L-header Testing, Evaluation and Design Methodology

Cold-formed steel L-shaped headers have gained popularity over the past few years due to their simplicity and cost effectiveness. While cold-formed steel conventional headers are widely used and can be designed for most applications, often it is necessary to reduce cost by using less material and labor hours. The L-shaped header provides both, a fast and economical solution to safely transfer applied loads to other structural elements in a building. As the name suggests, the main components of an L-shaped header is a piece of cold-formed steel formed into a shape resembling the letter L. An L-header assembly consists of a cold-formed steel angle with one short leg lapping over the top track and one long leg extending down the side of the wall above openings. The current design equations in the AlSI Specification do not provide a reasonable design values for L-header assemblies. Testing of the assemblies was necessary to develop an easy to use design equations that can be used by designers. A total of 71 gravity tests and 38 uplift tests of L-header assemblies having variable sizes and thicknesses and spans were conducted at the NAHB Research Center. Results of the tests as well as a proposed design procedure is presented here

Burnout and Resilience in Community Pharmacists in Qatar during the COVID-19 Pandemic: a Cross Sectional Study

Objective: The main aim of this study is to illustrate the prevalence of burnout and resilience among community pharmacists in Qatar during the COVID-19 pandemic. Methods: This is a cross-sectional study design that included the collection and analysis of quantitative data from community pharmacists in Qatar using a cross-sectional survey. Results: Overall, participants had a moderate level of burnout as illustrated in the mean scores of the three dimensions; 22.11±13.053 for emotional exhaustion, 7.17±6.55 for depersonalization, and 35.94±11.47 for personal accomplishment. The findings demonstrated that 15.2%, 15.6%, and 5.4% of community pharmacists had moderate levels of depression, anxiety, and stress, respectively. Further, they showed high resilience (35.7±8.57). Mental health outcomes were statistically positively correlated with fear while age was negatively correlated with depersonalization. Conclusion: This study is the first study to report the prevalence of mental health outcomes among community pharmacists during COVID-19 in Qatar. The pharmacists experienced moderate burnout but high resilience which indicates their high potential to overcome difficulties. Future interventions at the personal, national and organizational levels are needed to improve mental health during this pandemic by preventing and managing stress, improving self-efficacy and resilience, and providing adequate social support

Role of pharmacists in the care of adult asthma patients: A scoping review

This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from Elsevier via the DOI in this record Background: Asthma is a common long-term condition that affects people of all ages. Evidence suggests that a significant proportion of asthma patients in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) do not receive appropriate diagnosis, monitoring and/or treatment. When inadequately treated, asthma can negatively affect quality of life and may lead to hospitalisation and death. Although pharmacists play a role in asthma care globally, there appears to be no defined role for pharmacists in providing care to patients with asthma in the GCC countries. Aim: This scoping review aims to review and summarise studies conducted in the GCC countries involving pharmacists in the management of adults with asthma or evaluating pharmacists' asthma care knowledge and/or skills. Method: A systematic scoping review was undertaken. Seven databases were searched using relevant search terms for articles published up to May 2023. Studies that evaluated pharmacists’ roles, knowledge and skills in providing asthma care to adults in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Qatar, Kuwait, Oman, Saudi Arabia, and Bahrain were considered eligible for inclusion. Extracted data were collated using tables and used to produce narrative descriptive summaries. Results: Out of the 1588 search results, only seven studies met the inclusion criteria. Of those, only one developed and tested a pharmacist-led inhaler technique educational intervention in the UAE within community pharmacy setting for asthma patients. The remaining six studies assessed community pharmacists’ knowledge in providing asthma management and patient education in UAE, Saudi Arabia and Qatar. The quality of the included studies varied with four relying on simulated patients to assess pharmacists’ knowledge. The study that tested the intervention suggested improvement in inhaler technique and asthma symptoms control after receiving the intervention. The findings suggest a need to improve pharmacists’ knowledge of inhaler technique demonstration (mainly Metered Dose Inhalers), asthma management advice and assessment of asthma control and medication use. Conclusion: This review highlights a lack of research on pharmacist-led asthma interventions and identifies training needs to enable pharmacists to be involved in asthma care in the GCC countries. Future research could develop approaches involving pharmacists to improve asthma care and outcomes in the region.University of Exeter Global MENA Development fundUniversity of Sharja

Distance learning: opportunities and challenges in quarantine.

