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In this paper, we present an information retrieval system on a corpus of scientific articles related to COVID-19. We build a similarity network on the articles where similarity is determined via shared citations and biological domain-specific sentence embeddings. Ego-splitting community detection on the article network is employed to cluster the articles and then the queries are matched with the clusters. Extractive summarization using BERT and PageRank methods is used to provide responses to the query. We also provide a Question-Answer bot on a small set of intents to demonstrate the efficacy of our model for an information extraction module. © ACL 2020.All right reserved.
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Introduction and Aim: Post-covid syndrome is the group of nonspecific symptoms which are seen among the patients who have been recovered from COVID-19 and that persist over 4 weeks. Symptoms involve fatigue, breathlessness, cough, cognitive disturbances, depression and anxiety, many organs related symptoms, and the prominent features involve shortness of breath and inability to return to baseline activity level. Studies show that Pneumonia which is associated with the COVID-19 infections can lead to long-standing damage to the alveoli in the lungs and as a result scar tissues may develop which in the future can lead to long-term breathing problems. The aim of this study is to assess the effectiveness of osteopathic CV4 technique in post covid patients. Material(s) and Method(s): This is a pre-test and post-test experimental study conducted at Sri Sri University. In this study, 20 subjects both male and female, having mean age of 23.3 +/- 2.81 years were taken. After assessment of all inclusion and exclusion criteria, a brief history regarding COVID-19 and if present other respiratory disorders was taken. Following this, a 5 minutes window period was given to all participants before the collection of pre-test data. Result(s): When CV4 osteopathic technique was given to post-covid patients, there was a significant change in FVC, FEV1, PEF and pulse rate when compared to the pretest intervention data. However, the changes in oxygen saturation levels were not statistically significant. Conclusion(s): The results show that osteopathic CV4 technique alters the respiratory capacity in post covid patients.Copyright © 2023, Indian Association of Biomedical Scientists. All rights reserved.
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Undoubtedly, the COVID-19 epidemic's worldwide disturbance has brought about countless, indescribable, and widespread problems in the education sector. During the corona virus 2019 limitation, the significance of blended learning (BL) has indeed been highlighted. But there is very little research on students' and teachers experiences with BL, especially when utilizing WhatsApp as among the educational tools. This study examined the perspectives of ESL students and teachers toward utilizing different BL approaches. In an Indonesian university, a mix of in-person lectures and virtual learning is used. The study described in this paper attempts to investigate how students experience about their learning in a BL environment that uses the social media platforms Google Classroom and WhatsApp as teaching tools. It combined descriptive research design with a mixed method to examine how students' and teachers' perspectives of BL education relate to one another. According to the findings, students had a favorable opinion of their BL experience. Students express their issues about the internet connectivity and the clarity of the teaching in the online course resources. The greatest benefit, in the opinion of the teachers, was that it was difficult for them to prepare the material and use the media (93%). It can be suggested that BL can be practiced even after the COVID 19 period. Copyright © 2022 Wolters Kluwer Medknow Publications. All rights reserved.
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Regarding academic paradigms of the teaching process, educational administration, including governance, the COVID-19 outbreak has impacted the government education institutions. Educators' conflict self-efficacy as well as job dedication are crucial for investigation in light of this approaching paradigm change. The studies demonstrated that conflict self-efficacy substantially impacted public focuses on teachers' job involvement as during COVID-19 outbreak. Educators' job dedication is positively predicted by their ability to handle ambiguity throughout this period. In addition, the information revealed a high level of conflict self-efficacy in concepts of intervention, prevention, accomplishment, and confusion governance, as well as a significant impact on work dedication among instructors of devotion to the classroom, dedication to pupils, responsibility to educators, as well as dedication to the job role. The study's outcomes also revealed a relationship between crisis self-efficacy and teachers' job dedication during the epidemic. This research establishes a theoretical foundation for a more comprehensive assessment of teacher digital competence (TDC). Furthermore, it discusses the term digital literacy and skill and how it affects teachers' emotional state. It also states the emerging trends in the field of digital education in the time of COVID outbreak. Copyright © 2022 Wolters Kluwer Medknow Publications. All rights reserved.
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As the COVID-19 outbreak spread from early 2020 on, synchronous and asynchronous online learning became the predominant delivery method in the education system. This is the inaugural time that educational programs have indeed been totally given online across the state. So, this research aims to study the Indian student's perception of synchronous and asynchronous online courses amid COVID-19. This study involved 655 responses from UG students of various Indian educational institutions. In this study, we utilized basic random sampling to gather data, and SPSS was used to analyse the data. To narrow down the enormous dimensionality, the acquired data were subjected to a factor analysis utilizing a principal component analytical method. The results of the study demonstrate that synchronous can be challenging at times and puts more responsibility on the students. Asynchronous learning also gives the learners the chance to independently investigate and explore the subjects that have been given to them. Another reason why asynchronous exercises were perceived as burdensome by students was the large number of handwritten tasks that had to be turned in quickly. The COVID-19 outbreak has indeed been difficult for both students and teachers nationwide. Yet, teachers have supported students' use of digital learning tools. Therefore, asynchronous and synchronous online courses together have produced balanced learning.
