Modelling COVID-19 effect on the performance of MENA Health-care sector

PurposeThis study models the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on the performance of the private health-care sector in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) countries. This paper aims to address the economic, societal and sustainability of the health-care sector.Design/methodology/approachData were collected from Bloomberg and the sample consists of 534 firm-year observations from 55 firms listed over 2010–2020. The authors apply panel data and control for the country and governance effects.FindingsThe authors found heterogeneous results regarding the three sub-sectors. The pandemic has a negative effect on the accounting and market performances of the "Pharmaceutical companies” and an insignificant impact on "Healthcare Management and Facilities Services.” Moreover, the impact of COVID-19 on health-care firms' performance depends on the country's economic classification and the degree of regulatory and governance frameworks.Research limitations/implicationsFurther studies may consider a larger sample and other regions. It is recommended to address the health-care sector's challenges to invest in new technologies such as "digital twin” and predictive and personalized medicine. It is worth testing model development theory and its effects on speeding up and designing models to ensure the proper functioning and developing mathematics to determine uncertainties in patient data and model predictions.Originality/valueTo the best of the authors' knowledge, this paper is novel as it is unique in modeling the impact of COVID-19 on the health-care public companies in the MENA region. The findings pinpoint firms' and countries' heterogeneous impacts on financial and market performances.

Factors influencing turnover intention among healthcare employees during the COVID-19 pandemic in the private hospitals of Bahrain

PurposeThis study aims to examine the relationship between polychronicity, job autonomy, perceived workload, work-family conflict and high work demand on the health-care employee turnover intention during the COVID-19 pandemic. Design/methodology/approachThe authors conducted quantitative research in private hospitals using a self-administered questionnaire, and 264 respondents participated. The authors also used an analysis of moment structures to determine the relationship between independent and moderating variables. FindingsThe results show a significant positive relationship between polychronicity, job autonomy, perceived workload, work-family conflict and high work demand, affecting turnover intention. This study also found the moderating effect of high work demand on work-family conflict and turnover intention. Research limitations/implicationsThis research was limited to hospitals in Bahrain during the COVID-19 pandemic. Nevertheless, the findings highlight the factors associated with health-care employee turnover intention and only five factors were identified. Practical implicationsThis study enhances the theoretical and practical effects of turnover intention. The results provide a competitive benchmark for hospital managers, administrators and governing bodies of employee retention. Social implicationsIt advances economics and management theory by enhancing the understanding of health-care employees' turnover intention in Bahrain. It serves as a basis for future large-scale studies to test or refine existing theories. Originality/valueTo the best of the authors' knowledge, this study is the first to adopt extrinsic variables in self-determination theory to measure the turnover intention of health-care employees. However, using resources in a crisis can be applied to any disaster.

Implementation of a Student-Teacher-Based Blended Curriculum for the Training of Medical Students for Nasopharyngeal Swab and Intramuscular Injection: Mixed Methods Pre-Post and Satisfaction Surveys.

BACKGROUND: The COVID-19 pandemic caused a major disruption in the health care sector with increased workload and the need for new staff to assist with screening and vaccination tasks. Within this context, teaching medical students to perform intramuscular injections and nasal swabs could help address workforce needs. Although several recent studies discuss medical students' role and integration in clinical activities during the pandemic, knowledge gaps exist concerning their role and potential benefit in designing and leading teaching activities during this period. OBJECTIVE: The aim of our study was to prospectively assess the impact in terms of confidence, cognitive knowledge, and perceived satisfaction of a student-teacher-designed educational activity consisting of nasopharyngeal swabs and intramuscular injections for the training of second-year medical students in the Faculty of Medicine, University of Geneva, Switzerland. METHODS: This was a mixed methods pre-post surveys and satisfaction survey study. Activities were designed using evidence-based teaching methodologies based on the SMART (specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and timely) criteria. All second-year medical students who did not participate in the activity's old format were recruited unless they explicitly stated that they wanted to opt out. Pre-post activity surveys were designed to assess perception of confidence and cognitive knowledge. An additional survey was designed to assess satisfaction in the mentioned activities. Instructional design was blended with a presession e-learning activity and a 2-hour practice session with simulators. RESULTS: Between December 13, 2021, and January 25, 2022, a total of 108 second-year medical students were recruited; 82 (75.9%) students participated in the preactivity survey and 73 (67.6%) in the postactivity survey. Students' confidence in performing intramuscular injections and nasal swabs significantly increased on a 5-point Likert scale for both procedures-from 3.31 (SD 1.23) and 3.59 (SD 1.13) before the activity to 4.45 (SD 0.62) and 4.32 (SD 0.76) after the activity (P<.001), respectively. Perceptions of cognitive knowledge acquisition also significantly increased for both activities. For the nasopharyngeal swab, knowledge acquisition concerning indications increased from 2.7 (SD 1.24) to 4.15 (SD 0.83), and for the intramuscular injection, knowledge acquisition concerning indications increased from 2.64 (SD 1.1) to 4.34 (SD 0.65) (P<.001). Knowledge of contraindications for both activities increased from 2.43 (SD 1.1) to 3.71 (SD 1.12) and from 2.49 (SD 1.13) to 4.19 (SD 0.63), respectively (P<.001). High satisfaction rates were reported for both activities. CONCLUSIONS: Student-teacher-based blended activities for training novice medical students in commonly performed procedural skills seem effective for increasing their confidence and cognitive knowledge and should be further integrated within a medical school curriculum. Blended learning instructional design increases students' satisfaction about clinical competency activities. Future research should elucidate the impact of student-teacher-designed and student-teacher-led educational activities.

