Displaying publications 1 - 20 of 65 in total

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  1. A clinical and economic study of community-acquired pneumonia between single versus combination therapy
    Hasali MA, Ibrahim MI, Sulaiman SA, Ahmad Z, Hasali JB
    Pharm World Sci, 2005 Jun;27(3):249-53.
    PMID: 16096896
    BACKGROUND: Pneumonia is one of the leading causes of morbidity and mortality among children in many developing countries. It is reported that 12.9 million children under 5 years of age died world-wide in 1990 and one-third of these deaths or 4.3 million annually were attributed to acute respiratory infection with pneumonia.

    OBJECTIVES: On this basis, a study was conducted in a district hospital to study the therapy outcomes of antibiotic regimens used in pediatric community-acquired pneumonia (CAP) management and to conduct a cost-effectiveness analysis (CE) between IV ampicillin versus combination therapy of IV ampicillin and IV gentamicin.

    METHOD: A prospective, randomized, controlled, single blind study was conducted in a pediatric ward in a 80-bed district hospital. Pediatric patients diagnosed with CAP aged 2 months to 5 years old were randomly and equally divided into two treatment arms: ampicillin versus ampicillin plus gentamicin. The dose of IV ampicillin used in this study was 100 mg/kg/day divided every 6 h and 5 mg/kg of IV gentamicin as a single daily dose. Both clinical and economic evaluations were carried out to compare both treatment arms.

    RESULTS: With the inclusion and exclusion criteria, only 40 patients diagnosed with CAP were included in the study. The results showed that the two treatment arms were significantly different (P < 0.05) in terms of duration of patients on ampicillin, number of days of hospitalization and time to switch to oral therapy. A significant difference was noted between the two treatment modalities in terms of effectiveness and cost (P < 0.05).

    CONCLUSION: Overall, the endpoint of this study showed that the total cost per patient of ampicillin-treated group is cheaper than the total cost with the combination therapy (ampicillin plus gentamicin) and reduced unnecessary exposure to adverse effects or toxicities. Besides that, addition of gentamicin in the treatment modalities will only increase the cost of treatment without introducing any changes in the treatment outcome.

    Matched MeSH terms: Data Interpretation, Statistical
  2. A comparison of human elements and nonhuman elements in private health care settings: customers' perceptions and expectations
    Mohd Suki N, Chwee Lian JC, Suki NM
    J Hosp Mark Public Relations, 2009;19(2):113-28.
    PMID: 19827322 DOI: 10.1080/15390940903041567
    In today's highly competitive health care environment, many private health care settings are now looking into customer service indicators to learn customers' perceptions and determine whether they are meeting customers' expectations in order to ensure that their customers are satisfied with the services. This research paper aims to investigate whether the human elements were more important than the nonhuman elements in private health care settings. We used the internationally renowned SERVQUAL five-dimension model plus three additional dimensions-courtesy, communication, and understanding of customers of the human element-when evaluating health care services. A total of 191 respondents from three private health care settings in the Klang Valley region of Malaysia were investigated. Descriptive statistics were calculated by the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) computer program, version 15. Interestingly, the results suggested that customers nowadays have very high expectations especially when it comes to the treatment they are receiving. Overall, the research indicated that the human elements were more important than the nonhuman element in private health care settings. Hospital management should look further to improve on areas that have been highlighted. Implications for management practice and directions for future research are discussed.
    Matched MeSH terms: Data Interpretation, Statistical
  3. A method for cross-cultural adaptation of a verbal memory assessment
    Lim YY, Prang KH, Cysique L, Pietrzak RH, Snyder PJ, Maruff P
    Behav Res Methods, 2009 Nov;41(4):1190-200.
