Antibiotics in the Treatment of Uncomplicated Cystitis: A Google Trends Analysis.

INTRODUCTION: Using Google Trends (GT) data, the trend variations for the most common antibiotics used to treat uncomplicated cystitis were analyzed by time and region since 2004. METHODS: GT was used to create a "line-graph" that shows how interest in a topic in certain locations has grown or decreased over time. The relative search volume, which is displayed on a scale of 0-100, was used to index the search values for specific phrases. Nitrofurantoin (NFN), fosfomycin (FOS), trimethoprim (TMP), pivmecillinam (PIV), and cefadroxil are among the antibiotics recommended by the European Association of Urology (EAU) and the American Urological Association for the treatment of uncomplicated cystitis. Using the "global" inquiry category, the data was searched "worldwide" from 1 February 2004 to 31 December 2021. RESULTS: In the regression analysis, all antibiotics exhibited positive trends (p < 0.05). With a steady rise in popularity, NFN is the most popular antibiotic today. Search trend for cefadroxil stayed nearly stable until 2012, the rate of rise in the last 10 years increased, and cefadroxil is the second most popular antibiotic. In the previous 5 years, there was a decline in interest in TMP. In recent years, there was an increase in the trends for FOS and PIV. CONCLUSION: Clinicians and patients all around the world increasingly use the web to search for antibiotic therapies for uncomplicated cystitis. Antibiotics used to treat uncomplicated cystitis have various trends in different continents throughout the world. The web trends seem to be compatible with daily use.

How (not) to be held accountable in research: The case of the Dutch integrity code.

The article starts with a concise explanation of the nature and role of values and norms. I emphasize the ethical and political importance of making explicit how values are interpreted and which norms are taken to advance them in concrete situations. Next, I apply this account in a critical examination of the recent Netherlands Code of Conduct for Research Integrity. The conclusion is that this code is based on a flawed conception and an inadequate analysis of the nature and role of values and norms in science. Finally, I briefly sketch how the defects of the integrity code might be remedied by developing policies based on the broader notion of the public interest of science.

The Study on Public-Interest Short Message Service (SMS) in China during the COVID-19 Pandemic: Mobile User Survey and Content Analysis.

The outbreak of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has greatly threatened the global health system and triggered the public health emergency. In order to manage the COVID-19 pandemic, healthcare and prevention information have been delivered through omni-media channels (e.g., television, radio, social platform, etc.). As a traditional outlet, the short message service (SMS) can timely provide abundant anti-epidemic alerts to mobile users. In this paper, we aim to investigate mobile users' attitudes toward COVID-19 public-interest SMS sent from government authorities and then explore the insight from messaging texts collected between January and April 2020 in China. In general, respondents show a positive attitude towards content and the necessity of public-interest SMS during the pandemic. However, we find that gender and age differences not only affect content evaluation, but also influence reading and forwarding behaviors. For the necessity of SMS, it shows significant difference between the 18-25-year-old and over 40-year-old group, with the middle and elder group showing serious attitudes and giving higher remarks than the youth due to the habits of media usage. However no significant difference is presented between females and males. In terms of content, the category of topics and releasing institutions are analyzed, respectively. Due to the centralized responses and coordination of prevention and control in China, the messages from COVID-19 disposal organizations (e.g., municipal steering group and provincial CDC) account for more than 70% among four cities.

Designing intervention scheme for vaccine market: a bilevel programming approach.

Public-interest goods benefit consumers and also generate external benefits boosting societal welfare. Despite this characteristic of these goods, their level of consumption or production are generally well below the socially desirable levels without intervention. Motivated by influenza vaccine market, this paper examines the intervention design problem for a public-interest good facing yield uncertainty in production as well as inefficiencies in distribution and allocation. The proposed mechanism considers two intervention tools with the aim of resolving the inefficiencies in the system and allowing the actors to take socially desirable decisions. The first tool is to intervene so that demand level for the good is increased; we call it demand increasing strategy. The second tool aims to support the production, allocation, and distribution by investing in research and development and better planning and enhances the availability; we call this as availability increasing strategy. The intervention design problem is based on stylized demand and availability models that take into account investments made to improve them. The model suggested is experimented by a numerical study to analyze the impact of applying proposed joint mechanism in US influenza vaccine market. The results show that proposed strategy is very effectual in terms of vaccination percentages achieved and budget savings realized beyond the current practices, and the improvement in vaccination percentages is even greater when uncertainty in the system is higher. Besides, the results suggest that as long as the parameter calibration and decision problems are solved consistently, availability can be approximated by its average value when necessary.