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Background: Since the establishment of the International Health Promotion Hospitals (HPH) in 2006, standards have been designed to evaluate this network. Based on the request of the General Assembly of HPH, the new standards have been revised in 2020 to be in harmony with the new global strategy of HPH for the years 2021-2025. The present study was conducted to translate the original version of the self-evaluation form of HPH and to determine its validity and reliability in Iranian society. Methods: The standard process of forward and backward translation was followed after that to determine the face validity of the Persian version of HPH standards, fifteen experts from ten hospitals in five major cities in Iran (Tehran, Mashhad, Isfahan, Shiraz and Hamadan) gave their opinions about 86 standard statements based on a five-point Likert scale, and the impact score was calculated. For determining content validity, both the content validity ratio (CVR) and content validity index (CVI) were used. Results: All 86 standard statements of the five main standards had an impact score higher than 1.5. Also, regarding CVR, all 86 standard statements had a score higher than 0.49 (the minimum plausible score based on Lawshe's table). Finally, after calculating the CVI, all the standard statements had a CVI higher than 0.8, which indicated a very good content validity index for all the items. Conclusions: According to the results of this study, the Persian form of the 2020 HPH standards is valid enough to be used in Iranian hospitals and health services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Self-care of adolescents with congenital heart disease (CHD) is one of the challenges of the health care system. CHD is a common chronic disease that affects the quality of life (QoL) and self-efficacy of adolescents. This study compares the effectiveness of self-care education by face-to-face method and video clip (VC) on self-efficacy and QoL in late adolescents with CHD. Methods: This research was a non-randomized clinical trial. A total of 111 late adolescents aged 18 to 21 years with CHD referred to Rajaie Cardiovascular, Medical, and Research Center in Tehran, Iran, were recruited by convenience sampling and non-randomly assigned to either control, face-to-face (F2F), or VC groups (37 subjects in each group). The F2F group participated in two educational sessions (each lasted 35-45 minutes) with an interval of one week, and the VC group received a 90-minute video to watch at home. The study data were collected before (T1) and two months after the intervention (T2), using the Generalized Self-Efficacy (GSE) scale and World Health Organization's Quality of Life Questionnaire (WHOQOL-BREF) and analyzed in SPSS version 19 software using the Chi-square test, Fisher test, paired t test, Scheffé test, and ANOVA. The significance level was set at P<0.05. Results: Before the intervention, demographic variables, self-efficacy, and QoL were not significantly different in the three groups. The self-efficacy significantly increased in the F2F (P<0.004) and VC groups (P<0.031) at T2. Furthermore, QoL dimensions significantly improved in the F2F and VC groups (P<0.05), except for the environment dimension (P>0.05). Conclusion: Self-care education through F2F and VC significantly affects the self-efficacy and QoL of late adolescents. Such educational programs can greatly reduce the possible complications of the disease by empowering this group. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID‐19) pandemic has presented unique challenges to healthcare systems the world over. The management of the current pandemic places a huge strain on healthcare sectors and demands new strategies on a global level. We herein review the latest epidemiologic data on the COVID‐19 pandemic, the Iranian healthcare system's response, and the impact on cardiac surgery practice in Iran. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The superior type of sinus venosus atrial septal defect (SVASD) is a rare form of the atrial septal defect (ASD) in which the upper part of the atrial septum does not exist. The presence of other cardiac anomalies such as anomalous pulmonary venous connections has been reported in this type of congenital heart disease. This study aimed to assess the presence of the patent foramen ovale (PFO) in patients with the superior type of SVASD. Methods: This retrospective case-control study on 387 patients, consisting of 187 patients with a definite SVASD and 200 patients with problems other than the ASD, was conducted in Rajaie Cardiovascular Medical and Research Center between February 2005 and July 2014. Seven patients with inadequate data were excluded from the analysis. The presence/absence of the PFO was also evaluated in the case and control groups. Results: The analyses were performed on 182 male and 198 female patients at a mean age of 39.07±14.41 and 51.01±15.80 years in the case and control groups, respectively. The PFO was significantly more frequent in the patients with the superior type of SVASD than in those without the condition (P<0.001). The persistence of the left superior vena cava was seen in 34 out of 180 patients with SVASD and in 1 out of 200 patients without the condition (18.9% vs 0.5%; P<0.001). Conclusion: This study was the first to highlight the coexistence of the PFO and the superior type of SVASD. Physiological, genetic, or fetal factors may play an important role in the association between the PFO and the SVASD. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the article, the authors discuss the adverse effects of economic sanctions on the effective control of the COVID-19 pandemic in Iran. Also cited are the strategies used to control the pandemic like physical distancing, quarantine, and traffic reduction, the direct and indirect socioeconomic costs of the virus like essential supplies, as well as the impact of the sanctions on the supply of drugs and diagnostic and therapeutic medical equipment.

