IIUM Medical Journal Malaysia (IMJM)
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Ethical Considerations in Exploiting, Culturing and Killing Fish towards Animal Rights in Islam
Get PDFHuman show cruelty to fish during exploiting, culturing, killing, experimentation and amusement. Presently, overexploitation of marine fishes is a serious problem worldwide. More than 50% of total fish production is now raised in aquafarms where many fish suffer from parasitic infections, diseases, and debilitating injuries in culture systems. Every year, millions of fish are caught in nets and on hooks. Many of them are tortured just for sports. Fishes are also regularly used for scientific experiments. Many of them are killed by unethical ways. Among all animals, human is the main culprits in causing harms to animals including fishes by damaging their ecosystems. To secure animal rights, modern bio-ethics started to be developed in the last century. The principle of modern bio-ethics is very similar to the principle of Islamic bio-ethics. Therefore, modern bio-ethics might be guided by Islamic bio-ethics, which was well established in the 7th century. According to Islam, God gave the human being responsibility to look after animals, to protect them, and not to abuse or threaten them. Human is not permitted to kill animals just for sports or amusements. God created the universe in a perfect balance and human should not disturb this. Therefore, human may exploit and culture food (fish and other organisms) and ornaments without destroying aquatic ecosystems. Islam prescribes a set of rules to treat animals with the utmost kindness and compassion. However, Islamic direction can be integrated with science to ensure minimum stress, pain and suffering when killing animals including fishes
Fasting in Islam: A Combination of Spiritual Elevation and Prevention of Diseases
Get PDFThe obligatory fasting of Ramadan is not only an Islamic ritual to enhance the God-consciousness (called Taqwa), it may also lead to improvement of health status of fasting person(s). In other words, it is a complete overhauling instrument of Muslims soul/body in terms of faith and health. This can be termed as “Islamic fasting: a combination of spiritual elevation and prevention of diseases”. During fasting Muslims try to maintain integrity of the human body both physically and spiritually. It not only keeps us healthy physically/spiritually but also makes us healthy in social obligations. Furthermore, with full devotion it brings long-lasting changes in the individual’s life and relate to the level of righteousness and strength of character to resist desires. In health fasting plays an important role, for example the improvement of hyperlipidemia, obesity (fat loss), diabetes, cognition, cell functions, immunological factors, inflammation, stress and lifespan etc. This article is an effort to review and discuss research carried out on the listed conditions during the holy month of Ramadan on various aspects of human health
Integration and Islamisation Program for Clinical Post Graduate Students in International Islamic University of Malaysia (IIUM)
Get PDFIntegration and islamisation (INI) programmes for undergraduate medical students have been practiced, reviewed and published in many journals. However, there is only a dearth of study on the implementation of such a programme for postgraduate clinical students. Hence, there is a need to examine such a programme because of the different learning environment and characteristic of the students. The aim of this paper is to examine the existing clinical postgraduate programme at IIUM and attempts to improve the INI curriculum. Method: The study employs an analytical method and important factors for the development of the curriculum are analysed to come out with the objective, content, teaching methodology and assessment method suitable for the program. Result: The study identified the important factors that determine the curriculum to be the needs of National Health Service, the mission of the university, the requirement of the professional body and characteristic of the students. The study proposes that the objective of the program is to produce holistic orthopaedic surgeons who understand the belief of Muslim patients and is able to facilitate them in their ibadah and daily life as a Muslims. This is achieved through offering a course which consists of 4 main subjects on the principles of shariah which include the element of Islamic worldview, fiqh ibadah, fiqh muamalah and Islamic moral values with emphasis on issues related to medicine. The teaching method proposed is having regular seminars which consist of presentations and discussion of important concept in Islamic fiqh and followed by case study on fiqh issues related to Medicine. Finally, the students should be assessed from the case write up which they are required to submit before they can sit for the final professional exam. Conclusion: This improved program enables students to complete their study without compromising their duties to provide services at their respective hospitals
Machine Learning Cases in Clinical and Biomedical Domains
Get PDFThe aim of this paper is twofold: Firstly, to provide introductory knowledge to the reader who has little or no knowledge of machine learning with examples of applications in clinical and biomedical domains, and secondly, to compare and contrast the concept of Artificial Neural Network (ANN) and the Qur’anic concept of intellect (aql) in the Qur’an. Learning algorithm can generally be categorised into supervised and unsupervised learning. To better understand the machine learning concept, hypothetical data of glaucoma cases are presented. ANN is then selected as an example of supervised learning and the underlying principles in ANN are presented with general audience in mind with an attempt to relate the mechanism employed in the algorithm with Qur’anic verses containing the verbs derived from aql. The applications of machine learning in clinical and biomedical domains are briefly demonstrated based on the author’s own research and most recent examples available from University of California, Irvine Machine Learning Repository. Selected verses which indicate motivation to use the intellect in positive manners and rebuke to those who do not activate the intellect are presented. The evidence found from the verses suggests that ANN shares similar learning process to achieve belief (iman) by analysing the similitudes (amsal) introduced to the algorithm
