From intensive care to rehabilitation: survey on the satisfaction with care received during prolonged hospitalization for COVID-19 at a northern Italian university hospital.

OBJECTIVE: Investigating the experiences perceived by COVID-19 inpatients is a fundamental research area that is starting to be explored. For this reason, our objective was to provide the first Italian survey on COVID-19 inpatients' satisfaction, obtained through a self-completed questionnaire previously used in a reference study in a UK cohort of COVID-19 patients. SUBJECTS AND METHODS: Hospitalized COVID-19 patients (>20 days) admitted to Ferrara University Hospital who underwent rehabilitation during their hospital stay were invited to complete an anonymous questionnaire. The survey's questions explored the patients' satisfaction with the health services received, and their completion took place approximately one year after hospitalization. Information on sex, number of wards, ICU stays, and hospital discharge dates was collected. RESULTS: Sixty-two completed questionnaires were analyzed. The average overall satisfaction score obtained from the answers indicated by the participants in the tenth question was 4.7 out of 5.0. Very positive responses were observed for information about discharge plans, privacy, management of pain, sleep quality, and feeling of safety. The possibility of being consulted about medications and side effects received a very low satisfaction score. Considering overall satisfaction, no significant differences were noted for sex or ICU stay. The obtained results were almost superimposable to those reported in the cohort of COVID-19 patients of the reference study. CONCLUSIONS: This survey suggested that COVID-19 patients' healthcare satisfaction was high. Nevertheless, some areas must be improved, such as the communication and involvement of the patients in the decision-making of care and the discussion about medications or possible side effects.

Assessing drug effect from distributional data: A population approach with application to Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy treatment.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE: In Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy (DMD) treatment, muscle fiber size can be considered as an indicator of muscle health and function. In particular, the statistical distribution of fibers cross-sectional areas (CSAs) has been used as quantitative efficacy endpoint. For each patient, assessment of treatment effect relies on the comparison of pre- and post-treatment biopsies. Since biopsies provide "distributional data", i.e. empirical distributions of fibers CSA, the comparison must be carried out between the empirical pre- and post-treatment distributions. METHODS: Here, distributional fiber CSA data are analyzed by means of a hierarchical statistical model based on the population approach, considering both the single patient and the population level. RESULTS: The proposed method was used to assess the histological clinical effects of Givinostat, a compound under study for DMD treatment. At the single patient level, a two-component Gaussian mixture adequately represents pre- and post-treatment distributions of log-transformed CSAs; drug effect is described via a dose-dependent multiplicative increase of muscle fiber size. The single patient model was also validated via muscle composition data. At the patient population level, typical model parameters and inter-patient variabilities were obtained. CONCLUSIONS: The proposed methodological approach completely characterizes fiber CSA distributions and quantifies drug effect on muscle fiber size, both at the single patient and at the patient population level. This approach might be applied also in other contexts, where outcomes measured in terms of distributional data are to be assessed.