Intellectual capital and knowledge management for overcoming social and economic barriers in the health-care sector

PurposeThis study aims to explore how knowledge management (KM) influences the intellectual capital (IC) of organizations operating in health care and how IC and knowledge-sharing (KS) can contribute to the achievement of sustainable development in health systems. Notably, this study focuses on telemedicine, investigating how relational capital contributes to KS in the context of remote care services. Design/methodology/approachTo comply with the paper's aim, the authors use a qualitative research method based on a polar case study suitable for IC in health-care studies. More precisely, this study analyzes a nonprofit organization that, for over 15 years, has offered a free multispecialist teleconsultation service to answer medical questions from the most disadvantaged places in the world. FindingsThe findings show that the KM significantly contributes to the IC of organizations. Indeed, it improves the data management and transmission system, it increases performance flexibility in times of resource scarcity without compromising business objectives and it can attract new human resources even when not motivated by selfish goals (volunteer physicians). Research limitations/implicationsThis research contributes to studies on IC in health care by focusing on the contribution of telemedicine to the creation of IC. In particular, this work emphasizes the ability of telemedicine to develop and share knowledge in disadvantaged areas of the world. Moreover, in the current context, still strongly permeated by the health emergency generated by the pandemic and recently by the war in Eastern Europe, the importance of such assistance and diagnosis grows. Practical implicationsThe conclusions the research findings lead may guide policymakers toward a policy supporting telemedicine. It would alleviate general health-care costs and completely revolutionize light health care's role. Moreover, reducing socioeconomic distances, improving access to care and applying innovative technologies for sharing outcomes foster balanced socioeconomic development and knowledge dissemination. Originality/valueThis research has shown how telemedicine represents a new successful business model even in times of crisis. The organizational model makes it possible to offer cutting-edge specialized care, contain costs, easily reach disadvantaged areas of the planet, strengthen the skills and autonomy of the most backward countries through a process of KS and push the structures operating there to interact with those in advanced countries.

Ethical issues in health care sector: Myth or Reality?

Ethics are the moral duties and responsibilities which govern a lifestyle. In medical profession being ethical is the primary demand, but at times ethical judgement and behaviour may direct towards an unprecedented decision. In these circumstances, medical professionals and health care providers take utmost care to take a diligent decision. But a conflict always exists between the professional and personal ethical values of all health care professionals and workers. At times the health care workers and professionals undergo severe mental distress and agony to respond to professional ethics. The study is conducted with the objective of reviewing ethical issues and conflict existing in the health care sector in the current scenario when the whole world is fighting to defeat the deadly virus of COVID. This paper is based on extensive literature review which includes research articles and papers apart from newspaper articles and reports. The review gave a clear picture on the ethical stature in health care sector. Further, the paper also highlights the ethical issues and conflicts of health care workers and professionals.

A systematic review of the impact of corruption in Latin America during the spread of the first wave of COVID-19.

