ABSTRACT
Under the influence of the epidemic, many meetings or works have been changed to remote, and lots of competitions have been postponed or even suspended. Nowadays, few platforms replace physical competition in distance. Therefore, we provide and implement a platform for tug-of-war using strandbeest, enabling contestants from two places apart to compete at the same or different times. We create the strandbeest tug-of-war platform via the development board, database system, and backend logic. The uniqueness of the mac address of the development board and the current time of the round filter the strandbeests' tension data and take the arithmetic average. After both contestants finish the round, the system compares the score of each contestant. The arithmetic average of the filtered tension data from the strandbeest is made to decide who the winner is. The maximum number of tension data is shown to be read and sent to the database at different times and the change before and after the round. Even if the pandemic slows down in the future, people can compete with this platform, especially contestants from different cities or countries, since it beats the constraint of distance. © 2022 IEEE.
ABSTRACT
The number of pediatric emergency department (PED) visits fell significantly during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. However, the impact of the ongoing pandemic on PED patients suffering from asthma attacks in Taiwan has not been studied. We thus analyzed patients with asthma attacks visiting a PED during the early stage of the COVID-19 pandemic and the following (resurgent) waves. We retrospectively studied pediatric patients with asthma attacks who visited the PED from 01 January 2019 to 30 September 2021. We retrieved patient numbers, demographic characteristics, triage acuities, medications, and PED dispositions during the various waves of the COVID-19 pandemic. A total of 1842 patients with asthmatic attacks presented to the PED during the study period. PED visits caused by asthmatic attacks declined by 55% after the first COVID-19 outbreak in early 2020 (p = 0.009) and fell even more remarkably (by 85%) in mid-2021 (p = 0.038), during the time when the numbers of confirmed COVID-19 cases skyrocketed (the second wave). However, neither the high-triage acuity rate nor the rate of admission differed between the two periods (p = 0.08 and 0.406, respectively). However, the proportion of systemic corticosteroid (SCS) prescriptions increased during the pandemic (81.90 vs. 77.77%, p = 0.029). The COVID-19 pandemic notably impacted the number of asthmatic PED visits not only during the first peak period but also during the following waves, but asthma severity did not vary over time. Physicians tended to prescribe more SCSs during the pandemic to control respiratory symptoms. We suggest that SCSs should be used cautiously even during the pandemic to minimize their adverse effects. Copyright © 2022 The Author(s). Published by MRE Press.