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Today, economic shocks, negative effects of climate change, and the crises that directly affect human health, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, have shown that food security is always important for every country, regardless of its development status. With the introduction of the concept of healthy food along with adequate food, people have begun to change the criteria they look for when they eat. The demand for wheat-related products, which constitute the raw material of one of the most basic nutrients for human beings, has changed within this structure. It can be said that einkorn, emmer, and spelt wheats, which are known as the ancestors of wheat, come to the fore more today, especially when the demand for the products produced from wheat landraces is getting to increase. The fact that the products obtained from these wheats, which are important in terms of genetic resources, are healthier and more nutritious than the products obtained from commercial wheats is one of the main reasons for this interest. There are important initiatives in the production and commercialization of hulled wheat-based products in many countries in the world. It is seen that the products obtained from emmer and einkorn wheats are offered to the market, especially in Europe, as well as in countries such as Turkiye and the production is supported by the states, NGOs, and private sector. The products obtained from this type of wheats are finding more and more place day by day in different systems such as geographical indication and organic agriculture. For this reason, wheat landraces are of great importance as a genetic resource, and their sociological and economic aspects need to be evaluated in their conservation and sustainable use. In this study, the socioeconomic evaluation of einkorn wheat has been done and the results of a case study on Iza wheat, an einkorn wheat from Turkiye, have been presented. As a result of the study, it has been shown that economic sustainability is important in the protection and sustainability of this type of wheat, and it needs start-up support at the starting point. When these are provided, it has been revealed that the production of such wheat can become widespread both in organic agriculture and in the geographical indication system, and this type of wheat can be used as a development tool in local economic development by transforming it into value-added products. © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022.
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Background/purpose -The aim of this research is to examine the meanings through metaphors that academics derive from their experiences regarding the measurement and evaluation practices when emergency remote teaching was conducted due to the COVID-19 pandemic, to identify the problems they experienced with the measurement and evaluation practices, and to present their solution recommendations. Materials/methods -The study was structured as a qualitative research. The problems experienced by academics in measurement and evaluation practices, together with their solution suggestions were examined according to the "basic qualitative research" pattern. On the other hand, the "phenomenological qualitative research" design was used since the meanings attributed to the measurement and evaluation practice experiences were examined through metaphors. The participants of the study were 2,321 academics teaching at state and private universities in Turkey. Results - The findings reveal that most of the problems experienced were related to "cheating, test security, fair exam environment, plagiarism, inability to measure whether learning objectives had been achieved, inappropriate online measurement and evaluation methods, lack of quality in assessment practices, and technical issues regarding learning management systems." Conclusion - The solutions proposed by the participant academics were the use of alternative assessment methods, conducting face-to-face rather than online exams, asking different questions for each student by mixing up the questions in the exam, and using webcams for online exam invigilation. Metaphors attributed to the measurement and evaluation practices were grouped under three categories;as positive metaphors (e.g., lighthouse, life buoy), negative metaphors (e.g., hallucination, digging a well with a needle), and metaphors implying that such practices played a key role (e.g., water in desert, surgery) in emergency. Copyright © 2022 by the author(s). This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 4.0 International License (CC-BY-4.0), where it is permissible to download and share the work provided it is properly cited.
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Background and Aim: We aimed to evaluate cardiac manifestations of the multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children(MIS-C) and the changes in cardiac function during one year of follow-up. Method(s): All children diagnosed as MIS-C with cardiac involve-ment were enrolled in this prospective study. The diagnosis and severity of the disease of MIS-C was made according to the Centers for Disease Control and World Health Organization guidelines. Clinical findings, laboratory parameters including car-diac markers, electrocardiographic and echocardiographic findings at the time of diagnosis and during follow-up were evaluated. Cardiac magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) was performed on all children with echocardiographic abnormality. Result(s): Between April 1st 2020 and December 1st 2021,71 chil-dren were diagnosed with MIS-C and 44 of these patients had car-diac involvement (25 male and 19 female). 24 patients were followed up in the intensive care unit and all of these patients had myocardial involvement. All the patients had elevated NT-proBNP levels (median:5893pg/ml) whereas troponin-T levels were above upper limit in 13 patients. A significant positive cor-relation was found between troponin-T and NT-proBNP (plt;0.01). The NT-proBNP levels were also positively correlated with the severity of MIS-C (plt;0.05). On admission 22 patients had tachycardia and atrioventricular conduction disturbances and supraventricular tachycardia developed in 5 of these patients during follow-up. Bradycardia was observed in 18(40%) patients during hospitalization (4 of these occurred after tachycardia). Although 26 patients had an echocardiographic abnormality, only twelve patients had systolic dysfunction (9 with mild and 3 with moderate) and two patients had diastolic dysfunction. NT-proBNP and troponin-T were negatively correlated with ejection fraction ve fractional shortening (respectively, p = 0.003, p = 0.013). Cardiac MRI was normal in all patients except 3 patients who had myocardial late gadolinium enhancement of left ven-tricle. Pericardial effusion was observed in 14 patients. The echo-cardiographic abnormalities disappeared in 42 patients during follow-up, one patient died on the second day of hospitalization and and 1 patient has ongoing LV systolic dysfunction. Conclusion(s): Bradycardia and myocardial involvement is common during MIS-C. Although myocardial dysfunction can be observed during acute disease, commonly the disease does not cause perma-nent damage during one year of follow-up.
