Risk factors and the impact of vaccination on mortality in COVID-19 patients.

INTRODUCTION: The novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic has had a profound global impact economically, socially, and in many other areas. As vaccines are developed and introduced, their effect on the disease on both, the global and individual scale is a subject of intense curiosity. This study aimed to evaluate the relationship between risk factors for hospitalization, disease severity, and vaccination status in COVID-19 inpatients in a pandemic hospital. METHODOLOGY: Patients hospitalized for COVID-19 between June and September 2021 were retrospectively analyzed in three groups: unvaccinated, incompletely vaccinated, and fully vaccinated. Disease severity was classified as moderate, severe, or critical according to World Health Organization criteria, and mortality risk factors and the prognostic effect of vaccination were analyzed. RESULTS: The study included 486 patients, 228 women (46.9 %) and 258 men (53.1 %), with a mean age of 55.4 ± 16.5 years. Of these, 264 patients (54.3 %) were unvaccinated, 147 (30.2 %) were incompletely vaccinated, and 75 (15.4 %) were fully vaccinated. Older age, higher Charlson Comorbidity Index, greater disease severity, and being unvaccinated or incompletely vaccinated were associated with higher mortality. CONCLUSIONS: The results of our study indicate that age, disease severity, comorbidities, and vaccination status were factors affecting COVID-19 mortality. Our findings support that full vaccination reduces COVID-19 -related mortality rates, disease severity, and length of hospital stay. However, large-scale studies with larger patient populations are needed (Tab. 2, Ref. 22).

Surgical Antimicrobial Prophylaxis Compliance in Turkey: Data from the Prospective, Observational, Multicenter Survey Including 7,978 Surgical Patients.

Background: Surgical antimicrobial prophylaxis (SAP) is the peri-operative administration of antimicrobial agents. Compliance rates vary worldwide from 15% to 84.3%, with studies in Turkey not exceeding 35%. The aim of this multicenter study was to determine the rate of appropriate antibiotic class, timing, and duration as well as discharge prescriptions in Turkey. Thus, we aimed to determine the rate of full compliance with SAP procedures in our country Patients and Methods: This multicenter, prospective, observational, descriptive study was conducted in 47 hospitals from 28 provinces in seven different regions of Turkey. Patients over 18 years of age in all surgical units between June 6, 2022, and June 10, 2022, were included in the study. Results: Of the 7,978 patients included in the study, 332 were excluded from further analyses because of pre-existing infection, and SAP compliance analyses were performed on the remaining 7,646 cases. The antibiotic most commonly used for SAP was cefazolin (n = 4,701; 61.5%), followed by third-generation cephalosporins (n = 596; 7.8%). The most common time to start SAP was within 30 minutes before surgery (n = 2,252; 32.5%), followed by 30 to 60 minutes before surgery (n = 1,638; 23.6%). Surgical antimicrobial prophylaxis duration was <24 hours in 3,516 (50.7%) patients and prolonged until discharge in 1,505 (21.7%) patients. Finally, the actual proportion of patients compliant with SAP was 19% (n = 1,452) after omitting 4,458 (58.3%) patients who were prescribed oral antibiotic agents at discharge as part of a prolonged SAP. Conclusions: Surgical antimicrobial prophylaxis compliance rates are still very low in Turkey. Prolonged duration of SAP and especially high rate of antibiotic prescription at discharge are the main reasons for non-compliance with SAP.

Antimicrobial Susceptibility Profiles and Key Determinants for Mortality in Burkholderia cepacia Complex Infections.

Objective: We aimed to define the clinical features and antimicrobial susceptibility profiles of Burkholderia cepacia complex infections and to determine the predictors for mortality. Materials and Methods: Our single-center retrospective study included patients with nosocomial B. cepacia complex infection between 2018 and 2022. We evaluated the predictors of 14-day and 28-day mortality by analyzing clinical and microbiological data. Results: A total of 87 patients were included. Most infections (79.3%) occurred in the intensive care units (ICUs). Among B. cepacia complex isolates, 74.7% were susceptible to trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazole, 70.3% to levofloxacin, 50% to meropenem, and 23.4% to ceftazidime. The rates of 14-day mortality, 28-day mortality, and in-hospital mortality were 41.3% (n=36), 52.8% (n=46), and 64.3% (n=56), respectively. Multivariate analysis revealed neutrophil/lymphocyte ratio (NLR) (odds ratio [OR]=1.05, p=0.024), platelet count (OR=1.00, p=0.011), creatinine (OR=2.14, p=0.006), and aspartate aminotransferase (AST) (OR=1.02, p=0.028) as predictors for 14-day mortality. In addition to NLR (OR=1.07, p=0.014), platelet count (OR=1.00, p=0.039), creatinine (OR=2.05, p=0.008), and AST (OR=1.02, p=0.035), procalcitonin (OR=1.05, p=0.049) was also found as an independent predictor for 28-day mortality. In receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis for predicting 14-day mortality, area under the ROC curve (AUC) values were 0.684 (p=0.003) in NLR, 0.719 (p<0.001) in platelet count, 0.673 (p=0.003) in procalcitonin, 0.743 (p<0.001) in creatinine, and 0.700 (p<0.001) in AST. In ROC curve analysis for predicting 28-day mortality, AUC values were 0.674 (p=0.002) in NLR, 0.651 (p=0.010) in platelet count, 0.638 (p=0.020) in procalcitonin, 0.730 (p<0.001) in creatinine, and 0.692 (p=0.001) in AST. Conclusion: Increasing antibiotic resistance and higher mortality rates justify that B. cepacia complex is a significant threat to hospitalized patients, especially in ICUs. Elevated levels of NLR, AST, creatinine, procalcitonin, and decreased platelet may predict poor clinical outcomes and could help clinicians in the management of this notorious bacterial pathogen.

