Home Isolated COVID-19 Patients Adhering To Recommended Guidelines: A Cross Sectional Survey In Karachi.

Objectives: To assess compliance level of coronavirus disease-2019 patients with recommended isolation guidelines. METHODS: The cross-sectional phone-based survey was conducted in Karachi, from March to October 2020 after approval from the ethics review board of Dow University of Health Sciences, Karachi, and comprised patients of either gender who had been tested positive and were advised home isolation due to mild/asymptomatic nature of their infection. Data was collected using a predesigned 42-item questionnaire in the light of the guidelines issued by the National Institutes of Health, Islamabad, Pakistan. Data was analysed using SPSS 20. RESULTS: Of the 450 patients approached, 305(68%) responded; 176(57.7%) females and 129(41.1%) males. The overall mean age was 35.16±14.15 years (range: 13-78 years). Of the total, 9(2.95%) patients did not isolate themselves at all, 51(16.7%) came into contact with other people, 75(24.6%) broke the home isolation and 69(22.6%) were sharing their rooms with other family members. Overall, 260(85.2%) participants were keeping themselves updated with the changes in the guidelines through conventional and social media. CONCLUSIONS: Coronavirus disease-2019 patients who were advised home isolation adhered to some but not all of the recommendations.

Assessment of postgraduate educational environment in public and private hospitals of Karachi.

OBJECTIVE: To assess the environment of postgraduate fellowship training in teaching hospitals of an urban centre. METHODS: The cross-sectional study was conducted at one public-sector and two private-sector teaching hospitals in Karachi from December 2014 to June 2015. Data was collected by using a modified version of Postgraduate Hospital Educational Environment Measure, a validated questionnaire, for which clinical residents were selected through convenience sampling. Data was analyzed using SPSS 16. RESULTS: Of the 302 participants, 168(55.6%) were males and 134(44.4%) were females. The overall mean age of the respondents was 28.46±3.03 years. The internal reliability of the questionnaire was good with a Cronbach's alpha of 0.92. The overall mean score of 93.96±20.79suggested more positive than negative perception with room for improvement. After adjusting for all important socio-demographic and residency co-variates, residency in a private hospital was positively associated with Postgraduate Hospital Educational Environment Measure score (p<0.01) compared to residency in public hospitals. CONCLUSIONS: There is an urging need to standardise postgraduate training in terms of teaching, autonomy and social support in public and private hospitals of Karachi.

Awareness regarding research skills among clinical and academic post graduate doctors in teaching hospitals of Karachi.

OBJECTIVE: To assess the awareness regarding research skills among clinical and academic post-graduate doctors in teaching hospitals of Karachi. METHODS: The cross-sectional study was carried out from August to October 2012 in two teaching hospitals of Karachi. Total 92 doctors who were enrolled in academic and clinical post-graduation programmes were included in the study through convenience sampling. Data was collected through a self-administered questionnaire and analysed by SPSS version 20. RESULTS: The mean age of the 92 doctors was 30.4 + 3.4 years; 49 (53.3%) were clinical; and 43 (46.7%) were academic post-graduate trainee doctors. Besides, 74 (80.4%) post-graduate doctors had attended research methodology course during their academic or professional careers. Low level of competence was found regarding various research skills, such as 56 (60.8%) in statistics, 47 (51.09%) in paper preparation, 40 (43.5%) in study design, 39 (42.4%) both in result interpretation and paper presentation, 37 (40.2%) in protocol writing and 35 (38.04%) in sampling technique. Moreover, 68 (73.91%) doctors reported lack of research curriculum (p < 0.001) as reason for low research output in Pakistan. CONCLUSION: Post-graduate medical doctors showed positive attitude towards research, but they lacked research skills. They needed training in all aspects of research skills.