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As the COVID-19 outbreak spread from early 2020 on, synchronous and asynchronous online learning became the predominant delivery method in the education system. This is the inaugural time that educational programs have indeed been totally given online across the state. So, this research aims to study the Indian student's perception of synchronous and asynchronous online courses amid COVID-19. This study involved 655 responses from UG students of various Indian educational institutions. In this study, we utilized basic random sampling to gather data, and SPSS was used to analyse the data. To narrow down the enormous dimensionality, the acquired data were subjected to a factor analysis utilizing a principal component analytical method. The results of the study demonstrate that synchronous can be challenging at times and puts more responsibility on the students. Asynchronous learning also gives the learners the chance to independently investigate and explore the subjects that have been given to them. Another reason why asynchronous exercises were perceived as burdensome by students was the large number of handwritten tasks that had to be turned in quickly. The COVID-19 outbreak has indeed been difficult for both students and teachers nationwide. Yet, teachers have supported students' use of digital learning tools. Therefore, asynchronous and synchronous online courses together have produced balanced learning. Copyright © 2022 Wolters Kluwer Medknow Publications. All rights reserved.
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Background and aims: To evaluate the safety, pharmacokinetics (PK) and antiviral activity of ALG-010133, a STOPS molecule designed to reduce hepatitis B S-antigen (HBsAg) in chronic hepatitis B (CHB) patients. Method: This was a 3-part, multicenter, double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled study. In Parts 1 and 2, single and multiple subcutaneous (SC) doses of ALG-010133were generallywell tolerated in healthy volunteers (Gane et al, EASL 2021). Part 3 evaluatedweekly SC doses of ALG-010133 or placebo × 12 weeks in virologically suppressed Hepatitis B e-antigen (HBeAg) negative CHB subjects (N = 10/cohort;8 active:2 placebo). Reported here are preliminary blinded Part 3 safety, PK, and antiviral data;unblinded data will be presented at the conference. Results: 31 CHB subjects completed dosing and follow-up in Cohorts 1 (120 mg;N = 10), 2. (200 mg;N = 10), and 3 (400 mg;N = 11). Most subjects were male (61%) and 48% were white, with mean age 48 years, mean BMI 26.1 kg/m2 and baseline HBsAg across cohorts of 3.6 to 3.7 log10 IU/ ml. Therewas 1 unrelated serious treatment emergent adverse event (TEAE) (hospitalization for orchitis) and 1 unrelated TEAE (COVID-19 infection) resulting in premature study drug discontinuation. All TEAEs were Grade 1 or 2 in severity, except for 1 Grade 3 TEAE of injection site erythema (severity based only on surface area criteria of ≥100 cm2;required no treatment and resolved despite continued study drug dosing) and the aforementioned TEAE of orchitis (Grade 3). There was no dose relationship to severity or frequency for any TEAE. The most common (≥3 subjects) TEAEs were injection site erythema (n = 5), increased ALT (n = 4), injection site bruising (n = 4), increased AST (n = 3), and injection site pruritus (n = 3);none were assessed as clinically concerning. Although treatment-emergent ALT and AST elevations (n = 13) were observed, all were Grade 1 (<2.5x upper limit of normal [ULN]) or 2 (≥2.5 to <5x ULN) and none led to premature study drug discontinuation or were associated with symptoms or evidence of liver dysfunction. There were no other clinically significant lab abnormalities. No clinically significant physical examinations, vital signs, or ECG abnormalities were reported. Plasma ALG-010133 exposures increased more than dose proportionally between the 120 to 400 mg dose levels, with moderate variability and minimal accumulation. Compared to baseline, the magnitude of HBsAg decline at Week 12 was <0.1 log10 IU/ml for placebo and across all ALG-010133 dose levels, including the projected efficacious dose level of 400 mg (estimated to maintain total liver exposures >3x EC90 for HBsAg inhibition). Conclusion: ALG-010133 was safe and well tolerated with predictable PK properties when given to CHB subjects as multiple SC doses of up to 400 mg. No meaningful HBsAg reduction was observed across all cohorts. Further clinical development of ALG-010133 has been discontinued.
