TDuring COVID-19 pandemic, it was noticed that it was students who were mostly affected by the changes that aroused because of the pandemic. The interesting part is whether students’ well-being could be associated with their fields of study as well as coping strategies.

In this study, we aimed to assess 1) the mental health of students from nine countries with a particular focus on depression, anxiety, and stress levels and their fields of study, 2) the major coping strategies of students after one year of the COVID-19 pandemic.

We conducted an anonymous online cross-sectional survey on 12th April – 1st June 2021 that was distributed among the students from Poland, Mexico, Egypt, India, Pakistan, China, Vietnam, Philippines, and Bangladesh. To measure the emotional distress, we used the Depression, Anxiety, and Stress Scale-21 (DASS-21), and to identify the major coping strategies of students - the Brief-COPE.

We gathered 7219 responses from students studying five major studies: medical studies (N=2821), social sciences (N=1471), technical sciences (N=891), artistic/humanistic studies (N=1094), sciences (N=942). The greatest intensity of depression (M=18.29±13.83; moderate intensity), anxiety (M=13.13±11.37; moderate intensity ), and stress (M=17.86±12.94; mild intensity) was observed among sciences students. Medical students presented the lowest intensity of all three components - depression (M=13.31±12.45; mild intensity), anxiety (M=10.37±10.57; moderate intensity), and stress (M=13.65±11.94; mild intensity). Students of all fields primarily used acceptance and self-distraction as their coping mechanisms, while the least commonly used were self-blame, denial, and substance use. The group of coping mechanisms the most frequently used was ‘emotional focus’. Medical students statistically less often used avoidant coping strategies compared to other fields of study. Substance use was only one coping mechanism that did not statistically differ between students of different fields of study. Behavioral disengagement presented the highest correlation with depression (r=0.54), anxiety (r=0.48), and stress (r=0.47) while religion presented the lowest positive correlation with depression (r=0.07), anxiety (r=0.14), and stress (r=0.11).

1) The greatest intensity of depression, anxiety, and stress was observed among sciences students, while the lowest intensity of those components was found among students studying medicine.

2) Not using avoidant coping strategies might be associated with lower intensity of all DASS components among students.

3) Behavioral disengagement might be strongly associated with greater intensity of depression, anxiety, and stress among students.

4) There was no coping mechanism that provided the alleviation of emotional distress in all the fields of studies of students.

None Declared

The study’s objective was to investigate multiple underlying social, economic and agricultural determinants of stunting among under-five children in three distinct ecological areas in rural Myanmar.

Repeated cross-sectional surveys in three states of Myanmar.

Rural households in Chin (mountainous), Magway (plains) and Ayeyarwady (delta).

From two purposively selected adjacent townships in each state, we randomly selected twenty villages and, in each village, thirty households with under-five children. Households in the first survey in 2016 were revisited in late 2017 to capture seasonal variations.

Stunting increased from 40·4 % to 42·0 %, with the highest stunting prevalence in Chin state (62·4%). Univariate Poisson regression showed factors contributing to child stunting varied across the regions. Adjusted Poisson regression models showed that child’s age and short maternal stature (aRR = 1·14 for Chin, aRR = 1·89 for Magway and aRR = 1·86 for Ayeyarwady) were consistently associated with child stunting across three areas. For Chin, village-level indicators such as crop consumption (aRR = 1·18), crop diversity (aRR = 0·82) and land ownership (aRR = 0·89) were significantly associated with stunting. In Magway, the number of household members (aRR = 1·92), wealth status (aRR = 0·46), food security status (aRR = 1·14), land ownership (aRR = 0·85) and in Ayeyarwady, women’s decision-making (aRR = 0·67) and indicators related to hygiene (aRR = 1·13) and sanitation (aRR = 1·45) were associated with stunting.

Area-specific factors were associated with stunting. Maternal short stature and child age were consistent determinants of stunting. A multi-sectoral local approach, including improvements in transport, is needed to address the intergenerational malnutrition problem.

To explore the health impacts of Hurricane Maria (HM) on HIV care outcomes among people living with HIV who use drugs.

