Project description:The aim of this study is to analyze differences in participation, and in the results obtained in the anatomy and histology exams, over two academic years of the Sport Sciences degree course. During the first semester of the academic year 2019/2020 both the lectures and the exam took place face-to-face, while during the academic year 2020/2021 everything was done online. Statistical analysis revealed that the online modality was especially advantageous for the anatomy exam. Students' opinions were also assessed through a short questionnaire. The results showed that teachers involved themselves in both groups. Students needed to interact socially with teachers and colleagues and to ask them questions. Even if the differences were not significant, the difference was greater for face-to-face students in most comparisons. Finally, the most common methods of peer communication were by social media.
Project description:To understand and analyse the global impact of COVID-19 on outpatient services, inpatient care, elective surgery, and perioperative colorectal cancer care, a DElayed COloRectal cancer surgery (DECOR-19) survey was conducted in collaboration with numerous international colorectal societies with the objective of obtaining several learning points from the impact of the COVID-19 outbreak on our colorectal cancer patients which will assist us in the ongoing management of our colorectal cancer patients and to provide us safe oncological pathways for future outbreaks.
Project description:Introduction: Globally, the COVID-19 pandemic has affected older people disproportionately. Prior to the pandemic, some studies reported that telehealth was an efficient and effective form of health care delivery, particularly for older people. There has been increased use of telehealth and publication of new literature on this topic during the pandemic, so we conducted a scoping review and evidence synthesis for telehealth use in geriatric care to summarize learning from these new data. Methods: We searched PubMed, Embase, and the World Health Organization's COVID-19 global research database for articles published between 1 January and 20 August 2020. We included 79 articles that met our inclusion criteria. The information collected has been synthesized and presented as descriptive statistics. Strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats (SWOT) have also been discussed. Results: The articles included in our review provide some evidence of effective provision of preventive, curative, and rehabilitative telehealth services for older people, but they highlight a greater focus on curative services and are mostly concentrated in high-income countries. We identified convenience and affordability as the strengths of telehealth use in geriatric care. Weaknesses identified include the inability of telehealth to cater to the needs of older people with specific physical and cognitive limitations. While the threats of increasing inequity and the lack of standardization in the provision of age-friendly telehealth services remain, we identified opportunities for technologic advancements driven by simplicity and user-friendliness for older people. Conclusion: Telehealth offers futuristic promise for the provision of essential health care services for older people worldwide. However, the extent of these services via telehealth appears to be currently limited in low and low-middle income countries. Optimizing telehealth services that can be accessed by older people requires greater government investments and active engagement by broader participation of older people, their caregivers, physicians and other health care providers, technology experts, and health managers.
Project description:The COVID-19 pandemic led to a rapid switch from undergraduate classroom teaching to online-teaching; a challenging process for teachers and students. Based on a recent online survey among German pediatric university hospitals the "AG Lehre der DGKJ" (teaching working group of the German Society of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine) summarizes latest experiences with e?learning during the summer term of 2020. The survey participants from 17 pediatric university hospitals report that the large spectrum of e?learning formats could sufficiently replace classical lectures and seminars but could not fully replace teaching involving direct contact to patients. The introduction of new digital teaching formats is time-consuming, needs high-quality IT infrastructure, should be embedded in a continuous curriculum and provide the possibility of regular exchange between students and teachers. Teachers should be provided with the opportunity for training in didactic methods and IT skills. These results correspond to the literature on e?learning in general and undergraduate medical education during the COVID-19 pandemic in particular. The experiences summarized here should not only facilitate the development of e?learning tools during the ongoing pandemic but also stimulate to establish e?learning as a valuable component of future pediatric medical education. New digital substitutes for teaching involving pediatric patients need to be developed.The statement was drafted by consensus by the German Society of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine Working Group on Teaching and approved by the DGKJ board.
Project description:The main objective of this study is to offer and evaluate an interim triage approach for patients waiting for surveillance colonoscopies. This will reduce the waiting period and the psychological stressors for our patients and from a scientific point of view allow us to compare the yield of findings for each approach.
Project description:The shift to distance teaching and learning during the COVID-19 pandemic brought about a real challenge for both instructors and students. To face these difficulties in teaching undergraduate Chemistry courses at the University of Santo Tomas, a blended learning strategy in the context of teaching and learning of Physical Chemistry 1 and Analytical Chemistry for Chemical Engineering students were employed. Here, we present an online strategy that facilitated the transition from traditional face-to-face learning to full online instruction. This is a five-component blended learning strategy referred to as Discover, Learn, Practice, Collaborate and Assess (DLPCA). In DLPCA, the asynchronous part of the teaching was achieved through broadcast of pre-recorded lecture videos on YouTube to allow students to study and progress with learning at their own pace. The synchronous part of the teaching was conducted using video conferencing platforms, such as Zoom or Google Meet. The DLPCA strategy was presented and discussed to the students prior to its implementation. The analysis of the teaching and learning experience based on three indicators (i) student’s learning experience, (ii) student’s academic performance and (iii) instructor observations showed that DLPCA had a positive impact on students and instructors. The identified challenges were stability of internet connection and instructor’s familiarity with readily available internet-based teaching tools, such as video conferencing software. Instructors must also find means to improve their interaction with students and maintain student interest and engagement during online classes. The survey also indicated that most of the students are satisfied with the DLCPA strategy. Hence, this strategy is considered a manageable and effective alternative that can be adapted to full online instruction to other undergraduate Chemistry lecture courses. Overall, the findings and insights in this study will add valuable resources for further hybrid instruction in the post-COVID-19 time in higher education.
