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Pulmonary disorders are common illness that affects people of all ages worldwide. Common pulmonary disorders include pulmonary hypertension, CF (cystic fibrosis), asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disorder, emphysema, chronic bronchitis, lung cancer, and COVID-19. Treatments of these disorders vary but can be broadly categorized into pharmacological (medicinal), non-pharmacological, rehabilitation, and surgical techniques. Often, a combination of these approaches is used, both for symptomatic relief and treatment. Regarding these prophylactic and therapeutic approaches, advances are rapidly being made, and scientists are currently investigating modern and unique theranostic methods. However, there is a lacuna in drug delivery, pharmacokinetic aspects, and drug-induced adverse effects. One particular area for improvement that needs to be immediately addressed is the drug delivery system to significantly improve healthcare associated with pulmonary disorders. Natural polymer-based drug delivery systems are widely adopted for their ease of production, lack of biotoxicity, and strong bioaffinity. Of the natural polymerbased drug delivery systems, chitosan, sodium alginates, albumin, hydroxyapatite, and hyaluronic acid are the most common natural polymers. Each of these natural polymers has its preferred use, either due to tissue-specific delivery or medical property packaging. The current scientific article discusses the common pulmonary disorders, their pathophysiology, and the current therapeutic approaches. Additionally, we discuss the major natural polymer drug delivery systems, including their properties and common uses. © The Author (s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2023.
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Drug repurposing is an up-and-coming concept in the world of medicine. It is an efficient way to use already existing drug formulations in the treatment of diseases besides the ones which were initially intended for. This circumvents the tedious process of drug development and approval and helps to conserve resources. While multiple drugs have already been repurposed, their utility and reintroduction into the market is still a new concept. Even though it optimizes the use of resources, lab testing and animal model trials form a crucial aspect of determining the efficacy of these drugs in different diseases. This review encompasses the methods and trends in the repurposing of drugs while highlighting the use of animal models and the benefits of repurposing drugs during the COVID-19 pandemic. © Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2023.
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Objectives: To determine the budget impact if knee orthoses were funded for patients with severe osteoarthritis (OA) of the knee from a private Australian payer perspective. Method(s): The ISPOR Principles of Good Practice were used to guide a budget impact analysis comparing the use of knee orthoses to delay total knee reconstruction (TKR) versus the current environment. Delayed TKR was estimated based on a systematic review of electronic databases and a web-based search. Utilisation for TKR (sourced from Australian Medical Benefits Schedule statistics) was projected over the time horizon (2023 to 2027). The clinically eligible (i.e., target) population was based on the proportion of patients with OA of the knee in a large US cohort (N=8,002) deemed to have had TKR prematurely. The cost of TKR was based on Australian hospital separation data. Result(s): Funding of knee orthoses was associated with a cost-saving of $AUD122 to $AUD126 million over a 5-year time horizon based on device costs of $AUD500 and $AUD395, respectively. The cost-savings were primarily driven by 18,000 delayed TKR procedures. Knee orthosis, such as the Thuasne OA, were also associated with improvements in clinical outcomes including pain-free walk distance, pain during exercise, and lequesne index score (P<0.005). Conclusion(s): The widespread prevalence of COVID-19 has disrupted the capacity for Australian hospitals to undertake elective surgeries. The median wait-list time for TKR, which accounted for 47,000 surgeries in 2020-2021, increased from 223 to 308 days in Australia between 2019-2020 to 2020-2021. Our research indicates that the funding of appropriate knee orthoses in patients with severe OA has a cost-saving budget impact while offering potential clinical improvement for patients and reduced pressure on elective surgery wait lists.Copyright © 2022
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Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) is a novel coronavirus accountable for the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) that has led to many fatal cases worldwide. It causes a severe acute respiratory syndrome, a hyperinflammatory response, vascular damage, mi-croangiopathy, and widespread thrombosis. Vaccines, interferon therapies, and small-molecule drugs may be among the various alternatives for managing or preventing emerging SARS-CoV-2 infections. New interventions, on the other hand, are likely to take months to years to develop. Furthermore, existing antiviral agents commonly develop viral resistance along with certain side effects. Therefore, effective prevention and treatment medications without side effects against human coronavirus are urgently needed. Indian and Chinese traditional medicine have suggested some natural products for the prevention, treatment, and rehabilitation of the diseases, including COVID-19 and various herbs and mushrooms that have been reported to possess potential antiviral and anti-inflammatory activities. Therefore, in this pandemic, traditional medicines pose a ray of hope for human health. The Ministry of Ayush, India, has also recommended a number of therapies to increase immunity in addition to ayurvedic treatments. Thus, the probability of naturally occurring substances as successful treatments against COVID-19 may seem hopeful due to their diverse biological and therapeutic properties. This review focuses on the latest updates of Ayurvedic herbs and spices as promising approaches for treatment during this devastating pandemic situation.Copyright © 2023 Bentham Science Publishers.
