ABSTRACT
Objective: To investigate the blood glucose management of diabetic patients during the fight against corona virus disease 2019 (COVID-19) in Wuhan, China. Method(s): A questionnaire survey was conducted on diabetic patients receiving hypoglycemic drugs in wuhan, hubei province from February 16, 2020 to February 20, 2020. The questionnaire included participants' basic information, the management of blood glucose, and the prevention and control of COVID-19. SPSS 19.0 was used for statistical analysis, and chi2 test was used for comparison between the two groups. Result(s): A total of 152 valid questionnaires were retrieved. 86 cases (56.6%) diabetic patients achieved glycemic control. 80 cases (52.6%) could regularly monitor their blood glucose. 48 cases (31.6%) had the difficulty in the management of blood glucose for purchasing medicines. They also had the difficulties in adjusting blood glucose in the outpatient of endocrinology departments (31 cases, 20.4%), adherence to appropriate exercise (28 cases, 18.4%) and eating the balanced diet (16 cases, 10.5%). When faced with medical problems, 73 cases (48.0%) seek help from hospital out-patient clinics. Nearby pharmacies (78 case, 51.3%) or hospital outpatient (63 cases, 41.5%) were the main ways to purchase medicines for diabetic patients. 133 cases (87.5%) took medicines regularly. 39 cases (25.7%) and 17 (11.2%) diabetic patients were affected by the COVID-19 epidemic and changed or discontinued the original treatments. There was statistically significant in the proportion of discontinuation of hypoglycemic drugs between different drug treatment regiments and subgroups with diabetes course (chi2=13.30, P<0.01;chi2=8.72, P<0.05). Only 16 cases (10.5%) showed that their community health service organizations had specially trained diabetic management team. Conclusion(s): This survey suggests that the diabetic patients in Wuhan had not paid enough attention to blood glucose monitoring, and their blood glucose control standards need to be further improved. In terms of the present problems, more comprehensive blood glucose management measures need to be developed to help diabetic patients fighting against COVID-19.Copyright © 2020 by the Chinese Medical Association.
ABSTRACT
Covid-19 pandemic accelerates the growing use of augmented and virtual reality in various industries, especially in education sector. It is worthy to study whether VR training would apply to technology-accepted learners, i.e., does "If you believe, you will receive” apply to VR training. In this work, the researchers developed an immersive VR interview room system that allows pre-employment learners to try on a simulated environment. Pre-captured interviewer questions are played for the learners get a taste into a real-liked interview. The investigation is the relationship between learners' perceived usefulness and interview self-efficacy in VR training in human resources management. The experiment results show they are positively correlated. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.
ABSTRACT
Resilience in business continuity of an entire industrial complex has direct local socioeconomic impact;however, there are few methods available for objective assessment of its status. This study investigated whether change in air quality could explain the state of economic activity in an industrial complex. Concentrations of PM2.5 and NO2 above several industrial complexes in central Thailand were extracted using the Google Earth Engine™ and analyzed to examine their temporal characteristics in relation to decline in business activity caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. Results confirmed that industrial complexes whose activities were diminished by the pandemic showed concurrent trends of reduction in each pollutant, proving that the concentration of airborne substances has potential to reveal the level of activity of industrial complexes. To enhance the application potential of the proposed method, further study should investigate specific causal inferences by extracting the characteristics of other airborne substances, and consider industrial complexes that include a greater number of companies and major industries. © 2023 IEEE.
