Qatar Foundation Annual Research Forum Volume 2012 Issue 1

Background and Objectives: The Arabian Gulf region is rapidly developing, with major changes in lifestyle that can increase the risk of cardiovascular diseases, including stroke. Stroke constitutes a major cause of morbidity and mortality in Qatar. This research focuses mainly on ischaemic stroke, aiming to study carotid plaque morphology at biochemical, cellular and molecular levels. The objectives are to identify Read More

It is desirable to have a monitoring system that can keep a constant surveillance on the conditions of the heart and its related patterns. This is particularly important in many patients with critical cardiac abnormalities. This can be very convenient in clinical settings but may not be possible for individuals who are not in hospital and are in their day-to-day activities. Wearable ECG-based systems have been proposed for such s Read More

Background: Non-insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus (NIDDM) is one of the most common adult diseases caused by a secretory decrease in insulin from pancreatic Langerhans cells and/or peripheral cells which become resistant to the action of insulin as in the case of obesity. Serious side effects such as retinopathy, neuropathy, and cataracts are also brought about by its long-term manifestation. At present, the direct clini Read More

Background and Objectives: Preterm births are a major cause of neonatal mortality and morbidity. The number of preterm births is increasing due to assisted reproductive technology. The intensive care of preterm babies and follow-up care of their post-discharge morbidities takes up a major share of healthcare expenditure. PEARL study analyzed trends in mortality and pre-discharge morbidity outcomes of ≤32 week gestatio Read More

Reactive oxygen species (ROS), e.g. superoxide, hydrogen peroxide, peroxynitrite, are important mediators for many cell signaling processes. In the central nervous system, cardiovascular function is tightly regulated by cell signaling in specific nuclei (the subfornical organ (SFO), paraventricular nucleus (PVN), and rostral venterolateral medulla (RVLM)) and an imbalance of ROS in these nuclei contributes to the de Read More

Background and Objectives: Around one million deaths result from malaria each year worldwide. The infection starts by the inoculation of sporozoites by female Anopheles mosquito into the host. The mechanism of invasion of sporozoites into the host is not clear to date. CD81 is considered the only host receptor to be significant for the invasion of sporozoites. The aim of the first phase of this project is to identify Read More

Aims: Although laparoscopy is rapidly becoming the procedure of choice in adults, there are obstacles to its use in children. We analyzed our institution's experiences with laparoscopic procedures performed in children over the last 5 years, with particular emphasis on emergency procedures. Methods: We retrospectively evaluated the records of patients less than 14 years of age who had undergone laparoscopy fo Read More

A consanguineous Qatari family affected by a novel autosomal recessive disorder characterized by severe mental retardation, retinal degeneration, optic nerve atrophy, ataxic gait and edematous puffiness of hands was studied by genome-wide SNP genotyping with Illumina 200K SNP-chips, candidate gene mutation screening and whole exome sequencing for one affected member. Homozygosity mapping indicated a 19.6 M Read More

Background: Recent trends suggest that the sharpest increases in the prevalence of obesity are in countries of the Middle East, especially in Qatar. Early and rapid onset of the disease in this population, along with a primarily abdominal omental deposition of adipose tissue, is closely associated with insulin resistance, whilst longer duration of obesity in Caucasians is associated with maintenance of insulin sensitivity, independently Read More

Background & Objectives: Expanding adipose tissue in obesity requires effective vasoreactivity to combat hypoxia and its consequences, such as insulin resistance and type 2 diabetes. While recent evidence suggests that the adipose tissue is highly angiogenic, the tissue arteriolar vasoreactivity has been less investigated. Furthermore, the omental adipose tissue (OAT) synthesizes greater levels of vasocontrictive m Read More

Background and Objectives: Clinical research has led to some of the most important advances in improving human health including the discovery of important risk factors for heart disease, diabetes and cancer as well as treatments for common diseases which have led to unprecedented increases in life expectancy. Unfortunately despite having nearly 600 million people, the Eastern Mediterranean region (EMR) is one of th Read More

Background & Objectives Despite its long track record, segmentation in medical image computing still remains an active field of research, largely due to the complexities of in-vivo anatomical structures. We present a novel segmentation algorithm based on chaotic theory; the preliminary results show the potential of the technique. Methods: Henri Poincare first developed (later revisited by Lorentz) this chaotic model by ob Read More

