ABSTRACT
Background: Both healthcare personnel and patients have been impacted negatively by the COVID-19 epidemic, which has had a substantial effect on the healthcare sector. The healthcare workforce consists of physicians, nurses, and other healthcare professionals. Objective(s): To assess the psychological impact of COVID19 pandemic among different healthcare providers by assessing the depression, stress level, and anxiety related to COVID19 pandemic and the effect it had on their practice and psychological well-being. Methodology: To learn more about the experiences of healthcare professionals and to ascertain the effects of COVID-19 on their practice, a cross-sectional observational study including 311 practicing physicians, pharmacists, nurses, dentists, lab technicians, and other hospital staff members was carried out across Saudi Arabia. A pretested semi-structured QuestionPro questionnaire that was sent electronically via social media, email, and phones was used to collect responses from study participants. It was cleaned up before being examined with SPSS program 28. Frequency and percentage displays were used to illustrate quantitative data. Spearman's correlation was used to calculate the association between stress score, anxiety score, and depression score. Appropriate statistical tests of significance were used to determine the association between stress scores and various background characteristics. Statistical significance was set at the 0.05 level for P-value. Result(s): Over half of the medical staff had expertise in caring for COVID-19 patients, and approximately two out of every five trial participants had a history of COVID-19 infection previous to immunisation. The vaccine could minimise the infection, according to 3/4 of them. Among those surveyed, just 33% had a history of chronic diseases. The majority of participants believed they had dealt with difficult events at some time in the preceding week for all of the categories. Similar to this, depression was sometimes experienced for 4 items but never for 3 when there were the most participants. It could be deduced that the majority of participants had normal Anxiety (33.8%), Stress (36%), and Depression (38.6%) scores. The median psychological assessments were considerably higher among those who were between the ages of 35 and 56, divorced, were already infected with the COVID-19 virus previous to immunisation, and had a history of chronic disease. Conclusion(s): The study's findings led to the conclusion that stress and anxiety are significant COVID-19 effects on both healthcare professionals and patients. The epidemic has also highlighted the significance of the need for appropriate safety equipment, practices, and support for the physical and mental well-being of medical personnel.Copyright © 2023, Codon Publications. All rights reserved.
ABSTRACT
Objective: This present study seeks to summarise the psychological impact of COVID-19, address the mental health outcomes during a pandemic, and conduct a meta-analysis to draw conclusions and recommend coping strategies. Methodology: We follow the Preferred Reporting Items guideline for conducting this systematic review analysis (PRISMA). Online resources like PUBMED, ProQuest" and the "Web of Science" database were assessed to assemble the relevant research. A correlation model fixed effect model was used to generate proportions with 95 % confidence intervals (CI) and model fitted weights. Cochrane Q test and I2 tests were performed for measuring heterogeneity. Egger regression asymmetry test and funnel plot were to measure the publication bias. Result(s): Total of 12 articles were included with the main parameters of depression, anxiety, and stress. Out of these 12 articles eight (66.6%), articles were cross-sectional while four (33.3%) were online surveys. Meta-analysis shows 99.4% significant heterogeneity. Eggers test shows the 0.5726 value which indicates that no publication bias was reported. Conclusion(s): The prevalence of depression and anxiety among healthcare professionals was elevated during a pandemic. Female workers especially nurses working in COVID wards show more depression than others due to the unfavourable condition of patients.Copyright © 2022, Universidade de Sao Paulo. Museu de Zoologia. All rights reserved.
ABSTRACT
We report a case of a 40-year-old man who presented with left shoulder pain and marked functional impairment two days after receiving the second dose of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine. Advanced imaging demonstrated focal avascular necrosis (AVN) of his humeral head. Initial management included simple analgesics, activity modification, and an ultrasound-guided intra-articular hydrodilatation injection. The patient subsequently had an improved range of motion but persistent severe shoulder pain. He has now been offered surgical intervention. Despite having risk factors for developing AVN previously, the patient did not demonstrate any recent risk factors for developing the disease. COVID-19 vaccination is known to cause severe joint pain and stiffness rarely. However, avascular necrosis is not a known or documented side effect. His symptoms arose directly after the administration of the vaccine, with no other demonstrable cause. Therefore, we are reporting COVID-19 vaccination as a potential new risk factor for AVN of the humeral head.