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This study analyses the current scenario with COVID-19 affecting the international and Thai space law, and its impacts and corresponding repercussions upon the Thai economy, ASEAN region and then at international level. The methodology adopted for this study is a mixed method with qualitative research tools collected from key informant interviews and focus group discussions. The data analysis involves the Strength, Weakness, Opportunity, and Threat (SWOT) analysis, which has been integrated with Hierarchical Thematic areas to provide the supporting model for wholesome recommendations through analyzing the findings from the research. The key respondents involved several government officials associated with Thai space agencies and departments, along with judges, lawyers, researchers, academicians, non-government organizations (NGO) officials, and law students. The findings provided the need for adoption of Treaty leading to the creation of a space organization which would be accountable towards setting up a legal framework for commencement of space mining operations. The international space tribunal is to be created under this international space organization to resolve any disputes arising out of space mining. The overall implications of this research would lead to the sharing of the benefits of space mining with both developed and developing countries to enhance sustainable development for all mankind. © 2023 by the authors. Licensee ESJ, Italy.
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Context: Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) has profound hematopoietic manifestations reflected in complete blood count (CBC) parameters and peripheral blood morphology. Aims: We aimed to evaluate CBC and peripheral blood morphology in COVID-19 patients and correlated them with severity, progression, and mortality. Settings and Design: Prospective observational study. Methods and Materials: Baseline and sequential blood samples were collected in 197 hospitalized COVID-19 patients, and CBC and morphology were assessed and compared with severity, progression, and survival. Statistical Analysis Used: Independent samples t-test for parametric continuous and Chi-Square and Fisher Exact for categorical variables. Results: Of the 197 patients, 84 (42.6%) were non-severe and 113 (57.4%) severe. The severe group displayed higher mean Total leukocyte count (TLC) (mean 11,772/μL SD 5445 vs. mean 7872/μL SD 3789, P < 0.0001), neutrophils (mean 81.2% SD 17.01 vs. mean 59.8% SD 14.55, P < 0.0001), and Red Cell Distribution Width-Standard Deviation (RDW-SD) (mean 30.04 SD 17.1 vs. mean 16.95 SD 6.63, P < 0.0001) with lymphopenia (mean 12.86% SD 15.41 vs. mean 30.64% SD 13.23, P < 0.0001) and monocytopenia (mean 4.62% SD 3.56 vs. mean 7.23% SD 3.06, P < 0.0001). The severe group had significantly more pseudo Pelger-Huet (62.8% (71/113) vs. 22.9% (14/61), P < 0.0001), abnormal nuclear projections (27.4% (31/113) vs. 3.3% (2/61), P < 0.0001), elongated nucleoplasm (17.7% (20/113) vs. 3.3% (2/61), P = 0.0073), shift to left (100% (113/113) vs. 21.3% (13/61), P < 0.0001), prominent granules (100% (113/113) vs. 85.2% (52/61), P < 0.0001), cytoplasmic vacuolations (100% (113/113) vs. 50.8% (31/61), P < 0.0001), ring (8.3% (3/113) vs. 4.9% (3/61), P = 0.0117), fetoid (15.04% (17/113) vs. 1.6% (1/61), P = 0.039), and nucleolated forms (53.9% (61/113) vs. 21.3% (13/61), P < 0.0001) with red cell agglutination (8.8% (10/113) vs. 0% (0/61), P = 0.0154) than non-severe patients. The non-severe group showed lympho-plasmacytoid (98.4% (60/61) vs. 37.2% (42/113), P < 0.0001), monocytoid (96.7% (59/61) vs. 25.7% (29/113), P < 0.0001), apoptotic (100% (61/61) vs. 17.6% (20/113), P < 0.0001), and nucleolated lymphocytes (78.7% (48/61) vs. 5.3% (6/113), P < 0.0001) with prominent granules (80.3% (49/61) vs. 12.4% (14/113), P < 0.0001), cytoplasmic vacuolations (83.6% (51/61) vs. 30.1% (34/113), P < 0.0001), and plasma cells (45.9% (28/61) vs. 19.5% (22/113), P = 0.0004). The progressors (9/84) had baseline leukocytosis (TLC mean 15,889/cu mm SD 4163.96 vs. mean 6940.27/cu mm SD 2381.59, P < 0.0001) and lymphopenia (lymphocyte% mean 18.11% SD 10.75 vs. mean 32.1% SD 12.75, P = 0.0022) with elevated RDW-SD (P = 0.032) at 7 th to 10 th day of illness. The 14 non-survivors had significant thrombocytopenia (mean 63.35 × 10 3 /μL SD 30.72 vs. mean 230.77 × 10 3 /μL SD 98.77, P < 0.0001) with lymphocytes nadir at day 9 without recovery versus day 7 to 8 nadir before recovery in survivors. Conclusions: The peripheral blood morphological features are distinct in severe and non-severe COVID-19 patients and baseline leukocytosis, lymphopenia, and elevated RDW-SD at day 7 of illness are useful indicators of disease progression. © 2022 Medical Journal of Dr. D.Y. Patil Vidyapeeth ;Published by Wolters Kluwer - Medknow.
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Background: COVID-19 disease, a pandemic for more than two years, has major morbidity and mortality related to pulmonary involvement. Chest radiography is the main imaging tool for critically ill patients. As the availability of arterial blood gas analysis is limited in the Level I and II healthcare centres, which are major partners in providing healthcare in resource-limited times, we planned the present study. Objectives: To assess the role of chest radiography in predicting the need for oxygen/ventilator support in critically ill COVID-19 patients. Methods: This hospital-based, retrospective study included 135 patients who needed oxygen/ventilator support and had optimal-quality chest radiographs at admission. All the chest X-rays were evaluated and a severity score was calculated on a predesigned pro forma. Statistical evaluation of the data obtained was done using appropriate tools and methods. Results: Males outnumbered females, with a mean age of 54.35 ± 14.49 years. More than 72% of patients included in our study needed ventilator support while the rest needed oxygen support. There was a significant statistical correlation between the chest radiograph severity score and SPO2 /PaO2 levels in our study. Using a cut-off value >8 for the chest radiograph severity score in predicting the need for ventilator support in a Covid-19 patient, the sensitivity, specificity and accuracy was 85.7%, 92.5% and 89.5%, respectively. Conclusion: Chest radiography remains the mainstay of imaging in critically ill COVID-19 patients when they are on multiple life-support systems. Though arterial blood gas analysis is the gold standard tool for assessing the need for oxygen/ventilator support in these patients, the severity score obtained from the initial chest radiograph at the time of admission may also be used as a screening tool. Chest radiography may predict the need for oxygen/ventilator support, allowing time for patients to be moved to an appropriate-level healthcare centre, thus limiting morbidity and mortality.