As the Covid-19 pandemic crisis raged in Latin America, numerous acts of corruption affected containment strategies and weakened institutional systems. A systematic review was conducted during the first wave of contagion in 2020 to analyse the relationship between corruption and Covid-19 in Latin American countries, highlighting its components and the institutions involved. Following the PRISMA guidelines, scientific databases and prepublications were searched using the terms (((SARS-CoV-2) OR (Covid-19)) AND ((Corruption [Mesh]) AND (Latin America))). Seventy-two studies were included in the initial search, 36 in MEDLINE/PubMed, 20 in Scielo, and 11 prepublications. Of the 25 eligible studies, none met the required standard for inclusion. Although corruption is endemic in Latin America, its levels and impact during the first wave of Covid-19 contagion have not been quantified.

B2B marketing strategies in healthcare management: intellectual structure and research trends

Purpose>This study aims to map out the ways in which the intellectual structure and research trends of scientific publications come together in business-to-business (B2B) marketing strategies in the health-care sector. More specifically, it aims first to identify the fundamental contributions of research in this area of knowledge and second to determine the lines of research that constitute the most prominent intellectual contribution to the development of a solid future research agenda.Design/methodology/approach>The statistical and analytical methods include bibliometric, co-citation and cluster analysis techniques. To identify useful patterns of information within the paper, this study sought paid special attention to scholarship that was jointly cited. This study then applied hierarchical cluster analysis to the totality of the co-cited paper and then grouped the interrelated paper into distinct sets.Findings>This study were able to systematically identify and classify various theoretical perspectives of B2B marketing strategies within the health-care sector into four main approaches, namely, decision-making strategies;relational marketing;co-creation;new challenges.Originality/value>By systematically identifying, exploring and analyzing the key priorities of B2B marking within the health-care sector, this study contributes positively to the existing literature. The added value is that the work will help to further improve the international standards of excellence within the health-care sector and its marking apparatuses.

Psychological Contract Breach and Happiness at Work in Healthcare sector: Double Mediation of Colleague Support and Deviant Workplace Behaviour

The study examines the association between psychological contract breach (PCB) and happiness at work and the double mediating role of colleague support and deviant workplace behaviour on the relationship of PCB and happiness at work. structural equation modeling (SEM) has been used to analyze the data of 401 questionnaires from the health sector of Lahore, Pakistan. The study discovered support for the negative relationship between PCB and happiness at the workplace. However, colleague support is reduced in the manifestation of a PCB that reduces happiness at work. Similarly, deviant workplace behaviour has been increased in the presence of psychological contract breaches, causing a reduction in happiness at work. The data for the study was conducted during the time of Pandemic COVID19, where there was an immense level of pressure on the health sector, keeping in mind that schedules of doctors and nurses had been extremely stressful, collection of data and responses was challenging. The input of the study is the incorporation of conservation of resource theory (COR) and social exchange theory (SET) during the pandemic situation. The research also provides both theoretical and practical implications and suggests future areas for supplementary studies. © 2022. All Rights Reserved.

Modelling COVID-19 effect on the performance of MENA Health-care sector

Purpose This study models the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on the performance of the private health-care sector in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) countries. This paper aims to address the economic, societal and sustainability of the health-care sector. Design/methodology/approach Data were collected from Bloomberg and the sample consists of 534 firm-year observations from 55 firms listed over 2010-2020. The authors apply panel data and control for the country and governance effects. Findings The authors found heterogeneous results regarding the three sub-sectors. The pandemic has a negative effect on the accounting and market performances of the "Pharmaceutical companies" and an insignificant impact on "Healthcare Management and Facilities Services." Moreover, the impact of COVID-19 on health-care firms' performance depends on the country's economic classification and the degree of regulatory and governance frameworks. Research limitations/implications Further studies may consider a larger sample and other regions. It is recommended to address the health-care sector's challenges to invest in new technologies such as "digital twin" and predictive and personalized medicine. It is worth testing model development theory and its effects on speeding up and designing models to ensure the proper functioning and developing mathematics to determine uncertainties in patient data and model predictions. Originality/value To the best of the authors' knowledge, this paper is novel as it is unique in modeling the impact of COVID-19 on the health-care public companies in the MENA region. The findings pinpoint firms' and countries' heterogeneous impacts on financial and market performances.

Approaches to gender-based violence and legal abortion in health services during COVID-19 lockdown.

