Search

The abundance of air pollutants over the last few years, including the concentration of microplastics, has become an alarming concern across the world. Initially discovered in marine life, these toxic and inflammatory particles have recently been found in human lung tissues. When inhaled, these harmful particles settle down in the lung airways and, over time, lead to respiratory failures. A recent study analyzed the microplastic transport behavior in the mouth–throat airways. However, the knowledge of the microplastic migration in bifurcating tracheobronchial airways is missing in the literature. Therefore, this first-ever study analyzes in detail the transport behavior and settling patterns of microplastic particles of different sizes and shapes at different respiratory intensities in the tracheobronchial lung airways. A numerical technique based on discrete phase modeling is employed to simulate the flow of microplastic particles in a three-dimensional realistic lung geometry. The numerical model results indicate low velocity and turbulence intensity magnitudes with smooth flow in the trachea compared to the airways of left and right lobes, which experience higher velocities and generate secondary vortices. Lower lung lobes are the deposition hotspots for the harmful microplastic particles at a lower flow rate. These hotspots shift to upper lung lobes at a higher flow rate for the same particle size. Moreover, microplastic particle size and shape influence the overall deposition rate in the tracheobronchial lung airways. The results of the current study, including microplastic accumulation regions at different breathing intensities, will contribute to the updated knowledge of pollutant inhalation and facilitate relevant treatment measures.

BACKGROUND: Wastewater-based epidemiological surveillance has been considered a powerful tool for early detection and monitoring of the dynamics of SARS-CoV-2 and its lineages circulating in a community. This study is aimed to investigate the complexity of SARS-CoV-2 infection dynamics in Dhaka city by examining its genetic variants in wastewater. Also, the study seeks to determine a connection between the SARS-CoV-2 variations detected in clinical testing and those found in wastewater samples. RESULTS: Out of 504 samples tested in RT-qPCR, 185 (36.7%) tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 viral RNA. The median log10 concentration of SARS-CoV-2 N gene copies/Liter of wastewater (gc/L) was 5.2, and the median log10 concentration of ORF1ab was 4.9. To further reveal the genetic diversity of SARS-CoV-2, ten samples with ORF1ab real-time RT-PCR cycle threshold (Ct) values ranging from 28.78 to 32.13 were subjected to whole genome sequencing using nanopore technology. According to clade classification, sequences from wastewater samples were grouped into 4 clades: 20A, 20B, 21A, 21J, and the Pango lineage, B.1, B.1.1, B.1.1.25, and B.1.617.2, with coverage ranging from 94.2 to 99.8%. Of them, 70% belonged to clade 20B, followed by 10% to clade 20A, 21A, and 21J. Lineage B.1.1.25 was predominant in Bangladesh and phylogenetically related to the sequences from India, the USA, Canada, the UK, and Italy. The Delta variant (B.1.617.2) was first identified in clinical samples at the beginning of May 2021. In contrast, we found that it was circulating in the community and was detected in wastewater in September 2020. CONCLUSION: Environmental surveillance is useful for monitoring temporal and spatial trends of existing and emerging infectious diseases and supports evidence-based public health measures. The findings of this study supported the use of wastewater-based epidemiology and provided the baseline data for the dynamics of SARS-CoV-2 variants in the wastewater environment in Dhak

Objective. Poor health outcomes of Bangladeshi readymade garment (RMG) workers tend to be associated with a variety of occupational factors. This study aimed to investigate the prevalence of, and risk factors associated with, the physical and psychological health outcomes of Bangladeshi RMG workers. Methods. Responses to a cross-sectional survey from a convenience sample of 411 adult Bangladeshi RMG workers (mean age = 26.24 years; SD 6.40 years; female = 80%) were analysed using bivariate and multivariate (logistic regression models) analyses. Results. More than half of the participants reported headaches (61.6%) and colds/flu (51.3%), followed by fever (37.2%), diarrhoea (32.8%), bodily pain (29.9%) and respiratory infections (20.9%). For psychological health, stress (69.1%), anxiety (66.2%) and boredom (64.5%) were most prevalent, followed by sleeplessness (51.3%), depression (48.2%) and fear (34.3%). RMG workers from the factories located in Chattogram (a peripheral region compared to Dhaka) reported poorer physical and psychological health outcomes than those working in factories in Dhaka (the capital city of Bangladesh). Overall, compared to males, female RMG workers were more likely to be vulnerable to both physical and psychological health outcomes. Conclusion. Improvement in workplace conditions and safety programmes is needed to safeguard the overall health outcomes of Bangladeshi RMG workers.