Background and Objectives: Over one billion Muslims religiously fast worldwide during the month of Ramadan. Fasting during Ramadan is essentially a radical change in lifestyle for the period of one lunar month, so it is important to see whether this change predisposes patients to developing atrial fibrillation (AF). Our objective in this study is to investigate whether Ramadan fasting has any effect on the number of h Read More

The urinary tract infections (UTIs) are among the most common bacterial infections in diabetic patients, especially asymptomatic bacteriuria. The aim of this study is to investigate the causative organisms of ABU in type 2 diabetic patients, the phylogenetic grouping and the antibiotic sensitivity pattern of the causative organism in order to determine the drug of choice to cure ASB in diabetics. One hundred & sixty eight men wer Read More

Background: Na+/H+-exchanger isoform 1 (NHE1) is a ubiquitously expressed housekeeping glycoprotein that functions to regulate intracellular pH. Current reports have suggested that NHE1 is crucial to cell survival in the context of chronic kidney disease. The cellular mechanism by which NHE1 stimulates cell survival requires further investigation. Osteopontin (OPN), is a macrophage chemotactic protein that has been linked to ti Read More

We have designed the first nationwide primary percutaneous coronary intervention (PPCI) program for ST elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) in Qatar. Guidelines emphasize the door to balloon time (DBT) which should not exceed 90 minutes. This interval reflects the efficiency of the hospital system in the rapid recognition and transfer of the STEMI patient to the catheterization laboratory for PPCI. Although DBT is cle Read More

The use of mechanical assist devices for the treatment of advanced heart failure has increased dramatically in recent years. Significant recovery of myocardial function following insertion of left ventricular assisted device (LVAD) occurs in a small percentage of patients due to unloading alone. Several strategies for enhancing the degree of recovery using combination therapy have been introduced. Most of these strategies dep Read More

Background: The flow profile in the aortic root constitutes a major determinant of coronary and systemic blood flow, depending on the size, shape and dynamism of the aortic root. The aims of this study are to evaluate patterns of flow in the aortic root in health, disease and following different root replacement procedures. Methods: A total of 54 subjects underwent phase-contrast cardiovascular magnetic resonance (PC-CMR). Read More

Introduction: The global burden of rheumatic heart disease continues to be extremely high, with the main brunt being borne by developing countries. However, the prevalence and disease characteristics vary widely in different populations. Egypt hosts 80 million individuals and is known to be endemic for rheumatic heart disease. Methods: Cross sectional screening of a cohort of randomly selected 3062 school children b Read More

Hypertrophic cardiomyopathy is the most common inherited heart diseases associated with a large number of mutations in several sarcomere proteins that regulate striated muscle contraction. The 3-dimensional structural and biophysical consequences of these mutations and their impact on the genotype-phenotype relationship remains poorly understood. Mutations in cardiac TroponinT (cTnT) have been reported to purpo Read More

Recent studies have demonstrated that CAS is an active, regulated disease process akin to atherosclerosis, in which resident cells undergo remodeling and transformation. Normal valves harbor a low percentage of smooth muscle cells (SMCs) however their role in CAS is not defined. We analyzed 12 normal and 22 calcified valves for early and late differentiated SMC markers by immunocytochemistry. Expression of myoca Read More

Topology and organization of cell environment is an important regulator of differentiation and function. In view of heart valve tissue engineering, we devised a biomimetic scaffold that supports proper cell growth and cell-matrix interactions by reproducing the specific anisotropic fibrillar structure of valves extracellular matrix (ECM). We hypotheseized that high porosity levels of novel nanofibrillar matrices allow extensive cell coloni Read More

Background A hot environment is associated with an increase in core temperature and dehydration. However, there are minimal data investigating the time course of changes in oxidative stress and DNA in response to cycling in a hot environment. Additionally, it is not known whether there is a critical point in core temperature for the production of oxidative stress or DNA modification. Subsequently, this research investigated th Read More

Background and Objectives: Recent next generation sequencing studies of different cancers reveal a varied spectrum of mutations with patients having dozens to hundreds of mutations with little overlap in mutations between different patients. A difficult problem is to understand which of the observed mutations contribute to tumorigenesis. While several approaches have been used to determine significantly mutated genes, th Read More

