Hepatitis C elimination among people living with HIV

Background: Hepatitis C virus (HCV) is a major cause of liver-related morbidity and mortality among people living with HIV globally. Aims: The broad aim of this research was to evaluate progress towards HCV elimination among people living with HIV in Australia. Specific aims included evaluating incidence and factors associated with HCV reinfection and patterns of drug use and sexual risk behaviours after treatment and characterizing the HCV cascade of care and factors associated with engagement in HCV care among people living with HIV in Australia. Methods: In Chapter Two, the risk of HCV reinfection following successful therapy among people living with HIV was evaluated in a global systematic review and meta-analysis, with factors associated with reinfection assessed using meta-regression. In Chapter Three, patterns of drug use and sexual risk behaviours and HCV reinfection incidence were assessed before and after direct-acting antiviral (DAA) scale-up in Australia among people with HIV/HCV coinfection enrolled in CEASE. In Chapter Four, the HCV cascade of care, including HCV testing and treatment, among people living with HIV was characterized in the pre (2010–2015) and post (2016–2018) DAA era in a population-based linkage study including all people living with HIV in New South Wales, Australia with an HCV notification. Factors associated with HCV testing and DAA treatment were assessed using logistic regression. Key Findings: Globally, HCV reinfection incidence following treatment among people living with HIV was similar following interferon-based and DAA therapy, with the highest risk among men who have sex with men and those with recent HCV infection. Following unrestricted DAA access and broad treatment uptake among people living with xviii HIV in Australia, HCV reinfection incidence was low despite stable pattens of risk behaviours before and after DAA treatment. The HCV care cascade among people living with HIV demonstrated high HCV RNA testing coverage (91%) and treatment uptake following DAA availability (7% pre DAA, 73% post DAA). Younger age, female gender, and rural region of residence were negatively associated with testing; no factors were associated with DAA treatment. Conclusion: To maintain progress towards HCV elimination, ongoing HCV screening and treatment of (re)infection among people living with HIV will be required. Enabling access to and ensuring broad coverage of HCV testing, treatment and prevention will be essential

Explaining the Views of Ibn Sina and Al-Ghazali on Games and Physical Exercises and their Relation to the Relationship Between Body and Soul

The purpose of this article is to describe Ibn Sina and Ghazali's philosophical views on soul and body on the one hand and to express their views on physical movements on the other hand in order to explain the relationship between their philosophical views on games and physical exercises related to body and soul. The research method was descriptive-analytical. The research findings showed that despite the differences in the philosophical thought of Ibn Sina and Ghazali, in the field of proofs of the soul and the body, there is a similarity between these two thinkers and the relationship between the soul and the body is two-ways. With physical activity in the game, there is an effect on the soul and vice versa. In fact, whenever playing and exercising are done in proportion and the body is active, then the soul will also have fun, and this is based on the effect that the body has on the soul. According to the theory of two thinkers, such a conclusion is that games and physical exercises recreate energy and rejuvenates the body and soul

Paper and Fiber-Based Bio-Diagnostic Platforms: Current Challenges and Future Needs

In this perspective article, some of the latest paper and fiber-based bio-analytical platforms are summarized, along with their fabrication strategies, the processing behind the product development, and the embedded systems in which paper or fiber materials were integrated. The article also reviews bio-recognition applications of paper/fiber-based devices, the detected analytes of interest, applied detection techniques, the related evaluation parameters, the type and duration of the assays, as well as the advantages and disadvantages of each technique. Moreover, some of the existing challenges of utilizing paper and/or fiber materials are discussed. These include control over the physical characteristics (porosity, permeability, wettability) and the chemical properties (surface functionality) of paper/fiber materials are discussed. Other aspects of the review focus on shelf life, the multi-functionality of the platforms, readout strategies, and other challenges that have to be addressed in order to obtain reliable detection outcomes. Keywords: paper-based bio-analytical devices; shelf life; equipment-free bio-recognition; flow rate; readout strategies; multi-functional platform

Altmetric Indices in the Field of Oncology: Journal Level

The study aims to analyze altmetric indices at the journal level in the field of oncology and also examine the relationship between altmetric indicators and citation-based indicators of the journals. The study includes an analytical approach. Altmetric indices were exported from Altmetric Explorer database, and citation-based indicators of oncology journals were gathered through Scopus in Microsoft Excel. SPSS software was utilized to analyze data inferentially and descriptively. The highest level of altmetric attention score belonged to CA-A CANCER JOURNAL FOR CLINICIANS in 2019. Twitter is the most used social media to share research outputs in oncology. There is a significant, positive, and moderate relationship between Altmetric Coverage and citation-based indicators (SNIP, SJR, and CiteScore). Additionally, a significant, positive, and moderate relationship exists between Mean Altmetric Score and citation-based indicators (SNIP, SJR, and CiteScore). Journals, including high citation-based indicators in the field of oncology, are more likely to get more visibility via various social media. Researchers and policymakers could use altmetric indices via social media (such as Twitter) to improve health knowledge, connect the public and academics, and share clinical guides to enhance public health and reveal non-traditional scientific impact

The Prevalence of Overweight and Obesity in Iranian Men; a Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis Study