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Purpose: Chemosensory alteration in excessive alcohol drinkers substantially impacts their quality of life (QoL). Early assessment of chemosensory loss can help in early prediction of disease severity and associated comorbidities in heavy drinkers (HDs). In the present study we examined smell and taste self-reports of individuals with different alcohol drinking behaviors and association with change in overall QoL. Methods: Participants (n = 466;224 females/242 males) were recruited between June 2020 and September 2021 into the COVID-19 Pandemic Impact on Alcohol Study. Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test (AUDIT) consumption scores across four time points (at enrollment, and after four, eight and twelve weeks) were analyzed by group based trajectory modeling to stratify participants into three groups (non-drinkers, NDs;moderate drinkers, MDs;and HDs). Results: Linear mixed effects analysis of self-reported taste abd smell data revealed that, in HDs compared to NDs, there was a significant reduction smell ability (F1,224 = 4.40, p = 0.03) after adjusting for age and smoking status, but group differences in taste ability did not reach statistical significance (F1,241 = 3.55, p = 0.06). The smell/taste measures did not significantly differ between the MDs and NDs. Further, the reduced smell and taste ability of HDs was significantly associated with deterioration in several QoL domains, including physical health (smell: coeff = 0.13, 95% CI 0.04 to 0.21, p = 0.003;taste: coeff = 0.13, 95% CI 0.03 to 0.22, p = 0.01), psychological (smell: coeff = 0.15, 95% CI 0.06 to 0.24, p = 0.001;taste: coeff = 0.13, 95% CI 0.03 to 0.24, p = 0.01), social relationships (smell: coeff = 0.20, 95% CI 0.10 to 0.30, p < 0.001;taste: coeff = 0.30, 95% CI 0.19 to 0.41, p < 0.001), and environmental health (smell: coeff = 0.18, 95% CI 0.09 to 0.26, p < 0.001;taste: coeff = 0.21, 95% CI 0.12 to 0.31, p < 0.001). Conclusion: The reduced olfactory and taste function of HDs and association with poorer QoL indicates that early assessment of chemosensory changes may be crucial in identifying the risk for poorer outcomes in heavy drinkers.
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Background: Acute brain dysfunction is highly prevalent in critically ill patients with COVID-19. Limited literature is available on the prevalence and incidence of delirium in older patients during COVID. In addition to the illness, the isolation and lack of family visitation has been of great concern. A modified 4AT tool is used by bedside nurses to assess delirium every shift in patients age 70 or older. Positive screens were increased in the COVID era for both those with and without COVID. Methods Retrospective cohort study of de-identified data from delirium screening (4AT) dataset of all admissions ages >= 70 discharged from a tertiary acute care hospital. Comparisons were made of delirium rates between 2018-2019 and 2020-2021. Within the COVID surge of July- August 2020, delirium rates were compared in COVID vs non-COVID units of the hospital. Incident delirium is defined by having a first positive delirium screen 48 hours after admission. Present on admission (POA) delirium is defined by having a positive screen in the first 48 hours. Chi Square statistics calculated. Results See Table Conclusions. Delirium, measured by a positive 4AT screen, increased significantly during 2020-2021 for both present on admission and incident delirium, as well as percentage of positive assessments. During the July-August surge period, 4AT positive rates tended to increase across all measures;however, only the percentage of total positive assessments reached statistical significance comparing the COVID units vs non-COVID units indicating longer duration of delirium in the COVID population. Thus in older patients without COVID during a surge period, the severity of illness and isolation may have contributed to greater numbers of all older adults having delirium than before the COVID era. Results.
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Multiclass learning problems involve training classification models to accurately classify data instances into class labels. The number of class labels that are incorporated in a classification model directly affects its training time and accuracy. It has been noted that the existing models, when used on larger datasets having an extensive number of classes, often fail in achieving an accuracy usable for functional, real-world scenarios and tend to overfit on training data. Present research attempts to optimize the performance of classifiers by creating custom classification strategies, and neural network architectures for specific classification tasks and datasets. The efficiency of one such optimization of classifiers, classifier ensembles can further be improved by altering methods of subset generation from the dataset and correspondingly, class prediction. In this regard, we propose a method of constructing ensembles which aims to increase the accuracy of any given classifier while reducing training time by using a two step approach- one step for group formation as a part of constructing ensembles, and another for relative probability calculations which combines the result of ensembles. The proposed method is implemented and experiments are done on the Fashion MNIST (10 class labels), NIH Chest X-Ray + COVID-19 (16 class labels), Kuzushiji-49 (49 class labels), and CIFAR-100 (100 class labels) datasets. Experimental results show the efficacy of the proposed method which has achieved an increase of 6.33%, 9.32%, 8.59%, and 12.27% in accuracies of respective datasets and at the end, results are debated. © 2021 IEEE.