Background Analyzing the Electroencephalogram (EEG) is a standard approach for detecting newborn seizure. The manual detection of newborn seizure by visual scanning of EEG recordings is time consuming especially with long recordings. It also requires skilled interpreters, i.e. a neurophysiologist, resulting in possible subjective judgment and error. Hence, the EEG signal parameters extracted and analyzed using c Read More

In non-inferiority studies, a limit of indifference is used to express a tolerance in results such that the clinician would regard such results as being acceptable, or 'not worse'. We applied this concept to a measure of accuracy, the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve, for a sequence of tests. We expressed a limit of indifference for the range of acceptable sensitivity values and examined the associated cost of testing wit Read More

Background and Objectives: Oxidative stress plays a major role in the pathogenesis of various diseases including renal injury. Curcumin has been shown to exert antioxidant activity in various experimental models. Thus, the objectives of this study are to standardize and establish an in vitro model of hydrogen peroxide (H₂O₂)-induced renal cell injury using human embryonic kidney cells (HEK293), and to evaluate the cytoprot Read More

Background and Objectives: Perinatal mortality, a combination of stillbirths and early neonatal mortality (day 0-6 of life), is a very strong indicator to assess healthcare during the perinatal period. Our study aims to prospectively determine Qatar's perinatal mortality rate (PMR) during 2011, analyze trends from 1990 to 2011 and compare the findings with recent data from selected high income countries. Methods: A PEARL st Read More

Background and Objectives: The millennium development goals (MDG 5) mandate a three quarters reduction in maternal mortality ratio (MMR) by 2015. Hence, universal access to reproductive health and improvement in maternal survival remains the prime focus of all global health strategies and plans of action. Our study aims to analyze Qatar's performance in achieving MDG 5 by 2011. Methodology: A PEARL study (perinatal Read More

Background: The harmful effects of smoking during pregnancy on the health of the mother, fetus and newborn have been well documented in the literature. These include, low birth weight, prematurity and still birth. The negative effect of smoking on health is not restricted to active smokers as studies have shown that exposure to secondhand smoke (SHS) during pregnancy also poses risks on the mother and the fetus. To our kn Read More

Background and Objectives: Both diabetes and cancer are prevalent diseases with increasing incidence worldwide and especially in countries that are undergoing rapid industrialization (i.e. Gulf countries). Epidemiological studies provide strong evidence that subjects with diabetes are at a significantly higher risk of developing many forms of cancer and in particular solid tumors including colorectal cancer. While diabetes an Read More

Background: People with diabetes-related peripheral neuropathy (DPN) frequently suffer from concomitant postural instability that can lead to falls, fractures, depression, anxiety, and decreased quality of life. Exercise has been demonstrated to be effective in improving balance. However, high demands of conventional balance programs might overtax DPN patients' ability to perform exercises correctly. This might in turn reduce Read More

Background and Objectives: The incidence of type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) is increasing worldwide, and certain sub-populations appear especially vulnerable to developing the disease. In Qatar, the prevalence of T2DM in the adult population is approximately twice that in the USA. Qatar is ranked sixth in the world for diabetes prevalence. Risk of disease in the country is increasing with an apparent doubling of incid Read More

Consanguinity and endogamy is common in the Middle East resulting in higher frequency of autosomal recessive genetic disorders, in particular private or rare genetic conditions. Most of these diseases are due to homoallelic state of pathogenic variants, a direct consequence of founder effect and increased co-efficient of inbreeding. Advanced molecular genetic technologies such as next-generation sequencing (NGS) are Read More

Success in life can be directly related to the ability to communicate. Full interpersonal communication substantially enhances an individual's potential for education, employment, and independence. Therefore, it is imperative that the goal of augmentative and alternative communication (ACC) use be the most effective interactive communication possible. For more than three decades now, the field known as augmentativ Read More

Background and Objectives: The epidemiology of child injuries among infants and toddlers (IAT) in Qatar has not been fully described. This study will analyze the injury epidemiology of fatal and non-fatal injuries in IAT and provide recommendations for targeted injury prevention programs for IAT in Qatar. Method: Data from the Qatar statistics authority (QSA), Hamad Medical Corporation (HMC) Trauma Registry and the mortuary f Read More