Introduction: Overweight and obesity is one of the most common diseases worldwide that is less considered in men. In this regard scattered studies have been conducted in Iran, and our aim was to systematically study the prevalence of overweight and obesity in Iranian men. Methods: Major international databases including: Scopus and PubMed, and Web of Science and national databases including Magiran and SID were searched for articles in Persian and English which were published from August 10, 2010 to August 10, 2020. Qualitative evaluation of the studies was performed using the Newcastle-Ottawa Scale checklist (NOS). Random effects model was used to estimate the pooled prevalence by STATA software version 14.2 with significance level of 0.05. Results: Overall, 52 studies with a total sample size of 120,440 men with age range of 20-77 years were included in this systematic review. Most studies were conducted in 2017 and almost all of them were in Tehran province. The pooled prevalence of overweight was 46% (95% CI: 46, 46) in men. The lowest prevalence of overweight was 11.1% in Fars and the highest was 57% in Tabriz. The pooled prevalence of obesity in men was 18% (95% CI: 18, 19) with the highest prevalence in Birjand (46.5%) and the lowest in Tehran (0.8%). Conclusion: Our results showed a variety of tools for measuring overweight and obesity in Iran. Based on the BMI index, we found that the prevalence of overweight and obesity was substantial among Iranian men. There seems to be an urgent need for health policy makers to develop and implement proper preventive strategies in order to control this public health problem and its serious health consequences among men, especially in the workplace

Why are Men more susceptible to COVID-19: A narrative review of current global knowledge

Since its inception on December 2019, COVID-19 epidemic now has been titled a global emergency. Rich literature on the global descriptive epidemiology of the cases has shown that the burden of COVID-19 epidemic in terms of both morbidity and mortality is more pronounced among men. Physiological and genetic traits along with numerous differences in social and cultural profile of men are attributed to this discrepancy. This review attempted to delineate various proposed explanations for the observed gender-differences in COVID-19 morbidity and mortality

The Benefits of Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) System Implementation in Dry Food Packaging Industry

AbstractThe corporate competitive environment is being liberalized and globalized, therefore the organizations, especially dry food packaging industry, need greater interaction between their stakeholders. One of the problems organizations face to is the segregation of the business functions in an organization. Thus, the business experienced to implement ERP systems for solving this problem. In contrast, the ERP projects have not been effective enough and hence have been unable to achieve all the results envisaged. Therefore, an in depth understanding about the benefits of ERP implementation is needed to ensure the successful system implementation. This study seeks to determine and classify the benefits of ERP system implementation in dry food packaging industry. The methodology of this research comprised of three phases: define the benefits of ERP system implementation from the current literatures, categorize them into strategic, tactical and operational benefits in each business functions in an organization. These ERP benefits are summarized in this paper as a research finding to assist the managers in implementing ERP system successfully

The Effects of Occupational Stress on Quality of Life and Associated Factors among Hospital Nurses in Iran

Nurses deal with many crises at work. It is obvious that being exposed to stress for long, results in severe physical and mental complications and affects individual is welfare. This study was aimed at determining the quality of life (QOL) of nurses and whether there is any relation between occupational stress and QOL. This analytical-descriptive cross sectional study was carried out in University hospitals of Zanjan, Iran. 241 nurses were sampled using proportional to size stratified method. The data were collected by means of Iranian version of the Short Form Health Survey (SF-36) and a questionnaire on demographic information and work factors. Occupational stress was measured by Toft Gray and Anderson’s tool. The questionnaires were filled by nurses themselves and the data were analyzed by Spearman’s Correlation test, Kruskal-Wallis and one-way ANOVA and Enter-method Regression with SPSS 16.0 software. The results showed a high level of occupational stress among nurses, which adversely affected their quality of life. According to the results QOL of male and female nurses differ with men having a higher QOL and less occupational stress. 2 work factors, satisfaction and others positive attitude towards nursing, affected all dimensions of QOL and occupational stress. There was no significant correlation between QOL or occupational stress and factors like position, shift, ward, experience, time off, overtime hours, interest in desertion and education. According to harmful effects of occupational stress on nurses, cognitive-behavioral interventions, learning coping strategies are proposed

Preferred Learning Styles among Ophthalmology Residents: An Iranian Sample

Purpose: This study was performed to assess the learning styles of a sample of Iranian residents through Kolb’s and VARK questionnaires. Methods: In this descriptive-analytical study, 45 ophthalmology residents of Mashhad University of Medical Sciences were enrolled. Kolb’s and VARK questionnaires were provided, and residents were oriented and guided on how to complete them. Results: Forty-three out of the forty-five ophthalmology residents completed the questionnaire (95.5% response rate). The preferred learning style among ophthalmology residents was assimilative (51.2%), followed by convergent (37.2%), accommodative (7.7%), and divergent (4.7%), based on Kolb’s questionnaire. According to the results of the VARK questionnaire, most ophthalmology residents were auditory learners (34.9%), followed by multimodal learners (30.2%). In addition, there was no significant relation between genders, stage of residency, and Kolb’s and VARK learning styles (P > 0.05 for all). Conclusion: The most preferred learning styles of ophthalmology residents were assimilative and auditory. Considering the dominant learning styles of learners and incorporating various teaching methods are recommended to enhance the learning among residents