Coronaviruses - Online First

The COVID-19 pandemic has severely disrupted global health systems, highlighting the urgent need for effective treatment strategies. This article aims to provide an assessment of the pandemic's current status and examines the effectiveness of traditional treatments against innovative synthetic approaches.

The article explores synthetic strategies involving repurposed antiviral drugs, supportive care, and vaccinations. It emphasizes the role of computational modeling and artificial intelligence in engineering molecules with potent antiviral properties. In-silico methods were utilized to accelerate chemical library screenings, predict efficacy, and assess interactions between viral proteins and potential treatments.

Studies employing molecular docking analysis have evaluated the efficacy of approved antiviral drugs and natural compounds. Notably, Azithromycin was found to have a potential inhibitory effect with a binding energy of -9.69, while natural compounds like Camphor and Curcumin displayed binding energies of -5.18 and -6.16, respectively.

Synthetic treatments showed effectiveness in inhibiting viral proteins and facilitating rapid development, while natural products were more effective in preventing virus entry.

Based on in-silico docking studies, it can be concluded that natural products have more therapeutic effects than synthetic drugs.

Some evidence shows that the COVID-19 pandemic has had negative effects on the mental health status of different sections of society, including the medical staff.

The current study was conducted with the aim of investigating the mental health status of obstetrics and gynecology (OB-GYN) assistants during the COVID-19 pandemic in Iran.

The present cross-sectional study was conducted in 23 hospitals across Iran in 2021 (January-March). Four hundred OB-GYN assistants were randomly and voluntarily enrolled in the study. The instrument used in this study was the 28-item General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-28), which had four subscales, including somatic symptoms, anxiety/ insomnia, social dysfunction and severe depression. To collect data and to reach respondents in distant areas, the questionnaires were provided to the OB-GYN assistants by the online platform.

The mean age of the OB-GYN assistants was 32.3±2.6 years, and all were female. Of 400 OB-GYN assistants, 132 (33%) had no distress and 268 (67%) had psychiatric distress. According to subscales scoring, 72 (18%), 68 (17%), 92 (23%) and 64 (16%) had severe distress in somatic symptoms, anxiety/ insomnia, social dysfunction and severe depression, respectively.

Considering that more than half of the Iranian OB-GYN assistants had poor mental health, it seems that the COVID-19 pandemic has had a negative and destructive effect on the mental health of OB-GYN assistants. In this situation, they need psychological support and appropriate intervention.

Self-care is any activity that establishes and maintains one’s own health and prevents and deals with illnesses. According to the evidence, epidemiological crises affect mental health. Also, dealing with infertility can lead to mental health issues. The present study aimed to investigate the relationship of self-care knowledge towards the COVID-19 crisis with anxiety and quality of life in infertile women.

A cross-sectional online survey via the social media platform WhatsApp based on convenience sampling of infertile women was conducted from April to December 2019 during the COVID-19 pandemic in Infertility centers of Shiraz (A metropolis in the South of Iran, center of Fars province). Data was collected by demographic and infertility-related data questionnaire, self-structured questionnaire of self-care knowledge towards the COVID-19 crisis, state anxiety questionnaires, and Spielberger's standardized quality of life using Porsline software by self-report. Inclusion criteria were infertile women active in the virtual network. SPSS software IBM company version 20 was used for data analysis.

Most of the participants (62.2%) had average self-care knowledge about Covid-19. There was an inverse, and significant relationship between self-care knowledge of COVID-19 and anxiety of infertile women, i. e., the lower level of self-care knowledge of infertile women towards Covid-19 crisis was associated with a higher level of anxiety (p < 0.05). No significant relationship was found between the level of self-care knowledge of COVID-19 and infertile women’s quality of life (P > 0.05).

Increasing self-care knowledge of COVID-19among infertile women could affect their mental health. Education and increasing self-care knowledge during pandemics are recommended to manage the anxiety of infertile women and, as a consequence, promote fertility.

In December 2019, a group of patients in Wuhan, Hubei province, China, presented with severe illness and pneumonia of unknown origin. Subsequently, a novel coronavirus was identified as the cause and named “2019 novel coronavirus” (2019-nCoV), later defined as “SARS-CoV-2” (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus-2), leading to the development of the disease known as COVID-19. This study aimed to evaluate the effectiveness and safety of convalescent plasma as a potential therapy for patients with COVID-19.

Patients diagnosed with COVID-19 based on real-time polymerase chain reaction (PCR) or CT-Scan symptoms were randomly assigned to either the treatment group (n = 29, received convalescent plasma) or the control group (n = 29). Clinical manifestations and pulmonary involvement were monitored three times during the study. At the end of the intervention, patients were evaluated for clinical symptoms, laboratory test results, and length of hospital stay.

Among the 58 patients who completed the study, there were no significant differences in baseline characteristics between the treatment and control groups upon admission to the hospital. However, the length of hospital stay was significantly shorter (9.54 days) in the convalescent plasma group compared to the control group (12.88 days).

The findings from this study indicate that the use of convalescent plasma therapy, in addition to standard treatment, did not result in reduced mortality or improved clinical outcomes at day 7 when compared to a placebo or control group.

In the face of the rise of COVID-19, the multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children (MIS-C) associated with COVID-19 has been reported, and an increase in MIS-C cases has been observed throughout the world. The majority of these cases were similar to Kawasaki disease concerning clinical presentation.

Despite similarities, MIS-C cases present clinical and laboratory differentiation, which makes it essential to portray similar cases worldwide to have a better consensus in the future. A 7-year-old male child visited the hospital with the chief complaints of fever associated with chills, rigors, and excessive myalgia for 3 days. He had a history of elevated high C-reactive protein (CRP) of 42.7 mg/L. He was diagnosed with Paediatric inflammatory multisystem syndrome (PIMS)-grade 3. Here, for the first time, we bring an Indian MIS-C case with COVID-19-associated Paediatric inflammatory multisystem syndrome (PIMS)-grade 3.

PIMS-TS infection in paediatrics is associated with a wider range of complications, and the importance of musculoskeletal complications in PIMS-TS has been discussed.