Our findings propose that TGFβ1 + 868 TT genotype and TT/GG diplotype may confer increased risk of brucellosis in the examined population.

Background: Congenital heart diseases (CHD) are the most common of all birth defects, affecting nearly 0.9% of all live births. Nkx2-5 mutations were reported to cause CHD but data in Kurdish populations of Iran are limited.

Per the definition of the World Health Organization, rehabilitation is a set of interventions designed to optimize performance and reduce disability in people with a varying range of health-related disorders in interacting with their environment. Like many other fields of the health-care realm, the application and integration of valid and reliable research are perceivably highly primitive. It is not possible to accurately measure or predict the need for rehabilitation services in general, and it is certainly difficult to do so for specific demographic or geographic classes. Service providers lack the tools to make objective policy and financial decision-making at the systemic level without accurate and reliable information management practices. To gain the capacity to transform the current guidelines of the ministry and make financial changes in the entire rehabilitation process, the rehabilitation sector needs a strong voice and a solid political base to guide the rehabilitation process therefrom. The current narrative review focuses on our knowledge of rehabilitation information systems and what we know and what we want.

Context: Cancer is a major cause of death worldwide. It was estimated that 7.6 million people died during 2008 due to cancer and this figure is expected to double by 2030. To conquer this disease, discovery of validated targets and new drugs is a necessity. Evidence Acquisition: Telomeres are terminal structures of linear chromosomes in eukaryotes and consist of multiple repetitive sequences. Their main function is to protect and confer stability to chromosome ends and prevent their breakage, end-to-end fusion, and degeneration. Polymerases responsible for replication of DNA in eukaryotes are not able to replicate chromosome ends and, during cell division, chromosomes continuously become shorter from the telomere ends. This shortening will eventually stop cell division. In cancer cells, there is a ribonucleoprotein enzyme called telomerase that allows compensation of telomere shortening and continuation of the cell multiplication process. Results: About 90% of cancers need a high level of this enzyme to continue cell multiplication. Since this enzyme set is absent in normal cells, or present at a very low level, use of telomerase inhibitors cannot have significant effects on normal cells. Conclusions: Since telomerase is expressed in 90% of cancer cells, its inhibition can be considered as a goal of cancer treatment.

Introduction: Opioid addiction (OA) is a neurologically life-threatening challenge associated with socioeconomic and health concerns for individuals and society. The addictive drugs trigger neuromodulators and neurotransmitters through the opioid receptors and corresponding endogenous peptide ligands. In addition, drug addiction is reportedly related to the mu-opioid receptor (OPRM1) encoding gene and its variants. According to the role of the rs648893 polymorphism of the OPRM1 gene in numerous disorders, it has been suggested as a candidate associated with drug addiction. The present case-control study was conducted to evaluate the role of OPRM1 rs648893 polymorphism in the OA risk. Methods: To this end, the rs648893 polymorphism was genotyped by tetra amplification refractory mutation system-polymerase chain reaction among 160 Iranian subjects consisting of 105 OA cases and 155 controls. Results: According to our findings, there was no significant association between OA and the OPRM1 rs648893 gene polymorphism. Moreover, a marginally insignificant difference was found between OA cases and controls in accordance with the allelic frequencies (P=0.05) Conclusion: In general, our results reported no association between OPRM1 rs648893 gene polymorphism and OA although further research among various ethnicities with larger sample sizes is needed to draw a definite conclusion on the association of rs648893 polymorphism and other OPRM1 intronic variants with opioid and other addictions.