ABSTRACT
Objective: To investigate the blood glucose management of diabetic patients during the fight against corona virus disease 2019 (COVID-19) in Wuhan, China. Method(s): A questionnaire survey was conducted on diabetic patients receiving hypoglycemic drugs in wuhan, hubei province from February 16, 2020 to February 20, 2020. The questionnaire included participants' basic information, the management of blood glucose, and the prevention and control of COVID-19. SPSS 19.0 was used for statistical analysis, and chi2 test was used for comparison between the two groups. Result(s): A total of 152 valid questionnaires were retrieved. 86 cases (56.6%) diabetic patients achieved glycemic control. 80 cases (52.6%) could regularly monitor their blood glucose. 48 cases (31.6%) had the difficulty in the management of blood glucose for purchasing medicines. They also had the difficulties in adjusting blood glucose in the outpatient of endocrinology departments (31 cases, 20.4%), adherence to appropriate exercise (28 cases, 18.4%) and eating the balanced diet (16 cases, 10.5%). When faced with medical problems, 73 cases (48.0%) seek help from hospital out-patient clinics. Nearby pharmacies (78 case, 51.3%) or hospital outpatient (63 cases, 41.5%) were the main ways to purchase medicines for diabetic patients. 133 cases (87.5%) took medicines regularly. 39 cases (25.7%) and 17 (11.2%) diabetic patients were affected by the COVID-19 epidemic and changed or discontinued the original treatments. There was statistically significant in the proportion of discontinuation of hypoglycemic drugs between different drug treatment regiments and subgroups with diabetes course (chi2=13.30, P<0.01;chi2=8.72, P<0.05). Only 16 cases (10.5%) showed that their community health service organizations had specially trained diabetic management team. Conclusion(s): This survey suggests that the diabetic patients in Wuhan had not paid enough attention to blood glucose monitoring, and their blood glucose control standards need to be further improved. In terms of the present problems, more comprehensive blood glucose management measures need to be developed to help diabetic patients fighting against COVID-19.Copyright © 2020 by the Chinese Medical Association.
ABSTRACT
The pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 is "not over,"in fact, the "dynamic clearing"policy for SARS-CoV-2 control and prevention in China has been firmly enforced. This study aimed to analyze the clinical symptoms and dynamic viral RNA changes in 2021 at Guangzhou Eighth People's Hospital. This study showed that 31.4% of the patients (695/2212) tested negative for viral RNA from admission to the final release from quarantine. Of all negative cases, 86.5% (601/695) remained in the hospital for no more than 5 days and were asymptomatic or mild. Among the remaining 402 patients who stayed for no more than 5 days, 76.4% (307/402) were viral RNA retest positive during the isolation stage. However, 96.4% of the peak viral RNA (296/307) was over Ct = 33 cycles during the isolation stage. © Wolters Kluwer Health, Inc. All rights reserved.
ABSTRACT
It was to explore the clinical characteristics of late pregnant women with asymptomatic infection of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) and the risk of intrauterine vertical transmission and breastfeeding transmission. The clinical data of a late pregnant woman with COVID-19 were retrospectively analyzed. The patient (singleton, cephalic) was admitted to the hospital on April 3, 2022. The patient had a dramatic increase in C-reactive protein after delivery, other blood routine tests were unremarkable, and the result of nucleic acid test was positive. On April 13, 2022, due to oligohydramnios, under measures such as positive pressure headgear and protective clothing in negative pressure operating room, second cesarean section combined with hysterorrhaphy (emergency) was performed to terminate the pregnancy, and the mother and baby were in good condition. Postpartum amniotic fluid, milk, and neonatal nucleic acid tests were negative. Corresponding treatment was given after cesarean section, and the patient was continuously monitored for nucleic acid detection to meet the discharge criteria of the COVID-19 and discharged and isolated. After discharge, the patient was followed up for 1 month. The newborn's spirit, diet, and development were normal. The maternal cesarean section incision recovered well. Patient with COVID-19 in the third trimester has prolonged hospital stays and are difficult to treat. However, the virus was not found in amniotic fluid, breast milk, and newborn, for which COVID-19 does not lead to intrauterine vertical transmission and breastfeeding transmission in the third trimester.Copyright © 2023 by the authors.
