Association of pre-migration socioeconomic status and post-migration mental health in Syrian refugees in Lebanon: a descriptive sex-stratified cross-sectional analysis.

BACKGROUND: Refugee populations present with high levels of psychological distress, which may vary among sociodemographic characteristics. Understanding the distribution across these characteristics is crucial to subsequently provide more tailored support to the most affected according to their specific healthcare needs. This study therefore seeks to investigate the association between pre-migration socioeconomic status (SES) and post-migration mental health separately for male and female Syrian refugees in Lebanon. METHODS: In a cross-sectional study, a cluster randomized sample of 599 refugees from Syria were recruited between 2016 and 2019 within 12 months after they fled to Lebanon. Logistic regression was used to determine the association between self-reported pre-migration SES and levels of anxiety and depressive symptoms assessed on the Hopkins Symptoms Checklist-25 (HSCL-25) scale, both for the entire sample and stratified by sex. To assess the informative value of self-reported SES, its correlation with education variables was tested. All analyses were conducted in R version 4.3. RESULTS: Using complete cases, 457 participants (322 female, 135 male) were included in the analyses. Females showed on average more symptoms of anxiety (Median: 2.5) and depression (Median: 2.4) than males (Median: 2.10 and 2.07, respectively). Below average SES was associated with significantly higher odds for mental illness compared to average SES (anxiety: OR 4.28, 95% CI [2.16, 9.49]; depression: OR 1.85, 95% CI [1.06, 3.36]). For anxiety, differences between SES strata were larger for males than females. The self-reported SES measure showed only a weak positive correlation with education. CONCLUSIONS: This study adds additional descriptive data highlighting mental health differences in Syrian refugees in Lebanon, whereby below average SES is associated with worse mental health outcomes compared to average SES. These findings demand further research into the underlying mechanisms. Improving our understanding of the observed differences will provide valuable insights that can contribute to the future development of targeted measures.

Long-Term Retrograde Global Amnesia Following Minor Trauma.

BACKGROUND Retrograde amnesia has several causes and may be the core concern in several conditions. When acute, somatic, and neurologic causes are excluded, along with substance use, a consideration of psychiatric disease is imminent. Here, we present a case with amnesia, where diagnostics and treatment were challenging due to severe psychiatric symptoms and course of the disease. CASE REPORT After a minor trauma while driving an electric scooter, a 41-year-old man lost all memories of the past 20 years. The patient was raised in a refugee camp, where he experienced traumatic events, and later came to Denmark and established family and work life. He had 1 prior contact with the psychiatric ward. After the incident, the patient was brought to the emergency room. The patient could not recognize his wife or children and believed he was 21 years old and living with his mother in the refugee camp. A full somatic and neurological workup was performed and no somatic or organic cause could explain the retrograde amnesia. He developed post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and psychotic symptoms. Treatment consisted of a combination of psychoeducation, cognitive remediation, and medical treatment for psychotic symptoms and PTSD. CONCLUSIONS The diagnosis "prolonged delirium", "PTSD", and "dissociative amnesia" were considered. Psychiatric comorbidity and previous traumatic experiences might have contributed to the development of long-term amnesia, which eventually was considered to be dissociative. During 8 months, the patient slowly regained his memory. It is impossible to conclude with certainty whether the successful outcome was the result of psychological treatment, pharmacological treatment, the passing of time, or a mixture of these.

Considerations for Using Multiple Imputation in Propensity Score-Weighted Analysis - A Tutorial with Applied Example.

