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The low degradability of waste plastics will continue to pollute the environment, and the spread of the COVID-19 has exacerbated the use and accumulation of plastics, and thus the efficient treatment of waste plastic resources has become an urgent technical problem to be solved. By analyzing several mainstream waste plastics treatment technologies, it was clear that resourceful and high value-added utilization technology was the most competitive and environmentally friendly waste plastics treatment route in the market. The research progress of high value-added utilization technology of waste plastics at home and abroad in recent years were reviewed. The development and variation of conventional thermal cracking technology were discussed. Through this route, the highest yield of waste plastics into fuel products can reach 97%—98%. It was pointed out that the conversion of waste plastics into jet fuel, high value-added chemicals and functional materials for special applications through chemical, catalytic and biological technologies was the mainstream research direction and development trend in this field. Among them, the yield of conversion to high value-added monomer could reach more than 97%, so as to realize the upgrading of plastic waste from the primary treatment stage of "waste clearance” to "turning waste into use” and "turning waste into treasure”, and help China achieve the goal of "double carbon”。. © 2023 Chemical Industry Press. All rights reserved.
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COVID-19 (coronavirus disease 2019) is a new viral infection disease that is widely spread worldwide. Deep learning plays an important role in COVID-19 images diagnosis. This paper reviews the recent progress of deep learning in COVID-19 images applications from five aspects;Firstly, 33 COVID-19 datasets and data enhancement methods are introduced;Secondly, COVID-19 classification methods based on supervised learning are summarized from four aspects of VGG, ResNet, DenseNet and Lightweight Networks. The COVID-19 segmentation methods based on supervised learning are summarized from four aspects of attention mechanism, multiscale mechanism, residual connectivity mechanism, and dense connectivity mechanism;Thirdly, the application of deep learning in semi-supervised COVID-19 images diagnosis in terms of consistency regularization methods and self-training methods. Fourthly, the application of deep learning in unsupervised COVID-19 diagnosis in terms of autoencoder methods and unsupervised generative adversarial methods. Moreover, the challenges and future work of COVID-19 images diagnostic methods in the field of deep learning are summarized. This paper reviews the latest research status of COVID-19 images diagnosis in deep learning, which is of positive significance to the detection of COVID-19. © 2023 by the authors.
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Background. Outpatient antibiotic (OP Abx) prescribing in adults in Arkansas (AR) was among the country's highest in 2019. AR Medicaid analyzed prescription (Rx) claims data and communicated the relative prescribing intensity as an informational metric to each patient-centered medical home (PCMH) beginning in 2020. We describe the Abx prescribing patterns in calendar years 2019 and 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Methods. Data from AR Medicaid paid claims for OP Abx Rxs in adult patients attributed to a PCMH practice for > 6 months were analyzed. Annual Abx Rx claims per 1000 patients were calculated for rural or urban status and by 2019 prescribing rate histories, defined as the low-,middle-, and high-rate prescribers based on 1st, 2nd - 3rd, & 4th quartiles, respectively. The five most common classes in 2019 and fluoroquinolones were explored.A paired t-test, Wilcoxon signed rank test, and one-wayANOVA with post hoc least significant difference test were used to determine statistical significance. Results. 183 PCMHs qualified for analysis. There was a significant decrease in overall annual Abx claim rate, from 1034 to 910 (-12.0%, p< 0.0001). Claim rates decreased in rural (-10.9%, p< 0.0001) and urban areas (-13.3%, p< 0.0001) with no difference between groups (p=0.240). Low-rate prescribers did not change practice from 2019 to 2020, with claim rates of 666 to 665 (-0.2%, p=0.957), while middle- and highrate prescribers decreased, from 1032 to 897 (-13.1%, p< 0.0001), and from 1404 to 1183 (-15.7%, p< 0.0001), respectively. Claim rates significantly decreased for penicillins (-16.0%, p< 0.0001), fluoroquinolones (-15.5%, p< 0.0001), sulfonamides (-13.1%, p< 0.0001), macrolides (-9.9%, p=0.0001), and tetracyclines (-6.3%, p=0.021). First-generation cephalosporins down trended (-7.9%, p=0.111). Conclusion. OP Abx Rx claims significantly decreased from 2019 to 2020 in middle and high-rate prescribers. Low-rate prescribers maintained low Abx Rx claim rates throughout 2020. Future analyses are needed to highlight any rebound effect of Abx prescribing when the pandemic subsides, discerning the informational metric effect versus COVID-19, and informing the next steps for antimicrobial stewardship for PCMHs in AR.
