Post COVID-19 condition of the Omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2 Morioka, S.; Tsuzuki, S.; Suzuki, M. ...
Journal of infection and chemotherapy : official journal of the Japan Society of Chemotherapy,
11/2022, Letnik:
28, Številka:
11
Journal Article
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To investigate the prevalence of post coronavirus disease (COVID-19) condition of the Omicron variant in comparison to other strains.
A single-center cross-sectional study.
Patients who recovered ...from Omicron COVID-19 infection (Omicron group) were interviewed via telephone, and patients infected with other strains (control group) were surveyed via a self-reporting questionnaire. Data on patients’ characteristics, information regarding the acute-phase COVID-19, as well as presence and duration of COVID-19-related symptoms were obtained. Post COVID-19 condition in this study was defined as a symptom that lasted for at least 2 months, within 3 months of COVID-19 onset. We investigated and compared the prevalence of post COVID-19 condition in both groups after performing propensity score matching.
We conducted interviews for 53 out of 128 patients with Omicron and obtained 502 responses in the control group. After matching cases with controls, 18 patients from both groups had improved covariate balance of the factors: older adult, female sex, obesity, and vaccination status. There were no significant differences in the prevalence of each post COVID-19 condition between the two groups. The number of patients with at least one post COVID-19 condition in the Omicron and control groups were 1 (5.6%) and 10 (55.6%) (p = 0.003), respectively.
The prevalence of post Omicron COVID-19 conditions was less than that of the other strains. Further research with a larger sample size is needed to investigate the precise epidemiology of post COVID-19 condition of Omicron, and its impact on health-related quality of life and social productivity.
To examine the length of stay, hospitalisation costs and case fatality of methicillin-susceptible and -resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MSSA and MRSA) bacteremia in Japan.
Retrospective cohort study. ...Patients with a diagnosis of S. aureus bacteremia who were admitted to a tertiary care hospital (the National Centre for Global Health and Medicine NCGM) in Tokyo, Japan, between 1st January 2016 and 31st December 2020 were included in the study.
We combined Japan Nosocomial Infections Surveillance data and Diagnosis Procedure Combination data at NCGM from 2016 to 2020. The data were stratified into MSSA and MRSA groups. Length of stay (LoS), LoS after submission of a blood culture specimen (LoS-after), hospitalisation cost, hospitalisation costs per day and clinical outcome were compared after propensity score matching.
Median LoS was 46 (interquartile range IQR 28.5–64.5) days in the MSSA group and 66 (IQR 40–91) days in the MRSA group (P = 0.020). Median LoS-after was 38 (IQR 25–62.5) days and 45 (IQR 24–63) days (P = 0.691) in the MSSA and MRSA groups, respectively. Median hospitalisation cost was significantly higher in the MRSA group (26,035 IQR 18,154–47,362 USD) than in the MSSA group (19,823 IQR 13,764–32,042 USD) (P = 0.036), but cost per day was not (MRSA: 528.9 IQR 374.9–647.4 USD; MSSA: 455.6 IQR 359.2–701.7 USD; P = 0.990). Case fatality rate was higher in the MRSA group than in the MSSA group (22/60 vs 9/60, P = 0.012).
Patients with MRSA bacteremia had longer LoS and higher costs than those with MSSA bacteremia. However, LoS-after and hospitalisation costs per day were not different. The longer LoS of patients in Japan compared with other countries might contribute to the higher disease burden of S. aureus bacteremia in Japan.
This paper explores implementation of self-weight and inertial loading in topology optimization (TO) employing the Simulated Annealing (SA) algorithm as a non-gradient-based technique. This method ...can be applied to find optimum design of structures with no need for gradient information. To enhance the convergence of the SA algorithm, a novel approach incorporating the crystallization factor is introduced. The method is applied in a benchmark problem of a cantilever beam. The study systematically examines multiple scenarios, including cases with and without self-weight effects, as well as varying point loads. Compliance values are calculated and compared to those reported in existing literature to validate the accuracy of the optimization results. The findings highlight the versatility and effectiveness of the SA-based TO methodology in addressing complex design challenges with considerable self-weight or inertial effect. This work can contribute to structural design of systems where only the objective value is available with no gradient information to use sensitivity-based algorithms.
This work shows the application of an ultrasonic multiple-scattering sensor for monitoring water-in-petroleum emulsions. The sensor consists of a commercial ultrasonic transducer with an array of ...cylindrical scatterers placed in the near field. The scatterers are thin metal bars arranged in rows in front of the transducer. The backscattering signals were analyzed by calculating the wave energy and by a cross-correlation between signal segments; they were also used to determine the propagation velocity in the emulsions. The tests performed used emulsions with water volume concentrations from 0% to 50%. The results showed that both the signal energy and propagation velocity strongly depended on the concentration of water in the emulsion. Therefore, the ultrasonic multiple-scattering sensor can be used for on-line and real-time monitoring of the water content in water-in-crude-oil emulsions.
