Journal of investigative medicine : the official publication of the American Federation for Clinical Research
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Randomized Controlled Trial
Effect of bromhexine in hospitalized patients with COVID-19.
Bromhexine is a potent inhibitor of transmembrane serine protease 2 and appears to have an antiviral effect in controlling influenza and parainfluenza infection; however, its efficacy in COVID-19 is controversial. ⋯ Bromhexine is not an effective treatment for hospitalized patients with COVID-19. The potential prevention benefits of bromhexine in asymptomatic postexposure or with mild infection managed in the community remain to be determined.
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Multicenter Study Clinical Trial Observational Study
A prospective observational multicentric clinical trial to evaluate microscopic examination of acid-fast bacilli in sputum by artificial intelligence-based microscopy system.
Microscopy-based tuberculosis (TB) diagnosis i.e., Ziehl-Neelsen (ZN) stained smear screening still remains the primary diagnostic method in resource poor and high TB burden countries, however itrequires considerable experience and is bound to human errors. In remote areas, wherever expert microscopist is not available, timely diagnosis at initial level is not possible. Artificial intelligence (AI)-based microscopy may be a solution to this problem. ⋯ All the smears were observed by 3 microscopist and the AI based microscopy system. AI based microscopy was found to have a sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value, negative predictive value and diagnostic accuracy of 89.25%, 92.15%, 75.45%, 96.94%, 91.53% respectively. AI based sputum microscopy has an acceptable degree of accuracy, PPV, NPV, specificity and sensitivity and thus may be used as a screening tool for the diagnosis of pulmonary tuberculosis.