Time to Recovery of Severely Ill COVID-19 Patients and its Predictors: A Retrospective Cohort Study in Tigray, Ethiopia.

Background: COVID-19 is one of the leading causes of morbidity and mortality and is caused by Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). A patient infected with SARS-CoV-2 is said to be recovered from the infection following negative test results and when signs and symptoms disappear. Different studies have shown different median recovery time of patients with COVID-19 and it varies across settings and disease status. This study aimed to assess time to recovery and its predictors among severely ill COVID-19 patients in Tigray. Methods: A total of 139 severely ill COVID-19 patients who were hospitalized between May 7, 2020 and October 28, 2020 were retrospectively analyzed. Cox proportional hazard regression model was fitted to identify the risk factors associated with the time duration to recovery from severe COVID-19 illness. Results: The median age of the patients was 35 years (IQR, 27-60). Eighty-three (59.7%) patients recovered with a median time of 26 days (95% CI: 23-27). The results from the multivariable analysis showed that the recovery time was lower for severely ill patients who had no underline comorbidity diseases (AHR=2.48, 95% CI: 1.18-5.24), shortness of breath (AHR=2.08, 95% CI: 1.07-3.98) and body weakness (AHR=2.62, 95% CI: 1.20-5.72). Moreover, COVID-19 patients aged younger than 40 years had lower recovery time compared to patients aged 60 and above (AHR=4.09, 95% CI: 1.58-10.61). Conclusion: The median recovery time of severely ill COVID-19 patients was long, and older age, comorbidity, shortness of breath, and body weakness were significant factors related with the time to recovery among the severely ill COVID-19 patients. Therefore, we recommended that elders and individuals with at least one comorbidity disease have to get due attention to prevent infection by the virus. Moreover, attention should be given in the treatment practice for individuals who had shortness of breath and body weakness symptoms.

Maternal risk factors associated with neural tube defects in Tigray regional state of Ethiopia.

INTRODUCTION: Unlike developing countries, including Ethiopia the identification of the risk factors in decreasing the burden of neural tube defects (NTDs) is well established in the developed world. Hence, we sought to determine the factors associated with NTDs in Tigray - Ethiopia. METHODS: We undergo a case-control analysis where all NTDs cases were compared to a group of controls derived randomly from the same hospitals where cases were recruited from. The NTDs survey tool which contains a standard questionnaire was prepared. Parental socio-demographic and clinical information such, maternal age, obstetric history, illnesses, drug intake, radiation, occupation, education, history of congenital anomalies, residence, exposure to pollutants such as smoking, chemicals, paternal history, and folic acid utilization was collected and analyzed using SPSS version 20. RESULT: This study has shown the maternal age, and residency, birth order 3 and 4, unplanned pregnancy, history of breastfeeding above 2 years, history of stillbirths, history of male gender predominance were found to have a strong association with an occurrence of NTDs (p = 0.0001). Though the binary logistic regression analysis showed no significant association in some of the risk factors such as maternal health and drug history, the frequency analysis showed they may have an impact on the incidence of NTDs. CONCLUSION: This study has shown the majority of the maternal risk factors and other lifestyle patterns had a significant impact on the occurrence of NTDs. Therefore, efficient monitoring of NTDs in Ethiopia is vital, so our study could be groundwork information in Ethiopia for future programs.

Nutritional status among women whose pregnancy outcome was afflicted with neural tube defects in Tigray region of Ethiopia.