Project description:BackgroundThis article's purpose is to compare burnout syndrome indicators at different levels of teaching in Brazil during the covid-19 pandemic. The comparison also considers the teachers' quality of life and health, working conditions, and digital competence.MethodsThe hypotheses of this study are that there are statistically significant differences in teachers' burnout rates, quality of life, working conditions, and digital competences depending on the teaching level. A mixed-methods ex-post-facto survey involved 438 Brazilian teachers, with a mean age of 42.93 years (SD = 9.66), 330 females (75%) and 108 males (25%). Data were collected through an online questionnaire. Statistical analysis of variance (ANOVA) tests was performed to compare groups, the Tukey test for paired comparison of the analyzed groups, and the chi-square to verify the association between variables.ResultsHigher levels of digital competence were associated with lower burnout syndrome scores. Elementary and middle school teachers presented worse quality of life and health indexes. Adapting pedagogical work involved learning but also overwork, exhaustion, and frustration.ConclusionsThe study concludes that basic education teachers had higher burnout rate scores than higher education teachers during the covid-19 pandemic and that early childhood education should be treated as a separate category.Trial registrationEthics approval was obtained from the University of Santa Catarina (UFSC) Research Ethics Committee (4.432.063, December 7, 2020). Informed consent was obtained from all subjects.
Project description:Roy, Steven, Inigo Soteras, Alison Sheets, Richard Price, Kazue Oshiro, Simon Rauch, Don McPhalen, Maria Antonia Nerin, Giacomo Strapazzon, Myron Allen, Alistair Read, and Peter Paal. Guidelines for mountain rescue during the COVID-19 pandemic: official guidelines of the International Commission for Alpine Rescue. High Alt Med Biol. 22: 128-141, 2021. Background: In mountain rescue, uncertainty exists on the best practice to prevent coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) transmission. The aim of this work was to provide a state-of-the-art overview of the challenges caused by the COVID-19 pandemic in mountain rescue. Methods: Original articles or reviews, published until December 27, 2020 in Cochrane COVID-19 Study Register, EMBASE, PubMed, and Google Scholar were included. Articles were limited to English, French, German, or Spanish with the article topic COVID-19 or other epidemics, addressing transmission, transport, rescue, or cardiopulmonary resuscitation. Results: The literature search yielded 6,190 articles. A total of 952 were duplicates and 5,238 were unique results. After exclusion of duplicates and studies that were not relevant to this work, 249 articles were considered for this work. Finally, 72 articles and other sources were included. Conclusions: Recommendations are provided for protection of the rescuer (including screening, personal protective equipment [PPE], and vaccination), protection of the patient (including general masking if low risk, specific PPE if high risk), equipment hygiene (including disinfection after every mission), use of single-use products, training and medical measures under COVID-19 precautions, and psychological wellbeing of rescuers during the COVID-19 pandemic. Adapted COVID-19 precautions for low-and-medium-income countries are also discussed.
Project description:PurposeDue to the coronavirus disease of 2019 (COVID-19), teachers during the pandemic have had to adapt to online teaching at short notice. This study aims to investigate the voice symptoms and their environmental risk factors as well as the work ability associated with distance teaching and to compare these with symptoms in previous contact teaching.MethodsWe conducted a survey of 121 primary and secondary school teachers across Finland. The survey was advertised online through social media and the replies collected from voluntarily participating teachers.ResultsDuring distance teaching vocal symptoms appeared less often than in school with 71% teachers experiencing them in regular teaching and 44% in distance teaching, VHI result decreased from 7.88 in school teaching to 4.58 in distance teaching. Acoustic conditions were reported to be more suitable in distance teaching with 73% of teachers finding them adequate during distance teaching in comparison to 46% for those in regular teaching. Background noise was the most disturbing factor for a teacher's voice in the classroom and in distance teaching and this was even more conspicuous in the classroom. Also, subjectively experienced poor indoor air quality at school influenced the voice negatively. Further, voice problems were associated with increased subjective stress levels and reduced ability to work.ConclusionDistance teaching has affected teachers' voices in a positive way compared with regular teaching. This difference is likely to be due to better acoustics and indoor air quality in distance teaching conditions.