Effect of Glycemic Control on Platelet Indices in Children with Type 1 Diabetes Mellitus.

Objectives: The aim of this study is to compare children diagnosed with type 1 diabetes mellitus (T1DM) with healthy controls in terms of some laboratory parameters and platelet indices. Methods: This study is retrospective. We used glycated hemoglobin (HbA1c) values to classify patients as <7% (good) and ≥7% (poor). The platelet mass (PM) value was calculated from the hemogram data (PM=PLTxMPV). Results: The study included a total of 87 patients who had been diagnosed with T1DM and 120 healthy participants. Fasting glucose, urea, creatinine, hemoglobin (HGB), red blood cell (RBC), mean platelet volume (MPV) and platelet distribution width (PDW) were significantly higher in the patient group than in the healthy control group. Platelet (PLT), plateletcrit (PCT) and PM were significantly lower in the poor glycemic control than in the good glycemic control and healthy groups. The PDW in the healthy control group was statistically significantly lower than in the good and poor glycemic control groups. In the group with poor glycemic control, there was a positive and significant correlation between the MPV and the level of HbA1c (r=0.401, p<0.05). Conclusion: To sum up, our results show that the MPV and the PDW are significantly higher in children with T1DM than in healthy control. In the group with poor glycemic control, PLT levels were significantly lower than in the other two groups, leading to a decrease in PCT and PM levels. Further studies are needed to understand whether the decrease in PLT levels is due to the hyperactivity and rapid turnover of PLT.

Development of an Attitude Scale for the Use of Telemedicine Services.

Abstract Introduction: This study aimed to develop a scale to assess attitudes toward the use of telemedicine services, to study the reliability and validity of the developed scale, and to determine the characteristics that may be associated with the scores obtained from the scale. Methods: This study, which was conducted with 600 people older than 18 years, who applied to Family Health Centers in Meram district of Konya province, was designed in a methodological type. The sociodemographic characteristics form and the candidate scale form designed in a 5-point Likert structure were used to collect data in the study. The data collection forms were applied to the participants under observation. SPSS and R programs were used for data analysis. Statistically, cases with p < 0.05 were considered significant. Results: Two hundred fifty people (n = 250) for reliability and explanatory factor analysis and 350 people for confirmatory factor analysis, 600 people in total, were included in the study. The results of all reliability and validity analyses of the candidate scale were found to be sufficient. The explained variance of the one-dimensional 18-item scale was 53.8% and the Cronbach's alpha coefficient was 0.947. There was a significant difference between the score obtained from the scale and work status and presence of chronic disease (p < 0.05). Conclusion: As a result of the research, a new measurement tool called "Attitude Scale Towards the Use of Telemedicine Services" consisting of 18 questions was developed, reliability and validity analyses were performed, and it was shown that it is suitable for use in individuals older than 18 years.

Comparison of reduced-toxicity conditioning protocols using fludarabine, melphalan combined with thiotepa or carmustine in allogeneic hematopoietic cell transplantation.

The age of patients undergoing allogeneic hematopoietic cell transplantation (allo-HCT) has increased during the last decades, mainly due to improved reduced-intensity/toxicity conditioning protocols. A reduced-intensity conditioning based on fludarabin, carmustin/BCNU and melphalan (FBM) has been previously developed at our institution. Since we observed detrimental effects in individual patients with compromised lung function, efforts have been made in order to replace BCNU by thiotepa (FTM) to reduce toxicity. In this study, we retrospectively analyzed the outcome, GvHD incidence, lung function and organ toxicity of patients with a median age of 62 years (range 21-79) transplanted for malignant disease (96.7%, 62.3% in intermediate/advanced disease stage) at our institution after conditioning with FBM (n = 136) or FTM (n = 105) between 2013 and 2017. Median follow-up was 868 days (range 0-2615). In multivariate analysis for overall survival, no difference was detected between both conditioning protocols in the presence of impaired lung function, age, lower performance, and liver disease previous allo-HCT. In the subgroup analysis, FTM was not inferior to FBM in patients with pulmonary disease prior allo-HCT, lymphoid malignancies, and higher comorbidity index. In conclusion, the reduced-intensity FBM and FTM conditioning protocols show adequate antineoplastic efficacy and are suitable for patients with impaired lung function.