    PMID: 19897828 DOI: 10.3758/BRM.41.4.1190
    Verbal memory tests-although important to the neuropsychological assessment of memory-are biased to many cultures. In the present article, we highlighted the limitations associated with the direct translation of tests and word matching, as well as the lack of ecological validity and cultural appropriateness when tests developed in one culture are used in another. To overcome these limitations, a verbal memory paradigm was developed that framed the memory assessment with a shopping-list format, but that developed culturally specific stimuli for the different language groups. The aim of the present study was to determine the equivalence of this shopping list memory test in different cultural and language groups. Eighty-three adults from English-, French-, Malay-, and Chinese-speaking cultures participated in four experiments. The results of all the experiments indicated that performance of verbal list learning is equivalent, irrespective of the language used. These results support the use of this methodology for minimizing cross-cultural test bias, and have important implications for testing culturally and linguistically diverse individuals.
    Matched MeSH terms: Data Interpretation, Statistical
  4. Fulltext A review of feature extraction software for microarray gene expression data
    Tan CS, Ting WS, Mohamad MS, Chan WH, Deris S, Shah ZA
    Biomed Res Int, 2014;2014:213656.
    PMID: 25250315 DOI: 10.1155/2014/213656
    When gene expression data are too large to be processed, they are transformed into a reduced representation set of genes. Transforming large-scale gene expression data into a set of genes is called feature extraction. If the genes extracted are carefully chosen, this gene set can extract the relevant information from the large-scale gene expression data, allowing further analysis by using this reduced representation instead of the full size data. In this paper, we review numerous software applications that can be used for feature extraction. The software reviewed is mainly for Principal Component Analysis (PCA), Independent Component Analysis (ICA), Partial Least Squares (PLS), and Local Linear Embedding (LLE). A summary and sources of the software are provided in the last section for each feature extraction method.
    Matched MeSH terms: Data Interpretation, Statistical*
  5. Fulltext ABCB1 C3435T polymorphism and the risk of resistance to antiepileptic drugs in epilepsy: a systematic review and meta-analysis
    Haerian BS, Roslan H, Raymond AA, Tan CT, Lim KS, Zulkifli SZ, et al.
    Seizure, 2010 Jul;19(6):339-46.
    PMID: 20605481 DOI: 10.1016/j.seizure.2010.05.004
    The C3435T, a major allelic variant of the ABCB1 gene, is proposed to play a crucial role in drug-resistance in epilepsy. The C/C genotype carriers reportedly are at higher risk of pharmacoresistance to AEDs, but only in some studies. The hypothesis of the C-variant associated risk and resistance to antiepileptic drugs (AEDs) has been hampered by conflicting results from inadequate power in case-control studies. To assess the role of C3435T polymorphism in drug-resistance in epilepsy, a systematic review and meta-analysis was conducted.
    Matched MeSH terms: Data Interpretation, Statistical
  6. Fulltext Algorithm for rapid identification of flavonoids classes
    Noh, C.H.C., Azmin, N.F.M., Amid, A., Asnawi, A.L.
    International Food Research Journal, 2017;24(101):0-0.
    MyJurnal
    Bioactive compounds are one of the natural products used especially for medicinal, pharmaceutical and food application. Increasing research performed on the extraction, isolation and identification of bioactive compounds, however non to date has explored on the identification of flavonoids classes. Therefore, this study was focused on the development of algorithm for rapid identification of flavonoids classes which are flavanone, flavone and flavonol and also their derivatives. Fourier Transform Infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy coupled with multivariate statistical data analysis, which is Principal Component Analysis (PCA) was utilized. The results exhibited that few significant wavenumber range provides the identification and characterization of the flavonoids classes based on PCA algorithm. The study concluded that FTIR coupled with PCA analysis can be used as a molecular fingerprint for rapid identification of flavonoids.
    Matched MeSH terms: Data Interpretation, Statistical
  7. An observational study of drug administration errors in a Malaysian hospital (study of drug administration errors)
    Chua SS, Tea MH, Rahman MH
    J Clin Pharm Ther, 2009 Apr;34(2):215-23.
    PMID: 19250142 DOI: 10.1111/j.1365-2710.2008.00997.x
    Drug administration errors were the second most frequent type of medication errors, after prescribing errors but the latter were often intercepted hence, administration errors were more probably to reach the patients. Therefore, this study was conducted to determine the frequency and types of drug administration errors in a Malaysian hospital ward.
