The spread of the COVID-19 pandemic has led to widespread concerns internationally and among the members of the public health community including dental health professionals The dental health care professionals are at higher than usual risk due to the proximity to the patients face, direct contact with the body fluids such as saliva and blood The objective of this article is to provide an overview of the symptoms, modes of transmission of the COVID-19 infection, triaging of the dental patients, specific recommendations for the management of the dental patient, infection control modalities with an emphasis on dental specialties, global outlook on the pandemic by dentists, and implications on the patients and dentists A literature search was performed and articles about the symptoms and modes of transmission of the COVID-19 infection, management of COVID-19 diffusion in dental practice were retrieved The articles were then reviewed and infection control measures for various dental specialties as well as patient management strategies were also outlined in the results The dental team has to implement measures to provide care and treatment to the patient as well as prevent the spread of the infection

After coming out of the state debt crisis, Greece is facing yet another crisis - that of the COVID-19 pandemic. The key challenges facing the organizational structure and function of the Greek public health system in order to meet the populations' health needs are discussed. Social distancing, through imposed national lockdown very early in the pandemic, has been a key emergency public health measure that has saved lives. However, the system needs to enhance its capacity, through strengthening primary health and social support care, to be able to meet existing unmet health needs, the impact of the pandemic on mental health, as well as to tackle future new waves of outbreak. The related changes in health service provisions in response to the COVID-19 pandemic call for developing new models and novel approaches for delivering effective mental health services.

The COVID-19 epidemic has brought a huge impact to the clothing industry Because of the inconveniences caused by countermeasures, clothing consumers can't go to physical stores to try on, so it is urgent to develop a virtual clothing trial system In addition, online fitting and online shopping gradually become the trend of clothing consumption Based on virtual reality technology, this paper proposes a virtual clothing fitting system, and studies the color saturation in the process In this paper, a method of parametric drawing of garment characteristic curve is proposed, and the shape of garment is designed by using control vertices Based on this, this paper presents four forms of sutured parabola space and their control point solving algorithm According to the principle of scale method, a three-dimensional coordinate transformation model of feature points is established The model can calculate the coordinates of each characteristic value point of clothing according to the body shape information provided by customers and the empirical formula of different clothing styles, and then reverse calculate the curve control point Furthermore, Bezier surface generation method is used to fit the control points After the surface patches are spliced, the 3D rigid clothing model can be obtained Experiments show that the method of personalized clothing modeling in this paper is efficient and accurate, which can be further extended to the observation system with larger degree of freedom ? 2020 - IOS Press and the authors All rights reserved

In 2018, there were about 228 million cases of malaria leading to an estimated 405,000 deaths worldwide;94% of these deaths occurred in the World Health Organization (WHO) African Region [1], where malaria is a leading cause of death While the past decade has seen a reduction in malaria incidence, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa, to maintain these gains, it is imperative for malaria-endemic countries to continue to focus on malaria control efforts in addition to efforts to combat the COVID-19 pandemic Modellingexternal icon analysis by WHO and partners suggests that if essential malaria interventions are significantly disrupted due to COVID-19 challenges, numbers of malaria cases will significantly increase, and death rates could double [2] Ministries of Health and National Malaria Control Programs (NMCPs) need to ensure that malaria prevention and treatment activities are implemented while also protecting patients, health care providers, and public health officials from COVID-19 exposure The following are some key considerations for continuing essential malaria prevention and control activities safely and effectively;these should supplement country Ministry of Health guidance Malaria/COVID-19 National Strategy A representative from the National Malaria Control Program should be considered for membership on the countrys National COVID-19 Incident Management Team to provide the malaria perspective for decision-makers

A type of coronavirus disease called COVID-19 is spreading all over the globe. Researchers and scientists are endeavoring to find new and effective methods to diagnose and treat this disease. This article presents an automated and fast system that identifies COVID-19 from X-ray radiographs of the chest using image processing and machine learning algorithms. Initially, the system extracts the feature descriptors from the radiographs of both healthy and COVID-19 affected patients using the speeded up robust features algorithm. Then, visual vocabulary is built by reducing the number of feature descriptors via quantization of feature space using the K-means clustering algorithm. The visual vocabulary train the support vector machine (SVM) classifier. During testing, an X-ray radiograph's visual vocabulary is sent to the trained SVM classifier to detect the absence or presence of COVID-19. The study used the dataset of 340 X-ray radiographs, 170 images of each Healthy and Positive COVID-19 class. During simulations, the dataset split into training and testing parts at various ratios. After training, the system does not require any human intervention and can process thousands of images with high precision in a few minutes. The performance of the system is measured using standard parameters of accuracy and confusion matrix. We compared the performance of the proposed SVM-based classier with the deep-learning-based convolutional neural networks (CNN). The SVM yields better results than CNN and achieves a maximum accuracy of up to 94.12%.

