ABSTRACT
This chapter reflects our experiences as PhD students and mothers of adolescents during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. We describe how our positionality as mothers has shaped our socialisation experience in graduate school and how the impact of our positionality has been exacerbated during the COVID-19 pandemic. Our experiences highlight a disparate graduate school experience for students managing motherhood, family responsibility, and research commitment during the pandemic. We reflect on the disruptions that the pandemic has had on the different aspects of our personal and professional life priorities, including transitioning to online supervision meetings, the solitude of doing research from home, the juggling of family and children's needs, study and work commitments, and physical and mental health concerns. While these may seem like disruptions and distractions to our research, we have discovered new insights through these experiences, and we have found some silver linings. These include seeing our research work and family life as complementary instead of in competition, the opportunity to share our research with our family members, a renewed sense of confidence to deviate from the norm in graduate school, and newfound meaning about academia, learning, and research. Finally, we provide recommendations for policy and practice including the review of graduate school expectations and support systems for students, particularly students who do not fit in the mould of young, single students who devote most of their waking hours to research. In this way, we believe academia can harness the experience and untapped potential of mature students and reimagine the graduate student experience. © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2022.
ABSTRACT
Background: The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has led an implementation of institutional infection control protocols. This study will determine the effects of these protocols on outcomes of acute ischemic stroke (AIS) patients treated with endovascular therapy (EVT). Methods: Uninterrupted time series analysis of the impact of COVID-19 safety protocols on AIS patients undergoing EVT. We analyze data from prospectively collected quality improvement databases at 9 centers from March 11, 2019 to March 10, 2021. The primary outcome is 90-day modified Rankin Score (mRS). The secondary outcomes are angiographic time metrics. Results: Preliminary analysis of one stroke center included 214 EVT patients (n=144 pre-pandemic). Baseline characteristics were comparable between the two periods. Time metrics "last seen normal to puncture” (305.7 vs 407.2 min;p=0.05) and "hospital arrival to puncture” (80.4 vs 121.2 min;p=0.04) were significantly longer during pandemic compared to pre-pandemic. We found no significant difference in 90-day mRS (2.0 vs 2.2;p=0.506) or successful EVT rate (89.6% vs 90%;p=0.93). Conclusions: Our results indicate an increase in key time metrics of EVT in AIS during the pandemic, likely related to infection control measures. Despite the delays, we found no difference in clinical outcomes between the two periods.
ABSTRACT
Background: The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has led the implementation of institutional infection control protocols. This study will determine the effects of these protocols on outcomes of acute ischemic stroke (AIS) patients treated with endovascular therapy (EVT). Methods: Uninterrupted time series analysis of the impact of COVID-19 safety protocols on AIS patients undergoing EVT. We analyze data from prospectively collected quality improvement databases at 6 centers from March 11, 2019 to March 10, 2021. The primary outcome is 90-day modified Rankin Score (mRS). The secondary outcomes are angiographic time metrics. Results: Preliminary analysis of one stroke center included 214 EVT patients (n=150 pre-pandemic). Baseline characteristics were comparable between the two periods. Time metrics last seen normal to puncture (305.7 vs 407.2 min;p=0.05) and hospital arrival to puncture (80.4 vs 121.2 min;p=0.04) were significantly longer during pandemic compared to pre-pandemic. We found no significant difference in 90-day mRS (2.0 vs 2.2;p=0.506) or successful EVT rate (89.6% vs 90%;p=0.93). Conclusions: Our results indicate an increase in key time metrics of EVT in AIS during pandemic, likely related to infection control measures. Despite the delays, we found no difference in clinical outcomes between the two periods.
ABSTRACT
Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is the most devastating infectious disease in the 21st century with more than 2 million lives lost in less than a year. The activation of inflammasome in the host infected by SARS-CoV-2 is highly related to cytokine storm and hypercoagulopathy, which significantly contribute to the poor prognosis of COVID-19 patients. Even though many studies have shown the host defense mechanism induced by inflammasome against various viral infections, mechanistic interactions leading to downstream cellular responses and pathogenesis in COVID-19 remain unclear. The SARS-CoV-2 infection has been associated with numerous cardiovascular disorders including acute myocardial injury, myocarditis, arrhythmias, and venous thromboembolism. The inflammatory response triggered by the activation of NLRP3 inflammasome under certain cardiovascular conditions resulted in hyperinflammation or the modulation of angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 signaling pathways. Perturbations of several target cells and tissues have been described in inflammasome activation, including pneumocytes, macrophages, endothelial cells, and dendritic cells. The interplay between inflammasome activation and hypercoagulopathy in COVID-19 patients is an emerging area to be further addressed. Targeted therapeutics to suppress inflammasome activation may have a positive effect on the reduction of hyperinflammation-induced hypercoagulopathy and cardiovascular disorders occurring as COVID-19 complications.