COVID-19 in elderly: Correlations of viral load, clinical course, laboratory parameters, among patients vaccinated with CoronaVac.

SARS-CoV-2 virus was initially identified in Wuhan, China, in December 2019 and a global pandemic was declared in March 2020 by World Health Organization. COVID-19 disease is characterized with severe pneumonia and hypoxemia, especially in the elderly population. The elderly population was primarily vaccinated with CoronaVac, which is a whole virion inactivated vaccine (Sinovac Biotech, China) in Turkey. This study aimed to investigate the association of viral load and laboratory parameters with the severity of the disease and vaccination status in elderly (older than 60 years old) COVID-19 patients. The age range of the patients was 61-97 years old with a mean of 71.80. Vaccinated patients had a lower viral load (P = 0.253) in nasopharyngeal swabs during breakthrough COVID-19 infection compared to unvaccinated ones and were hospitalized for a shorter period of time in hospital wards (P = 0.035). A lower number of patients were vaccinated in both moderate (n = 33, 29.20%) and severe/critical group (n = 46, 34.07%) (P = 0.412). Only 17 (32.08%) vaccinated patients were hospitalized in an intensive care unit (ICU), whereas 36 (67.92%) of the ICU patients were unvaccinated (P = 0.931). Severe/critical patients had higher c-reactive protein (CRP), platelet-to-lymphocyte ratio (PLR), fibrinogen, ferritin, and lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) levels compared to the moderate group on the admission day (P < 0.05). Our study suggested that elderly patients vaccinated with CoronaVac had a shorter stay in hospitals and according to our results CRP, PLR, fibrinogen, ferritin, and LDH levels could be used to determine the severity of the infections.

The effect of balneotherapy on body mass index, adipokine levels, sleep disturbances, and quality of life of women with morbid obesity.

To investigate the effect of balneotherapy on body mass index, adipokine levels, sleep disturbances, and quality of life in women with morbid obesity. Fifty-four women with morbid obesity were included in the study. The body mass indexes (BMI) and waist/hip ratios (WHR) of the women were calculated. Subcutaneous fat thickness was measured using a *skinfold meter, and the percentage of adipose tissue was calculated. The *Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) was used to assess sleep quality, and the Nottingham Health Profile (NHP) was used to assess quality of life. In addition to routine biochemical tests, leptin, adipokine, visfatin from blood, and cortisol from saliva samples were studied. Participants were given 15 sessions of balneotherapy for 20 min each. After treatment, the laboratory and clinical parameters of the participants were *reevaluated. There was no statistically significant difference of BMI, WHR, and percentage of adipose tissue between before and after treatment measurements (p Ëƒ 0.05).There was a statistically significant improvement in PSQI and NSP scores (p Ë‚ 0.001). The levels of blood glucose, leptin, and visfatin were significantly decreased, and adiponectin was significantly increased after treatment (p = 0.047, p Ë‚ 0.001, p Ë‚ 0.001, and p Ë‚ 0.001, respectively).There was no statistically significant changes in salivary cortisol levels (p = 0.848). Patients with diabetes showed a statistically significant decrease in glucose levels after treatment (p = 0.017).There was a statistically significant decrease in low-density lipoprotein cholesterol levels in patients with dyslipidemia compared with pre-treatment (p = 0.018). Balneotherapy improves sleep and quality of life of women with morbid obesity. After balneotherapy, glucose, leptin, adiponectin, and visfatin levels may change positively.