The COVID-19 pandemic - related psychological distress and job burnout among Serbian pharmacy practitioners: a cross-sectional online study.

OBJECTIVE: The current COVID-19 pandemic has increased occupational stress for all healthcare providers, making job burnout one of the most common and largely unrecognized mental health issues among healthcare professionals. Besides physicians and nurses, pharmacy practitioners were "front-line" healthcare professionals with a critical and unique role in the public health crisis. Considering this, the aim of this study was to examine distress levels and the prevalence of job burnout among Serbian pharmacy practitioners in relation to the COVID-19 pandemic. SUBJECTS AND METHODS: This cross-sectional online study was conducted in April and May of 2020. A total of 176 pharmacy practitioners anonymously and voluntarily completed the two-section questionnaire, consisting of Copenhagen burnout inventory, CBI and 4DSQ Distress subscale. The two-section questionnaire was distributed online, among various social-media groups of pharmacy practitioners, as well as by personal contacts following the "snowball" sampling method. RESULTS: Results revealed moderately high burnout scores in our sample. The majority of the participants showed signs of personal-related job burnout, followed by work-related and client-related burnout. A strongly elevated distress level was obtained in almost two-thirds of study respondents. In addition, a significant and high correlation of all CBI subscales with distress was found, as well as medium correlations with sleep duration shortening as a mediator between distress and job burnout. CONCLUSIONS: Results of our study showed that job burnout significantly increased among pharmacy practitioners during the COVID-19 pandemic. Furthermore, we discovered that stress has an indirect impact on study participants' burnout via insufficient sleep.

The glassy behaviour of poorly crystalline Fe2O3 nanorods obtained by thermal decomposition of ferrous oxalate.

Nanorod ferrous oxalate dihydrate (FeC2O4 × 2H2O) which had been synthesized by the microemulsion method, was used as a precursor in the thermal decomposition process performed in air atmosphere. The formation of nanocrystalline hematite as the final product was preceded by the appearence of an intermediate product. Comprehensive study comprising several complementary techniques (x-ray diffraction, transmission electron microscopy, selected area electron diffraction, thermogravimetric/differential thermal analyses and SQUID magnetometry) confirmed that the intermediate product corresponds to the poorly crystalline Fe2O3. Due to the specific nanorod shape and poorly crystalline structure, the investigated Fe2O3 showed high coercive field value of ~0.5 T at 5 K. Special attention in this study was devoted to the peculiar magnetic properties of poorly crystalline Fe2O3, which were thoroughly investigated by employing sophisticated experimental procedures such as relaxation of thermoremanent magnetization for different cooling fields, zero field and field cooled memory effects as well as aging experiments for different waiting times. At low temperatures and weak applied magnetic fields, the investigated system behaves similarly to spin glasses, manifesting slow, collective relaxation dynamics of magnetic moments through memory, rejuvenation and aging effects.

Ferromagnetic properties of the Zn-Mn-O system.

Polycrystalline Zn-Mn-O samples with nominal manganese concentration x = 0.01 and 0.10 were synthesized by a solid state reaction route using (ZnC(2)O(4)·2H(2)O)(1-x) and (MnC(2)O(4)·2H(2)O)(x). Thermal treatment of the samples was carried out in air at temperatures of 673, 773 and 1173 K. The samples were investigated by x-ray diffraction, thermogravimetry, differential thermal analysis, transmission electron microscopy, magnetization measurements and electron paramagnetic resonance. Room temperature ferromagnetism is observed in Zn-Mn-O samples with x = 0.01 thermally treated at low temperatures (673, 773 K). It seems that the ferromagnetic phase could originate from interactions between Mn(2+) ions and acceptor defects incorporated in the ZnO crystal lattice during the thermal treatment of the samples.

Preparation and properties of nano-sized Ag and Ag2S particles in biopolymer matrix.

Silver (Ag) and silver sulfide (Ag(2)S) nanoparticles were synthesized in a sago starch matrix. The resulting nanocomposites were investigated using structural, optical and thermal methods. XRD spectra of the nanocomposites confirmed the presence of nanostructured silver (cubic phase) and silver sulfide (monoclinic phase) in the matrix. TEM micrographs showed that the nanoparticles are mostly spherical in shape. Analyzes of the optical properties of the silver nanocomposite aqueous dispersions/solutions of various concentrations were carried out. The results and the theoretical considerations suggested that at high concentrations there is a release of silver nanoparticles from the composite in the water environment. Further dilution produces homogeneous solution in which silver nanoparticles are capped with starch macromolecules. TGA analysis revealed reduced thermal stability of the nanocomposites with respect to pure starch matrix.