Opium technique

IL-10 and interferon-gamma (IFN-γ) are the important anti and pro-inflammatory cytokines, respectively, which may participate in the cardiovascular disease pathogenesis. Additionally, environmental factors, such as the X-ray, can modulate cytokine expression. Due to the fact that X-ray is used during angiography, hence, angiography may alter expression of the cytokines. OBJECTIVE: Accordingly, this project was aimed to assess IL-10 and IFN-γ serum levels within cardiovascular patients (with and without vessel stenosis) versus healthy controls and also the effects of angiography on the serum levels of the cytokines...

A novel lab-on-chip integrated microfluidic device for solid-phase extraction (SPE) and spectrophotometric detection of morphine (MOR), codeine (COD), and papaverine (PAP) was developed. The extracted analytes were analyzed with a miniature UV-Vis spectrophotometer. The SPE adsorptive phase composed of polyurethane/polyaniline (PU/PANI) nanofibers was fabricated by electrospinning and in situ oxidative polymerization techniques. The sorbent was characterized by Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy and scanning electron microscopy (SEM)...

Rapid detection of illicit opium poppy plants using UAV (unmanned aerial vehicle) imagery has become an important means to prevent and combat crimes related to drug cultivation. However, current methods rely on time-consuming visual image interpretation. Here, the You Only Look Once version 3 (YOLOv3) network structure was used to assess the influence that different backbone networks have on the average precision and detection speed of an UAV-derived dataset of poppy imagery, with MobileNetv2 (MN) selected as the most suitable backbone network...

This data was acquired using a cross-sectional design in which medical records of patients admitted at Arya and Razi Hospitals of Rasht from 2006 to 2015 were examined. The patients' demographic data, history of smoking and opium, underlying disease, clinical symptoms at admission, the utilized diagnostic method, duration of hospitalization, findings of chest CT scan, type of pneumothorax, and therapeutic technique were collected through a questionnaire. The collected data were encoded and analyzed using SPSS 21...

If the use of natural opiates, such as opium, is more than millennial, the history of synthetic opioids begins after 1950, with the development of the so-called 'modern' anaesthetic techniques. In 1962, in Belgium, the use of fentanyl, the first synthetic opioid for use in anaesthesia, is described. Subsequently, the use of opioids at high doses during surgery became common. However, over the last twenty years, many studies have questioned this practice, highlighting the many unknowns as the side effects of these molecules...

In this study, an integrated aerobic membrane bioreactor (MBR)-nanofiltration (NF) system has been applied for advanced treatment of Opium processing wastewaters to comply with strict discharge limits. Aerobic MBR treatment was successfully applied to high strength industrial wastewater. In aerobic MBR treatment, a non-fouling unique slot aeration system was designed using computational fluid dynamics techniques. The MBR was used to separate treated effluent from dispersed and non-settleable biomass. Respirometric modeling using MBR sludge indicated that the biomass exhibited similar kinetic parameters to that of municipal activated sludge systems...

Papaverine is a non-narcotic alkaloid found endemically and uniquely in the latex of the opium poppy. It is normally refined out of the opioids that the latex is typically collected for, hence its presence in a sample is strong prima facie evidence that the carrier from whom the sample was collected is implicated in the mass cultivation of poppies or the collection and handling of their latex. We describe an analysis technique combining surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) with microfluidics for detecting papaverine at low concentrations and show that its SERS spectrum has unique spectroscopic features that allows its detection at low concentrations among typical opioids...

From the beginning of the 19th century to the Opium War, by taking the advantages of free entering and departing China, and to protect themselves, the foreign firms introduced vaccination technique into China. This is the beginning of the introduction of western medicine to China. After 1807, following the arrival of protestant missionaries, foreign firms became the stronghold for the missionaries to conceal their missionary status so as to propagate the principles of Christianity. With the aid of the business firms employee's legal identity, the missionaries started their activities of delivering western medicines and practices...

Esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) is an aggressive tumor that is typically diagnosed only when the tumor has gained remarkable size, extended to peripheral tissues, and led to dysphagia. Five-year survival of advanced cancer is still very poor (19%), even with improved surgical techniques and adjuvant chemoradiation therapy. Therefore, early detection and prevention are the most important strategies to reduce the burden of ESCC. Our review will focus on the studies conducted in Golestan province, an area with a high prevalence of ESCC in northern Iran...

While opioids are very effective analgesics for treating acute pain, humans have struggled with opiate addiction for millenia. An opium abuse epidemic in the early 1900's led the US government to develop a systematic research infrastructure and scientific plan to produce new compounds with analgesic properties but without abuse liability. This review describes the techniques that were developed for testing in the human laboratory, including empirically derived outcome measures and required elements for human abuse potential assessment...