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Individuals, particularly those within the lower middle class, are battling to outlive in progressively troublesome financial conditions, particularly with the COVID-19 widespread. Of course, this influences numerous individuals, one of them is individuals with disabilities. Prior to the widespread, individuals with disabilities had experienced challenges. Be that as it may, due to the widespread, the lives of individuals with incapacities are indeed more difficult. Information can be stunted and hard to get. That is why it is important to sign and improve the technology that is possibly used for people with disabilities. In this paper, we are going to talk further more about text to speech technology that are used by many people with disabilities and especially in this case, the Deaf community. The methods we use to help us answer our question is with quantitative methods to measure the relevanceness in the Deaf communities. This study has a purpose to make sure the technologies that are used are easy to access and cheap. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.
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Online learning is a technique of instruction that does not include face-to-face interaction between teachers and students that was employed during the epidemic. This learning method is a solution to the limitations of learning activities during the current Covid-19 pandemic. To support online learning and assist the learning process, there are currently many applications that provide video conferencing facilities so that educators and students can still communicate. The Zoom application is one of them, many schools use this application because this application has features that can help the teaching and learning process. This study aims to find out in-depth how the adoption of the use of the Zoom application as a learning tool in a private school to increase neuro-cognitive students. This study uses a qualitative method. The population is all students in a private school with a sample of 18 students who filled out the survey. Data collection techniques using the questionnaire method. Based on the data analysis that has been carried out, it was concluded that 83.4% of respondents admitted that adopting the Zoom application as a learning medium in their schools was effective to increase neuro-cognitive as well as student responses while using the Zoom application as an online learning medium were very enjoyable. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.
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Dynamics in supply chains (SCs) can trigger risks due to the changing and propagating nature. In the context of COVID-19, this article presents an assessment-to-control decision-making support scheme to tackle propagation effect uncertainties of SCs considering product changes. First, a new decision model is proposed for risk warnings, with the potential advantages that: 1) propagation effects can be assessed generally and objectively and 2) permitting control theory to integrate and identify the interrelations between propagation effects. More specifically, the bullwhip effect (BE) with operational and behavioral causes is quantified as cascading amplified inventory fluctuations. The ripple effect (RE) from large-scale supplier disruptions driven by COVID-19 is quantified as increased entropy rates (ERs). Then, the system studied is integrated as a closed-loop control system under provided change control. Moreover, some criteria are derived for the existence of controller gains/decision coefficients to stabilize the closed-loop system with the BE mitigation under the RE. Finally, a mask SC case study under COVID-19 is performed for examining the effectiveness of the proposed scheme. IEEE
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Students all over the world have experienced significant changes in their learning due to the covid-19 pandemic as schools and institutions were forced to switch to distant online education, which requires high self-regulated learning skills. A total of 338 were males and 886 were female respondents from public high school and university students in Indonesia and Malaysia (542 Malaysian and 682 Indonesian). Data were collected using the online self-regulated learning questionnaire (OSRL), which assesses self-regulated learning in the online and blended learning environment. Results revealed that there was statistically significant interaction between the effect of nationality and level of education on SRL among Indonesian and Malaysian students. Postgraduates showed higher levels of SRL in comparison to students from other levels. This study highlighted the SRL strategies that Indonesian and Malaysian students use to overcome the online learning challenges in covid-19, which might help educational institutions understand what support is needed to help students develop self-regulated learning skills in an online learning environment.