    Matched MeSH terms: Data Interpretation, Statistical
  8. Application of nonlinear methods to discriminate fractionated electrograms in paroxysmal versus persistent atrial fibrillation
    Acharya UR, Faust O, Ciaccio EJ, Koh JEW, Oh SL, Tan RS, et al.
    Comput Methods Programs Biomed, 2019 Jul;175:163-178.
    PMID: 31104705 DOI: 10.1016/j.cmpb.2019.04.018
    BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE: Complex fractionated atrial electrograms (CFAE) may contain information concerning the electrophysiological substrate of atrial fibrillation (AF); therefore they are of interest to guide catheter ablation treatment of AF. Electrogram signals are shaped by activation events, which are dynamical in nature. This makes it difficult to establish those signal properties that can provide insight into the ablation site location. Nonlinear measures may improve information. To test this hypothesis, we used nonlinear measures to analyze CFAE.

    METHODS: CFAE from several atrial sites, recorded for a duration of 16 s, were acquired from 10 patients with persistent and 9 patients with paroxysmal AF. These signals were appraised using non-overlapping windows of 1-, 2- and 4-s durations. The resulting data sets were analyzed with Recurrence Plots (RP) and Recurrence Quantification Analysis (RQA). The data was also quantified via entropy measures.

    RESULTS: RQA exhibited unique plots for persistent versus paroxysmal AF. Similar patterns were observed to be repeated throughout the RPs. Trends were consistent for signal segments of 1 and 2 s as well as 4 s in duration. This was suggestive that the underlying signal generation process is also repetitive, and that repetitiveness can be detected even in 1-s sequences. The results also showed that most entropy metrics exhibited higher measurement values (closer to equilibrium) for persistent AF data. It was also found that Determinism (DET), Trapping Time (TT), and Modified Multiscale Entropy (MMSE), extracted from signals that were acquired from locations at the posterior atrial free wall, are highly discriminative of persistent versus paroxysmal AF data.

    CONCLUSIONS: Short data sequences are sufficient to provide information to discern persistent versus paroxysmal AF data with a significant difference, and can be useful to detect repeating patterns of atrial activation.

    Matched MeSH terms: Data Interpretation, Statistical
  9. Applying a statistical PTB detection procedure to complement the gold standard
    Noor NM, Yunus A, Bakar SA, Hussin A, Rijal OM
    Comput Med Imaging Graph, 2011 Apr;35(3):186-94.
    PMID: 21036539 DOI: 10.1016/j.compmedimag.2010.10.002
    This paper investigates a novel statistical discrimination procedure to detect PTB when the gold standard requirement is taken into consideration. Archived data were used to establish two groups of patients which are the control and test group. The control group was used to develop the statistical discrimination procedure using four vectors of wavelet coefficients as feature vectors for the detection of pulmonary tuberculosis (PTB), lung cancer (LC), and normal lung (NL). This discrimination procedure was investigated using the test group where the number of sputum positive and sputum negative cases that were correctly classified as PTB cases were noted. The proposed statistical discrimination method is able to detect PTB patients and LC with high true positive fraction. The method is also able to detect PTB patients that are sputum negative and therefore may be used as a complement to the gold standard.
    Matched MeSH terms: Data Interpretation, Statistical*
  10. Association of loss of heterozygosity and PTEN gene abnormalities with paraclinical, clinical modalities and survival time of glioma patients in Malaysia
    Abdullah JM, Farizan A, Asmarina K, Zainuddin N, Ghazali MM, Jaafar H, et al.
    Asian J Surg, 2006 Oct;29(4):274-82.
    PMID: 17098662
    The pattern of allelic loss of heterozygosity (LOH) and PTEN mutations appear to be associated with the progression of gliomas leading to a decrement in the survival rate of patients. This present study was carried out to determine the LOH and PTEN mutational status in glioma patients and its association with patients' survival.