The aim of this study was to investigate the epidemiology of post-COVID conditions beyond 12 months and identify factors associated with the persistence of each condition.
This was a cross-sectional ...questionnaire-based survey.
We conducted the survey among patients who had recovered from COVID-19 and visited our institute between February 2020 and November 2021. Demographic and clinical data and data regarding the presence and duration of post-COVID conditions were obtained. We identified factors associated with the persistence of post-COVID conditions using multivariable linear regression analyses.
Of 1148 surveyed patients, 502 completed the survey (response rate, 43.7%). Of these, 393 patients (86.4%) had mild disease in the acute phase. The proportion of participants with at least one symptom at 6, 12, 18, and 24 months after symptom onset or COVID-19 diagnosis was 32.3% (124/384), 30.5% (71/233), 25.8% (24/93), and 33.3% (2/6), respectively. The observed associations were as follows: fatigue persistence with moderate or severe COVID-19 (β = 0.53, 95% confidence interval CI = 0.06–0.99); shortness of breath with moderate or severe COVID-19 (β = 1.39, 95% CI = 0.91–1.87); cough with moderate or severe COVID-19 (β = 0.84, 95% CI = 0.40–1.29); dysosmia with being female (β = −0.57, 95% CI = −0.97 to −0.18) and absence of underlying medical conditions (β = −0.43, 95% CI = −0.82 to −0.05); hair loss with being female (β = −0.61, 95% CI = −1.00 to −0.22), absence of underlying medical conditions (β = −0.42, 95% CI = −0.80 to 0.04), and moderate or severe COVID-19 (β = 0.97, 95% CI = 0.41–1.54); depressed mood with younger age (β = −0.02, 95% CI = −0.04 to −0.004); and loss of concentration with being female (β = −0.51, 95% CI = −0.94 to −0.09).
More than one-fourth of patients after recovery from COVID-19, most of whom had had mild disease in the acute phase, had at least one symptom at 6, 12, 18, and 24 months after onset of COVID-19, indicating that not a few patients with COVID-19 suffer from long-term residual symptoms, even in mild cases.
Topology optimization (TO) of engineering products is an important design task to maximize performance and efficiency, which can be divided into two main categories of gradient-based and ...non-gradient-based methods. In recent years, significant attention has been brought to the non-gradient-based methods, mainly because they do not demand access to the derivatives of the objective functions. This property makes them well compatible to the structure of knowledge in the digital design and simulation domains, particularly in Computer Aided Design and Engineering (CAD/CAE) environments. These methods allow for the generation and evaluation of new evolutionary solutions without using the sensitivity information. In this work, a new non-gradient TO methodology using a variation of Simulated Annealing (SA) is presented. This methodology adaptively adjusts newly-generated candidates based on the history of the current solutions and uses the crystallization heuristic to smartly control the convergence of the TO problem. If the changes in the previous solutions of an element and its neighborhood improve the results, the crystallization factor increases the changes in the newly random generated solutions. Otherwise, it decreases the value of changes in the recently generated solutions. This methodology wisely improves the random exploration and convergence of the solutions in TO. In order to study the role of the various parameters in the algorithm, a variety of experiments are conducted and results are analyzed. In multiple case studies, it is shown that the final results are well comparable to the results obtained from the classic gradient-based methods. As an additional feature, a density filter is added to the algorithm to remove discontinuities and gray areas in the final solution resulting in robust outcomes in adjustable resolutions.
On-line data collection from the manufactured parts is an essential element in Industry 4.0 to monitor the production’s health, which required strong data analytics. The optical metrology-based ...inspection of highly reflective parts in a production line, such as parts with metallic surfaces, is a difficult challenge. As many on-line inspection paradigms require the use of optical sensors, this reflectivity can lead to large amounts of noise, rendering the scan inaccurate. This paper discusses a method for noise reduction and removal in datapoints resulting from scanning the reflective planar surfaces. Utilizing a global statistic-based iterative approach, noise is gradually removed from the dataset at increasing percentages. The change in the standard deviation of point-plane distances is examined, and an optimal amount of noisy data is removed to reduce uncertainty in representing the workpiece. The developed algorithm provides a fast and efficient method for noise reduction in optical coordinate metrology and scanning.
We analysed associations between exposure to nightlife businesses and severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 PCR test results at a tertiary hospital in Tokyo between March and April 2020. A ...nightlife group was defined as those who had worked at or visited the businesses. We included 1517 individuals; 196 (12.9%) were categorised as the nightlife group. After propensity score matching, the proportion of positive PCR tests in the nightlife group was significantly higher than that in the non-nightlife group (nightlife, 63.8%; non-nightlife, 23.0%; P < 0.001). An inclusive approach to mitigate risks related to the businesses needs to be identified.
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