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In this pandemic situation, there are many problems facing people from all over the world. For example, economic downgrades, family problems, illness, and health problems, etc. Indonesia is one of many countries facing this situation. With a record of being the fourth most populous country in the world, Indonesia easily creates a lot of problems in this pandemic situation. This pandemic situation has made the world aware of such problems in their lives. One of the important types of problems that arise from this awareness is the maintenance of physical health. Maintenance of physical health is very important for this pandemic situation. COVID-19 can really cause many diseases, and therefore, health maintenance is very important to get rid of this virus. Many media inform the public to take care of their physical health, but there are also many things that need to be considered and continue life as it is. Therefore, information explaining the importance of maintaining physical health is needed by people in Indonesia, and this study tries to review the importance of health maintenance. This data can be shown in of an app, where it is all currently done digitally, in conjunction also with COVID-19 pandemic that has resulted all people to become digitally literate. In addition, there is also the risk of access to meet other people if you have to consult a doctor, so making a physical health maintenance application during the COVID-19 pandemic will be very helpful. Various educations can be given to the public, such as educating the public that taking supplements/vitamins is important in preventing the COVID-19 virus. Consuming minerals and vitamins for endurance is indeed important during the current pandemic, because the body needs these substances to increase endurance. Apart from supplements, vitamin and mineral needs can also be obtained from various types of food. According to dietitian Maxine Smith, eating healthy foods is the best way to keep the immune system in balance, because the immune system relies heavily on nutritious food. This is because healthy foods contain various substances, including vitamins and minerals as immune support. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.
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Since the angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2) protein is abundant on the surface of respiratory cells in the lungs, it has been confirmed to be the entry-point receptor for the spike glycoprotein of SARS-CoV-2. As such, gold nanorods (AuNRs) functionalized with ACE2 ectodomain (ACE2ED) act not only as decoys for these viruses to keep them from binding with the ACE2-expressing cells but also as agents to ablate infectious virions through heat generated from AuNRs under near-infrared (NIR) laser irradiation. Using plasmid containing the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein gene (with a D614G mutation), spike protein pseudotyped viral particles with a lentiviral core and green fluorescent protein reporter were constructed and used for transfecting ACE2-expressing HEK293T cells. Since these viral particles behave like their coronavirus counterparts, they are the ideal surrogates of native virions for studying viral entry into host cells. Our results showed that, once the surrogate pseudoviruses with spike protein encounter ACE2ED-tethered AuNRs, these virions are entrapped, resulting in decreased viral infection to ACE2-expressing HEK293T cells. Moreover, the effect of photothermolysis created by ACE2ED-tagged AuNRs under 808-nm NIR laser irradiation for 5 min led to viral breakdown. In summary, ACE2ED-tethered AuNRs with dual functions (virus decoy and destruction) could have an intriguing advantage in the treatment of diseases involving rapidly mutating viral species such as SARS-CoV-2.
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SESSION TITLE: COVID-Related Critical Care Cases SESSION TYPE: Case Reports PRESENTED ON: 10/19/2022 11:15 am - 12:15 pm INTRODUCTION: We present a case of rapidly progressive glomerulonephritis in a patient with granulomatosis with polyangiitis and COVID-19 pneumonia. CASE PRESENTATION: A 72 year old man presented to the hospital with shortness of breath, fatigue, fevers, and malaise. Chest x-ray showed bilateral lower lobe infiltrates consistent with COVID-19 pneumonia and creatinine of 1.57, elevated from baseline of 1.30. He was diagnosed with COVID-19 pneumonia and admitted to the Intensive Care Unit due to acute hypoxic respiratory failure and worsening acute kidney injury. Past medical history was significant for granulomatosis with polyangiitis (GPA) with recurrent deep venous thromboses and splenic infarct. Warfarin was held due to supratherapeutic INR on admission. COVID-19 drug therapy was initiated, including baricitinib, remdesivir and decadron. Creatinine began to rise significantly and renal ultrasound was ordered but showed no hydronephrosis or acute abnormality of the kidneys. There was no improvement with administration of fluids, and hemodialysis was initiated due to worsening