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Objectives: This study aimed to evaluate the COVID-19 triage results of the admissions made by patients in a certain region to the Education Family Practice Center (E-FPC) during the pandemic period. Methods: Patients aged 18 years and above, who were applied to the E-FPC between March 12 and April 30, 2020, were included in the study. Every patient had filled in a triage form. Potential cases were referred to a high-level healthcare center. Polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and chest computed tomography (CT) results of the referred patients were followed up and noted. Results: Four hundred sixty-one patients were included in the study. Twenty-seven (5.9%) patients had a fever, 219 (47.5%) patients had a cough, 34 (7.4%) patients had dyspnea, and 305 (66.2%) patients had other symptoms. Eighty-six (18.6%) of the patients were admitted to the hospital for PCR test of which 15 (17.4%) had a positive test result. Seventy-one (15.4%) patients underwent a chest CT and 25 (35.2%) of them had results compatible with COVID-19. Fever was detected in 8 (53.3%) of the patients with a positive PCR result and in 6 (8.5%) patients with a negative PCR result (p<0.001). Dyspnea was detected in 13 (52.0%) patients whose chest CT results were compatible with COVID-19 and in 5 (10.9%) patients whose chest CT results were not compatible with COVID-19 (p<0.001). Conclusion: Symptoms, CT imaging, and PCR results should be evaluated together in the diagnosis of COVID-19. Triage practices should be maintained in primary healthcare centers throughout the pandemic. ©Copyright 2022 by Anatolian Journal of Family Medicine
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Introduction: Although Phase III trial results of many COVID-19 vaccines were reported, the literature regarding community results is inadequate for Corona Vac. This study aims to evaluate the experience gained during the vaccination process among health care workers (HCWs), the measured antibody responses and the factors affecting the response. These findings will contribute to the literature in this field. Materials and Methods: Anti-SARS-CoV-2 (anti-spike) antibodies were measured by ELISA in blood samples taken at least 28 days (28-32) after the second CoronaVac among 264 HCWs vaccinated twice with an interval of 28 days. Information from individuals was collected with an online participation form. Results: A total of 264 HCWs (166 females (63%), 98 males (37%) whose ages werebetween 23-69 (mean 44.22 +/- 11.58) were included independent of their COVID-19 history in the study. After vaccination, 2211CWs (8.3%) were unresponsive, 25 (9.5%) HCWs among responders had a weak antibody response, and 217 (82.2%) had afull antibody response according to the test kit manufacturer. For HCWs with and without a COVID-19 infection history, the full antibody response rates were 91.7% and 77.5%, respectively. The antibody titres tended to be lower in HCWs with no prior COVID-19 infection (p= 0.046). In our study, antibody response was found to be significantly lower in males (p= 0.043). There was a significant decrease in antibody response with advancing age (p= 0.002 Chi-square test, p= 0.030 Spearman coefficient), and the difference was highly significant (p= 0.017) above the age of 60. Conclusion: In this study, it was determined that 91.7% of healthcare workers (weak in 9.5% and full in 82.2%) developed anti-spike antibodies with CoronaVac. It was determined that the factors affecting the development of antibodies were gender, age, and the state of having COVID-19.
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BACKGROUND AND AIM: Anticoagulant treatment reduces mortality rates in COVID-19 patients. aPTT is measured to be prolonged in many Covid-19 patients and is associated with the presence of lupus anticoagulant (LA). Our aim in the study is to emphasize that LA should be considered in the evaluation of anticoagulant therapy and prolonged aPTT status due to the increased risk of thrombosis in LA-positive with COVID-19 patients. METHODS: Patients who LA test performed between November-2020 and April-2021 were grouped as positive and negative according to the COVID-19 PCR test results. Confirmed COVID-19 patients were evaluated for thromboembolic event and thrombosis laboratory. The data were obtained retrospectively from the laboratory information management system. RESULTS: The LA test of 806 patients were performed during the time interval, and 52 patients also confirmed positive COVID-19 PCR results. While LA was positive in 25% of PCR (-) patients, this rate increased to 50% in COVID-19 patients (p=0.003). Also, mean prothrombin time and aPTT were measured to be prolonged in LA positive COVID-19 patients compared to those with PCR(-) (p=0.02). Although thrombosis was observed in the COVID-19 group with LA positivity, no thromboembolic event was found in the negative group, but this situation is not statistically significant. CONCLUSIONS: LA positivity is associated with an increased risk of thrombosis. We recommend adding the LA test to the coagulation panel and using it especially for patients with high aPTT values in the follow-up of the disease against the increased risk of thrombosis.