Therapeutic monoclonal antibodies (mAbs), targeting tumor antigens, or immune checkpoints, have demonstrated a remarkable anti-tumor effect against various malignancies. However, high costs for mono- or combination therapies, associated with adverse effects or possible development of resistance in some patients, warrant further development and modification to gain more flexibility for this immunotherapy approach. An attractive alternative to passive immunization with therapeutic antibodies might be active immunization with mimotopes (B-cell peptides) representing the mAbs' binding epitopes, to activate the patient's own anti-tumor immune response following immunization. Here, we identified and examined the feasibility of inducing anti-tumor effects in vivo following active immunization with a mimotope of the immune checkpoint programmed cell death 1 (PD1), alone or in combination with a Her-2/neu B-cell peptide vaccine. Overlapping peptides spanning the extracellular domains of human PD1 (hPD1) were used to identify hPD1-derived mimotopes, using the therapeutic mAb Nivolumab as a proof of concept. Additionally, for in vivo evaluation in a tumor mouse model, a mouse PD1 (mPD1)-derived mimotope was identified using an anti-mPD1 mAb with mPD1/mPDL-1 blocking capacity. The identified mimotopes were characterized by in vitro assays, including a reporter cell-based assay, and their anti-tumor effects were evaluated in a syngeneic tumor mouse model stably expressing human Her-2/neu. The identified PD1-derived mimotopes were shown to significantly block the mAbs' capacity in inhibiting the respective PD1/PD-L1 interactions. A significant reduction in tumor growth in vivo was observed following active immunization with the mPD1-derived mimotope, associated with a significant reduction in proliferation and increased apoptotic rates in the tumors. Particularly, combined vaccination with the mPD1-derived mimotope and a multiple B-cell epitope Her-2/neu vaccine potentiated the vaccine's anti-tumor effect. Our results suggest active immunization with mimotopes of immune checkpoint inhibitors either as monotherapy or as combination therapy with tumor-specific vaccines, as a new strategy for cancer treatment.

BACKGROUND The prevalence of secondary hyperparathyroidism (SHPT) is high after bariatric surgery. Vitamin D is supplied to counteract SHPT and bone disease, and we studied vitamin D associations with SHPT. METHODS We measured serum levels of 25-OH vitamin D and parathyroid hormone (PTH) 5 years after gastric bypass and duodenal switch. One hundred twenty-five patients were included, of whom 114 (91 %) had undergone gastric bypass and 11 (9 %) had undergone duodenal switch. SHPT was defined as PTH > 7.0 pmol/l in the absence of hypercalcemia. 25-OH vitamin D levels were divided into three categories: <50, 50-74, and 75 nmol/l. Serum ionized calcium, magnesium, phosphate, and creatinine were divided into tertiles. RESULTS Mean age SD was 44 9 years at 5 years follow-up. Ninety out of 125 (72 %) patients were women. SHPT was present in 45 out of 114 (40 %) gastric bypass patients and in 11 out of 11 (100 %) duodenal switch patients. The prevalence was high in all vitamin D categories studied. An inverse association between ionized calcium and PTH was found. For the gastric bypass patients, the odds ratio for SHPT in the upper two tertiles of ionized calcium was 0.35; 95 % CI, 0.15-0.79; p = 0.011, compared with the lowest tertile. Supplements of vitamin D and calcium were not associated with a lower prevalence of SHPT at 5 years follow-up. CONCLUSIONS The prevalence of SHPT was high 5 years after gastric bypass and duodenal switch. SHPT was inversely associated with serum ionized calcium, but not with vitamin D. The supplementation used was insufficient to compensate for the impaired calcium absorption after surgery.