BACKGROUND: A comprehensive understanding of temporal trends in the disease burden in Australia is lacking, and these trends are required to inform health service planning and improve population health. We explored the burden and trends of diseases and their risk factors in Australia from 1990 to 2019 through a comprehensive analysis of the Global Burden of Disease Study (GBD) 2019. METHODS: In this systematic analysis for GBD 2019, we estimated all-cause mortality using the standardised GBD methodology. Data sources included primarily vital registration systems with additional data from sample registrations, censuses, surveys, surveillance, registries, and verbal autopsies. A composite measure of health loss caused by fatal and non-fatal disease burden (disability-adjusted life-years [DALYs]) was calculated as the sum of years of life lost (YLLs) and years of life lived with disability (YLDs). Comparisons between Australia and 14 other high-income countries were made. FINDINGS: Life expectancy at birth in Australia improved from 77·0 years (95% uncertainty interval [UI] 76·9-77·1) in 1990 to 82·9 years (82·7-83·1) in 2019. Between 1990 and 2019, the age-standardised death rate decreased from 637·7 deaths (95% UI 634·1-641·3) to 389·2 deaths (381·4-397·6) per 100 000 population. In 2019, non-communicable diseases remained the major cause of mortality in Australia, accounting for 90·9% (95% UI 90·4-91·9) of total deaths, followed by injuries (5·7%, 5·3-6·1) and communicable, maternal, neonatal, and nutritional diseases (3·3%, 2·9-3·7). Ischaemic heart disease, self-harm, tracheal, bronchus, and lung cancer, stroke, and colorectal cancer were the leading causes of YLLs. The leading causes of YLDs were low back pain, depressive disorders, other musculoskeletal diseases, falls, and anxiety disorders. The leading risk factors for DALYs were high BMI, smoking, high blood pressure, high fasting plasma glucose, and drug use. Between 1990 and 2019, all-cause DALYs decreased

Despite the increased risk of disasters in the Bangladesh, there is a dearth of research about women’s physical and mental health vulnerability following disasters. This study aimed to explore the physical and mental health status and associated risk factors of women in recurrent disaster-affected areas of Bangladesh. Participants (N = 408) were recruited using systematic random sampling from two purposively selected disaster-prone areas (Upazilas of Sagata and Sarankhola), using a structured questionnaire conducted in person. Physical and mental health status was assessed using the health Short Form 12 (SF-12) measure that is comprised of both physical health (PCS-12) and mental health (MCS-12) subscales. Of the 408 participants, the mean scores on PCS-12 and MCS-12 subscales were 43.85 ± 28.04 and 37.70 ± 27.29, respectively, which were strongly correlated, r =.71, p <.001. Overall, 65.9% and 63.0% of total participants scored below the validated cut-off of PCS-12 and MCS-12 subscales which indicates both poor physical and mental health. The results indicated that physical and mental health were significantly poorer for the participants who witnessed casualties, lost family members or relatives, were relocated to shelters and sacrificed food during disasters. Moreover, poorer mental health scores were identified among participants who were physically injured and/or consulted a medical practitioner during or after the disaster. Accurate health knowledge is crucial for adequate and effective disaster preparation to decrease the health impacts on women in disaster-prone areas of Bangladesh. Research in this area is needed, and strategies to improve the public health status of women are warranted.

Understanding the transportation and deposition (TD) of inhaled particles in the upper respiratory tract is crucial for predicting health risks and treating pulmonary diseases. The available literature reports highly turbulent flow in the extrathoracic (ET) region during normal breathing, which leads to higher deposition of the drug aerosol in this region. To improve the targeted deposition of inhaled drugs, in the tracheobronchial airways, it is essential to understand the flow and particle transport dynamics and reduce the turbulence behavior at the ET region. The less-dense heliox gas could reduce the turbulence behavior at the ET; however, the knowledge of heliox inhalation therapies in drug aerosol TD remains underachieved to realize the full potential for assisted breathing and drug delivery. Additionally, the impact of the inhalation of heliox mixed with other gases on particle deposition is missing in the literature. Therefore, this study aims to develop a mixture model to advance the knowledge of inhalation therapy. A heliox (78% helium and 22% oxygen) and a mixture of heliox and air are used to understand the flow behavior and particle TD in airways. The impact of different inhalation and Stokes numbers on the deposition efficiencies in the ideal and age-specific upper airways is studied. The study reports that less-dense heliox gas has lower turbulence intensity and results in lower deposition efficiency in the G3–G5 lung airways compared to air and mixture inhalations. Moreover, slightly higher deposition efficiencies during mixture inhalation as compared to air inhalation are found in the upper airways. The deposition patterns of different inhalations obtained in this study could help improve targeted drug delivery into the upper and deeper lung airways.

