Perceived Public Stress Among Jordanians During the COVID-19 Outbreak.

OBJECTIVES: Outbreaks and containment measures implemented to control them can increase stress in affected populations. The impact of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) outbreak on perceived stress levels in the Jordanian population is unknown. The aim of the study was to determine the perceived stress level and factors associated with it in the Jordanian population during the COVID-19 outbreak. METHODS: Required data, such as those from the Perceived Stress Scale (PSS-10) and possible predictors of perceived stress, were collected through a Web-based survey. Statistical analysis was conducted through SPSS. RESULTS: The mean (SD) of perceived stress score was 19.8 (6.7). Regression analysis revealed that stress was increased in females, young adults, usually being stressed more than others by a health problem, increased perceived severity of the disease, increased overall worry score, and student's worry regarding their studies/graduation. Perceived stress was decreased if participants' self-rated health status score increased. CONCLUSIONS: In the context of increasing public health preparedness, the results of this study can be used in designing interventions to alleviate stress in susceptible segments of the Jordanian community.

Knowledge and awareness about human papillomavirus infection and its vaccination among women in Arab communities.

Cervical cancer (CC) is one of the most common types of cancer that affect females worldwide with hundreds of thousands of women dying annually due to this disease, mainly in developing countries. Infection with human papillomavirus (HPV) is the main risk factor for this cancer. There are no public awareness and national immunization programs in most Arab countries. This study aimed to investigate the knowledge and awareness about the HPV vaccine among females in four Arab countries and their acceptance to receive the vaccine. A cross-sectional study was conducted in several Arab countries: Jordan, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), and Iraq. Respondents that fulfilled the desired criteria and were willing to participate in the study were asked to fill out the survey. Knowledge and awareness were assessed using 13 questions. Ethical approvals were given from the four countries. A total of 3658 individuals participated in the study; however, 2804 responses were included in the analysis and more than one third of participants (n = 1007) were aged between 18 and 25 years old. This study revealed poor awareness and knowledge of the participants about HPV and its vaccine among all four countries' participants with relatively better knowledge among participants from the UAE. Participants who are younger (18-25 years old), have a postgraduate education, have an education or career related to the medical field, or had a Pap smear in the last three years tend to have higher knowledge about the HPV vaccine compared to others. Poor knowledge and awareness findings in this study were expected, considering the lack of public education campaigns regarding the HPV virus coupled with the absence of the HPV vaccination from the national immunization schedule in three participating countries (Jordan, Qatar, and Iraq). It is recommended that there is a need to provide national educational campaigns about the HPV vaccine to the public in all Arab populations.

A systematic review of population pharmacokinetic analyses of digoxin in the paediatric population.

This is a PROSPERO registered systematic review (CRD42018105207), conducted to summarize the available knowledge regarding the population pharmacokinetics of digoxin in paediatrics and to identify the sources of variability in its disposition. PubMed, ISI Web of Science, SCOPUS and Science Direct databases were searched from inception to January 2019. All paediatric population pharmacokinetic studies of digoxin that utilized the nonlinear mixed-effect modelling approach were incorporated in this review, and data were synthesized descriptively. After application of the inclusion-exclusion criteria 8 studies were included. Most studies described digoxin pharmacokinetics as a 1-compartment model with only 1 study describing its pharmacokinetics as 2-compartments. Age was an important predictor of clearance in studies involving neonates or infants, other predictors of clearance were weight, height, serum creatinine, coadministration of spironolactone and presence of congestive heart failure. Congestive heart failure was also associated with an increased volume of distribution in 1 study. The estimated value of apparent clearance in a typical individual standardized by mean weight ranged between 0.24 and 0.56 L/h/kg, the interindividual variability in clearance ranged between 7.0 and 35.1%. Half of the studies evaluated the performance of their developed models via external evaluation. In conclusion, substantial predictors of digoxin pharmacokinetics in the paediatric population in addition to model characteristics and evaluation techniques are presented. For clinicians, clearance could be predicted using age especially in neonates or infants, weight, height, serum creatinine, coadministration of medications and disease status. For future researchers, designing pharmacokinetic studies that allow 2-compartment modelling and linking pharmacokinetics with pharmacodynamics is recommended.