We studied 36 patients (24 males, 12 females), all of whom had definite subacute sclerosing panencephalitis with typical periodic complexes in their electroencephalograms and increased titers of measles antibody in serum and cerebrospinal fluid. Their clinical and laboratory findings on admission were reviewed retrospectively. The age at onset of symptoms varied from 4 to 23 years. The average age at onset of disease was 13.1 +/- 4.18 years. The mean of the duration from the infection to the onset of subacute sclerosing panencephalitis was 9 years. Unusual symptoms, especially in the early periods of disease, included hemiparesis (7 patients), headache (3), generalized tonic-clonic seizures (6), absence seizure (1), nausea (3), and vomiting (3). Twenty-six cranial magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and 12 computed tomography examinations were performed. Nine patients had normal MRI. In the early stages, lesions usually involved parieto-occipital corticosubcortical regions asymmetrically. In time, symmetric periventricular white-matter changes became more prominent. In addition to the common clinical findings in cases of subacute sclerosing panencephalitis reported in the literature, there were some different clinical features of the disease. Eventually, we concluded that there seems to be no correlation between the clinical stages and either the duration from the onset of subacute sclerosing panencephalitis or the MRI findings.

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Ozturk a & Sendirm(2011) Journal of Nursing and Healthcare of Chronic Illness3, 319–328 
Evaluation of knowledge of osteoporosis and self‐efficacy perception of female orthopaedic patients in Turkey Aim.  To evaluate the osteoporosis knowledge and self‐efficacy of female orthopaedic patients. Background.  Osteoporosis can affect either gender; however, 80% of those affected are women. Many women present with fractures of the hip or wrist each year as a result of osteoporosis. The disease is essentially incurable and so a preventive public health approach is required. Knowledge‐based intervention programmes have been effective in increasing osteoporosis awareness. Method.  This descriptive cross‐sectional survey design was conducted in three public and two private hospitals in Turkey. The sample consisted of 146 patients hospitalised in orthopaedic clinics of these hospitals. Data were collected by a Demographic Questionnaire, Osteoporosis Knowledge Test and Osteoporosis Self‐Efficacy Scale. Data were collected in 2007. Results.  The mean age of the patients was 59·6 ± 12·9 years. Patients’ osteoporosis knowledge (9·9 ± 4·4) and osteoporosis self‐efficacy perception mean scores (778·2 ± 260·4) were low. It has been determined that osteoporosis self‐efficacy increases as osteoporosis knowledge increases. Significant relations between age and both osteoporosis knowledge and self‐efficacy were found. In addition, osteoporosis knowledge was found to be correlated with education and income. Conclusion.  The results indicated that female orthopaedic patients display low level of knowledge and self‐efficacy with regard to the osteoporosis. Women may engage in self‐efficacy perceptions which would help to prevent osteoporosis, if they are informed regarding the effects and risk factors of osteoporosis, and the preventative behaviours associated with osteoporosis. Relevance to clinical practice.  Results indicate the need for further health education concerning the importance of dietary calcium and exercise on osteoporosis prevention in female orthopaedic patients especially who are older and have less formal education.

In this retrospective study 67 patients with SSPE seen between the years 1980 and 1998 were reviewed. Using the criteria of SSPE diagnosis (clinical signs, characteristic EEG patterns, high titres of measles antibodies in the serum and CSF), the patients were divided into two groups. Group A fulfilled all criteria, however, due to the inability of measuring measles antibody before 1987, it was not possible to observe the third criterion in Group B. Among 67 patients, groups A and B consisted of 51 boys and 16 girls ranging in age between 1 to 23 years, mean age 13.1. The male/female ratio was 3.1. The periodic EEG complexes (PCs) were usually bilateral, synchronous and symmetrical. PC amplitude asymmetry was seen in 12 patients and 2 patients had no PC synchronization between the hemispheres. Six patients had more than one form of PC. Delta activity in anterior hemispheres after PC was seen in 40 patients, mostly in stage 2A. Thirty-two patients had focal epileptiform abnormalities in multiple locations at every stage but most frequently in frontal, central and temporal regions. One patient had PC over both hemispheres and periodic lateralized epileptiform discharges (PLEDs) over the right hemisphere. The EEG findings described and observed in our study do not seem to be specific to SSPE but these findings were not atypical or unusual.

Economic dispatch problem is an optimization problem where objective function is highly nonlinear. In this paper, an efficient method based on hybrid genetic algorithm- particle swarm optimization (GA-PSO) for economic dispatch (ED) problem is proposed. In the proposed method, children created by using similarity measurement between mother and father chromosomes relationship. The feasibility of the proposed approach is demonstrated for solve various types of economic dispatch (ED) problems in power systems such as, economic dispatch with valve point (EDVP) effects, the ED of generators with prohibited operating zones and ED with only fuel options and it is compared in the recent literature. The study results show that the proposed approach is more efficient in finding higher quality solutions in various type ED problems. Ill. 3, bibl. 20, tabl. 10 (in English; abstracts in English and Lithuanian).http://dx.doi.org/10.5755/j01.eee.108.2.155