Bmc Infect Dis
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Randomized Controlled Trial
Evaluation of the effectiveness and safety of adding ivermectin to treatment in severe COVID-19 patients.
An effective treatment option is not yet available for SARS-CoV2, which causes the COVID-19 pandemic and whose effects are felt more and more every day. Ivermectin is among the drugs whose effectiveness in treatment has been investigated. In this study; it was aimed to investigate the presence of gene mutations that alter ivermectin metabolism and cause toxic effects in patients with severe COVID-19 pneumonia, and to evaluate the effectiveness and safety of ivermectin use in the treatment of patients without mutation. ⋯ According to the findings obtained, ivermectin can provide an increase in clinical recovery, improvement in prognostic laboratory parameters and a decrease in mortality rates even when used in patients with severe COVID-19. Consequently, ivermectin should be considered as an alternative drug that can be used in the treatment of COVID-19 disease or as an additional option to existing protocols.
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Following a first wave in spring and gradual easing of lockdown, Luxembourg experienced an early second epidemic wave of SARS-CoV-2 before the start of summer school holidays on 15th July. This provided the opportunity to investigate the role of school-age children and school settings for transmission. ⋯ Transmission of SARS-CoV-2 within Luxembourg schools was limited during an early summer epidemic wave in 2020. Precautionary measures including physical distancing as well as easy access to testing, systematic contact tracing appears to have been successful in mitigating transmission within educational settings.
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The manifestation of Talaromyces marneffei infection in some HIV-infected patients may be atypical. Cases with gastrointestinal involvement have rarely been reported. It is hard to make a diagnosis when patients are lacking the characteristic rash and positive blood culture. ⋯ Talaromyces marneffei is an unusual cause of clinical presentations involving obvious abdominal pain and lower gastrointestinal bleeding, but can be included in the differential diagnosis. As an important diagnostic tool, the significance of mNGS using FFPE samples of lesions provides a more targeted diagnosis.
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The current pandemic of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, widely known as COVID-19, has affected millions of people around the world. The World Health Organization (WHO) has recommended vigorous testing to differentiate SARS-CoV-2 from other respiratory infections to aid in guiding appropriate care and management. Situations like this have demanded robust testing strategies and pooled testing of samples for SARS-CoV-2 virus has provided the solution to mass screening of people for COVID-19. A pooled testing strategy can be very effective in testing when resources are limited, yet it comes with its own limitations. These benefits and limitations need critical consideration when it comes to testing highly infectious diseases like COVID-19. ⋯ As COVID - 19 infection numbers and need for testing remain high, we must meticulously evaluate the testing strategy for each country depending on its testing capacity, infrastructure, economic strength, and need to determine the optimal balance on the cost-effective strategy of resource saving and risk/ cost of missing positive patients.
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COVID-19 pandemic has forced physicians to quickly determine the patient's condition and choose treatment strategies. This study aimed to build and validate a simple tool that can quickly predict the deterioration and survival of COVID-19 patients. ⋯ A simple-to-use nomogram with excellent performance in predicting deterioration risk and survival of COVID-19 patients was developed and validated. However, it is necessary to verify this nomogram using a large-scale multicenter study.