Purpose: Propensity score-weighting for confounder control and multiple imputation to counter missing data are both widely used methods in epidemiological research. Combination of the two is not trivial and requires a number of decisions to produce valid inference. In this tutorial, we outline the assumptions underlying each of the methods, present our considerations in combining the two, discuss the methodological and practical implications of our choices and briefly point to alternatives. Throughout we apply the theory to a research project about post-traumatic stress disorder in Syrian refugees. Patients and Methods: We detail how we used logistic regression-based propensity scores to produce "standardized mortality ratio"-weights and Substantive Model Compatible-Full Conditional Specification for multiple imputation of missing data to get the estimate of association. Finally, a percentile confidence interval was produced by bootstrapping. Results: A simple propensity score model with weight truncation at 1st and 99th percentile obtained acceptable balance on all covariates and was chosen as our model. Due to computational issues in the multiple imputation, two levels of one of the substantive model covariates and two levels of one of the auxiliary covariates were collapsed. This slightly modified propensity score model was the substantive model in the SMC-FCS multiple imputation, and regression models were set up for all partially observed covariates. We set the number of imputations to 10 and number of iterations to 40. We produced 999 bootstrap estimates to compute the 95-percentile confidence interval. Conclusion: Combining propensity score-weighting and multiple imputation is not a trivial task. We present considerations necessary to do so, realizing it is demanding in terms of both workload and computational time; however, we do not consider the former a drawback: it makes some of the underlying assumptions explicit and the latter may be a nuisance that will diminish with faster computers and better implementations.

The association between long-distance migration and PTSD prevalence in Syrian refugees.

BACKGROUND: Refugees are forced migrants but there is a large variation in the distance that refugees cover and there is a paucity in the evidence of how this may affect refugees' health and health care needs. OBJECTIVE: We investigated the association between long-distance migration and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), a serious psychiatric disorder associated with deteriorating mental and somatic health. METHODS: Included from 2016-2019 were adult Syrian refugees in Lebanon and Denmark that arrived up to 12 months prior to inclusion. PTSD was assessed using the Harvard Trauma Questionnaire and the estimate of association was obtained by multiply imputing missing data and adjusting for confounding by propensity score-weighting with covariates age, sex, socioeconomic status, trauma experience and general mental well-being, reporting the bootstrap 95-percentile confidence interval (95% CI). Additionally, a number of sensitivity analyses were performed. RESULTS: Included were 599 participants in Lebanon (mean age 35 years old, 73% being female) and 133 participants in Denmark (mean age 30 years old, 47% being female). After multiply imputing missing data and propensity score-weighted adjustment for confounding, migration to Denmark instead of Lebanon was associated with an increase in PTSD prevalence of 9 percentage point (95% CI [-1; 19] percentage point). CONCLUSIONS: Long-distance migration may be associated with an increase in PTSD prevalence in refugees. The migration could be an important factor to consider when assessing refugees' and asylum seekers' health. Practitioners should consider "long-distance migration" in refugee health screenings and in particular when assessing the risk of post-traumatic stress disorder. Future research should be designed to ultimately lead to studies of relevant interventions to lower the risk of post-traumatic stress disorder in refugees.

First wave of COVID-19 did not reach the homeless population in Aarhus.

INTRODUCTION: The deadly coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has rapidly become a pandemic affecting the whole world. Lower health literacy and higher mortality rates in the homeless and vulnerable population compared with the background population potentially leaves this group or people more exposed to COVID-19. This study assessed the vulnerable population of Aarhus in relation to COVID-19 infection. METHODS: Participants were tested during a six-day period in April and a four-day period in June at drop-in centres, injection rooms and homeless shelters in Aarhus. Oropharyngeal swab tests were performed and analysed with real-time quantitative polymerase chain reaction. Test days in June were supplemented with lateral flow tests for immunoglobulin (Ig) G and IgM. Prevalence and corresponding Wilson 95% confidence intervals were computed. RESULTS: We tested 295 individuals in April and 141 individuals in June. All oropharyngeal swabs were COVID-19 negative. The lateral flow tests were IgM-positive in six of 129 individuals (4.7%) and IgG-positive less than five of 129 (less than 3.9%) individuals. On the day of testing, COVID-19 symptoms such as fever, coughing and/or sore throat were found in 63 of 240 (26.3%) of the participants in April and in 26 of 123 (21.1%) in June. In the April testing round, 175 of 291 (59.9%) reported to be born in Denmark. The corresponding number for the June testing round was 84 of 138 (60.9%). CONCLUSIONS: Despite their vulnerable profile, the vulnerable citizens tested in Aarhus were not infected with COVID-19 at the testing day and very few participants carried antibodies. FUNDING: Testing was funded by Aarhus University Hospital. TRIAL REGISTRATION: not relevant.