    Matched MeSH terms: Data Interpretation, Statistical
  11. Attitudes toward epilepsy among the primary and secondary school teachers in Malaysia, using the public attitudes toward epilepsy (PATE) scale
    Lim KS, Hills MD, Choo WY, Wong MH, Wu C, Tan CT
    Epilepsy Res, 2013 Oct;106(3):433-9.
    PMID: 23886655 DOI: 10.1016/j.eplepsyres.2013.06.014
    INTRODUCTION: There is a lack of study comparing the attitudes toward epilepsy between the teachers and general population, teachers and students, using a similar quantitative scale.
    METHODS: This study was performed in one primary and one secondary school in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, using the Public Attitudes Toward Epilepsy (PATE) scale.
    RESULTS: A total of 186 teachers aged 39.6±10.4 years completed the questionnaire. The mean scores in both personal and general domains of PATE scale were significantly better in the teachers, comparing to the scores in the secondary and college students reported in previous study (Lim et al., 2013; p<0.001 and <0.05, respectively). The mean scores in personal domain was significantly better in the teachers, comparing to the general population reported by Lim et al. (2012; p<0.001). This hold true when comparing teachers with general population with tertiary education, suggesting that the better attitude is specific to the job, rather than tertiary education generally. Subanalysis showed that the attitudes of teachers were significantly better than the general population and the students related to employment and social life, but were equally negative on issues directly related to education, such as placing children with epilepsy in regular classes.
    CONCLUSION: Teachers had more positive attitudes toward epilepsy as compared with the general population with tertiary education. Attitude to epilepsy may differ specific to types of work.
    Matched MeSH terms: Data Interpretation, Statistical
  12. Fulltext Authentication of Nigella sativa seed oil in binary and ternary mixtures with corn oil and soybean oil using FTIR spectroscopy coupled with partial least square
    Rohman A, Ariani R
    ScientificWorldJournal, 2013;2013:740142.
    PMID: 24319381 DOI: 10.1155/2013/740142
    Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) combined with multivariate calibration of partial least square (PLS) was developed and optimized for the analysis of Nigella seed oil (NSO) in binary and ternary mixtures with corn oil (CO) and soybean oil (SO). Based on PLS modeling performed, quantitative analysis of NSO in binary mixtures with CO carried out using the second derivative FTIR spectra at combined frequencies of 2977-3028, 1666-1739, and 740-1446 cm(-1) revealed the highest value of coefficient of determination (R (2), 0.9984) and the lowest value of root mean square error of calibration (RMSEC, 1.34% v/v). NSO in binary mixtures with SO is successfully determined at the combined frequencies of 2985-3024 and 752-1755 cm(-1) using the first derivative FTIR spectra with R (2) and RMSEC values of 0.9970 and 0.47% v/v, respectively. Meanwhile, the second derivative FTIR spectra at the combined frequencies of 2977-3028 cm(-1), 1666-1739 cm(-1), and 740-1446 cm(-1) were selected for quantitative analysis of NSO in ternary mixture with CO and SO with R (2) and RMSEC values of 0.9993 and 0.86% v/v, respectively. The results showed that FTIR spectrophotometry is an accurate technique for the quantitative analysis of NSO in binary and ternary mixtures with CO and SO.
    Matched MeSH terms: Data Interpretation, Statistical
  13. Automated diagnosis of congestive heart failure using dual tree complex wavelet transform and statistical features extracted from 2s of ECG signals
    Sudarshan VK, Acharya UR, Oh SL, Adam M, Tan JH, Chua CK, et al.
    Comput Biol Med, 2017 04 01;83:48-58.
