The Glasgow Coma Scale and Full Outline of Unresponsiveness score evaluation to predict patient outcomes with neurological illnesses in intensive care units in West Bank: a prospective cross-sectional study.

Background: Determining the clinical neurological state of the patient is essential for making decisions and forecasting results. The Glasgow Coma Scale and the Full Outline of Unresponsiveness (FOUR) Scale are commonly used tools for measuring behavioral consciousness. This study aims to compare scales among patients with neurological disorders in intensive care units (ICUs) in the West Bank.

The burden in family caregivers of people living with dementia: prevalence and predictors.

Background: Providing care for people with dementia incorporates a level of burden which can affect quality of life for both the caregiver and the recipient of care. This study measures the level of burden experienced by Jordanian caregivers for people with dementia and explore related predictors.

Methods: Through a cross-sectional survey, participants were invited through convenience sampling to participate in a structured interview.

COVID-19 vaccine acceptance and associated factors among pregnant and lactating women attending maternity care clinics in refugee camps in Jordan.

Background: Despite the advantages of vaccination in preventing maternal and fetal problems, there were many concerns in the medical community regarding vaccine safety for pregnant women, and this has put obstetricians in a challenging situation when it comes to advising their pregnant patients on whether to obtain the vaccine.

Aim: This study was performed to define the level of acceptance of COVID-19 vaccination and assess the impact of COVID-19 attitudes and knowledge on vaccine acceptance between pregnant and lactating Syrian women who are seeking prenatal care services at the clinics in Azraq refugee camp in Jordan.

Method: A quantitative, cross-sectional study utilizing a non-probability convenience sample.

Perceptions of Bedside Nurses Caring for Patients with Left Ventricular Assist Devices (LVAD): A Qualitative Study.

Introduction: Bedside nurses in the intensive care units are exposed to multiple challenges in their regular practice and recently have taken in ventricular assist device care in Lebanon since its introduction as a fairly new practice.

Objectives: To explore the experiences of nursing staff who work in Lebanese hospitals with Left Ventricular Assist Devices (LVAD).

Methods: This study employed a qualitative phenomenological research design, where semi-structured interviews were carried out among fifteen LVAD nurses in an acute care hospital.

The association between psychological reactions, resilience, and work engagement among Palestinian critical care nurses in West Bank.

Aim: This study aimed to assess the association between psychological reactions (e.g., stress, anxiety, and depression), resilience, and work engagement among Palestinian critical care nurses in the West Bank and examine the correlation of psychological reactions and resilience with work engagement.

Etiology of Acute Lower Respiratory Illness Hospitalizations Among Infants in 4 Countries.

Background: Recent studies explored which pathogens drive the global burden of pneumonia hospitalizations among young children. However, the etiology of broader acute lower respiratory tract infections (ALRIs) remains unclear.

Methods: Using a multicountry study (Albania, Jordan, Nicaragua, and the Philippines) of hospitalized infants and non-ill community controls between 2015 and 2017, we assessed the prevalence and severity of viral infections and coinfections.

Evaluation of the public health empowerment program in the Eastern Mediterranean region.

Background: The Public Health Empowerment Program (PHEP) is a 3-month training program for frontline public health staff to improve surveillance quality and strengthen the early warning system capacities. Studies evaluating the program and its impact on the health systems in the Eastern Mediterranean Region (EMR) are lacking. Therefore, this study aimed to assess the level of PHEP graduates' engagement in field epidemiology activities, assess their perceived skills and capacity to perform these activities and assess the extent to which PHEP helped the graduates to perform field epidemiology activities.

Factors correlating with self-care behaviors among patients with coronary artery disease: a cross-sectional study.

In Palestine, there is a lack of studies that examined self-care behaviors among patients with coronary artery disease in outpatient clinics. This study purposed to evaluate self-care behaviors, examine the relationship between self-care behaviors and selected sociodemographic and psychosocial factors (e.g.

Challenges to online education during the time of COVID-19: A focus group study.

Aim: To explore the experience of online education during coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) from the perspectives of nurse educators, postgraduate students, and undergraduate students in two universities in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT). This article only highlights the challenges faced by nurse educators and students.

Method: A qualitative design using a focus group strategy was employed.

Cross-Sectional Study Concerning the Knowledge, Attitude, and Practice of People With Diabetes Regarding the Prevention of Foot Ulcers in a Community.

Foot ulceration is a serious problem among people with diabetes. This study assessed the knowledge, attitude, and practice of 483 people with diabetes with regard to the prevention of diabetic foot ulcers (DFUs). Data were collected using a valid and reliable questionnaire, and logistic regression was carried out to predict the effect of statistically significant independent variables on the scores of dependent variables.

The epidemiology of meningococcal meningitis: multicenter, hospital-based surveillance of meningococcal meningitis in Iraq.

Objectives: Outbreaks of have reached alarming levels due to the pathogen's ability to cause severe complications, presenting as meningitis or septicemia. Our study reports the results of the first wide-scale surveillance of meningococcal meningitis in Iraq.

Methods: The study included all consecutive cases of clinically suspected meningitis between June 2018 and May 2020 at 18 major hospitals around Iraq ( = 2314).

Seroprevalence of SARS-CoV-2 in the West Bank region of Palestine: a cross-sectional seroepidemiological study.

Objectives: Seroprevalence rates are important indicators to the epidemiology of COVID-19 and the extent of the pandemic given the existence of asymptomatic cases. The purpose of this study is to assess the seroprevalence rate in the Palestinian population residing in the West Bank.

Setting: The study involved 1355 participants from 11 governorates, including 112 localities in the West Bank and 1136 individuals visiting Palestinian medical laboratories.

Intent to obtain pediatric influenza vaccine among mothers in four middle income countries.