The health status of newly arrived asylum-seeking minors in Denmark: a nationwide register-based study.

OBJECTIVES: Asylum-seeking minors are known to be at increased risk of physical and mental diseases compared to both native children and adult asylum seekers. We present a nationwide register-based study based on the health assessment of 7210 newly arrived minors in Danish asylum centres from 1 January 2011 to 31 December 2015. METHODS: We describe socio-demographic characteristics, trauma history and symptoms of physical and mental health. To associate the reporting of traumatic events and signs of anxiety or depression, we performed logistic regression analysis. RESULTS: We found a high, albeit varying, prevalence of traumatic experiences, sleeping and eating problems, and head- and toothache. In the subgroup that was assessed for need of urgent support, more than two of every five minor scored above the threshold. In the subgroup examined by a doctor, one of every four had at least one abnormal finding. CONCLUSIONS: The prevalence of trauma and mental health symptoms and the association of the two were striking. Our findings underline that timely recognition and appropriate treatment of childhood traumas should be given high priority in the receiving communities.

Asylum seekers' and Refugees' Changing Health (ARCH) study protocol: an observational study in Lebanon and Denmark to assess health implications of long-distance migration on communicable and non-communicable diseases and mental health.

INTRODUCTION: By end of 2018, the European Union countries hosted approximately 2.5 million refugees and Lebanon alone hosted more than 1 million. The majority of refugees worldwide came from Syria. The prevailing study design in published studies on asylum seekers' and refugees' health leaves a number of fundamental research questions unanswerable. In the Asylum seekers' and Refugees' Changing Health (ARCH) study, we examine the health of a homogeneous group of refugees and asylum seekers in two very different host countries with very different migration histories. We aim to study the health impact of the migration process, living conditions, access to healthcare, gene-environment interactions and the health transition. METHODS AND ANALYSIS: ARCH is an international multisite study of the health of adult (>18 years old) Syrian refugees and asylum seekers in Lebanon and Denmark. Using a standardised framework, we collect information on mental and physical health using validated scales and biological samples. We aim to include 220 participants in Danish asylum centres and 1100 participants in Lebanese refugee camps and settlements. We will use propensity score weights to control for confounding and multiple imputation to handle missing data. ETHICS AND DISSEMINATION: Ethical approval has been obtained in Lebanon and Denmark. In the short term, we will present the cross-sectional association between long-distance migration and the results of the throat and wound swab, blood and faeces samples and mental health screenings. In the longer term, we are planning to follow the refugees in Denmark with collection of dried blood spots, mental health screenings and semistructured qualitative interviews on the participant's health and access to healthcare in the time lived in Denmark. Here, we present an overview of the background for the ARCH study as well as a thorough description of the methodology.

High prevalence of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, Giardia, and Blastocystis in asymptomatic Syrian asylum seekers in Denmark during 2016 through 2018.