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Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic has brought the world to a standstill. Governments throughout the world have been struggling for the adequate risk governance, reducing the pandemic risk. This chapter focuses on the experiences and the repercussions thereof in Thailand. Being the world's top COVID-19 recovery indexed country, Thailand, on the other hand, suffers from the economic downfall and recent uprising of public agitations as a direct result of COVID-19. The research methodology adopted for this study is qualitative. The data have been collected through key informant interviews among 50 respondents, who are selected among stakeholders who contribute toward disaster governance in Thailand. The data analysis process involves the Strength, Weakness, Opportunity, and Threats (SWOT) analysis of the current COVID-19 situation. This chapter analyzes and provides for recommendations toward lessons learned, the repercussions and strategic measures to be adopted at local, national, and global levels for achieving comprehensive sustainable development. © 2022 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
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The novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) emerged in December 2019. It is caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) and is still existent all over the world. Researchers worldwide are continuously conducting in silico studies or virtual screening on various phytochemicals and reporting potential candidates that can be developed against COVID-19 after in vitro and in vivo validation. Antiviral effects of several phytochemicals have been demonstrated against different kinds of coronavirus, including SARS-CoV. Using drug repurposing techniques, a number of phytochemicals have shown substantial antiviral efficacy against COVID 19. This article reviews the efficacy of lead phytochemicals in computational studies on different important targets of SARS-CoV-2 like main protease, ACE-2, papain-like protease, spike protein, nsp-1, nsp-15, RdRp, MTase, helicase, cathepsin, TMPRSS-2. This review discusses potential application of these phytochemicals, which can guide medicinal chemists to choose phytochemicals to proceed with further in vitro and in vivo testing for SARS-CoV-2, which may eventually lead to an effective therapeutic agent and thus can be used to control the current ongoing pandemic. © 2022 Bentham Science Publishers.
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Globalization has opened the avenues for the world to come together and attain sustainable growth. Migrant workers are a lifeline for several countries' labour forces and productivity. However, in Thailand, the rights of these migrants are restricted due to the non-ratification of the International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of Migrant Workers and Family Members (ICRMW). This research explores and analyzes various factors essentially responsible for the ratification of ICRMW in Thailand. The methodology adopted is the mixed method. The collected data were analyzed based on a socio-legal approach, with qualitative and quantitative tools and techniques combined: the strength, weakness, opportunity, and threats (SWOT) technique was integrated into the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) (SWOT-AHP). The findings suggest that Thailand has not yet ratified the ICRMW conventions, including ILO C-87 and ILO C-98, thus depriving migrant workers of protection. They are not protected by national law and are not entitled to equal protection as nationals: for instance, foreign workers are forbidden from migrating to the established labour unions and enjoying medical benefits and salaries. All these must be consistent with the conventions, particularly the Labor Protection Act, B.E. 2541 (1998) and the Labor Relations Act B.E. 2518 (1998). The novelty of this research is the analysis of the domestic and international laws in the Thai context, which depicts the need for ratification of ICRMW to protect migrant workers and their families. The findings can pave the way for similar future research in other ASEAN member countries. © 2022 by the authors. Licensee ESJ, Italy.
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Education is essential for any country to secure its future, but COVID-19 has caused considerable difficulty in Thailand. The COVID-19 pandemic harms the education of the students. The online education system is adopted in almost all parts of the globe. However, the pandemic has been impacting the overall quality of the education system. This research explored the experiences of law students in Thailand by analyzing several factors which affect their intellect. The methodology adopted for this study was a multiple method study. The sample size of 330 law students selected from leading Thai universities was analyzed qualitatively through Strength, Weakness, Opportunity, and Threat (SWOT) analysis and regression model for the quantitative analysis. The findings revealed that factors including internet availability, accessibility to own gadgets, online resources, government, social media, and classrooms have a significant impact on the education system of Thai law students. The study paves way for further microanalysis of the educational system in Thailand with the perceptions and experiences of teachers and parents.
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The purpose of this research paper was to evaluate the effectiveness of corporate law on agency issues in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) developing countries. Therefore, the agency issues are discussed in this study inclusive of the free trade policies, the effect of COVID-19 in trade, incorporation of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) in business during COVID-19 pandemic. The COVID-19 pandemic has been restricting the development of the developing member nations of the ASEAN region since March, 2020. This research used the economic qualitative research method that entails collecting and evaluating non-numerical data. Further, it helps in developing a profound aspect of the study. The findings of this study highlight that ASEAN countries have harmonized ICT laws to enhance e-commerce and this is not limited to developed countries. The competition regulation strategy within the region helps in fair trade practices, and lastly, the ASEAN countries have incorporated substantive measures to mitigate and be adequately prepared to cope with COVID-19. Due to enactment of commercial law legislation, it has enriched the jurisprudence. © 2022 Kasetsart University.