This study is interested in analyzing how health services address gender-based violence and legal abortion in a context of mandatory preventive social isolation. Between May and June 2020, 27 telephone interviews were conducted with healthcare professionals and key informants from Córdoba and Resistencia. Changes in detection, methods, and demand were identified, related to the reorganization of the healthcare system, modifications in the care relationship, and the resources needed to respond to demand. The pandemic has deepened barriers to women's access to health services and has added new ones. Networks among healthcare professionals, feminist healthcare practices, and innovative approaches were identified as facilitators of access, which have been central in mitigating the effects of the pandemic and guaranteeing rights.

Este estudio buscó indagar cómo los servicios de salud abordan las violencias de género y la interrupción legal del embarazo en contexto de aislamiento social preventivo y obligatorio. Entre mayo y junio de 2020, se realizaron 27 entrevistas telefónicas a profesionales sanitarios e informantes claves de las ciudades argentinas de Córdoba y Resistencia. Se identificaron cambios en la detección, abordaje y demanda vinculados a la reorganización sanitaria, las modificaciones en la relación asistencial y los recursos necesarios para canalizar la demanda. La pandemia ha profundizado los obstáculos de acceso a servicios sanitarios de las mujeres y ha generado otros nuevos. Ante ello, las redes entre profesionales, la práctica sanitaria feminista y los abordajes innovadores fueron identificados como facilitadores de acceso, claves para amortiguar la pandemia y garantizar derechos.

Characterising the health and social care segment of the BCS (The Chartered Institute for IT) membership and their continuing professional development needs.

OBJECTIVES: The aim of this study was to identify and characterise the health and social care membership of the British Computer Society (BCS), an international informatics professional organisation, and to determine their ongoing development needs. METHODS: A prepiloted online survey included items on professional regulatory body, job role, work sector, qualifications, career stage, BCS membership (type, specialist group/branch activity (committees, event attendance)), use of BCS.org career planning/continuing professional development (CPD) tools, self-reported digital literacy and other professional registrations. The quantitative data were analysed using descriptive statistics in JASP V.0.9.2 to report frequencies and correlations. RESULTS: Responses were received from 152 participants. Most were male (n=103; 68%), aged 50-59 years (n=41; 28%), working in England (n=107; 71%) with master's or honours degrees (n=80; 53%). Most were either new (5 years or less; n=61; 40%) or long-term members (21 years or more; n=43; 28%) of BCS. Most were not interested in health specialist groups (n=57; 38%) preferring non-health specialist groups such as information management (n=54; 37%) and project management (n=52; 34%). DISCUSSION: This is the first paper to characterise the health and social care membership of an IT-focused professional body and to start to determine their CPD needs. There are further challenges ahead in curating the content and delivery. CONCLUSION: This study is the starting point from which members' CPD needs, and ongoing interest, in being recognised as health and social care professional members, can be acknowledged and explored. Further research is planned with the participants who volunteered to be part of designing future CPD content and delivery.

A Review of Deep Learning Algorithms and Their Applications in Healthcare

Deep learning uses artificial neural networks to recognize patterns and learn from them to make decisions. Deep learning is a type of machine learning that uses artificial neural networks to mimic the human brain. It uses machine learning methods such as supervised, semi-supervised, or unsupervised learning strategies to learn automatically in deep architectures and has gained much popularity due to its superior ability to learn from huge amounts of data. It was found that deep learning approaches can be used for big data analysis successfully. Applications include virtual assistants such as Alexa and Siri, facial recognition, personalization, natural language processing, autonomous cars, automatic handwriting generation, news aggregation, the colorization of black and white images, the addition of sound to silent films, pixel restoration, and deep dreaming. As a review, this paper aims to categorically cover several widely used deep learning algorithms along with their architectures and their practical applications: backpropagation, autoencoders, variational autoencoders, restricted Boltzmann machines, deep belief networks, convolutional neural networks, recurrent neural networks, generative adversarial networks, capsnets, transformer, embeddings from language models, bidirectional encoder representations from transformers, and attention in natural language processing. In addition, challenges of deep learning are also presented in this paper, such as AutoML-Zero, neural architecture search, evolutionary deep learning, and others. The pros and cons of these algorithms and their applications in healthcare are explored, alongside the future direction of this domain. This paper presents a review and a checkpoint to systemize the popular algorithms and to encourage further innovation regarding their applications. For new researchers in the field of deep learning, this review can help them to obtain many details about the advantages, disadvantages, applications, and working mechanisms of a number of deep learning algorithms. In addition, we introduce detailed information on how to apply several deep learning algorithms in healthcare, such as in relation to the COVID-19 pandemic. By presenting many challenges of deep learning in one section, we hope to increase awareness of these challenges, and how they can be dealt with. This could also motivate researchers to find solutions for these challenges.