Using data from an ongoing cohort study in San Juan, Puerto Rico (Proyecto PACTo), we measured differences in HIV care outcomes (viral load, viral suppression, and CD4 counts) before and after HM using assessments conducted at 6-month intervals. Generalized estimating equations were used to assess factors associated with HIV care outcomes.

All HIV care outcomes showed a deterioration from pre-HM values to post-HM values (mean viral load increased, CD4 counts decreased, and rate of viral suppression decreased) after controlling for pre-HM sociodemographic and health characteristics. In addition to HM, age (aIRR = 1·01), being homeless (aIRR = 0·78) and having health insurance (aIRR = 1·6) were independently associated with viral suppression.

219 participants completed follow-up visits between April 2017 and January 2018, before and after HM.

People living with HIV who use drugs in Puerto Rico experienced poorer HIV outcomes following HM. Socio-environmental factors contributing to these outcomes is discussed in the context of disaster response, recovery, and program planning.

This study aimed to explore the utility of the eosinophil percentage in peripheral blood for guiding post-operative glucocorticoid therapy in patients with chronic rhinosinusitis with nasal polyps.

Forty-four patients with chronic rhinosinusitis with nasal polyps underwent functional endoscopic sinus surgery and were randomly divided into two groups. Patients in the standard treatment group used oral and nasal spray glucocorticoids. In the biomarker treatment group, patients with peripheral blood eosinophil percentage values less than 3.05 per cent did not receive glucocorticoid treatment, whereas patients with values 3.05 per cent or above were part of the standard treatment group. Visual Analogue Scale, Sino-Nasal Outcome Test-22 scores, endoscopic Lund–Kennedy scores, eosinophils, interleukin-5 and eosinophil cationic protein in peripheral blood, and nasal secretions were measured.

After functional endoscopic sinus surgery, the Visual Analogue Scale, Sino-Nasal Outcome Test-22 and Lund–Kennedy scores were significantly reduced in both groups; there were no significant differences in those indicators between the groups during the three follow-up visits.

Peripheral blood eosinophil percentage offers a potential biomarker to guide post-operative glucocorticoid therapy in patients with chronic rhinosinusitis with nasal polyps.

Although aberrant brain regional responses are reported in social anxiety disorder (SAD), little is known about resting-state functional connectivity at the macroscale network level. This study aims to identify functional network abnormalities using a multivariate data-driven method in a relatively large and homogenous sample of SAD patients, and assess their potential diagnostic value.

Forty-six SAD patients and 52 demographically-matched healthy controls (HC) were recruited to undergo clinical evaluation and resting-state functional MRI scanning. We used group independent component analysis to characterize the functional architecture of brain resting-state networks (RSNs) and investigate between-group differences in intra-/inter-network functional network connectivity (FNC). Furtherly, we explored the associations of FNC abnormalities with clinical characteristics, and assessed their ability to discriminate SAD from HC using support vector machine analyses.

SAD patients showed widespread intra-network FNC abnormalities in the default mode network, the subcortical network and the perceptual system (i.e. sensorimotor, auditory and visual networks), and large-scale inter-network FNC abnormalities among those high-order and primary RSNs. Some aberrant FNC signatures were correlated to disease severity and duration, suggesting pathophysiological relevance. Furthermore, intrinsic FNC anomalies allowed individual classification of SAD v. HC with significant accuracy, indicating potential diagnostic efficacy.

SAD patients show distinct patterns of functional synchronization abnormalities both within and across large-scale RSNs, reflecting or causing a network imbalance of bottom-up response and top-down regulation in cognitive, emotional and sensory domains. Therefore, this could offer insights into the neurofunctional substrates of SAD.

Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) instigated a flurry of clinical research activity. The unprecedented pace with which trials were launched left an early void in data standardization, limiting the potential for subsequent data pooling. To facilitate data standardization across emerging studies, the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI) charged two groups with harmonizing data collection, and these groups collaborated to create a concise set of COVID-19 Common Data Elements (CDEs) for clinical research.