For patients with lung disease, dry powder inhalers (DPI) are profoundly beneficial. The current study introduces and develops a series of dry powder inhalers (DPIs). A capsule-based (size 0) active DPI was considered. The study aims to investigate whether swirling flow and outlet capillary diameter (dc_out) affect the percentage of emitted doses (ED) released from the capsule. Spiral vanes were added to the capillary inlet to produce a swirling flow. Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) was applied to simulate the problem. The results were compared with previous in vitro and numerical studies to validate the results. Based on the derived results, the small swirl parameter (SP) enhances the secondary flow and recirculation zone. It increases the central jet flow, which increases the ED value by about 5–20% compared to no-swirl flow. However, as the airflow rate increases, the recirculation zone enlarges, vorticities become dominant, and asymmetrical flow patterns emerge. Consequently, ED % drops significantly (more than 50%). As dc_out decreases, the vorticities around the outlet capillary become more potent, which is undesirable. Indeed, the emptying of the capsule does not happen ideally. The research provides a perspective on the device's design and DPI performance.

Air conditioning and refrigeration have become necessary in modern life, accounting for more than 7.8% of greenhouse gases (GHG) emitted globally. Reducing the environmental impact of these systems is crucial for meeting the global GHG emission targets. Two principal directions must be considered to reduce the environmental impact of air conditioning systems. Firstly, reducing the direct effect by looking at less harmful refrigerants and secondly, reducing the indirect effect by searching for options to improve the system efficiency. This study presents the latest developments in the vapor compression cycle and natural refrigerants, focusing on water as a refrigerant. Natural refrigerants, and especially water, could be the ultimate solution for the environmental problems associated with the operation of vapor compression cycle (VCC) cooling systems, including ozone depletion (OD) and global warming (GW). Reducing the environmental impact of building cooling systems is essential, and the recent system improvements made to enhance the system coefficient of performance (COP) are thoroughly discussed in this paper. Though the cycle improvements discussed in this work are essential and could increase the system efficiency, they still need to solve the direct environmental impact of refrigerants. Accordingly, this paper suggests that natural refrigerants, including water, are the most suitable strategic choice to replace the current refrigerants in the refrigeration and air conditioning industry. Finally, this study reviews the latest VCC system improvements and natural refrigerants in order to guide interested researchers with solutions that may reduce the environmental impact of VCC systems and suggest future research areas.

Spray cooling technology offers high levels of uniform heat removal with very low fluid volumes and has found recent application in relatively small-scale use cases. Since it is a complex process, research can enable spray cooling to be applied more widely and at larger scales, such as in HVAC, as a means to operate more efficiently. Weather conditions are one of the main parameters that directly affect the effectiveness of spray cooling. This study investigates the spray cooling performance for temperature and humidity conditions in six Australian cities. ANSYS Fluent (2021 R1) software is applied for the numerical simulation. The numerical model is first validated with the available literature before a numerical simulation is conducted to assess each city throughout the year. These include Adelaide, Brisbane, Darwin, Melbourne, Perth, and Sydney. The spray cooling pattern, temperature, and humidity distribution, as well as the evaporation effect on different regions in Australia, is simulated and analysed based on the CFD technique. The results from this study indicate that weather conditions influence spray cooling for all cities, especially in summer. Along the wind tunnel, the temperature significantly drops at the spray cooling area, while the humidity increases. Due to the effect of spray cooling inside the wind tunnel, the temperature at the outlet is still lower than the inlet for all cases. However, the humidity at the outlet is higher than the inlet for all cases.

OBJECTIVE: The objective of this study was to describe and compare almost all the components of disaster preparedness between private and government hospitals in the Eastern Province of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, using the World Health Organization's (WHO) checklist. METHODS: We assessed and compared the disaster preparedness between government and private hospitals in Province, using the 10-key component WHO checklist in a descriptive cross-sectional study. Of 72 hospitals in the region, 63 responded to the survey. RESULTS: All 63 hospitals had an HDP plan and reported having a multidisciplinary HDP committee. In all responding hospitals, HDP was acceptable in most indicators of preparedness; however, some hospitals to some extent fell short of preparedness in surge capacity, equipment and logistic services, and post-disaster recovery. Government and private hospitals were generally comparable in disaster preparedness. However, government hospitals were more likely to have HDP plans that cover WHO's "all-hazard" approach, both internal and external disasters, compared to private hospitals. CONCLUSION: HDP was acceptable, however, preparedness in surge capacity, equipment and logistic services, and post-disaster recovery fell short. Government and private hospitals were comparable in preparedness with regards to all indicators except surge capacity, post-disaster recovery, and availability of some equipment.