PURPOSE: To promote nationwide dissemination and implementation of COVID-19 Risk Assessment and Safety Management Operational Guidelines, drawn up by SAMeR Task Force in ART centers in Argentina. Our objective is to prevent and mitigate the transmission of SARS-CoV-2 at an institutional level, while reducing the risk of infection among both physicians and patients in the context of a critical scenario in the local and Latin American healthcare system. METHODS: SAMeR Executive Committee set up a crisis committee which was made up of specialists in reproductive medicine, embryology, and healthcare management. A critical and updated review of the advances in science, documents, and recommendations released by other societies (ASRM, ESHRE, IFFS, Red LARA, societies of anesthesiologists, infectious diseases, and Occupational Safety and Health Administration-OSHA) was carried out. Likewise, there were joint meetings with the Ministry of Health of Argentina in order to draw up the guidelines. Simultaneously, ongoing medical training was carried out, thus providing added value to them, including two status surveys of the activities of the monovalent and polyvalent centers according to the country's epidemiological mapping. Four additional recommendations were made, and online training was given to healthcare workers. The aforementioned regulations were first analyzed by the healthcare providers and their practical suggestions were then added to the guidelines. RESULTS: The one-off collaborative work and the actions coordinated with the National ART Program of the Ministry of Health of Argentina resulted in the development and implementation of the present COVID-19 Risk Assessment and Safety Management Operational Guidelines at a national level. SAMeR gave recommendations for the implementation of the Management Guidelines for the center reopening, providing new safety criteria against the threat of viral contagion. A new organizational culture was promoted through the awareness of all the healthcare workers and teaching responsibility. We continue working on the compliance with a new "Code of Conduct and Commitment in Healthcare" and with workplace safety measures. We helped with transforming the theoretical knowledge into practical measures for the healthcare workers in different services, with the aim to prevent, mitigate, and/or handle contingencies at the centers/services and gamete banks, in line with the actions agreed upon with the Ministry of Health. CONCLUSIONS: As an extraordinary and uncertain event, the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic helped consolidate a volunteer-based and collaborative panel of SAMeR experts who developed the COVID-19 Risk Assessment and Safety Management Operational Guidelines as a new and readily available tool for physicians, patients, and gamete banks care. Their implementation has provided specific guidelines to minimize risk for professionals in ART clinics, as well as guaranteeing patient safety.

BACKGROUND: Physical activity (PA) has been identified as a promising intervention to improve executive function (EF) and reduce ADHD symptoms in children. Few African American children with ADHD and Disruptive Behavior Disorders (DBDs) from families with low incomes are represented in this literature. The purpose of this study is to test the relationships between PA and sedentary time (ST), and EF and academic skills among African American children with ADHD and DBD from low-income families. METHODS: Children (n = 23, 6-13 years old) wore an ActiGraph for one week to measure PA and ST. EF was measured through parent report and direct neuropsychological tests. Academic skills were measured with the Curriculum-Based Measurement System. Bivariate correlations tested relationships between PA, ST, EF, and academic skills. RESULTS: A significant correlation was observed between vigorous PA time and parent reported EF (r = -0.46, p = 0.040). Light PA and moderate PA were not related to EF or academic skills, and neither was ST. CONCLUSIONS: Vigorous PA may prove useful as an adjunct treatment to improve EF in African American children with ADHD and DBD in low-income neighborhoods. Research using experimental and longitudinal designs, and examining qualitative features of PA experiences, will be critical for understanding relationships between PA, academic skills, and EF in this population.

The covid-19 pandemic has transformed the teaching and learning process from offline to online and it has challenged all stakeholders, teachers, students, and parents. One of the key variables that work in dealing with the challenge of online teaching and learning is known as the academic coping strategies (ACS). Some studies have confirmed that academic coping strategies positively contribute to students' learning outcomes and students' ability to deal with their academic pressure. Besides, other factors that influence the students' academic coping skills are the students' self-regulation and students' psychological capital. Therefore, the main aim of this research is to examine the correlation between (1) self-regulation and the academic coping strategies;(2) the self-regulation and psychological capital;(3) the psychological capital and the academic coping strategies;and (4) the self-regulation and the academic coping skills through the psychological capital. This research applied the correlational multifactor which took samples from 518 high school and vocational school students. The instruments employed in this research were a personal data information form, self-regulation scale, psychological capital scale for academic purposes, and academic coping strategies scale. The data were analyzed by using the path analysis in AMOS 23. This research revealed that self-regulation directly affects the students' academic coping strategies and psychological capital during online learning in a covid-19 pandemic. The pedagogical finding of this study can improve the quality of learning during the covid - 19 pandemics which is expected to be applicable not only in Indonesia but also in other countries, particularly in southeast. ? 2022 Eskisehir Osmangazi University. All rights reserved.

