Association between time of exposure to screens and food consumption of children aged 2 to 9 years during the COVID-19 pandemic.

OBJECTIVE: To identify and map families' time of exposure to screens during the COVID-19 pandemic and to associate it with the frequency of children's food consumption. METHODS: This is a cross-sectional study carried out with parents or guardians of children aged between 2 and 9 years through an online questionnaire. The participants answered questions about socioeconomic data, family's screen habits, and children's food consumption. RESULTS: A total of 517 parents or guardians participated in the research. Children's median age when first exposed to screens was 6 months (interquartile range: 1-12 months). The average number of hours that children and guardians/parents were exposed to electronic devices was 3.9±2.3 and 9.0±2.9 respectively. As for food consumption, 60.9% of the guardians/parents and 54.3% of the children had the habit of having meals in front of screens. In addition, the consumption of snacks outside mealtimes, while using screens, was frequent in both groups. CONCLUSIONS: Children aged 2 to 9 years are excessively exposed to screens and the consumption of meals or snacks while using the devices is frequent. Considering the current demands of the pandemic, the necessity of using electronic devices is understandable. However, the authors emphasize the importance to educate families regarding limiting the use of screens, especially during meals, and monitoring the content of activities with electronic devices, as this exposure can influence food consumption and affect children's nutritional status and health.

Cardiovascular disease and COVID-19, a deadly combination: A review about direct and indirect impact of a pandemic.

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is known to present with respiratory symptoms, which can lead to severe pneumonia and respiratory failure. However, it can have multisystem complications such as cardiovascular manifestations. The cardiovascular manifestations reported comprise myocarditis, cardiogenic shock, arrhythmias, pulmonary embolism, deep vein embolism, acute heart failure, and myocardial infarction. There is also an indirect impact of the pandemic on the management of cardiovascular care that has been shown clearly in multiple publications. In this review, we summarize the deadly relation of COVID-19 with cardiovascular events and the wider impact on several cardiovascular care areas by the pandemic situation.

Optic neuritis in lung adenocarcinoma: A challenging diagnosis.

Optic neuritis with CRMP-5 IgG is a paraneoplastic inflammation of the optic nerve associated with lung cancer, mostly small-cell lung cancer. We present the case of a patient with lung adenocarcinoma who developed progressive bilateral visual loss a few months after immune-chemotherapy with pembrolizumab and after Covid-19 vaccination. Positive CRMP-5 IgG were detected in blood sample and complete work-up - including brain MRI - did not show any progression. High dose systemic corticoids were administered with transient improving, followed by intravenous immunoglobulins, methotrexate and rituximab but despite negativization of CRMP-5 IgG, the patient had a progressive visual loss.

Immune response to anti-SARS-CoV-2 prime-vaccination in patients with cancer: a systematic review and meta-analysis.

PURPOSE: This systematic review and meta-analysis aimed to evaluate the immune response to anti-SARS-CoV-2 prime-vaccination in patients with cancer. METHODS: We performed a systematic literature search using PubMed, Embase, and Cochrane Library until 28/09/2021, and conference proceedings from ASCO and ESMO 2021 annual meetings. We screened for observational or interventional studies including subjects ≥ 16 years old with cancer diagnosis who were vaccinated against SARS-CoV-2. Prime-vaccination was defined as one dose of Ad26.COV2-S vaccine or two doses of BNT162b2, mRNA-1273, ChAdOx1-S or inactivated SARS-CoV-2 vaccine. The outcomes were humoral and adaptive immune responses (proportion of subjects with positive titers of antibody anti-SARS-CoV-2 spike protein and anti-SARS-CoV-2 cellular responses, respectively). RESULTS: We included 89 records reporting data from 30,183 subjects. The overall seropositive rate within the first month after complete anti-SARS-CoV-2 prime-vaccination was 80% [95% confidence interval (CI), 72-86%], 60% (95%CI, 53-67%) in patients with hematological malignancies (HM) versus 94% (95%CI, 88-97%) in patients with solid malignancies (SM). The diagnosis of HM was significantly associated with a lower seropositive rate on multivariate meta-regression (odds ratio 0.35, 95% CI 0.18-0.69, HM versus both, p = 0.002). The overall humoral response was 49% (95% CI, 42-56%) after incomplete prime-vaccination and 79% (95% CI, 70-86%) at 2 months after complete prime-vaccination. These responses were also lower in patients with HM at these time points. The overall cellular response rate at any time after vaccination was 61% (95% CI, 44-76%). CONCLUSION: This meta-analysis provides compelling evidence of humoral and adaptive immune responses against SARS-CoV-2 in patients with cancer, which last for at least 2 months following complete prime-vaccination.