INTRODUCTION: Concerns have been raised regarding the emergence of antimicrobial-resistance and parasitic infections in the European refugee population. Here, we estimated the prevalence of intestinal parasites and selected antimicrobial-resistant bacteria in newly arrived asylum seekers in Denmark. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Using a cross-sectional one-stage cluster sample design, adult Syrian asylum seekers were included upon arrival in Denmark. Faecal samples were collected and tested for ova and parasites, extended-spectrum beta-lactamase-producing Enterobacterales (ESBL-E) and carbapenemase-producing organisms (CPO). Throat swabs were collected and analysed for methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) and Corynebacterium diphtheriae. RESULTS: We invited 121 eligible individuals (20% of the source population) from six different asylum centres to participate, of whom 113 agreed. Throat swabs and faecal samples were received from 104 and 48 participants, respectively. Seven individuals did not provide enough material for the entire panel of faecal analyses. Three individuals (7.3%, 95%CI: 2.5-19.4%) were colonised with Giardia intestinalis and 28 (68.3%, 95%CI: 53.0-80.4%) with Blastocystis sp. (subtypes 1 [n = 5], 2 [n = 9] and 3 [n = 14]). Seven individuals (6.7%, 95%CI: 3.3-13.3%) were colonised with MRSA and one with ESBL-E. None had CPO or Corynebacterium diphtheriae and none reported any gastro-intestinal symptoms. DISCUSSION: Even with the most conservative estimates, the prevalence of Giardia intestinalis, Blastocystis sp. and MRSA was high in this asymptomatic refugee population. CONCLUSIONS: We highlight the importance of raised awareness of antimicrobial-resistant bacteria when attending to newly arrived Syrian refugees. Meanwhile, our data suggest that routine screening for intestinal parasites in this population is of limited clinical relevance.

Epidemiology of tuberculous lymphadenitis in Denmark: A nationwide register-based study.

BACKGROUND: Tuberculous lymphadenitis (TBLA) is the most common extrapulmonary manifestation of tuberculosis (TB), often claimed to be reactivation. We aimed to describe the epidemiology of TBLA in Denmark, as it has not previously been investigated specifically although extrapulmonary TB has been associated with an increased long-term mortality and delays in the diagnosis. METHODS: Register-based study of all patients notified with TBLA in Denmark from 2007 through 2016 utilizing six different nationwide registers. Patients were identified through the national TB surveillance register, and the diagnosis evaluated based on microbiology, pathology and/or clinical assessment. RESULTS: In total, 13.5% (n = 489) of all TB patients in Denmark had TBLA with annual proportions from 9.4 to 15.7%. Most patients were immigrants between 25-44 years. Incidence rates ranged from as high as 1,014/100,000 for Nepalese citizens to as a low as 0.06/100,000 for Danes. Danes had a significant higher median age and significant more risk factors and comorbidities, as well as an increased overall mortality, compared with immigrants (p<0.05). A significant and much higher proportion of unique MIRU-VNTR genotypes were seen among TBLA patients compared to other TB manifestations. CONCLUSION: In Denmark, TBLA is a common manifestation of TB, especially in young immigrants from high-incidence countries. In Danes, it is a rare disease manifestation and associated with higher morbidity and mortality. To our knowledge, this is the first study suggesting that TBLA is predominantly associated with reactivation of latent TB infection based on genotyping although this remains to be clarified.

Delays in the Diagnosis and Treatment of Tuberculous Lymphadenitis in Low-Incidence Countries: A Systematic Review.

Early detection and treatment of tuberculosis (TB) is essential to achieve the goals appointed in the WHO End TB Strategy. Tuberculous lymphadenitis (TBLA) is the most common manifestation of extrapulmonary TB, but the diagnosis can be challenging in low-incidence countries due to sparse and inconsistent clinical features, resulting in delay. We aimed to summarize and discuss the current literature on patient delay, health care delay, and total delay (i.e., time to first health care contact, diagnosis, and treatment) in patients with TBLA in TB low-incidence countries. A systematic review using PubMed was conducted, searching for studies set in TB low-incidence countries (defined as <20 per 100,000 citizens) that reported on health care seeking behaviour, patient delay, health care delay, and/or total delay. Studies were categorized by type of delay and compared. We identified 11 heterogeneous studies with highly variable observations. Mean patient delay varied from 55 to 154 days (range, 14-1,461), mean health care delay from 44 to 94 days (range, 7-224) and median total delay from 77.5 to 122 days (range, 0-2,820). Evidently, more comprehensive insights into the diagnostic pathway and delay in TBLA patients are warranted.

Crowding in the emergency department in the absence of boarding - a transition regression model to predict departures and waiting time.

