Determination of Workload, Work Stress and Related Factors in Nursing Home Workers during the COVID-19 Pandemic in Turkey.

COVID-19 has caused a major crisis all over the world. To manage this crisis, a fixed shift system was applied to nursing home staff in Turkey to protect nursing home residents from the COVID-19 pandemic. Staff were not allowed to leave the institution during fixed shifts. It is thought that this practice for the COVID-19 outbreak, while protecting nursing home residents on the one hand, increased the workload and related stress of nursing home staff on the other hand. To the best of our knowledge, there is no study examining the workload and stress caused by the COVID-19 pandemic for nursing home staff in Turkey. The aim of this study was to examine the level of workload and work stress experienced by staff working in nursing homes during the COVID-19 pandemic in Turkey. METHODS: A cross-sectional research design was used in the study. The sample of the study consisted of nursing home personnel working in nursing homes in the provinces of Istanbul, Ankara, Izmir and Antalya between October 2021 and January 2022. A personal information form and a workload and stress scale were used for collecting the data. Cluster analysis was performed with SPSS software. RESULTS: In total, 154 nursing home personnel participated in the study. A statistically significant difference was found between the mean age of the two clusters. The first cluster was described as "old" and the second as "young". Statistically significant and high values were found in the quantitative workload, qualitative workload, job organization, social work area and fatigue factors in the nursing home staff in the older participant cluster. CONCLUSION: The results of this study provide new information about the concepts of workload and work stress experienced during the COVID-19 pandemic in Turkey, which will serve as a guide for the management of future pandemics. Therefore, this study will contribute to the strategies to be followed in future pandemics in Turkey.

Assessment of movement time in patients with essential tremor.

BACKGROUND: We have observed mild bradykinesia in essential tremor (ET) patients, which do not satisfy the criteria of Parkinson's disease (PD). OBJECTIVE: To compare the mean movement time for repetitive movements around distal and proximal joints in ET patients with normal controls by using a simple test paradigm. PATIENTS AND METHODS: Seventeen patients with ET and 14 control subjects were instructed to tap with the index finger sequentially on push-button microswitches. Movement times around metacarpophalangeal, wrist, elbow, and shoulder joints of the right side were tested. The data collected were stored on a computer and the time elapsed between sequential taps on two keys (ms) and number of taps on the left key for 15 seconds were evaluated offline. RESULTS: Movement times of the patients with ET were not found to be significantly different from those of the controls at all joints tested despite slight prolongation for movements around the shoulder joint. CONCLUSION: The simple test paradigm we have used showed that there is no difference in the movement time for repetitive movements around four joints of the upper extremity between patients with ET and normal control subjects. The slightly prolonged movement time around the shoulder joint noted in patients with ET may be ascribed to tremor, not bradykinesia. Tremor may cause these patients to pay more attention to the performance of goal-directed finger movements and consequently prolong movement time slightly or it may simply delay the time elapsed to reach the goal in the absence of overt intention tremor.

Two siblings with homocystinuria presenting with dystonia and parkinsonism.

Movement disorders such as dystonia, chorea or tremor are rarely encountered in patients with homocystinuria. We present 2 siblings with laboratory-confirmed homocystinuria, one with severe generalized dystonia and the other with mild parkinsonism. The movement disorders in our patients appeared in the second and first decades, respectively.

High-dose piracetam is effective on cerebellar ataxia in patient with cerebellar cortical atrophy.

We describe a patient with cerebellar ataxia of degenerative nature who was administered high-dose piracetam in a single-blind trial. Piracetam was demonstrated to be highly effective on tandem gait and gait ataxia in daily doses of 60 g. We suggest piracetam has a potential anti-ataxic effect in human cerebellar ataxia when used in considerably higher doses than those indicated for other purposes.