ABSTRACT
A multifunctional medical device for the aid of COVID affected patients are scarce. This paper proposes an automated medical device which is incorporated with a feedback mechanism and a GSM base emergency alarm system. The combined sensors in the prototype can acquire readings of a patient's temperature, heart rate, oxygen saturation (SpO2), respiratory rate (RR), and heart condition noninvasively and can send these vitals easily via SMS in real time. Based on the patient's SpO2 level and RR, the system can control the oxygen flow through a nasal canola with the aid of a servo motor mechanism. The system derives information from the sensors to operate automatically based on the degrading vitals of a patient. Due to its nature of user friendliness the protype can be operated without much prior medical knowledge. © 2023 IEEE.
ABSTRACT
A general lockdown to minimize to slow transmission of COVID-19 in Bangladesh came into effect on March 26th and lasted until May 30th. The lockdown had far-reaching economic implications for the population, with many facing economic hardship due to loss of income. Despite the attempt of the government to ease economic hardship by means of social safety net packages, people suffered from poor access to health services, and financial and food insecurity. This is likely to have disastrous consequences for the nutritional status of young children. This cross-sectional study measured the impact of the first general lockdown on food consumption of young children, access to water, handwashing and health seeking behavior, and the ability to maintain livelihood among households with children under the age of 5, in rural Bangladesh. The result of the analysis suggest that loss of income was reported by almost all respondents across all socio-economic groups. However, the poorest households were less likely to provide for sufficient food for their families and had to reduce consumption of food. Diet diversity and food intake-particularly animal protein sources-for young children were severely affected. On the other, increased awareness of handwashing and access to soap were also reported. The pandemic is likely to be detrimental to the nutritional status of children in Bangladesh and can exacerbate existing health inequities. Strong social safety net programs are needed to protect vulnerable populations to consequences of restrictive measures, supported in design and implementation by non-governmental organizations.
Subject(s)
COVID-19 , Nutritional Status , Humans , COVID-19/epidemiology , COVID-19/prevention & control , Cross-Sectional Studies , Communicable Disease Control , Patient Acceptance of Health CareABSTRACT
Background and Objective(s): Poverty is a key contributor to delayed diagnosis and limited access to early intervention and rehabilitation for children with cerebral palsy (CP) in rural Bangladesh. Earlier studies suggested that efforts to improve outcomes for children with disabilities in low-and middle-income countries should include combined measures to improve service provision and family economic/ social capital. This trial aimed to test the efficacy of an integrated microfinance/livelihood and community-based rehabilitation (CBR) (IMCBR) program in improving health-related quality of life (HRQoL) and motor function of children with CP from ultra-poor families and social capital gain to those families from such intervention in rural Bangladesh. Study Design: Cluster randomised controlled trial. Study Participants & Setting: Children with CP aged <=5 years from ultra-poor families in rural Bangladesh. Materials/Methods: Children with CP were randomly allocated in three arms;Arm-A: livelihood support and CBR (IMCBR), Arm-B: CBR only, and Arm-C: care-as- usual. Livestock (e.g. goat, lamb, chicken, etc.) or sewing machines were provided as livelihood support. As part of CBR, group-based goal directed training sessions and parent training sessions were organised weekly and home visits were made fortnightly. The CBR was stopped 2.5 months post-enrollment due to the COVID-19 pandemic and was replaced with phone follow-up. The primary outcome was HRQoL of children while Gross Motor Function Classification System (GMFCS) level of children and social capital of their families were the secondary outcomes. Intention-to- treat analysis was performed. Result(s): Twenty-four clusters including 251 children-primary caregivers' dyads were assigned to three arms;Arm-A= 80, Arm-B= 82, and Arm-C= 89. Between baseline and endline, the percentage change in mean HRQoL was highest in Arm-A (30.0%) with significant mean differences between Arm-A and Arm-B (p=0.015). The GMFCS level significantly changed both in Arm-A (p=0.007) and Arm-C (p=0.011). Also, the improvement in mean total social capital score was significantly higher in Arm-A compared to Arm-B (p<0.001) and Arm-C (p<0.001). Conclusions/Significance: The findings suggest that IMCBR could improve HRQoL and motor functions of children with CP and the social capital of their ultra-poor families. Long-term follow-up of the trial participants and/ or future exploration of such interventions is essential.