Our iterative approach followed three guiding principles: 1) draw from existing multi-center COVID-19 clinical trials as precedents, 2) incorporate existing data elements and data standards whenever possible, and 3) alignment to data standards that facilitate data sharing and regulatory submission. We also supported rapid implementation of the CDEs in NHLBI-funded studies and iteratively refined the CDEs based on feedback from those study teams

The NHLBI COVID-19 CDEs are publicly available and being used for current COVID-19 clinical trials. CDEs are organized into domains, and each data element is classified within a three-tiered prioritization system. The CDE manual is hosted publicly at https://nhlbi-connects.org/common_data_elements with an accompanying data dictionary and implementation guidance.

The NHLBI COVID-19 CDEs are designed to aid data harmonization across studies to achieve the benefits of pooled analyses. We found that organizing CDE development around our three guiding principles focused our efforts and allowed us to adapt as COVID-19 knowledge advanced. As these CDEs continue to evolve, they could be generalized for use in other acute respiratory illnesses.

Mental health was only modestly affected in adults during the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic on the group level, but interpersonal variation was large.

We aim to investigate potential predictors of the differences in changes in mental health.

Data were aggregated from three Dutch ongoing prospective cohorts with similar methodology for data collection. We included participants with pre-pandemic data gathered during 2006–2016, and who completed online questionnaires at least once during lockdown in The Netherlands between 1 April and 15 May 2020. Sociodemographic, clinical (number of mental health disorders and personality factors) and COVID-19-related variables were analysed as predictors of relative changes in four mental health outcomes (depressive symptoms, anxiety and worry symptoms, and loneliness), using multivariate linear regression analyses.

We included 1517 participants with (n = 1181) and without (n = 336) mental health disorders. Mean age was 56.1 years (s.d. 13.2), and 64.3% were women. Higher neuroticism predicted increases in all four mental health outcomes, especially for worry (β = 0.172, P = 0.003). Living alone and female gender predicted increases in depressive symptoms and loneliness (β = 0.05–0.08), whereas quarantine and strict adherence with COVID-19 restrictions predicted increases in anxiety and worry symptoms (β = 0.07–0.11).Teleworking predicted a decrease in anxiety symptoms (β = −0.07) and higher age predicted a decrease in anxiety (β = −0.08) and worry symptoms (β = −0.10).

Our study showed neuroticism as a robust predictor of adverse changes in mental health, and identified additional sociodemographic and COVID-19-related predictors that explain longitudinal variability in mental health during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Patients with single ventricle CHD have significant morbidity and healthcare utilisation throughout their lifetime, including non-cardiac hospital admissions. Respiratory viral infections are the main cause of hospitalisation in children, but few data exist for single ventricle patients. We sought to identify how respiratory viral infections impact patients with single ventricle CHD and potential differences between Glenn and Fontan circulation.

We conducted a retrospective study of patients seen from 01/01/2011–12/31/2020. We identified patients with a history of single ventricle CHD and Glenn palliation, and a normoxic control group with isolated atrial septal defect requiring surgical closure. We compared viral-related clinical presentations, admissions, and admission characteristics.

A total of 312 patients were included (182 single ventricle, 130 atrial septal defect). Single ventricle patients were more likely than children with isolated atrial septal defect to be admitted with a respiratory virus (odds ratio 4.15 [2.30–7.46]), but there was no difference in mechanical ventilation or hospital length of stay (p = 0.4709). Single ventricle patients with Glenn circulation were more likely than those with Fontan circulation to present and be admitted (odds ratio 3.25 [1.62–6.52]), but there was no difference in ICU admission, mechanical ventilation, or hospital length of stay (p = 0.1516).

Respiratory viral infections are prevalent but uncomplicated in patients with single ventricle CHD. Viral-related presentations and admissions are more prevalent during the period of Glenn circulation compared to Fontan circulation; however, rate of mechanical ventilation and hospital length of stay are similar.

This study aimed to research risk factors of hearing loss among neonates in the neonatal intensive care unit.

Hearing screening tests were performed on 572 neonates in the neonatal intensive care unit. Those who failed screening tests were referred for diagnostic tests.