The incidence of smuggling and transporting illegal substances by internal concealment, also known as body packing, is on the rise. The clinical approach to such patients has been changed significantly over the past 2 decades. However, despite a recorded increase in body packing in general, there are controversies in the management of these patients. We aimed to gather data regarding the demographic characteristics, treatment, and outcome of body packers, which were that referred to Loghman Hakim Hospital, Tehran, Iran...

Opium addiction is one of the main health problems in developing countries and induces serious defects on the human body. In this work, the concentrations of 32 minerals including alkaline, heavy and toxic metals have been determined in the iliac crest bone tissue of 22 opium addicted individuals using inductively coupled plasma-optical emission spectroscopy (ICP-OES). The bone tissues of 30 humans with no physiological and metabolomic diseases were used as the control group. For subsequent analyses, the linear and quadratic discriminant analysis techniques have been used for classification of the data into "addicted" and "non-addicted" groups...

BACKGROUND: Anesthesia induction in patients with current substance abuse can be a challenge for anesthesiologists. OBJECTIVES: This study aimed to evaluate the effect of adding Sufentanil to Bupivacaine on duration of brachial plexus nerve block. PATIENTS AND METHODS: One hundred and twenty patients with (Groups C and D) and without (Groups A and B) a history of opium abuse (60 in each group) scheduled for elective upper extremity procedures were randomly assigned to either receive 30 mL bupivacaine alone (Groups A and C) or in combination with additional 10 µg sufentanil (Groups B and D)...

Heinrich von Pfalzpaint (circa 1415-1465) was a Bavarian military surgeon of the Teutonic Order who treated more than 4000 casualties during the siege of Marienberg Fortress (1454-1457). In 1460, he reported "How to create a new nose if it has been chopped off and the dogs have eaten it" in his treatise on wound care Bündt-Ertznei. He used opium-soaked sponges for anesthesia, described the surgical extraction of bullets and cleft lip repair. Pfalzpaint would have been the first author to describe nasal reconstruction in Europe if his treatise had not been lost...

BACKGROUND: Opium dependence is one of the most challenging health problems in the developing countries as well as Iran. Among several health problems due to opium dependence, there are limited reports indicating the presence of lead in opium. The aim of this study is to investigate the blood lead level (BLL) in oral and inhalational opium dependents and its association with anemia. MATERIALS AND METHODS: A cross-sectional study was done among 86 opium dependent patients who were referred to five large detoxification centers in Tehran city and 48 healthy individuals...

Covering: up to December 2013. Over the past decade, there has been a growing transition in recreational drugs from natural materials (marijuana, hashish, opium), natural products (morphine, cocaine), or their simple derivatives (heroin), to synthetic agents more potent than their natural prototypes, which are sometimes less harmful in the short term, or that combine properties from different classes of recreational prototypes. These agents have been named smart drugs, and have become popular both for personal consumption and for collective intoxication at rave parties...

OBJECTIVE: The aim of our study is to compare the prevalence of illicit drug use estimated through a technique referred to as the "crosswise model" (CM) with the results from conventional direct questioning (DQ). METHOD: About 1,500 students from Tehran University of Medical Sciences 2009-2010 were first interviewed by DQ and, then three months later, by the CM. RESULT: The CM yielded significantly higher estimates than DQ for lifetime prevalence of use of any illicit drug (CM = 20...

An automated liquid-phase microextraction (LPME) device in a chip format has been developed and coupled directly to high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC). A 10-port 2-position switching valve was used to hyphenate the LPME-chip with the HPLC autosampler, and to collect the extracted analytes, which then were delivered to the HPLC column. The LPME-chip-HPLC system was completely automated and controlled by the software of the HPLC instrument. The performance of this system was demonstrated with five alkaloids i...

BACKGROUND: The present study was conducted to evaluate keratinization as well as nuclear and cytoplasmic changes of oral epithelial cells among smokers, opium addicts and non-smokers through exfoliative cytology technique. METHODS: Smears of buccal mucosa and mouth floor were collected from 300 males (100 smokers, 100 opium addicts and 100 non-smokers). The nucleus and cytoplasm sizes were determined using image analysis software. Data was analyzed with Mann-Whitney test and Student's t-test on SPSS version 13 statistical software...

Discovery of fire at the dawn of prehistoric time brought not only the benefits to human beings offering the light and heat, but also misfortune due to burns; and that was the beginning of burns treatment. Egyptian doctors made medicines from plants, animal products and minerals, which they combined with magic and religious procedures. The earliest records described burns dressings with milk from mothers of male babies. Goddess Isis was called upon to help. Some remedies and procedures proved so successful that their application continued for centuries...