ABSTRACT
Introduction: This trial aimed to test the efficacy of an integrated microfinance/livelihood and community-based rehabilitation (CBR) (IMCBR) program in improving health-related quality of life (HRQoL) and motor function of children with cerebral palsy (CP) from ultra-poor families and social capital gain to those families from such intervention in rural Bangladesh. Patients and Methods: This was an open-label cluster randomized controlled trial among children with CP aged ≤5 years randomly allocated in three arms;Arm-A: livelihood support and CBR (IMCBR), Arm-B: CBR only and Arm-C: care-as- usual. The CBR was stopped 2.5 months post-enrollment due to the COVID-19 pandemic and was replaced with phone follow-up followed by home-based CBR. The primary outcome was HRQoL of children while Gross Motor Function Classification System (GMFCS) level of children and social capital of their families were the secondary outcomes. Intention-to- treat analysis was performed. Results: Twenty-four clusters including 251 children-primary caregivers' dyads were assigned to three arms;Arm-A = 80, Arm-B = 82 and Arm-C = 89. Between baseline and endline, the percentage change in mean HRQoL was highest in Arm-A (30.0%) with significant mean differences between Arm-A and Arm-B (p = 0.015). The GMFCS level significantly changed both in Arm-A (p = 0.007) and Arm-C (p = 0.011). Also, the improvement in mean total social capital score was significantly higher in Arm-A compared to Arm-B (p <0.001) and Arm-C (p <0.001). Conclusion: The findings suggest that IMCBR could improve HRQoL and motor functions of children with CP and social capital of their ultra-poor families. Long-term follow- up of the trial participants and/or future exploration of such interventions are essential.
ABSTRACT
Objective: This study aimed to test the effectiveness of an 'integrated microfinance/livelihood and community-based rehabilitation (CBR)' (IMCBR) program in improving quality of life and physical ability of children with cerebral palsy (CP), mental health of primary caregivers and social/economic capital of ultra-poor families of children with CP in rural Bangladesh. Design: Open-label pragmatic randomized controlled trial (registration: ACTRN12619001750178). Method: Children with CP aged ≤5 years were recruited in three arms: Arm-A: IMCBR, Arm-B: CBR, and Arm-C: control (i.e. care as usual). Each arm had eight clusters of 10-14 child-caregiver dyads. Caregivers recruited in the Arm-A received livelihood support (e.g., goat/lamb/poultry) and their children with CP received CBR once a week. The child-caregiver dyads in Arm-B received CBR only. The control Arm did not receive any intervention. However, CBR was stopped at 2.5 months of intervention due to COVID-19 pandemic and weekly phone follow-up was completed for home-based CBR. TNO-AZL Preschool children Quality of Life (TAPQoL), Gross Motor Function Classification System (GMFCS) and Communication Function Classification System (CFCS) were used to assess quality of life, motor function and communication of children, respectively. Depression, Anxiety, Stress Scale-Short Form-21 (DASS-21) was used to assess depression, anxiety and stress of primary caregivers. Results: Out of 251 children with CP and their caregivers recruited at baseline, 233 children and primary caregivers (Arm-A: n = 74, Arm-B: n = 77, and Arm-C: n = 82 dyads) completed the 12 month trial. The mean values of livelihood items given per family in Arm A increased from ∼USD66 to ∼USD79 between 0month(m) and 12m (p = 0.066), respectively. The mean TAPQoL score for physical functioning significantly increased between 0m and 12m in all three Arms (p < 0.001, p = 0.017 and p < 0.001 in Arm A, Arm B and Arm C, respectively), however, the improvement in the score was highest in Arm A. Similarly, significant improvement in the GMFCS level was observed between 0m and 12m in all three Arms with the highest improvement in Arm A (p < 0.001). Children's CFCS levels deteriorated slightly at 12m follow up in all three Arms. The depression, anxiety and stress levels among primary caregivers of children reduced significantly between the 0m and 12m in all three Arms (p ≤ 0.001 for all). Conclusion: Our findings suggest that the IMCBR is effective in enhancing quality of life and motor functions of children with CP, mental health of primary caregivers and economic status of ultra-poor families.