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The Covid-19 pandemic delayed the ratification of several internal laws, reforms, and amendments, especially in developing countries such as Thailand, resulting in limited human rights for the populations. There is a unique violation of human rights inclusive of the right to life, the right not to be tortured, the right to liberty and safety of persons which are very important to international and civil society. This research explores the enforcement measures of the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance (CED). Thailand is currently in the process of ratifying its membership in CED. This ratification process will contribute towards Thailand for holding an important position to fulfill its obligations as a State Party member of this Convention. Thailand has been drafting internal laws and regulations to be consistent with the CED to recognize and protect lawful human rights. People must not be forced to disappear because such action is a serious criminal offence that must be punished appropriately under the CED. In addition, the injured persons shall be treated fairly and equally in accordance with the objectives and purpose of CED, and the Member of Parliament (MP) shall legislate and support the enactment in accordance with the Convention's obligations. In accordance with international mechanisms, these measures will further enhance the promotion and protection of Thailand's human rights. Therefore, Thailand should complete the ratification process at the earliest to develop more efficient domestic legal measures and mechanisms. Similarly, ratification would be consistent with Article 16 of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which will contribute to security and enhance a peaceful society by providing access to justice to all people in Thailand. © 2022 by the authors. Licensee ESJ, Italy.
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Respiratory viruses are transported from an infected person to other neighboring people through respiratory droplets. These small droplets are easily advected by air currents in a room and can potentially infect others. In this work, the spread of droplets released during coughing, talking, and normal breathing is numerically analyzed in a typical conference room setting. The room space is occupied by ten people, with eight people sitting around a conference table and two people standing. Four different scenarios are considered, with the air-conditioning turned on/off and people wearing/not-wearing masks, to understand the spread of respiratory droplets inside the room. The flow in the room is simulated using a multiphase mixture model with properties computed for the inhaled and exhaled air using fundamental gas relations. The transport of respiratory droplets is analyzed using the discrete phase model with a range of droplet sizes fitted to data from previous experimental studies. The mask is modeled as porous media with the properties of a woven fabric computed using a newly developed model for multilayered homemade masks. The human inhalation and exhalation are modeled using analytical functions to mimic the biological flow patterns during breathing, coughing, and talking. Important observations about the air flow and dispersion of respiratory droplets in the conference room are presented based on the numerical analysis. Animations of all the results are included to provide insight into flow physics of the various dynamic conditions occurring in the room during an ongoing meeting. Although this study is conducted for a typical conference room, the newly developed models and techniques can be applied to other confined environments. © 2022 Author(s).
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The objective of the chapter is to analyze Twitter data to extract sentiments and opinions in unstructured text. The team attempted to use contextual text analytics to categorize Twitter data to understand the positive or negative sentiments for COVID vaccinations and wish to highlight key concerns. Text clustering has been performed on positive and negative sentiments to understand the key themes behind them. We followed a two-step process. In the first step, we identified positive and negative sentiments from Twitter feeds. In the second step, we aggregated all sentiments into categories to deduce what the Twitterati is thinking about COVID-19 vaccinations. The whole analysis was performed using Python, including TextBlob and Vader libraries. TextBlob library uses the Naïve-Bayes (probabilistic algorithms using Bayes’s Theorem to predict the category of a text) classifier to assess the polarity of a sentence and generates a score ranging between −1 (strongly negative) and +1 (strongly positive). The Naïve Bayes classifier categorizes based on probabilities of events. Although it is a simple algorithm, it performs well in many text classification problems. On the other hand, the Vader library uses a lexical approach that uses preassigned scores labeled positive and negative for different words found in a text. These scores are based on pre-trained models classified as positive/negative by actual human beings. We then performed the topic extraction that discovers the keywords in sentiments that capture the recurring theme of a text and is widely used to analyze large sets of sentiments to identify the most common topics easily and efficiently. We found a large segment as neutral (53%) followed by a positive sentiment segment that contributed 36% of tweets. However, at the same time, many people (10%+) remain on the fence regarding the potential repercussions of COVID vaccines as they are relatively new and yet untested over longer periods of time. It is reasonable to expect that people are a bit skeptical about vaccinations. Text clustering of negative sentiments identified late vaccinations and side effects being the key concerns. Positive sentiments mainly were driven by the readiness of other vaccines and weak reactions following vaccinations. The study contributes to text mining literature by providing a framework for analyzing public sentiments. This can help to understand the key themes in negative sentiments related to COVID vaccinations and can help in adjusting policies. © 2022, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.
