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This study investigated the effect of hybrid working on the productivity and environmental satisfaction in an activity-based office. Activity-based working is a work style in which workers choose where and when they work. Offices that introduced this concept are known as activity-based offices. To prevent the transmission of COVID-19, hybrid working has become common in Japan after the declaration of the state of emergency. We conducted three surveys in an activity-based office, before, during, and after the state of emergency. The results showed that hybrid working improved workers' perceived productivity. However, the results were influenced by whether the workers valued working with team members at the same location. Workers who valued on-site collaboration saw their productivity decline at home since they found it difficult to communicate. In contrast, others reported higher productivity at home since they found it easier to concentrate, mainly due to the sound environment. © 2022 17th International Conference on Indoor Air Quality and Climate, INDOOR AIR 2022. All rights reserved.
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Objectives: Various reagents and equipment for testing SARS-CoV-2 infections have been developed, particularly rapid molecular tests based on polymerase chain reaction (PCR). Methods: We evaluated the analytical performance of four rapid molecular tests for SARS-CoV-2. We used 56 nasopharyngeal swabs from patients with confirmed SARS-CoV-2 infection;36 diagnosed as positive by the AmpdirectTM 2019-nCoV Detection Kit (Shimadzu assay) were considered as true-positive samples. Results: The sensitivity of CobasR Liat SARS-CoV-2 and Flu A/B (Cobas) was the highest among the four molecular test kits. The limit of detection was 1.49 x 10-2 copies/ micro L (95% confidence interval [CI]: 1.46x10-2-1.51 x 10-2 copies/ micro L) for Cobas;1.43 x 10-1 copies/ micro L (95% CI: 8.01x10-3-2.78 x 10-1 copies/ micro L) for XpertR Xpress SARS-CoV-2 test (Xpert);2.00 x 10-1 copies/ micro L (95% CI: 1.95x10-1-2.05 x 10-1 copies/ micro L) for FilmArray Respiratory Panel v2.1 (FilmArray);and 3.33 x 10 copies/ micro L (95% CI: 1.93 x 10-4.72x10 copies/ micro L) for Smart GeneR SARS-CoV-2 (Smart gene). Cobas also had a high sensitivity (100%) compared with Shimadzu assay. The sensitivities of Xpert, FilmArray, and Smart Gene were 97.2%, 97.2%, and 75.0%, respectively. The specificity of all tests was 100%. Conclusions: In conclusion, the four rapid SARS-CoV-2 molecular test kits have high specificity and sensitivity for detecting SARS-CoV-2. As they are easy to use, they could be a useful method for detecting SARS-CoV-2.
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A 63-year-old man was admitted to our hospital with sore throat and fever. He was diagnosed with Coronavirus Disease 2019(COVID-19), and on the 3rd day after diagnosis, he started on ventilatory management. On the 25th day, the patient presented with over 3 L of watery diarrhea, which continued daily. When the diarrhea did not improve with various treatments, on the 98th day, a double-balloon endoscopy of the small intestine was performed, and diffuse loss of villi structure in the jejunum was noted. Due to massive pleural effusion, the patient succumbed to circulatory and respiratory failure 111 days after admission to the hospital. The pathological autopsy revealed that the mucosal epithelium had been exfoliated from the entire small intestine. As this case shows, some COVID-19 cases are associated with severe diarrhea;further investigation is needed to elucidate the pathogenesis of COVID-19-associated diarrhea.Copyright © 2023 Authors. All rights reserved.
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Objectives: Administration of the third dose of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) vaccine was initiated on December 1, 2021, in Japan. However, data on the long-term effects of this third vaccination remain scarce. Here, we examined the levels of SARS-CoV-2 antibodies in those who received the Pfizer BioNTech (BNT162b2) vaccine, 6 months after the third vaccination. Method(s): Samples from 40 healthy volunteers were used to measure SARS-CoV-2 antibodies with chemiluminescent assays against the receptor-binding domain (RBD) of the virus. Result(s): At 445 days after the first dose of BNT162b2, which is 180 days after the third vaccination, the mean anti-RBD IgG level was 159.4 AU/mL (SD 100.1 AU/mL), which was significantly higher than 144 days after the second vaccination, while mean anti-RBD IgM was baseline level (0.4 C.O.I.). The decline in IgG, 180 days after the third vaccination, was 74.1% (SD 16.1%), which was significantly lower than the 88.6% (SD 4.4%) decline observed 144 days after the second vaccination. Furthermore, we revealed that the reduction in IgG from 14 to 180 days after the third vaccination showed a significant inverse correlation with age, and the higher antibody response in younger participants at 14 days after the third vaccination disappeared at longer time points. Conclusion(s): The long-term durability of the IgG titer was significantly higher following the third vaccination compared with the second vaccination, and the reduction in IgG titer after the third vaccination inversely correlated with age.Copyright © 2022 the author(s), published by De Gruyter, Berlin/Boston.