Background: Since the establishment of the International Health Promotion Hospitals (HPH) in 2006, standards have been designed to evaluate this network. Based on the request of the General Assembly of HPH, the new standards have been revised in 2020 to be in harmony with the new global strategy of HPH for the years 2021-2025. The present study was conducted to translate the original version of the self-evaluation form of HPH and to determine its validity and reliability in Iranian society., Methods: The standard process of forward and backward translation was followed after that to determine the face validity of the Persian version of HPH standards, fifteen experts from ten hospitals in five major cities in Iran (Tehran, Mashhad, Isfahan, Shiraz and Hamadan) gave their opinions about 86 standard statements based on a five-point Likert scale, and the impact score was calculated. For determining content validity, both the content validity ratio (CVR) and content validity index (CVI) were used., Results: All 86 standard statements of the five main standards had an impact score higher than 1.5. Also, regarding CVR, all 86 standard statements had a score higher than 0.49 (the minimum plausible score based on Lawshe's table). Finally, after calculating the CVI, all the standard statements had a CVI higher than 0.8, which indicated a very good content validity index for all the items., Conclusions: According to the results of this study, the Persian form of the 2020 HPH standards is valid enough to be used in Iranian hospitals and health services., Competing Interests: There are no conflicts of interest., (Copyright: © 2023 International Journal of Preventive Medicine.)

Background: Professional driving is associated with overworking, lack of physical activity, and high stress, which are susceptible to cardiovascular diseases (CVDs). We aimed to determine the prevalence of hypertension and obesity in Iranian professional drivers., Methods: Overall, 132,452 drivers were included by census sampling methods and those who did not pass periodic examinations were excluded. Demographics and anthropometric data, including height and weight and the driver's blood pressure, were recorded. The criteria for hypertension assumed as the systolic blood pressure ≥ 130 mm and/or diastolic blood pressure ≥ 80 mm, and the criteria for prehypertension assumed as 120-129 systolic and < 80 mm Hg. In addition, body mass index (BMI) ≥ 25 is assumed as overweight, and BMI ≥ 30 is assumed as obesity., Results: Overall, 113,856 male drivers were included in the final analysis. The prevalence of HTN, pre-HTN, and abnormal blood pressure (HTN + pre-HTN) was calculated to be 14.2%, 57.4%, and 71.6%, respectively. Khuzestan, West Azerbaijan, and Yazd had the most prevalence of abnormal blood pressure. The prevalence of overweight, obesity, and abnormal weight (overweight + obesity) was calculated to be 50.9%, 22.6%, and 73.5%, respectively, and the northwest provinces had the highest prevalence of abnormal weight., Conclusion: Professional Iranian drivers have a high prevalence of abnormal blood pressure and weight associated with job-related risk factors. Preventive measures should be taken to confront a possible outbreak of CVDs in this population., (Copyright © 2023 Nikpajouh et al. Published by Tehran University of Medical Sciences.)