ABSTRACT
Acute wheezing in children due to underlying asthma or airways hypersensitivity (including allergic rhinitis) can be exacerbated by infectious and non-infectious causes. Of the infectious causes, seasonal rhinoviruses are the most common. Particulate airborne pollutants (PM2.5, PM10) can also play a role. During the COVID-19 pandemic, we observed changes in the pattern of paediatric emergency department (PED) presentations for acute wheezing. In this retrospective observational cohort study, data was extracted for children (0-18 years) presenting to the PED during 2018-2021, whose illness episodes were coded as 'asthma' or 'viral induced wheeze', along with their age, ethnicity, gender, and clinical outcomes, from hospital databases. The Figure shows the number of PED presentations for acute wheezing during 2018-2021, with annotations to explain the changing patterns. The number of cases presenting during the pandemic years 2020-2021 were similar to those in 2018-2019 in the same months, except for April-June 2020, July-August 2020, November 2020 and January-March 2021. Decreases in PED presentations coincided with periods of enforced national and local lockdowns, likely due to parental reluctance to expose their children to SARS-CoV-2 in a hospital setting. In addition, fluctuations in the incidence of rhinovirus infections, as shown by national sentinel surveillance data, likely contributed to changes in case numbers. Higher and lower incidence of rhinovirus infections tended to increase and decrease the number of presentations, respectively. Surprisingly, the level of airborne particulates (PM2.5, PM10) showed no correlation with these PED presentations for acute wheezing.
ABSTRACT
One fundamental question about any novel pathogen is: how does it transmit? Answering this question will help to protect ourselves from the agent, at least until effective vaccines and antiviral therapies can be developed, especially if it is an agent of moderate to high lethality. Initially, at the start of the Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, more emphasis was placed on handwashing rather than on droplet and aerosol transmission. Although severe acute respiratory syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2)-infected secretions such as saliva can spread the virus to hands, it became increasing evident that the virus mostly transmitted through close contact (though not necessarily touching), whilst people were breathing, talking, laughing, singing, coughing and sneezing near one another. During such respiratory activities, droplets and aerosols are produced together, and the amount of transmission due to these differentsized liquid particles will likely vary between individuals at different stages of their infection and illness. This question became even more complex as it emerged that viral transmission can occur for several days before symptom onset, and that asymptomatic cases can also shed just as much virus and potentially transmit it just as well as symptomatic cases. This chapter summarizes our understanding of how SARS-CoV-2 transmits and the infection control precautions to reduce this. © 2023 by World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd.
ABSTRACT
Networked social influence and strategic information manipulation are two social mechanisms fueling misinformation spread in online communities. However, it is unclear how these two mechanisms differ in their impacts. We conducted social network analyses on two online communities sharing misinformation concerning refugees in 2016 and COVID-19 in 2020. The results robustly showed that online misinformation spread is transitive and positively associated with members' embedded authority (i.e., the extent to which members' information is exclusively shared within the focal community). At the same time, strategic misinformation sharing by members of high community loyalty (i.e., targeted information sharing within the community) is less likely to gain momentum. The impact of bots on misinformation is contingent. Findings suggest that networked social influence is a more powerful driver of misinformation spread than strategic information manipulation. © 2022 The Author(s). Published with license by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.
ABSTRACT
Since 2020, the outbreak of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has affected the entire world, and networks of human connections were identified as a factor that had potentially impacted the geographical spread of COVID-19. With the help of social media platforms, these networks have connected populations across the word and allowed people to view each other in close virtual proximity. Consequently, the Social Connectedness Index (SCI) is used to measure the strength of social connectivity across geographical regions through friendship ties on Facebook. The importance of social networks—and their relation to human connections—may correlate with the spread of COVID-19. Since these networks can have a potential effect on the spread of COVID-19, it is crucial to identify the factors that were associated with its spread during the pandemic. In order to analyze SCI data, a social network analysis was conducted to define the network parameters and perform calculations using graph theory. A correlation analysis was also performed to identify factors that correlated with the spread of COVID-19 cases using the data in the United States (US). Finally, the machine learning model was used to create a case prediction paradigm from the network parameters. The results showed that SCI can be used as a parameter to create a pandemic prediction model. Multiple linear regression also yielded satisfactory results that predicted the total number of positive cases measured by adjusted R2. In terms of the time frame, this study suggested that the parameters from the previous week can be used to predict the number of weekly infections. The findings showed that social networks had a greater impact on the prediction of current active cases than total positive cases. The social networks between counties within a state also held more importance than those across states. © Fuji Technology Press Ltd.
