BACKGROUND & PURPOSE Humans act as an intermediate host for Toxocara canis and Toxocara cati. Toxocara may be an important risk factor for asthma in humans. The aim of the present study was to evaluate immunoglobulin G (IgG) anti-Toxocara canis antibody, using enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) in asthmatic patients (aged 5-15 years), referring to a clinic of pulmonary diseases in Arak, ...

BACKGROUND The objective of this study was to investigate HLA-DRB1*and DQB1* allelic polymorphisms in Iranian patients with hydatidose. This is the first survey dealing with the correlation between HLA-DRB1* and DQB1* alleles and cystic echinococcosis in Iranian patients. METHODS The study was carried out on 56 patients with confirmed cystic echinococcosis and 30 apparently healthy individual...

BACKGROUND This study aimed to determine the effects of the interventions of Isfahan Healthy Heart Program (IHHP) on the type of oil consumed at the population level. It also tried to assess how this strategy has been effective as a health policy. METHODS The IHHP, a six-year community intervention program (2001-07), aimed at health promotion through the modification of cardiovascular disease...

The purpose of this paper is to construct perfect samplers for length-interacting Arak–Clifford–Surgailis polygonal Markov fields in the plane with nodes of order 2 (V-shaped nodes). This is achieved by providing for the polygonal fields a hard core marked point process representation with individual points carrying polygonal loops as their marks, so that the coupling from the past and clan of ...

BACKGROUND Enterococcal species have emerged as important pathogens in Iran as well as throughout the world. With the increased use of vancomycin, Vancomycin-Resistant Enterococci (VRE) has become an important nosocomial pathogen. OBJECTIVES The aim of the present study was to determine the incidence and antimicrobial susceptibility pattern of VRE and also to determine the most important gene...

BACKGROUND On the continuation of sorting the puzzle of the situation of hydatid disease in Iran and considering that so far no survey was conducted in this context in Arak City, Markazi Province central Iran, the present study was conducted to determine the seroprevalence of human hydatidosis using AgB-ELISA test. METHODS Totally 578 serum samples randomly were collected from patients referr...

We construct random dynamics on collections of non-intersecting planar contours, leaving invariant the distributions of lengthand area-interacting polygonal Markov fields with V-shaped nodes. The first of these dynamics is based on the dynamic construction of consistent polygonal fields, as presented in the original articles by Arak (1982) and Arak & Surgailis (1989, 1991), and it provides an e...