OBJECTIVE: The study aimed to identify the factors that influence the disaster preparedness of hospitals and validate an evaluation framework to assess hospital disaster preparedness (HDP) capability in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia. METHODS: A cross-sectional survey of all hospitals (n = 72) in the Eastern Region of Saudi Arabia was conducted. A factor analysis method was used to identify common factors and validate the evaluation framework to assess HDP capacity. RESULTS: Sixty-three (63) hospitals responded to the survey. A 3-factor structure was identified as key predicators of HDP capacity. The first factor was the most highly weighted factor, which included education and training (0.849), monitoring and assessing HDP (0.723), disaster planning (0.721), and command and control (0.713). The second factor included surge capacity (0.708), triage system (0.844), post-disaster recovery (0.809), and communication (0.678). The third factor represented safety and security (0.638) as well as logistics, equipment, and supplies (0.766). CONCLUSION: The identified 3-factor structure provides an innovative approach to assist the operationalization of the concept of HDP capacity building and service improvement, as well as serve as a groundwork to further develop instrument for assessing HDP in future studies.

BACKGROUND: Recovery concepts were conceived by, and for, people living with mental health issues. Practitioners are key in translating recovery principles into action. Therefore, practitioners' perceptions should be routinely assessed to facilitate in-service training, professional development, and curriculum redesign. AIM: To explore practitioners' and trainees' current perspectives regarding the concept of recovery. METHODS: The study used a qualitative exploratory design with in-depth interviews to explore ten fully trained practitioners and eight trainees' perspectives on recovery. RESULTS: The findings revealed a shared understanding of recovery among practitioners and trainees. Many responses explained recovery as a process involving internal and external conditions, however, some revealed medically oriented perspectives and/or were unclear about recovery terminologies. CONCLUSIONS: There is convergence and growing acceptance of the recovery practice principles among practitioners and trainees. However, the results suggest that the recovery principles/terminologies have not yet been universally adopted. IMPLICATIONS FOR PRACTICE AND RESEARCH: Continuous training on recovery principles is needed, incorporating emerging terminologies and principles. Also, education providers are encouraged to continue to review their training to incorporate emerging issues and trends in recovery-oriented practice. Finally, research is needed to enhance the development and delivery of recovery-focused practice.

The monkeypox virus poses a new pandemic threat while we are still recovering from COVID-19. Despite the fact that monkeypox is not as lethal and contagious as COVID-19, new patient cases are recorded every day. If preparations are not made, a global pandemic is likely. Deep learning (DL) techniques are now showing promise in medical imaging for figuring out what diseases a person has. The monkeypox virus-infected human skin and the region of the skin can be used to diagnose the monkeypox early because an image has been used to learn more about the disease. But there is still no reliable Monkeypox database that is available to the public that can be used to train and test DL models. As a result, it is essential to collect images of monkeypox patients. The "MSID" dataset, short form of "Monkeypox Skin Images Dataset", which was developed for this research, is free to use and can be downloaded from the Mendeley Data database by anyone who wants to use it. DL models can be built and used with more confidence using the images in this dataset. These images come from a variety of open-source and online sources and can be used for research purposes without any restrictions. Furthermore, we proposed and evaluated a modified DenseNet-201 deep learning-based CNN model named MonkeyNet. Using the original and augmented datasets, this study suggested a deep convolutional neural network that was able to correctly identify monkeypox disease with an accuracy of 93.19% and 98.91% respectively. This implementation also shows the Grad-CAM which indicates the level of the model's effectiveness and identifies the infected regions in each class image, which will help the clinicians. The proposed model will also help doctors make accurate early diagnoses of monkeypox disease and protect against the spread of the disease.

A metallic foam heat dissipator for cooling electronic components was addressed. A heat dissipator is a partitioned aluminum container loaded along with aluminum metallic foam and saturated with paraffin wax. A heat flux at a surface contains a basic uniform flux and the step transient raise, which should be managed by a heat dissipator and a Phase Change Material (PCM). The regulating equations for a melting/solidification transfer of heat & momentum transport in a heat dissipator were instituted into a structure of partial differential equations. Then, the vital monitoring equations were converted into a general dimensionless type and solved by the Finite Element Method. A mesh adjustment technique & automated time-step control was employed to control the accuracy & convergence of the result automatically. An adaptation technique controls the mesh resolution at the melting/solidification interface. The dimensionless temperature of fusion is a vital factor in the control of the surface temperature and heat dissipator efficiency. Considering a fixed amount of material for walls, a heat dissipator with thick sidewalls and thin top and bottom walls results in slightly better thermal performance. Using a PCM heat sink could reduce the heated surface temperature by >175 % during the pulse load.