    PMID: 28231511 DOI: 10.1016/j.compbiomed.2017.01.019
    Identification of alarming features in the electrocardiogram (ECG) signal is extremely significant for the prediction of congestive heart failure (CHF). ECG signal analysis carried out using computer-aided techniques can speed up the diagnosis process and aid in the proper management of CHF patients. Therefore, in this work, dual tree complex wavelets transform (DTCWT)-based methodology is proposed for an automated identification of ECG signals exhibiting CHF from normal. In the experiment, we have performed a DTCWT on ECG segments of 2s duration up to six levels to obtain the coefficients. From these DTCWT coefficients, statistical features are extracted and ranked using Bhattacharyya, entropy, minimum redundancy maximum relevance (mRMR), receiver-operating characteristics (ROC), Wilcoxon, t-test and reliefF methods. Ranked features are subjected to k-nearest neighbor (KNN) and decision tree (DT) classifiers for automated differentiation of CHF and normal ECG signals. We have achieved 99.86% accuracy, 99.78% sensitivity and 99.94% specificity in the identification of CHF affected ECG signals using 45 features. The proposed method is able to detect CHF patients accurately using only 2s of ECG signal length and hence providing sufficient time for the clinicians to further investigate on the severity of CHF and treatments.
    Matched MeSH terms: Data Interpretation, Statistical
  14. Fulltext Backcalculation of HIV infection rates in Malaysia
    Ong HC, Soo KL
    Med J Malaysia, 2006 Dec;61(5):616-20.
    PMID: 17623964 MyJurnal
    It has been almost two decades ago since the first AIDS case was reported in Malaysia. It has also been approximately eight years ago when the method of backcalculation was used to estimate the past HIV infection rate from the AIDS incidence data and an estimate of the incubation period distribution. This method is used because it makes use of the Malaysian AIDS incidence which is fairly reliable and reflects the trend of the epidemic as compared to the HIV infection rate recorded. The latest results generated show a slowdown in the increase of the number of estimated infected HIV+ cases in the late 1990s and this trend is supported by a slowdown in the increase of the number of AIDS cases recorded.
    Matched MeSH terms: Data Interpretation, Statistical
  15. Based on Real Time Remote Health Monitoring Systems: A New Approach for Prioritization "Large Scales Data" Patients with Chronic Heart Diseases Using Body Sensors and Communication Technology
    Kalid N, Zaidan AA, Zaidan BB, Salman OH, Hashim M, Albahri OS, et al.
    J Med Syst, 2018 Mar 02;42(4):69.
    PMID: 29500683 DOI: 10.1007/s10916-018-0916-7
    This paper presents a new approach to prioritize "Large-scale Data" of patients with chronic heart diseases by using body sensors and communication technology during disasters and peak seasons. An evaluation matrix is used for emergency evaluation and large-scale data scoring of patients with chronic heart diseases in telemedicine environment. However, one major problem in the emergency evaluation of these patients is establishing a reasonable threshold for patients with the most and least critical conditions. This threshold can be used to detect the highest and lowest priority levels when all the scores of patients are identical during disasters and peak seasons. A practical study was performed on 500 patients with chronic heart diseases and different symptoms, and their emergency levels were evaluated based on four main measurements: electrocardiogram, oxygen saturation sensor, blood pressure monitoring, and non-sensory measurement tool, namely, text frame. Data alignment was conducted for the raw data and decision-making matrix by converting each extracted feature into an integer. This integer represents their state in the triage level based on medical guidelines to determine the features from different sources in a platform. The patients were then scored based on a decision matrix by using multi-criteria decision-making techniques, namely, integrated multi-layer for analytic hierarchy process (MLAHP) and technique for order performance by similarity to ideal solution (TOPSIS). For subjective validation, cardiologists were consulted to confirm the ranking results. For objective validation, mean ± standard deviation was computed to check the accuracy of the systematic ranking. This study provides scenarios and checklist benchmarking to evaluate the proposed and existing prioritization methods. Experimental results revealed the following. (1) The integration of TOPSIS and MLAHP effectively and systematically solved the patient settings on triage and prioritization problems. (2) In subjective validation, the first five patients assigned to the doctors were the most urgent cases that required the highest priority, whereas the last five patients were the least urgent cases and were given the lowest priority. In objective validation, scores significantly differed between the groups, indicating that the ranking results were identical. (3) For the first, second, and third scenarios, the proposed method exhibited an advantage over the benchmark method with percentages of 40%, 60%, and 100%, respectively. In conclusion, patients with the most and least urgent cases received the highest and lowest priority levels, respectively.