Background: Structural heart disease (SHD) has great impacts on healthcare systems, creating further public health concerns. Proper data are scant regarding the magnitude of the affected population by SHD., Objectives: This study aimed to determine the prevalence of SHD among children and adolescents in an Iranian population., Methods: In this population-based study, a multistage cluster-random sampling was used to choose schools from the Tehran urban area. All students were examined using a handheld Vscan device by echocardiographer, and the results were concurrently supervised and interpreted by cardiologists. All the major findings were reevaluated in hospital clinics., Results: Of 15,130 students (6-18 years, 52.2% boys) who were examined, the prevalence of individuals with congenital heart disease (CHD) and cardiomyopathy was 152 (10.046 per 1,000 persons) and 9 (0.595 per 1,000 persons), respectively. The prevalence of definite and borderline rheumatic heart disease (RHD) was 30 (2 per 1,000 persons) and 113 (7.5 per 1,000 persons), correspondingly. Non-rheumatic valvular heart disease (VHD) was also detected in 465 (30.7 per 1,000 persons) students. Of all the pathologies, only 39 (25.6%) cases with CHD and 1 (0.007%) cases with RHD had already been diagnosed. Parental consanguinity was the strongest predictor of CHD and SHD (odds ratio [OR]: 1.907, 95% CI, 1.358 to 2.680; P < 0.001 and OR, 1.855, 95% CI, 1.334 to 2.579; P < 0.001, respectively). The female sex (OR, 1.262, 95% CI, 1.013 to 1.573; P = 0.038) and fathers' low literacy (OR, 1.872, 95% CI, 1.068 to 3.281; P = 0.029) were the strongest predictors of non-rheumatic VHD and RHD, correspondingly., Conclusions: The implementation of echocardiographic examinations for detecting SHD among young population is feasible which detected SHD prevalence in our population comparable to previous reports. Further studies are required to delineate its economic aspects for community-based screening., Competing Interests: SH reports grants from the NIMAD, during the conduct of the study. All other authors have none to declare., (Copyright: © 2022 The Author(s).)

Objective: Farshchian Heart Center is the fifth health-promoting hospital and the first center of its type in Western Iran that officially joined the International Network of Health Promoting Hospitals and Health Services (HPH) in 2016. The purpose of the present study is to evaluate the health promotion standards at this center in 2018., Methods: We conducted this cross-sectional study at Farshchian Heart Center of Hamadan. The main data collection instruments included questionnaires obtained from indicators of five different main standards of health-promoting hospitals developed by the World Health Organization (WHO) which were evaluated from three different perspectives: Management staff, hospital employees, and patients. The data were analyzed by SPSS version 21 software., Results: We evaluated 111 hospital employees, 109 patients, and 6 management staff. Nurses (46.8%) comprised the majority of the hospital staff respondents. Less than half (42.3%) of the hospital staff expressed awareness of hospital health promotion policies; however, only 13.5% had attended various health promotion programs. Only 51.4% of patients knew about the hospital health promotion policies and 17.4% of them participated in relevant programs. The mean score for patient satisfaction with the hospital health promotion programs according to the visual analogue scale (VAS, range: 0-10) was 7.16 ± 2.45, which was significantly higher in outpatients (8.16 ± 1.85) compared to inpatients (6.44 ± 2.59, p = 0.001). Two thirds (66.7%) of the management staff expressed awareness of implementation of these programs., Conclusion: The results of this study demonstrated that health promotion policies based on WHO standards were not well-recognized among patients, hospital employees, and management staff in Farshchian Heart Center of Hamadan, Iran.

Background: The superior type of sinus venosus atrial septal defect (SVASD) is a rare form of the atrial septal defect (ASD) in which the upper part of the atrial septum does not exist. The presence of other cardiac anomalies such as anomalous pulmonary venous connections has been reported in this type of congenital heart disease. This study aimed to assess the presence of the patent foramen ovale (PFO) in patients with the superior type of SVASD. Methods: This retrospective case-control study on 387 patients, consisting of 187 patients with a definite SVASD and 200 patients with problems other than the ASD, was conducted in Rajaie Cardiovascular Medical and Research Center between February 2005 and July 2014. Seven patients with inadequate data were excluded from the analysis. The presence/absence of the PFO was also evaluated in the case and control groups. Results: The analyses were performed on 182 male and 198 female patients at a mean age of 39.07±14.41 and 51.01±15.80 years in the case and control groups, respectively. The PFO was significantly more frequent in the patients with the superior type of SVASD than in those without the condition (P<0.001). The persistence of the left superior vena cava was seen in 34 out of 180 patients with SVASD and in 1 out of 200 patients without the condition (18.9% vs 0.5%; P<0.001). Conclusion: This study was the first to highlight the coexistence of the PFO and the superior type of SVASD. Physiological, genetic, or fetal factors may play an important role in the association between the PFO and the SVASD., (Copyright © 2020 Tehran University of Medical Sciences.)

