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National levels of personal health-care access and quality can be approximated by measuring mortality rates from causes that should not be fatal in the presence of effective medical care (ie, amenable mortality). Previous analyses of mortality amenable to health care only focused on high-income countries and faced several methodological challenges. In the present analysis, we use the highly standardised cause of death and risk factor estimates generated through the Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries, and Risk Factors Study (GBD) to improve and expand the quantification of personal health-care access and quality for 195 countries and territories from 1990 to 2015. We mapped the most widely used list of causes amenable to personal health care developed by Nolte and McKee to 32 GBD causes. We accounted for variations in cause of death certification and misclassifications through the extensive data standardisation processes and redistribution algorithms developed for GBD. To isolate the effects of personal health-care access and quality, we risk-standardised cause-specific mortality rates for each geography-year by removing the joint effects of local environmental and behavioural risks, and adding back the global levels of risk exposure as estimated for GBD 2015. We employed principal component analysis to create a single, interpretable summary measure–the Healthcare Quality and Access (HAQ) Index–on a scale of 0 to 100. The HAQ Index showed strong convergence validity as compared with other health-system indicators, including health expenditure per capita (r=0·88), an index of 11 universal health coverage interventions (r=0·83), and human resources for health per 1000 (r=0·77). We used free disposal hull analysis with bootstrapping to produce a frontier based on the relationship between the HAQ Index and the Socio-demographic Index (SDI), a measure of overall development consisting of income per capita, average years of education, and total fertility rates. This frontier allowed us to better quantify the maximum levels of personal health-care access and quality achieved across the development spectrum, and pinpoint geographies where gaps between observed and potential levels have narrowed or widened over time. Between 1990 and 2015, nearly all countries and territories saw their HAQ Index values improve; nonetheless, the difference between the highest and lowest observed HAQ Index was larger in 2015 than in 1990, ranging from 28·6 to 94·6. Of 195 geographies, 167 had statistically significant increases in HAQ Index levels since 1990, with South Korea, Turkey, Peru, China, and the Maldives recording among the largest gains by 2015. Performance on the HAQ Index and individual causes showed distinct patterns by region and level of development, yet substantial heterogeneities emerged for several causes, including cancers in highest-SDI countries; chronic kidney disease, diabetes, diarrhoeal diseases, and lower respiratory infections among middle-SDI countries; and measles and tetanus among lowest-SDI countries. While the global HAQ Index average rose from 40·7 (95% uncertainty interval, 39·0–42·8) in 1990 to 53·7 (52·2–55·4) in 2015, far less progress occurred in narrowing the gap between observed HAQ Index values and maximum levels achieved; at the global level, the difference between the observed and frontier HAQ Index only decreased from 21·2 in 1990 to 20·1 in 2015. If every country and territory had achieved the highest observed HAQ Index by their corresponding level of SDI, the global average would have been 73·8 in 2015. Several countries, particularly in eastern and western sub-Saharan Africa, reached HAQ Index values similar to or beyond their development levels, whereas others, namely in southern sub-Saharan Africa, the Middle East, and south Asia, lagged behind what geographies of similar development attained between 1990 and 2015. This novel extension of the GBD Study shows the untapped potential for personal health-care access and quality improvement across the development spectrum. Amid substantive advances in personal health care at the national level, heterogeneous patterns for individual causes in given countries or territories suggest that few places have consistently achieved optimal health-care access and quality across health-system functions and therapeutic areas. This is especially evident in middle-SDI countries, many of which have recently undergone or are currently experiencing epidemiological transitions. The HAQ Index, if paired with other measures of health-system characteristics such as intervention coverage, could provide a robust avenue for tracking progress on universal health coverage and identifying local priorities for strengthening personal health-care quality and access throughout the world. Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Navid Radfar of Paramus is getting help from a \"doctor\" to reach his dream of attending medical school. \"It would have been tough to go to medical school without this,\" said Radfar, who had taken out loans for his first year and a half of college. Radfar, a graduate of Paramus Catholic High School, hopes to become a neurosurgeon. \"If you have a compelling story to tell and have big dreams to make a difference in the world, we want to hear from you,\" Chris Barnes, director of corporate communications at Dr Pepper Snapple Group, said in a statement. \"A 60-second video could very well earn you tuition assistance and possibly a shot at a $100,000 grand prize.\"

As the name implies, panoramic X-rays provide a wide- angle view of the teeth, jaws and surrounding structures. Patients have a panoramic X-ray taken for an initial evaluation, followed by a series of close-up views of all sections of the teeth, called periapical X-rays. A periapical X-ray gives an in-depth look at a particular tooth. A \"full-mouth series\" consists of a group of periapical X-rays taken of all the patient's teeth. Nearly everything a dentist needs to know about a person's oral health is revealed by full-mouth periapical X-rays, said [Lida Radfar], meaning the routine panoramic view serves no real purpose. She and her colleagues randomly selected 1,000 panoramic X-rays from records of 1,000 patients admitted to UB dental-school clinics over four years. Two dental experts evaluated the X-rays for evidence of bone lesions or other indications of trouble. The evaluators found a total of 352 lesions, and concluded that all but a few would have been picked up by full-mouth- series X-rays. \"We're lucky to have a unique animal model for atherosclerosis - familial hypercholesterolemic (FH) swine, whose genetic defect causes them to spontaneously develop high blood cholesterol leading to atherosclerosis and vascular dysfunction by eight months of age, very similar to the way human beings do,\" said Kruse-Elliot. She noted that the FH pigs' blood vessels don't function normally compared with normal pigs. \"However when the FH pigs were fed cranberry juice powder made from whole cranberries for six months, their vessels acted more like normal pigs' while a control group of FH pigs had significantly less vascular relaxation. The researchers, who discovered that pigs are very fond of tart whole cranberries, are planning a series of experiments to dig deeper into the cranberry- vessel function link by applying tests used on humans to the pigs.