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High Energy Accelerator Research Organization (KEK) launched an education project for the fabrication of an accelerator named "AxeLatoon" in 2020 together with the National Institute of Technology (KOSEN). This project aims to improve engineering skills of students and foster the next generation of accelerator researchers by providing hands-on training in the field of accelerator science. In the first year, we collaborated with the NIT (KOSEN), Ibaraki College to build an accelerator. Students took the initiative in this extracurricular activity and challenged building an accelerator. From 2021, we expanded this project to other prefectures and four schools are now participating. The design and fabrication of a small cyclotron accelerator is currently underway. Despite the restrictions on activities and the limited mobility of people due to the novel coronavirus pandemic, the project continues to educate students about basic technologies and accelerators. We are holding seminars a few times a month utilizing online communication tools. In this report, we would like to share the status of AxeLatoon's activities based on the actual production of students at KOSEN and deepen the discussion on accelerator outreach programs. © Copyright owned by the author(s) under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)
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Taking advantage of self-restraint due to the infection spread of COVID-19 in recent years, the utilization of online communication using the Internet in various fields such as classes and conference is rapidly expanding. However, it has been pointed out that many systems that are mainly used at present have traditional problems, such as feeling various discomforts compared to normal face-to-face communication. In order to realize on-line communication more smoothly, we proposed and implemented an on-line communication system that can convey the face and face orientation of the participant by using multiple cameras. In addition, we verified the effectiveness of this proposed system by comparative experiments with traditional on-line communication system. As these results, we confirmed that the multi-camera system can communicate the direction of the face to the other participants. Moreover, the obstacles in conversation can be removed as a whole, although there are differences in the usability of each participant. © 2022, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.
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Objectives An effective vaccine against SARS-CoV-2 is essential to mitigate the COVID-19 pandemic. In these several months, a number of groups have started to report humoral responses and side effects after BNT162b2 vaccinations. Although these reports demonstrate the safety and efficacy, further studies are warranted to verify these findings. Here we examined the levels of SARS-CoV-2 antibodies in Japanese healthy volunteers who underwent BNT162b2 vaccine, to assess the humoral responses and side effects. Methods Forty-one healthy volunteers' samples were used for the measurement of SARS-CoV-2 antibodies with chemiluminescent assays against the Receptor Binding Domain (RBD) of the virus. We also measured the side effects of the vaccination. Results Although the levels of IgM varied, all participants were seronegative for IgM and IgG before vaccination, and both IgM and IgG were significantly increased after the vaccinations. We further analyzed the humoral responses in relation to age, and found that the IgG levels for 14 days and 35 days, and IgM levels for 14 days after vaccination showed clear declining trends with age. Commonly reported side effects in the participants were sore arm/pain (90.0%) after the first dose, and generalized weakness/fatigue (70.0%), fever (57.5%), and sore arm/pain (90.0%) after the second dose. Conclusions BNT162b2 vaccination generates sufficient production of IgG especially after the second dose, though the response decreases age-dependently. The high frequencies of generalized weakness/fatigue, fever, and sore arm/pain were not negligible, especially after the second dose. This may be associated with the age characteristics of the population.
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Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection is rapidly spreading globally. Early diagnosis plays an essential role in controlling the infection. Therefore, early and accurate SARS-CoV-2 detection assays along with easy operation are required. The aim of this study was to compare the clinical performance of the Ampdirect™ 2019-nCoV Detection Kit (SHIMADZU assay), which does not require RNA purification steps, with that of the preexisting SARS-CoV-2 detection assays, which use a purified RNA template. A total of 71 samples (65 nasopharyngeal specimens and 6 sputum specimens) were collected from 32 individuals, including patients infected with SARS-CoV-2 and those with suspected infection. The sensitivity and kappa (κ) coefficient were assessed between the SARS-CoV-2 detection assays using the reference standard, which was defined as a true positive result by any one of the four SARS-CoV-2 detection assays. The overall sensitivity and κ coefficient of the SHIMADZU assay were 86.0% (95% confidence interval [CI]: 77.9-94.2) and 0.83 (95% CI: 0.69-0.96), respectively. In particular, among the 18 samples collected within 10 days from symptom onset, the sensitivity and κ coefficient of the SHIMADZU assay were 100% and 1.0, respectively. Although a relatively small number of samples was evaluated, the SHIMADZU assay showed good analytical performance and as such would be highly useful for the detection of SARS-CoV-2. The test can be performed easily and quickly and has the potential for future applications in situations where a highly sensitive diagnosis is required. © 2021
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Background: An emergency framework was set to confront the first wave COVID-19 pandemic at the medical oncology division for breast cancer at the Cancer Institute Hospital of JFCR, Tokyo, in March 2020. Medical therapy was classified into two phases in our guideline. In the initial phase, workload or patients' visit was to be reduced without impairing disease control and survival. In the successive phase under restriction of medical resources, only therapies with higher priority and alternate therapies were to be practiced. Whereas no significant effect on medical practice was observed during first wave pandemic, actual impact was evaluated in this study. Methods: Among patients in our division from April to May 2020, cases of treatment change, postponement of treatment introduction, treatment interruption, long-term prescription, telephone consultation, postponement of visit, reference to other hospital, and COVID-19 diagnosis were retrospectively searched from medical records. Results: There were estimated 984 patients, 389 perioperative and 595 metastatic, of whom 119(12%) were affected by COVID-19. The breakdown is 7 cases of treatment changes, 7 cases of postponements of introduction, 20 cases of interruptions, 12 cases of long-term prescriptions of oral chemotherapy and molecular targeted therapy, 36 cases of prescriptions by telephone consultation, 94 cases of postponements of visit, 3 cases of reference to other hospital, and 4 cases of fever for which COVID-19 infection could not be denied. Conclusion: 12% of patients in the division of medical oncology at the breast center changed their treatment or schedule of visit. Treatment change that could affect breast cancer survival were 2 cases of cancellation of adjuvant chemotherapy. The effect might have been minimized by formulation of a COVID-19 guideline prior to the pandemic.