Amphiphilic hydrogel nanoparticles, composed of covalently cross-linked Pluronic F127 and PEG, exhibit a temperature- and concentration-dependent gelation in water which is interpreted as a colloidal glass formation. The possible applications of these phenomena in biomaterials and controlled release are also discussed.

Right-wing populism as a desideratum of social-ecological transition research ;GAIA 30/1 (2021): 62-64 Keywords: climate denialism, environmental attidudes, right-wing populism, socio-ecological transformation Seien es die Etablierung nachhaltiger Mobilit?tsysteme, Ver?nderungen im Agrarsektor oder die Transformation des Energiesystems - der Erfolg in unterschiedlichen Feldern einer sozial-?kologischen Transformation ist nicht allein von Wissensbest?nden, der Qualit?t von Konzepten oder technischen Schlsselinnovationen abh?ngig The role of populist attitudes in explaining climate change skepticism and support for environmental protection Right-wing populism and the climate change agenda: exploring the linkages

The demographic characteristics of a leader are important for small businesses during the COVID-19 pandemic. Several researchers have proven that demographic characteristics affect business success. Unfortunately, business success has only been analyzed from a financial perspective and has not been compared to the owner's interests perspective. This study examines business success from both perspectives. This study aims to analyze the demographic characteristics of small entrepreneurs and their impact on business success. Demographics consist of age, experience, education, and gender. Meanwhile, business success is seen from two perspectives: financial performance and the owner's interest. The study used an explanatory survey method. The number of samples is 155 entrepreneurs who are also the leaders of their businesses. The research was conducted in Bandung City, Indonesia, in 2021. The data was processed using descriptive statistics and multiple regression. The study results found that age only affects financial performance. Experience is proven to affect financial performance and the interests of the owner. Gender only affects the interests of the owner. This study concludes that in difficult times such as the COVID-19 pandemic, having young leaders who are experienced will make it easier to achieve business success.

Pour tre plus efficient, le systme de soins doit dpasser le travail en silo. Lmergence des maisons ou p?les de sant et des communauts professionnelles territoriales de sant favorise un fonctionnement bas sur la synergie, o chaque acteur apporte ses comptences. La russite tient en la capacit mettre en ?uvre un projet au bnfice des patients. Working together, the key to efficiency To be more efficient, the healthcare system must move beyond working in silos. The emergence of health centers or clusters and territorial professional health communities favors an approach based on synergy, where each player contributes his or her skills. Success lies in the ability to implement a project for the benefit of patients.

This paper explores corporate law rules adopted in some European states amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, in order to track the major reform trends and consider how corporate law in Europe has adjusted to the emergency The analysis focuses primarily on the U K , Germany, France, Italy and Spain;occasionally, depending also on the relevant rules actually introduced by the states, other systems are considered as well The paper groups the emergency measures into three main categories that include rules aimed at facilitating shareholders meetings and meetings of the board of directors, rules relaxing directors duties and liability and giving directors some leeway as companies face unprecedented challenges and uncertainties, and rules designed to support corporate liquidity The analysis shows that while some points of similarity exist among the emergency rules considered, there are nevertheless numerous differences in their nature, scope, technicalities, and also timing These differences emphasize a lack of coordination at the European level The discussion also sheds light on the potential of some emergency measures to call traditional corporate law rules into question and last in what will be the new normal after the crisis

Background and ImportanceCOVID-19 is a viral infection that mainly affects the respiratory tract, but can also cause multiple inflammatory reactions, including neurological and cerebrovascular manifestations. We report the case of a COVID-19 patient who developed 'de novo' multiple cerebral aneurysms with no risk factors for aneurysm formation.Clinical PresentationA 55-year-old man with SARS-CoV-2 infection came to our attention for left eye blindness accompanied by ptosis, palpebral chemosis and retro-orbital pain. Brain CT and CT-angiography were negative for hemorrhages and for vascular malformations. Repeated intracerebral hemorrhages and neurological deterioration then occurred, and a new CT-angiography showed multiple intracranial aneurysms that were not present before.ConclusionIntracranial aneurysm formation as a complication of COVID-19 has not been previously reported. As other viral infections do, COVID-19 may be able to determine a vascular damage that can ultimately lead to development of an aneurysm. It is reasonable to hypothesize an involvement of the renin-angiotensin system as a pathogenic mechanism.A conservative therapy aiming at inflammatory modulation and vascular damage prevention may be warranted in these patients.