The pass rates for automated auditory brainstem response, distortion product otoacoustic emission and acoustic impedance tests at first hearing screening were 69.93 per cent, 70.02 per cent and 92.92 per cent for 1144 ears. Failure in the first screening correlated with preterm birth, very low birth weight, revised advanced maternal age, neonatal hyperbilirubinaemia and Activity, Pulse, Grimace, Appearance, Respiration score less than 8. Thirty cases failed in diagnostic hearing tests for brainstem auditory evoked potentials, 28 failed in otoacoustic emissions and 33 failed in acoustic impedance, which correlated with preterm birth, very low birth weight, twins, advanced maternal age and revised advanced maternal age.

Abnormalities in the hearing levels of most neonates who needed hearing retests were completely or partially reversible. Preterm birth, very low birth weight, twins and advanced maternal age are potential risk factors for hearing impairment.

The objectives of this study were to develop and refine EMPOWER (Enhancing and Mobilizing the POtential for Wellness and Resilience), a brief manualized cognitive-behavioral, acceptance-based intervention for surrogate decision-makers of critically ill patients and to evaluate its preliminary feasibility, acceptability, and promise in improving surrogates’ mental health and patient outcomes.

Part 1 involved obtaining qualitative stakeholder feedback from 5 bereaved surrogates and 10 critical care and mental health clinicians. Stakeholders were provided with the manual and prompted for feedback on its content, format, and language. Feedback was organized and incorporated into the manual, which was then re-circulated until consensus. In Part 2, surrogates of critically ill patients admitted to an intensive care unit (ICU) reporting moderate anxiety or close attachment were enrolled in an open trial of EMPOWER. Surrogates completed six, 15–20 min modules, totaling 1.5–2 h. Surrogates were administered measures of peritraumatic distress, experiential avoidance, prolonged grief, distress tolerance, anxiety, and depression at pre-intervention, post-intervention, and at 1-month and 3-month follow-up assessments.

Part 1 resulted in changes to the EMPOWER manual, including reducing jargon, improving navigability, making EMPOWER applicable for a range of illness scenarios, rearranging the modules, and adding further instructions and psychoeducation. Part 2 findings suggested that EMPOWER is feasible, with 100% of participants completing all modules. The acceptability of EMPOWER appeared strong, with high ratings of effectiveness and helpfulness (M = 8/10). Results showed immediate post-intervention improvements in anxiety (d = −0.41), peritraumatic distress (d = −0.24), and experiential avoidance (d = −0.23). At the 3-month follow-up assessments, surrogates exhibited improvements in prolonged grief symptoms (d = −0.94), depression (d = −0.23), anxiety (d = −0.29), and experiential avoidance (d = −0.30).

Preliminary data suggest that EMPOWER is feasible, acceptable, and associated with notable improvements in psychological symptoms among surrogates. Future research should examine EMPOWER with a larger sample in a randomized controlled trial.

Lifestyle interventions are an important and viable approach for preventing cognitive deficits. However, the results of studies on alcohol, coffee and tea consumption in relation to cognitive decline have been divergent, likely due to confounds from dose–response effects. This meta-analysis aimed to find the dose–response relationship between alcohol, coffee or tea consumption and cognitive deficits.

Prospective cohort studies or nested case-control studies in a cohort investigating the risk factors of cognitive deficits were searched in PubMed, Embase, the Cochrane and Web of Science up to 4th June 2020. Two authors searched the databases and extracted the data independently. We also assessed the quality of the studies with the Newcastle-Ottawa scale. Stata 15.0 software was used to perform model estimation and plot the linear or nonlinear dose–response relationship graphs.

The search identified 29 prospective studies from America, Japan, China and some European countries. The dose–response relationships showed that compared to non-drinkers, low consumption (<11 g/day) of alcohol could reduce the risk of cognitive deficits or only dementias, but there was no significant effect of heavier drinking (>11 g/day). Low consumption of coffee reduced the risk of any cognitive deficit (<2.8 cups/day) or dementia (<2.3 cups/day). Green tea consumption was a significant protective factor for cognitive health (relative risk, 0.94; 95% confidence intervals, 0.92–0.97), with one cup of tea per day brings a 6% reduction in risk of cognitive deficits.

Light consumption of alcohol (<11 g/day) and coffee (<2.8 cups/day) was associated with reduced risk of cognitive deficits. Cognitive benefits of green tea consumption increased with the daily consumption.