15 research outputs found
Assessment of Emotional Intelligence Levels among Students of a Public Medical College of Pakistan amidst the Crisis of Covid-19 Pandemic
ABSTRACT
Purpose
Aim of the study was to determine the standards of emotional intelligence among students of Rawalpindi Medical University, Rawalpindi.
Method
A cross-sectional study, employing the use of a self-made online questionnaire, was carried out among the students of Rawalpindi Medical University’s 1st year to final year MBBS. Convenience sampling was used to collect data, which was subsequently entered into Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) version.25 for analysis.
Results
The average value of emotional intelligence was calculated to be 54.34% ±13.89 SD; mean values for emotional awareness, emotional management and social awareness were found to be 65.15% ±12.6 SD, 51.12% ±12.12 SD and 48.4% ±17.39 SD respectively.
Conclusion
The emotional intelligence of the students amidst the Corona virus pandemic had a noticeably lower value compared to the values determined previously in other studies in the absence of such pandemic. This result points towards the role of pandemic-induced stress in the apparent decrease of emotional intelligence
Prognostic significance of ischaemic electrocardiographic changes during stress testing in patients with normal nuclear myocardial perfusion imaging
Objective: To evaluate cardiovascular outcomes in patients with normal nuclear myocardial perfusion imaging, but ischaemic electrocardiogram changes during pharmacological or exercise stress tests.Methods: The retrospective study was conducted at the Aga Khan University Hospital, Karachi, and comprised data of patients who underwent either pharmacological or exercise stress myocardial perfusion scan and had a normal scan with ischaemic electrocardiogram changes between January 2013 and December 2014. All cardiac events, including angina, myocardial infarction, heart failure, coronary revascularisation and cardiac death, as well as non-cardiac deaths were noted. Data was analysed using STATA 14.2.Results: Of the 2770 patients whose data was initially checked, 296(10.6%) developed ischaemic electrocardiogram changes during the stress test but had normal myocardial perfusion scan. Of them, 181(61%) patients were male, and the overall mean age was 62±15 years. Follow-up data was available for 280(94.5%) of these patients, with a mean follow-up of 48±7 months. Of these patients, 8(2.8%) died, and 1(0.3%) of them died due to inferior wall myocardial infarction. Myocardial infarction was found in 2(0.7%) patients, and 1(0.3%) patient was hospitalised with heart failure. Also, 12(4.3%) patients underwent revascularization for stable angina, 9(3.2%) underwent percutaneous transluminal coronary angioplasty, and 3(1.07%) needed coronary artery bypass grafting.Conclusions: Ischaemic electrocardiographic changes during stress testing in patients with normal myocardial perfusion scan were not associated with adverse outcomes, and the risk of cardiovascular events was relatively low for an intermediate follow-up period
An empirical study exploring the determinants of stress among medical healthcare professionals
Background: Medical profession is considered as one of the stressful
professions. Work related stress level among the general working
population is around 18% while the stress level among the healthcare
practitioners is around 28%. Multiple stressors contribute to the
stress of doctors resulting in negative consequences. Objective: The
objective of the current study was to determine, categorize and to rank
the existing stressors according to their significance for medical
healthcare professionals in Pakistan. Method: A self-administered
questionnaire was used to collect data from 327 doctors. 47.2% were
males while 52.8% were females. A structured questionnaire was
developed and convenience sampling technique was applied to collect the
data from the different positions of healthcare professionals.
Exploratory factor analysis (EFA) was performed to categorize and to
analyse the underlying structure of stressors. Finally, the stressors
were ranked according to their significance. Results: Appropriateness
of factor model was judged through Kaiser, Meyer and Olkin (KMO) index
which was 0.905, and by Bartlett\u2019s Test of Sphericity which
resulted significant (Approx. Chi- Square= 1111.529, Df =136,
Sig.=0.000). Seventeen stressors were converted into four categories by
factor analysis and were supported by both scree plot and eigen values.
The variance explained by the first, second, third and fourth component
was 20.89%, 19.09%, 16.33%, and 11.72% respectively. The 4 components
cumulatively explained 68.03% of the total variability in the data,
hence supported the extraction of 4 components. Conclusion: There are
number of factors which enhance the stress of healthcare professionals.