BACKGROUND: Crowding in the emergency department (ED) is associated with increased mortality, increased treatment cost, and reduced quality of care. Crowding arises when demand exceed resources in the ED and a first sign may be increasing waiting time. We aimed to quantify predictors for departure from the ED, and relate this to waiting time in the ED before departure. METHODS: We utilised administrative data from the ED and calculated number of arrivals, departures, and the resulting queue in 30 min time steps for all of 2013 (N = 17,520). We build a transition model for each time step using the number of past departures and pre-specified risk factors (arrivals, weekday/weekend and shift) to predict the expected number of departures and from this the expected waiting time in the ED. The model was validated with data from the same ED collected March through August 2014. RESULTS: We found that the number of arrivals had the greatest independent impact on departures with an odds ratio of 0.942 (95%CI: 0.937;0.948) corresponding to additional 7 min waiting time per new arrival in a 30 min time interval with an a priori time spend in the ED of two hours. The serial correlation of departures was present up to one and a half hour previous but had very little effect on the estimates of the risk factors. Boarding played a negligible role in the studied ED. CONCLUSIONS: We present a transition regression model with high predictive power to predict departures from the ED utilising only system level data. We use this to present estimates of expected waiting time and ultimately crowding in the ED. The model shows good internal validity though further studies are needed to determine generalisability to the performance in other settings.

Review of infectious diseases in refugees and asylum seekers-current status and going forward.

An unprecedented rise in the number of asylum seekers and refugees was seen in Europe in 2015, and it seems that numbers are not going to be reduced considerably in 2016. Several studies have tried to estimate risk of infectious diseases associated with migration but only very rarely these studies make a distinction on reason for migration. In these studies, workers, students, and refugees who have moved to a foreign country are all taken to have the same disease epidemiology. A common disease epidemiology across very different migrant groups is unlikely, so in this review of infectious diseases in asylum seekers and refugees, we describe infectious disease prevalence in various types of migrants. We identified 51 studies eligible for inclusion. The highest infectious disease prevalence in refugee and asylum seeker populations have been reported for latent tuberculosis (9-45%), active tuberculosis (up to 11%), and hepatitis B (up to 12%). The same population had low prevalence of malaria (7%) and hepatitis C (up to 5%). There have been recent case reports from European countries of cutaneous diphtheria, louse-born relapsing fever, and shigella in the asylum-seeking and refugee population. The increased risk that refugees and asylum seekers have for infection with specific diseases can largely be attributed to poor living conditions during and after migration. Even though we see high transmission in the refugee populations, there is very little risk of spread to the autochthonous population. These findings support the efforts towards creating a common European standard for the health reception and reporting of asylum seekers and refugees.

Differences in reported sepsis incidence according to study design: a literature review.

BACKGROUND: Sepsis and severe sepsis are common conditions in hospital settings, and are associated with high rates of morbidity and mortality, but reported incidences vary considerably. In this literature review, we describe the variation in reported population-based incidences of sepsis and severe sepsis. We also examine methodological and demographic differences between studies that may explain this variation. METHODS: We carried out a literature review searching three major databases and reference lists of relevant articles, to identify all original studies reporting the incidence of sepsis or severe sepsis in the general population. Two authors independently assessed all articles, and the final decision to exclude an article was reached by consensus. We extracted data according to predetermined variables, including study country, sepsis definition, and data source. We then calculated descriptive statistics for the reported incidences of sepsis and severe sepsis. The studies were classified according to the method used to identify cases of sepsis or severe sepsis: chart-based (i.e. review of patient charts) or code-based (i.e. predetermined International Classification of Diseases [ICD] codes). RESULTS: Among 482 articles initially screened, we identified 23 primary publications reporting incidence of sepsis and/or severe sepsis in the general population. The reported incidences ranged from 74 to 1180 per 100,000 person-years and 3 to 1074 per 100,000 person-years for sepsis and severe sepsis, respectively. Most chart-based studies used the Bone criteria (or a modification hereof) and Protein C Worldwide Evaluation in Severe Sepsis (PROWESS) study criteria to identify cases of sepsis and severe sepsis. Most code-based studies used ICD-9 codes, but the number of codes used ranged from 1 to more than 1200. We found that the incidence varied according to how sepsis was identified (chart-based vs. code-based), calendar year, data source, and world region. CONCLUSION: The reported incidences of sepsis and severe sepsis in the general population varied greatly between studies. Such differences may be attributable to differences in the methods used to collect the data, the study period, or the world region where the study was undertaken. This finding highlights the importance of standardised definitions and acquisition of data regarding sepsis and severe sepsis.