\"Everyone has a Picasso, but not all of them are fakes. It can happen,\" said Farhad Radfar, director of Mir Appraisal Services in Chicago. Radfar and his staff will be examining the items brought to the antique road show event beginning at 10 a.m. Saturday at the Wheaton Community Center, 1777 Blanchard Road, Wheaton. Radfar said the Wheaton event will be slightly different from the television show. For one, Radfar is discouraging participants from bringing in very large furniture pieces. However, photographs of a very large piece can be substituted for the real thing as long as they are clear.

[Sara Radfar], 21, spent her childhood in Laguna Niguel, Calif., about 56 miles southeast of Los Angeles. Her dad, Fereidoon Radfar, is a computer programmer. Her mom, Shiva, works in retail. Four years ago, Fereidoon Radfar got a job in Florida. The family moved right after Sara's high school graduation. The transition was difficult at first, but she adapted. Sara loved her quiet neighborhood in the suburbs of northwest Hillsborough County. Her pets had a back yard to play in. Her neighbors were friendly.

Just as much of the world did that day, [Alexander Radfar] sat in front of his television in shock as the buildings crumbled. \"When that happened, I couldn't do anything,\" Radfar, 51, said. \"I couldn't work, couldn't do oriental rugs. I couldn't handle it. So I closed my shop and I was thinking about freedom, about real freedom - and we have it.\" Features of the table trumpet Radfar's intended patriotic theme. One hole is beneath a Statue of Liberty and says \"God bless America\" when a player pockets a ball there. Another features Shahyad, \"In memory of the [Shah],\" a monument in Iran. Radfar has been fascinated by pool since he first saw the game as a 16-year-old. He said he has never played golf, only the mini version of it found in parks and amusement centers. So to objectively test the game, Radfar invited relatives and a few people who play either pool or golf to try it out. He said they called it challenging and encouraged him to go further with it. He now has patents pending for the table and the several variations of the game he has devised, and hopes a manufacturer will one day produce it.

In a telephone interview in Maku [West Azarbayjan Province] with a correspondent of the Central News Unit [of Iranian radio and TV], the governor of Maku [Ali Reza Radfar] announced the above piece of news, and said: With an increase in the number of victims in the two Turkish cities of Igdir and Dogubeyazit, which are close to the Iranian border, the country's HQ set up to prevent bird flu has decided to close the border to Turkish one-day visitors in order to stop the spread of the disease to our country.

Shiva Radfar, 50, of Safety Harbor, said her daughter, 21-year- old Sara Radfar, lived at the duplex. Thursday night, she invited her daughter over for dinner. She declined. \"She said, 'Mom, I have so much to do. I can't. Maybe the next day,' \" Shiva Radfar said. Vern Allen, the property manager of the duplex where Sara Radfar lived, said he noticed something strange on Friday. Radfar's black Ford Bronco wasn't there. It was 6 a.m., an hour when the SUV is almost always parked outside.

Privately owned Ariana TV broadcast a discussion programme entitled \"Negarish\" (\"Review\") on 26 November. The programme was devoted to Afghan President Hamed Karzai's new preconditions for signing bilateral security pact with Washington. A reporter began the programme with factual reports about the consultative loya jerga's decision and President Karzai's new conditions. The studio guests were journalist Shah Hussan Mortazawi, Dr Taher Hashemi, university lecturer, and political observer Hashmat Radfar. \"Neither should America specify a deadline, whether 10 or 20 days, for Karzai to sign, nor should Karzai continue the game so that Afghanistan loses the current opportunity\". \"One part of what Karzai has bargained is the president's legal worries. As the elected Afghan president, Karzai has the right to voice concerns over house searches, defend rights of Guantanamo prisoners - as Afghan nationals - and discuss the transparency of elections\".

Nawyan said the USA was trying to set an October deadline for the signing of the security agreement because it did not want the agreement to be \"misused by any side in the elections\". He said the 2014 elections \"will be very decisive and take Afghanistan in a new direction,\" but accused [Karzai] of using the Afghan-US security agreement to help his ruling team remain in power. Asked what situation in the country he predicts if the ruling team fails to meet the USA's deadline for signing the Kabul-Washington security agreement, [Mohammad Daud Hasas] said: \"The respected president and the USA know each other very well... They warn each other. The respected president says that the next president will sign it and the Americans say that it should be signed in October.\" He criticized the president for asking young people to \"get their voting cards\" in a situation where the provinces do not enjoy security. Karzai \"should exert pressures on the Americans and Europeans to ensure the people's security... And at least 50 per cent of the people should be able to take part in the elections,\" he said.