In Pakistan, the major stressor of medical healthcare professionals is
\u201ccareer & reward prospects\u201d followed by
\u201cworkplace environmental stressor\u201d. \u201cJob demand &
performance stressor\u2019\u2019 ranks third among the list of
stressors and \u201cinterpersonal stressor\u2019\u2019 ranks fourth
according to significance for healthcare professionals
The effects of different length of pineapple leaf fibre (PALF) on tensile properties of random oriented composites
Pineapple, AnanasComosus is one of the most primary tropical plant in Malaysia and abundantly available waste materials produced every yea. Previously, there were many pineapples waste available. To date, the use of fibres that were extracted from the pineapple leaf is still limited due to lack of information, knowledge and facilities available to process the leaf into potential materials in various applications. This present study covered on the tensile properties of PALFs composites reinforced with vinyl ester resin in different length of fibre. The composites were fabricated by using hand lay-up technique with different fibre length of PALF. There were three different type of composites which are short (15 mm), mixed (15-30 mm) and long (30 mm) PALF. Based on the result, the highest tensile strength was achieved by the composites that was prepared using the long PALF which is 25.77 MPa while mixed PALF composites showed the highest in tensile modulus (2.848 GPa). In summary, the usage of PALFs in the fabrication of composites had great potential to reduce the non-renewable materials for real-life application
Effect of silver nanopowder on mechanical, thermal and antimicrobial properties of kenaf/HDPE composites
This study aims to investigate the effect of AgNPs on the mechanical, thermal and antimicrobial activity of kenaf/HDPE composites. AgNP material was prepared at different contents, from 0, 2, 4, 6, 8 to 10 wt%, by an internal mixer and hot compression at a temperature of 150 °C. Mechanical (tensile, modulus and elongation at break), thermal (TGA and DSC) and antimicrobial tests were performed to analyze behavior and inhibitory effects. The obtained results indicate that the effect of AgNP content displays improved tensile and modulus properties, as well as thermal and antimicrobial properties. The highest tensile stress is 5.07 MPa and was obtained at 10wt, TGA showed 10 wt% and had improved thermal stability and DSC showed improved stability with increased AgNP content. The findings of this study show the potential of incorporating AgNP concentrations as a secondary substitute to improve the performance in terms of mechanical, thermal and antimicrobial properties without treatment. The addition of AgNP content in polymer composite can be used as a secondary filler to improve the properties
A nationwide study of adults admitted to hospital with diabetic ketoacidosis or hyperosmolar hyperglycaemic state and COVID‐19
AimsTo investigate characteristics of people hospitalized with coronavirus-disease-2019 (COVID-19) and diabetic ketoacidosis (DKA) or hyperosmolar hyperglycaemic state (HHS), and to identify risk factors for mortality and intensive care admission.Materials and methodsRetrospective cohort study with anonymized data from the Association of British Clinical Diabetologists nationwide audit of hospital admissions with COVID-19 and diabetes, from start of pandemic to November 2021. The primary outcome was inpatient mortality. DKA and HHS were adjudicated against national criteria. Age-adjusted odds ratios were calculated using logistic regression.ResultsIn total, 85 confirmed DKA cases, and 20 HHS, occurred among 4073 people (211 type 1 diabetes, 3748 type 2 diabetes, 114 unknown type) hospitalized with COVID-19. Mean (SD) age was 60 (18.2) years in DKA and 74 (11.8) years in HHS (p < .001). A higher proportion of patients with HHS than with DKA were of non-White ethnicity (71.4% vs 39.0% p = .038). Mortality in DKA was 36.8% (n = 57) and 3.8% (n = 26) in type 2 and type 1 diabetes respectively. Among people with type 2 diabetes and DKA, mortality was lower in insulin users compared with non-users [21.4% vs. 52.2%; age-adjusted odds ratio 0.13 (95% CI 0.03-0.60)]. Crude mortality was lower in DKA than HHS (25.9% vs. 65.0%, p = .001) and in statin users versus non-users (36.4% vs. 100%; p = .035) but these were not statistically significant after age adjustment.ConclusionsHospitalization with COVID-19 and adjudicated DKA is four times more common than HHS but both associate with substantial mortality. There is a strong association of previous insulin therapy with survival in type 2 diabetes-associated DKA
Clinical utility of routine investigations and risk factors of end-organ damage in asymptomatic severe hypertension
Asymptomatic severe hypertension is defined as systolic blood pressure of ≥ 180 mmHg or diastolic blood pressure of ≥ 120 mmHg without signs and symptoms of end-organ damage or dysfunction. Literature shows that around 5% of the patients with severe asymptomatic hypertension had acute hypertension-related end-organ damage. This study aimed to determine the clinical utility of routine investigations and risk factors of end-organ damage in patients presented to the emergency department with asymptomatic severe hypertension. This single-center, cross-sectional study was conducted at the emergency department of the Aga Khan University Hospital, Karachi, Pakistan, from January 2018 to December 2020. All adult patients (age ≥ 18 years) presented to the emergency department with a systolic blood pressure of ≥ 180 or diastolic blood pressure of ≥ 120 mmHg without any signs and symptoms of end-organ damage (e.g., chest pain, unilateral limb or facial weakness, or hemiplegia, altered mental status, shortness of breath, decreased urine output, and sudden-onset of severe headache) were included. Routine investigations were analyzed to detect end-organ damage, including complete blood count, basic metabolic panel, urine detailed report, electrocardiogram, and troponin-I. Multivariable binary logistic regression was applied to identify the risk factors of end-organ damage considering the significant p value of ≤ 0.05. A total of 180 patients were presented to the emergency department with asymptomatic severe hypertension during the study period. Among the total patients, 60 patients (33.3%) had abnormal investigation findings; out of them, new-onset end-organ damage was diagnosed in 15 patients (8.3%). The most common end-organ damage was the kidney (73.3%) followed by the heart (26.6%). The multivariable binary logistic regression showed that age of more than 60 years, past medical history of diabetes, ischemic heart disease, and cerebrovascular accident were significantly associated with a higher risk of end-organ damage (p \u3c 0.05). The study identified a higher prevalence of abnormal routine investigations and acute end-organ damage in emergency department patients with asymptomatic severe hypertension compared to high-income countries and suggested a lower threshold for end-organ damage screening in these patients. The current recommendations of foregoing further workup in patients with asymptomatic severe hypertension may need modification for emergency departments in low-middle-income countries if similar associations are replicated in other setting