COVID-19 Pandemic Affects the Medical Students' Learning Process and Assaults Their Psychological Wellbeing.

BACKGROUND: With the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic, people are living within a milieu of stress, anxiety, and fear. Medical students are susceptible to these emotional injuries, but their psychological wellbeing and learning may further be assaulted by future uncertainties and altered teaching and training programs. Our objective was to find the extent of the psychological impact of the pandemic and the learning difficulties they are experiencing; Methodology: This cross-sectional study included 418 undergraduate and postgraduate medical students from all over the world. A questionnaire was uploaded in Google survey form. It included background characteristics, questions for psychiatric impact like PHQ-9, GAD-7, ZF-OCS, and questions for learning difficulties perceived in comparison to the pre-pandemic time. RESULTS: Among participants, 34.9% of students were male and 65.1% female. Around 46.4% belonged to the WHO, Eastern Mediterranean region, 26.8% from South East Asia region, 17.5% from the region of America, 5.5% from the European region,2.2%from the Western Pacific region, and 1.7% from the African region. Symptoms due to psychiatric illness were noticed in 393 (93.1%); depression in 386 (92.3%), anxiety in 158 (37.8%), obsessive compulsion disorder in 225 (53.8%), and post-traumatic stress syndrome in 129 (39.9%). Female gender, geographical region, and history of previous psychiatric illness were significantly related to almost all the psychiatric illnesses. Regarding learning difficulty, 96% of students faced problems: trouble with memorizing in 54.0%, concentration problems in 67.0%, about 55.5% of students made more mistakes, while 44.5% noted an increase in reaction time for solving questions. In addition, 90% experienced greater difficulty in overall learning during the pandemic in comparison to the pre-pandemic time. CONCLUSION: Assault on psychological wellbeing, struggling to memorize, inattention and difficulty in concentration on studies, along with perceived overall trouble with learning, have emerged as collateral damage from the COVID-19 pandemic with respect to medical students.

Cancer patterns in Karachi (all districts), Pakistan: First results (2010-2015) from a Pathology based cancer registry of the largest government-run diagnostic and reference center of Karachi.

National level population-based cancer data have never been published from Pakistan in seven decades since independence (1947). Therefore, generation of high-quality regional data becomes highly relevant. Cancer data for the period of 2010-2015 representing the population from all districts of Karachi (14.6 million) are presented herein. After institutional approval (Ref no. IRB-459/DUHS/-14), a Pathology based cancer registry was established at the largest government-run diagnostic and reference center of Karachi. During 2010-2015, a total of 13,508 cancers (including 686 non-melanoma-skin-cancers (NMSC)) were diagnosed. Of these, 5665 (41.9%) were in males while 7843 (58.1%) were in females. Incidence rates for all cancers (excluding NMSC) were 66.7 per 100,000 (crude) and 105.1 per 100,000 (ASR) for males and 112.0 per 100,000 (crude) and 175.8 per 100,000 (ASR) for females. In males, cancer of lip and oral cavity was the most frequently diagnosed cancer (30.8%, ASR 33.1), followed by NMSC (7.7%, ASR 9.5) and colorectum (7%, ASR 7.3). In females, breast cancer was the most frequently recorded malignancy (49.5%, ASR 87.9), followed by lip and oral cavity (11.2%, ASR 22.0) and oesophagus (5.6%, ASR 10.7). We report that Karachi has the highest incidence of cancers of breast, lip and oral cavity, oesophagus and larynx in females and cancer of lip and oral cavity and larynx (2nd only to Turkey) in males compared to any of the Asian populations. Notably, incidence of tobacco associated cancers is very high in Karachi, demanding urgent attention by relevant authorities to address the un-controlled and drastically high consumption of various forms of tobacco in the city.