Search

Background/Aims: Alexithymia is a concept characterized by the impairment of an individual's awareness of his feelings and ability to clearly identify and describe them. This study investigated whether alexithymia levels would differ in three different groups consisting of participants exhibiting suicidal ideation, attempted suicide, and non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI). Methods: Seventy-five patients admitted to the psychiatry clinic and emergency department due to suicidal ideation, attempted suicide, or non-suicidal self-injury and 25 healthy controls were included in the study. The Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS-20) and Hamilton Depression Rating Scale (HDRS) were applied to all participants. The individuals taking part were assigned into three different groups for comparisons: suicidal ideation, attempted suicide, and NSSI. Results: TAS-20 scores and HDRS scores were higher in the patient groups than in the healthy controls (p<0.001). Significantly higher TAS-20 scores were determined in the group with NSSI than in the attempted suicide group. Mean scores for the TAS subscales TAS-A (difficulty identifying feelings) and TAS-B (difficulty describing feelings) were significantly higher in the NSSI group than in the attempted suicide group. Positive correlation was found between severity of depression and alexithymia levels, TAS-20 scores, TAS-A scores, TAS-B scores, and TAS-C (externally oriented thinking) scores. Conclusion: The data from this study indicate that alexithymia levels in NSSI are higher than in individuals with attempted suicide and suicidal ideation. This finding reveals the importance of examining individuals with NSSI in terms of alexithymia as well. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Accurate and rapid diagnosis is a significant factor in reducing incidence rate; especially when the number of people inflicted with a disease is considerably high. In the healthcare sector, the decision-making process might be a complex and error-prone one due to excessive workload, negligence, time restrictions, incorrect or incomplete evaluation of medical reports and analyses, and lack of experience as well as insufficient knowledge and skills. Clinical decision support systems (CDSSs) are those developed to improve effectiveness of decisions by supporting physicians' decision-making process regarding their patients. In this study, a new artificial intelligence-based CDSS and a user-friendly interface for this system were developed to ensure rapid and accurate detection of pandemic diseases. The proposed CDSS, which is called panCdss, uses hybrid models consisting of the Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) model and Machine Learning (ML) methods in order to detect covid-19 from lung computed tomography (CT) images. Transfer Learning (TL) models were used to detect monkeypox from skin lesion images and covid-19 from chest X-Ray images. The results obtained from these models were evaluated according to accuracy, precision, recall and F1-score performance metrics. Of these models, the ones with the highest classification performance were used in the panCdss. The highest classification values obtained for each dataset were as follows: % 91.71 accuracy, % 92.07 precision, % 90.29 recall and % 91.71 F1-score for covid-19 CT dataset by using CNN+RF hybrid model; % 99.56 accuracy, % 100 precision, % 99.12 recall and % 99.55 F1-score for covid-19 X-ray dataset by using VGG16 model; and % 90.38 accuracy, % 93.32 precision, % 88.11 recall and % 90.64 F1-score for monkeypox dataset by using MobileNetV2. It is believed that panCdss can be successfully employed for rapid and accurate classification of pandemic diseases and can help reduce physicians' workload. Furthermore, the study showed that the proposed CDSS is an adaptable, flexible and dynamic system that can be practiced not only for the detection of pandemic diseases but also for other diseases. To the authors' knowledge, this proposed CDSS is the first CDSS developed for pandemic disease detection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Data are scant regarding serum bilirubin levels in non-ST-segment elevation acute coronary syndrome (NSTE-ACS). In this study, we evaluated the role of serum bilirubin levels in NSTE-ACS. We enrolled 782 patients who presented to the emergency department with acute chest pain. Patients were divided into 2 groups based on the troponin positivity. Patients with NSTE-ACS who had troponin positivity were included in group 1 (n = 382), and group 2 consisted of the control patients (n = 400). Direct bilirubin (DB) levels (group 1: 0.31 ± 0.37 mg/dL, group 2: 0.20 ± 0.25 mg/dL, P < .001) and total bilirubin (TB) levels (group 1: 0.78 ± 0.56 mg/dL, group 2: 0.62 ± 0.45 mg/dL, P < .001) were significantly higher in group 1. There was a significant and moderate correlation between serum bilirubin levels and admission troponin values (r = .34, P < .001 for TB and r = .42, P < .001 for DB). These results show that serum bilirubin levels were associated with troponin positivity in patients with NSTE-ACS. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: We aimed to provide additional information in order to prevent the misdiagnosis and malpractice in the emergency department by examining the detailed characteristics of migraines associated with dizziness. Material and Methods: This is a prospective and cross-sectional study. A hundred consecutive patients applied with the complaints of both headache and dizziness to emergency department within 6 months were examined. The patients were referred to neurology polyclinic after the treatment in emergency department. For each patient, a form containing questions about the specific symptom, the history and the clinic characteristics was full-filled. The patients were divided into two groups according to whether there is aura or not, and migraine in the family or not; than the differences were examined. Results: Eighty-seven of our patients (87%) were female. Forty-one patients (41%) described aura. Of headache,66% were unilateral and 32% were bilateral. Of the patients,83% experienced nausea, 48% experienced vomiting and 92% described photophobia and phonophobia. The duration of headache of the migraine patients having a family history of migraine was significantly shorter than others. The monthly migraine frequency was significantly higher in patients having a family history of migraine than the others. Conclusion: Among the patients having a headache and vertigo who applied to emergency department, migraine associated with vertigo should be considered in the young ladies whose headache is unilateral and who describes photophobia and phonophobia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Spor Hekimligi Dergisi/Turkish Journal of Sports Medicine is the property of Turkish Journal of Sports Medicine / Spor Hekimleri Dernegi and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Objective: Carbon monoxide poisoning (COP) is one of the important causes of morbidity and mortality in toxicological cases. In this study, we aimed to find out more about the pathophysiology of COP by investigating the effects of COP on oxidative stress parameters such as total oxidant status (TOS) and total antioxidant status (TAS). Methods: Eighty-eight patients admitted to the emergency department of our hospital with acute COP and 35 healthy adults as control group were included in this study. Blood samples were collected from all COP patients at the time of initial emergency department evaluation to determine the oxidative stress parameters. Then, serum levels of total antioxidant status and total oxidant status levels were measured. Results: A total of 88 patients poisoned by carbon monoxide (CO; mean age 37.1 ± 18.2 years; 54’% women) were enrolled. TOS and carboxyhemoglobin (COHb) levels in COP patients were increased when compared to control group (p = 0.001). TOS, oxidative stress index (OSI) and COHb levels in COP patients were significantly lower after the treatment. (respectively, p = 0.016; p = 0.023; p = 0.001). On the other hand, no statistical differences were observed in TAS levels of study and control group as well as there were no changes with treatment. Conclusion: Measurements of TOS, TAS and OSI levels may be useful markers to find out the pathophsiology of COP. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim: The urokinase-type plasminogen activator (uPA) system consists of a protease, a receptor (urokinase-type plasminogen activator receptor, uPAR), and inhibitors that can be expressed on various cell types. Previous literature shows that the amount of soluble urokinase-type plasminogen activator receptor (suPAR) secreted from affected cells is higher in Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fever (CCHF) patients than in healthy controls. Thus, we aimed to investigate the diagnostic value of suPAR in the differential diagnosis of CCHF in emergency services. Material and Methods: Individuals over 16 years old with a preliminary diagnosis of CCHF disease were divided into two groups as real time-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) and/or IgM positive (CCHF group) and RT-PCR and/or IgM negative (control group). Results: Eighty patients were included in this study. Forty patients with CCHF virus PCR and/or CCHF virus IgM were identified as CCHF group and 40 patients included as negative control group. The median age of the patients was 45 (range, 16-91) years, and 49 patients (61.3%) were male. Leukocyte, platelet, and fibrinogen levels were significantly lower, while creatinine kinase, aPTT, and D-dimer levels were significantly higher in CCHF group. There was no statistically significant difference between the control group and CCHF group for SuPAR (p=0.386). In addition, control group patients not diagnosed with CCHF were examined, brucellosis, influenza, and pneumonia were found to be the most common. Conclusion: The use of suPAR as a biomarker in the differentiation of patients with similar findings in emergency services was investigated and found to have no diagnostic value. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]