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India Meteorological Department (IMD) has been using a Limited Area Model (LAM) on operational basis for the forecast up to 48 hours with the first guess fields for objective analysis and lateral boundary conditions from the global spectral model (T-80) run of the National Center for Medium Range Weather Forecasting (NCMRWF), New Delhi. In this paper the model code has been modified and made more flexible, delinking it from the NCMRWF (T-80). This has allowed the use of initial and boundary conditions directly from the NCEP Global Forecast System (GFS) products available at the resolution of 1° × 1° lat./long. The main interest in this study is to improve the analysis and forecast in the short range time scale (up to 72 hours) by improving the model (LAM) resolution and using better Initial and boundary conditions from the NCEP GFS instead of the NCMRWF T-80 model. Simulation experiments are performed on wide variety of synoptic situations which occur very often over the Indian sub-continent. The performance evaluation in terms of qualitative comparison between the model simulated outputs against actual observations and the outputs of the operational model indicates that the modified version of the model is capable to provide a improved numerical guidance on the occurrence of heavy rainfall in the 48-72 hours forecast scale. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drug therapy in diabetes care along the duration of diabetes has been documented scarcely in literature, especially from Indian subcontinent. An audit of an endocrine practice from New Delhi was conducted to understand the current diabetes practice and its direct cost to the patient. Aims: The aim of this study was to analyze the current trend in the use of antidiabetes as well as other drugs for comorbidities along the duration of diabetes. The study also aimed to analyze the direct drug cost to patients. Settings and Design: Retrospective cross-sectional study. Subjects and Methods: Data captured in clinic electronic medical records of an endocrine practice was analyzed. Statistical Analysis Used: Data was analyzed descriptively using machine learning codes on python platform. Results: Records of 489 people who attended the clinic during the 6-month period were retrieved. Data of 403 people with diabetes were analyzed after exclusion of incomplete data. Use of antidiabetic drug increased from 1.44 (0.78) [mean (standard deviation)] in people with a duration of diabetes <5 years to 3.18 (1.05) in people with 20+ years of diabetes. The mean number of antidiabetic drug usage seems to plateau at 15 years of diabetes. About 46% of people with 20+ years of diabetes required insulin therapy. Prescription patterns involving a combination of different drug classes in patients were also analyzed. The cost of diabetes therapy increases linearly along the duration of diabetes. Conclusion: This study provides valuable insights on temporal prescription patterns of antidiabetic drugs from an endocrine practice. Metformin remains the most preferred drug across the entire duration of diabetes. Dipeptidyl peptidase-4 inhibitors seem to be fast catching up with sulfonylureas as a second-line treatment after metformin. After 20 years or more of diabetes duration, 46% people would require insulin for glycemic control. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]