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Background: The aim of this study is to shed light on the patients ‘knowledge, expectations and attitudes with regards to glucose control, and to understand the barriers to achieving good glucose control among south Indian patients with type 2 diabetes.Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted among 76 type 2 diabetic patients in this study. Patients’ information such as sociodemographic characteristics, family history of diabetes, diabetes duration, medication adherence, dietary pattern, physical activity was obtained through interview. Anthropometric details were noted during the interview. All available last readings for fasting blood sugar, post prandial blood sugar and glycosylated hemoglobin were abstracted from patients’ records.Results: A total of 76 patients were enrolled in the study. The overall mean (SD) duration of the disease was 9±7.02 years. 63% had HbA1c ≥7%, which is categorized as a poor glycemic control. 43% of the subjects had poor glucose control who did not follow healthy eating plans. 84% of the patients did participate in physical exercise but did not follow as recommended. 67% of the patients have poor knowledge about glucose control.Conclusions: The main results indicate that glycemic control in type 2 diabetes is generally poor. Longer duration of diabetes and not adherent to diabetes self-care management behaviors were associated with poor glycemic control. Therefore, a balanced approach to improve awareness about diabetes and its control both among patients and the medical fraternity is urgent need of the hour in India.

Purpose: Catechol-O-methyltransferase (COMT) plays a central role in DNA repair and estrogen-induced carcinogenesis. The nonsynonymous single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) in exon 4 G > A or Val108 > 158Met or rs4680 G > A influences COMT enzyme activity. The three phenotypes of the COMT enzyme activities include COMT A/A with low enzyme activity, COMT A/G with medium enzyme activity and COMT G/G with high enzyme activity. The Met allele is associated with low enzymatic activity resulting in higher levels of prefrontal dopamine. Conversely, the Val allele is associated with high enzymatic activity and lower levels of prefrontal dopamine. The Met allele has been associated with several psychiatric disorders such as panic disorder. Many recent epidemiologic studies have investigated the association between the COMT Val158Met polymorphism and coronary artery diseases risk, but the results are inconclusive. Therefore our study was aimed to explore the association between COMT Val158Met polymorphism and the risk of coronary artery disease in India. Methology: This study was conducted on 100 clinically confirmed cases of coronary artery diseases and 100 healthy controls. COMT Val158Met genotyping was performed by allele-specific polymerase chain reaction (AS-PCR). Results: A significant correlation was observed in the COMT Val158Met genotype distribution between the coronary artery disease cases and healthy controls (p = 0.008). The frequencies of all three genotypes, GG, GA, AA, reported in the CAD patients were 10%, 70%, and 20%, and 30%, 60%, and 10% in the healthy controls respectively. An increased risk of coronary artery disease was observed in the codominant inheritance model for COMT-GA vs. GG genotype with an OR of 3.5, 95% CI (1.58–7.74) p = 0.002) and COMT-AA vs. GG genotype with an OR of 6.0 95% CI (2.11–17.3) p = 0.003). The higher risk of coronary artery disease was observed in the dominant inheritance model for COMT (GA + AA) vs. GG genotype (OR 3.85, 95% CI 1.76–8.4, p < 0.007), whereas a non-significant association was found in recessive model for COMT (GG + GA vs. AA) (OR = 2.01, 95% CI (0.86–4.7) p = 0.72). The results indicated that A allele significantly increased the risk of coronary artery disease compared to the G allele (OR = 1.8, 95% CI (1.20–2.67) p = 0.004). COMT Val158Met polymorphism leads to a 6.0, 3.5 and 1.8-fold increased risk of developing coronary artery disease in the Indian population and providing novel insights into the genetic etiology and underlying biology of coronary artery disease. Conclusions: It is concluded that COMT-AA genotype and A allele are significantly associated with an increased susceptibility to coronary artery disease in Indian population. A larger sample size can be the key to progress in establishing the genetic co-relationship of COMT polymorphism and cardiovascular disease.

Favipiravir is a synthetic prodrug, which was first discovered while assessing the antiviral activity of chemical agents active against the influenza virus in the chemical library of Toyoma chemicals. It works by inhibiting RNA dependant RNA polymerase (RdRP), an enzyme required for RNA viral replication inside human cells. A simple, rapid, and economic method was developed for the quantitative determination of Favipiravirusing spectrofluorometer. The Favipiravir standard drug solution and sample tablet solution was prepared using double distilled water as a diluent. The different concentrations ofpure drugin the range 2-10 μg/ml and one sample solution were measured for the intensity at 432nm in the spectrofluorometer. The calibration curve was plotted and the sample’s unknown concentration was calculated from the plot. The calibration curve was found to be linear with r2 value obtained as 0.99.There are various other methods available for the quantification of Favipiravir which include RP-HPLC, UV-spectroscopic methods, FTIR, LC-MS with different extraction methods spiked in human plasma but not by using spectrofluorometer. Favipiravir shows fluorescence when dissolved in appropriate solvent hencethis method was developed to quantify Favipiravir which is a simple and efficient method. This method developed is easy and can be used for routine quality control test for Favipiravir pharmaceutical formulations. Keywords: Favipiravir, spectrofluorometer, Calibration curve.

<p class="abstract"><strong><span lang="EN-US">Background:</span></strong>The study was performed to assess the prevalence of dry eye syndrome in patients with non-insulin dependent diabetes in urban south Indian population.</p><p class="abstract"><strong><span lang="EN-US">Methods:</span></strong>100 patients with non-insulin dependent diabetes in urban South Indian population were consecutively studied who attended OPD at Ideal Diabetes Care Center. Dry eyes were on the basis of history of ocular discomfort, including soreness, gritty sensation, itchiness, redness, blurred vision that improves with blinking and excessive tearing. The condition was confirmed by ocular surface dye staining pattern with fluorescein, tear film break up time (TBUT) and Schirmer test. All the patients were given artificial tears (carboxy methycellulose sodium eye drops).</p><p class="abstract"><strong><span lang="EN-US">Results:</span></strong>Of 100 diabetic patients, 60 patients (60.0%) had dry eye syndrome. Dry eye syndrome was more common in older and female patients. A significant association was observed between duration of diabetes and frequency of dry eye syndrome. Of 60 patients with dry eye syndrome 43.0% suffered from gritty sensation, 41.0% had soreness. 26.0% complained from tearing, redness and 11.0% from pain. 60.0% had shimmer test positive. 8.0% had TBUT positive and none of the patients had abnormal corneal sensitivity test positive. Response after using artificial tears was good.  </p><p class="abstract"><strong><span lang="EN-US">Conclusions:</span></strong><span lang="EN-US"> Our finding strongly support diabetic patients have an elevated prevalence </span>of dry eye syndrome. In this study the prevalence of dry eye syndrome was 60.0%. So, examination for dry eye should be an integral part of the assessment of dry eye disease. Further results showed management with artificial tears improved dry eye symptoms<span lang="EN-US">.</span></p>