creatinine with a peak of 12.09 and a strong suspicion for rapidly progressive glomerulonephritis (RPGN) in the setting of GPA. High-dose steroid therapy was started and daily hemodialysis was continued. Patient required transfer to a tertiary care center for multifactorial shock where he continued to receive dialysis therapy. Patient eventually required mechanical ventilation and ultimately expired. DISCUSSION: GPA is an autoimmune small and medium vessel vasculitis most often associated with anti-neutrophil cytoplasmic antibodies (c-ANCA). Without treatment, GPA has a high mortality rate due to systemic vasculitis. Treatment of GPA includes immunosuppressive therapies like rituximab or cyclophosphamide. Environmental and infectious processes are thought to cause GPA. Viruses have also been shown to cause GPA with two such cases documented with SARS-CoV-2. Our case illustrates a patient with known previously GPA who developed RPGN in the setting of COVID-19. RPGN can lead to rapid loss of renal function in GPA and can be the initial presentation of the disease process. However, care must be taken as often the presentation of GPA lung sequela may mimic those of COVID-19, including dyspnea, hemoptysis, and radiographic changes. Obtaining ANCA autoantibodies as well as a urinalysis showing proteinuria can help distinguish GPA and guide clinical judgment in starting high-dose steroid therapy early in renal failure due to RPGN in the setting of COVID-19. CONCLUSIONS: COVID-19 in patients with GPA can trigger renal failure due to RPGN. Reference #1: Bressler MY, Pathak N, Cervellione K, et al. New Onset Granulomatosis with Polyangiitis Associated with COVID-19. Case Rep Dermatol Med. 2021. Reference #2: Hasan MR, Sakibuzzaman M, Tabassum T, Moosa SA. A Case of Granulomatosis with Polyangiitis (Wegener's Granulomatosis) Presenting with Rapidly Progressive Glomerulonephritis. Cureus. 2019. Reference #3: Lutalo PM, D'Cruz DP. Diagnosis and classification of granulomatosis with polyangiitis (aka Wegener's granulomatosis). J Autoimmun. 2014. DISCLOSURES: No relevant relationships by Kristin Davis No relevant relationships by Charles Peng
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SESSION TITLE: COVID-19 Co-Infections SESSION TYPE: Rapid Fire Case Reports PRESENTED ON: 10/19/2022 12:45 pm - 1:45 pm INTRODUCTION: We present a case of Eggerthella bacteremia in a patient with COVID-19. CASE PRESENTATION: A 69-year-old woman presented to the emergency room with chief complaint of cough, dyspnea, and malaise. After testing positive with a home COVID-19 test three days earlier, she continued to have worsening respiratory status and was brought in via ambulance. She was found to be tachycardic and hypoxic, requiring high-flow oxygen to maintain saturation in the emergency department. Chest X-ray showed bilateral patchy opacities consistent with multifocal COVID-19 pneumonia, and she was admitted to the intensive care unit for acute hypoxic respiratory failure. COVID-19 drug therapy was initiated, including baricitinib, remdesivir and decadron. Shortly after hospitalization, she began to endorse worsening abdominal pain. Physical exam elicited tenderness to palpation of her right lower quadrant. Abdominal CT scan showed distal ileum fluid collection concerning for possible bowel perforation. She underwent exploratory laparotomy which confirmed perforation, and a small bowel resection with anastomosis was performed. Blood cultures were positive for gram-positive bacilli, which were further identified as Eggerthella species. She required mechanical ventilation for worsening respiratory function post-surgery but remained unresponsive on the ventilator. The patient was administered vancomycin but continued to decline and eventually expired. DISCUSSION: Eggerthella is an anaerobic, gram-positive bacilli present in the gut microflora. Eggerthella infection has most often been reported in intra-abdominal infections. However, cases of bacteremia infection remain sparse. Most infections have been associated with other gastrointestinal processes including Crohn's disease, ulcerative colitis, appendicitis, and diverticulitis abscesses. Our case involved a patient with no significant gastrointestinal history admitted for COVID-19 pneumonia infection on baricitinib complicated by bowel perforation and bacteremia. Bowel perforation is a known risk factor of baricitinib use, and these risks should be discussed with the patient before beginning therapy. Overall mortality for Eggerthella species infection remains high, with some estimates as high as 31%. Much remains unknown about the impact on gut microbiome by SARS-CoV-2, however, early research suggests a higher rate of fungal co-infection in patients with COVID-19. As the literature on COVID-19 expands, more and more unusual pathogens such as Eggerthella may be found to contribute to the morbidity and mortality of patients being treated for COVID-19. CONCLUSIONS: Unusual pathogens such as Eggerthella may complicate a patient's hospital course while undergoing treatment for COVID-19. Reference #1: Alejandra Ugarte-Torres, Mark R Gillrie, Thomas P Griener, Deirdre L Church, Eggerthella lenta Bloodstream Infections Are Associated With Increased Mortality Following Empiric Piperacillin-Tazobactam (TZP) Monotherapy: A Population-based Cohort Study, Clinical Infectious Diseases, Volume 67, Issue 2, 15 July 2018. Reference #2: Gardiner BJ, Tai AY, Kotsanas D, et al. Clinical and microbiological characteristics of Eggerthella lenta bacteremia. J Clin Microbiol. 2015. Reference #3: Lau SK, Woo PC, Fung AM, Chan K-M, Woo GK, Yuen K-Y. Anaerobic, non-sporulating, gram-positive bacilli bacteraemia characterized by 16s rrna gene sequencing. Journal of medical microbiology. 2004. DISCLOSURES: No relevant relationships by Kristin Davis No relevant relationships by Charles Peng