ABSTRACT
The spread of COVID-19 has greatly threatened human health and economic growth. Angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2) is a receptor for severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-COV-2). By attaching to ACE2, SARS-COV-2 reduces its expression and induces lung injury. Vitamin D can inhibit the progression of COVID-19 by inhibiting the activity of ROCK pathway, up-regulating ACE2 expression and bio-availability, and slowing down the adverse reactions caused by Ang II accumulation. This study explored a novel mechanism, i.e., vitamin D protects against COVID-19-induced injury by upregulating ACE2 expression. It provides theoretical guidance for the role of Vitamin D in the prevention and treatment of COVID-19. Copyright © 2022 Chinese Journal of Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics. All rights reserved.
ABSTRACT
Studies have indicated that the COVID-19 pandemic has had miserable effects on athlete performance due to the movement control order (MCO) announced by the Malaysia Government. Dealing with self-training without the coach's guidance leads the archers to lose concentration, diminished self-confidence, and elevated anxiety levels. These factors contribute to inconsistent shooting performance. This study attempted to identify the archer's anxiety status during the training isolation period on the shooting performance. A total of 32 participants from the recurve archery category were recruited and enrolled in a web-based cross-sectional study during the MCO. The CSAI-2R instrument was applied to participants to examine the psychological aspect. Training Isolation resulted in a significant effect on anxiety status and shooting performance. Analysis from CSAI-2R, low-level archers, indicated 5% more anxiety than top-level archers for both cognitive and somatic anxiety sub-component. In contrast, Top archers revealed a higher self-confidence mean of 2.32 (moderately high) than low archers (1.38). The result shows improvement in anxiety and score performance with complete online monitoring and coaching supervision first session until the 8th session. These findings could assist sports institutions in improving a better training experience and understanding the pandemic's impact on athletes' mental health during home isolation. © 2023, Intelektual Pustaka Media Utama. All rights reserved.
Subject(s)
COVID-19 , Extracorporeal Membrane Oxygenation , Respiratory Distress Syndrome , Respiratory Insufficiency , Humans , SARS-CoV-2 , Extracorporeal Membrane Oxygenation/adverse effects , Respiratory Distress Syndrome/etiology , Respiratory Insufficiency/therapy , Respiratory Insufficiency/etiologyABSTRACT
The expansion of the homestay industry is shadowed by ethical concerns and perceived risks. In this context, the emotional relationship between hosts and tourists in the wake of COVID-19 pandemic needs to be re-examined. Focusing on the togetherness of "we" rather than the demarcation of "you versus me," we integrate homestay hosts and guests into a conceptual model to examine and compare their emotional solidarity with each other, as well as the relevance of emotional solidarity to perceived risk, MES (Multidimensional Ethics Scale), and support for homestays. Our results show that despite the assumption of perceived risk, tourists feel welcomed by hosts during the pandemic, while hosts feel emotionally close to tourists. In addition to the findings that emotional solidarity mediates perceived risk, MES, and support for homestays in both samples, we find that hosts' perceived risk is more likely to influence their emotional solidarity and support for homestays.
ABSTRACT
The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is an emerging disease that has continued from 2019 to the present. It has affected every country both major and minor pictures. Therefore, effective management reflecting the lessons learned is necessary and urgent for the management. Disaster management consists of three key periods including the mitigation and preparedness phase, response phase, and recovery and rehabilitation phase through clear-fast-safe and build-back-better concepts. Innovation by new application is one of the important tools in such issue. Previous research was found to paying attention only to recording the number of infected cases, resources, and basic self-care. Severe epidemic situations make a service place an inadequate healthcare provider. Therefore, disaster management that encourage infected people to manage themselves is essential. The research team developed tele health self-management (THSM) as a medium for communication of management and self-care guidelines during stay at home isolation and awaiting hospitalization. A proposed guideline is expected to supporting the caring of patients with COVID-19 and providing effective self-management services, reduce the loss rate, and improve the quality of life during infection. © Fuji Technology Press Ltd.
