Search

Background: Evidence suggests that healthy dietary patterns such as Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH), Mediterranean diet (MED), and Healthy Eating Index 2015 (HEI-2015) may reduce the risk of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) albeit with controversial results. Objectives: This study aimed to investigate possible associations between the NAFLD risk and adherence to the MED, DASH, and HEI-2015 diets. Methods: A case-control study was conducted involving 122 NAFLD patients and 122 non-NAFLD patients. A gastroenterologist confirmed the NAFLD diagnosis. A 147-item food frequency questionnaire (FFQ) was used to collect the dietary data, and the scores for MED, DASH diet, and HEI-2015 were obtained. Multivariable logistic regression was used to calculate the odds ratio (OR) and 95% confidence intervals (Cis). Results: The highest pentile of adherence to the DASH diet was significantly associated with the lowest risk of NAFLD (OR: 0.37, 95% CI: 0.14 - 0.92, P trend = 0.03). This association remained significant after adjustment for the confounding variable NAFLD (OR: 0.33, 95% CI: 0.11 - 0.96, P trend = 0.04). No significant difference was found between NAFLD risk and adherence to the MED and HEI-2015. Conclusions: This study demonstrated that the highest score of adherence to the DASH diet was associated with the lowest risk of NAFLD. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Despite the confirmed association between higher BMI with increased risk of the acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS), the association between obesity with mortality in critically ill patients with coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID‐19) is not clear. The present study aimed to investigate the association between obesity with treatment duration, ICU length of stay, and the risk of death in critically ill patients with COVID‐19. Methods: This case–control study was performed on 223 patients with COVID‐19 including 148 surviving patients as the control group and 75 eventually dead patients as the case group in Rasht, Iran. Data on demographic factors, comorbidities, anthropometric measurements, the length of hospitalization and the mortality were obtained from patients' medical records. Results: The mortality rate was significantly associated with weight (OR = 1.04, 95% CI: 1.002–1.083, p =.04), but not with BMI after adjustments for age, gender, length of stay in ICU, chronic diseases and smoking. The results did not change after further adjustments for biochemical and pathological factors. Conclusions: Weight was positively associated with mortality after controlling for confounding variables. Further studies should consider the patient's body composition such as fat mass to establish the relationship between obesity and COVID‐19 outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background and purpose: Neonates of pregnant women with epilepsy may compromise normal neurodevelopment and hippocampal morphology. Memory and learning disorders and a decrease in verbal IQ scores are seen in these children later in life. In the previous study, we suggested that the central muscarinic cholinergic receptors had an important role in learning and memory deficits induced by prenatal pentylenetetrazol-kindling in pups born to kindled mothers. This study aimed to investigate the effects of kindling during pregnancy on long-term potentiation (LTP) induction and the role of M1 muscarinic acetylcholine receptors in the hippocampus of male offspring. Experimental approach: Twenty female Wistar rats were divided into two groups on the 13th day of their gestation (kindled and control; n = 10). Animals in the first group were kindled by i.p. injections of 25 mg/kg body weight pentylenetetrazol every 15 min until seizures occurred and the control group received normal saline. The effect of maternal seizures and perfusion of specific M1 muscarinic receptors antagonist (telenzepine at doses of 0.01, 0.1, and 1 nmol) on the LTP induction of 80 pups were tested at 12 weeks of age by field potential recordings. Findings/Results: The results of the electrophysiological study revealed that recurrent seizures during pregnancy impaired field excitatory postsynaptic potentials (fEPSP)-LTP induction and normal development of M1 muscarinic receptors in the hippocampus of male offspring. Also, the results demonstrated that maternal seizure did not significantly affect the paired-pulse indexes and population spike-LTP in the hippocampus of male offspring. Conclusion and implications: Our study showed that recurrent seizures during pregnancy cause impaired fEPSP-LTP induction and abnormal development of the M1 muscarinic receptor in the hippocampus. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]