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Introduction: Anemia is one of the major public health problems among pregnant women in the world. It causes low birth weight and maternal mortality during pregnancies. This study aimed to determine the prevalence of anemia and its associated factors among pregnant women. Methods: This cross-sectional study was conducted on 400 pregnant women in Shirvan city, Iran in 2015. For sampling, each of the three centers in this city were considered as a single cluster and the number of required participants from each center was selected proportional to the number of pregnant women covered by each center using systematic approach. Data collected from health records of families using a checklist were analyzed by descriptive statistics and appropriate statistical tests including chi- square, Fisher's exact, and McNemar's test. Results: The age mean ± SD of the pregnant women was 29.9 ± 5.3 with a range of 16-40 years. Most of pregnant women were in the age group of 18-35 (84.5%) years, had high school education (65.8%), and were housewives (87.8%). The prevalence of anemia in pregnant women in the first and third trimester were 4.75% (CI95%: 2.66%-6.84%) and 16% (CI95%: 12.40%- 19.60%), respectively. Prevalence of anemia increased in the third trimester (p<0.01). Conclusion: Shirvan is one of the areas with a mild prevalence of anemia. However, iron deficiency anemia, as a nutritional disorder can be prevented. Therefore, community-based interventions should be implemented considering the identified associated factors.

Background: Very deadly esophageal cancer (EC) is one of the most common cancers in the world, with a wide distribution in Iran and China and with poor overall survival. Most EC patients are at the metastatic stage of the disease at the time of diagnosis. So, effective non-invasive biomarkers are still needed for the early diagnosis of this malignancy. In this study, platelet-derived growth factor receptor beta (PDGFRB) was selected for further validation as a candidate biomarker for EC diagnosis and prognosis.Methods: Serum from 83 individuals (33 patients with EC and 50 normal volunteer controls) were collected. RNAs of the specimens were extracted and their levels of PDGFRβ gene expression were measured by real-time PCR.Results. The results demonstrated that the expression of PDGFRβ in the sample of the case group is higher in comparison with the control group (fold change= 1.12 ،p=0.03).Conclusions. According to our results, the evaluation of serum RNAs including beta-platelet-derived growth factor receptor mRNA could help to achieve a non-invasive, rapid diagnostic method and ultimately earlier treatment of EC. Further studies in this field are necessary to find the appropriate diagnostic and differential pattern of esophageal cancer.

Background: Very deadly esophageal cancer (EC) is one of the most common cancers in the world, with a wide distribution in Iran and China and with poor overall survival. Most EC patients are at the metastatic stage of the disease at the time of diagnosis. So, effective non-invasive biomarkers are still needed for the early diagnosis of this malignancy. In this study, platelet-derived growth factor receptor beta (PDGFRB) was selected for further validation as a candidate biomarker for EC diagnosis and prognosis.Methods: Serum from 83 individuals (33 patients with EC and 50 normal volunteer controls) were collected. RNAs of the specimens were extracted and their levels of PDGFRβ gene expression were measured by real-time PCR.Results. The results demonstrated that the expression of PDGFRβ in the sample of the case group is higher in comparison with the control group (fold change= 1.12 ،p=0.03).Conclusions. According to our results, the evaluation of serum RNAs including beta-platelet-derived growth factor receptor mRNA could help to achieve a non-invasive, rapid diagnostic method and ultimately earlier treatment of EC. Further studies in this field are necessary to find the appropriate diagnostic and differential pattern of esophageal cancer.

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