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Over 12% of the US population reports taste or smell (chemosensory) dysfunction. Patients with severe alcohol use disorder (AUD) reported to suffer with inability to discriminate taste and smell. Sleep disturbances are ubiquitous in AUD, there are reports on associations between sleep quality, and chemosensory dysfunction. The aim of this analysis was to investigate reports of chemosensory dysfunction and sleep quality, if any, in AUD after the first four weeks of the start of this ongoing longitudinal COVID-19 impact study (conducted approximately weekly). AUD and non- AUD participants were asked to complete a series of online surveys for 24 months. Taste and smell data are collected using a VAS self-rating online questionnaire (0-100: higher score, better sense of taste/smell). Of a total of 171 there were 73 AUD (39 males/34 females;45.3 ± 14.5 years) and 98 non-AUD subjects (44 males/54 females, 45.3 ± 14.6 years). 10% of AUD subjects (65% males) reported taste and smell scores of 75 or below, and 8% of non-AUD subjects showed similar taste and smell scores. There were no significant correlations between sleep quality, taste and smell measures in both AUD and non-AUD groups. Chemosensory impairment was not likely an impact of COVID infection as only 1 AUD subject reported to be SARS-CoV2-positive, while 12 of these individuals complained for fever, cough, sore throat, or runny nose for more than one day within the previous month. Our preliminary results suggest that there is no correlation between taste, smell, and sleep quality in this cohort. These results must be taken with caution for a possible under-reporting of chemosensory perception and a known COVID diagnosis. Future studies should include psychophysical measures in this population with quantitative assessment of taste and smell.
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Background: COVID-19 has had a significant impact on the provision of HCV treatment services within the National Health Service (NHS). As one of the largest HCV treatment centres in London, we adapted to the pandemic by instituting changes in the dispensing of medications, alongside provision of virtual consultations. We aimed to review this pathway and assess the impact on patient outcomes. Methods: Data was extracted from HCV treatment trackers and patient records, and correlated with clinical outcomes. Outcomes for patients treated from April 2020 to March 2021 were compared to the preceding year. For the purpose of continuity of documentation and consultation style, outcome data of those patients treated at a designated pharmacist led treatment clinic was reviewed to assess the impact on medication adherence. Results: 216 patients were treated for HCV in the year commencing April 2020 compared to 318 in the preceding year, with documented SVR rates of 90% compared with 92% respectively. A greater number of patients did not attend for SVR12 bloods post pandemic despite completing treatment (42% vs 27%). There was also a noticeable increase in patients treated without genotyping (16.6% vs 8.8%). The pharmacist led clinic treated 22 patients in 2020, all of whom received at least one telephone consultation as part of the 'on treatment review'. 91% (n=20) were adherent (defined by NHS England as taking >75% of intended course). Of those who had reached SVR12, cure rates were 100% (n=15) in treatment naïve and 75% (n=3) in patients receiving re-treatment, with the single relapse likely attributable to an active HCC. Conclusion: There was a noticeable increase in the number of patients who did not attend for SVR12 bloods post pandemic compared to 2019. Social issues, including the inability of some patients to access a telephone, make virtual consultations more difficult. This could account for the increased number of patients lost to follow up in patient cohorts who have additional needs. In the pharmacist led treatment clinic, remote access consultations did not impact on medication adherence or patient outcomes, demonstrating a less intensive approach to monitoring may work for specific patient cohorts with specific designated providers. We present our findings to aid the evolution of treatment pathways to support the WHO target for HCV elimination. As we continue to evolve our pathways, future analysis should include patient acceptability of consultations via virtual means.
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As part of the National Pregnancy in Diabetes (NPID) audit that takes place annually in the United Kingdom, East Surrey Hospital obtained data from every livebirth that occurred in the hospital from 1st October 2018 to 31st October 2019 from pregnant women with diabetes (either type 1, 2 or gestational diabetes). From this data, we were able to see which of those babies were admitted to the neonatal unit. We analyzed the causes of admission to the neonatal unit from these babies born to diabetic mothers, finding that a high proportion was due to diabetes-related complications, specifically neonatal hypoglycemia. The majority of these babies would not have been admitted to the neonatal unit otherwise (for example, due to prematurity). We are now in the phase of analyzing the glycemic control of the mothers that these babies were born to. If these babies, that were admitted to the neonatal unit with hypoglycemia and other diabetesrelated complications, were born to mothers with particularly difficult glycemic control or with poor compliance to diabetes treatment and monitoring, then this would suggest that there is scope to actively reduce admissions to the neonatal unit for diabetes-related complications by optimizing the diabetic treatment of the mothers. Due to the unprecedented effects of COVID-19, leading to redeployment of staff and cancellation of non-urgent procedures and teaching sessions, we have unfortunately not been able to analyze the data from the diabetic mothers yet - which we would have done otherwise. However, we are confident that by the time of the conference, this analysis will be complete.