This commentary presents the case against housing rats and mice in laboratory cages; the commentary bases its case on their sentience, natural history, and the varied detriments of laboratory conditions. The commentary gives 5 arguments to support this position: (a) rats and mice have a high degree of sentience and can suffer, (b) laboratory environments cause suffering, (c) rats and mice in th...

statistical errors are common in scientific literature and about 50% of the published articles have at least one error. the assumption of normality needs to be checked for many statistical procedures, namely parametric tests, because their validity depends on it. the aim of this commentary is to overview checking for normality in statistical analysis using spss.

the topic of how cost-effectiveness information informs priority setting in healthcare remains important to both policy and practice. this commentary considers the study carried out by eckard and colleagues in sweden. in it we distinguish between the conditions at national and local levels and put forward some recommendations for research into local priority setting in particular.

in terms of time, iranian mystic seyyed jaafar kashfi belongs to the era that is known as the end of the political thought era, from the perspective of decline theory. however, he is one of the great thinkers of the qajar era who in his two books entitled “tohfat al-muluk” and “mizan al-muluk” presented his political thought on the basis of mystical way. the main question in this research is wh...

BACKGROUND Uterine rupture is a tear in the wall of uterus which carries grave risks to the mother as well as her baby. OBJECTIVES To estimate uterine rupture bad outcomes using propensity score and its determinants in Mizan-Tepi University teaching hospital. METHODS A case control study on 363 participants, 121 cases and 242 controls, was conducted. Data was analyzed by STATA 14. Propensit...

BACKGROUND The applicability of the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) in screening of insomnia is demonstrated in various populations. But, the tool has not been validated in a sample of Ethiopians. Therefore, this study aimed to assess its psychometric properties in community dwelling Ethiopian adults. MATERIAL AND METHODS Participants (n = 311, age = 25.5 ± 6.0 years and body mass index...

Estimating the independent effect of ‘‘place’’ on health outcomes has proven quite difficult. In this issue of the Journal, Auchincloss and Diez Roux contribute a lucid introduction to agent-based simulation models and argue that they may be a fruitful alternative to current approaches to the problem. Insofar as conceptual understanding must precede empirical investigation, this author agrees. ...

An association between air pollution and hospital admission for heart failure was first noted in the literature in 1995 (1). The association was confirmed in subsequent studies (2, 3), along with many studies showing an association with a more general increase in cardiovascular admissions (4–6). The most consistent associations have been with carbon monoxide and particulate matter, and both Poi...