The Libyan journal of medicine
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Medical research and publications are the back-bone for advancing the medical field. We identified the Pubmed medical publications that are affiliated with Libya to shed some light on the contribution of this country's medical community to the PubMed database. All publications affiliated with Libya in the PubMed were counted over a five year period ending December 2006. We also used the same method to obtain data on the PubMed medical publications from Tunisia, Morocco and Yemen. Tunisia had the largest number of PubMed publications among the studied countries: 20.4 publications per million population per year and 7.2 publications per year per one billion US$ GDP. Libya had much fewer publications: 2.4 publications per million population per year and 0.4 publications per one billion US$ GDP. The citation frequency for Libyan published research was very low compared to Tunisian and Moroccan related research. ⋯ This preliminary analysis shows that medical research output in Libya is about twenty times less than in other countries with similar backgrounds, and that it needs to be enhanced.
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The capillary changes at the initial stage of diabetes may show an angioarchitecture clearly different from those of later stages and/or very severe glomerular change. However, the onset of alterations in the early phases is unclear. This study attempts to determine the structural alterations of the glomerular wall and vessels in the early stage of diabetes. ⋯ In early stages of diabetes mellitus in rats, there was an increase in the diameter of glomerular vessels. In later stages of the disease, the reverse was seen, but insulin treatment had a positive role in reversing these changes in the study subjects.
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Contrast media-induced nephropathy (CIN) is a well-known complication of radiological examinations employing iodine contrast media (I-CM). The rapid development and frequent use of coronary interventions and multi-channel detector computed tomography with concomitant administration of relatively large doses of I-CM has contributed to an increasing number of CIN cases during the last few years. ⋯ For the radiologist, there are several steps to consider in order to minimise the risk for CIN: use of "low-" or "iso-osmolar" I-CM and dosing the I-CM in relation to GFR and body weight being the most important as well as utilizing radiographic techniques to keep the I-CM dose in gram iodine as low as possible below the numerical value of estimated GFR. There is as yet no pharmacological prevention that has been proven to be effective.