ABSTRACT
At present, just 40% of Nigeria’s populace is associated with the energy matrix, while power supply challenges are capable around 60% of the time. In the best-case scenario, the regular everyday power supply in Nigeria is assessed at four hours, albeit a few days can pass by with no force by any means. Neither force cuts nor reclamations are reported;prompting requires a heap shedding plan during the COVID-19 lockdowns to help reasonable conveyance and consistency. To address this issue, this paper proposes energy harvesting technologies to the epileptics power supply in Nigeria. The technology was chosen as proven efficient and reliable in many studies as an alternative and reliable power generation source. It is also largely maintenance-free and environmentally friendly, and powers hardware where there are no ordinary force sources, and ultimately, it wipes out the requirement for continuous battery substitutions and running wires to end applications. The paper was written in sections: Introduction;Power Supply in Nigeria;Current Situation in the Power Sector;Overview of Energy Harvesting Technology;Application Area of Energy Harvesting;and Solution to Epileptic Power Supply in Nigeria. Lastly, a concise conclusion and a list of relevant references were presented. © 2021, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.
ABSTRACT
Healthcare is one of the basic needs for human beings. Unfortunately, a densely populated country like Bangladesh has always struggled to provide adequate healthcare to all of its people, especially to the rural population. To handle with huge amount of data and coordination between the doctors and patients, electronic health record system (EHR) has become a necessity. During this Covid-19 pandemic, face to face consultation between frontline workers like doctors, and nurse and patients has become difficult. As a result, many patients are having difficulty in getting treatment from doctors. In Bangladesh's perspective at this moment, a cost effective, energy efficient and portable device system is needed to build up a customized Electronic health record system. The proposed system can reduce medical errors about patient identification and treatment, increase effectiveness and timeliness of doctors and overall improve the health care of people of the rural area Therefore, an easy to use, affordable, user-friendly and customized EHR system design is proposed in this paper by utilizing recent wireless communication techniques that can give the rural people better health service during lockdown / isolated condition as imposed due to pandemic scenario. © 2021 AIUB Office of Research and Publication. All rights reserved.
ABSTRACT
This study represents a detailed investigation of induced stress detection in humans using Support Vector Machine algorithms. Proper detection of stress can prevent many psychological and physiological problems like the occurrence of major depression disorder (MDD), stress-induced cardiac rhythm abnormalities, or arrhythmia. Stress induced due to COVID -19 pandemic can make the situation worse for the cardiac patients and cause different abnormalities in the normal people due to lockdown condition. Therefore, an ECG based technique is proposed in this paper where the ECG can be recorded for the available handheld/portable devices which are now common to many countries where people can take ECG by their own in their houses and get preliminary information about their cardiac health. From ECG, we can derive RR interval, QT interval, and EDR (ECG derived Respiration) for developing the model for stress detection also. To validate the proposed model, an open-access database named "drivedb” available at Physionet (physionet.org) was used as the training dataset. After verifying several SVM models by changing the ECG length, features, and SVM Kernel type, the results showed an acceptable level of accuracy for Fine Gaussian SVM (i.e. 98.3% for 1 min ECG and 93.6 % for 5 min long ECG) with Gaussian Kernel while using all available features (RR, QT, and EDR). This finding emphasizes the importance of including ventricular polarization and respiratory information in stress detection and the possibility of stress detection from short length data (i.e. from 1 min ECG data), which will be very useful to detect stress through portable ECG devices in locked down condition to analyze mental health condition without visiting the specialist doctor at hospital. This technique also alarms the cardiac patients from being stressed too much which might cause severe arrhythmogenesis. © 2021 AIUB Office of Research and Publication. All rights reserved.
ABSTRACT
In 2020 and because of COVID-19 pandemic, all institution transformed into online education is well established that there was no face to face teaching anymore and some institute and teachers were not ready to deal with, moreover students didn't adapt to start the learning process online, This study shows aims to determine the best methods and technique we can use to give the best online education experience for both students and teachers in all institution wither if it's academic, business or an individual. To test the hypothesis that we can enhance online education for all students an online survey was distributed to 115 students who study bachelor computer science and were taking online classes through Zoom and Youtube, the result showed that students prefer to digital pen and vLogs over slides, they care about video's sound quality and prefer to watch 10 - 15 min video duration also they welcomed the Youtube chapters new technique to divided the long video into sections plus they prefer the audience engaging, energetic teaching style. The result showed that students are adapting to online learning and some of our technique were well received and some had no effect, On this basis, the concept of enhancing online education through new tools and practising new methods and trying them can taking into account when creating an online class in any educational institution. © Published under licence by IOP Publishing Ltd.