Pressoreceptor reflex or baroreflex is an automatic control mechanism of the cardiovascular system that helps keep homeostasis or maintain blood pressure at a constant level. It is crucial to consider viscoelastic aortic arterial behavior in the pulse wave blood flow to determine the exact distributed location of the aortic arch pressoreceptors. This chapter presents a three-dimensional (3D) healthy man computer tomography model of the aortic arch. Computational Fluid Dynamic and Fluid–Structure Interaction methods were used to obtain the velocity–pressure field in the fluid domain and the stress–strain distribution in the solid domain. We found an increase in the pressure and velocity of the fluid in the aortic arch domain with a maximum of 14.9 kPa and 1.4 m/s in the systole, respectively. Endothelial cells in the artery wall concave located at the junctures of the supraaortic branches sense the wall shear stress with a value of 20 Pa in the systole. Deformation in the aortic artery wall convex reaches over 1 mm. The highest normal stress at the supraaortic branches root when sensed through the adventitia layer pressoreceptor is 188 kPa. Increasing age of a person leads to an increase in the elastic modulus and adds to the amount of normal stress in the pressoreceptor.

This research work presents a computational investigation of hafnium(IV) oxide and its crystals doped by Si, Ge and Sn atoms, replacing the oxygen atom in HfO2. Hafnium(IV) oxide, which has a wide band gap, has been used in power electronics applications as insulator for resistive random access memory (RRAM) in metal–oxide–semiconductor field effect transistors (MOSFETs). However, this gives rise to the serious issue of high resistance in optoelectronic devices. In this work, hafnium(IV) oxide was selected to investigate the change in band gap after large-area-surface doping with Si, Ge, and Sn. The lattice parameters and band gap values were calculated using the Perdew–Burke–Ernzerhof (PBE), revised Perdew–Burke–Ernzerhof (RPBE), Perdew–Wang (PW91), Wu–Cohen (WC), and Perdew–Burke–Ernzerhof for solids (PBEsol) nonlocal functionals of the generalized gradient approximation (GGA). This first-principles method based on density functional theory (DFT) was employed to investigate the structural geometry, electronic structure, and optical properties using conventional calculations for HfO2 executed with the computational tools of the CASTEP code from the Materials Studio 8.0 software program. The band gap was recorded at 4.340 eV, 2.033 eV, 1.686 eV, and 3.210 eV for HfO2, Hf0.88Si0.12O2, Hf0.88Ge0.12O2, and Hf0.88Sn0.12O2 crystals, respectively, through GGA with the PBE functional. Further investigations were conducted for GGA with RPBE, GGA with PW91, GGA with WC, and GGA with PBEsol. The results revealed band gap values for HfO2, Hf0.88Si0.12O2, Hf0.88Ge0.12O2, and Hf0.88Sn0.12O2 of 4.427 eV, 2.093 eV, 1.744 eV, and 3.262 eV, respectively, using GGA with WC; 4.333 eV, 2.032 eV, 1.675 eV, and 3.172 eV, respectively, using GGA with PW91; 4.252 eV, 2.002 eV, 1.632 eV, and 3.086 eV, respectively, using GGA with WC; and 4.245 eV, 2.001 eV, 1.629 eV, and 3.076 eV, respectively, using GGA with PBEsol. However, the PBE functional of GGA showed the best electronic band gap, wh

Aim: Female sex workers (FSWs) are particularly susceptible to sexual and reproductive health (SRH) problems due to their occupation. Given that their health needs are often ignored, a review was undertaken to identify the nature, factors, and experiences associated with health-seeking behavior of FSWs worldwide. Subject and methods: We searched four electronic databases (EBSCOhost, ProQuest, Pubmed, and Scopus), along with a manual search in Google Scholar and the citations from retrieved articles on health-seeking behavior of female sex workers. Articles that were peer-reviewed, presented in full-text, written in English language, and published between August 2012 and July 2022, were considered for this study. The review was carried out following the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis (PRISMA) guidelines. Results: The database and manual search yielded 334 studies. Seventeen papers that met our inclusion criteria were included in our review. Our qualitative synthesis resulted in five themes: sexual and reproductive health (SRH) issues, lack of access and awareness, social stigma, non-SRH matters, and drugs, violence, and abuse. Conclusion: Findings of this review demonstrated that the FSWs faced challenges seeking both SRH and general health needs. They were often victims of social stigma and violence. A number of socioeconomic and cultural factors shaped their experience with regard to healthcare access. Special attention is needed to promote awareness and access to safe healthcare services for FSWs in the future to improve their situation.