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OBJECTIVE: In this period when mutant strains are increasing all over the world, studies on how much humoral immunity will protect against the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome 2 (SARS-CoV-2) are quite limited. The aim of our study is to investigate the positivity and antibody levels of the COVID-19 reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) test, the frequency of SARS-CoV-2 re-infection, and the protective antibody level against re-infection. METHODS: Patients who were positive for COVID-19 IgG antibody between 1 July and 31 August were included in our study. The COVID-19 RT-PCR test positivity, age, gender and comorbidities of these patients were recorded before this date. The COVID-19 RT-PCR test positivity of these patients was followed from the National COVID-19 Database between September 1, 2020 and February 28, 2021. RESULTS: 1665 patients (female: male 683: 982, mean age 40.6+/-13.4 years). Among all patients, 14 patients had reinfection and the frequency of reinfection was 0.8%. It was observed that the frequency of reinfection was more frequent in patients with PCR negative (p<0.001). The IgG cut-off value causing reinfection was found to be 11.9 (AUC: 0.844, 79.2% sensitivity, 78.6% specificity) (p<0.001). CONCLUSION: Humoral antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 were protective against COVID-19 reinfection, 0.8% of the patients had reinfection and the resultant reinfection was mostly seen in PCR negative patients who were asymptomatic.
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Purpose: The study aims to examine the effects of sociodemographic, organizational, and resilience factors on the fear of COVID-19 of healthcare workers in the filiation teams. Materials and Methods: 1028 healthcare workers participated in the study. The sociodemographic questionnaire, The Fear of COVID-19 Scale, and The Resilience Scale for Adults were used. The data were analysed with stepwise multiple linear regression by using the backward elimination method. Results: The study showed that age and family cohesion are positively significant, while planned future and perception of self are negatively significant explanatory factors on the fear of COVID-19. The fear of COVID-19 is higher in females, and in those;with a high level of education, who have an individual with a chronic disease at home, with a low-income level, who lost a colleague or a family member due to coronavirus, who have an increase in patient burden, and who have problems in access to medical equipment. Conclusion: It is recommended to improve psychosocial support and organizational conditions for healthcare workers in the filiation teams.
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Objective Multisystemic inflammatory syndrome in children (MIS-C) is characterized by persistent fever, systemic hyperinflammation, and multiple-organ dysfunction. There are a few reports about MIS-C presenting with acute abdomen. The aim of this study is to demonstrate the clinical characteristics and treatment options for MIS-C-related acute abdomen and appendicitis. Methods This was a retrospective study conducted between April 2020 and October 2020 in our pediatric intensive care unit in Turkey. Patients between the ages of 1 month and 18 years who presented with acute abdomen and were ultimately diagnosed with MIS-C were included. Results Seven patients with a median age of 12.5 (interquartile range 10.5-13) years were enrolled. Four were females. The most frequent symptoms were fever, abdominal pain, and vomiting. Three patients had involvement of the appendix that required surgical intervention. All pathology reports were compatible with appendicitis. The other patients also had an acute abdomen. One patient had malignant hyperthermia during induction of anesthesia, so surgery was postponed and medical management was commenced. The clinical picture regressed with immunomodulation. All patients were treated with intravenous immunoglobulin and steroids. Four patients with acute abdomens improved with immunomodulation, and surgery was not needed. Conclusion MIS-C may present with an acute abdomen. Immunomodulation should be considered instead of surgery if the clinical course is not complicated.
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Nutrition is an important component of human health that influences the immune response, especially in those who are at risk of cancer. It is critical in the COVID-19 era to respond to cancer in a more coordinated and timely manner. So far, there are only a few systematic studies on the increased prevalence of COVID-19 or SARS-CoV2 symptomatic or asymptomatic infections in cancer patients with no comprehensive care plan. The goal of this research is to learn more about the function of diet in cancer patients with in COVID-19 period. The importance of diet in the predisposition, prevention, and management of COVID-19 in cancer patients, as well as the role of dietary supplementation with vitamins or minerals, and microbiota in the COVID-19 period, was discussed in this study. The results might aid in the development of nutritional maintenance and complication control guidelines for all patients with cancer during the continuing COVID-19 pandemic.