The urgent introduction of distance education into the learning process due to the COVID-19 pandemic has become a spontaneous experiment, requiring urgent decisions, effective mechanisms to implement into the educational process and analysis of ongoing educational process. The possibilities of modern digital technologies made it possible to quickly set up the information component of education and to controle student’s knowledge. A detailed analysis of the communication between the faculty members of the department among themselves and analysis of the features of teaching and self-education of students in the field of medical radiology and oncology based on answers and comments with using Google classroom, Socrative, Messenger Telegram, etc. was made. Issues of communicative interaction between faculty members and students, psychological aspects of distance communication, language of instruction, logistics of distance education and methodological problems are described in details. It has been suggested that distance education may be equally effective for theoretical subjects in full-time study form, but when studying clinical disciplines, the priority should be given to traditional methods of teaching, involving student's bedside training. Taking into account technical possibilities and high risk of development of extreme and emergency situations, it is suggested to introduce permanent readiness for distance education, to create all – Ukrainian distance imitation service of patients’ follow-up. The importance of using the state language in training as the basis for mastering the professional Ukrainian and English language as the basis for mastering international medical experience is indicated

Effects of postmortem delays on protein composition and oxidation.

Human autopsy brain tissue is widely used to study neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and other diseases. However, when it comes to an evaluation of data obtained from such tissue, it is essential to consider potential postmortem effects on protein composition, posttranslational modification and proteolysis with increasing postmortem delays. In this study, we analyzed mouse brain tissues with different postmortem delays (pmd) of 0h, 6h and 24h, for changes in protein composition, proteolysis and modifications such as S-nitrosylation, carbonylation and ubiquitination. Proteins involved in Alzheimer's disease (AD) were of special interest, including cytoskeletal and synaptic proteins or proteins involved in inflammation. Several proteins were fairly resistant to degradation during the first 6h but started to degrade thereafter. S-nitrosylation and carbonylation showed not much variation, except for those proteins that were susceptible to degradation. Brain spectrin was S-nitrosylated at death, and S-nitrosylated degradation fragments were measured at a pmd of 24h, indicating a susceptibility of brain spectrin to degradation. Furthermore, the physiological role of S-nitrosylation remains to be investigated. When studying human brain tissue, some proteins are more susceptible to degradation than others, while ubiquitination and carbonylation were little affected during the first 24h after death

Barriers to Diabetes Adherence (BDA): Translation and Cultural Adaptation of the Instrument into Arabic Context

Objectives: Barriers to Diabetes Adherence (BDA) instrument is a measure developed in English to assess barriers to adherence in adolescents with type 1 diabetes (T1DM). The main objectives of the present study were to translate and culturally adapt the BDA tool into Arabic for the assessment of barriers to adherence in adolescents with T1DM in Arabic-speaking populations. Methods: The International Society for Pharmacoeconomics and Outcomes Research guidelines for the translation and cultural adaptation of patient-reported outcome measures were used for the process. Permission to use the instrument was obtained from the developers. This was followed by 2 forward translations of the tool into Arabic. The 2 Arabic versions were combined into a reconciled Arabic version that was then back-translated into English. This was then tested against the original tool. The resultant Arabic version underwent a cognitive debriefing process to assess its comprehension and appropriateness among potential users, and this resulted in further refinements, leading to the final Arabic version of the tool. Results: The translation and cognitive debriefing processes revealed issues related to the cultural or conceptual equivalence of the tool that were addressed and resolved by rewording, restructuring, or addition or elimination of words or phrases that in certain circumstances necessitated communications with the developers for further clarifications of the intended meaning of relevant items. This process generated an easy, comprehensive, clear, and culturally acceptable tool as proven by the cognitive debriefing and clinical review processes. Conclusion: A culturally acceptable Arabic translation of the BDA tool was developed to be used in adolescent Arabic population with T1DM. 2020 ISPOR-The professional society for health economics and outcomes researchScopu