Ο εμβολιασμός κατά της εποχικής γρίπης στους επαγγελματίες υγείας στην Κύπρο

Εισαγωγή: Η γρίπη αποτελεί ένα σημαντικό πρόβλημα δημόσιας υγείας. Οι επαγγελματίες υγείας παρουσιάζουν αυξημένο κίνδυνο νόσησης και μετάδοσης της γρίπης στους ασθενείς τους. Ο ΠΟΥ συστήνει η εμβολιαστική κάλυψη για τον αντιγριπικό εμβολιασμό στους επαγγελματίες υγείας να είναι 75%. Σκοπός: H μελέτη του ποσοστού εμβολιαστικής κάλυψης έναντι της γρίπης στους επαγγελματίες υγείας στην Κύπρο και η μελέτη των συμπεριφορών και απόψεων σχετικά με τον αντιγριπικό εμβολιασμό. Μεθοδολογία: Πρόκειται για μια περιγραφική μελέτη με ανώνυμο, δομημένο ερωτηματολόγιο το οποίο αυτό-συμπληρώθηκε εθελοντικά , διαμοιράστηκε σε όλους τους γιατρούς και νοσηλευτές της Κύπρου μέσω των παγκύπριων συλλόγων τους και στο προσωπικό 4 νοσοκομείων. Αποτελέσματα: Λάβαμε 658 απαντημένα ερωτηματολόγιο. Το ποσοστό εμβολιαστικής κάλυψης υπολογίστηκε στο 35,2% για το 2019-20. Οι γιατροί έχουν μεγαλύτερο ποσοστό εμβολιασμού (70%) σε σχέση με τις υπόλοιπες επαγγελματικές ομάδες(27% και 23% αντίστοιχα). Οι συχνότεροι λόγοι επιλογής εμβολιασμού ήταν η προστασία της οικογένεια τους, και ο μεγαλύτερος κίνδυνος να νοσήσουν από γρίπη. Οι συχνότεροι λόγοι μη επιλογής εμβολιασμού ήταν ο φόβος για τις παρενέργειες του εμβολίου και κανένας ιδιαίτερος λόγος. Συμπεράσματα: Η εμβολιαστική κάλυψη των επαγγελματιών υγείας στη Κύπρο απέχει από τους στόχους εμβολιασμού που έθεσαν οι διεθνείς οργανισμοί υγείας.Background: Influenza is a major public health problem. Health care providers are at higher risk of influenza infection and transmitting infection to their patients. WHO has set a 75% vaccination rate for HCW. Purpose: Is to study the influenza vaccination coverage among hospital health care personnel in Cyprus and study the behaviors and attitudes of health care personnel regarding influenza vaccination. Methods: This is a survey using an anonymous, structured questionnaire that was self-completed voluntarily by the healthcare workers. The study was conducted in 4 hospitals in Cyprus, 2 public and 2 privates and between all doctors and nurses in Cyprus. Results: We had 658 participants in our survey. Vaccination coverage in our study was overall 35.2% for 2019-20 and doctors had the higher vaccination uptake (70%). On the contrary nurses had 23% vaccine coverage and all other healthcare workers 27%. Most common reasons for vaccination were the protection of their family and the greater risk of getting the flu. The most common causes that they avoid vaccination were the fear of adverse reactions of the vaccine (26.1%) and for no apparent reason (23%). Conclusions: The vaccine coverage for healthcare workers in Cyprus is below the target that was set by national health organizations

Exploring patterns in water consumption by clustering

Water scarcity, high water demand due to increasing urbanization and the ongoing liberalization of the water and energy markets makes water utilities look into innovative ways to approach consumers, to offer attractive plans and educate them by raising their awareness of their resource use. We analyze water consumption data from a group of consumers at the Greek island of Skiathos, for which we have additional information about features concerning their water consumption patterns. These features are used as input vectors for the construction of Kohonen Self-Organized Maps that are used as classification methods to cluster consumers according to their water consumption. Results show that such analysis can be promising for the automatic classification of water consumers, based on urban water demand data, even if the data is not real-time, or even frequent, since consumptions from standard quarterly water bills are used. © 2015 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd

Low Admission Immunoglobulin G Levels Predict Poor Outcome in Patients with Mild-to-Critical COVID-19: A Prospective, Single-Center Study

Introduction Immunoglobulins (Igs) comprise a critical part of the immune response. Little information exists on Ig serum levels in COVID-19 patients. We, therefore, investigated whether hospital admission Igs in patients with mild-to-critical disease are associated with clinical outcome. Materials and Methods This prospective, observational, single-center, cross-sectional study included 126 consecutive noncritically ill and critically ill and COVID-19 patients, in whom IgG, IgM, and IgA were measured on hospital admission. Results The cohort was divided in survivors and non-survivors, based on in-hospital mortality. Median IgG levels of survivors were significantly higher than non-survivors (p < 0.01). The cohort was subsequently divided in IgG deficient (< 690 mg/ dl) and sufficient (>= 690 mg/dl) patients. IgG-deficient patients had a higher mortality rate (p < 0.01). The multivariate logistic regression model showed that subnormal IgG was significantly associated with increased mortality risk (p < 0.01). Conclusion In our COVID-19 cohort, admission subnormal IgG levels might be independently associated with reduced survival