COVID QA Network: A Specific Case of Biomedical Question Answering

COVID-19 crisis has led to an outburst of information that needs to be organized, validated, and made available to the seekers. Despite the rapid growth and success of BERT models in the last 3 years, COVID QA is a difficult task due to the lack of applicable datasets and a relevant language representation. Therefore, this study proposes a transformer-based Question Answering (QA) model for COVID-19 questions from the biomedical domain. Further, explored several datasets, and models required for question type prediction, no-Answer prediction, and answer extraction and transfer learning strategies. It has been demonstrated that the exact match score can be significantly improved with limited amounts of training data from the biomedical domain. Finally, the findings of the study have been summarized as Factoid QA Finetuning Framework (FQFF), which can provide initial direction for domain-specific QA tasks with a limited amount of data. © 2023 IEEE.

Screen time and mental well-being of students during the COVID-19 pandemic: Findings from a survey among medical and engineering students

Background and Objectives: Concerns have been expressed about the possible adverse impact of increased screen time on the psychological well-being of students during the COVID-19 pandemic. The current study aimed to assess the relationship between screen time and mental well-being among college students. Methods: This cross-sectional online survey-based study was conducted among Indian college students. Details regarding sociodemographics and the amount and pattern of screen time usage and mental well-being (assessed using World Health Organization Well-Being Index;5) were collected. Furthermore, personality traits were assessed using a validated questionnaire. Results: The final study sample comprised of 731 medical and engineering undergraduate students with a mean age of 20.7 years. The total screen time across different devices among the study participants for both weekdays and weekends was comparable, with a median value of 540 min. Poor mental well-being was significantly associated with higher total screen time (P = 0.03). Furthermore, screen time use predominantly to access social media for noncommunication purposes was associated with significantly lower mental well-being scores (P = 0.03). Conclusions: The current study highlights the impact of screen time on the mental well-being of students. The higher total screen time use was associated with poor mental well-being. Various types of screen time could have a differential relation with the mental well-being of students. Increased screen time use predominantly to access social media for noncommunication purposes was associated with a higher risk of poor mental well-being. © 2022 Medknow. All rights reserved.

Predicting ICU Admissions based on Preconditions and Comorbidity for SARS COV2 Infected Patients

Hospitals across the globe have severe constraints in regard to ICU facilities, beds, and other life support systems. However, in certain situations including natural calamities, epidemics or pandemics, large-scale accidents, and so on, the requirement for ICU beds and resources immediately gets augmented. During such times, there exists an impending need for an optimum apportioning of ICU admissions and resources so that those patients who need critical care are given at the right point of time. The onslaught of COVID-19 pandemic has exuded a high probability of virus transmissions and subsequent complications in patients with co-morbidities and relevant medical issues, resulting in the exploration and investigation of models that could forecast the need for ICU admissions with a higher degree of accuracy. In this research study, a patient's pre-condition dataset will be used that is categorical in nature. Feature selection and extractions are implemented and the modified descriptors are provided as input to the model, for evaluating them based on the metrics namely F1-score, accuracy, specificity, and sensitivity. The prime objective is to build a predictive algorithm that will predict prior to the necessity of ICU admissions based on the patient's comorbidity/ precondition specifically for SARS COV2 infection. © 2022 IEEE.

An Observational Study, Impact of Tuberculosis on Covid-19 Disease and Its Effect on Severity

Background: covid-19 disease is a new disease of international concern. Till now there is limited studies available on this new disease.it is anticipitated that the people suffering from both tuberculosis and covid-19 may have poor outcomes, the present study conducted to find out the impact of tuberculosis on covid-19 disease and its severity. Material(s) and Method(s): 486 patients of both genders from general and private ward were enrolled in this study, data of tuberculosis case made as per clinical manifestations, current or old treatment history of ATT and investigations. While covid-19 cases confirmed by RT-PCR and HRCT chest, scoring of covid-19 severity was done by Spo2, HRCT chest and inflammatory markers. Result(s): In enrolled total 486 confirm cases of covid-19,39(8%) patients had history of tuberculosis and 447 (92%) patients without H/o of tuberculosis. It have been seen that severity of covid-19 was significantly low in patients with history of tuberculosis (p value <0.0001). Conclusion(s): Thus in our observational study, it is concluded that the severity of covid-19 was less in patients having tuberculosis as compared to patients without tubercular infection. Copyright © 2022 International Journal of Academic Medicine and Pharmacy. All rights reserved.

Screen time and COVID-19: Observations from among the college students in India

Objectives: The current study aimed to assess the pattern of digital media use and screen time among students during lockdown. It also aimed to explore possible correlates of problematic digital media use and screen-time among students. Methodology: It was a prospective observational study. Students pursuing undergraduate courses in Public and Private State Universities constituted the study universe. The study used a survey approach for data collection. Besides the screen time, the mental well being of the study participants was assessed by the WHO Well-being Index and the personality was assessed using the Big Five Inventory (BFI)-10. Results: A total of 731 responses were included in the analysis. Around 93% self-reported an increase in daily screen time during COVID-19. A small but significant negative correlation between increased screen time and QoL (rs = -0.154, p < .001) was found. Increased screen time due to the use of social media for non-communication purposes was associated with poorer QoL (U = 32947.50;p = .02) and greater COVID stress (U = 32381.50;p = .01). Out of total of 202 students who shared the screenshot of the phone ST function, 145 (71.8%) underestimated their daily smartphone ST, whereas 56 (27.7%) overestimated ST. In the regression analysis the predicted odds of poor mental well-being were 1.430 times greater for subjects with higher neuroticism scores for the overall sample.