Stem Cells Research: Therapeutic Potentials and Ethical Issues from Islamic Perspective
Get PDFThe advancement in human stem cell research has promised a viable alternative treatment for a range of ‘incurable diseases’ such as neurological diseases. To date, several studies have documented substantial evidences on the therapeutic properties of stem cells in promoting repair in different diseases including common neurological disorders i.e. ischaemic stroke and spinal cord injury. However, the progress of stem cell research has been surrounded by ethical issues which largely due to the usage of human embryos as one of the sources. These embryonic stem cells which originally derived from human embryo of aborted foetus or already existing human embryonic stem cells (hESCs) lines, has sparked an intense moral and religious argument among people of various faith, including Muslim community. From the therapeutic point of view, amongst the currently available stem cells, hESCs show the greatest potential for the broadest range of cell replacement therapies and are regarded as the most commercially viable. This review focuses on the major ethical issues, particularly to Muslim community, related to human embryonic stem cells research with special emphasis on the moral status of the embryo and the beginning of life according to the Islamic ethics and rulings. In this paper, we also discuss some ethical positions towards embryonic stem cell research in the Islamic world, including official regulations existing in some Muslim countries. We examine the justification and the necessity on the usage of hESCs following the newly discovered Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells (IPSCs) in the laboratory. In addition, we supplement the discussions with the general views and positions from the other two Abrahamic religions i.e. Christianity and Judaism
Abdominal Obesity and High-sensitivity C-reactive Protein Level among Malay Obese Adults in Kuantan, Malaysia
Get PDFIntroduction: Abdominal obesity and inflammation are two independent risk factors for cardiovascular disease. However, the inter-relationship between these two factors among Malay population is fragmented. The purpose of this study is to determine the association between waist circumference as a measure of abdominal obesity and high-sensitivity C-reactive protein as an indicator of inflammation status among Malay obese adults in Kuantan, Pahang. Materials and Methods: Ninety-three apparently healthy obese adults (BMI between 27.5 and 39.9 kg/m2 ) aged between 20 to 62 years old were recruited in this study (68% men and 32% women). Circumference tape was used to measure the waist circumference and fasting venous blood was obtained to determine the high-sensitivity C-reactive protein level. Results: On average, the waist circumference of obese men and women was 103 cm (SD = 8.7) and 94 cm (SD = 7.0), respectively. The median (IQR) of the hs-CRP level of the study participant was 3.80 mg/L (1.5, 10.1). The Kendall’s Tau correlation reveals that there is a significant positive linear correlation between waist circumference and hs -CRP level in obese men (r (30) = 0.355, p = 0.006) and women (r (63) = 0.177, p = 0.043). Conclusion: There is a significant inter-relationship between waist circumference and hs-CRP level among apparently healthy obese adults in Kuantan, Pahang. This study suggests that assessment of hs-CRP level is beneficial to predict the risk for future cardiovascular disease event and facilitate the management of obesity in this population. A prospective clinical study is recommended to confirm the findings
Cytotoxicity and Antifungal Properties of Hydroxychavicol Against Trichophyton rubrum
Get PDFHydroxychavicol (HC) is a phenolic compound of betel leaf (Piper betle). It has been reported to have antifungal properties against dermatophytes including T. rubrum. The aim of this study was to identify the effects of the HC against T. rubrum. Broth dilution method was used to determine the minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) and minimum fungicidal concentration (MFC) of the HC. Microscopic study of the treated fungus was done by transmission electron microscope (TEM). Cytotoxicity study using pre-adipocyte (3T3-L1) cell line was performed by means of MTT cell proliferation assay. The MIC and MFC results of the HC were both 0.49 µg/ml. Microscopic study revealed the destruction of the fungal cell wall and organelles. Cytotoxicity study showed HC to be non-toxic to the tested human cell line. In conclusion, HC may potentially be used as an alternative therapeutic agent against T. rubrum infections
Identification of Risk Factors for Myopia Questionnaire in the Malay Language among Primary School Children in Malaysia
Get PDFIntroduction: This study aimed to develop a questionnaire in Malay language for the identification of risk factors for myopia among primary school children aged 10 to 12 years old in Malaysia. Materials and Methods: The study commenced in October 2012 till Julai 2013 in two main phases. The first phase was a pilot study for the construction of questionnaire items by literature review and discussion with the experts. A total of 103 parents of primary school children were randomly selected to test the comprehensibility of the preliminary questionnaire. The second phase was the actual study which involved parents of 353 primary school children , 132 were parents whose children were myopes and 221 parents whose children were nonmyopes. Results: Discussions with experts in human vision science identified 5 main domains and 71 items for the preliminary questionnaire. A total of 55 items were retained for the actual study phase in view of statistically good correlation (r = 0.4 and above). Predictive validity by chi-square test allowed 28 items to be retained because of significant association with myopia (p <0.05). The correlation coefficient of testretest reliability result was considerably good (r = 0.765) and the validity in 2 categories of risk for myopia showed highly significant predictive validity of the questionnaire (p = 0.000). Conclusion: The developed Malay language questionnaire has good reliability and validity to identify the risk factors for myopia among primary school children in Malaysia