A generic method for evaluating crowding in the emergency department.

BACKGROUND: Crowding in the emergency department (ED) has been studied intensively using complicated non-generic methods that may prove difficult to implement in a clinical setting. This study sought to develop a generic method to describe and analyse crowding from measurements readily available in the ED and to test the developed method empirically in a clinical setting. METHODS: We conceptualised a model with ED patient flow divided into separate queues identified by timestamps for predetermined events. With temporal resolution of 30 min, queue lengths were computed as Q(t + 1) = Q(t) + A(t) - D(t), with A(t) = number of arrivals, D(t) = number of departures and t = time interval. Maximum queue lengths for each shift of each day were found and risks of crowding computed. All tests were performed using non-parametric methods. The method was applied in the ED of Aarhus University Hospital, Denmark utilising an open cohort design with prospectively collected data from a one-year observation period. RESULTS: By employing the timestamps already assigned to the patients while in the ED, a generic queuing model can be computed from which crowding can be described and analysed in detail. Depending on availability of data, the model can be extended to include several queues increasing the level of information. When applying the method empirically, 41,693 patients were included. The studied ED had a high risk of bed occupancy rising above 100 % during day and evening shift, especially on weekdays. Further, a 'carry over' effect was shown between shifts and days. CONCLUSIONS: The presented method offers an easy and generic way to get detailed insight into the dynamics of crowding in an ED.

Selection of quality indicators for hospital-based emergency care in Denmark, informed by a modified-Delphi process.

BACKGROUND: In 2013, Danish policy-makers on a nationwide level decided to set up a national quality of care database for hospital-based emergency care in Denmark including the selection of quality indicators. The aim of the study was to describe the Delphi process that contributed to the selection of quality indicators for a new national database of hospital-based emergency care in Denmark. METHODS: The process comprised a literature review followed by a modified-Delphi survey process, involving a panel of 54 experts (senior clinicians, researchers and administrators from the emergency area and collaborating specialties). Based on the literature review, we identified 43 potential indicators, of which eight were time-critical conditions. We then consulted the Expert panel in two consecutive rounds. The Expert panel was asked to what extent each indicator would be a good measure of hospital-based emergency care in Denmark. In each round, the Expert panel participants scored each indicator on a Likert scale ranging from one (=disagree completely) through to six (=agree completely). Consensus for a quality indicator was reached if the median was greater than or equal to five (=agree). The Delphi process was followed by final selection by the steering group for the new database. RESULTS: Following round two of the Expert panel, consensus was reached on 32 quality indicators, including three time-critical conditions. Subsequently, the database steering group chose a set of nine quality indicators for the initial version of the national database for hospital-based emergency care. CONCLUSIONS: The two-round modified Delphi process contributed to the selection of an initial set of nine quality indicators for a new a national database for hospital-based emergency care in Denmark. Final selection was made by the database steering group informed by the Delphi process.

[On the brink of a new era in the treatment of chronic hepatitis C virus infection in Denmark]. / På tærsklen til en ny epoke i behandling af kronisk hepatitis C-virusinfektion.

Treatment of chronic hepatitis C virus (HCV) has for more than a decade been based upon use of pegylated interferon in combination with ribavirin. Sustained virologic response rates are in general at a moderate level and severe adverse effects are frequent. With the introduction of direct acting antivirals (DAA) we now face the possibility of interferon-free treatment with higher response rates and less severe adverse effects. However, the costs of the DAAs are high presenting an additional economical burden to the health sector calling for necessary priorities to be taken.