Predicting the role of coping factors on pandemic-related anxiety.

The year 2020 saw the emergence of a worldwide pandemic caused by the novel coronavirus COVID-19. Measures against further spread of the virus were taken nearly everywhere in the world. Many countries also imposed social distancing rules and lockdowns on their population. This situation has caused a lot of fear and insecurity, along with reactance and even unrest in some countries. In this study, we measured the psychological concepts of resilience, reactance, positive schemas, social solidarity, and anxiety among psychiatric patients and in how far these factors influence their psychopathological anxiety during the pandemic. The aim was to better understand in what ways these factors influence pandemic anxiety to be able to reduce its negative psychological effects. Findings show a significant effect of positive schemas and social solidarity on the level of pandemic anxiety in a sample of psychiatric patients, but no correlation between resilience or reactance and pandemic anxiety. Based on these insights, the inclusion of positive schemas and social solidarity for therapy should be considered. Looking deeper into the relation between positive schemas and pandemic anxiety could provide insight into the different ways that schemas influence people's anxiety and determine whether some of them are particularly important.

Expression of estrogen and progesterone receptors in papillary thyroid carcinoma.

BACKGROUND: Papillary thyroid carcinoma (PTC), occurs mostly in women and sex hormones may play a role in the pathogenesis and clinical course. The objective of this study was to determine the status and prevalence of estrogen and progesterone receptors in PTC with regard to age, gender, tumor size and lymph node involvement. METHODS: Immunohistochemical stains were performed on 92 tissue blocks of PTC for estrogen receptor (ER) and progesterone receptor (PR) expression in tumor cells. Chi-square test and Mann-Whitney U test were used to determine statistical difference using statistical software SPSS. RESULTS: The mean age of patients was 39.32±1.7 years (range 13-80) with 79(85.9%) women and 13 (14.1%) men. Lymph node involvement was seen in 76.1% of patients. The average tumor size was 3.6±2.21 cm. The rate of ER and PR expression were 46.75% and 5.6%, respectively. ER expression for females was higher than males (P=0.014), but no relation was found between males and females in PR expression (P=0.7). Also there was no statistical difference between ER and PR expression with respect to age, lymph node involvement and tumor size. CONCLUSION: Our study showed higher ER expression in females than males with PTC. No relation was found between the expression of these receptors and age of presentation, lymph node involvement and tumor size. Further investigation is required to determine the prognostic importance of ER and PR in PTC.