MATERIALS AND METHODS: A total of 140 patients who had compatible ABO blood type with negative T-cell lymphocytotoxicity crossmatch were included in the study and 25% of them were spousal transplant donors. No remarkable differences in acute rejection rate, graft survival, patient survival and serum creatinine level were observed between the spousal and living-related donor groups.
RESULTS: The spousal donor group had a higher degree of HLA mismatch than the living-related donor group. HLA-A mismatch was associated with increased rejection risk at 6 months (odds ratio [OR], 2.75; P = 0.04), 1 year (OR, 2.54; P = 0.03) and 3 years (OR, 3.69; P = 0.001). It was also observed in the deleterious effects of HLA-B and HLA-DQ loci when the number of antigen mismatches increased. The risk was 7 times higher in patients with ≥1 mismatch at HLA-A, HLA-B and HLA-DR loci than those who did not have a mismatch at these loci at 6 months (P = 0.01), 1 year (P = 0.03) and 3 years (P = 0.003).
CONCLUSION: A good match for HLA-A, HLA-B, HLA-DR and HLA-DQ can prevent acute rejection risk in renal transplant patients. Consequently, spousal donor transplants could be a safe intervention in renal patients.
MATERIAL AND METHODS: Nine electronic databases and manual search were applied to detect available publications. A meta-analysis using a fixed- or random-effect model was performed to measure standardized mean difference (SMD) with 95% confidence interval (CI). The National Institute of Health (NIH) tools for observational cohort, cross-sectional, and case-control studies were used to examine the risk of bias. The protocol was recorded in PROSPERO with CRD42017060230.
RESULTS: A total of 38 articles were found including 19 case-control, 11 cross-sectional and 8 prospective cohort studies. We indicated that Th2 cytokines (IL-4, IL-6, IL-8) and Th17 cytokine (IL-17) in dengue patients were notably higher than in a healthy control group in acute phase (SMD = 1.59, 95% CI [0.68, 2.51], p = 0.001; SMD = 1.24, 95% CI [0.41, 2.06], p = 0.003; SMD = 1.13, 95% CI [0.61, 1.66], p<0.0001; SMD = 1.74, 95% CI [0.87, 2.61], p<0.0001), respectively.
CONCLUSIONS: This study provides evidence of the significant roles of IL-4, IL-6, IL-8, IL-10 and IL-17 in the pathogenesis of developing a severe reaction in dengue fever. However, to fully determine the association of Th cytokines with dengue, it is necessary to perform further studies to assess kinetic levels during the duration of the illness.
METHODS: We carried out a systematic search in 11 electronic databases to identify in vivo studies published between 2001 and 2017 that reported artemisinin resistance. This was then followed by A network meta-analysis to compare the efficacy of different ACTs. Quality assessment was performed using the Cochrane Risk of Bias (ROB) tool for randomized controlled trials and National Institute of Health (NIH) tool for cross-sectional studies. The study protocol was registered in PROSPERO under number CRD42018087574.
RESULTS: With 8400 studies initially identified, 82 were eligible for qualitative and quantitative analysis. Artemisinin resistance was only reported in South East Asia. K13 mutation C580Y was the most abundant mutation associated with resistance having an abundance of 63.1% among all K13 mutations reported. Although the overall network meta-analysis had shown good performance of dihydroartemisinin piperaquine in the early years, a subgroup analysis of the recent years revealed a poor performance of the drug in relation to recrudescence, clinical failure and parasitological failure especially in the artemisinin resistant regions.
CONCLUSION: With report of high resistance and treatment failure against the leading artemisinin combination therapy in South East Asia, it is imperative that a new drug or a formulation is developed before further spread of resistance.
METHODS: This multinational, multicenter, cross-sectional survey was conducted among hospital HCWs from February to May 2020. We used a hierarchical logistic regression multivariate analysis to adjust the influence of variables based on awareness and preparedness. We then used association rule mining to identify relationships between HCW confidence in handling suspected COVID-19 patients and prior COVID-19 case-management training.
RESULTS: We surveyed 24,653 HCWs from 371 hospitals across 57 countries and received 17,302 responses from 70.2% HCWs overall. The median COVID-19 preparedness score was 11.0 (interquartile range [IQR] = 6.0-14.0) and the median awareness score was 29.6 (IQR = 26.6-32.6). HCWs at COVID-19 designated facilities with previous outbreak experience, or HCWs who were trained for dealing with the SARS-CoV-2 outbreak, had significantly higher levels of preparedness and awareness (p<0.001). Association rule mining suggests that nurses and doctors who had a 'great-extent-of-confidence' in handling suspected COVID-19 patients had participated in COVID-19 training courses. Male participants (mean difference = 0.34; 95% CI = 0.22, 0.46; p<0.001) and nurses (mean difference = 0.67; 95% CI = 0.53, 0.81; p<0.001) had higher preparedness scores compared to women participants and doctors.
INTERPRETATION: There was an unsurprising high level of awareness and preparedness among HCWs who participated in COVID-19 training courses. However, disparity existed along the lines of gender and type of HCW. It is unknown whether the difference in COVID-19 preparedness that we detected early in the pandemic may have translated into disproportionate SARS-CoV-2 burden of disease by gender or HCW type.