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The effect of pandemic COVID-19 outbreak has become a big matter of concern in the world. Healthcare industry demands for new technologies to fight against the pandemic. Fog-assisted IoT-enabled technology (Fog-IoT) is the alternative to cloud technology, which has potential strength to fulfill the requirements of patients as well as healthcare organization. In this paper, we explore and review the fog computing technology to mitigate the impact of COVID-19. Fog computing technology provides resources to IoT at proximity of network. This integrated technology is useful for dynamic monitoring of patients and provides rapid diagnosis to high risk patients. In healthcare industry, the delay sensitive patient information should be accessed in a fraction of seconds. So, fog computing could be a better solution for providing response intensive IoT application for medical emergencies. © 2022, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.
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The COVID-19 pandemic came with a flux of new words, terminologies, and phrases, which led to the rapid coinage or neologisms in the world’s different languages. These lexical innovations may take place within one language as well as with the combination of two different languages. Therefore, this paper scrutinizes coroneologisms and word-formation processes in Hindi-English code-mixed words. Such a phenomenon happened due to the acceptance of English by Indians besides their mother tongue which makes them bilingual. The data were gathered from newspapers, blogs, social media, TV news, etc. Next, the linguistic analysis of the data revealed different types of word classes in Hindi-English codemixed words such as compounding, affixation, blending, and reduplication. Out of these, compounding and borrowing were reported as the most productive types of coroneologisms in Hindi-English code-mixed words. © 2022
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In this demo paper, we feature HealthDist, an innovative system that is an additional asset in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic. HealthDist utilizes context (e.g., weather conditions), location (e.g., crowded areas), and user preferences to provide safe pedestrian paths which decrease the exposure to the virus causing COVID-19. Its modular design, consisting of four components, reduces the time and resources needed to provide accurate localization and indoor-outdoor path recommendations that satisfy the user's preferences. We demonstrate interactively using smartphones how HealthDist can provide real time navigation information within a university campus and illustrate the reduction of the COVID-19 exposure risk while satisfying the constraints defined by the user.
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Introduction: For students and trainees, COVID-19 has restricted opportunities for training and development. We sought to develop a virtual network to facilitate remote engagement and training in surgical research during COVID-19. RoboSurg aims to conduct a series of systematic reviews, to summarise and critique the reporting of studies of robot-assisted surgery across seven upper gastrointestinal procedures. Methods: A protocol was developed based on previously published work. Searches were undertaken to identify studies evaluating robotic pancreas, liver, oesophagus, stomach, gallbladder, bariatric and antireflux surgery. Participants were identified through social media and collaborative research networks. Abstracts were screened for inclusion by two participants. Data extraction is completed by teams of collaborators, entered into a bespoke REDCap database and verified by senior team member. Changes are logged, with rationale and feedback provided to collaborators and reviewed by a third reviewer to assess consistency. Results of each review will be summarised in narrative syntheses. Results: A total of 134 collaborators have registered, with 73 active participants. Collaborators range from second year medical students to surgical registrars across the UK. To date, 9444 abstracts and 1653 full texts have been screened with 422 eligible articles identified. Data extraction for two systematic reviews, including 193 articles, has been completed using this approach. Conclusion: RoboSurg has developed a network and methodological framework for the remote conduction of complex systematic reviews, which can be utilised to engage and train students and trainees in surgical research.