Evaluating Filtering Facepiece Respirator Wearing-Comfort of Lebanese Red Cross Healthcare Providers.

Introduction: The COVID-19 pandemic significantly increased the usage of various types of face masks. In addition, it triggered the rapid manufacture of new production lines of masks to cope with the unprecedented demand to overcome worldwide shortages. Such masks, which were previously used mostly by the health care personnel, became a daily necessity to the greater mainstream population. This rapid and sudden increase in their usage and the fact that new masks' innovations are progressively emerging to meet the growing global shortage requires an ongoing analysis on the factors associated with the fit and comfort while using these masks. Methods: This paper presents the first translation and validation of the R-COMFI questionnaire to evaluate the comfort of a newly developed filtering face-piece respirator by the research team at the University of Antwerp. The questionnaire, which consists of 3 sections: Discomfort, General wearing experience, and Function, was translated from English to Arabic and involved 43 participants in the Lebanese Red Cross healthcare field based in Lebanon. Results: The results showed discomfort factors that are mostly related to breathability and sweating caused by mask usage. Additionally, the results revealed that female respondents found the mask significantly less comfortable than male respondents (p-value with the two-tailed test is 0.0319), which confirmed that future validations should consider the concerns of both genders, and validated the R-COMFI translation exercise detailed in this paper. Discussion: The contribution of this paper can be pinned down into three findings. The first finding is related to the discomfort issues. The second finding highlighted a significant difference in comfort experience between females and males. The last finding is the translation validation of the R-COMFI instrument, which confirmed that the questionnaire can be applied among wider geographical locations.

Case study into the successful emergency production and certification of a filtering facepiece respirator for Belgian hospitals during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The SARS-CoV-2 pandemic presented European hospitals with chronic shortages of personal protective equipment (PPE) such as surgical masks and respirator masks. Demand outstripped the production capacity of certified European manufacturers of these devices. Hospitals perceived emergency local manufacturing of PPE as an approach to reduce dependence on foreign supply. The fact of a pandemic does not circumvent the hospital's responsibility to provide appropriate protective equipment to their staff, so the emergency production needed to result in devices that were certified by testing agencies. This paper is a case study of the emergency manufacturing of respirator masks during the first month of the first wave of SARS-CoV-2 pandemic and is separated into two distinct phases. Phase A describes the three-panel folding facepiece respirator design, material sourcing, performance testing, and an analysis of the folding facepiece respirator assembly process. Phase B describes the redevelopment of individual steps in the assembly process.

Vibrotactile feedback for correcting aerodynamic position of a cyclist.

Guidance to maintain an optimal aerodynamic position is currently unavailable during cycling. This study used real-time vibrotactile feedback to guide cyclists to a reference position with minimal projected frontal area as an indicator of aerodynamic drag, by optimizing torso, shoulder, head and elbow position without compromising comfort when sitting still on the bike. The difference in recapturing the aerodynamic reference position during cycling after predefined deviations from the reference position at different intensities was analysed for 14 participants between three interventions, consisting of 1) vibrotactile feedback with a margin of error of 1.5% above the calibrated reference projected frontal area, 2) vibrotactile feedback with a margin of 3%, and 3) no feedback. The reference position is significantly more accurately achieved using vibrotactile feedback compared to no feedback (p < 0.001), but there is no significant difference between the 1.5% and 3% margin (p = 0.11) in terms of relative projected frontal area during cycling compared to the calibrated reference position (1.5% margin -0.46 ± 1.76%, 3% margin -0.01 ± 2.01%, no feedback 2.59 ± 3.29%). The results demonstrate that vibrotactile feedback can have an added value in assisting and correcting cyclists in recapturing their aerodynamic reference position.

Vibrotactile Feedback During Physical Exercise: Perception of Vibrotactile Cues in Cycling.

The aim of this study was to investigate the perception of vibrotactile signals during physical exercise by comparing differences in recognition between stationary and cycling positions. The impact of physical exercise on the ability to perceive vibrotactile cues is unknown, whereas the recognition in stationary position has been shown previously. Vibrating elements were positioned at 3 locations on the thighs and spine of 9 athletes to apply various vibrotactile cues. Subjects performed at 0, 50, 70 and 90% of their maximal cycling power output and denoted the interpretation of the vibration signals on a touchscreen. The results show a similarity in correct recognition between stationary position and physical exercise for the thighs and spine (p>0.1) and demonstrate a decrease in response time for 70 and 90% levels of physical exercise compared to 0 and 50% (p<0.001). Furthermore, vibrotactile signals at the spine are noticed more accurately and more rapidly compared to the thighs (p<0.01). These results suggest that vibrotactile feedback also has potential in applications during physical exercise. The potential use of vibrotactile feedback can be in cycling for, among other, correcting the aerodynamic position. Applications in other sports and health-related domains are feasible as well.

Awake 18F-FDG PET Imaging of Memantine-Induced Brain Activation and Test-Retest in Freely Running Mice.

PET scans of the mouse brain are usually performed with anesthesia to immobilize the animal. However, it is desirable to avoid the confounding factor of anesthesia in mouse-brain response. Methods: We developed and validated brain PET imaging of awake, freely moving mice. Head-motion tracking was performed using radioactive point-source markers, and we used the tracking information for PET-image motion correction. Regional 18F-FDG brain uptake in a test, retest, and memantine-challenge study was measured in awake (n = 8) and anesthetized (n = 8) C57BL/6 mice. An awake uptake period was considered for the anesthesia scans. Results: Awake (motion-corrected) PET images showed an 18F-FDG uptake pattern comparable to the pattern of anesthetized mice. The test-retest variability (represented by the intraclass correlation coefficient) of the regional SUV quantification in the awake animals (0.424-0.555) was marginally lower than that in the anesthetized animals (intraclass correlation coefficient, 0.491-0.629) over the different regions. The increased memantine-induced 18F-FDG uptake was more pronounced in awake (+63.6%) than in anesthetized (+24.2%) animals. Additional behavioral information, acquired for awake animals, showed increased motor activity on a memantine challenge (total distance traveled, 18.2 ± 5.28 m) compared with test-retest (6.49 ± 2.21 m). Conclusion: The present method enables brain PET imaging on awake mice, thereby avoiding the confounding effects of anesthesia on the PET reading. It allows the simultaneous measurement of behavioral information during PET acquisitions. The method does not require any additional hardware, and it can be deployed in typical high-throughput scan protocols.

Ergonomic design of an EEG headset using 3D anthropometry.

Although EEG experiments over the past decades have shown numerous applications for brain-computer interfacing (BCI), there is a need for user-friendly BCI devices that can be used in real-world situations. 3D anthropometry and statistical shape modeling have been shown to improve the fit of devices such as helmets and respirators, and thus they might also be suitable to design BCI headgear that better fits the size and shape variation of the human head. In this paper, a new design method for BCI devices is proposed and evaluated. A one-size-fits-all BCI headset frame is designed on the basis of three digital mannequins derived from a shape model of the human head. To verify the design, the geometric fit, stability and repeatability of the prototype were compared to an EEG cap and a commercial BCI headset in a preliminary experiment. Most design specifications were met, and all the results were found to be similar to those of the commercial headset. Therefore, the suggested design method is a feasible alternative to traditional anthropometric design for BCI headsets and similar headgear.