BACKGROUND: Nutritional deficiency in pregnant women is a confirmed cause of neural tube defects (NTDs). Alongside to this background, We sought to determine the nutritional status and level of awareness on the issue of the NTDs as well as folic acid (FA) utilization among women who born infants with NTDs in Tigray region of Ethiopia. METHOD: A standard interviewer and a food frequency questionnaire was used to obtain information from mothers of cases with neural tube defects (n = 205) and their controls (n = 412). Demographic information, weekly food frequency consumption, information on awareness on the issue of the NTDs as well as folic acid (FA) use was collected. RESULT: The mean age of the mothers of the cases and controls was 26.5 years (range 17-43 years) and 26.05 years (range 18-40 years), respectively. Approximately 92.2% (189/205) of the cases and 90.5% (373/412) control mothers do not know the term folic acid (FA). Notably, all participant mothers (100%) did not understand that NTDs are a serious health problem associated with inadequate intake of FA and none of them used FA prior to conception. Food frequency analysis revealed that except for cereals (p = 0.12) and milk products (p = 0.8), the proportion of the consumed food type within seven days recalls period showed a statistically significant difference (p < 0.05) as compared with controls. The dietary diversity score assessment showed those attained low and high dietary diversity score were a statistically significant difference (p = 0.0003) and (p = 0.0002) respectively) as compared with controls, but the medium dietary diversity score no significant variation was found (p = 0.35). CONCLUSION: This study has shown none of the study participants do understand that NTDs are a serious health problem associated with inadequate intake of FA. Dietary diversity score was significantly associated with incidence of NTDs. This Ethiopian study also highlighted the need of considering the basic food in future programs of food fortification with folic acid, preconceptional folic acid supplementation and adequate dietary intake counseling. Advance research is required to find out the gene-nutrient and gene environment interactions, as well as particular causative factors associated with NTDs in Ethiopia.

High burden of neural tube defects in Tigray, Northern Ethiopia: Hospital-based study.

INTRODUCTION: Neural tube defects are the major causes of fetal loss and considerable disabilities in infants. Currently, there is no significant research on the incidence of Neural tube defects in the Tigray region of Ethiopia. OBJECTIVE: To determine the incidence and clinical pattern of the Neural Tube Defects. METHODS: A hospital-based cross-sectional study was conducted from October 2016 to June 2017. All pregnancy outcomes were examined for any externally visible birth defects and neurological integrity by trained midwives under the supervision of senior obstetrics and gynecology and a neurosurgeon. Data were collected using a survey tool to collect maternal and newborn demographic data and a checklist developed to capture newborns with Neural Tube Defects. Data were analyzed using SPSS version 20. The prevalence of NTDs was calculated per 10,000 births. RESULT: Out of the 14,903 births during the study period, a total of 195 infants were born afflicted with Neural Tube Defects. The burden of infants with anencephaly and spina bifida was 66.4 and 64.4 per 10, 000 births, respectively. The overall incidence rate of NTDs in this study was 131 per 10, 000 births of which 23% were liveborn and 77% were stillborn. The highest burden of Neural Tube Defects was observed in Adigrat Hospital from Eastern Zone of Tigray (174 per 10,000 births) and Lemlem Karl Hospital from Southern Zone of Tigray (304 per 10,000 births) compared to Kahsay Abera Hospital from Western Zone (72.8 per 10,000 births) and Sihul Hospital from North Western Zone of Tigray (69.8 per 10,000 births). CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION: Assuming that the non folic acid preventable rate should be 5 per 10,000 births, our prevalence rate is 131 per 10,000 births, and then we have a rate or an epidemic that is 26 times what it should be. This just emphasizes the urgency to implement effective programs to get all women of reproductive age to have adequate folic acid to prevent all of folic acid-preventable spina bifida and anencephaly, which would prevent 96% (125/130) of spina bifida and anencephaly in the Tigray Provence.

Toxic effect of khat (Catha edulis) on memory: Systematic review and meta-analysis.

BACKGROUND: People use khat (Catha edulis) for its pleasant stimulant effect of physical activity, consciousness, motor, and mental functions. Although there are reports assessing the effect of khat on memory, there was no study based on formal systematic review and meta-analysis. OBJECTIVE: We have therefore conducted this meta-analysis to determine the level of evidence for the effect of khat (C. edulis Forsk) on memory discrepancy. METHODS: MEDLINE, Cochrane Library, PubMed, Academic Search Complete, SPORTDiscus, ScienceDirect, Scopus, Web of Science, and Google Scholar were searched to retrieve the papers for this review. Keywords utilized across database search were khat, cat, chat, long-term memory, short-term memory, memory deficit, randomized control trial, and cross-sectional survey. The search was limited to studies in humans and rodents; published in English language. RESULT: Finding of various studies included in our meta-analysis showed that the effect of acute, and subchronic exposure to khat showed that short-term memory appears to be affected depending on the duration of exposure. However, does not have any effect on long-term memory. CONCLUSION: Although a number of studies regarding the current topic are limited, the evidenced showed that khat (C. edulis) induced memory discrepancy.