Background & Purpose: In evaluating new drugs for the treatment of various types of cancer, investigations have been made to discover a variety of anti-tumor compounds with less side effects on normal cells. Investigations have shown that the heterodimers S100A8 and S100A9 inhibit the enzyme casein kinase 2 and then prevent the activation of the E7 oncoprotein. Therefore, the aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of calprotectin as an antitumor compound on the Nalm6 (B cell precursor leukemia cell line)., Materials & Methods: Transformation of genes encoding S100A8 and S100A9 human, designed in the pQE32 plasmid, was performed by the thermal shock method into E. coli M15 bacteria. After bacterial growth in LB medium, the expression of two S100A8 and S100A9 subunits, the solubility of the protein by SDS-PAGE method was determined. Finally, the S100A8 / A9 complex was equally placed in the microtube. In the next step, the cytotoxic effects of calprotectin produced on the Nalm6 cell line were evaluated using the wst1 test. Then, the apoptosis in these cells was measured using flow cytometry methods with Annexin-V coloration., Results: In the current study, the results showed that the cytotoxic effects of Calprotectin are time and concentration- dependent. Therefore, it can reduce the tumor expression and had a beneficial effect by induced apoptosis in Nalm6 cell line., Conclusion: Calprotectin has an anti-tumor effect on the Nalm6 cell line by increasing apoptosis., (Copyright© Bentham Science Publishers; For any queries, please email at epub@benthamscience.net.)

Background: Considering the importance of assessing the program of health promotion hospitals (HPH) for elucidating the compliance with the standards, the present study aimed to evaluate the health promotion standards in governmental and nongovernmental hospitals of East-Azerbaijan. Methods: In the present cross-sectional study, all hospitals in East-Azerbaijan province in 2018 were recruited. The Persian validated World Health Organization (WHO) a self-assessment questionnaire was sent to the director of each hospital and invited to corporate with the study. Self-assessment questionnaire consists of 40 measurable elements that assess management policy, patient's assessment, patient information and intervention, promoting health work placed and continuity and cooperation. Independent sample ttest was conducted to compare the mean score of each standard across hospitals type, location, and size. A significance level of 0.05 was used. Results: Hospitals total HPH score was 56.06±21.27 (out of 100). Among five standards, Standard 3 had the highest score (66.85±18.80), and Standard 4 had the lowest score (47.79±19.12). The capital cities' hospitals had a significantly higher score in Standard 5 (p=0.02). Non-governmental hospitals had a significantly higher score in standard 4 (p=0.02). There were no significant differences in all five standards of HPH between hospitals with ≤200 and >200 beds (p>0.05). Conclusion: The hospitals in East-Azerbaijan-Iran had moderate compliance with HPH program, and they need to improve their performance especially in the field of providing healthy workplace and offering proper education and health-promoting services to patients after discharge., (© 2019 Iran University of Medical Sciences.)

Background: According to the World Health Organization, hospitals should assess their internal wards to improve health promotion services using self-assessment tools. To achieve this goal, standards of health promoting hospitals have been developed by the World Health Organization, and measurable elements and indicators have been defined to facilitate the practical application of these standards in planning, implementation, and evaluation of health promotion in hospitals. Moreover, a form has been developed for this self-assessment. Considering linguistic and cultural differences in various countries, standards must be written in equivalent texts and, then, their content and face validity should be examined. Performing this process in a systemic and scientific way can guarantee that the same tools have been used, and thus the results obtained from different hospitals are comparable. Methods: After the preparation phase (considering research aim, obtaining permission from the original designers, and determining the time), the following activities were done: translating the form from its original language to the target language, combining and compiling initial translations to a single translation, reversing the final version of the translation from the target language to the original language, obtaining cognitive information, revising and concluding, and determining the content and face validity of the translated form and final report. After filling in the form, face validity was calculated using impact score formula. Content validity was measured using content validity ratio (CVR) and content validity index (CVI). Results: After calculating the impact score, all 40 items showed a high impact score greater than 1.5, representing the fact that all items are important. The minimum value of CVR for each of the 40 items was estimated to be 0.64; CVI of all items was greater than 0.79. Conclusion: Given the input of the standards of health promoting hospitals affiliated to the World Health Organization in National Accreditation of Iranian hospitals, the form was translated and found to be valid according to content and face validity and is available in Persian to be used in Iranian hospitals (Appendix 1).