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Mental health is an important part of overall health and well-being. In this COVID-19 pandemic era, many people are facing mental health problems, especially depression and anxiety. In this study we will discuss the impact of the RuangCerita application on the depression and anxiety of private university students. This study aims to know what impact the RuangCerita application has on the depression and anxiety of private university students especially in this pandemic COVID-19 era. The data collection method from this research is a questionnaire (Google Form) which is distributed to 22 respondents and was carried out for 3 days. Population of this research is students of private universities. The result of this research shows that 77.3% of all respondents felt lonely during this pandemic. Besides that, 88.4% of all respondents have an interest in using applications that focus on mental health. In conclusion, COVID-19 pandemic can cause people to have mental health issues. Therefore, it is hoped that with the RuangCerita application, many people can more easily overcome their mental health problems. © 2022, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.
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Introduction: In 2020, the COVID pandemic altered care patterns throughout health care. Routine office and ER visits declined and antibiotic prescribing changed as a consequence. Research Question or Hypothesis: How did the COVID pandemic affect outpatient antibiotic prescribing in an Arkansas Medicaid population? Study Design: Descriptive statistics were used to determine the impact of the COVID pandemic on outpatient antibiotic prescribing in Arkansas Medicaid patients. Methods: Antibiotic pharmacy claims were extracted from the Arkansas Medicaid prescription claims database for calendar years 2018 through 2021. The monthly total number of antibiotic claims from January 2018 through December 2021 were calculated. Monthly data from 2018 and 2019 were averaged to create a baseline. The average percent change in the number of outpatient antibiotic claims from February 2018-2019 to April 2018-2019 was compared to the percent change from February 2020 to April 2020. Additional percent change was calculated as the difference between the 2018-2019 average percent change and the 2020 observed percent change among all ages and prespecified age-groups. Results: The seasonal (February-April) drop in antibiotic prescriptions pre-pandemic was -18%, from 52,000 to 42,750 per month. In February-April 2020, claims fell an additional 42% (-60% in 2020, from 49,020 to 19,640). Age-related decreases showed claims for patients <5 years dropped an additional 54% from baseline;5-17 years, 48%;and >18 years, 20%. Antibiotic prescriptions in April 2021 (∼34,000) rebounded to approach the pre-pandemic baseline of 42,750. Conclusion: Outpatient antibiotics prescription claims declined sharply from baseline, especially in children, in 2020 during the COVID pandemic. Potential reasons may be attributed to clinic avoidance, more viral than bacterial illnesses, or less illness due to masking and distancing;however, the degree attributed to each has not been determined. A return to baseline was observed in 2021. Continued efforts in antibiotic stewardship are warranted.
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The COVID-19 pandemic has showed that distress to the financial system is always accompanied with the interconnection between the stock and bond markets. However, limited studies have identified the flight-toquality effect between these two markets from a nonlinear extreme perspective. Thus, using the multi-quantile VaR Granger causality test that measures the non-linearity of extreme risk, we investigated this effect in Chinese sectors via extreme risk spillover networks. Based on the findings, defensive (offensive) sectors are dominant in the stock market when facing upside (downside) risk to avoid potential investment losses. The results also confirm the robustness of the conclusion that the investment function of the financial markets weakened during the financial crisis. Moreover, compared to the Financial Bond and Enterprise Bond, the Government Bond is likely to show better risk hedging effect in cross-market risk spillover networks due to its high information transparency.