Impact of COVID-19 Pandemic on Screen Time: Findings From a Cross-Sectional Observational Study Among College Students From India

In this study, we assessed the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the amount and pattern of screen time among college students. The relationship between increased screen time and quality of life (QoL), COVID-related stress, and personality traits were also explored. A cross-sectional online survey-based study was conducted among Indian college students who were recruited by purposive sampling. Details regarding socio-demographics, amount and pattern of screen time usage, change in screen time patterns during the COVID-19 pandemic, and COVID-related stress were collected. In addition, personality traits and QoL were assessed with validated questionnaires. A total of 731 responses (51% female, mean age 20.7 years) were analysed. Of the participants, 93.2% self-reported an increase in daily screen time during COVID-19. The predominant reasons for the increased screen time were educational screen time (89.6%), streaming or watching videos for entertainment (82.8%), use of social media for non-communication purposes (78.1%), communication with friends and/or family members (76.2%), reading or watching news (65.9%), and interactive recreational screen time (44.7%). A small but significant negative correlation between increased screen time and QoL (rs =-0.154, p o .001) was found. Increased screen time due to the use of social media for non-communication purposes was associated with poorer QoL (U = 32947.50;p = .02) and greater COVID stress (U = 32381.50;p = .01). Educational screen time was the most common cause for increased screen time among college students and was not associated with negative effects on QoL. The context and purpose of screen time appears to be important in ascertaining the impact of screen time on QoL. © 2022, Centre for Addiction and Mental Health. All rights reserved.

Liver Injury at Presentation in COVID-19 is Associated with Immuno-Inflammatory Response

Background: SARS-CoV-2 has been shown to affect liver and GI tract in addition to primary involvement of lungs. Liver injury in COVID-19 is hypothesized to be multifactorial with 14- 73% of patients showing evidence of deranged liver functional. Data regarding the liver injury due to SARS CoV-2 infection in a large cohort of unselected patients, is limited, especially from India. So, we conducted a retrospective study among consecutive patients admitted with COVID-19 disease to a tertiary care hospital during the first wave of pandemic. Methods: It was a retrospective observational study. Consecutive patients infected with SARS- CoV-2 and admitted to the COVID-19 ward or ICU of our hospital between 1/4/2020 to 30/6/2020 were included. Patients, < 18 years of age, pregnant ladies and those with underlying liver disease were excluded. Detail history along with data on laboratory parameters, treatment given and outcomes (need for oxygen therapy, ICU admission, need for ventilatory support and in-hospital mortality) was collected and analysed. Results: Data on 303 patients was analysed after exclusions. The mean age was 47.9(15.9) years and 214(69.5%) were males. Out of 303 patients 149 (49.2%) had liver injury. Mild liver injury was present in 95(31.3%), moderate to severe liver injury in 54 (17.8%) patients and only 5 (1.6%) had severe liver injury. Pure cholestatic liver injury was present 19 (6.2%) cases. Male sex (82.1% vs 58.5%;P<0.001) and presence of symptoms (97.3% vs 90.8%;P= 0.01) were associated with presence of liver injury. Patients who had liver injury had significantly longer duration of symptoms before presentation [6 (3-8) days vs 4 (3-7) days);P=0.02] and higher serum ferritin levels [322(156-552) vs 151(44.9-299.5) ng/ml;P=0.02]. On multivariate analysis, serum ferritin was the only factor, independently associated with liver injury (OR- 1.002;95% CI- 1.001-1.004;P=0.006). Serum ferritin had a positive correlation with AST [r=0.416;P=0.0001] and ALT [R=0.458;P =0.0001] in the entire cohort. Liver injury was not significantly associated with need of oxygen therapy, ICU stay, mechanical ventilation or mortality but patients with moderate-severe liver injury had a longer hospital stay than those without [12.2 (5.07) vs 10.3 (4.84) days;P=0.01]. Conclusion: In COVID-19 patients, liver injury at presentation is common in symptomatic male patients and occurs around the end of first week and correlates strongly with serum ferritin levels, suggesting that it might be driven by immuno-inflammation.

Exposure to smartphone and screen media in children and adolescents and COVID-19 pandemic

Digitalization has changed the way children learn and grow in the contemporary society. Also, COVID-19 has ushered in a ʼnew normal’ as a means of prevention and safety, necessitating children and adolescents to stay at home for educational and recreational purposes. This ‘Position Statement’ addresses the issue of conceiving a balance with respect to exposure to digital media and the ʼnew normal’ in mind. Individualized evidence- based family plans remain the cornerstone of ensuring effective management.