Comparison of Pneumonia Severity Indices, qCSI, 4C-Mortality Score and qSOFA in Predicting Mortality in Hospitalized Patients with COVID-19 Pneumonia.

This is a retrospective and observational study on 1511 patients with SARS-CoV-2, who were diagnosed with COVID-19 by real-time PCR testing and hospitalized due to COVID-19 pneumonia. 1511 patients, 879 male (58.17%) and 632 female (41.83%) with a mean age of 60.1 ± 14.7 were included in the study. Survivors and non-survivors groups were statistically compared with respect to survival, discharge, ICU admission and in-hospital death. Although gender was not statistically significant different between two groups, 80 (60.15%) of the patients who died were male. Mean age was 72.8 ± 11.8 in non-survivors vs. 59.9 ± 14.7 in survivors (p < 0.001). Overall in-hospital mortality was found to be 8.8% (133/1511 cases), and overall ICU admission was 10.85% (164/1511 cases). The PSI/PORT score of the non-survivors group was higher than that of the survivors group (144.38 ± 28.64 versus 67.17 ± 25.63, p < 0.001). The PSI/PORT yielding the highest performance was the best predictor for in-hospital mortality, since it incorporates the factors as advanced age and comorbidity (AUROC 0.971; % 95 CI 0.961−0.981). The use of A-DROP may also be preferred as an easier alternative to PSI/PORT, which is a time-consuming evaluation although it is more comprehensive.

The Effect of Host miRNAs on Prognosis in COVID-19: miRNA-155 May Promote Severity via Targeting Suppressor of Cytokine Signaling 1 (SOCS1) Gene.

The epigenetic features contribute to variations in host susceptibility to SARS-CoV-2 infection and severity of symptoms. This study aimed to evaluate the relationship between the relative expression of microRNAs (miRNAs) and the severity of the disease in COVID-19 patients. The miRNA profiles were monitored during the different stages of the disease course using reverse transcription-quantitative polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR). The expression levels of the selected 11 miRNAs were measured in the blood samples collected from 73 patients (moderate, n = 37; severe, n = 25; critically ill, n = 11, a total of 219 longitudinal samples) on hospitalization day and days 7 and 21. Expression changes were expressed as "fold change" compared to healthy controls (n = 10). Our study found that several miRNAs differed according to disease severity, with the miR-155-5p the most strongly upregulated (p = 0.0001). A statistically significant negative correlation was observed between the expression of miR-155-5p and its target gene, the suppressor of cytokine signaling 1 (SOCS1). The relative expression of miR-155-5p was significantly increased and SOCS1 was significantly decreased with the disease progression (r = -0.805 p = 0.0001, r = -0.940 p = 0.0001, r = -0.933 p = 0.0001 for admission, day 7, and day 21, respectively). The overexpression of miR-155-5p has significantly increased inflammatory cytokine production and promoted COVID-19 progression. We speculated that microRNA-155 facilitates immune inflammation via targeting SOCS1, thus establishing its association with disease prognosis.

Evaluation of 170 Followed-up Cases Treated for Hydatid Disease: A Multicentre Study.

OBJECTIVE: To determine the clinical characteristics of patients with cystic echinococcosis and the diagnostic and therapeutic approaches used. METHODS: This is a multicentre, retrospective study. Patients from six centres who were diagnosed with hydatid cysts in the last five years were evaluated. RESULTS: The mean age was 45.4±17.4 years, and 54.7% were female. The most common complaints were abdominal pain, nausea and vomiting, and the most common physical examination finding was abdominal tenderness. Most patients were diagnosed within 2-6 months. Anaemia and eosinophilia were the most common laboratory findings. The liver was the most commonly involved organ (n=153, 90%). One hundred twenty-five (73.5%) patients underwent ultrasonography. The largest cyst was present in the liver at stage four, and its diameter was 160x170 mm. The rates of the negative, grey zone and positive results were 9.4%, 8.8% and 81.8%. Surgery was more common (n=72, 42.4%) than puncture, aspiration, injection, and re-aspiration treatments (n=14, 8.2%). Of the 47 patients who had a recurrence, 22 (46.8%) had a history of hydatid cyst treatment. CONCLUSION: Hydatid disease, which is endemic in our country, is diagnosed at a late stage. In terms of disease diagnosis, serological tests may be misleading. It was not possible to compare the success rates according to the treatment choices because of the lack of randomisation of stages and sizes of the lesions.