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Objective To investigate the influence of negative emotions on risk perception in frontline medical staff at the early stage of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) outbreak. Methods An online questionnaire survey was conducted on the dispatched medical staff of Wuhan Huoshenshan Hospital and the frontline anti-epidemic medical staff of Changhai Hospital of Naval Medical University (Second Military Medical University) from Feb. 3 to 5, 2020. The negative emotions were measured by the reduced version of negative affection scale composed of 7 negative emotions. The risk perception level was evaluated by the risk perception questionnaire of frontline anti-epidemic medical staff adapted from nursing staff risk perception questionnaire. Results A total of 220 valid questionnaires were collected, with an effective rate of 85.94%. The total score of negative emotions of frontline medical staff at the early stage of COVID-19 outbreak was 11.18±4.58, and the scores of 7 negative emotions from high to low were tension (1.92±0.90), upset (1.75±0.92), fear (1.61±0.84), impatience (1.58±0.84), sadness (1.51±0.83), trembling (1.50±00.83) and guilt (1.31±0.64). The scores of impatience, sadness, upset and guilt of non-nursing staff were significantly higher than those of nursing staff (all P＜0.05). The total score of risk perception of medical staff was 17.68±4.60, and the score of time risk dimension was the highest (3.20±1.20). The organizational risk score (3.39±1.01 vs 2.88±1.01) and time risk score (3.46±1.22 vs 3.09±1.18) of the non-nursing staff were significantly higher than those of the nursing staff (P＜0.01 or P＜0.05). There was a positive correlation between the total score of negative emotions and the total score of risk perception (r＝0.499, P＜0.01). The score of each negative emotion classification had an indicating effect on different risk perception tendencies, and impatience had the most obvious indicating effect on time risk (β＝0.227, P＝0.033). Conclusion Medical staff with high negative emotions have high risk perception. The negative emotion management at the early stage of the epidemic can help frontline anti-epidemic medical staff to correctly understand the risk. © 2021 Second Military Medical University Press. All rights reserved.
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This study aims to explore the relationship between social capital and the innovation performance of digital firms. In addition, we examine the mediation effect of cross-border knowledge search on this relationship and investigate the serial mediation effect of cross-border knowledge search and absorptive capacity between social capital and innovation performance. Using data collected from 217 Chinese digital companies, we tested the proposed hypotheses by constructing structural equation models through SPSS 22.0 and AMOS 24.0. Based on the results of theoretical deductions and empirical tests, some conclusions can be drawn. First, for digital firms, social capital remains significantly and positively associated with innovation performance during the COVID-19 pandemic. Meanwhile, digital firms with higher social capital are likely to generate higher innovation performance even if they experience a more severe impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. Second, cross-border knowledge search effectively mediates the relationship between social structural capital, social relational capital, and innovation performance, whereas this mediation effect is not significant between social cognitive capital and innovation performance. Finally, the serial mediation effect of cross-border knowledge search and absorptive capacity on the relationship between social capital and innovation performance is confirmed. Some managerial implications are summarized based on our findings. On the one hand, digital firms should still actively build social capital to enhance innovation performance during the pandemic. On the other hand, social capital can help digital firms implement cross-border knowledge search and develop absorptive capacity. Thus, digital firms can effectively utilize heterogeneous knowledge to enhance their innovation performance. © 2022 The Author(s)
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The current global pandemic of COVID-19 has caused significant strain on the medical resources of the healthcare providers, so more and more hospitals use telemedicine and virtual care for remote treatment (i.e. consulting, remote diagnosis, treatment, monitoring and follow-ups and so on) in response to COVID-19 pandemic, which is expected to deliver timely care while minimizing exposure to protect medical practitioners and patients. In this study, we study the telemedicine assignment between the patients and telemedical specialists by considering different sources of uncertainty, i.e. uncertain service duration and the no-show behavior of the doctors that is caused by the unexpected situations (i.e. emergency events). We propose a two-stage chance-constrained model with the assignment decisions in the recourse problem and employ an uncertainty set to capture the behavior of telemedical doctors, which finally gives rise to a two-stage binary integer program with binary variables in the recourse problem. We propose an enumeration-based column-and-constraint generation solution method to solve the resulting problem. A simple numerical study is done to illustrate our proposed framework. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first attempt to incorporate the behavior of doctors and uncertain service duration for the telemedicine assignment problem in the literature. We expect that this work could open an avenue for the research of telemedicine by incorporating different sources of uncertainty from an operations management viewpoint, especially in the context of a data-driven optimization framework. © 2022, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.