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has affected most of the countries on Earth. It has become a pandemic outbreak with more than 50 million confirmed infections and above 1 million deaths worldwide. In this study, we consider a mathematical model on COVID-19 transmission with the prosocial awareness effect. The proposed model can have four equilibrium states based on different parametric conditions. The local and global stability conditions for awareness-free, disease-free equilibrium are studied. Using Lyapunov function theory and LaSalle invariance principle, the disease-free equilibrium is shown globally asymptotically stable under some parametric constraints. The existence of unique awareness-free, endemic equilibrium and unique endemic equilibrium is presented. We calibrate our proposed model parameters to fit daily cases and deaths from Colombia and India. Sensitivity analysis indicates that the transmission rate and the learning factor related to awareness of susceptibles are very crucial for reduction in disease-related deaths. Finally, we assess the impact of prosocial awareness during the outbreak and compare this strategy with popular control measures. Results indicate that prosocial awareness has competitive potential to flatten the COVID-19 prevalence curve.

Methadone is a synthetic opioid agonist with notoriously unique properties, such as lower abuse liability and induced relief of withdrawal symptoms and drug cravings, despite acting on the same opioid receptors triggered by classical opioids, in particular the -opioid receptor (MOR). Its distinct pharmacologic properties, which have recently been attributed to the preferential activation of -arrestin over G proteins, make methadone a standard-of-care maintenance medication for opioid addiction. Although a recent biophysical study suggests that methadone stabilizes different MOR active conformations from those stabilized by classical opioid drugs or G protein-biased agonists, how this drug modulates the conformational equilibrium of MOR and what specific active conformation of the receptor it stabilizes is unknown. Here, we report the results of sub-millisecond adaptive sampling molecular dynamics (MD) simulations of a predicted methadone-bound MOR complex, and compare them with analogous data obtained for the classical opioid morphine and the G protein-biased ligand TRV130. The model, which is supported by existing experimental data, is analyzed using Markov State Models (MSMs) and transfer entropy analysis to provide testable hypotheses of methadone-specific conformational dynamics and activation kinetics of MOR. SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT: Opioid addiction has reached epidemic proportions in both industrialized and developing countries. Although methadone maintainance treatment represents an effective therapeutic approach for opioid addiction, it is not widely used as needed. In this study, we contribute an atomic-level understanding of how methadone exerts its unique function, in pursuit of more accessible treatments for opioid addiction. In particular, we present details of a methadone-specific active conformation of the -opioid receptor that has thus far eluded experimental structural characterization.

Unruptured vertebral arteries dissecting aneurysms have a benign clinical course. The most common symptoms compromise headache, neck pain, dizziness and vomiting. The optimal endovascular treatment option remains controversial. Reconstructive techniques have many advantages over deconstructive ones since the advent of flow diverters such as the Pipeline embolization device (PED). Here, we present a case successfully treated with a PED through a combination of the radial access and advancement of the Marksman catheter into the contralateral vertebral artery due to the special angio-architecture of the patient.

A loss-of-function mutation in the Lrp5 gene in mice leads to a low bone mass disorder due to the inhibition of the canonical Wnt signaling pathway; however, the role of bone marrow microenvironment in mice with this mutation remains unclear. In this study, we evaluated proliferation and osteogenic potential of mouse osteoblasts using the MTT assay and Alizarin red staining. The levels of alkaline phosphatase, tartrate-resistant acid phosphatase, and adiponectin in culture supernatants were measured using the enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. Osteoclast bone resorbing activity was evaluated by toluidine staining and the number and area of bone resorption pits were determined. We observed increased osteogenesis in osteoblasts co-cultured with the BM-derived myeloid cells compared to the osteoblasts cultured alone. Mice with global Lrp5 deletion had a relatively higher bone density compared to the mice carrying osteoblast/osteocyte-specific Lrp5 deletion. An increased frequency of M2 macrophages and reduced expression of inflammatory cytokines were detected in the myeloid cells derived from the bone marrow of mice with global Lrp5 deletion. Higher adipogenic potential and elevated levels of adiponectin in the global Lrp5 deletion mice contributed to the preferential M2 macrophage polarization. Here, we identified a novel systemic regulatory mechanism of bone formation and degradation in mice with global Lrp5 deletion. This mechanism depends on a crosstalk between the adipocytes and M2 macrophages in the bone marrow and is responsible for partly rescuing osteopenia developed as a result of decreased Wnt signaling.