Awareness, Attitude and Practice during COVID-19 Pandemic among Non-Health Care Workers in a Tertiary Care Hospital in South India: A Cross Sectional Study

Introduction: To plan and implement effective control measures, knowledge about basic hygiene and the mechanism of disease transmission, and practices adopted in such circumstances is of utmost importance. Non-professional health care workers working in a tertiary care hospital is at a major risk than general population in contracting a pandemic. This study was undertaken to assess the awareness, attitude and practice during COVID-19 pandemic among non-health care workers in a tertiary care hospital. Materials and Methods: Cross-sectional self-administered questionnaire was used to assess the awareness, attitude and practice of non-health care workers. Personnel in pharmacy, patient service and food and security were taken as subjects. The subjects were also categorised according to their educational status. Results: The knowledge, attitude and practice scores and the total combined scores were found to be statistically significant based on the occupation and educational status of the subjects. Pharmacy personnel had better awareness and those with higher educational status were found to have favourable attitude and practice scores. Conclusion: The non-health care workers were found to have adequate knowledge, attitude and practice behaviour regarding prevention of Covid infection. Educational status of the subjects influenced their awareness, attitude and practice. © The Journal retains the copyrights of this article. However, reproduction is permissible with due acknowledgement of the source.

Destructive Role of COVID-19 Fear on Nurses Performance: Mediating Role of Stress.

Given its importance to psychological issues, the COVID-19 pandemic has created numerous challenges for all individuals, but healthcare professionals and particularly nursing staff are at front lines, and their performance is significantly affected. The current study relates COVID-19 fear with psychological strain, i.e., stress amongst the nursing staff. Moreover, the intervening role of COVID-19 stress between COVID-19 fear and the performance of the nursing staff has also been tested. An online survey was conducted to collect data from nurses. A total of 471 responses of nurses were received during the process of online data collection from 16 November 2020 to 30 April 2021. Results revealed the significant effect of COVID-19 fear on COVID-19 stress and the performance of nurses. Additionally, the results substantiate that COVID-19 stress mediates between COVID-19 fear and the health care performance of nurses. COVID-19 fear has become a psychological consequence that increases stress among nursing staffs. This study fills the research gap about the performance of the health care sectors, particularly with respect to COVID-19 fear and COVID-19 stress among nurses. Hence, COVID-19 fear plays a significant role in COVID-19 stress in terms of influencing the health care performance of nurses. Overall, the results give pragmatic insights for the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Validation of parsimonious prognostic models for patients infected with COVID-19.

OBJECTIVES: Predictive studies play important roles in the development of models informing care for patients with COVID-19. Our concern is that studies producing ill-performing models may lead to inappropriate clinical decision-making. Thus, our objective is to summarise and characterise performance of prognostic models for COVID-19 on external data. METHODS: We performed a validation of parsimonious prognostic models for patients with COVID-19 from a literature search for published and preprint articles. Ten models meeting inclusion criteria were either (a) externally validated with our data against the model variables and weights or (b) rebuilt using original features if no weights were provided. Nine studies had internally or externally validated models on cohorts of between 18 and 320 inpatients with COVID-19. One model used cross-validation. Our external validation cohort consisted of 4444 patients with COVID-19 hospitalised between 1 March and 27 May 2020. RESULTS: Most models failed validation when applied to our institution's data. Included studies reported an average validation area under the receiver-operator curve (AUROC) of 0.828. Models applied with reported features averaged an AUROC of 0.66 when validated on our data. Models rebuilt with the same features averaged an AUROC of 0.755 when validated on our data. In both cases, models did not validate against their studies' reported AUROC values. DISCUSSION: Published and preprint prognostic models for patients infected with COVID-19 performed substantially worse when applied to external data. Further inquiry is required to elucidate mechanisms underlying performance deviations. CONCLUSIONS: Clinicians should employ caution when applying models for clinical prediction without careful validation on local data.