article emphasises on the part that tumour microenvironment (TME) and its constituents play in lung cancer progression. This review also highlights the inflammatory (pro- or anti-) roles of different cytokines (ILs, TGF-β, and TNF-α) and chemokine (CC, CXC, C, and CX3C) families in the lung TME, provoking tumour growth and subsequent metastasis. The write-up also pinpoints recent developments in the field of chemokine biology. Additionally, it covers the role of extracellular vesicles (EVs), as alternate carriers of cytokines and chemokines. This allows the cytokines/chemokines to modulate the EVs for their secretion, trafficking, and aid in cancer proliferation. In the end, this review also stresses on the role of these factors as prognostic biomarkers for lung immunotherapy, apart from focusing on inflammatory actions of these chemoattractants.

Over the past two decades, with advancement of medical research and technology, treatments of many diseases including chronic disorders like rheumatoid arthritis (RA) have been revolutionized. Treatment and management of RA has been refined by advances in understanding its pathologic mechanisms, the development of drugs which target them and its association with various other chronic comorbidities like diabetes. Diabetes prevalence is closely associated with RA since elevated insulin resistance have been observed with RA. It is also associated with inflammation caused due to pro-inflammatory cytokines like tumour necrosis factor α and interleukin 6. Inflammation encourages insulin resistance and also stimulates other factors like a high level of rheumatoid factor in the blood leading to positivity of rheumatoid factor in RA patients. The degree of RA inflammation also tends to influence the criticality of insulin resistance, which increases with high activity of RA and vice versa. Markers of glucose metabolism appear to be improved by DMARDs like methotrexate, hydroxychloroquine, interleukin 1 antagonists and TNF antagonist while glucocorticoids adversely affect glycemic control especially when administered chronically. The intent of the present review paper is to understand the association between RA, insulin resistance and diabetes; the degree to which both can influence the other along with the plausible impact of RA medications on diabetes and insulin resistance.

MicroRNA is a type of non-coding, small RNA which regulates great range of cellular processes. miRNA also considered as master regulator of gene expression. Dysregulation of microRNA expressions has linked with abnormal expression of gene and can cause pathological conditions. Studies suggested that miRNA plays key functions in biological pathways and may considered as biomarkers for treatment, prognosis, diagnosis, and monitoring of several diseases. Downregulation or upregulation of expression of various miRNAs also play significant role in pathogenesis of lung disorders like chronic obstructive pulmonary disorder, asthma, lung cancer. Information about altered miRNAs expression profiles in unhealthy lungs may bring novel insights in lung disorders biology. We aimed to review the biogenesis of miRNAs and their roles in pulmonary disorders like chronic obstructive pulmonary disorder, asthma, and lung cancer.

Type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) is a polygenic metabolic disease described by hyperglycemia, which is caused by insulin resistance or reduced insulin secretion. Interaction between various genetic variants and environmental factors triggers T2DM. The main aim of this study was to find the risk associated with genetic variant (rs5210) of KCNJ11gene in the development of T2D in Indian Population. A total number of 300 cases of T2D and 100 control samples were studied to find the polymorphism in KCNJ11 through PCR-RFLP. The genotype and allele frequencies in T2DM cases were significantly different from the control population. We found a significant association of KCNJ11 (rs5210) gene polymorphism with T2DM in North Indian patients indicating the role of this variant in developing risk for T2DM.

The present study was conducted to determine the prognostic significance of I655V SNP (rs1136201) is a genetic one in HER-2 oncoprotein in cases of colorectal cancer (CRC). We conducted a case–control study analysing 83 subjects (naive primary CRC cases) who underwent CRC biopsy/colectomy and included 57 healthy control subjects. Analysis of HER-2 polymorphism was done by PCR-RFLP technique. The mean age was found to be 55.9 years; median age was 56 years and mode age was 54 years with a range of 43 (30–73). Males constitute 63 (75.9%) and females constitute 20 (24.1%) of patient population. According to gradewise distribution, 12 (14.45%) patients were of Grade I, 53 (63.85%) of Grade II, and 18 (21.68%) were of Grade III. We found out that out of 83 patients, 52 (62.65%) were of homozygous wild type (A/A; Ile/Ile); 27 (32.53%) were of heterozygous type (A/G; Ile/Val) and 4 (4.81%) were of homozygous mutant type (G/G; Val/Val). Allelic frequency of Ile (A) was found out to be 0.79 and that of Val (G) is 0.21 and were not significantly different from the healthy control population. Fischer’s exact p value obtained was 0.86.

The present study was conducted to determine the prognostic significance of I655V SNP (rs1136201) is a genetic one in HER-2 oncoprotein in cases of colorectal cancer (CRC). We conducted a case–control study analysing 83 subjects (naïve primary CRC cases) who underwent CRC biopsy/colectomy and included 57 healthy control subjects. Analysis of HER-2 polymorphism was done by PCR-RFLP technique. The mean age was found to be 55.9 years; median age was 56 years and mode age was 54 years with a range of 43 (30–73). Males constitute 63 (75.9%) and females constitute 20 (24.1%) of patient population. According to gradewise distribution, 12 (14.45%) patients were of Grade I, 53 (63.85%) of Grade II, and 18 (21.68%) were of Grade III. We found out that out of 83 patients, 52 (62.65%) were of homozygous wild type (A/A; Ile/Ile); 27 (32.53%) were of heterozygous type (A/G; Ile/Val) and 4 (4.81%) were of homozygous mutant type (G/G; Val/Val). Allelic frequency of Ile (A) was found out to be 0.79 and that of Val (G) is 0.21 and were not significantly different from the healthy control population. Fischer’s exact p value obtained was 0.86.

BACKGROUND: Human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER-2) is an oncogenic gene and a well-established therapeutic target in several cancers including breast and ovary. AIM: The present study aimed to compare HER-2 expression status with histological grades as well as Clinicopathological parameters including age, bleeding per rectum, pain/burning sensation in defecation and exercise. METHODS: Her-2 status was assessed by immunohistochemistry (IHC). RESULTS: Results of the study shows that 40.96% patients were Her-2 positive for expression and a statistically significant difference (p-value = 0.004) was observed in histological grades where most of the cases were of grade II. We also observed a significant difference in histological grades with gender (p-value = 0.04), as well as in both the age groups ≤ 55 years and > 55 years (p-value = < 0.0001). Patients with the bleeding rectum and pain/burning sensation in defecation had grade II/III tumours (93.4%, 88.7%) respectively. A significant association was observed between bleeding per rectum and pain/burning sensation in defecation. About 95% of patients with pain/burning sensation in defecation had bleeding per rectum. CONCLUSION: To conclude, Her-2 can be a potential prognostic marker in CRC. The role of age, tumour grade and bleeding per rectum/burning sensation in defecation are of significant worth. Thus, CRC cases of high grades can be screened for HER-2/neu positivity so that they can be subjected to mAb-based individualised therapy.