ABSTRACT
The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic caused a major shake-up in the global tourism industry, causing people from all over the world to self-isolate and avoid travel. Indonesia is one of the largest archipelago countries in the world, consisting of five major islands and thousands of small islands, making it a prime global tourism destination. However, due to the pandemic, the tourism industry in the country has been deeply affected, and many of the tourism businesses in Indonesia have had to shut down. This article discusses the COVID-19 impact on tourism in Indonesia through a systematic review of research articles from the ScienceDirect database for 2019–2022. This study aims to explore the pandemic’s impact on various tourism industries throughout Indonesia and the recovery strategy of the affected areas. Accordingly, this study reviewed the literature on this issue, focusing on the post-recovery strategy for the tourism industry and the impact of COVID-19 on various branches of the tourism industry, such as the hotel, geoparks, and halal industries. Connecting the gap between policies and demographic characteristics is a crucial strategy for tourism recovery that can lay a foundation for future studies in similar fields. © Fuji Technology Press Ltd.
ABSTRACT
Data visualization is a powerful tool for understating information through visual cues. However, allowing novices to create visualization artifacts for what they want to see is not easy, just as not everyone can write SQL queries. Arguably, the most natural way to specify what to visualize is through natural language or speech, similar to our daily search on Google or Apple Siri, leaving to the system the task of reasoning about what to visualize and how. In this demo, we present Sevi an end-to-end data visualization system that acts as a virtual assistant to allow novices to create visualizations through either natural language or speech. Sevi is powered by two main components: Speech2Text which is based on Google Cloud Speech-to-Text Rest API, and Text2VIS, which uses an end-to-end neural machine translation model called ncNet trained using a cross-domain benchmark called nvBench. Both ncNet and nvBench have been developed by us. We will walk the audience through two general domain datasets, one related to COVID-19 and the other on NBA player statistics, to highlight how Sevi enables novices to easily create data visualizations. Because nvBench contains Text2VIS training samples from 105 domains (e.g., sport, college, hospital, etc.), the audience can play with speech or text input with any of these domains.
ABSTRACT
Background: Sézary syndrome (SS) is an aggressive type of cutaneous T-cell lymphomas (CTCL). Due to its low prevalence, there are limited data on real-world treatment patterns of currently available SS therapies. Furthermore, recent approvals of new agents for patients with CTCL as well as COVID-19 likely impacted real-world treatment patterns. Objective: To examine real-world treatment patterns and the impact of COVID-19 among SS patients treated in 2018-2020 in the US. Methods: Patients with public or private insurance in the 2018-2020 Symphony Health Solutions database were classified into 3 groups: ≥1 diagnosis of SS (ICD-10-CM code: C84.1x) in 2018, 2019, and 2020, respectively. Patient characteristics and treatment patterns for all therapies recommended by the National Comprehensive Cancer Network guidelines version 2.2021 were examined: systemic therapy (e.g., extracorporeal photopheresis (ECP), parenteral, or oral agents), skin-directed therapy (SDT, e.g., topical, local radiation, total skin electron beam therapy, or phototherapy) and bone marrow transplant. The impact of COVID-19 was assessed via quarterly analysis. National drug codes, current procedural terminology and healthcare common procedure coding system codes were used to identify all treatments. Results: The analyses included 869, 882, and 853 SS patients in 2018, 2019, and 2020, respectively (mean age: 66.3, 66.9 and 67.3 years;male: 54.4%, 54.8%, and 55.6%). Overall, systemic therapy increased from 2018 to 2020 (41.8% to 46.5%), with increased parenteral (20.7% to 28.7%) but decreased ECP (17.0% to 13.5%) usage. SDT increased from 2018 to 2020 (48.9% to 52.9%), with increased topical (42.3% to 48.3%) but decreased phototherapy (6.3% to 4.1%) usage. ECP, mogamulizumab, and bexarotene were the most prescribed systemic therapies in 2019-2020, with mogamulizumab being the only one with increased usage over time. Quarterly analysis showed a decreasing ECP from Q1 to Q4 within each year, with a notable drop in Q2 2020. For parental systemics, there was an increasing trend in 2019 and 2020, but utilization in Q4 2020 was lower than that of Q3 2020. For oral systemic, there was a notable drop in Q2 2020 but an increased trend in Q3-Q4 2020. Conclusions: This claims analysis indicated increased use in systemic and SDT among SS patients in 2018-2020. The quarterly analysis indicated that the drop in ECP and oral systemic usage in Q2 2020 coincided with the onset of the pandemic, but there was a stable use of parenteral systemic during 2020.