Background and Objectives: Metabolic labeling with stable isotopes remains a prominent technique for comparative quantitative proteomics and stable isotope labeling with amino acids in cell culture (SILAC) is the most prominent approach used. However, despite its power the approach traditionally is limited if applied to complex tissue culture regiments as those required for human embryonic stem cells (hESC). Classic h Read More

Background and Objectives: Foodborne illness is a major hindrance to health advancement around the world and has been identified as a high priority in the Qatar National Food Security Program (QNFSP) master plan. Increased risk of illnesses is worsened by the ease of travel around the world, by an increase in global food and animal commodities trade, and by continued movement of large populations across vast areas. Read More

Background: Management of physical activity in patients with diabetic foot disease is poorly understood. There is paucity of data, more specifically evidence from a randomized study investigating the levels and profiles of physical activity in this population. This study explores the quantification of physical activity as a function of offloading modality in patients with diabetic foot ulcers. Method: Thirty eligible subjects with non-infec Read More

Background: Hepatitis C has emerged in recent years as a common cause of liver disease. An estimated 200 million people are thought to be infected worldwide. Hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection is characterized by viral persistence and chronic liver disease in approximately 80% of cases. Chronic HCV infection is curable by either a combination of interferon and ribavirin, or PEGylated interferon. Both drugs had been shown Read More

Objectives: To investigate the synthesis and in vitro characterization of a novel family of photo-cross-linked biodegradable poly(alkylene-co-tartrate) (PAT) for the purpose of their use in implantable drug delivery and tissue engineering applications. Methods: PAT prepolymers were first synthesized via polycondensation reaction of L-tartaric acid with alkylene diols of varying chain lengths (C6-C12) at 130°C for two hours under nitrog Read More

Background and Objectives: Antimicrobial stewardship is rapidly becoming very popular throughout the Middle East and abroad. Immunization programs, as a form of disease prevention, may reduce utilization of antimicrobials by decreasing incidence of disease requiring treatment. This may be especially important in children, as exposure to antimicrobials has been associated with chronic diseases such as asthma. The o Read More

Background and Objectives: The State of Qatar has achieved maternal, neonatal and perinatal survival rates which are comparable to many high income countries, both from the West and East. Our study aims to analyze obstetric determinants of Qatar's neonatal mortality rate (NMR) during 2011. Methodology: A PEARL study (Perinatal Neonatal Outcomes Research Study in the Arabian Gulf), a joint collaborative research proj Read More

Background: Large numbers of chemicals (natural and synthetic, including human dietary food components) are tested each year worldwide for potential genotoxic properties to protect humans and the environment against the consequences of exposure to such chemicals (cancer, infertility, accelerated ageing, and instability of ecosystems). For primary screening, fast in vitro and in vivo tests are used, but their predictive val Read More

Background: Egypt has the highest hepatitis C virus (HCV) prevalence in the world. Numerous HCV prevalence studies have published various estimates from different Egyptian communities, suggesting that Egypt, relative to the other nations of the world, might be experiencing an intense ongoing HCV transmission. Objective: To investigate the trend in HCV prevalence among the general population in Egypt with respect to Read More

Background and Objectives: Gene regulatory networks model the interactions among the genes and provide a decision rule describing activation and repression of each gene via various proteins. In order to be able to capture the complex gene interactions efficiently, it is imperative to develop algorithms that model the nonlinear interactions among the genes. This work considers the problem of inferring gene regulatory networ Read More

Background: Community-based interactive approach-diabetes mellitus (CBIA-DM) is an active self learning method. CBIA is a method used for public education which emphasizes the active role of participants in looking for information. The intention of CBIA is to empower participants to seek and critically assess information about their treatment. Objectives: This study is aimed at improving type 2 diabetic patients knowle Read More

Background: Prostate cancer (PC) remains the second leading cause of male death in Western countries and has been on the rise in Qatar during the last decade. Recent studies established that unlike differentiated PC cells, PC stem cells (PCSC) display high tumorigenic and metastatic potential and become resistant to current therapy. Therefore therapeutic success depends on the ability to effectively kill PCSC. The dise Read More

Background and Objectives: In cells exposed to environmental stress, inhibition of translation initiation conserves energy for the repair of cellular damage. Untranslated mRNAs that accumulate in these cells move to discrete cytoplasmic foci known as stress granules (SGs). The assembly of SGs helps cells to survive under adverse environmental conditions. SGs are formed as a consequence of eIF2α phosphorylation that inhi Read More