Non-pharmacological treatments for COVID-19: current status and consensus

Purpose: COVID-19 is a disease caused by SARS-CoV-2 (coronavirus type 2 of the severe acute respiratory syndrome), isolated in China, in December 2019. The strategy currently used by physicians is to control disease and to treat symptoms, including non-pharmacological treatments, as there is still no specific treatment for COVID-19. Thus, the aim of this article is to carry out a systematic review about non-pharmacological treatments used for COVID-19, addressing current status and consensus found in the literature. Methods: Three databases were consulted for evidence referring to the drugs indicated for COVID-19 (Cochrane Central, MEDLINE and Embase). The following terms and combinations were used: ((“2019-nCoV” OR 2019nCoV OR nCoV2019 OR “nCoV-2019” OR “COVID-19” OR COVID19 OR “HCoV-19” OR HCoV19 OR CoV OR “2019 novel*” OR Ncov OR “n-cov” OR “SARS-CoV-2” OR “SARSCoV-2” OR “SARSCoV2” OR “SARSCoV2” OR SARSCov19 OR “SARS-Cov19” OR “SARS-Cov-19”) OR “severe acute respiratory syndrome*” OR ((corona* OR corono*) AND (virus* OR viral* OR virinae*)) AND ((“lung injury”) OR (“ventilation use”) OR (“respiratory injuries” OR prone)) AND (treatment)) NOT Drugs NOT medicines NOT antivirals. Results: A total of 28 articles were selected. These articles adopted one or more treatment methods for patients with severe cases of COVID-19, i.e., oxygen therapy, prone position, inhaled nitric oxide, intravenous infusion, passive immunotherapy, mesenchymal stem cells (MSC). Conclusion: There is still no specific treatment approved for patients with COVID-19. The available evidence is not able yet to indicate the benefits or harms of non-pharmacological treatments, but some studies show that some treatments can play an important role in relation to COVID-19. The current consensus among researchers is that several studies using a randomized clinical trial should be carried out to provide evidence of safety and efficacy of the proposed treatments.

Impact of solid cancer on in-hospital mortality overall and among different subgroups of patients with COVID-19: a nationwide, population-based analysis.

BACKGROUND: Cancer seems to have an independent adverse prognostic effect on COVID-19-related mortality, but uncertainty exists regarding its effect across different patient subgroups. We report a population-based analysis of patients hospitalised with COVID-19 with prior or current solid cancer versus those without cancer. METHODS: We analysed data of adult patients registered until 24 May 2020 in the Belgian nationwide database of Sciensano. The primary objective was in-hospital mortality within 30 days of COVID-19 diagnosis among patients with solid cancer versus patients without cancer. Severe event occurrence, a composite of intensive care unit admission, invasive ventilation and/or death, was a secondary objective. These endpoints were analysed across different patient subgroups. Multivariable logistic regression models were used to analyse the association between cancer and clinical characteristics (baseline analysis) and the effect of cancer on in-hospital mortality and on severe event occurrence, adjusting for clinical characteristics (in-hospital analysis). RESULTS: A total of 13 594 patients (of whom 1187 with solid cancer (8.7%)) were evaluable for the baseline analysis and 10 486 (892 with solid cancer (8.5%)) for the in-hospital analysis. Patients with cancer were older and presented with less symptoms/signs and lung imaging alterations. The 30-day in-hospital mortality was higher in patients with solid cancer compared with patients without cancer (31.7% vs 20.0%, respectively; adjusted OR (aOR) 1.34; 95% CI 1.13 to 1.58). The aOR was 3.84 (95% CI 1.94 to 7.59) among younger patients (<60 years) and 2.27 (95% CI 1.41 to 3.64) among patients without other comorbidities. Severe event occurrence was similar in both groups (36.7% vs 28.8%; aOR 1.10; 95% CI 0.95 to 1.29). CONCLUSIONS: This population-based analysis demonstrates that solid cancer is an independent adverse prognostic factor for in-hospital mortality among patients with COVID-19. This adverse effect was more pronounced among younger patients and those without other comorbidities. Patients with solid cancer should be prioritised in vaccination campaigns and in tailored containment measurements.