An in-depth study of the ICT ecosystem in a South African rural community: unveiling expenditure and communication patterns

There is no doubt of the contributions made by mobile phones and mobile network operators in increasing access to communications in rural areas of developing countries. Yet how affordable is this ubiquitous access in such an ICT ecosystem? Using data from two stratified random surveys conducted in a South African rural community, this paper provides a unique in-depth picture of the expenditure and communication patterns of its dwellers. Results show a high access ratio of people using mobile phone services weekly and a high proportion of disposable income dedicated to a very constrained set of mobile phone services. Factors such as mobile phone charging and the extra charges added by airtime resellers contribute to increase the communication costs. This data and its analysis can be used by the following: regulators and government agencies to better design their policy implementations to provide universal service and access; competing industry players to understand the dynamics within rural communities to better target their products; civil society organizations to a constitutional right

“Acute kidney injury in critically ill patients with COVID–19: The AKICOV multicenter study in Catalonia”

This study describes the incidence, evolution and prognosis of acute kidney injury (AKI) in critical COVID-19 during the first pandemic wave. We performed a prospective, observational, multicenter study of confirmed COVID-19 patients admitted to 19 intensive care units (ICUs) in Catalonia (Spain). Data regarding demographics, comorbidities, drug and medical treatment, physiological and laboratory results, AKI development, need for renal replacement therapy (RRT) and clinical outcomes were collected. Descriptive statistics and logistic regression analysis for AKI development and mortality were used. A total of 1,642 patients were enrolled (mean age 63 (15.95) years, 67.5% male). Mechanical ventilation (MV) was required for 80.8% and 64.4% of these patients, who were in prone position, while 67.7% received vasopressors. AKI at ICU admission was 28.4% and increased to 40.1% during ICU stay. A total of 172 (10.9%) patients required RRT, which represents 27.8% of the patients who developed AKI. AKI was more frequent in severe acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) ARDS patients (68% vs 53.6%, p<0.001) and in MV patients (91.9% vs 77.7%, p<0.001), who required the prone position more frequently (74.8 vs 61%, p<0.001) and developed more infections. ICU and hospital mortality were increased in AKI patients (48.2% vs 17.7% and 51.1% vs 19%, p <0.001) respectively). AKI was an independent factor associated with mortality (IC 1.587-3.190). Mortality was higher in AKI patients who required RRT (55.8% vs 48.2%, p <0.04). Conclusions There is a high incidence of AKI in critically ill patients with COVID-19 disease and it is associated with higher mortality, increased organ failure, nosocomial infections and prolonged ICU stay

"Acute kidney injury in critically ill patients with COVID-19 : The AKICOV multicenter study in Catalonia"

This study describes the incidence, evolution and prognosis of acute kidney injury (AKI) in critical COVID-19 during the first pandemic wave. We performed a prospective, observational, multicenter study of confirmed COVID-19 patients admitted to 19 intensive care units (ICUs) in Catalonia (Spain). Data regarding demographics, comorbidities, drug and medical treatment, physiological and laboratory results, AKI development, need for renal replacement therapy (RRT) and clinical outcomes were collected. Descriptive statistics and logistic regression analysis for AKI development and mortality were used. A total of 1,642 patients were enrolled (mean age 63 (15.95) years, 67.5% male). Mechanical ventilation (MV) was required for 80.8% and 64.4% of these patients, who were in prone position, while 67.7% received vasopressors. AKI at ICU admission was 28.4% and increased to 40.1% during ICU stay. A total of 172 (10.9%) patients required RRT, which represents 27.8% of the patients who developed AKI. AKI was more frequent in severe acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) ARDS patients (68% vs 53.6%, p<0.001) and in MV patients (91.9% vs 77.7%, p<0.001), who required the prone position more frequently (74.8 vs 61%, p<0.001) and developed more infections. ICU and hospital mortality were increased in AKI patients (48.2% vs 17.7% and 51.1% vs 19%, p <0.001) respectively). AKI was an independent factor associated with mortality (IC 1.587-3.190). Mortality was higher in AKI patients who required RRT (55.8% vs 48.2%, p <0.04). Conclusions There is a high incidence of AKI in critically ill patients with COVID-19 disease and it is associated with higher mortality, increased organ failure, nosocomial infections and prolonged ICU stay

