The hepatitis C virus in Iran: health policy, historical, ethical issues and future challenges.

BACKGROUND: Hepatitis C infection (HCV) can have a harmful effect on the health of people and can impose relevant healthcare costs. The World Health Organization has identified the elimination of Hepatitis C by 2030 as an important goal for all countries. This study aimed to identify the HCV-related policies in Iran. METHODS: A qualitative approach was used for this study. Data was collected through a comprehensive search of documents and interviews with different stakeholders related to the HCV program. Data was analyzed and validated using content analysis based on the policy triangle framework. RESULTS: Our findings highlighted that certain social and cultural issues related to stigma can impact on awareness-raising processes. It is also necessary to consider HCV directly in the context of government policies. All relevant stakeholders should be included. Continued talks and interactions need to be made between them for the active participation of all actors. CONCLUSION: The findings of this study can provide useful information for improving, supporting and developing policy processes. Healthcare providers should address all aspects of the disease by 2030 in order to achieve the goal of HCV elimination. Evidence-based planning, support for up-to-date policies and resource mobilization are needed to achieve this ambitious goal.

High expression level of human epidermal growth factor (hEGF) using a well-designed fusion protein-tagged construct in E. coli.

AIM: The study was aimed at design a good fusion construct that would successfully express the recombinant proteins and produce peptides in Escherichia coli. Two different constructs including human epidermal growth factor (hEGF) gene were designed to obtain an efficient expression level of hEGF. The hEGF sequence was inserted in pET32a vector containing thioredoxin (Trx) sequence and modified pET15b vector containing intein and elastin-like polypeptide (ELP). METHODS: The vectors were transformed into E. coli TOP10F' for multiplication and further into E. coli BL21 (DE3) to express protein. The hEGF expression was induced by isopropyl ß-D-1-thiogalactopyranoside (IPTG) while the expression levels were evaluated by SDS-PAGE and western blotting and compared by ImageJ analysis, BCA and Elisa assays. RESULTS: The expression level after 2 hours of IPTG induction was significantly higher than after other induction times. ImageJ, BCA and Elisa analyses demonstrated that the Trx presence enhanced protein expression significantly when compared to ELP-intein-based construct. CONCLUSION: The pET32a-Trx-hEGF construct had a higher expression than pET15b-ELP-intein-hEGF. Overall, considering Trx, the fusion protein in construct design can make it suitable to significantly express hEGF compared to ELP-intein while its combination with ELP-intein may improve the expression of the ELP-intein construct (Tab. 2, Fig. 7, Ref. 34).

Correlation between adequate nursing staff and the hospital performance: Case Study in Tehran University of Medical Sciences Hospitals.

Background: As the biggest collection among various collections of hospital employees, nurses perform a vital role in the progress of the hospital actions and the improvement of community health. Objectives: This research intended to find the relationship between the shortage of nursing workforce and hospitals performance of Tehran's Medical Sciences University. Materials and Methods: The current analysis was a cross-sectional definitive research, which was conducted in selected educational hospices associated to Tehran University of Medical Sciences during the year 2010. While using three researcher-made questionnaires, information was obtained from all clinical, paraclinical, commercial, managerial and support units of hospitals. Information was investigated according to the patterns of Iran's Healthcare Ministry and Medical Education by employing Excel software. Pabon Lasso model was used for performance measurement during the year 2010. The mixture of 3 indicators was applied to determine the period of stay, bed occupancy time and bed turnover. Results: The outcomes revealed that the personnel of nursing, in the 18 hospital wards (66.67%) were at levels below the standards, just one ward (3.7%) reached the standards requirements, and the remainder of the hospital wards (29.62%) were at greater levels than the standard requirements. Both hospitals were near the value 4 in the Pabon Lasso model. The correlation analysis among the nursing shortage and performance showed a meaningful relationship (P<0.05). Conclusion: Frequently, the examined hospices were challenged with a shortage of nursing workforce and the dissemination of workforce was not suitable. A decent supervision of workforce in conformity with the shortage of staff compensated and achieved the rules needed for the hospital's nursing workforce and this would guide to an improvement in the performance of the hospitals' actions and could present gratification for the personnel.

Relationship between learning styles and interpersonal communication skills of nursing student in Medical Sciences Tehran University in 2012.

Introduction: interpersonal communication skills are required for training and represent one of the most significant parts concerning the character of student learning. In another idea, learning is a constant method and learners favor a position of knowledge forms according to their character and individual practices. Evaluate the correlation between the learning methods and interpersonal conversation abilities of the nursing undergraduate in Medical Sciences Tehran University in 2012 was the purpose of this research. Methods: In this regular detailed cross-sectional analysis, 361 students from the School of Nursing and Midwifery were chosen during a census method. The information collection instruments were regulated, giving a questionnaire called Interpersonal Communication Skills Standards exam and VARK Learning Styles questionnaire. Data was examined by SPSS application (18th edition) by using Mann-Whitney and Kruskal-Wallis test. Results: 320 questionnaires were finished. 60.6% of the members were females. The average number of the students' conversation abilities level was 101.91 ± 10.35. More than half of the samples (58.8%) preferred multi-modal learning styles (Bi-Tri and Quad Modals) and 41.2% of the students preferred single modal learning styles. There were no significant differences between the Interpersonal Communication Skills and the learning styles (P= 0.46). Conclusion: According to no significant relationship between the communication skills of students with learning style and Demographic changeable and Lack of proper form of communication skills, we were ready to build different systems and courses related to improving the skills' level.