Psychometric Analysis for fear of COVID-19 Scale (FCV-19S) and its association with depression in patients with diabetes: A cross sectional study from a Tertiary Care Centre in Karachi, Pakistan.

BACKGROUND AND AIMS: To assess the psychometric properties of the Fear of COVID-19 (FCV-19S) scale and to determine its associated factors among the Pakistani patients with diabetes. METHODS: This observational study was conducted in 24-h helpline service, a department of Baqai Institute of Diabetology and Endocrinology (BIDE). Study duration was from August to September 2020. The target population was registered adult patients with type 2 diabetes aged >16 years. Baseline demographic details were obtained from hospital management system of BIDE. Forward-backward translation method was used to translate the existing Fear scale (FCV-19S). Symptoms of depressive disorder were assessed through Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ9). RESULTS: Total of 380 participants with mean age 51.93 ± 12.03 years contributed in the study. Three factors loading and item correlation of fear COVID-19 explained 96% of total variance having unidimensional Cronbach's alpha of 0.881. All demographic indicators that showed significance in univariate model were included in multivariate model. Females had more fear for COVID-19 compared to males (OR = 1.73, 95% CI (1.15-2.6)), whereas current smokers had also showed 4 times more fear than non-smokers (OR = 4.19, 95% CI (1.18-14.83). Depression assessed by PHQ9 showed maximum fear of COVID-19 in participants with moderate depression. CONCLUSION: FCV-19S had adequate psychometric properties for assessing effects of pandemic in people with diabetes attending tertiary care center.

Incidence of microvascular complications of type 2 diabetes: A 12 year longitudinal study from Karachi-Pakistan.

OBJECTIVES: To estimate the incidence of microvascular complications among subjects with type 2 diabetes at a tertiary care hospital. METHODS: This retrospective longitudinal follow-up study assessed the data records of type 2 diabetic subjects who visited the outpatient department of Baqai Institute of Diabetology and Endocrinology, Baqai Medical University, from January 2005 to April 2016. Subjects with gestational diabetes, type 1 diabetes and with history of any microvascular complication were excluded. Medical records were obtained through electronic database (Health Management System). Statistical analyses were conducted using STATA version 14 and SPSS version 20. RESULTS: The incidence of microvascular complications was 92.8, 106.2, and 130.2 per 1000 person per years for retinopathy, neuropathy and nephropathy respectively. Retinopathy, neuropathy and nephropathy were significantly high among diabetic patients with duration of diabetes >10 years followed by 5-10 years. Incidence of retinopathy and nephropathy was significantly higher in patients who had HbA1c>7% than patients with HbA1c≤7% (p-value<0.05). Higher incidence rate of all three microvascular complications were seen in subjects with hypertension than subjects without hypertension. CONCLUSION: A high incidence of microvascular complications is found in subjects with type 2 diabetes. Poor glycaemic control, longer duration of diabetes and hypertension was found to be associated with the occurrence of these complications.

Efficacy and safety of halofantrine in Pakistani children and adults with malaria caused by P. falciparum and P. vivax.

One hundred two patients aged 2-43 years diagnosed with acute malaria due to P. falciparum or P. vivax were treated with 3 doses of halofantrine (500 mg for > or = 18 year old patients and 8 mg/kg of patient body weight for 2-17 year olds), with each dose administered once in 6 hours and followed up for 28 days. Out of 102 patients 63 had P. falciparum, 36 had P. vivax and 3 had unidentified species. Following three dose therapy, 96.1% (98/102) of patients were cured, 0.98% (1/102) showed improvement from baseline, 1.96% (2/102) did not respond and were considered as treatment failures and one patient had indeterminate data. The lone patient, who relapsed after 120 hours post dose 1, was cured following re-treatment on day 7. The median parasite clearance and fever clearance times, from the first dose, were 26 hours and 30 hours, respectively. Eleven point eight percent (12/102) of patients reported adverse events, of which abdominal pain, reported by one subject, was considered to be probably related to the drug and required corrective therapy. There were no serious adverse events or fatalities and none of the patients had a change in QTc interval greater than 10%. Thirteen point seven percent (14/102) of patients had abnormal clinical laboratory parameters that normalized later.