CIBERER : Spanish national network for research on rare diseases: A highly productive collaborative initiative

Altres ajuts: Instituto de Salud Carlos III (ISCIII); Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación.CIBER (Center for Biomedical Network Research; Centro de Investigación Biomédica En Red) is a public national consortium created in 2006 under the umbrella of the Spanish National Institute of Health Carlos III (ISCIII). This innovative research structure comprises 11 different specific areas dedicated to the main public health priorities in the National Health System. CIBERER, the thematic area of CIBER focused on rare diseases (RDs) currently consists of 75 research groups belonging to universities, research centers, and hospitals of the entire country. CIBERER's mission is to be a center prioritizing and favoring collaboration and cooperation between biomedical and clinical research groups, with special emphasis on the aspects of genetic, molecular, biochemical, and cellular research of RDs. This research is the basis for providing new tools for the diagnosis and therapy of low-prevalence diseases, in line with the International Rare Diseases Research Consortium (IRDiRC) objectives, thus favoring translational research between the scientific environment of the laboratory and the clinical setting of health centers. In this article, we intend to review CIBERER's 15-year journey and summarize the main results obtained in terms of internationalization, scientific production, contributions toward the discovery of new therapies and novel genes associated to diseases, cooperation with patients' associations and many other topics related to RD research

Advances in One-Pot Synthesis through Borrowing Hydrogen Catalysis

The borrowing hydrogen (BH) principle, also called hydrogen auto-transfer, is a powerful approach which combines transfer hydrogenation (avoiding the direct use of molecular hydrogen) with one or more intermediate reactions to synthesize more complex molecules without the need for tedious separation or isolation processes. The strategy which usually relies on three steps, (i) dehydrogenation, (ii) intermediate reaction, and (iii) hydrogenation, is an excellent and well-recognized process from the synthetic, economic, and environmental point of view. In this context, the objective of the present review is to give a global overview on the topic starting from those contributions published prior to the emergence of the BH concept to the most recent and current research under the term of BH catalysis. Two main subareas of the topic (homogeneous and heterogeneous catalysis) have been identified, from which three subheadings based on the source of the electrophile (alkanes, alcohols, and amines) have been considered. Then the type of bond being formed (carbon-carbon and carbon heteroatom) has been taken into account to end-up with the intermediate reaction working in tandem with the metal-catalyzed hydrogenation/dehydrogenation step. The review has been completed with the more recent advances in asymmetric catalysis using the BH strategy.Financial support by the Ministerio de Economia y Competitividad, Programa Severo Ochoa (SEV2016-0683) and by the European Union through ERC-AdG-2014-671093 (SynCatMatch) is gratefully acknowledge

Augmented renal clearance. An unnoticed relevant event

Altres ajuts: Blood Purification Therapies Collaboration Group; Catalan Society of Intensive Care Medicine.Augmented renal clearance (ARC) is a phenomenon that can lead to a therapeutic failure of those drugs of renal clearance. The purpose of the study was to ascertain the prevalence of ARC in the critically ill patient, to study the glomerular filtration rate (GFR) throughout the follow-up and analyze the concordance between the Chronic Kidney Disease Epidemiology Collaboration (CKD-EPI) estimation formula and measured GFR. Observational, prospective, multicenter study. ARC was defined as a creatinine clearance greater than 130 ml/min/1.73 m. Eighteen hospitals were recruited. GFR measurements carried out twice weekly during a 2-month follow-up period. A total of 561 patients were included. ARC was found to have a non-negligible prevalence of 30%. More even, up to 10.7% already had ARC at intensive care unit (ICU) admission. No specific pattern of GFR was found during the follow-up. Patients in the ARC group were younger 56.5 (53.5-58.5) versus 66 (63.5-68.5) years than in the non-ARC group, p < 0.001. ICU mortality was lower in the ARC group, 6.9% versus 14.5%, p = 0.003. There was no concordance between the estimation of GFR by the CKD-EPI formula and GFR calculated from the 4-h urine. ARC is found in up to 30% of ICU patients, so renal removal drugs could be under dosed by up to 30%. And ARC is already detected on admission in 10%. It is a dynamic phenomenon without an established pattern that usually occurs in younger patients that can last for several weeks. And the CKD-EPI formula does not work to estimate the real creatinine clearance of these patients