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ABSTRACT: Abstractï¼ Objective To analyze the first epidemic spread of the novel coronavirus Delta variant in China based on public security forensic perspective, investigate its transmission characteristics, contributing factors, and epidemiologic research experience, and provide a reference for the prevention and control of the epidemic caused by the novel coronavirus variant. Methods Based on the information that public security forensic experts obtained from front-line epidemiologic research, the gender, age, place of residence, transmission route and infectivity of the coronavirus disease 2019 ï¼COVID-19ï¼ confirmed cases, asymptomatic infected persons and their close contacts in Guangzhou caused by the novel coronavirus Delta variant were analyzed. The basic reproduction number ï¼R0ï¼ during this epidemic in Guangzhou was calculated. Results Among the 153 cases infected with novel coronavirus Delta variant in the epidemic, 63 cases were male and 90 cases were female, their age ranging from 1 to 92 years, with a median age of 49 years. The main route of transmission was close contact, including dining together, co-living, and close contact in the same residential building. There were 31 cases of family clusters, 25 of which were in Liwan District. The epidemic lasted from May 26 to May 29, and the R0 remained above 4.0. After May 30, R0 began to decline and remained below 1.0 from June 7. Conclusion The novel coronavirus Delta variant is highly infectious, the crowd is generally susceptible to infection and family cluster cases are easy to occur. So, it is necessary to precisely prevent and control this strain. Public security forensic experts have both medical literacy and criminal investigation capabilities, they can play a more professional role in epidemic prevention and control.
Subject(s)
COVID-19 , Epidemics , Adolescent , Adult , Aged , Aged, 80 and over , Child , Child, Preschool , China/epidemiology , Female , Humans , Infant , Male , Middle Aged , SARS-CoV-2 , Young AdultABSTRACT
Stress-induced sleep and psychological problems are common in modern life. The rapid spread of COVID-19 and implementation of social isolation has diminished social activities, leading to major changes in daily lifestyles.Unprecedented changes, coupled with the fear induced by the pandemic, have added stress and anxiety for a large segment of the population. Interestingly, within this timeframe, there has been a significant increase in cellphone dependence, which may be linked to social isolation. These events could result in a disruption in sleep patterns and increase in psychological challenges. In this study, we surveyed 288 volunteers to gain insight into how stress, anxiety, and time spent on cellphones affected sleep and mood. In addition, we developed an herbal compound preparation, “Smarto-One”, which is rich in flavonoids that play a role in GABAA receptor modulation. We tested its therapeutic effects on these conditions presumably linked to social isolation. We found 1) a negative linear correlation between sleep duration vs stress level and time on cellphone. 2) a negative correlation between wake-up mood/symptoms vs stress. 3) volunteers taking Smarto-One showed substantial improvements in stress levels, hours of sleep, cellphone dependence, and wake-up mood/symptoms as compared to taking placebo. Overall, this work illustrates the value of Smarto-One as an alternative remedy for improving overall mental health and wellbeing. (Int J Biomed Sci 2021;17 (3): 40-49).
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Two-dimensional (2D) transition metal carbides and/or nitrides (MXenes) are a family of graphene-like 2D materials, with unique layered structures, high mechanical strength, excellent carrier mobility, and outstanding physical and chemical properties. In particular, the work function (Phi) of MXenes and Gibbs free energy of the adsorbed intermediate, such as H* (;Delta G(H)(*);), can be regulated by their surface adsorption groups (-OH, -O, and -F), enabling the applications in the field of photocatalysis. This article systematically summarizes the recent advances of synthetic routes of MXene-based photocatalysts and discusses the interfacial charge kinetics and photogenerated charge transfer mechanism of MXene-based photocatalysts. Furthermore, major challenges and further research trends of MXene-based photocatalysts are also presented. (c) 2021 Author(s).