    Matched MeSH terms: Data Interpretation, Statistical*
  16. Fulltext Bayesian inference of the Weibull model based on interval-censored survival data
    Guure CB, Ibrahim NA, Adam MB
    Comput Math Methods Med, 2013;2013:849520.
    PMID: 23476718 DOI: 10.1155/2013/849520
    Interval-censored data consist of adjacent inspection times that surround an unknown failure time. We have in this paper reviewed the classical approach which is maximum likelihood in estimating the Weibull parameters with interval-censored data. We have also considered the Bayesian approach in estimating the Weibull parameters with interval-censored data under three loss functions. This study became necessary because of the limited discussion in the literature, if at all, with regard to estimating the Weibull parameters with interval-censored data using Bayesian. A simulation study is carried out to compare the performances of the methods. A real data application is also illustrated. It has been observed from the study that the Bayesian estimator is preferred to the classical maximum likelihood estimator for both the scale and shape parameters.
    Matched MeSH terms: Data Interpretation, Statistical
  17. Burden of care among caregivers of patients with Parkinson disease: a cross-sectional study
    Razali R, Ahmad F, Rahman FN, Midin M, Sidi H
    Clin Neurol Neurosurg, 2011 Oct;113(8):639-43.
    PMID: 21684679 DOI: 10.1016/j.clineuro.2011.05.008
    Parkinson disease (PD) affects the lives of both the individuals and their family members. This study aims at investigating for clinical as well as socio-demographic factors associated with the perception of burden among the caregivers of individuals with PD in Malaysia.
    Matched MeSH terms: Data Interpretation, Statistical
  18. Call for Special Issue Papers: Big Data Analytics for Agricultural Disaster Management
    Balamurugan S, Muthu BA, Peng SL, Wahab MHA
    Big Data, 2020 10;8(5):450-451.
    PMID: 33090023 DOI: 10.1089/big.2020.29038.cfp
    Matched MeSH terms: Data Interpretation, Statistical*
  19. Cardiovascular responses to stress in Singapore and India
    Kaur D, Bishop GD
    Int J Psychophysiol, 2013 Feb;87(2):130-40.
    PMID: 23206971 DOI: 10.1016/j.ijpsycho.2012.11.011
    Epidemiological studies have shown significant ethnic differences in coronary heart disease death rates with South Asians showing significantly greater coronary heart disease mortality than other groups.
    Matched MeSH terms: Data Interpretation, Statistical
  20. Clostridium perfringens and sulphite reducing clostridia densities in selected tropical Malaysian rivers
    Lee FC, Hakim SL, Kamaluddin MA, Thong KL
    Southeast Asian J. Trop. Med. Public Health, 2012 Jan;43(1):129-35.
    PMID: 23082563
    Clostridium perfringens (CP) and sulphite reducing clostridia (SRC) densities in the Selangor River, Bernam River and Tengi River Canal were examined between April 2007 and January 2008. Water samples were taken from two or three locations along each river, using either depth-integration or grab sampling methods. The downstream sampling site of the Selangor River, Rantau Panjang, reported the highest arithmetic mean of CP and SRC densities (583.45 and 8,120.08 cfu/100 ml, respectively). Both CP and SRC densities in the Selangor River increased further downstream, but the reverse was true in the Bernam River. The SRC densities in these rivers were significantly different from each other (p < 0.05) when comparing upstream and downstream results, but CP densities were not significantly different (p > 0.05). SRC densities were significantly correlated (p < 0.05) in different locations along the Selangor River and the Bernam River. The CP densities did not show such pattern (p > 0.05). River discharge had no significant correlation with SRC or CP densities by study site (p > 0.05). Since the Selangor River has a denser human population along its banks, this study confirms CP as a suitable indicator of human fecal contamination. However, tracing CP distribution along the river is more difficult than SRC. To our knowledge, this is the first study of CP and SRC densities from Malaysian rivers. CP densities found in this study were within the range of general water bodies reported from other countries.
    Matched MeSH terms: Data Interpretation, Statistical
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