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Objectives: This study aims to focus on the radiological severity of covid-19 pneumonia in patients with rheumatic musculoskeletal diseases (RMD). Materials and Methods: A total of 342 Polymerase Chain Reaction positive patients were retrospectively reviewed. The patients were divided into two groups in terms of the presence of RMD. Chest Computed Tomography (CT) severity scores, demographic characteristics, hospitalization, intensive care unit (ICU) requirement, length of stay at the hospital were compared between RMD and non-RMD groups. Typical and atypical findings on CT images were identified with their incidence in both groups of patients. Results: Age and female gender were significantly higher in the RMD group (p=0.001, p=0.041). The average CT-severity score was higher in the RMD group, but the difference was not statistically significant (p=0.081). ICU transfer and mortality rates were higher in the RMD, whereas no difference was found in hospitalization rates and length of stay (p=0.002, p=0.036, p=0.280, p=0.168). Ground glass opacities, superimposed consolidation, and crazy paving patterns were the most common typical findings seen on both groups. Atypical CT findings for covid-19 pneumonia were found to be higher in the RMD group than in the non-RMD group. Conclusion: Chronic inflammation and the use of immunosuppressive drugs constitute a vulnerability to infections in RMD patients. In this study, mortality and ICU requirements were found to be higher in patients with RMD. Similarly, the higher rate of atypical chest CT findings in the RMD group may be of particular importance in the diagnosis and differential diagnosis of covid-19 pneumonia in this patient group. © 2021 Ankara Yildirim Beyazit University. All Rights Reserved.
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Background and aims: The COVID-19 pandemic became a challenge to maintain care for patients with idiopathic intracranial hypertension (IIH). We aimed to find out how they were affected during lockdown. Methods: 30 IIH patients admitted to hospital during the COVID-19 pandemic were studied. Their demographic, neuro-ophthalmologic findings were evaluated. World Health Organization-5 Well-Being Index (WHO-5), The EUROHIS-QOL 8-item index, National Eye Institute Visual Functioning Questionnaire (NEI-VFQ-25), Headache Impact Test (HIT-6), Covid-19 Anxiety Scale were used to assess QoL and pandemic associated anxiety. Age, sex and body mass index (BMI) matched volunteers constituted the control group. Results: Apart from the Covid-19 Anxiety Scale and the NEI-VFQ-25 color vision subscale, all test scores were impaired in IIH patients. General vision, distance vision and social function subscale scores of the NEI-VFQ-25 were lower in patients with low visual acuity (logMAR 0.1). Patients with perimetric MD 9 and papilledema grade three had higher HIT-6 scores than patients with perimetric MD<9 and papilledema grade <3. Conclusion: Both vision-specific and overall QOL was reduced in patients with IIH. Headache disability was more prominent in patients with severe clinical features of raised intracranial pressure. Anxiety caused by COVID pandemic was not different from the healthy controls.
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Objective The novel coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) infection was declared as a pandemic by the World Health Organization on March 11, 2020. Although the complaint of anosmia is well described in adult patients, there is limited knowledge in pediatric patients. We aim to evaluate the epidemiological characteristics and clinical findings of children with anosmia in COVID-19-positive pediatric patients. Materials and Methods Patients diagnosed with COVID-19 infection at 1 month to 18 years of age, who admitted to Meram Faculty of Medicine of Necmettin Erbakan University between March and June 2020, were retrospectively reviewed, and the patients who had anosmia or developed anosmia during follow-up were then included in the study. The diagnosis was established by polymerase chain reaction (PCR). Results A total of 71 patients were diagnosed with COVID-19 and 14 (19.7%) of them had anosmia. Mean patient age was 14.07 (range: 10-16) years. Six of our 14 (42.8%) patients had anosmia at the time of diagnosis and anosmia developed in the follow-up among eight patients. The mean duration of anosmia in our patients was 6.9 ± 3.8 days. Recovery time was 1 to 4 days in four patients (28.5%), 5 to 8 days in four patients (28.5%), and 9 to 14 days in six patients (42.8%). Conclusion In this article, it was emphasized that anosmia can be the sole manifestation or concomitant with other symptoms in children with COVID-19 disease. Care and attention is important to identify COVID-19 patients at an early stage of the disease and limit the spread of the virus.
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Ophthalmology practice has needed new precautions after COVID-19, which was emerged in Wuhan, China in December 2019 and spread to the whole world very quickly. It was known that elderly people, whose majority of retina clinics, were the most affected by this new disease. Considering that many retinal diseases are among the ophthalmological emergencies, the slowed down health service due to COVID-19 pandemic should be provided to these patients in some way. In this review, the precautions that can be taken by retina specialists to avoid the spread and transmission of the virus are summarized. © 2020 Gazi Eye Foundation. All rights reserved.