Background: Despite a large burden of influenza in middle income countries, pediatric vaccination coverage remains low. The aims of this study were to (1) describe mothers' knowledge and attitudes about influenza illnesses and vaccination, and (2) identify characteristics associated with mothers' intent to vaccinate their child.

Methods: From 2015 to 2017, infants 0-11 months old in Nicaragua, Philippines, Jordan, and Albania were enrolled from community settings and hospitals.

The Role of the Global Health Development/Eastern Mediterranean Public Health Network and the Eastern Mediterranean Field Epidemiology Training Programs in Preparedness for COVID-19.

The World Health Organization (WHO) declared the current COVID-19 a public health emergency of international concern on January 30, 2020. Countries in the Eastern Mediterranean Region (EMR) have a high vulnerability and variable capacity to respond to outbreaks. Many of these countries addressed the need for increasing capacity in the areas of surveillance and rapid response to public health threats.

Underdetection of laboratory-confirmed influenza-associated hospital admissions among infants: a multicentre, prospective study.

Background: Since influenza often presents non-specifically in infancy, we aimed to assess the extent to which existing respiratory surveillance platforms might underestimate the frequency of severe influenza disease among infants.

Methods: The Influenza and Respiratory Syncytial Virus in Infants (IRIS) study was a prospective observational study done at four hospitals in Albania, Jordan, Nicaragua, and the Philippines. We included acutely ill infants aged younger than 1 year admitted to hospital within 10 days or less of illness onset during two influenza seasons (2015-16 and 2016-17) in Albania, Jordan, and Nicaragua, and over a continuous 34 week period (2015-16) in the Philippines.

Femtosecond time synchronization of optical clocks off of a flying quadcopter.

Future optical clock networks will require free-space optical time-frequency transfer between flying clocks. However, simple one-way or standard two-way time transfer between flying clocks will completely break down because of the time-of-flight variations and Doppler shifts associated with the strongly time-varying link distances. Here, we demonstrate an advanced, frequency comb-based optical two-way time-frequency transfer (O-TWTFT) that can successfully synchronize the optical timescales at two sites connected via a time-varying turbulent air path.

Low-loss reciprocal optical terminals for two-way time-frequency transfer.

We present the design and performance of a low-cost, reciprocal, compact free-space terminal employing tip/tilt pointing compensation that enables optical two-way time-frequency transfer over free-space links across the turbulent atmosphere. The insertion loss of the terminals is ∼1.5  dB with total link losses of 15 dB, 24 dB, and 50 dB across horizontal, turbulent 2-km, 4-km, and 12-km links, respectively.

Influenza and respiratory syncytial virus in infants study (IRIS) of hospitalized and non-ill infants aged <1 year in four countries: study design and methods.

Background: This multi-country prospective study of infants aged <1 year aims to assess the frequency of influenza virus and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) infections associated with hospitalizations, to describe clinical features and antibody response to infection, and to examine predictors of very severe disease requiring intensive care.

Methods/design: We are enrolling a hospital-based cohort and a sample of non-ill infants in four countries (Albania, Jordan, Nicaragua, and the Philippines) using a common protocol. We are currently starting year 2 of a 2- to 3-year study and will enroll approximately 3,000 infants hospitalized for any acute illness (respiratory or non-respiratory) during periods of local influenza and/or RSV circulation.

Synchronization of Clocks Through 12 km of Strongly Turbulent Air Over a City.

We demonstrate real-time, femtosecond-level clock synchronization across a low-lying, strongly turbulent, 12-km horizontal air path by optical two-way time transfer. For this long horizontal free-space path, the integrated turbulence extends well into the strong turbulence regime corresponding to multiple scattering with a Rytov variance up to 7 and with the number of signal interruptions exceeding 100 per second. Nevertheless, optical two-way time transfer is used to synchronize a remote clock to a master clock with femtosecond-level agreement and with a relative time deviation dropping as low as a few hundred attoseconds.

Invited Article: A compact optically coherent fiber frequency comb.

We describe the design, fabrication, and performance of a self-referenced, optically coherent frequency comb. The system robustness is derived from a combination of an optics package based on polarization-maintaining fiber, saturable absorbers for mode-locking, high signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) detection of the control signals, and digital feedback control for frequency stabilization. The output is phase-coherent over a 1-2 μm octave-spanning spectrum with a pulse repetition rate of ∼200 MHz and a residual pulse-to-pulse timing jitter <3 fs well within the requirements of most frequency-comb applications.

International Nosocomial Infection Control Consortium (INICC) report, data summary of 43 countries for 2007-2012. Device-associated module.

We report the results of an International Nosocomial Infection Control Consortium (INICC) surveillance study from January 2007-December 2012 in 503 intensive care units (ICUs) in Latin America, Asia, Africa, and Europe. During the 6-year study using the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC) U.S.

Short-term effect of antibiotics on human gut microbiota.

From birth onwards, the human gut microbiota rapidly increases in diversity and reaches an adult-like stage at three years of age. After this age, the composition may fluctuate in response to external factors such as antibiotics. Previous studies have shown that resilience is not complete months after cessation of the antibiotic intake.

Microbiome composition by pyrosequencing in mesenteric lymph nodes of rats with CCl4-induced cirrhosis.

Background: The cross talk between the gut microbiota and the immune system, which is essential to maintain homeostasis, takes place at the intestinal lymphoid tissue such as the mesenteric lymph nodes (MLNs). Here, we investigated the presence of bacterial DNA in MLNs of control and cirrhotic rats and its relationship with inflammatory responses.

Methods: The MLN microbiome of cirrhotic rats with ascites, which was induced by carbon tetrachloride (CCl4), was compared to that of control rats using quantitative real-time PCR and pyrosequencing of the 16S rRNA gene.